At last!

This picture says a lot about how I feel right now. Relief, excitement, and like we are actually moving along now. Less start-stop, jerking momentum like the two weeks struggling to figure out what Sitara was going to be doing. Actually, this is the second day at school, since she wouldn't let me take a picture the first day. Not in front of the school anyway. So here she is, all excited and pumped up about returning to school, playing with her friends, and learning math, English, and listening to stories. Religion, history and social studies are all in Maltese, so she gets good exposure to the language, while dissipating my nerves regarding the Catholic school part. Now with regard to Catholic school and religion, I am not opposed to Catholicism, and I had considered putting Sitara in Catholic schools before because of the generally good academics, but without knowing how the curriculum goes or how strict they would be regarding parish attendance (the website required local children to be baptized). They aren't charging me tuition, but I will be giving them some donation soon since they were nice enough to take her in when no one else would.
 Sitara loves her new school, and she gets to sit next to two girls who speak English well. Most kids can understand English, but only a few can speak it well. The uniforms are very cute and simple, and they are made to last a couple years (you sew in the hems so that they can be let down as she grows). They are fairly inexpensive, as I purchased one set of everything for under 200 euro (1 summer dress, 1 summer PE outfit, 1 pair winter PE sweats, one V-neck sweater, button down shirt, tie, slacks, blazer for winter), socks and shoes. And since the kids only wear them at school (they change when they get home), they don't need to be washed as much. Given, the play yard doesn't have grass or mud to contend with, so my experience is a bit skewed.
 The "finally" feeling has also come to several other aspects of our life here on Malta. Since it is a tourist haven during the summer, many locals are over polite or ignore you, so getting to know my neighbors in Qbajjar Bay took some time. Since Sitara has begun school, I have also been able to take a few moments to myself to focus on enjoying the town of Victoria and the people again instead of fretting so much. The internship is becoming more varied and full of potential. I have begun the application process for four universities, and am nearly done updating my CV. I have received feedback and updates on my readership for my other blog site at www.reachtheworld.org, giving me more push to get the site working for me better. I am becoming more comfortable in the culture, excited about the opportunities, and pondering when or how we will return again. But that can be worried about later. For now, I just need to get into grad school.

Discovering Our New Home

Its been great here since we arrived a week ago, and interesting getting everything in order.  While I expected things to be different, it has been somewhat frustrating with the schools, and getting Sitara enrolled. To begin, the paperwork is approved on the main island, and not at the Education Office here on Gozo. Secondly, they required a notarized letter from her father that I didn't know about until Tuesday. Luckily her father was on top of it and got me the letter Friday. The original plan was to get it all submitted, but the Visa page from our passports was not copied as it should have when we were there Tuesday morning, and so the application that should have been submitted that day has yet to be submitted until Monday morning when I can bring the passports back down again. Work starts the same day, so Sitara will be accompanying me to work and may get a birthday gift sooner than expected to occupy her time.
But alas life goes on, se la vie, and so forth. For all my preparation to get here, so much is being tripped over now we are here as well. It should all work out though. Everyone has been very sweet, and Sitara has made a new friend even! The daughter of the apartment owners is about the same age, and they have been playing non-stop since Friday afternoon. That has given me some time to try to sort things out, and time to chill myself out as well. Since there is a distinct lack of good coffee in the grocers, I have been drinking far too much tea with honey and milk. Evenings are for the instant Vanilla Lattes with a good shot of locally made almond liqueur. I think by now most of my calories are liquid.
Realizing how much I do cook Thai and Japanese food, I am noticing a distinct lack of such foods here, and since my other main staple recipes are Italian--let's just say we've been eating a lot of pasta. And I still have yet to figure out how to light the oven. Lots of European style bread though, very cheap, makes lots of toast and jam or butter. Or cheese. Fresh produce is all over, but it is in carts that are only around in the towns until about noon, and by then it starts to look a bit wilty. We've gotten grapes and oranges, both of which were delicious (though the seeds in the grapes threw Sitara for a loop), and we also bought strawberries which we thought were a bit lacking. Not really the climate for them I suppose.
So here we are, enjoying the beautiful seaside, the sand in Sitara's shorts and all over the apartment floor, and the great, amazing sun. It did rain at the beginning of the week, and seems to have cleared. I see the logistical rain also clearing soon as well, I hope.