winter has fled

03.02.08 9:45

Wow… 2 weeks have really flown. Again this writing in the journal thing is starting to die off and even causing me a little stress because the longer I wait to write in it the more I forget to write about. I guess I just don’t have the motivation. I am also slacking on my letters to friends… im sorry for those who are reading this and are like… he had enough time to blog this but not enough time to respond. I have time I just have to be in the mood to do so. Most of the time I get back from boxing or supervising basketball and I am just tired. I would rather just sit down after a shower and meal and watch a movie until I fall asleep rather then blog or such.

All those excuses aside ill do my recap though as of now I am not even in the mood… so I might just quit halfway through and continue later… Lets see last week after that great meeting I had with the volunteers I spent most of that week preparing for the meeting for Friday. I have been doing a lot of thinking about the best way to go about discussing project design from a more sustainability level but its hard. The students want to do these projects that are massive and I just don’t fully understand all the resources we would have at our disposal. For the last meeting they all chose a project out of their 5 ideas and we did a few exercises like a problem tree to brain storm ideas on what is the causes of the this problem they are trying to solve and what are the effects of this problem on the community. Then we went over the basics of a SWOT analysis to try analyze their solution to their problem and to really strengthen their ideas. The meeting went well, though they kids were kinda bored from the information towards the end but the seemed positive about it.

I guess on the other side of that I was getting pummeled in boxing. I am really not in good enough cardiovascular strength to go and spar for 2 minute rounds switching from one guy to the next just yet but I was doing it. I think I was having problems because I was so tight that I was not breathing correctly and holding my breath a tad to long forcing the oxygen out of my body and giving me a heck of a time. As I was telling my dad last week just to survive with these guys in the first 30 seconds or so I really look mean, I hit as hard as I can to get them to fear my punch then I just fake it and block only hitting when I really have to till I get through the round without passing out. They guys I am sparring with are about 30 pounds lighter then me (with the exception of a few guys that are my size but rarely come) and they are just faster. If I throw anything at them an miss I am punished for it and because of their quickness this is not a rare occurrence.

I was delt a nice fat black eye that lasted all of a week to show everyone that didn’t know that I am getting punished in boxing. To be fair though I am doing alright. I mean these kids spar and learn technique while sparring I was always the other way around having sparred very little in the past. So this is really a wake up call. I can hold my own with about everyone there except these 2 kids that have been doing it for a long time though one of them I got the best of yesterday to really give me a confidence boost.

My boss or program manager came to talk to me last Friday and we had a meeting with my work partners to see how everything is going. I told him that I don’t really do anything in my office because I am told I by them that I just need to wait till spring to do anything so I sit in the office and read about agriculture and prepare for my project design group. My program manager wasn’t thrilled at this and encouraged my partners to work with me more. I am fine in the current situation but I guess I will start pushing my partners more to include me. They said they thought I was too busy with other activities to work with me. I am there nearly 4 hours every day and I told them after that I find other things to do because I have nothing to do here. We will see if we go anywhere in the coming months.

I received my package from my parents thank you! The shirts all fit so thanks for sending them. The pictures were a great addition so thank you for that. I have so many books right now that I am neglecting that I am starting to just picking up a book here and there and reading about 20 pages from each. I started reading that Water book “not a drop to drink” from my dad and to be honest it is interesting but repetitive. But it does make you look to future and shows you the effects of the population growth and the effects of irrigation in farming on the water resources of our world. I will think about this before doing any irrigation projects here in Moldova.

Well last weekend I went to Chisinau to hang out with most of the members in our group that I went through training with. I am so lame with taking pictures so I am sorry I took none. I will pick it up sometime and I am sorry for those of you who wish to see what’s going on over here. Maybe I will do some walk around videos. It was great meeting up with everyone and hear about everyone’s lives. Though it is really rough on the wallet to visit Chisinau its worth it. So I stayed in Chisinau Saturday night with everyone then hung out in town most of Sunday walking around and killing time till I left for Peresecina to visit my old host family. That was a good time though kind of depressing when I left because I realized how much I miss having kids in the house to hang out with.

Wednesday I went back to Chisinau to meet up with the new volunteers who were just arriving from the airport from America. Their journey is just beginning and it was fun to cheer them all in when the came in. Met most of them talked with them and found out where they are were from. There is this girl who was working in my Home town for a year or so and lived 2 blocks from my parents house, I thought that was a little crazy.

Also my mission in meeting the volunteers was to take a picture of the new volunteer living with my old host family and the volunteer living in with the host family across the street so I could send the pictures to them so they know what they look like 2 days before they would normally see them. I got phone calls of anticipation from the family checking to see how they were and what not. They seem like really good people so I anticipate no problems.
Oh one new thing… We got a new puppy. I think his name is Jackie Chan, aka Jack and Jackie. He is only 2 months old and adorable as can be. He is going to be a big boy. Right now his body is way to big for his legs and he just falls down in all directions as he tries to come and play with you.

My hair is staying long as of now. It is starting to get in my eyes which I can remedy if I just go and buy a hat. Why am I keeping my hair you ask? Why am I not cutting it? I hear these questions often from the Moldovan’s here. Because as I have begun to point out I am doing a survey to every girl that I have any acquaintance with and asking them if I should grow my hair out longer or cut it shorter… It is hands down let it grow out. I am a student of business and I know who my target market is… I give the customer what they want :).

The weather here has been unreal! It has been near the 50s for a couple days on and off and really pretty out. All of the frozen lake is nearly thawed. On that note, I walked around with my language tutor through the park where she showed me some things I had never seen before. I saw a mini amphitheatre that was all smashed and over taken over by undergrowth, Ferris Wheel rusted and missing the seats between the trees. Old bath houses, old dance floors wells… it was really sad. All I hear about is how pretty our park used to be. How it was the prettiest park in all of northern moldova before the fall of the soviet union and now its all gone to ruins. I felt like I was looking at all roman ruins of a great city from the past.