ben ben benko blog

Sick and Tired...

...of what you ask? Nothing in particular. I'm literally sick and tired. A head cold decided to hit me with it's full force today. Of course I also for once had a lot of stuff to do today. Between the hours of 10 and 5 today I finally got my visa that will allow me to stay here legally until August 15, I also finally got my health insurance (and maybe not a moment too late), and I had two meetings that resulted in two job offers to teach English. I say offers, but that's not exactly how things work here. Either it's the way things are done around here or it's just there situations in particular, but these felt a lot more like job obligations than offers. I really don't have a problem with that since I think both would be very interesting, but it was just an interesting set of meetings.
I'm also quite lucky to find work at all. My "special skills" as a native English speaker are what has made this possible but it's still more than many Croatians my age can hope for. The economy here isn't great. It's growing, but it still has a long way to go. Many young people here have no jobs at all and no real prospects to speak of. I guess a good way to give you an idea of where the economy is here is to tell you that for the 6-8 hours of class room time I'll be teaching a week I'll make about $70.
I'm just realizing that this cold is making it difficult for me to come up with interesting things to say so I'll just give you a few more quick notes and then go drink my tea.
My favorite sausage and cook wine stand in the center has just had it's permit extended through February. I plan to take full advantage of this. I guess I'm not the only one who loves this stuff!
We went skiing again yesterday. This time it was an amazingly crisp day with not a cloud in the sky. It was warm enough to sit outside for lunch. We went with my mother in law and cousin in law who are right around my level. So the three of us had a good time skiing the easy slopes together while we sent H off to throw himself down the near vertical crazy hard slopes. It was a great day and my new equipment rocked!

posted by Liz @ 7:45 PM