An overview of my trip

So I am back; the building trip which I have been looking forward to for so long is over and now I am on the long and exciting slide towards leaving for good. Actually (I realised earlier) five months from today - yesterday as I will publish this tomorrow.

I wanted to write a blog looking back on the trip and giving a more general overview of what happened, and how I feel about it all, from a perspective improved by a few days of sleep and resting and this is what this post will attempt to be.

The large hole we arrived to

As I was writing the blog last night and, to some extent, while I am writing this one I am feeling very strongly that until this trip I have been playing at this plan. I know I have been really serious (obviously) but all the blogs, and all the preparations, almost feel like they were badly focused, unnecessary in a sense, and possibly misleading. Did I really need to be thinking about buying 2-way radios for the vehicles (or even the vehicles at all) or should I have been waiting for this trip and then only now put those efforts into motion.

Having said that I think this feeling is probably less a position of wondering whether my plans have up til this point been worth while (they certainly have and all the advice and suggestions I have received on here have been helpful, not even mentioning the fact of having been able to codify my thinking by writing it all down). But maybe now this whole adventure is starting to become real. I spent ten days in Bulgaria, worked for six of them with the men, and loved every single second of it. Every day I fell in love with the country a little bit more and every day I realised just how correct I was to buy the school.

What's not to love

This is the feeling I have as I sit here, back in my office on my lunch break and both looking back and looking forwards.

When I consider what we achieved over the ten days it amazes me. Within a couple of hours I had running water, I also now have a connected official supply which is signed off. The men also got onto the roof and fixed twice as much as I thought needed fixing. I got to go around the building, making it more secure from weather and animals and also tidy the roof-stairs and the last rooms in the main building which are not full of hay. How could I have hoped to end up with that much stuff done.

Before and after on the roof

I also think back to the stress I was feeling on the Wednesday when we still hadn't started the roof; it is really excellent to be able to sit and think "well actually that wasn't a terrible place to be and it all worked out" and it is a lesson learned that I need to realise that I do not know always how long something will take. I can see next year being more of a challenge around this as I don't think I'll have Bekir and Sally for most of it so I hope the workers I do end up with are reliable and work as well as those two.

I feel like I've woken up after a long time of dreaming about something, and the reality is right in front of me and that is an amazing feeling.

Having looked back, a little about what is happening now.

So, tomorrow (today as you read this) I am getting the bill paid for the electricity (tok) to be connected and maybe there might be some more things done on the building as my friend is taking Bekir to get it all signed off and sorted. The paperwork will then be passed on to Veselka to be included in her project.

Talking of which, I've not yet received the contract from Veselka so it looks like out of sight, out of mind and I may need to put a bit of a chaser on her to get it done.

I have the plans printed out five times on A3 paper and I need to get some time this weekend to draw in and label what I want done; these will then be scanned and emailed to Veselka to get included in the plans. Hopefully she has been down to my local Obshtina this week to get the PUP process started; nothing can happen from her point of view until that is done.

Now for sale....

Lastly I finally have received the V5 for Pierre so if an of you want to buy a lovely camper van which I have hardly used since I bought it please shout. He is great; just not left hand drive so not suitable for me.