12.30.2007 9:14
Holiday week 1 down 3 more to go. This week I went to a holiday party with at the children’s center, ate Christmas dinner started teaching English, began formation of a club I have been wanting to start, survived the holiday drinking fest at work, had a run in the police, made an ass out of myself in a restaurant, made friends with a little boy, got lost in the dark, shut out from basketball, and that about covers the majority of what my week was like. I will start at the beginning.
Monday, was the Christmas party at the children’s center I have been working at for the past 2 weeks. I skipped work so I could go early and help prepare the center with Farina from Germany and her 14 year old sister who came to visit her for the holiday’s. We all went the bank early that morning then off to the local store to pick up candy and cookies for the kids. I have become a regular at this one magazine close by to my house and of course went there to buy our sweets. The lady who works behind the counter is the mother of one of the boys who I instruct in weight lifting and now basketball. She surprised me by giving me a free bottle of water as a thanks for helping her son and possibly for bringing more business to her shop though I doubt she had marketing in mind when she gifted the water though it had its effect and if I can I will be doing my shopping there for now on.
At the party it was funny because Farina was stressing over what games we needed to come up with to entertain the children. She was getting all concerned about it, while I was calm explaining we will just make stuff up. We had a few songs we could sing locked down and a few games that we conceivably play and that seemed to calm her down a little. But as the children showed up they seemed content on playing cards or making faces. I participated in both activities and soon the time was flying by so much so that our “responsibility” to come up with games quickly diminished. The more senior women who works there with us sat all the kids down and had them all just take turns reciting poems and singing songs they knew until time ran out. Problem solved and our goofy games and songs never came out of the basement.
After the children went home there was another party for the local group of high school kids who have or do volunteer there time at the center mainly in the summer when they have more free time. They were a nice group of kids, but I found myself having to do most of the talking. We were seated around this table with nobody talking. Me, being the worst Romanian speaker at the table was forced to carry the conversation. I eventually formed the conversation to revolve around possibly forming a group that I had been wanting to start for some time that involves the group members coming up with ideas for what they volunteer the carrying out the projects from raising the money or committing the time. They seemed interested so I had them write there contact information down for future use. I was then approached by them to start tutoring English, so I agreed and will be doing this up to three times a week at the children’s center after it is closed.
Ok so Tuesday, I went to work like normal, but had the fortune of getting to ride in a car for about an hour to a nearby town and drop off a package of some sort with on of my partners. Then drive right on back. The scenery was really beautiful given this other town is surrounded by trees and all of the trees are covered in ice creating a type of icicle fantasy world. On the way back my partner who loves to fish stopped by the side of the road so we could walk out onto a lake and watch some strangers ice fish. My partner is very out going and this is not the first time we have stopped while in the middle of doing something to meander near a lake and see what size fish someone has caught. It was interesting though a tad dangerous given the thinness ice we were walking on. The men on the lake had these home made contraptions made with wire, corks and flags attached to nets placed in the holes in the ice they made to catch fish. When a fist swims through the net the tail of this device flips up letting the fisherman know he needs to run over to the net and get the fish.
By the time I made way back to work from the trip it was time for me to head home so I could be off to weightlifting then basketball. Weight lifting went smoothly but basketball was a different story. So I show up at the school door to find out its locked. So I sit take out a book and wait 15 minutes before some other kids show up to play. Then the janitor or care keeper of the school comes by inquires why we are standing outside, we explain he says… eh you only have 3 people if you get more ill open the school up for ya. So we wait another 20 minutes, 2 more guys show up and the janitor walks by again, opens it up and tells us we have 2 hours to play then he will come back and lock up. Given the kids are on school vacation I think the janitor and we proceed inside. We finally get in the gym to realize all the balls are locked up in a separate closet which of course we don’t’ have the key for. Dangit! So we play volleyball with some cloth ball thing sit around an watch one of the kids do flips and grab moves off the walls and make our way home after about an hour.
Wednesday, had work, actually stayed in the office for the full 4 hours then off to play with kids at the center. Normal day at the center but I was introduced to that little kid who I mentioned earlier who gets abused. The kid looks like he is 5 and after playing him chess I labeled him a child genius. Of course I later find out he is 10 and that instantly makes me feel better about myself and downgrades his mental capacities from genius to smart kid. Anyway after work Farina and her sister wanted to come over and use the internet at my house and the little boys house is on the way so he followed us. He came inside and continued to play games with me while they checked their mail. Because he doesn’t get to eat very much we bought him so food at the store and sent him on his way home.
The next day so Thursday I went to play with the kids at the center after workout by passing basketball all together until after Christmas vacation is over and hung out playing cards. Any who the boy follows me home again, my host mom serves us lunch/dinner given its now 4pm and then I let him use my computer to play computer games. After that I walked him home. He basically walked me to his home because I was utterly lost. It was really dark outside and I went to a part of town I had never been. After losing my guide I quickly realized I only thought I knew where I was and as I proceeded to walk in the direction I thought was house. So after some time getting lost I decided to go another direction… then another… I was lost, directionless, and cold… it was like 15 degrees F outside and I had not prepared to walk around for 2 hours. Lucky for me I had my trusty Yak Tracks on ( these are if I haven’t mentioned lime green glow in the dark attachment cleats for boots on the ice… did I mention lime green? They are horrible for cultural integration given everybody just looks at u like your freakin nuts here. The previous group of volunteers were given black ones… a much saner color but for some reason they thought we needed the added safety aspect of glow in the dark to completely make them unwearable unless we wanted to be ridiculed and labeled “not from moldova” on ourselves. ). They work great on the ice and I was lucky to have them. I found my way eventually and vowed never to walk around in the dark in places I have never been again, unless I am properly equipped.
Friday went smoothly as I guess it could. Because it was the last day of the week of work before we have a week off for the holiday’s we had to celebrate at work of course. I had no idea what was going to happen, but I went to work prepared with a gift for the office. I went to a random store of the side of the street and purchased some vodka for the office to go along with a calendar purchased in America with pictures of Kansas. The funny thing about this calendar is that the pictures are unbelievable. They are beautiful, with pictures of waterfalls… lakes… amazing rock formations… places I have never been or seen but it sure makes Kansas look way more amazing then it is but whatever. I go to the office, sit down and translate for a couple hours until im invited upstairs to some random office I had never been before. There I sit with the head people in the agriculture industry for my Rayon. The party started with this women dressed up like … I dunno kinda like santa clause but with Pajamas on. She only spoke Russian but seemed happy enough. She got people dancing around and the preached to us all about something that I couldn’t follow. After that we all sat down and ate. There was a big spread of food, of course I forgot my camera… but it was good. Knowing I was going to be going to the Children’s center later that day I laid off the drinking as much as I could. It was funny there were about 25 of us in all and a good 15 of them gave toasts explaining their hopes for next year.
I felt like I was in the mafia hanging out with this people… I dunno why but it just the appearance of higher society… above the law kind of stuff. For example the personal driver for the president of Agriculture in the Rayon was being given drinks in which he refused of course, but the mere thought of him drinking was alarming. Mainly because unlike America where I think you can legally have one beer then drive here if you have any type of drink and drive you are arrested hands down. I expressed this concern my partner and he looked at me like I was crazy saying.. hes the driver for the agriculture boss… the police can’t touch him…. anywho between every toast you were required to drink the vodka or wine or whatever you had in your cup. Not wanting to drink or get hammered I just acted like I was drinking it or sipping the vodka in very small increments which is gross and not fun to do. I got some shit from the guys around me but I explained to them im working with kids whos parents are alcoholics and some of them abuse their kids and it wouldn’t look good for me to be drunk and then to go play with them. They seemed to understand and stopped pressuring me. I gave a toast in English and Romanian Apologizing for my inability to speak Russian but they understood. After that, spent some time at the center with the kids and finished off the night listening to music and Rocky 6.
Saturday I spent running errands with other peace corps volunteers who came in to my city to get some things done. We developed some pictures, shopped the market and ate at the local bar. Two things happened this day in the course of an hour that made me feel like an idiot. The first was walking around the market where a police man very friendly like grabbed me and asked me if I would come with him. now im nervous because I am leagal in this country as of 3 days ago but I need to go to chisnau and get my document that says this. Until then all I have is an expired passport. He kept telling me not to worry and not to be afraid and he seemed very reassuring. What the hell I thought, im caught ill go with him maybe he’ll go for a bribe. I go with him he asks me to stand on a chair and look at some electrical box. For him… ok I get up on the chair find some money on top of it ask him if that’s what he wanted he says no and explains he wants me to read it. Its in Russian.. this guy doesn’t know Russian and he thinks im Russian! Haha! I tell him sorry man I don’t understand Russian and he looks at me like im crazy and asks me what language I speak cause im not from here. I say I speak English and he laughs with his friend and send me on my way. .. I was confused.. nervous.. but utterly relieved after the fact.
So not more then 30 mintues after I go to this restaurant, sit down get my menu sit for a bit trying to decide what I want to eat. Realize across from my table there are three guys all getting up to leave and one leaves his hat. I jump up grab the hat and follow the guys outside saying here did u leave ur hat? They look at me like im freakin nuts… tell me something in Russian..i take that as its not thiers… so I walk back inside.. this waiter looks at me like im nuts… I put the hat back. Then after about 1 minute it clicks.. they aren’t done eating they are just taking a smoking break… and about 2 min later they all come back in… I felt like such an idiot. The waiter laughed at me. Sigh.
Also last night Saturday night… I met my host sister who lives in America with her husband and their son. And my host brother who lives in Chisinau. They all came in and we all ate together. It was a great meal, and I volunteered to do the dishes so they could spend time catching up and what not. That about finishes up this week I think. This next week is the new years and vacation week from work. So I will have to find stuff to keep myself occupied.
Happy new year.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Monday, December 24, 2007
Merry Christmas
I just wrote an entry yesterday so I will not elaborate more, and my next entry will be in a week or so I hope. I added a video of what I did today. Video link to the right. Christmas2007
Thank you Grandma June/Sac for my Christmas Gifts :-)
Merry Christmas, Happy New Year
Sunday, December 23, 2007
let is snow
12.23.2007 14:30
This is the park i walk through every day to work. Beautiful.
Another exhausting week of “work”. This week was as the first sentence suggest exhausting. It went by ridiculously fast, and now I find my self trying to remember all that happened. Since Tuesday. Much less the same as the week before to be perfectly boring. Spent my mornings at work with the agriculture NGO. That went smoothly without any real problems. I do recall one day where I was the only one in the office for a couple of hours having the pressure of answering the phone and letting people know I was here nobody else was and where they were if they really needed to speak with them.
Answering the phone is horribly difficult. I have good days and bad days at this and more often then not I am nervous the whole time and can’t understand what is being said on the phone. There is no miming, there is no… oh he’s an American and has been here a short time… nope they expect to be talking with an organization that can speak to them and respond well. I have had a few calls where I repeated poftim? Or the equivalent of im sorry what did u say? Then we both hung up in confusion. Just like my language days are good and bad so are my phone conversations.
Any who I had a really good day on the phone. I answered 3 calls and understood what was going on and answered appropriately. I left completely satisfied with my work for the day knowing that I let the three callers know that I was the only one in the office, where other members of the office were, and sent them off with have a great day :-).
Also I got a handle of some completed projects my organization has done in the past. In it are the proposal for the project, the budget and why it is important. I found it interesting and I was glad to finally have somewhat of a vague idea of what I have gotten myself into working over here. I also was told that in the spring life will pick up and I will be out of the office a lot staying longer then 4 hour days. This is good news but it also means that I will have to sacrifice days at the children center and possibly weightlifting class. But I will see if I can find ways to work some of both in.
At the children’s center they days went by fast. My german counter part brought in a severely annoying card game from Germany that involves a bell in the middle of the table and the ringing of the bell when certain matches come about. It is now the cause of little Russian speaking kids yelling and excitement over there and helps break the monotony of playing the card game Solo which is the german equivalent to uno in the states. Its starting to get cold. I dunno why I decided to write that but its true. It was -10 Celsius this morning and I was thoroughly aware that I was in the northern part of moldova.
Also I bought a bag of cookies for the kids at the center for a snack to go along with their bread and jam they eat. I came in put the bag next to the other food forgot about and went about my day. I found out 2 days later that those cookies had not been touched because they didn’t know who brought them and I wasn’t there to ask if I had so they assume it was the directors cookies and thought nothing else of it. So I cleared that matter up after I found out the misunderstanding and we all had a good laugh about the whole thing.
Did laundry this week, and cleaned my room like a fiend. Lucky for me this new host family is just as passionate as my old host family and Friday I was given my lesson on how to clean my room properly by my host dad. I helped of course, beating the carpets outside with this tennis racket looking object then mopping the floor to make sure to kill any piece of dust that showed its ugly head in my room. Its pretty clean in here. Pretty clean.
This week in basketball I had a good time with my weightlifting guys who came to join in on the fun. They are horribly under practiced, given their school doest have a coach or the opportunity to play afterschool over there. I brought them up to speed with the basics and laughed heartily as they attempted to play. There was a fun unfair of rookies vs regulars where they rookies were stomped 32 to 6 in a 20 min game. I of course stepped in to play full time defense under the basket for the rookies and proudly evened the game out. Also at weight lifting we were able to really get in some great workouts. They were near to tears after a few exercises and I managed to work up a real sweat as well, something I have needed for a while. They are a good group of boys and I am counting on taking them with some other kids and starting a community action club so they can start addressing issues they feel they can correct in their community. The plan is to meet once a week, with a project and then have them do it, meet the following week and discuss and critique. Of course who knows when this will happen. I will need to wait till the holidays are over so at least a month, and my language skills have increased ever so slightly.
This weekend was fun. I met up with some other volunteers and just hung out speaking English and swapping stories. You need those breaks, to just escape sometimes and I am rejuvenated, though I am in need of some sleep as is the normal repercussion of hanging out with volunteers you haven’t seen in a while and there is catching up to be done.
Ok so now im sitting I my spick and span room, getting ready to settle down and relax after a long week, with little free time and enjoy it thoroughly. I will talk to my family tonight on the web cam and to what is my understanding my grandma june will be joining in on the conversation, so I am looking forward to tonight.
Christmas is Jan. 7th so I will not be celebrating it on the 25th like all of you in America but I will be thinking about you. They have put a great big Christmas tree in the center of town here and decorated it all up. I will get a picture of it this week and post it soon. My host families son from Chisinau and daughter who is living I America now with her husband and their son will be staying with us starting next weekend for 2 weeks for the holidays and my site mate comes back this week so the fun will only increase as time goes by here.
Also Moldova was in the new York times for those of you who missed it:
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-moldova-christmas.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
a kuna ma ta ta
12:16:2007 20:19
One week down, many more to go. Quick preview what this entry is about, another good week. Worked with the kids, taught weightlifting, now we have a program, recruited two more boys. Learning to knit soon, going to get materials tomorrow. Meeting with director of children’s center to talk about a grant project because the are hurting severely on money. Translation work at work is going smoother, starting to enjoy translating and learning about agriculture in moldova which is a key step in learning the language and being useful at work. My partner had his gate stolen because of some holiday. Im learning Russian now on top of Romanian because it just makes more sense that way. Don’t’ know what to do about child abuse here. Going to begin a entrepreneur club in the next 6 months. Will start it as a “what is next” club to help solve community problems or just create things for the community that kids come up with. From there I will map out the community, assess the assets it has, what it is capable of doing, and how to improve things. I really hope to get the kids involved starting some type of business or service, raising the money and then making it sustainable. Starting to get pretty excited about that possibility. But that will only happen when my language skills are better and I can find kinds with an interest in it. I have located a pretty group of kids out of basketball and weight lifting class and most of the kids I have worked with at the high school seem eager to do something so I am lucky in that aspect.
I talked with Farina about this idea, the volunteer from Germany and she is on board to help and donate time when she has it. I will hopefully begin drawing a map of the community this week or next. I have been slacking on going to visit the mayors office but I will hopefully find time soon and get some maps and other information about the city if possible from them.
Work at the agriculture NGO is going well. I am meeting people, I am talking when I can, and I am keeping on tracking doing some much needed studying of the language. I am making some headway on the grammar. After studying for the last three days I now have a better grasp of what my language teacher was attempting to teach me. I made the call to end tutoring with that tutor until after the new year because I had no idea where she was coming from and I needed to do some studying on my own to try to understand what exactly she was trying to teach me. She doesn’t speak English so explaining the grammar gets tricky.
This past week was really busy. My new schedule makes me feel like I am doing something but it is also wearing me out. My colleagues give me pats on the back and smile a lot telling me molodetets ( that’s how its spelled but how you say it in English which means well done, bravo in Russian). From what I have understood from my other friends in the Peace Corps is that I am doing quite a bit. They are for the most part stuck in the work rut, working for a few hours going to tutoring 4 hours a week and reading books. That’s not all but that’s what I think I would be stuck doing also had luck not fallen my way. I was lucky to have a site mate who has been here for a year who got met started with the coaching, then I lucked into being able to teach weight lifting class, then as luck would have it I met a German volunteer at a bar who works with kids and I am allowed to work over there.
From what I understand that organization is fairly progressive and there are other projects I can launch with them, or get involved with other programs they have going on to get that feeling of accomplishment going on for myself which can be sometimes the hardest part about the peace corps. I have a good launch pad to begin from and I am grateful for it.
On other note my partner had is gat stolen. He comes into work says good morning to me then about 10 minutes later tells us in the office that he has to leave work because some local boys stole his gate. Every house has a wall and a gate, and when I heard this I became concerned. Then I realized how heavy these gates were and became confused on to why anybody would steal one. Then I inquired as to why they stole his gate and he said because he had a daughter as if this explains everything… he later did … because of some holiday if you have a daughter local boys will steal your fence and hide it. Long story short he found his gate 5 hours later after searching the city for it. It was next door in the neighbors garden behind their house.
Workout at the gym is going well. I recruited some more boys to begin the program that I drew up for them. Spent more time then I should have figuring out a correct split for them with the excercises they should do and the set amounts. They were all very grateful as am I because I love doing that kind of stuff. Last week I spent the time in the gym last week basically going over how to do the exercise correctly instructing each boy how to do them correctly. It did kinda waste an entire week of workout for them and me but it ill be worth it in the long run. Today we had a great workout and they are grasping the concept of doing a exercise correctly though can be harder is more beneficial for them. I had them squirming in pain from the intensity on some new exercises they had never seen before. They were all laughing about how tough it was, and extremely happy to have the instruction. I also invited those boys to play basketball because of how fun they are to teach and eager to learn. We had a great practice. Not much of a turn out for on the boys side so I was able to give some personal help on technique and that the weight lifting boys really needed. The girls had a fair showing and did a great job today as well.
I went to Chisinau this weekend to go to a seminar and visit my old host family. It was great. I brought another volunteer to stay over at the house with me and we all had a great time eating rabbit drinking a little bit of wine and talking about life in general. It was so nice, my host grandmother came up along with my dads sister and another relative I couldn’t place. The neighbors came over as well to say hi and have a bite to eat. It was quite the wonderful reunion, and the next day before I had to catch my bus back to my town I live in now we all played cards and just sat around enjoying a Sunday.
Monday … yesterday, was a good day. I got to go to the center and play with the kids. Played a little chess, and dominated! That’s right I beat up on some kids in chess. I am horrible, but I have started practicing against the computer on my laptop on easy and winning about 7 out of 10 times ;-) which is horrible because my strategy is basically an eye for an eye wildling down my opponents attacking pieces knowing the game get simpler when you only have a couple of pawns maybe a bishop and a knight to attack each other with. But what are you gonna do right? I also had a sad conversation about a kid that doesn’t come to center anymore because of abusive parents. She mentioned how fun he was to have around, but his parents are both drunks, and his mother won’t let him come anymore for whatever reason. He would come to the center with horrible marks on him. The police won’t do anything about it because I haven’t gotten a firm answer on this but I think they are either A) lazy, B) underpaid, C) corrupt, D) all the above. I am going to say D. I have heard horror stories about people reporting people dead and the police not even caring. Anyways the boy stopped coming the center about 3 weeks ago but is known to still go to school. I am going to inquire to peace corps what is the procedure in handling this, given the police are unresponsive. I fear the worst in the answer to just do nothing. It is a rough thing to grasp, but it is common place here where they people are poor, alcoholism is rampid and people take out their frustrations on the weak.
Ok… im tired. Need to sleep. Gnight.
kyle
One week down, many more to go. Quick preview what this entry is about, another good week. Worked with the kids, taught weightlifting, now we have a program, recruited two more boys. Learning to knit soon, going to get materials tomorrow. Meeting with director of children’s center to talk about a grant project because the are hurting severely on money. Translation work at work is going smoother, starting to enjoy translating and learning about agriculture in moldova which is a key step in learning the language and being useful at work. My partner had his gate stolen because of some holiday. Im learning Russian now on top of Romanian because it just makes more sense that way. Don’t’ know what to do about child abuse here. Going to begin a entrepreneur club in the next 6 months. Will start it as a “what is next” club to help solve community problems or just create things for the community that kids come up with. From there I will map out the community, assess the assets it has, what it is capable of doing, and how to improve things. I really hope to get the kids involved starting some type of business or service, raising the money and then making it sustainable. Starting to get pretty excited about that possibility. But that will only happen when my language skills are better and I can find kinds with an interest in it. I have located a pretty group of kids out of basketball and weight lifting class and most of the kids I have worked with at the high school seem eager to do something so I am lucky in that aspect.
I talked with Farina about this idea, the volunteer from Germany and she is on board to help and donate time when she has it. I will hopefully begin drawing a map of the community this week or next. I have been slacking on going to visit the mayors office but I will hopefully find time soon and get some maps and other information about the city if possible from them.
Work at the agriculture NGO is going well. I am meeting people, I am talking when I can, and I am keeping on tracking doing some much needed studying of the language. I am making some headway on the grammar. After studying for the last three days I now have a better grasp of what my language teacher was attempting to teach me. I made the call to end tutoring with that tutor until after the new year because I had no idea where she was coming from and I needed to do some studying on my own to try to understand what exactly she was trying to teach me. She doesn’t speak English so explaining the grammar gets tricky.
This past week was really busy. My new schedule makes me feel like I am doing something but it is also wearing me out. My colleagues give me pats on the back and smile a lot telling me molodetets ( that’s how its spelled but how you say it in English which means well done, bravo in Russian). From what I have understood from my other friends in the Peace Corps is that I am doing quite a bit. They are for the most part stuck in the work rut, working for a few hours going to tutoring 4 hours a week and reading books. That’s not all but that’s what I think I would be stuck doing also had luck not fallen my way. I was lucky to have a site mate who has been here for a year who got met started with the coaching, then I lucked into being able to teach weight lifting class, then as luck would have it I met a German volunteer at a bar who works with kids and I am allowed to work over there.
From what I understand that organization is fairly progressive and there are other projects I can launch with them, or get involved with other programs they have going on to get that feeling of accomplishment going on for myself which can be sometimes the hardest part about the peace corps. I have a good launch pad to begin from and I am grateful for it.
On other note my partner had is gat stolen. He comes into work says good morning to me then about 10 minutes later tells us in the office that he has to leave work because some local boys stole his gate. Every house has a wall and a gate, and when I heard this I became concerned. Then I realized how heavy these gates were and became confused on to why anybody would steal one. Then I inquired as to why they stole his gate and he said because he had a daughter as if this explains everything… he later did … because of some holiday if you have a daughter local boys will steal your fence and hide it. Long story short he found his gate 5 hours later after searching the city for it. It was next door in the neighbors garden behind their house.
Workout at the gym is going well. I recruited some more boys to begin the program that I drew up for them. Spent more time then I should have figuring out a correct split for them with the excercises they should do and the set amounts. They were all very grateful as am I because I love doing that kind of stuff. Last week I spent the time in the gym last week basically going over how to do the exercise correctly instructing each boy how to do them correctly. It did kinda waste an entire week of workout for them and me but it ill be worth it in the long run. Today we had a great workout and they are grasping the concept of doing a exercise correctly though can be harder is more beneficial for them. I had them squirming in pain from the intensity on some new exercises they had never seen before. They were all laughing about how tough it was, and extremely happy to have the instruction. I also invited those boys to play basketball because of how fun they are to teach and eager to learn. We had a great practice. Not much of a turn out for on the boys side so I was able to give some personal help on technique and that the weight lifting boys really needed. The girls had a fair showing and did a great job today as well.
I went to Chisinau this weekend to go to a seminar and visit my old host family. It was great. I brought another volunteer to stay over at the house with me and we all had a great time eating rabbit drinking a little bit of wine and talking about life in general. It was so nice, my host grandmother came up along with my dads sister and another relative I couldn’t place. The neighbors came over as well to say hi and have a bite to eat. It was quite the wonderful reunion, and the next day before I had to catch my bus back to my town I live in now we all played cards and just sat around enjoying a Sunday.
Monday … yesterday, was a good day. I got to go to the center and play with the kids. Played a little chess, and dominated! That’s right I beat up on some kids in chess. I am horrible, but I have started practicing against the computer on my laptop on easy and winning about 7 out of 10 times ;-) which is horrible because my strategy is basically an eye for an eye wildling down my opponents attacking pieces knowing the game get simpler when you only have a couple of pawns maybe a bishop and a knight to attack each other with. But what are you gonna do right? I also had a sad conversation about a kid that doesn’t come to center anymore because of abusive parents. She mentioned how fun he was to have around, but his parents are both drunks, and his mother won’t let him come anymore for whatever reason. He would come to the center with horrible marks on him. The police won’t do anything about it because I haven’t gotten a firm answer on this but I think they are either A) lazy, B) underpaid, C) corrupt, D) all the above. I am going to say D. I have heard horror stories about people reporting people dead and the police not even caring. Anyways the boy stopped coming the center about 3 weeks ago but is known to still go to school. I am going to inquire to peace corps what is the procedure in handling this, given the police are unresponsive. I fear the worst in the answer to just do nothing. It is a rough thing to grasp, but it is common place here where they people are poor, alcoholism is rampid and people take out their frustrations on the weak.
Ok… im tired. Need to sleep. Gnight.
kyle
Monday, December 10, 2007
im happy
12.10.2007 18:07
I am doing really well. I’ll start off this entry with this statement and then end with it after I have explained why.First…
Here is a part of a letter we all got in email from our new Program Training Manager (PTM)
“
Finally…concerning my Peace Corps philosophy, my general belief is that 46 years of Peace Corps has demonstrated to us that there is something magical about a single Volunteer living and working with people in a community. It produces outcomes that are practically not reproducible through any other means. By living and working alongside people, Volunteers come to understand people in a way that is significantly more important than studying development data, attending meetings in capital cities, spending large sums of money, or reading countless sociological, economic, and historical texts about a country. It also demonstrate to the people with whom Volunteers' work that their lives, their communities, and their work is important…so important that the United States Government sent a person half way around the world to work with them. At the same time, Peace Corps is able to assist people in a way that big development groups with huge budgets can never do. Volunteers serve people where they work…in their offices…in their fields…in their classrooms…in their clinics and where they live…in their homes…in their parks…on their streets…even in their bars, hangouts, and discos. Using organizational development parlance…this is Peace Corps' niche…sending Volunteers to communities to work, often one-on-one, on community-based development. To achieve this good work, though, Volunteers must commit to working and really living (not just existing…not just being) in their communities. Of course, Volunteers also do great work using project funding, working at the national and even occasionally international levels, but this great work normally stems from the great work that the Volunteers first started on a small scale in their community and grew into larger initiatives over time. This commitment to community, incidentally, is also the primary mechanism through which Volunteers work toward fulfillment of Peace Corps' second and third goals.
“
I’ll start with how my day went today. I woke this morning after planning the night before that I would go for a run… successfully. I last dream I had before I woke up was me back in America going to a gym with my jump rope and gloves ready to hit the bag and do cardio for at least 2 hours. The gym in my dream was phenomenal, funny thing was the entire dream was me trying to get into the gym because my card wouldn’t scan. At the end of the dream I had gotten in and was walking into the locker room with the intense feeling of adrenaline I normally get when I walk into a gym preparing to have a great workout… so my alarm goes off at this point and I wake up with that feeling. Which was great because I jumped right up out of bed and had a great workout. I went out to the stadium and did laps around the “track” where the goats feed and pull-ups and pushups, some shadow boxing, lunges, speed rope and finished feeling complete. Anyway, it was really really dark when I woke up, the rabid dogs were roaming around town at this time so I had my guard on the whole time, and had only one attempt to take me on where upon I had to take to the form of the “alpha male” and stare it down and puff up until it let me pass. ( it scared the crap out of me ;-) ) after that my day was normal except that it started with a shower. I went to work, then met up with a german girl who I will later describe and went to this after school house that lets younger kids who lost their parents, or parents are off in another country working sending money home. That was a good time, the kids were insanely energetic … but they are kids :-). I talked with the supervisor over there for a while, she was very good with speaking to me and teaching me so I think I will use her as another tutor. Maybe do an hour with her then an hour with the Romanian teacher. I will now be going there to hang out and play with the kids every Monday, Wednesday, Friday after I get off “work” (also known as sitting in the office translating children’s books). So that excites me greatly. I wanted to get involved working with kids and this gives me a chance to organize activities and just play games. New schedule is… Monday, Wednesday, Friday work 8-12, eat, tutor, play with kids till 5. Tuesday, Thursday, work 9-1, train at the gym 2-3 coach basketball 4-8. Saturday, Sunday off :-).
This last week was the repeat of the previous week. Except I coached basket ball by my self without my site mate because she is in America vacationing with her family for Christmas. It went well and the kids listened to me. I feel like a dork but I used that good American know how and went on the internet to find some basketball drills and games so I have some knowledge about this sport I have really never competitively played or practiced playing. www.kudda.com has the answers for you if you are ever in that boat. I has videos and plays draw out with verbal instructions on how to coach an array of different sports for free. Wonderful resource. I spent at least 3 hours watching and taking notes and ran 2 successful practice with drills and ideas from that site.
I walked a lot this past week. I walked around the town, was ignored by about 70% of the people I said hello to but that’s better then 100%. I assume if I continue to see the same people and continue to greet them as I pass I can get that number down to 50%. I found a tutor lat week as well. So now I am getting some what of a direction on the language and I have someone to talk to. My tutor is a high school teacher who teaches Romanian as English teachers teach English in America… grammar and such. She doesn’t speak English which makes learning a little difficult but the act of describing a word to me in a language im trying to learn is beneficial. But learning grammar from someone who doesn’t speak English is a nightmare. My brain is throbbing after an hour and last week I was doing 2, 2 hour sessions. I cut that down to 1 hour session now 3 times a week when possible. Like I said I want to utilize that other teacher from the after school program and the kids as much as possible to supplement.
I am getting a phone call every other day from my host mom where I used to live asking how my day was and how im doing and what’s going on with me. I am also trying to write at least every other day how my day went in email and sending to them. I get to go visit them in a week when I travel to the city for some peace corps stuff so that is really exciting.
This weekend went really well. I was able to meet up with some other volunteers who lived nearby to chat and walk around my town. Because im in the center of a larger town called a Rayon they surrounding volunteers will come in a use the big market we have to buy stuff or go the restaurants. It was a nice change of pace seeing some friends and speaking English and laughing about stories and awkward moments we have all shared in experiencing. I feel rejuvenated from that, and now that I have basketball under control, a somewhat routine workout schedule, and a full slate of activities to do on a day to day basis I have centered myself and that will help me be a better volunteer. Alright just as I am about to wrap up I forgot about that German girl. I met her this weekend at a restaurant who was an acquaintance of the neighboring Peace corps volunteer. She has been here for 2 months, one month in the main city learning and 1 month here in my town. She speaks passable English and was great to talk to. She explained what she was doing while she is here working with those children and two disabled children before going to work with the kids every morning.
She is in the European Volunteer program which makes the peace corps and Americans look like a bunch of loonies. The PC is organized and so bureaucratic that we have things like lockdown, limits on when we can leave our sites, we have bosses, we have to notify everybody when we do anything. Her program is her and around 10 other people from around the world where they get an assignment, handed a positive attitude and a little living allowance. She is not given a heater, water distiller, doctor anything. It is really hardcore. I am thankful for the network we have here with the peace corps but sometimes it can be overbearing and controlling. Anyway shes great, invited me to see where she works and now I have a new friend in town to hang out with and another place to work.
And now to go off on a tangent here…
As I am reading the godfather by Mario Puzo, I came across a part where Michael gives his Apollonia a gold necklace. The author described it to be this magnificent gold necklace which is rare for this part of the country in this poor community. As the story progresses a little further I am imagining this girl wearing one of these ridiculous massive one inch think gold chains with a clock hanging from the end like some rapper would wear on a music video and how out of place that must look in a place like that… Then I realized the author never mentioned the size of it… and that It could just as well be a nice thin gold necklace looking entirely proper for the situation. It made me laugh out loud when I realized how ridiculous my imagination was working. I love that book, and I am already sad that I am coming to the end of it, My next package request will include the books following the first book. So I can complete the series.
Ok so I hope I got everything in. I am slackin on the picture updates, I have a bunch, I need to make some slide shows on for youtube…. But im busy…and I haven’t taken any pictures since I have moved to my new site… I will … soon I promise. And I will update my pictures for those of you wanting me to.
Until Next week.
Here is a part of a letter we all got in email from our new Program Training Manager (PTM)
“
Finally…concerning my Peace Corps philosophy, my general belief is that 46 years of Peace Corps has demonstrated to us that there is something magical about a single Volunteer living and working with people in a community. It produces outcomes that are practically not reproducible through any other means. By living and working alongside people, Volunteers come to understand people in a way that is significantly more important than studying development data, attending meetings in capital cities, spending large sums of money, or reading countless sociological, economic, and historical texts about a country. It also demonstrate to the people with whom Volunteers' work that their lives, their communities, and their work is important…so important that the United States Government sent a person half way around the world to work with them. At the same time, Peace Corps is able to assist people in a way that big development groups with huge budgets can never do. Volunteers serve people where they work…in their offices…in their fields…in their classrooms…in their clinics and where they live…in their homes…in their parks…on their streets…even in their bars, hangouts, and discos. Using organizational development parlance…this is Peace Corps' niche…sending Volunteers to communities to work, often one-on-one, on community-based development. To achieve this good work, though, Volunteers must commit to working and really living (not just existing…not just being) in their communities. Of course, Volunteers also do great work using project funding, working at the national and even occasionally international levels, but this great work normally stems from the great work that the Volunteers first started on a small scale in their community and grew into larger initiatives over time. This commitment to community, incidentally, is also the primary mechanism through which Volunteers work toward fulfillment of Peace Corps' second and third goals.
“
I’ll start with how my day went today. I woke this morning after planning the night before that I would go for a run… successfully. I last dream I had before I woke up was me back in America going to a gym with my jump rope and gloves ready to hit the bag and do cardio for at least 2 hours. The gym in my dream was phenomenal, funny thing was the entire dream was me trying to get into the gym because my card wouldn’t scan. At the end of the dream I had gotten in and was walking into the locker room with the intense feeling of adrenaline I normally get when I walk into a gym preparing to have a great workout… so my alarm goes off at this point and I wake up with that feeling. Which was great because I jumped right up out of bed and had a great workout. I went out to the stadium and did laps around the “track” where the goats feed and pull-ups and pushups, some shadow boxing, lunges, speed rope and finished feeling complete. Anyway, it was really really dark when I woke up, the rabid dogs were roaming around town at this time so I had my guard on the whole time, and had only one attempt to take me on where upon I had to take to the form of the “alpha male” and stare it down and puff up until it let me pass. ( it scared the crap out of me ;-) ) after that my day was normal except that it started with a shower. I went to work, then met up with a german girl who I will later describe and went to this after school house that lets younger kids who lost their parents, or parents are off in another country working sending money home. That was a good time, the kids were insanely energetic … but they are kids :-). I talked with the supervisor over there for a while, she was very good with speaking to me and teaching me so I think I will use her as another tutor. Maybe do an hour with her then an hour with the Romanian teacher. I will now be going there to hang out and play with the kids every Monday, Wednesday, Friday after I get off “work” (also known as sitting in the office translating children’s books). So that excites me greatly. I wanted to get involved working with kids and this gives me a chance to organize activities and just play games. New schedule is… Monday, Wednesday, Friday work 8-12, eat, tutor, play with kids till 5. Tuesday, Thursday, work 9-1, train at the gym 2-3 coach basketball 4-8. Saturday, Sunday off :-).
This last week was the repeat of the previous week. Except I coached basket ball by my self without my site mate because she is in America vacationing with her family for Christmas. It went well and the kids listened to me. I feel like a dork but I used that good American know how and went on the internet to find some basketball drills and games so I have some knowledge about this sport I have really never competitively played or practiced playing. www.kudda.com has the answers for you if you are ever in that boat. I has videos and plays draw out with verbal instructions on how to coach an array of different sports for free. Wonderful resource. I spent at least 3 hours watching and taking notes and ran 2 successful practice with drills and ideas from that site.
I walked a lot this past week. I walked around the town, was ignored by about 70% of the people I said hello to but that’s better then 100%. I assume if I continue to see the same people and continue to greet them as I pass I can get that number down to 50%. I found a tutor lat week as well. So now I am getting some what of a direction on the language and I have someone to talk to. My tutor is a high school teacher who teaches Romanian as English teachers teach English in America… grammar and such. She doesn’t speak English which makes learning a little difficult but the act of describing a word to me in a language im trying to learn is beneficial. But learning grammar from someone who doesn’t speak English is a nightmare. My brain is throbbing after an hour and last week I was doing 2, 2 hour sessions. I cut that down to 1 hour session now 3 times a week when possible. Like I said I want to utilize that other teacher from the after school program and the kids as much as possible to supplement.
I am getting a phone call every other day from my host mom where I used to live asking how my day was and how im doing and what’s going on with me. I am also trying to write at least every other day how my day went in email and sending to them. I get to go visit them in a week when I travel to the city for some peace corps stuff so that is really exciting.
This weekend went really well. I was able to meet up with some other volunteers who lived nearby to chat and walk around my town. Because im in the center of a larger town called a Rayon they surrounding volunteers will come in a use the big market we have to buy stuff or go the restaurants. It was a nice change of pace seeing some friends and speaking English and laughing about stories and awkward moments we have all shared in experiencing. I feel rejuvenated from that, and now that I have basketball under control, a somewhat routine workout schedule, and a full slate of activities to do on a day to day basis I have centered myself and that will help me be a better volunteer. Alright just as I am about to wrap up I forgot about that German girl. I met her this weekend at a restaurant who was an acquaintance of the neighboring Peace corps volunteer. She has been here for 2 months, one month in the main city learning and 1 month here in my town. She speaks passable English and was great to talk to. She explained what she was doing while she is here working with those children and two disabled children before going to work with the kids every morning.
She is in the European Volunteer program which makes the peace corps and Americans look like a bunch of loonies. The PC is organized and so bureaucratic that we have things like lockdown, limits on when we can leave our sites, we have bosses, we have to notify everybody when we do anything. Her program is her and around 10 other people from around the world where they get an assignment, handed a positive attitude and a little living allowance. She is not given a heater, water distiller, doctor anything. It is really hardcore. I am thankful for the network we have here with the peace corps but sometimes it can be overbearing and controlling. Anyway shes great, invited me to see where she works and now I have a new friend in town to hang out with and another place to work.
And now to go off on a tangent here…
As I am reading the godfather by Mario Puzo, I came across a part where Michael gives his Apollonia a gold necklace. The author described it to be this magnificent gold necklace which is rare for this part of the country in this poor community. As the story progresses a little further I am imagining this girl wearing one of these ridiculous massive one inch think gold chains with a clock hanging from the end like some rapper would wear on a music video and how out of place that must look in a place like that… Then I realized the author never mentioned the size of it… and that It could just as well be a nice thin gold necklace looking entirely proper for the situation. It made me laugh out loud when I realized how ridiculous my imagination was working. I love that book, and I am already sad that I am coming to the end of it, My next package request will include the books following the first book. So I can complete the series.
Ok so I hope I got everything in. I am slackin on the picture updates, I have a bunch, I need to make some slide shows on for youtube…. But im busy…and I haven’t taken any pictures since I have moved to my new site… I will … soon I promise. And I will update my pictures for those of you wanting me to.
Until Next week.
Saturday, December 1, 2007
"is he prost?, no hes american. Oooh"
12:1:2007 10:03
So it has been a week since I graduated and moved to my permanent site, worked my first full week at my job and experienced more loneliness then I have thus far here in moldova. Of course I am having family withdraws of having to leave my second family who I had grown to enjoy tremendously. My current situation is just different. There are no kids in the house the house is situated to where I have my living space and they have there’s and we meet in the kitchen except it seems I eat alone most of the time because my host father eats earlier then I do to leave for work early in the morning and my mother doesn’t eat… at least I have to see her sit down and eat. So I don’t have the 2 hour dinners and the 1 hour lunches every day chatting it up, I have Russian television to keep me company [let me just tell you its not that comforting, Russian is not exactly the most comforting language to soothe your troubles to rest].
It really is not bad at all. I just want to put out there the differences in my situation and where they are now. My living area is nicer, the bathroom situation is improved (to a point, I miss the outside toilet for weird reasons that im not going to get into on this blog and you will just have to talk to me to hear about that if it is really tearing at your curiosity button… whatever that is). The food is really good. My new host mom loves to cook and is intent on making gain 20 lbs before I leave. I keep telling her she has time to do this but it is if she must make me gain 20lbs by next week. I protest between mouthfuls but she seems determined to succeed. I mentioned to her there was a time when I was eating an enormous amount of food (nearly 8000 calories a day) when I was trying to bulk up for weight lifting and how I didn’t even enjoy food but I think I only managed to challenge her.
Lets see what I have accomplished this week. It really is not much but I blame it on the snow and me needing to adjust to a new location. I found my office that I will be working at. It is about a 20 min fast walk through the haunted forest where the rabid hungry dogs live past the frozen lake and broken down soviet monuments. I wave to Lenin every day as he points past me in to the distance always intent on moving forward. It really is a pretty walk. In the fall I took a lot of pictures because the leaves were colored and the water slowly waving in the lake as the fish ( which I am not allowed to eat for obvious pollution reasons) would swim and enjoy their paradise with the coca cola bottles. There is some very artistic graffiti along this concrete wall that is built bordering the park. They have such things like bart simpson on his skate board saying eat my shorts to tupac with the phrase live by the gun die by the gun. I am glad American influence has reached the hoodlums over here giving them material for their works of art. The trees are all bare now, the lake is frozen and the dogs are hungry. It is still pretty and I have enjoyed the walk everyday on my to and from work.
My work setting is really ideal. From the horror stories I have heard from other volunteers having partners that just leave them alone in the office as they go off and do things without them to partners telling them they are not want they wanted and they just need to go find somewhere else to work mine seem rather pleasant. My routine now is to sit at my desk they set up for me and do whatever I want until I can speak the language. I really am not even required to go into work as my partner told me because my language skills don’t allow me to really function as part of their team just yet but I can do what ever I want. So I come to work every day from 10-2 sit at my desk and translate articles from the month old newspaper they let me have. It is slow and grueling work but it passes the time and it is somewhat constructive. I have a routine where I spend about an hour and a half doing my newspaper work then I spend another hour or so writing my old host family a letter in Romanian that is painfully difficult trying to spell everything correctly with the correct accent marks on the keyboard. In between that I take short breaks have conversations with my partners such as;
“no thank you I don’t want tea.. I know im crazy I just don’t like tea as much as you… I know its good for you but no thanks I had tea with my breakfast that I didn’t want either but my host mom forced me to drink it… yep thanks but no thanks..”
Or
“I am learning Romanian as fast as I can, no I haven’t begun to learn Russian yet… I know it would be very useful but I think I need to get Romanian down first a little better before I confuse myself and begin to learn Russian… give me a year and I will try to learn Russian then..”
Yesterday we had a conference with all of the members of the rayon in attendance. I work in the center of the rayon and there are around 11 or so other smaller villages that report to this rayon for my organization. I was able to meet them all yesterday and stand up introduce myself in my amazingly poor Romanian. They all seemed nice and after our conference we ate meat and cheese and cake with vodka and juice.
A funny thing about my office is that people come in and out all the time. I try to catch who they are but it is difficult and for the most part when people say their names I have no idea what they say. The names are so foreign to me just like when I say my name is kyle they look at me like kyle? They can’t pronounce it just like I can’t pronounce their names and then they say well kyle kind of sounds like colia which is a name I have heard before so I’m going to call you colia. And I am fine with that just like I hope they are happy when I call them by names I can understand for example.. Tacolpilia, Taco :).
Also my favorite quote that I understood was when a gentlemen came into the office and sat down talking in Russian with on of my partners. After about 10 minutes my partner goes into the whole do you want tea routine, I didn’t understand the first time what she said so she repeated a little slower for me and I answered with a negative maybe not with perfect pronunciation but she understood me. The guy looks at my other partner and asks him if I am prost (Prost is the equivalent to village idiot … a little slow in the head). My partner answers no hes not prost hes American. The guy understood with that explanation with an aww just a stupid American and went back to work. I just laughed and continued translating an article on what I have deduced to be about a women who raises chickens and sells them in the big city, really exciting stuff!.
Outside of work I did start coaching basketball with my site mate. She has been here a year and can communicate fairly effectively with the kids so it is not completely impossible to get our points across on what they need to do. Given I have never played organized basketball I am not exactly an ideal coach. But I am tall and they all think I played in America so I know what im doing. I tried my best not to shoot and give away the horrible truth or play with them during there games. That was the first practice how I did things not to give away my credibility. The second day at practice we only had 4 girls show up for practice so Myself and andrea my site mate (that means she is a peace corps volunteer also stationed in the same city) decided we would play so we could make the game 3 on 3. Now I am playing against girls aged anywhere from 15 -17 for all I know and feeling kind of stupid but ill be a sport and play. I got worked. It was me and andrea and another girl vs the two best girls we had that play for the sports school in the city.. whatever that means… and another girl. They were throwing picks on me throwing elbows fade away jump shooting over me … thoroughly humiliating me. But to give myself a little credit I did get a lot of stuffs and I was not playing physical ball. Given I really have no skills in basketball and realy on my size and strength to be a decent rebounder and defensive player they exploited my inability to play physical on them and laughed as stomped us. I think I lost all credibility in terms of being able to teach them something so I am going to have to read up on some drills to help them become better.
On the boys side it was the same story with only 4 boys so exhausted and perspiring andrea and I decided to play some bal with them as well. I did twice as good as I did agains the girls because I could play like a boy and gained a little self respect back along with some sore muscles :).
Also I have locked down a place to lift weights at. I visited this gym 3 different days missing the director who I needed to talk to before being able to workout there. Finally the 4th day I as able to meet up with him and I was given the Tuesday Thursday slot to work out for a hour on both days. I am grateful for anything I can get so I was happy and thanked him. But my two days are the on the same day I play/coach basketball for 4 hours a day which will leave me exhausted and wipe clean anything else I would want to do that day. I don’t care it leaves me exhausted and allows me to get my energy out.
I visited one of the high schools yesterday in order to hopefully find a tutor to help with my language skills. I want to do about 4 hours a week of supplemented help and direction. It was fun walking in to the school randomly finding a teacher stumbling through my question in Romanian and then being pointed in the direction I needed to go to find a teacher. I finally tracked down the teacher who was very nice and patient with me but said she doesn’t have time with the holidays coming up and the amount of papers she needs to grade but I should contact her after the new year. So I have a potential teacher in about a month. I will visit another high school Monday to attempt to start sooner but I am getting the feeling this is the answer I will be getting from everyone.
I want to thank my mother again for sending me my package with my jeans and a couple of shirts and dvds and such. The sweater fits wonderfully and so do the shirts and the jeans. THANK YOU! I received pictures from thanksgiving last week that I missed. Thanks Amy for that, it made me feel like was there for a little bit. Also it was great to see my family via web cam and see my sisters.
Also thank you to all my friends who are sending me emails saying hi keeping me up to date with what is going on in there lives. Love you grandmas who are reading this and anyone else.
Until next time kyle.
So it has been a week since I graduated and moved to my permanent site, worked my first full week at my job and experienced more loneliness then I have thus far here in moldova. Of course I am having family withdraws of having to leave my second family who I had grown to enjoy tremendously. My current situation is just different. There are no kids in the house the house is situated to where I have my living space and they have there’s and we meet in the kitchen except it seems I eat alone most of the time because my host father eats earlier then I do to leave for work early in the morning and my mother doesn’t eat… at least I have to see her sit down and eat. So I don’t have the 2 hour dinners and the 1 hour lunches every day chatting it up, I have Russian television to keep me company [let me just tell you its not that comforting, Russian is not exactly the most comforting language to soothe your troubles to rest].
It really is not bad at all. I just want to put out there the differences in my situation and where they are now. My living area is nicer, the bathroom situation is improved (to a point, I miss the outside toilet for weird reasons that im not going to get into on this blog and you will just have to talk to me to hear about that if it is really tearing at your curiosity button… whatever that is). The food is really good. My new host mom loves to cook and is intent on making gain 20 lbs before I leave. I keep telling her she has time to do this but it is if she must make me gain 20lbs by next week. I protest between mouthfuls but she seems determined to succeed. I mentioned to her there was a time when I was eating an enormous amount of food (nearly 8000 calories a day) when I was trying to bulk up for weight lifting and how I didn’t even enjoy food but I think I only managed to challenge her.
Lets see what I have accomplished this week. It really is not much but I blame it on the snow and me needing to adjust to a new location. I found my office that I will be working at. It is about a 20 min fast walk through the haunted forest where the rabid hungry dogs live past the frozen lake and broken down soviet monuments. I wave to Lenin every day as he points past me in to the distance always intent on moving forward. It really is a pretty walk. In the fall I took a lot of pictures because the leaves were colored and the water slowly waving in the lake as the fish ( which I am not allowed to eat for obvious pollution reasons) would swim and enjoy their paradise with the coca cola bottles. There is some very artistic graffiti along this concrete wall that is built bordering the park. They have such things like bart simpson on his skate board saying eat my shorts to tupac with the phrase live by the gun die by the gun. I am glad American influence has reached the hoodlums over here giving them material for their works of art. The trees are all bare now, the lake is frozen and the dogs are hungry. It is still pretty and I have enjoyed the walk everyday on my to and from work.
My work setting is really ideal. From the horror stories I have heard from other volunteers having partners that just leave them alone in the office as they go off and do things without them to partners telling them they are not want they wanted and they just need to go find somewhere else to work mine seem rather pleasant. My routine now is to sit at my desk they set up for me and do whatever I want until I can speak the language. I really am not even required to go into work as my partner told me because my language skills don’t allow me to really function as part of their team just yet but I can do what ever I want. So I come to work every day from 10-2 sit at my desk and translate articles from the month old newspaper they let me have. It is slow and grueling work but it passes the time and it is somewhat constructive. I have a routine where I spend about an hour and a half doing my newspaper work then I spend another hour or so writing my old host family a letter in Romanian that is painfully difficult trying to spell everything correctly with the correct accent marks on the keyboard. In between that I take short breaks have conversations with my partners such as;
“no thank you I don’t want tea.. I know im crazy I just don’t like tea as much as you… I know its good for you but no thanks I had tea with my breakfast that I didn’t want either but my host mom forced me to drink it… yep thanks but no thanks..”
Or
“I am learning Romanian as fast as I can, no I haven’t begun to learn Russian yet… I know it would be very useful but I think I need to get Romanian down first a little better before I confuse myself and begin to learn Russian… give me a year and I will try to learn Russian then..”
Yesterday we had a conference with all of the members of the rayon in attendance. I work in the center of the rayon and there are around 11 or so other smaller villages that report to this rayon for my organization. I was able to meet them all yesterday and stand up introduce myself in my amazingly poor Romanian. They all seemed nice and after our conference we ate meat and cheese and cake with vodka and juice.
A funny thing about my office is that people come in and out all the time. I try to catch who they are but it is difficult and for the most part when people say their names I have no idea what they say. The names are so foreign to me just like when I say my name is kyle they look at me like kyle? They can’t pronounce it just like I can’t pronounce their names and then they say well kyle kind of sounds like colia which is a name I have heard before so I’m going to call you colia. And I am fine with that just like I hope they are happy when I call them by names I can understand for example.. Tacolpilia, Taco :).
Also my favorite quote that I understood was when a gentlemen came into the office and sat down talking in Russian with on of my partners. After about 10 minutes my partner goes into the whole do you want tea routine, I didn’t understand the first time what she said so she repeated a little slower for me and I answered with a negative maybe not with perfect pronunciation but she understood me. The guy looks at my other partner and asks him if I am prost (Prost is the equivalent to village idiot … a little slow in the head). My partner answers no hes not prost hes American. The guy understood with that explanation with an aww just a stupid American and went back to work. I just laughed and continued translating an article on what I have deduced to be about a women who raises chickens and sells them in the big city, really exciting stuff!.
Outside of work I did start coaching basketball with my site mate. She has been here a year and can communicate fairly effectively with the kids so it is not completely impossible to get our points across on what they need to do. Given I have never played organized basketball I am not exactly an ideal coach. But I am tall and they all think I played in America so I know what im doing. I tried my best not to shoot and give away the horrible truth or play with them during there games. That was the first practice how I did things not to give away my credibility. The second day at practice we only had 4 girls show up for practice so Myself and andrea my site mate (that means she is a peace corps volunteer also stationed in the same city) decided we would play so we could make the game 3 on 3. Now I am playing against girls aged anywhere from 15 -17 for all I know and feeling kind of stupid but ill be a sport and play. I got worked. It was me and andrea and another girl vs the two best girls we had that play for the sports school in the city.. whatever that means… and another girl. They were throwing picks on me throwing elbows fade away jump shooting over me … thoroughly humiliating me. But to give myself a little credit I did get a lot of stuffs and I was not playing physical ball. Given I really have no skills in basketball and realy on my size and strength to be a decent rebounder and defensive player they exploited my inability to play physical on them and laughed as stomped us. I think I lost all credibility in terms of being able to teach them something so I am going to have to read up on some drills to help them become better.
On the boys side it was the same story with only 4 boys so exhausted and perspiring andrea and I decided to play some bal with them as well. I did twice as good as I did agains the girls because I could play like a boy and gained a little self respect back along with some sore muscles :).
Also I have locked down a place to lift weights at. I visited this gym 3 different days missing the director who I needed to talk to before being able to workout there. Finally the 4th day I as able to meet up with him and I was given the Tuesday Thursday slot to work out for a hour on both days. I am grateful for anything I can get so I was happy and thanked him. But my two days are the on the same day I play/coach basketball for 4 hours a day which will leave me exhausted and wipe clean anything else I would want to do that day. I don’t care it leaves me exhausted and allows me to get my energy out.
I visited one of the high schools yesterday in order to hopefully find a tutor to help with my language skills. I want to do about 4 hours a week of supplemented help and direction. It was fun walking in to the school randomly finding a teacher stumbling through my question in Romanian and then being pointed in the direction I needed to go to find a teacher. I finally tracked down the teacher who was very nice and patient with me but said she doesn’t have time with the holidays coming up and the amount of papers she needs to grade but I should contact her after the new year. So I have a potential teacher in about a month. I will visit another high school Monday to attempt to start sooner but I am getting the feeling this is the answer I will be getting from everyone.
I want to thank my mother again for sending me my package with my jeans and a couple of shirts and dvds and such. The sweater fits wonderfully and so do the shirts and the jeans. THANK YOU! I received pictures from thanksgiving last week that I missed. Thanks Amy for that, it made me feel like was there for a little bit. Also it was great to see my family via web cam and see my sisters.
Also thank you to all my friends who are sending me emails saying hi keeping me up to date with what is going on in there lives. Love you grandmas who are reading this and anyone else.
Until next time kyle.
Saturday, November 24, 2007
now i am a PCV
11.24.2007 14:33
Picture update:
This is the family there on the top left. That’s Stephan, tudor, veronica, and mama Maria. To the right of that is at the closing ceremony below that to the left is me and and my father with tudor in the middle before I went to the nunta. To the right of that is breakfast the morning I left. That’s rabbit in the middle with some meast on the right and placenta to the left of that. Heaven on a table right there ;-) . below that to the left is at the ceremony and then to the right of that is my two good friends phil and Jessica on our walk.
It has happened.
Tuesday was amazing. Last full day living with my host family and it ended better then I could have imagined. Ok so I had my language assessment that morning at 8am. That was really early for me to get my brain in romanain mode and I was not really in gear for the test but I did it and its over. I have a feeling its for our teachers more then its of us to give them feedback on how well they taught us because from my perspective it is impossible for anyone to fail.
Right after completing the test I went on a 3 hour hike around the town as a kind of farewell. We walked places i had not been before but always wanted to hike. It was beautiful. In the inclusion of the sentence I am talking about the weather, the landscapes, the conversations I had with my friends, but excluding most of the pictures I took.
Phil and I had a great time taking pictures of ourselves in mid air poses with scenery in the back ground as if we are snow skiing of ramps pulling off grab moves like a couple of 8 year olds. I did manage to get jess involved but only slightly. Stephen had nothing to do with this small tribute to our less mature years (though I have yet to grow up and those actions accurately portray my current state of maturity). I have a couple of pictures of the event, one of which is now the wallpaper on my computer and facebook picture. Nobody really gets it but I think it looks cool, (Moldovan people that have witnessed the pictures clearly state “nu inteleg” or I don’t understand).
After the walk I spent time packing up all of the things I own into my suit cases and then walked around the house talking to my mom waiting for my host brother and sister to come home. Im throwing host brother and sister in there now because now that I am not living with them ( I will get further into the fact that im writing from my new house later) its just sad to think of them as my brother and sister who I no longer live with. I ate lunch with my parents and grandma. We had delicious rabbit and an assortment of other items. Of course I was instructed to get my drink on because it was my last day and I had yet to get drunk with the family at our house. I have a few glasses of wine finished packing just in time for my brother and sister to come home.
As I was sitting inside I realized my host dad had begun cutting all of that small forest we had piled next to the house with a borrowed… rented… don’t really know the story with the chain saw. I went outside to help but was greeted with a no way go back inside and have a good time. I insisted by just helping anyway where ever I could getting in the way when I could until they included me. They told my jacket would get way to dirty so I was given one of my dads work coats (my favorite one in fact that I secretly wished he would give to me, it is this tan color and it could well be 20 years old with a Moldova patch in Russian and some other words I can’t make out yet).
We began working with a glass of wine and about every hour we had another one. We probably cut wood for 3 hours before we finnaly finished thoroughly dehydrated from the wine and the physical activity but feeling good that it was over. We all thoroughly wallowed in self pity equally about the pain in our backs and the hunger in our stomach in which my mom should have prepared by then. Haha I’m not going to lie I was feeling pretty manly by that point with the jacket and the sawdust everywhere with a small buzz from the wine and the praise for a job well done by my bad ass father. (I love you more dad in America don’t worry :-) ). By this time my (ok this will get confusing but ill try to explain it to ya by calling him Johnny his name of course) new host father from my new site Johnny who was coming to pick up my luggage to take to their house in the north. I quickly told him where our house was .. (that’s right talked to him on the phone without gestures in Romanian) ok.. it wasn’t quickly but I got the job done. I loaded up the van just in time for my old family to meet my new host dad and there was this instant invite to come inside and eat and talk about me. So it happened. We merged families and my fathers and I with my old host fathers best friend and work partner and my new dad’s driver all sat around a tiny little table with rabbit and chicken and salad and a lot of wine. We laughed we talked we patted each other on the backs we Tim Taylored it up ( from the tv show home improvement “o orah ah ah” grunting and all that other manly stuff) .
After that we said our goodbyes my old dad sent my new dad off with 6 bottles of wine and a promise that I would spend new years with them. It was a great time and a great transition for me that my parents knew my new host parents and they approved and in a way it settled my mom down a little about her anxiety of my leaving the safety of their home. At this point it was near 11 pm and I was exhausted sleepy from the wine and all of the labor. I stumbled upstairs to get my presents for my family as a kind of going away gift.
I came down set it down next to them and said here ya go I bought these for you because you have been so great to me. My brother grabbed his present (the mp3 player and went to work getting it to work right away with excitement.) but my sister and mother looked really confused like what? My sister flipped through the phone and the hair dryer and her straighter that I had bought and just asked me why would I do this. They didn’t seem all that excited but more in shock like what do you want from us in exchange for this. I told them again and again its because of how great they treated me and that I could afford to give them these gifts. I wanted to give them these gifts and I didn’t want anything for it but liked giving gifts when I can. They said thank you but it was still awkward like I thought it was going to be but I don’t care im glad I did it. I went to sleep shortly after that.
That next morning I woke up early to eat breakfast with the family before my brother and sister went to school. My mom set out an amazing breakfast with rabbit and other meats and even a cake for my going away breakfast. I was so stunned and amazed. My dad rolled out of bed and participated even though I know he doesn’t eat breakfast and would have rather been sleeping. At the close of it my sister ran out of the room and my mom began to cry and left as well. My brother just shook my hand and smiled. I tracked down my sister and mother told them to stop crying because I wanted a picture of the whole family before I left. Got them together and then snapped the picture. Soon after that I made my way to chisnau to begin a new adventure.
I am getting tired of typing and its my own fault for not writing more each day and saving it all up for a big wrap up. I will be more concise for now on but I wanted to explain my magical goodbye experience though I know I missed some stuff but im ok with it if you are. Chisinau was Chisinau ( oh wait I have to stop im going to a birthday party I will finish this later. Sorry J)
And so it is later. The time is now 20:36 and I have had a few shots of vodka in my system but I have survived. Chisinau like I said was Chisinau. It’s a big city I stayed in a horrible hotel I was able to talk to all my friends for one last time before leaving for our sites and that was that. On a more detailed level we were sworn in as official peace corps volunteers I broke in my dress shoes by walking no less then 4 miles in them as I walked around the city. That sounds like a good thing except by the time the ceremony was over I was limping and flinching in pain as my heels began to bleed inside my socks. Luckily I was walking with some friends and I was able to switch shoes with one of the nice girls I was walking with (her shoes did not have a back and she had big feet :-) .
After that I said goodbye to my friends and mother and host sister who came to the ceremony to watch me graduate. It was a little emotional but less then me leaving the house. I was able to get to my house alright on the routerea with my site mate and that about covers that day. Once I got to my new house I ate a small meal then went to bed. Yesterday is kind of a blur… let me remember here.. ok I woke up unpacked all my stuff went to the piatza ( or large market where there are a bunch of vendors selling everything from batteries to high class clothes)
i don't know if i should complain about this but my family is entirely too normal. my room is spacious, clean, warm given i have my own soba heated by gas and my dad is the director of the gas in the city so im not sure if we don't pay for it or if he is just loaded because they keep coming in my room telling me that its too cold in my room and according to the temperature gauge they have here its at a nice 70 degrees. my mom keeps coming in and turning it up. i have a steady wireless connection where i found out im going to be paying 250 lei a month for but im am completely alright with that.
my walks have consisted of me walking down the main drag to visit our amazing large piatza and spending money. bought some track pants, slippers and some flowers for a birthday party im going to tonight. i have yet to meet the partner here but i think im supposed to go to work on monday.
i witnessed red squirrels with what looks to be ears or a frow coming up off of thier heads but my host mom was freaking out with delight when she pointed them out for me.
that’s about all i have. house is too normal, food is too good, i am waiting for it to all come crashing down around me at any point now.
I guess I should talk now about how that birthday party was. Ill be brief but it was kind of humerous and a little sad. I still am not sure exactly who this person was that was having the birthday but that matters not. The family seemed to know this person very well and she was going to be heading to Canada to be with her husband in less then one month. I bought her a boquite of flowers as I was instructed that would be an apporpiate gift and headed off to the party with my host mom, dad, and new host brother. I met most of of my mothers side of the family. It was a good time except my language skills were severly tested. Because people at the talbe did not know romanain. I am in the northern part of the country where there is a large Russian influence. So get this as I sat at the dinner table with everyone my host dad was translating the Russian they were all speaking into romanain. It was the craziest experience for me because I was understanding a lot more then you would think I would. Maybe it was because I hear all of this language that makes no sense at all to me (Russian) then its translated into a language that I have more of a comprehension of and add to that vodka to smooth out the brain cells and for some reason make everything clear. I think they gave me more credit then I deserved for understanding but never the less I felt like I was not completely lost during that crazy time and I came back survived and have a positive attidude about my language in the future.
I also think that it will be a good idea if I learn Russian seeing how it is the primary language anywhere that one person speaks Russian. The scenario is everyone in the room speaks romanain, but they also speak Russian. One person walks into the room that does not know romanain so everyone speaks Russian so everyone understands. Only problem with this is that Russian is like 5 times as hard as Romanian and I need to get romanain down before even trying Russian or else I will just get really confused. Oh geez.
On the plus side I have internet 24/7 so I will be able to chat it up with anyone with a aim, msn, or skype account.
Let me know your name and talk to me.
kylestremme@hotmail.com – msn
kycertaintragedy – aim
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