To Whom It May Concern: It’s a Thursday of no particular importance

And this blog is screaming for an update. But since there has been a lot on my mind lately, I am not quite sure where and how to begin. Except that maybe I should first spill out the unexciting news before I could move on to somewhat exciting ones?

So the non-so exciting part – it’s been veeery quiet on the job-hunt front, despite the fact that I keep applying away to anything that comes on my radar. Besides my recent rant and apprehensions on the said topic, the process leaves me with a feeling that I am compromising my own integrity. Not fun at all.

I had a mild freak out earlier this week due to what turned out (hopefully that’s the case) a minor gum infection that I thought was spreading at alarming rate to bring many serious consequences that would require surgical intervention. And since I am not covered by dental insurance, I was even more scared as to what to do about the situation. A trip to a physician calmed me down a bit, as I found out that surgery may not be necessary at this point and a good dose of antibiotics might do the trick. Also I cleared it with the said physician and my health insurance company that in case I do need a surgery, it would be billed as “medical” and not “dental,” which, in its turn was a pretty big relief. For once I should not bitch about the American health care system (yet).

On slightly more exciting news – I have been offered a ten week fellowship with a microfinance organization (that I have worked with for a couple of years in the past) to conduct a client assessment research in Georgia (country) and Armenia. Besides having a darn good reason to go back home this summer (and a trip is long overdue), I would gain a much needed research experience, get to compare data on two neighboring countries that share many political, social, cultural and geographic similarities and get to hang out in Tbilisi. Also, one of my classmates from Ukraine who I really like will be accompanying me in my Georgia trip. The downside of it is that the fellowship does not pay shit. Even more so, despite the fact that the said organization covers the living expenses in both countries, the cost of the trip is completely my responsibility. With continuously depreciating dollar airline tickets have gotten very, extremely expensive, so my ability to actually do the research will be contingent upon my being able to find funding for the said trip, along with several other factors that I won’t go into now.

Needless to say, I am excited about this fellowship. However, there are a couple of concerns that rise off the top of my head in case I do end up accepting the fellowship. For one, there’s the whole situation of depreciating dollar and appreciating Georgian/Armenian currencies that makes my already limited resources stretch rather thinly. Then, in case I do end up going to Georgia, I do not have the vaguest idea as to how in the world I will be able to communicate. I do not speak Georgian. Neither does my Ukrainian friend. We both speak Russian. You’d think that Georgians would too, given our shared seventy years of Soviet history, but due to current and not-so current political relations between the said two countries, Georgians are not very friendly towards the Russian speaking folk. And they refuse pointblank to speak Russian (or so I hear). There are quite a few people who speak English in Tbilisi but I doubt that a middle-age rural microfinance client would be fluent enough for us to be able to communicate. Although the flip side of it is that this might create some pretty hilariously nonsensical situations worth getting into. Or maybe not. All I know is that at this point I should hold off the excitement, since there is a whole lot more stuff that needs to be worked and figured out before I can wholeheartedly accept this offer. For now all I can say is that I really really want to go home…