Sat. July 31 - The trip

I'm sitting in Minich, awaiting my flight to T'blisi. It is about 8am local time; 2am at home. I've been traveling for over 14 hours now and I am tires. Gravol and Benedryl ahave me feeling human, at least, so that's something. And my back hasn't been a problem at all (knock on wood). The most notable thing about the trip so far was the incredibly cute hockey player from Edmonton that had the seat next to me from Montreal to Munich. I totally slept with him. I mean that literally, of course. We slept in our own seats, on the overnight flight.
While writing this, I made another new friend. She's 18 months old, with blue eyes, ringlet curls and an adorable smile. She's sharing her stuffed animals.
My e-reader has been a godsend in the airports, but not so much on the planes. That's just because I've been drugged up and sleepy.

Finally, T'blisi. We're staying in a hotel for the next 2 nights, and then onto training. The girl sharing the room with me is from Hamilton. We were on the same planes all the way over, but didn't actually meet until we were picking up our luggage here. There was a Polish basketball team on the flight from Munich. I felt bad for those really tall guys trying to fold themselves into itty-bitty airplane seats.
There were only 8 people from the group on our flight, so we had about 2 hours to kill in the airport waiting for the last group. Everyone's pretty cool. We've already formed a posse, even though we're all being sent to different places to teach.
Also while waiting, there was a media circus. And I'm not exaggerating. We're talking a bunch of different networks, at least 8 cameras. And the presenters were all waving microphones in our faces. It was so bizzare, but kinda neat. We also got to meet the Minister of Education and I think we get to meet the President tomorrow. I knew that this was a big deal, but it's crazy how huge this program is.
Took a mini-bus from the airport to the hotel. It was terrifying. I'm really glad that I don't have to drive here. At the hotel we got some downtime in our rooms before meeting for a late dinner. They didn't plan much for us today, because they knew we'd be exhausted, but tomorrow's going to be a long one.