Minor correction

Oh the stories I have to tell.

Today was a very cool day.

First though, I feel like I should clarify something. I've finally been able to talk to some people, and it seems that this blog has been slightly misrepresenting.

I'm not unhappy. I'm sorry if I made it seem that way. I'm pretty happy. Sometimes i'm not really sure that's the right word for it, though. Excited maybe.

I do, however, sometimes feel slightly bi-polar.

There are times when I feel really excited and contented and think things are going really well. And then the next moment I could be really upset because I've frozen up when someone has asked me the most basic of questions, and I've been in class for six days straight and I'm tired and really don't want to get up in the morning...

But more often than not, I feel excited. There's a lot of possibility at the moment, and I'm working really hard to make the most of it.

So.

I actually am not going to have time to tell the stories of the super cool day I had. I'm sorry, I'm such a tease. It had to do with a 600 year old fortress, 650 steps, 3 different moldovan dances and seeing Ukraine... and you'll just have to wait for it, because that's it for now....

But the above are pictures of said fortress, to get you excited about it.

Pictures!

The above is from Chisanau, the capital city of Moldova. The statue is of Stefan Cel Mare (Stephan the Large, or the Great) who is kind of the greatest hero of the country.

You can see the little Arc de Triumph.

The Church is probably the most famous site in the country.







The above pictures are of Peresecina, my village.

Peresecina means two things: it means dried pears in Romanian, because it has a great agricultural past.... and it means crossroads in the slavic tradition because its at the crossroads of many major roads. It has about 8,200 people.

Stream

Friday

There was a reason I thought I should write this blog post, but for the life of me, I can't remember what it is.

But updates are important right? So what, I wonder, should I write about?

Well, off the top of my head, I got a cell phone. My integration into Moldovan society is somewhat more complete, and hey, if anyone at home wants to call me, it's free for me! I would recommend buying a calling card or something, and then dialing the following number:

011 373 69 750462


I can get text messages, too! Directions for free web text:

Go to www.orange.md

click on the box on the right hand side with a picture of an envelope, that says Orange Text and „expediaza web sms” (send web sms)

It will take you to another web page that says Web SMS at the top. Follow the directions:

De la—type in your name instead of „websms”
Catre—leave the opening as +37369 and then type in 750462 (the rest of Rian’s number)
Mesajul—type your message
Introduceti—type the 5-digit code that you see in the blank box.
Click „trimite sms” to send your text.

It's free for me to send you texts, so if you remind me of your phone numbers, I will totally holler at you once in a while.

It would be great if you send me your phone number IN A TEXT MESSAGE, because you know how often it is that I get to the internet. I'm not saying, i'm just saying.



This Saturday it will be one month since I left home, and three weeks since I've been at my home stay, which means I am no longer on "lock down." This is very important, because it means that I am, basically, free to travel about the country. Which means I can go to Chisanau or wherever, whenever, and use the internet to my hearts content.

Le sigh.

Still, with the pace that we're at, don't expect that drastic of a change.

My phone, by the way, has a flashlight at the top. I would like to recognize Nokia for their brilliance in this design, because there's been a few people who have probably thought me intoxicated because I have trouble walking home on twisty, unpaved streets without the benefit of, oh, street lights or really, strong houselights of any kind.

The lack of light pollution does make the stars something else though. I can count on one hand the number of airplanes I've seen since I've been here, but I've seen numerous satellites flying across the sky. The closest thing I've seen to this was in... oh Attila, was it in Montana that we saw that falling star?

It is, by the way, 8pm here. Thus, 1pm central time. A 7 hour difference, in case anyone was wondering, or thinking of calling me.

I'm actually already in bed, if I want to be honest with everyone. I'm freaking tired, and I've memorized a craduca load of words in the past two hours.

My host dad calls me the computer.

I may not be able to speak the language, but I can sure point to things and say: porumb! That means corn. You pronounce the b, so it's fun to say.

Some of my friends are living in Porumbeni right now, which literally means Corntown. I wonder how old their town is, and how they got their name. Obviously, corn is a New World vegetable, but I suppose it could have immigrated here any time during the 1600s. After all, the tomato certainly did get co-opted by the Italians.

Did you know that many Early Americans considered tomatoes a dangerous fruit? Or vegetable, whatever you want to call it? They thought it drove people mad, or made them lovesick - which is kind of the same thing if you think about it.

There is someone in my Peace Corps training group who is driving me crazy, and I don't know what to do about it. We see each other waaaaay too often, and it's too early to be this annoyed with someone. I've been unable to figure how to peacefully resolve this potential conflict.

I think my language instructor is pregnant. I have no obvious reason for this suspicion, and I've told no one of my thoughts. But I want to make the claim in public, so in case I'm right I can point to it and go HA! I am psychic!

of course, in case I'm wrong, I can always edit this post. Ah, blogging.

Well now, I've just spent 20 minutes doing stream of consciousness thought, not sure how it will fly. I do have a lot on my mind . I've dreamt of kissing three different guys in the past few days, and I'm really curious as to what's going on with that. I also have visions of verb conjugations dancing in my head. I think I prefer the sugar plum fairies.

Speaking of the 5:07 club....

TUESDAY, LATER

(for those of you not "in the know," a few friends and I would meet up on Fridays after work at the marvelous and wondrous Konak's Bar in Andersonville, Chicago on Clark Street (hello, Ozgur!). It's called the 5:07 club because we would try to see who could get there as close to 5:07 pm as possible. I would often win because I worked at a Jewish social justice agency and thus, got off early on fridays, but most of the others worked in the Uptown Hood and got there fast as well. Mr Tom Walsh, the man who has taken my position as Advocacy Director at JCUA, is the convener of the 5:07 club).

I would be remiss if I didn't mention the EXTREME amount of organizing talk and training that's being thrown at me lately. Ah, SWOT analysis. Oh, participatory assessment. Of course, 1 on 1's and House meetings.

Shannon, my god, you would laugh silly at me.

These are tools utilized by the organizing community and apparently Peace Corps members.

Many aspects of this stuff I frankly .... well, I just.... I haven't been all that fond of, really. Sometimes I'd rather do it myself.

Oh, that is a huuuuuuuge no no here.

So Shannon, Tom, ONE people at large, it may amuse you to know that I am going to become a good organizer. Maybe, Possibly.

Maybe I'll like it more in Romanian?

One more thing - Ms. Shannon, the lovely and amazingly talented woman currently in school for interior design, etc., and I had a running debate on color schemes.

I believed that orange and purple were two colors that worked well together.

She strongly disagreed.

Moldovans... agree with me. It's a scheme I see used frequently. I open it up to the group for comment, and will try to take pictures to illustrate the frumousa (beauty).

Imbibing

TUESDAY

Sit down, children, and let's have a discussion about the dangers of alcohol.

Peace Corps does not tell us not to drink. Peace Corps does make every attempt possible to pound it into your head that, while you may drink,

it's just bad m'kay?

There are a good many reasons for PC to have concerns about volunteers drinking. I respect all of them greatly. Top among them are volunteer safety, Peace Corps reputation, and the way that Americans are viewed by a population that's only access to American culture is through Nickelodian and dubbed over movies like Legally Blonde.

(Not that there's anything wrong with Legally Blonde mind you- the second one was on the other day, and that movie is straight up a lesson in American politics.)

But you see my point, I really do get it.

Except here's where I started to get, for lack of a better word, itchy, during our alcohol safety 3 hour seminar.

Things like, for a girl, drinking anything over a tall shot glass of wine is exceeding the moderate drinking level.

Things like, even when you're in Chisanau visiting friends, people from your site will find out that you've been drinking or at a bar and it could affect your reputation.

Things like, Peace Corps hears about our behavior, "even if they don't want to."

Things like, in some villages women don't ever drink with the men.

Ok, point by point, I don't even think a tall shot glass of wine would put you over the .08 legal limit. I could totally be wrong, but seriously? I don't feel bad about taking a few of those shots, particularly over a five hour dinner. How many tall shot glasses would even go into one glass of wine? And most of this wine is homemade, not even as potent.

Second: If people from my site find out that I've been drinking outside of the village. Well ... first this might mean that I'm not drinking at all in my own village - a possibility, to be sure. Let's say that is does mean that - if they find out that I'm drinking outside of the village, but not their own, doesn't that in its own way indicate a respect towards the tradition of their home? A desire to fit in with the way of things in my placement?

Third: I'm going to take four first, actually.

Four: part of Peace Corps mission is to break down gender barriers and stereotypes. And one of the first ways of doing that, surely is to allow women and men to interact together, and to ensure that the women are treated respectfully in a recreational environment. My culture, one that I'm here to represent, allows for me to drink with my male friends. Now, while I'm here, I have to take some uber-fantastical precautions if I want to drink and I'm well aware of that. However, I believe it's important for Moldovan men to, you know, start to think that it's

- appropriate to shake women's hands when they meet them
- appropriate to say hello when they pass women on the street
and
- okay for women to join in extra-curricular activities.

Now, for number 3. I'm about to turn 28 years old, and I'm not a child. In fact, the most common reaction I get when I'm introduced to people by my host family is "why aren't you married? you're so old!" If Peace Corps staff hears things about things that i'm doing well, then, I'm very much responsible for my actions. I'm more inclined to think they will hear good stuff about me, but I'm also not a pushover, and I wonder if my adult determination and stances will sometimes reflect as ... I don't know, something that it's not, or that I surely don't mean it to be.

It's probably really good that PC staff didn't tell us that drinking is forbidden, because I would have probably bristled extremely: "this is a wine producing culture! how can they expect us to integrate into the community if they don't allow us to participate fully" la de da.

As it is, I'll give them credit in that they did a really good job in giving food for thought. They brought in some obviously "super rece" (rece is cool in romanian, I'm trying really hard to start a trend) older volunteers who had stories of people who had gotten hurt, or had done just stupid things that had screwed things up for other volunteers, or how they'd really messed up their site placement...

what really surprised me is how, it seems that the longer people are here, the more likely you are to give up alcohol, altogether. And these are younger people, 25-30 (some older).

One of the staff asked us to ask ourselves, if you're just getting together to drink, what are you really doing?

Which damnit, isn't the only reason I want to get together with the rest of my volunteer group, but I'll admit it's part of it! I feel like I'm wound tighter than a top, and I just want to relax and decompress and digest all the information that's been thrown at us...

I want a 5:07 club night.

To blog or not to blog, that is the question.

FRIDAY

I have homework. It may be Friday night, but I have homework. This is because I have class tomorrow. At 9am. And because it's a Saturday it means that I won't get a ride halfway, which means I actually have to wake up earlier than I would on a weekday.

In Romanian, Friday is "Vinere." The joke is, the word for wine is "vin," so Friday is wine day.

But since I have yet to go out to an entertainment establishment, and due to the said practice of Peace Corps scheduling language lessons at 9am on Saturday mornings, I have yet to experience the wonder and joy of that joke.

Goodness they do work your hynie off (also, incidentally, the word for clothes wardrobe in Romanian ... Ha!). The first week the group in Perecesina had to do a community mapping project - find out all the important things in your town, infrastructure, gender differences, government, etc., and then do a presentation. Now, we have to identify any worthwhile non-profit entities and work with them to throw a fundraiser before we leave PST in 8 weeks. We actually have about 7 weeks to pull this off, because the last week we have to throw a party for the entire town.

All this, of course, while having 5 hours a day in Romanian lessons for 6 days a week, plus optional "super happy fun time" outings, etc., on Sunday.

But no pressure or anything.

On Sunday, we actually have a semi-non optional optional outing to Chisanau, the Moldovan capital. But today, I got a sneak peak. (Not that we haven't all been there before, mind you. We were there for three days - we just saw about two blocks of it). I went in a rutiera (I'll explain later) with o sora gazda (my host sister), a lovely girl all of 14 who's allowed to go into a bustling 700,000 people capital by herself, into the central market.

The central market is huge, and sells just about everything. O mama gazda (my host mother) actually works at the fruit market there, so we said hello to her...

the purpose of the visit was to find a present for... o tata gazda. I think everyone gets the picture now, so I'll skip the explanation. It's his birthday tomorrow. I also had to buy laundry detergent and toilet paper, and I bought some tea to contribute to the household since I'm drinking so much.

So much being 1-2 cups a day using the same tea bag, mind you.

Anyway the central market is bustling, crazy and cramped, like most outdoor markets. If you stop too long in one place you'll either a) get run over, or b) have someone vigorously try to sell you something.

I'm a fan of neither a nor b.

After a few minutes of looking around, I saw this box of shaving lotion and cologne that was designed after Rambo. This, I thought, was the perfect gift for my tata gazda.

You see, Ion was in the Russian Army, and a few nights ago he showed me pictures. They were in this huge leather bound amazing thing that had paper inserts that had cartoons on them, and oh, my goodness, were the cartoons amazing. At some point, I will be taking pictures and uploading them (con permisso, already granted) because they are just remarkable. Some of them are generic soldering types - he was in the balloon corps, so they showed pictures of that, some of girls, and then, some of like, Russian tanks bombing American submarines and the like. He served from 89-91, by the way.

He actually colored them in himself, but at some point when he was talking at me in Romanian, he looked at me and pointed at a picture of a cartoon that depicted a very muscular man that was barechested and had obviously russian paraphanelia on it and said "Rambo."

It was a cross-cultural moment I will never forget.

So I thought the Rambo cologne and shaving creme would be perfect. Even if it didn't smell good, it would be freaking hilarious.

Alas. Katya did not agree with my choice. The cologne, I agree, was undeniably gross, and she forced me to get the cologne with a bare chested Brad Pitt on the cover that says "Brett Pidd." The bottle however, actually says "Pacino." Who the cologne is meant to emulate, the young and hip Brett Pidd or the every dignified Pacino, I suppose we'll never know. And I always regret not buying the Rambo cologne set.

But I digress.

So I've gotten this sneak peak at Chisanau. I went to the main market, walked up the main street (which I actually did do a little when I was here before) and observed things around me. Then, I waited for the rutiera.

A rutiera is a minivan that may or may not have seats that are secured to the floor that are crammed with people(kind of like an incredibly full Chicago bus during rush hour). People stand for long periods of time.

We waited for the rutiera to arrive, then literally rushed the door to get seats. I only got one because mama gazda elbowed her way through and saved me one, and I wasn't about to argue with an hour ride in front of me in a freaking van with low ceilings.

I don't know if the crampness was due to the time (5pm on Friday) or if this is a general state. I will report back.

As I rode home, I thought a lot about myself. It would have been a great time to eavesdrop and try to understand what people were saying but, whatever.

I realized that, in many many ways, I'm totally a second city kind of girl. I might even change the name of the blog to reflect this realization. Or maybe just my tagline.

I hated that market. I don't like being bombarded with data on every turn. I don't like having to decide between 47 of the same products. Especially in huge, tight places. They make me nervous.

I like having the option of doing nice things, but I'm really a neighborhood lass, when it comes down to it. I like my local grocer (shout out to La Primera!) and I like my local bars that are small and have the same people over and over that I can see all the time.

So if I'm placed in a smaller place (smaller place, I mean smaller than Chisanau - I think anywhere upwards of 40,000 would be good maybe? Maybe 60,000? That was my ward size...) that might be okay. It might even be better.

So this second city realization will also greatly affect the places I want to travel or, where I go in the places I travel. If I go to Morocco, I'm not sure I want to go to that crazy largest market in the world.

As dirty as I feel saying this, I kind of like malls. Or at least stores, particularly places like Target (oh target, i love you so) with impersonal sales people who don't give a damn and will only help you if you ask them.

The people who run the local stores in Peresecina (called magazines, by the way, imagine the hilarity that ensured when the kept asking me "you want go magazine?" and I was all "do I want a magazine? do you want a magazine?") are super friendly without being overbearing. Although, everytime you walk into one, I do feel like you have to buy something.

Which brings me back, oh so very nicely, to my homework.

We're supposed to go into a magazine and ask the vendors what ten things cost. Not necessarily buy anything, just ask what they cost. Part of this exercise is to get us used to the kilogram system. The teacher flat out laughed at me when I asked for 1/4 of a kilogram of sugar.

But how was I to know? Christ, I got a 1/2 kilo of cookie biscuit things the other day and it was like a full bag's worth. And the only experience I had with kilo's and grams, etc., in the states was hearing about drug sentencing and the discrepancies in cocaine vs crack, and when they show it on tv, a kilo of drugs seems like a lot! Can I get an Amen from the Americans??

Somebody said that they think a kilo is roughly 2 american lbs, which, hell ya, I think a kilo is quite a bit.

But possibly the confusion might be that people here aren't used to buying food just for themselves? They buy food for a family. Maybe a family does go through 2lbs of sugar quickly. Hell if I know, I can't even remember the last time I bought sugar.

So yea, this homework assignment, I'm not so into it. I actually did ask the prices of stuff in Chisanau - I had no choice as I was actually asking for the prices of things in Chisanau. And, just to be on the safe side, I asked the prices of castraversti's, and rosii's, and ceava's and cartofii's... so, part 1 of temru pentru acasa accomplished, I guess, because I'm not going to annoy the shopkeepers in Peresecina, that's for sure.

Contacting me, Part II

Okay, so DHL, maybe not the best idea. Apparently it costs the earth to send stuff DHL from the states to Moldova, though not from Moldova to the States.

USPS is the much better way.

Just don't send me, like an ipod or anything.

Like you would anyway.

Contacting me and information about Moldova

(written on the day it actually says it was written!)

Hey folks,

I've gotten a few emails asking "where can I write you?" "can i send you things" etc. So, for those of you that are interested,

yes, I will still be checking my gmail account. Whenever I can, I'm not sure how often that can be for the first two months. After that, I'm extremely hopeful that it can be more often.

If you want to send me something, a letter, some package, send it to the address on the blog. American mail should get there just fine, but if you want the package to for sure get here (if, for instance, there's a dvd or something cool and exciting that might be cool and exciting to a Moldovan postal officer) send it through DHL, that has an account through Peace Corps/Moldova.

I do appreciate the emails. And I'm glad you like the blog.

A few of you have asked why you can't get good pictures of Moldova/Chisanau/Peresecina on Google Maps. Well my friends, it's because google maps uses a composite of satellite pictures, and not too many people are taking satellite pictures of Moldova. At least, not those who are willing to give up those pictures for public purposes. Maybe at some point I can upload a map.

For now, know that moldova is about the size of Massachusetts (shout out to StacyP), and has about 8 million people, of which 1/4 is working outside of the country at any point in time.

Cultural Differences, cont.

Disclaimer: This was written quickly. There will be errors. I always get so annoyed when I see errors on blogs, but, well, right now everyone, including me, will have to deal with it if they want news.

==============================================================
(written March 7)

I feel like I should tell about certain things.

Things like, half the time I'm so frustrated in language class that I almost break down crying. Things like, today I was so frustrated that I can't seem to fricking remember for the life of me the difference between the words "who" and "how" and "what" that I actually did start crying at the dinner table.

Having a language drilled into you for five straight hours, then walking home - in the rain - without an umbrella, in a town with roads straight of the labyrinth movie - is no picnic.

Particularly because women aren't allowed to talk to men here... I mean we're not even supposed to look at them, but you know for certain they're looking at you, and I also know for certain they know that I'm not a local. So everytime I see a pack of boys on the side of the road i'm on - or on the otherside of the road, or in the yard of someone who is near where I'm walking - I tense up, afraid of getting harassed or something. I have no basis for this feeling, other than it's been drilled into us that we're NOT SUPPOSED TO TALK TO THE MEN.

Come to think of it, the tense feeling is the same way I would feel passing pack of men in the states - machismo is truly an international standard. It's just, you know, in the states i'm not usually huffing and puffing because I'm not used to extreme hills and I can't understand the taunts they might throw at me.

I'm so conscious of the fact that I'm breathing heavy when I'm walking up these freaking hills - even though my gazda family members are as well - that I literally hold my breath when I pass people so they can't hear me. I don't want to pass on the stereotype of an out of shape American.

Although I am an out of shape American. I'm well aware of this.

I'm being treated, unsurprisingly, as if I'm very young, because most of the woman my age have - oh kids into their double digits. Usually I don't mind being thought of as being young, but here it has the unfortunate consequence of being thrown in with these 18 year-old railroad thin girls who are all getting lectures by their tata's on not developing belly's. The 15lbs in goodbye dinners I gained has definitely come back to haunt me slightly, although I would still be very curvy comparitively to the teenagers I'm being thrown in with. I have yet to meet a Moldovan 20-something that is not married with children.

Not that I haven't started to lose that 15lbs already, oh don't you worry. Going from the extreme flatness of Chicago, with all that lovely public transportation, to the extreme hilly-ness of Moldova, has been quite good for my legs. And, though they do try to push food on you at every minute, including massive amounts of bread, the very fact that they use small plates has an incredible impact. They also have an interesting custom. I present to you:

---------------------------
Cultural Difference #9
Meals
All meals here are served family style. If you are at a table with enough room, you are provided with a plate that Americans would think of as a side (perhaps a bread) plate. The table is then loaded with the main food. Everyone is given a fork, and people proceed to eat. There is no attempt to dish out food onto the plates that have been given out, really... most people just dip their fork into the plates around the table and put it straight into their mouth. The only way this is negated is if you need to put, say, pasta on your plate. But even that can be worked around.

When you go out to eat at someone's house, well, then, sometimes you get a plate, but usually you just get a massive piece of bread (bread being a staple at EVERY meal). Plates are stacked everywhere, and continually brought out through the entire meal. Continually. And stacked on top of each other. Precariously. Dangerously. The table clothes are always threatened.

Rarely, unless at a "masa" dinnerparty, is the table set with anything to drink. You may get a cup of tea at the end of the meal. Occasionally, a shot glass may be passed around with wine - all are included, including children. In my household, this is usually done when it's cold, a habit I've come to GREATLY appreciate. I was at a masa the other day where vodka was passed around, and the kids got that, too. I want to emphasis, they do not get a *lot* of liquor, and this is not that unusual of a custom, even in some parts of America. It can even have a slightly sopoforic effect on the kids, something that I think most parents can appreciate.

I do, however, think the everyone eating off of every dish at the table thing would probably freak a lot of Americans out, us being neat freaks and all.

Since the night I came out of the living room and into the kitchen to see pig parts strewn all over the kitchen and my host dad cleaning an ax in the sink, I've kind of learned to calm my freaked out-ed-ness.

I've even figured out a way to eat the chicken jello that is so famous here (a cold dish that is super super super popular, served with whole pieces of chicken in chicken marrow jello).... wipe the jello off with bread, and just eat the chicken. I can be polite, and not gag, like I did the first time. I cannot imagine how much I would have embarassed my host family by throwing up all over the dad's mom's table.
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Let's move on to:
__________________________________
Myth Busting #1
How many of us have heard that roosters crow at sun-up? It's a common thing often seen in... commercials, cartoons, etc. Roosters, however, are much more garrulous than this. Much much much more. They crow at sun-up, at sun-down, at mid-day...

and god are they loud. I mean for real.
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Cultural Difference #10
__________________________________
Moldovans use crepe paper for toilet paper. The kind used to decorate houses in America, basically, only it's not crinkled. And it's pink. The same color my sister and I used for the twins birthday. Strangely absorbant, though.
__________________________________

Cultural Difference #11
(for anyone wondering, I did kind of start these numbers arbitrarily, but I figured I'd at least described 8 thus far)

Moldovans take really special care of appearances. They are obsessed with shoes, and they want you to dress up all the time.

Yet they only have a few outfits. They treat their clothing so well - I've never seen kids - 7-year olds! treat their clothes so particularly.

Needless to say, while I might have been fine in the states for the most part, I mostly don't measure up here. This is for a few reasons:

1) My shoes are nowhere in good enough condition;

2) Even if my shoes were in good enough condition, I'm not used to / not into walking 45 minutes in them. My feet hurt, and I'll be damned if I'm wearing anything by my boots or tennis shoes (blue and sparkly silver, oh yeah!) when I'm walking these roads that have very little pavement. This applies particularly if I'm only going to have to take off my shoes as soon as I get to wherever I'm going (stay tuned for cultural difference #12). I'll be happy to bring better shoes with me, but what's the point, if I'm, again, taking them off as soon as I get somewhere?

I've had to wash my shoes on quite a few ocassions already. And if I don't wash them, my host family washes them for me, which makes me feel terrible. But shoes get muddy, for chrissakes. And if it's still muddy, why don't we all just wait until the land dries to wash our shoes? Please?

3) My coat appalls them. It has those fuzz balls on them, and damned if I know how to get those out. It was a cheap $60 Target coat, what the hell? I'm tempted to try and burn them off, because there's way to many to pick. But I feel like that could probably lead to badness.

4) My jeans, and yes, pretty much every pair of pants that I own has a little bit of fray at the bottom. Just a little bit, most of them, but yes, they have fray. This is a huuuuuuge no no. My mom almost gasped when she saw them.

5) Most Moldovans wear a lot of black and grey, etc. Hmm.

4) My style is ... my style. It always has been. It's not Moldovan, and I'm okay with that, but I have to walk around with my family and try not to embarass them, and, most of all, fit in here. How to do that a limited clothing line on so many levels?
------------------------------------------------------------------
Cultural Difference #11
Taking off shoes
You don't wear shoes in the house. I almost don't know what else to say here. Except for this requires a few things:

1) that your socks match whatever you're wearing.

2) that your socks be clean so that they don't smell and offend the people you're with when you get wherever you're going.

3) that you buy slippers to wear around the house. And work shoes to wear when your... getting eggs out of the chicken coop, or picking up clothes from the line.

I'm sure there's more, but that's all I can think of right now.

Cultural Difference #12
Driving without a seatbelt. And with kitchen chairs.

It's considered kind of rude to put a seatbelt on in someone's car. And the other night, I was driven home with my family by my host dad's brother in his van, that didn't really have seats in the back, so we put kitchen chairs in the back and we sat on those.

Let me also express the extreme craziness of the roads here. There are two main roads in Peresecina, and then a bazillion mini roads that I'm more inclined to call alleys. These alleys are not paved and remind me soooo much the Labryinth movie it's crazy. So there we were, bumping around on these kitchen chairs in this labryinth roads ... we got home quite safely, but it was a little scary, I admit. Particularly after a five hour dinner party. Did I mention how long the dinner parties are? Because that's another noticeable cultural difference.

The Little Things

(written March 6, 2008)

I'd like to talk a little about the cultural differences I've seen so far in Moldova.

The kids are most striking. At least the ones in my household. They're so incredibly well-behaved! Quiet, do *everything* they are told to do.... the 14 year old here does most of the chores around the house when the mom's at work.

We were at a lunch the other day and the two girls were incredibly well-behaved. We were there, in one room, without entertainment or toys, for four hours. They didn't complain, or bug the adults. They just say there, or went and laid on the couch. They listened to the adult conversation, and spoke when spoken to.

They also drink wine. Shots of wine to be exact.

Though that's the same for everyone in Moldova. They all drink shots of wine rather than glasses of it. Very interesting.

It's very good wine - almost all of it it homemade. Most people have vineyards in their backyards, you see. My family makes white wine, which is nice for me because it means I can actually drink it.

It's very taboo, in the little village that I'm staying in, for women to smoke in public. Or greet men. Or greet people younger then them. Or smile.

Guess how often I've broken that rule.

For a minute I tried to keep up the no smiling thing. Then I decided to screw it. I say hello to everybody but the men (because apparently that could cause real problems - them I just ignore), and I particularly smile and say an enthusiastic hello to the kids. Americans are known for to be smiley, overly nice people, yeah? I see no reason to break with that tradition, particularly if the result is that Moldovan kids happen to come out of my visit thinking that Americans are super nice people.

Peace Corps mission accomplished?

We were told today that, and I quote, "Peace Corps mission is to promote world peace and understanding. That," our director said, "is our expectation of you.

They aim low.

(Who else in the house got that "what's so wrong about peace love and understanding" song stuck in their head immediately following reading that? I know that I can think of nothing else sense then. And I don't even know who that song is by, or what the rest of the lyrics are.)

Apparently the United States government invests $40,000 per year on each Peace Corps volunteer - that includes the salary of all the staff here, the security, etc. It surely does *not* represent the salary I will receive in Moldova, and surely does *not* come close to the salary Ireceived in America. But it's, oh, roughly 35 times what an average Moldovan makes in a year.

Or to put it another way, my computer (an apple computer, mind) could pay for an entire family here for one year. Try explaining that to someone in a language not your own.

You know how we, as Americans, get annoyed sometimes at seeing and hearing Spanish everywhere? We feel like people should just learn to speak English already?

Imagine, if you will, living in a world where you're constantly barraged with languages you don't understand...

the Nokia phone the dad owns? the instruction manual is in German.

The tea biscuits? English.

Some of the music is in Spanish, some in Russian, some in English, some German, some in French...

the girls know a shocking amount of Britney Spears, but get her confused with Shakira. I guess when you don't know Spanish or English they could both sound the same.

I wonder if eventually all these languages will just kind of blend together, you know? Surely, particularly with the borders in Europe dissolving, the seperate languages can't continue.

Though it does seem that people, faced with the loss of something, seem ever more determined to keep it. The Irish did a pretty remarkable job of reviving Gaelic. My god, look what the Jews did.


I get the feeling that my family is getting kind of frustrated that I'm not picking up Romanian more quickly. I've been here almost a week - surely I should be able to understand and carry on a conversation by now, right?

But they are surrounded by English all the time. They could sing Piece of Me... hell, the dad sang some Beach Boys song to me the other day - not knowing, I think, that he was calling me baby perhaps.

I don't know. Maybe he did. Wouldn't that be funny. And scary, obviously.



So here's the thing - Peace Corps keeps talking about how we're supposed to integrate, and when we get to our sites we'll be partners... sustainable partners, participatory partners. I talked to a few of you all about my concerns about this before I left... I am quite good at doing things on my own. Just, doing them. Taking on projects, finishing projects, getting them done - that independence is seriously frowned upon here.

I am an independent person. I like taking on projects and completing them. Wonder how that will go?

At the Internet Cafe! (Woot!!)

So here I am at the Internet Cafe with my fellow volunteer Eden. She and I are crying pretty regularly reading the emails from home. My 2 year old niece is apparently asking for me, which kills me. She thinks that I live with Shrek in Far Far Away.

It's almost harder being in contact with your family than it is not.

Yesterday a bunch of us went walking around the town - it has two main roads, and no direct roads connecting the two... only alleys. I was taken by my family a crazy loooong way around to get to school, and knew there had to be a short cut to get to the main town road. Which I found, eventually, after wandering for an hour in alleys, running into grandmother's and kids every two minutes, all staring at the lost American.

I feel like I've been here a year, and a day, all at once. I wish it was a year later, I want to see my family. It's crazy how I could live away from them in Chicago effortlessly, but this is a lot harder. It's possibly harder because I can't talk to them, and can't, you know, talk to anybody really.

Very disappointed in the primary results. Not cool, zeus, not cool.

Whoever knew that I knew so much Spanish?/ I mean seriously. I'm having a hell of a time getting the spanish numbers, and quesiton words out of my head, i keep answering Si, and it's not even remotely funny anymore. I'm getting really pissed at myself.

It is 4 in the morning. I have a habit of waking up with the roosters. Though, since I went to sleep at 8pm last night, I suppose I can't been too annoyed. It also gives me valuable time to practice my vocab, erase the spanish from my head and institute Romaneste. Then it's on to breakfast - thick slabs of bread, thickly slabbed with butter, covered with thick slabs of cheese and thick slabs of salami.

I need to get up the courage to say "nu ute, va rog." No butter, please"." And they keep pushing more and more bread on me, which damnit, no more damn piine. I'll take the cheese and salami though. And the tea, the delicious chea (pronounced chai, which just makes me miss my chai latte every day. sniff) doused with about a million spoon fulls of sugar.

I really want to know how the election is going. It's driving me crazy.

Eventually I'm going to get a cell phone (maybe in two weeks) and apparently it can be pretty cheap to call from the states. I'd love to look into having one of those external modem things my dad has that hooks into the cell phone towers, because I can already tell you that I am not going to dig this dial up thing. Romanians really like their phones, so if I clog up their lines, I don't think that's going to fly very well.

March 2, 2008

Buna Dimeanat,a! (good morning!)

Pay no attention to the actual date this is posted. I have no idea when I'm going to be able to upload this, really, but I know I should try to keep a semi-regular update of some sort, and now that I'm living with my first host family, I really really really miss my own.

This heart- sickness is, no doubt, heightened by the fact that I have finally gotten sick. And everyone knows that you only ever want your mommy when you're sick.

I've been in country for five days now - we're already heavily into the language classes, and I'm already heavily petrified that I'm never going to get it. I find myself answering questions in spanish - when I can answer questions at all. Who knew that I was so amazing in spanish?

I seem to be able to get pronounciation really easily, somewhat able to get the vocab, but once you put me into a situation of actually having to utilize what I've learned - to converse - I'm screwed. I kind of freeze and freak out. I don't think I'm alone in this boat, luckily.

We have 29 people in my group - I think I mentioned this. We're split up into groups of four and sent out to different villages to have intense language training and "community oriented learning." This basically means: we're going to throw you in with a family to sink or swim."

I'm in a town called Perecisina. It's about 40 minutes outside of the capital of Chisanau and it's going to be what's called a "hub site." All of the other groups are going to come to our town each week for extra special classes. Lucky us. This means we don't have to get up extra special early to ride van buses.

I'm really happy with my host family. I'm living with Ion (35), Tatiana (33), Katya (14), and Adriana (7). I really emphasized my desire for a family, and that emphasis turned out to be a right one. Katya knows a fair bit of English, and Adriana is working on learning it. Ion really wants his daughters to learn English, and is heavily pushing them to garner as much info from me as they can gather in the time they can.

I think I made a fairly good impression. We had gone out to buy presents for our family in Chisanau - chocolates and flowers (the flowers I got were amazing, and were from this unbelievable flower market - more to follow). I practiced and practiced the two sentences "I don't know any Romanian, but I hope you'll help me learn" so that when I met them i could be somewhat charming. So we all got ushered into the room to be introduced and I met my lovely host "mom" and promptly forgot everything after "I don't know any Roman...." I felt incredibly stupid, which really sucks considering that one of the sentences uses the word "soma" and I had used the word trick "stupify" because of the drug, and that was the first word I forgot, which led to my train reaction of stupid. I'll never live down my internal shame. So I just blushed a lot and gave her a hug, and that was it.

The kids were easily charmed by my gifts of candy necklaces and coloring books, as well as the ever amazing-ness of mac computers. They loved the photo booth application, and used that widely.

We pretty much ate the same things for lunch and for dinner - schnitzel of some sort, though no doubt with some other name, bread, more meat, cole slaw, and the kicker for me, rice wrapped in some kind of skin covered with sour cream. Yum. "Maninc, Rian, Maninc!" "Eat, Eat!" I actually have no idea what made me sick, and actually none of it was home made, unlike a latter meal which I will tell you about later. todays meal,

As for the house I'm staying in - it's actually quite gorgeous. Spacious - laid out like pieces of it were built on in different stages, which it probably was. There are doors that lead to places I haven't discovered yet.

I'm staying in a different wing than the rest of the family which is great and all, but also has the unenviable aspect of making my room - and the hallways leading to it specially, flipping freezing. It's not even that cold here, I don't get it! It's like the house is built into a cave or something. And they put an electric blanket on the bed, only I noticed last night that the fuze was shot and thus - sparking, so I had a choice of setting my bed on fire or freezing.

I have to admit that for a few hours I chanced the fire. Peace Corps provided us with a fire extinguisher after all, and it was sooooo cold.

I do have running water in the house - and even a toilet! However, if you want to go number 2, you do have to go outside. And, not only that, it's a squat outhouse. So yes, Rian has successfully taken a poop, squatting, in a hole, twice. As such things go, however, it's a very nice hole - it flushes, and has tiles. I just really wish it had hand grips or something. People here much have thighs of steel. In my sickened state, I really was not into it. I doubt that I'll ever really be into it, honestly. But the thing is, I know it could be a whoooole lot worse.


Today is Sunday, and all the Perecesina volunteers were welcomed in a ceremony i the school. My host sister, Katya, was chosen to be the official speaker - a great honor. The ceremony went as followed: these adorable little kids in native dress came out and did dances and songs, then the high school kids came out and did a dance and made us dance with them. The dance is supposed to represent the stomping of the wheat during the harvest, and was really easy. But we still got heartily laughed at.

Then, the mayor came and spoke to us about Perecesina. At a whopping 8,200 people, it's one of the largest villages in Moldova, and one of the oldest on record. It may mean "Dried Pears" or it may mean "Crossroads." The Perecesinians abdjured the feudal lifestyle of the surrounding countryside, instead choosing to live equally as peasants and cattle herders.

After the ceremony, i was taken to my host-dad's parent's house, where we had a traditional "massa." "La Massa" means table - to partake in a "massa" is to have a feast. Their home was significantly different than the one I'm staying in - one room, heated by a "soba" oven, and everything - but everything, is made in house. The cheese, the bread, the wine, the pork was home slaughtered, the chicken as well, the sausage was home made... I didn't actually get sick from any of this though, which shocked me.

Oh, many of you may have heard me speaking of the delicacy here in Moldova - the cold chicken jelly? Well it's not only a chicken dish, it's a pork dish, too! And now I've had both. I swear I really tried to like it! But to no avail, I barely kept from openly gagging.

I don't want to give the impression that the food here is bad though - most of it is really quite good - but the jelly thing... that's never going to get fun, and I'm always going to have to at least sample it.

The entire family was really into my camera, and looking at pictures of my friends and family. They were scandalized by the fact that Sally kept a goat in the house! They took a buuuunch of photos with the camera, and I think I'm going to try and send the digitals home and get copies sent here. It would be a great gift.

As I mentioned, there are six volunteers here with me. One boy, Tommy from Virginia, and five girls - Eden, Sarah, Pan, Christine and me. Sarah and I are what Moldovans think are typical Americans (aka white and english looking), but Eden, Christine and Pan are a little different. Pan, first of all, is 62. She's a retired Michigan legislator who was a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV) when she was in her 20s in the 60s. Christine and Eden are of Asian descent. The entire family that I'm living with are really confused by their presence here - they don't quite understand what Pan is doing here, period... how can such an older person be a volunteer? And with Eden and Christine, they just don't fit into the box that Moldovans have established for what an American should be. They kept slanting their eyelids and laughing. Ah, the very first case of cultural differences.

There's also a lot of curiosity as to why I'm not married. 27 is quite an old age here to be single I'm practically an old maid! I'm telling people that my parents won't allow it, and that I'm young in America to be married.

Off to school.