For those of you who who want to know how to communicate with us, here are three options:
1) email (of course)--we generally aren't able to check it every day, since Internet access isn't constant, but we do try to check at least every day or two (and sometimes all we are able to do is check, which is why it may be several days to a week before a reply :)

2) phone--we do have cell phones (local Georgian numbers); if you want our numbers, please email us (it's probably not a good idea to put them out on a publicly available blog). you can call & sent text messages (I heard--although I haven't confirmed this--that an international text message, at least to Georgia, is something like 15-25 cents if you have Verizon). Oh, and keep in mind that we mailed back our U.S. phones, so we probably don't have your number on our phones here.

3) snail mail--if you want to send us a letter, postcard, or package the old-fashioned way (keep in mind it will take a minimum of 3 weeks, and quite possibly up to 6-8 weeks), here is our address:
(our names)
110b Burdzgla
Tbilisi, 0194
GEORGIA

Keep in mind the hints linked to before if you send us a package—that (supposedly) increases the chance we'll get it (or, to be really sure, send it via FedEx, but that might be quite expensive).

For those interested, Friday night I had my first adverse reaction to the food here, and I threw up in the middle of the night. I had never been so thankful that we have a normal, clean, Western-style toilet across the hall, rather than a squatter out in the yard like many of the trainees stationed in the villages around Gori have.

I also got a cold this weekend—it started with a sore throat on Saturday, then by Sunday morning was a sore throat and feeling generally fuzzy and not well. So Sunday I didn't do much of anything, and Monday when I woke up, I felt marginally better, but not really. We're just so exhausted due to the intense classwork—it's hard to believe we're really in our third week of training (it's 10 weeks long, so we're *almost * to the 1/3 marker). In week 5 (I believe), we should find out our permanent placements, and in week 6, we visit our permanent site. Anyway, point being, EVERYONE in our cluster (our small group that has all our language classes together; there are 6 of us) seemed tired and unmotivated two days ago (Monday), which is the beginning of the week, which doesn't bode well; I think we're finally all feeling the pressure of the intensity of the sdhedule. One of the G6s (G6s are the volunteers who came in last year) said that the turning point for them was the announcement of permanent site placements in week 5, so here's for hoping! (also, in week 5, by the way, is our mid-training language assessment, so that will be a crazy week, I'm thinking...)

Now I'm back to the daily grind of homework...since the 4th of July is today (Wednesday), we have the day off, wa-hoo! We have an official Peace Corps 4th of July party, so the mid-week break is exciting, plus we get real and free American food (then back to classes for Thursday through Saturday, but it provides a nice and very welcome break).

- Carissa