On Friday night I met 20 new Fulbright ETAs in Bulgaria. They are teaching all over the country from Sofia to Russe to Varna to Vidin and Kurdzhali among other places. This is pretty incredible considering the fact that four years ago when I showed up in Bulgaria as an ETA, I was one of<em> two</em> ETAs. I was in Sofia and the other ETA was in Plovdiv.

Here's the thing, I don't think it's easy to move to a new country, learn a new language, make new friends, start a new job and try to figure out which way is up anywhere in the world. Bulgaria is no exception. But of all of the jobs you could have and all of the places you could work, I think that teaching in a Bulgarian school is especially difficult.

It's difficult for a lot of different reasons: differences in educational school systems, underpaid teachers (the starting salary is something like 450 leva), underfunded schools, huge class sizes (think 30+ students), poor textbooks and often a pervasive sense of apathy.

On top of this being a foreign teacher and quote "Native Speaker" is difficult because more often than not the school wants as many students as possible to have access to you and your language. It often means that you see 8-12 different groups of students each week. That's probably 200+ students and given the fact you see these students once a week (or worse) every other week, you quickly realize: I am not going to know these kids names until Christmas break.

This alone would be enough to frustrate anyone but then there's the always-changing schedule, the awesomely bureaucratic paperwork, chalk boards (or white boards sans whiteboard markers) and the fact that you don't get your own classroom. You go to the students.

So what's a Fulbrighter teaching in a Bulgarian school to do?<img title="More..." src="http://www.karolinkabulgaria.com/wp-includes/js/tinymce/plugins/wordpress/img/trans.gif" alt="" /><img title="More..." src="http://www.karolinkabulgaria.com/wp-includes/js/tinymce/plugins/wordpress/img/trans.gif" alt="" />

Well, you've got to take a deep breath and jump in.

The job is going to be amazing and at other times amazingly frustrating.  The middle road doesn't really exist in Bulgaria so get ready for both the highs and the lows.

Teaching in Bulgaria is going to stretch you, push you, exhaust you and wow you.

So, I think it boils down to this: if you're a Fulbrighter teaching in Bulgaria you've got to adjust your expectations, look for the joyful moments at work and let the rest of it go. I realize these things are probably easier said that done. But here's the thing, you can really only control yourself. So you've got to make your corner of the world the best it can be.

Look for the students are excited to learn and plan activities with them. Find the teachers who are trying to make a difference at school and in the lives of students even though the system is set-up in such a way as to discourage this and talk to them. Learn as much Bulgarian as you can and use it as often as you can (Bulgarians love it). Create a project for yourself outside of school.

<em>Mine?</em> Well, you're reading it.

My first year I'd go to school and students would be texting under the desk (or in one bold case making a telephone call during a dictation), they'd never complete their homework (or blatantly copy and paste from wikipedia), they'd throw paper and ignore my instructions. Most times, if felt more like I was a babysitter than their teacher.

This enough to get anyone down but there's more.

I had too many students and saw them too infrequently to actually know all of their names. I knew the names of the best students and the worst students and I hated that. I also hated that administration regularly questioned my need for photocopies and chalk. I was teaching a conversation class without a textbook and needed worksheets/handouts for class but when I asked for 150 copies administration would ask me: how about 50? (Um, how could you like me to decide which students wont get photocopies?)

The low point for me?

I bought seven copies of the game Scrabble from the States in order to teach my students the game and to have them practice their vocabulary and problem solving skills. The second time my students played they spent more time throwing the tiles around the room than playing the game. I spent the 15 minutes after class with tears in my eyes picking up Scrabble pieces off the floor determined not to actually cry at school.

I left school that day miserable (and I cried outside the school gate).

Sofia looked uglier than I could ever remember it and every step I took on my home that day reminded me of the day's earlier events because the damn Scrabble tiles were rattling in my bag. Luckily for me though, I had something more in my life than just school.

By the time I'd gotten home my anger, frustration and tears had morphed into a blog post. A blog post that has since turned out to be one of my most popular posts of all time, <a href="http://www.karolinkabulgaria.com/2009/03/31/things-i-dont-understand/" target="_blank">Things I don't Understand</a>, and the post which introduced me to a much wider Bulgarian readership.

So here's my advice, when you go to school each day do something each that you're excited about and at the end of the day, make sure that you have something else to look forward to as well because if the only thing you have in your life is school/work, I can just about guarantee heartbreak for you here in Bulgaria. My own experience teaching in a public school in Sofia was neither satisfying nor especially gratifying but the whole experience taught me a lot about myself and frankly given same opportunity I'd do it again in a heartbeat.