Gyumri buy snow

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Gyumri buy snow

The outdoor skating rink in Gyumri has been open for the second year, and more than 4, people have already visited it over the past winter. The winter ice rink in Gyumri Friendship Park has already opened! Place Friendship Park. Follow us online Ice Rink Live Preview. Price AMD. Description The outdoor skating rink in Gyumri has been open for the second year, and more than 4, people have already visited it over the past winter. This year, the ice rink will be open to the public from Tuesday to Sunday from 5 p. Grab your skates and go towards the fun and winter! Follow the news on our social media pages. See more.

Should You Visit Armenia in Winter?

Gyumri buy snow

One of my friends, Lexi, had an apartment there until the middle of February, so I went a couple weekends ago and stayed with her. There are three ways that you can get to Gyumri from Yerevan without having your own car excluding walking :. This may seem strange to you. In what universe is the train the slowest and the least expensive mode of transportation?? Answer: the strange, strange universe called Armenia. I guess it makes sense that when one of those is true, the other also is… but like, when is the train the slowest mode of transportation?? Despite this, the train is without a doubt my favorite way to travel. I woke up bright and early on Saturday to take the first train of the day at 8AM. I had an incredibly productive ride… I worked on my blog, I worked on my journal, I studied some Armenian, I looked out the window… and then just like that, we were in Gyumri! I walked out of the station, saw a 12 marshrutka, and vaguely remembered that maybe it went to the right neighborhood. I figured that worst case, I would get off in whatever random part of town I ended up in and call a taxi. Score one for my memory! There are stray dogs and cats everywhere, and people mistreat them all the time. We went over to their house to see three puppies that they had found roaming around on the side of the highway the day before. After checking out the situation, they realized they had been dumped there and left to die, probably because they were all female puppies, and people want males for dogfighting. They took the puppies in, got them checked out by the vet, and were starting to look for permanent homes for them. Lexi loves puppies, so off we went. After a little puppy time, we went to cross off the only three things I had on my list for the weekend. Nikolai the Wonderworker Church, so that was my first must-do. It was built in and is located in what is now a Russian military cemetery. I stopped by a few times back when I lived in Gyumri, but it was never open. This time, we were in luck! We walked around the grounds first and then went inside. They look awesome!!! I love painted churches. I mostly was just impressed that a construction project was completed in a reasonable amount of time, so I wanted to check it out. Number three was really the most important. I wanted to have ponchiks at Ponchik Monchik. In their terminology, a ponchik is a vanilla one, and a monchik is a chocolate one. It was relaxed and fun, and I think it was exactly what I needed. Sometimes it can get exhausting living in Yerevan. Yerevan feels like a big city, and Gyumri feels like home. There was an old woman with her little dog, a couple of guys with their cat, and a few other dog owners came and went. The woman was losing it a bit because they had to drug her dog. It was nice to see that there are some people who care about animals. She clearly loved that dog. Post-vet, Lexi and I spent some time wandering around the fields near the neighborhood. We walked around the same fields back in July when we first met throwback here , so it was a fun full circle for our friendship. There was still some clean, untouched snow to play around in out there, and the mountains in the distance were beautiful and snow-covered. Field walks are also always good for conversations, and it was nice to have some time to catch up. We had just enough time to eat before I had to get to the train station to catch the last train back to Yerevan. It was kind of crowded this time, so I ended up in the window seat on top of the heater… which tried very hard the entire ride to burn my butt. I finished my Armenian homework, made some flashcards, and by the time we were back in Yerevan, I had them memorized. When I came to Armenia, I hoped that my family would come to visit, but I thought there was no chance of it actually happening. It worked!!! They bought their plane tickets a few months back, and it even worked out for my brother Mike to come with them! I was so excited, but then that also meant that I had to plan. A lot of people say that about themselves, I know, but sometimes I think that maybe I take it to an extreme level. I love to plan. I love schedules. I love organization. I spent a solid week putting together our schedule, researching and digging into every detail so that there would be no surprises. I found a driver and an apartment and started grilling my friends for restaurant recommendations. Then, everything was ready, and I could just be excited about getting to see them. To be honest, I almost cried when they walked out of the airport. It was a little weird going back to my old home. In so many ways, I loved it more than Yerevan. The city feels like a home, the people feel like your neighbors, and everything has a special kind of charm. Everyone says that people are nicer in Armenia in general, but people are seriously nicer in Gyumri. The best place to look for kindness is on a crowded marshrutka. People give up their seats without a second thought for people with kids, the elderly, or just anyone who might need a seat more than they do. If someone is struggling with their things or struggling to climb on, people rush to help them without hesitation. As much as I hated having to stand half bent over on marshrutkas, I loved getting to be part of the complex social dance that took place every time a new person got on. I was excited to show my family my favorite city in Armenia, and during the planning process, I was stressed about how to possibly do it justice in such a short time period. I ended up making a list of every activity I could think of and then paring it down to the absolute must-sees and my personal favorites. We started out at one of my favorite churches, the Cathedral of the Holy Martyrs. I raved about this before, I know, but here it is again. It looks like every other Armenian church on the outside and then the inside is this elegant, modern adaptation of the classic design. The fact that I still remember it perfectly after seeing nearly infinity more churches since then speaks for itself. From there, we walked through the market to the main square. Last time I walked through that market, it was my second weekend in Armenia, and I had a mime exchange with a shopkeeper while trying to buy shower supplies. In case you have somehow forgotten, ponchiks are kind of like condensed milk cream-filled donuts except a million times better, and monchiks are filled with Nutella instead. I had my first big Armenian test at Sev Berd. We decided to give it a try, and sure enough, I asked the gatekeeper if we could see the fort in my fabulously fluent Armenian , he called someone to check, and in we went! At the top of the hill, we were met by another guy who showed us around. We got to go inside!!! From there, he took us up to see the box seating and finally, the roof! We had a great view of the city and Mother Armenia and could even see Turkey to the west. The whole time, the guy was talking and talking in Armenian, and Dad and I were doing the best we could to translate. Honestly, I think we did a decent job. The best part of the day, though, was probably lunch. Karen and Sona, the Birthright Gyumri coordinators from the summer, met up with us. I became good friends with both of them and was excited to introduce them to my family. Our last couple of stops were Ani district, the neighborhood where we lived, and Marmashen, a monastery west of town. By the time we got back to Yerevan, everyone was wiped out but happy with the day. We had a VERY ambitious week ahead, so it was encouraging to get off to a smooth start. At the end of August, my time in Gyumri wrapped up for good, and I got ready to move to Yerevan. Lucky for me, a bunch of my friends were moving at the same time, but it was still kind of a bittersweet feeling. Back when I got my location assignment pre-Armenia and found out that I was going to be outside of Yerevan for two months, I was a little disappointed. I had no idea what to expect, but whatever expectations I did have were far exceeded by what I found in Gyumri. The people were nice. The city was definitely big enough to be called a city, but it was small enough for me to quickly feel comfortable there. It felt like a city you could really live in. Sometimes, Yerevan feels too busy and too big and too chaotic. Gyumri feels like home. At the same time though, being in Gyumri for an extended period of time could start to feel a little claustrophobic. I was excited to move to Yerevan to experience something new, but I was sad to leave behind all of the things that had become familiar. I knew my way around. I saw familiar faces along my normal route. I knew what to expect from people. My first couple of days in Yerevan were overwhelming. I felt like small town girl in the big city. Yeah, that one. And so many cars! Here are some examples:. Me: What are you talking about? This question is almost always asked about something so basic that you want to smack yourself in the face. Just to make things clear, I lived in an apartment that had walls and a roof and running water and everything. And electricity! And internet! And furniture! The roads are paved sometimes poorly, but hey, gotta start somewhere. The end of my time in Gyumri also brought with it the end of my archaeology job. One of the other volunteers, Haig, joined me at the digs during the third week. He can speak Armenian, and that seriously changed everything. Oh yeah… remember how before I said that we were just digging up animal bones? We found some almost full human skeletons! During the last week of the month, we got to see them washing and cataloging the different bones and ceramic pieces that we found. There was one woman who had the job of measuring and sketching every single piece. We also got a mini tour of the storage rooms at the institute. Guess what was the coolest thing they had in my opinion … a mammoth tusk! The woman, Larissa, who was showing us around was just pulling these things out like they were no big deal. It was kind of awesome to be able to see everything up close when I could easily imagine them being in a museum behind a thick sheet of glass. On our last day of work, there was a party. Here, that always means khorovadz barbecue and a LOT of shots. This was an extra special party because they got a cow head in addition to enough chicken to feed three villages. The highlight of the day was watching a couple of the old guys taking swings at the cow skull with a hatchet and trying to break out the cow brain. Everyone was joking around and laughing, and I felt like I was part of a big family. At the very least, doing that kind of work together brings about a different kind of bond. Even before I could really communicate with everyone, I felt comfortable with and welcomed by them. In typical Armenian fashion, everyone made at least one toast during the course of the meal, and everyone always had a full shot glass. Well, he was at this party for sure. They were drinking some super strong, clear liquor that smelled like gasoline, followed by cheap vodka when that ran out. Lucky for me, water can look a lot like both of those, so I kept my own glass filled to the brim. Sad because it was ending, but happy because I got to spend the time that I did with them. Talk about unexpected experiences. Like I said, the program finally got installed, and I had my first software teaching experience. That all went well, at least in my opinion. I spent about 4 classes teaching different commands in the program. Basically, I made a list of all of the things that I thought they should know how to do, and then I tried to put them into an order that made sense. Before each class, I would go into the lab and draw up practice exercises for each of the different commands. I tried to make things that would challenge the students who were catching on quickly but still be doable for the students who were a bit slower. After my four classes of instruction, I gave them a mini-project to design a house. I said that it needed to have 2 bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen, and a bathroom, but everything else was up to them. I really just wanted everyone to practice drawing, use the different commands I taught them, and be a little creative. Some of the students came up with some amazing designs. Some of the students came up with less amazing ones, but I know that they tried hard on the assignment. It was a very good way to see what level everyone was on. I also made them give little presentations about their houses. That was a mess and a half because no one wanted to present, but I forced them all to get up and say something about their houses anyway. The last week of the class was supposed to be laser cutting. I was going to have each of them design the exterior of a little house, use the laser cutter to cut out the pieces, and glue them together into a model. I mean, I had an idea. I read the manual, did some googling, and asked Debbie my architect friend from Peru for some tips. With no time left to space, Carineh my friend who also worked at GTC and speaks Armenian and I made plans with the guy at GTC who knows how to use the laser cutter to come in on the Friday before my last Monday class so that he could teach us. Even if we did get approval, when was I going to learn how to use it? Originally, I was supposed to be placed in the technology center in Vanadzor, the third biggest city in Armenia which means not very big. I talked to a woman who works for the organization that is responsible for the technology centers, and after we discussed some ideas for my class, she decided that I should use the laser cutter even though I told her I had no clue how to use it , and that meant I had to be in Gyumri. She talked to Birthright, and my location was switched. Literally because of the laser cutter. Instead, we spent the last week doing more AutoCAD practice. I found some exercises online and also drew some things myself when there was nothing that I liked. It actually went much better than I thought it would, and it was good because the students who were super fast workers actually had to spend the entire class working in order to finish the assignment. This thing has been such a mess since the very beginning, and it took so much time outside of work to get all of my prep work finished. It was definitely a good experience to have. I hope that I never have to teach through a translator again especially not while teaching computer software! I need a break after this whole ordeal. In general, the excursions never run on schedule, there are too many people, and we usually want to do something more adventurous than whatever they have planned. We made an exception this weekend because the excursion description mentioned hiking and because we had heard that the destination, Lastiver, was super cool. Lastiver part of a wildlife preserve, Ijevan State Reserve, in the north-ish eastern part of the country. Zero trees, zero shade, zero shelter from the meltingly hot sun. Well, I was in luck with this hike. Almost the entire thing was through the trees and nice and shady. When we got there, the announcement was made that we had an hour to swim or hang out until lunch was ready. I, of course, wanted to spend my time exploring. We got a little farther upstream and found some of our other friends, Karen, Gagik, and his cousin, Anjela. I thought it was pretty funny how all of my favorite people ended up in the same place without any plans. That meant that we had to be creative and do a lot of jumping from rock to rock. Our group got split up as Karen, Carineh, Gagik, and Anjela gave up on staying dry and started wading through the river, and Shant and I kept hopping from place to place. Ahh it was so fun. This experience was definitely a balance and coordination challenge, but I felt like I was in control and could trust my legs to do what they were supposed to do. Anyway, by the time we decided to turn around and go back, lunch was long over. We made it back to the group, and I felt like we were castaways making it back to civilization. The next day, Shant and I decided to make the trek out to see the Marmashen, a group of churches about 10 kilometers from where we live in Gyumri. I successfully called a taxi to take us there, and we spent some time wandering around, checking out the sights, and eating snacks obviously, because we never go anywhere without snacks. It seemed like a cool place for locals because there was a picnic area, and people were going hard with their barbecue. After we were finished wandering, Shant really wanted to walk back to Gyumri, so off we went. I know, I know this all sounds ridiculous. At Lastiver, literally no one else from the Birthright group walked so far upstream. All of us were just naturally drawn to it. Here, who in their right mind decides to walk 10 km home when you could just call a taxi? To make things more ridiculous, we decided to ignore all of the roads. Instead, we took random paths through the fields that looked like they were leading in the right direction. Our wanderings took us through some cow pastures and old ruins that looked like one of our archaeology sites, over a river, into the village of Marmashen where people looked at us like we were actual space aliens , and out into some fields. There, we were summoned by a random farmer named Hamlet. He spoke no English, of course, and so we entered into the usual conversation of hand motions and sporadic Armenian words. He wanted us to come back to his house to eat dinner and spend the night. We finally managed to pull ourselves away, and off we went, back into the fields. The rest of the walk was interesting. There are a bunch of abandoned, half-collapsed buildings outside of Gyumri. Then, there are buildings that seem like they should be abandoned, but upon closer inspection, there are people living in them. We walked briskly by those. We made it back to our neighborhood just as it was getting too dark to see anything. Thank goodness because I was starting to panic a little bit. We got ice cream to celebrate our survival, and ice cream fixes all problems, so now I have nothing but happy memories of the day. No, but actually, it was really fun, and I think that I can safely say that no one has EVER had a Marmashen experience like ours because seriously… who walks?? Find a hill near the city, make a huge statue of a hardcore looking woman, and put her on a towering pedestal. This one was erected in , and from the looks of it, no maintenance work has been done on it since then. And cleaning. And weeding. The Sev Berd was built by the Russians in the late s. It… kind of worked. We went to the Sev Berd first and took another slightly questionable path to get there. Were we trespassing? Who knows. Was the security guard very surprised to see us leaving after not seeing us come in that way? Did anyone give us a hard time about it? Some other Armenian-speaking volunteers went a different day and talked themselves into an impromptu tour of the inside, so I guess my punishment is having to live with that. From there, we walked over to Mayr Hayastan Mother Armenia and took a lap before heading back into the city. Both things were interesting, but visiting Mayr Hayastan was a bit of a bummer because it was in such a sad state. Instead, like so many other things in Gyumri, you can see the former glory and present sadness of the city. It really makes me wonder what Gyumri used to be like, back in the days before the earthquake. The next day, Shant, Carineh, and I went back to Sarnaghpyur, the village we visited my very first week here, to hang out with Karen in his natural habitat. We got there early in the morning and were treated to a breakfast of pancakes, hard-boiled eggs, bread, cheese, fruit, etc etc etc just imagine every food in the universe and it was probably there. Very productive day so far, I know. I felt like my stomach was going to explode which is pretty typical here, to be fair , and still I was being guilted into eating more. Ahhhh peer pressure! Force feeding aside, it was fun getting to see Karen in his natural habitat. I love seeing how different and at ease people are when you put them in the places where they feel the most comfortable. We finally decided to mobilize after lunch and go on a hike in the nearby area. The dinner food because obviously we needed to eat AGAIN was packed up, firewood chopped, and everyone got ready for an adventure. Karen led us through a canyon where we got to climb some rocks and strategize the best route to take. It requires some thinking and planning and challenging yourself. The best part of the hike was this one place where we found the coolest cave. There was a big cave with a bunch of other little caves and passageways inside. I obviously had to climb into as many of the holes as possible because I love holes. From there, we made our way to a little picnic area to hang out and eat dinner. In typical Armenian fashion, the dinner plan was khorovats barbecue. We had eggplants, peppers, tomatoes, and pork, Karen and Shant grilled it all over the fire, and we ate it with lavash soft, flat Armenian bread. By the time dinner was finished cooking, it was pitch dark outside. Like not even a little moonlight to help us out. His uncle drove as close to us as he could, and we trekked through the dark with his headlights as our guide. It was like the Armenia version of a helicopter rescue from the wilderness. I was completely exhausted and passed out the instant we got in the car. This week has been a struggle. I went through the first treatment of antibiotic eye drops, wore my glasses for a whole two weeks during that time which I absolutely HATE having to do , and then went back to the doctor at the end to see if my eyes were healed and if I could start wearing my contacts again. She said yes, and I was thrilled. Back to glasses. I went to a different doctor because I lost all faith in the first one, and she said I had another infection. I personally think I have the same infection, but that makes no difference. She tried to tell me that the infection came from my contacts… unlikely. I constantly think about how much easier it would be to teach this class in a language I can speak or even just kind of speak. I would happily teach another class in Spanish. Needing a translator makes it so much harder to do everything. For space planning, we talked about the example of a school building. What kinds of rooms does a school need? How big do those rooms need to be? What rooms should be next to each other? I told them that the best way for them to get better at using AutoCAD is by practicing, so they should make their houses whatever they need to be to challenge themselves. I want each person to basically give the class a tour so that I can understand what they drew and why. My big outside-of-class project for next week is going to be trying to figure out how to use the laser cutter. I am completely wiped. My schedule here is at a constant sprint. It reminds me of when I was in college and felt like I had somewhere to be at every second of every day. On the bright side, I am happy with my crazy schedule. My other job, though, is awesome!! Remember how I talked about how I heard that an archaeology job exists in Gyumri? It does! During the month of August each year, the archaeology institute here does a dig! Let me go back to the beginning…. During my first weekend at Birthright, I heard a rumor that there used to be an archaeology placement in Gyumri, and I immediately emailed Sona, our jobsite coordinator, to see if it was true. She said yes, and after contacting them, she told me that they do a dig during August and were willing to take me! We went to a meeting with the guy in charge, and he told us that on August 1 st , there would be a sort of kick-off meeting that I should come to, and the work would start on the 2 nd. Sona sent me to the August 1 st meeting with Liana, my translator for class. It was announced to all people in attendance that no one should speak to me in English. Liana was silenced anytime she tried to translate for me, and instead I was given all of the instructions in Armenian thankfully, at a slow speed. She gave me a summary after we left, and I actually did get most of it on my own! Luckily, the one I take starts running at 7. I have to wear pants and long sleeves, and I should bring a hat, lunch, and lots of water. Better than nothing. On the first day, I made it to the office without any trouble, and off we went! We headed to a site that had already been partially excavated, and the day was spent removing weeds. The sun got to be brutal, and I was happy to be covered up so completely. I had a bandana that I used to shield my cheeks and neck, so literally the only part of my body that was exposed was my face. I found out that a couple of the girls can speak some English because they whispered some words to me to let me know what we were doing. Thank goodness. This week was pretty exhausting. We were doing some actual digging, so I spent two days shoveling and hauling bucketfuls of dirt. That plus the hot sun is more than enough to make you want to lay down and sleep forever. I have no idea how everyone else is doing that 5 days a week! Though it is a lot of fun, and the people are all awesome. Whoa, right? The constant question — rock or ceramic? They also were pulling out things that looked like wooden tools, and it took me almost an entire day to realize that they were actually bones. Less weird. We found some that were jawbones though and still had teeth! By the end of the week, I was spotting and pulling things out of the dirt too. I also upped our digging efficiency by taking on the role of bucket mover. My goal was to have no lag time between when a bucket was filled and a new bucket was put in place for the diggers to use. It was a fun challenge to keep myself entertained, and I think everyone noticed how much more smoothly the process went. Before that, the diggers were dealing with the buckets themselves, and it was super inefficient. It was cool to feel like I actually improved something rather than just being another body doing physical labor. Anyway, so far this job is everything I hoped it would be. This has been a crazy week! It was one of those ones that simultaneously feels like a lifetime and a split second. It started out on a rough note… Last Thursday was our last class doing pre-activities before starting AutoCAD, so I wanted to check out the program after class to make sure that it was in English like they told me. On any computer! Maybe I should be blamed for not checking sooner, but I thought that considering 1 I was literally brought to Gyumri to teach AutoCAD and 2 when I asked how many computers had it and what language it was in, I got answers to both questions, it was safe to assume that the program was installed. This was probably my first T. Having that mindset makes it much easier to just accept it, regardless of how seemingly ridiculous, and move on. So here we are, the new T. I immediately told the workshop coordinator, and she seemed shocked. That was comforting… not. At last. I made the call to cancel class because there was no time to prep something new for Monday, and even there was, we would have just been killing time. It was interesting. On the bright side, if I ever do any of these things again, they literally can only get easier. It actually went fairly well today which was encouraging. My amusement of the week has been discovering the Armenian way of pronouncing English words. For example, I was helping my friend Carineh Cah-ree-neh out by buying some Twix bars for her class. I went into a little store near GTC, and the shopkeeper asked if I needed any help. This was not the first time that pronunciation completely eliminated our chances of being understood. My first week, we were trying to confirm that GTC has a laser cutter, so Carineh asked one of the guys who works there if he knew where the laser cutter was. You mean the lah-zer cooter! Again, blank stares from people who definitely know what AutoCAD is. Silly me! Inside the train Despite this, the train is without a doubt my favorite way to travel. Enjoying all of my space on the train I woke up bright and early on Saturday to take the first train of the day at 8AM. The cemetery with the church in the background Painting in progress! Pretty cool! Slightly insane, maybe, but also spot on. Get ready for this to be a theme throughout the family visit week… The fall colors were AWESOME all week, and Gyumri was our first glimpse at the fall beauty that lay ahead. The outside of my church… so ordinary looking, right? And then, the inside! I love love love it! A stroll through the market From there, we walked through the market to the main square. Credit for this shot goes to Dad… what a classic. Birds in the cage, cigarette in the mouth. The tower crane that used to be a permanent fixture next to the church is gone! We actually could see that some work has been done on the church recently. There were some new carvings and other little things that looked fresh. My parents really enjoyed the stairs… not. Mike, enjoying the many recreational activities that Gyumri has to offer. The stage in the middle of the fortress. The whole thing felt very medieval but in a good, charming way Enjoying the view! Inside Ani church. In the two months I lived down the road, I never went inside. The view of the river from Marmashen. See if you can see Mike, the little speck standing on a rock. The sunset one day on my way home from work. One thing that Gyumri and, to be fair, much of Armenia could use some help with is their lighting design. This is City Hall at night, and every time I see it, I cringe. Why are they using orange lights? Why are half of them out? Why are some of the lights white? Why is it like Halloween threw up on the building? What is going on? On the dark side I wish there was more of a dark side… like dark ALL sides , this one is so much worse. Why is some of the light blue? Why is the rest of the light orange? What the heck were they trying to highlight on the building? Me: Umm… no. With multiple streets. And something like , people. Me: Yes… it IS a city, after all. This was generally the process of digging… the guy in red dug first, then people sifted through the dirt and pulled out anything interesting, and finally, the leftover dirt was shoveled out of the hole to be carried away. Views from the site! I think this is the only picture I have to prove that I was ever on the site haha. Soaking the ceramic pieces in some sort of acid to clean them During the last week of the month, we got to see them washing and cataloging the different bones and ceramic pieces that we found. Pot reconstruction Laying out to dry Imagine having to draw all of these… Inside one of the storage rooms We also got a mini tour of the storage rooms at the institute. A helmet! Arrowheads in front, glass perfume bottles in the back The van that we took out to the site Getting the meat off of the cow head… eek! Brain extraction The khorovadz scene In typical Armenian fashion, everyone made at least one toast during the course of the meal, and everyone always had a full shot glass. One of the house designs. He said that he needed a lot of rooms because he has a lot of friends who are going to come and visit him. This is one of the activities I drew up for the students to do during the final class. A mash up of the GTC staff and volunteers. Views from the drive to Lastiver. My face was glued to the window in the car. I think everyone else was sleeping. Carineh, Karen, me, Shant Well, I was in luck with this hike. The path Hi, valley! The result? The worlds most awkward group photo. Church views The next day, Shant and I decided to make the trek out to see the Marmashen, a group of churches about 10 kilometers from where we live in Gyumri. I think that the lettering on these churches is amazing. Can you imagine if your job was to write all of this? Remains of one of the chapels To make things more ridiculous, we decided to ignore all of the roads. The river and its cool cliffs Our wanderings took us through some cow pastures and old ruins that looked like one of our archaeology sites, over a river, into the village of Marmashen where people looked at us like we were actual space aliens , and out into some fields. Random green oasis area on our epic voyage home Random cemetery that we encountered along the road to Marmashen… and when I say road, I mean cow path The happening village of Marmashen Rubble, rubble everywhere The rest of the walk was interesting. This is one that Shant said was built after the earthquake, but who knows? Random foundation Sunset! The most defined path we took all day. Supposedly she looks like a dragon from the back because that side is facing Turkey We went to the Sev Berd first and took another slightly questionable path to get there. The canyon We finally decided to mobilize after lunch and go on a hike in the nearby area. Hole cave! See me? Climbing into my new hole home The crew… Karen, Shant, Carineh, and me in the front Random tiny church… of course because there are churches everywhere Inside the little church. Quick nap while we waited for a taxi From there, we made our way to a little picnic area to hang out and eat dinner. It was pretty funny! Sunset on my ride home from work! Here we have Shant getting ready to step over this nice gap on the way into a museum. This cracked me up… the street is under construction, so the entrance to the building is just floating. In the States, there would have been a whole plan for how to maintain safe access to the museum. Mind the gap. View from one of the excursion sites… in the middle of nowhere During the month of August each year, the archaeology institute here does a dig! Let me go back to the beginning… During my first weekend at Birthright, I heard a rumor that there used to be an archaeology placement in Gyumri, and I immediately emailed Sona, our jobsite coordinator, to see if it was true. View towards Gyumri Sona sent me to the August 1 st meeting with Liana, my translator for class. Me in my most attractive state, eyes still recovering from my Vardavar eye infection On the first day, I made it to the office without any trouble, and off we went! Success in the slowest way possible.

Gyumri buy snow