Caved in to peer pressure

2009-01-03T14:13:00.000-08:00

2008 year end survey
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer

This is my traditional Year End survey that I got of Chris's blog once. This year I added the handy Year at a Glance checklist from Sam. Enjoy!

End of the Year 2008 Survey

In 2008...

Did you do something you thought you would never do?

I never thought I’d get bit by a dog. I never thought I’d actually be in Bucuresti for the premiere of The Dark Knight. I never thought I’d stay up all night working in the Peace Corps office on the Beyond Gender magazine. I never thought I’d do so much talking on the phone in Romanian. I never thought I’d participate in organizing such a huge event as the gingerbread castle project and take meetings with the mayor of Hunedoara.

Did you keep any New Year's Resolutions?

No, not only did I not keep my new year’s resolution last year to stop putting honey in my green tea, I broke my resolution and adopted several new unhealthy habits, like eating before bed, snacking on peanut butter sandwiches and drinking lots of coke and coffee. Also if I’m even moderately stressed it’s a good excuse for a Twix bar, or you know, cuz it’s a day.

Did anyone close to you give birth?

Yes, my good friend Sarah Gaboda and I haven’t done the math but I was surprised to find out on facebook my ol’ college friend Bree has a beautiful son named Quinn.

Did anyone close to you die?

Thankfully no one I was personally close to died this year while I was in Romania but I was very saddened by the deaths of Heath Ledger and George Carlin.

Did you visit any countries?

Hungary was the first country I visited that I had never been to before, and Slovakia now officially counts as a country that I visited because we drove through it and even stopped there for lunch. Also, I had been the Czech Republic before but now I’ve actually visited my great grandmother’s village when before the only place I had been in the Czech Republic was Prague. I need to get a Slovakian flag patch for my backpack now.

What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008?

Time to travel. I didn’t really have any money to travel either but I feel like all 2008 I bounced from one project to the next to the next and even if the projects didn’t pan out or weren’t successful or weren’t what I expected I was so focused on getting things done and looking from one event to the next I didn’t have time to plan a trip or save for a vacation. I feel like there was very little time to just hang out and take in the Romanian culture – or explore some other place. And there was always the computer, camera, bicycle or something else that needed fixing or a tent or a printer cartridge or something that needed buying.

Will any date from 2008 stay etched in your memory forever?

4:45 am 5^th November 2008 when my mom called to say that Obama had 200 electoral votes and McCain couldn’t win. It was an amazing moment, but basically the election and the days afterward are the moments I’ll never forget – the ones I’m already planning go on telling my children about.

What was your biggest achievement of 2008?

A couple of the times I was singing “Ain’t it Good” from the musical Children of Eden I actually hit most of the notes. Also, I didn’t completely lose my mind after my computer broke down and had to be sent back to the USA again to be fixed.

That and the two GLOW/TOBE camps and I coordinated and organized (with help) last summer. I’m particularly proud of the Deva camp just because it was the one I where I got to attend the whole thing. And I’m proud of the amazing amount of work Micah and I accomplished on the Christmas at the Castle project. Even though I didn’t do that much work on the gingerbread castle, the thing looked great!

What was your biggest failure?

Not ever doing anything for the organization I was assigned to in Deva. Truthfully when I got here they said they might change their focus and I didn’t know what that meant and everyone is busy so I just kept my head down and didn’t ask enough questions and didn’t learn very much about the organization – and they were happy to let me do that and happy to let me concentrate on my other projects but I think maybe I could have done some project to benefit this organization if I had just tried harder. Even now there’s a chance we could work on something together but it’s really hard to understand what is needed and what will work with the information understanding that I have.

Also, I gave up on doing Carpathian Challenge 2009 because oops! I never started training.

Did you suffer illness or injury?

I got bit once on each leg by a stray rottweiler and had to go to Bucharest 5 times to get 9 anti-rabies shots. Other than that there were just a few evenings of flu-like symptoms and then there’s the illness brought on by too much alcohol (on three occasions in 1 year, so that’s not so bad.)

What was the best thing you bought in '08?

Hope. I donated $50 to Barack Obama’s campaign and when he won the election I felt like I had been a part of something. And for the first time in a long time (since I don’t know when) I actually think the future holds exciting possibilities and I'm not as worried.

Did your behavior change over the year?

I drink a lot more soda and coffee. I stopped doing yoga regularly around June and probably haven’t done it all since September. I’m not as much of a health nut as I was in the USA when I tried to eat organic. Now I’m content with the veggie ramen, but I’m also not very concerned about it because I feel like I’ll go back into that lifestyle when I get home.

I got really lazy though and I can do most of my work from home on the computer so it’s hard to make healthy decisions and make myself go out and do stuff.

Where did you spend most of your money?

I spent the most money at the grocery store or at the piaţa but as far as percent of increase since last year – I started spending way more on phone minutes but it occurred to me at about the 1 year mark – I guess I know a bunch more people now.

It also feels like a bunch of my money went for (computer, phone, bicycle, camera) repairs and not vacations this year. And parties. Party food for all the parties I had here

Are you happier than this time last year?

Yes. It’s a great time to be alive. Actually, I feel I have a new direction in my life and a lot of hope for the future, but my year has a lot of unknowns in it. A lot. And that kind of makes me nervous but I am I’m looking forward to filling them in as I go.

What songs will remind you of 2008?

The entire musical Tommy, “Ain’t it Good?” from the musical Children of Eden, “Someone To Love” and “Killer Queen” because I finally memorized all the words and that’s been a goal of mine.

And if you’d asked what song will always remind you of November of 2008, the answer would be Feelin’ Good by Michael Bublé, because I listened to it for two weeks straight.

What do you wish you would have done more of?

Vacationing, traveling with friends, observing, hanging out

What do you wish you would have done less of?

Nagging and bitching. Sometimes I just get into this contrary mood where everything a person does pisses me off. It happens when I hear a lot of absolute statements like “I don’t like potato chips because they’re unhealthy.” And I hear “You like potato chips because you’re fat and stupid.” Or “My parents taught me to read before I was in school” and I hear “You are dumb. You are so dumb because you can’t remember when you learned how to read and your parents are dumb too.”

I wish little things didn’t irritate me so much. It also bothers me when people can’t give supportive evidence to back up what they say, or they think they can and they don’t know what they’re talking about. Or when you’re trying to say something really personal and important to you and the other person just won’t hear you.

And nagging.

What did/will you do for Christmas '08?

For Christmas I spent a week with Micah and my cat at his New apartment at his site, Ocna Mures. It was nice to eat dinner with the same families we visited last year and go caroling. We watched The Muppet Family Christmas again and baked and decorated a whole ton of cookies. Caroling and baking for strangers and visiting (families) who are friends was a great way to spend Christmas and it makes me think about the traditions I would start in my home if/when I have a family.

Did you fall in love in 2008?

No, not exactly.

Did you get your heart broken in 2008?

No, not exactly.

Favorite TV program of '08?

I rediscovered a love for Supernatural which I had forgotten, after having been introduced to the show in Jan of 07. In ‘08 I suddenly caught up to season four and now Supernatural and the brother’s Winchester are sometimes my reason for living. And favorites, as always The Daily Show and the Colbert Report.

Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?

At several times throughout the year I have, Toby-like from West Wing season 1, felt and said out loud, “There is literally no one that I don’t hate right now.” I doubt if it was ever true, or if it was true I am sorry that it was and it was a passing hatred. I feel like this year I have had some experience feeling if not being hated or at least “hated on” and it’s no good. I had a person over to my apartment who made some veiled political comments and I could look at him and feel and sense the intensity of the hate that is in him and I just felt so sorry for this poor soul to be saddled with that great millwheel of hating what he does not and will not attempt to understand (Because he’s stupid >:P parentheses, emoticon for mean sticking-tongue-out face, close parentheses.)

It’s hard to make an effort to get a long with those with whom you are different, to find common ground among disagreements, it’s hard to be the subject of hate, but it’s important to put forth the effort and not give in to hate because it is such an ugly terrible thing. I’m proud to have done at least some reaching out this year, though I can’t say it isn’t difficult and frustrating.

What was the best book you read and/or movie you saw?

The best book I read was Three Cups of Tea by by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin and just cuz I can never pick one favorite of anything I was also rather partial The Kite Runner too. Both books inspired me to write letters to Congress/the author respectively.

What movies did I even see in 2008 that I hadn’t seen already? I honestly just watch the same 20 movies over again (like Amistad) and never see anything new. I have to say The Dark Knight was great, and Milk. I can’t remember when Stardust came out here and I liked that one.

What was your greatest discovery?

Where do I go from here? For now I believe the best course of action is to imagine what I want my life to be and then take steps to get there. I guess that’s all you can do. Set goals and take steps toward accomplishing them and hope and pray it works out. And, work hard.

Also, I discovered what it’s like to love someone so much that when you see them at the worst they’ve ever been to you – you only want them to improve (as opposed to wanting them to be miserable for being such a bastard) and when they are annoying you think man, there’s no one I’d rather find annoying right now – and you hope they feel the same way when they see you at your worst.

What did you do on your birthday and how old were you?

My 28^th birthday was the final day of the Christmas at the Castle project. We closed up, cleaned up, came home, had a glass of champagne to toast the completion of almost a year’s work and then went out to dinner with friends. It was a great birthday! The girls from the organization Punct Inima surprised me with a chocolate walnut cake! The next day, Dec. 15^th was the 1 year anniversary of the first time Micah and I ever visited Hunedoara castle.

What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

I can’t think of one thing that would have made my year immeasurably more satisfying. I few things might have improved my year somewhat, but as far as I’m concerned 2008 was immeasurably satisfying in many ways my hopes and dreams came true.

That said - I would have been significantly happier if my computer hadn’t needed to go back to the USA to get fixed again, and if my camera, my phone and my bicycle hadn’t also needed to be repaired.

How would you describe your personal fashion concept of 2008?

Underwear, bra, socks, pants, shirt. Or sometimes underwear, bra, tights, skirt and shirt. Simple. Easy. I don’t shop for clothes. I have enough.

Who are you most thankful that you met?

My new site mate Beth. It’s going to be great having another Peace Corps volunteer in town. Especially one I can be such easy friends with and who is on the GAD committee with me.

And Dani because I guess we met at the beginning of 2008 and he’s been a great friend and someone I can really count on. Someone who listens and lets me crash at his place when I’m up all night in Bucuresti working on Beyond Gender and I got no other place to go. He’s given me multiple rides so I didn’t have to take the train when he happened to be going my way across the country and it was so fabulous of him to meet me at the train station when I got bit by the dog and pick me up in his car and take me to dinner instead of me having to drag my sorry self to the hotel and eat alone that night (or just not at all would have been easier). I think the man puts up with a lot hanging out with all these Americans all the time and he’s a great friend.

Who did you wish you did not meet?

No one I can say I wish I didn’t meet. Even if I met someone really irritating it helps to put that person in perspective so that I clarify why it is that I don’t agree with this person and don’t respect his/her behavior. It’s good for me to know that he/she is out there being (a jackass) his/herself and that I don’t need to feel obligated to change him/her. He/She can just go right on being the way they are and I just don’t care enough about he/she/it to get involved.

Who was your best friend?

My best friends are still Micah, my cat Bella, and The Family at home whenever I hear from them.

Who was your enemy?

Sarah Palin. My enemy was the entire Republican National Convention for telling me I suck and that everything about me sucks and all my ideas suck and basically I just just go to hell. Also, the hypocrisy in the world that makes me angry and frustrated and therefore consumes my time by me being angry and frustrated.

Who do you miss?

Nicole and Sam. When was the last time we were together? I also miss my brothers. I’m looking forward to sitting down and having a Supernatural marathon when we get together.

Under the heading of What do I miss? – Book stores. I really miss book stores and libraries, but mostly bookstores where I can go with casually and spontaneously go with friends and make a huge mental list of wants and then exchange money for a book of my choosing which then becomes mine – my new special object that I treat myself to and can carry around and cherish because it is my own and I picked it out myself for me – but I also miss libraries too. I just have had less experience throughout my life with really good libraries than I have had with book stores. At home it’s like whenever I go shopping I’m in the bookstore. (Want to get me a coming home present? How about a bookstore gift card?)

Who will you never forget?

Elder Sumbot and Elder Sandberg the nicest Mormon missionaries I’ve ever met. They’re also the only Mormon missionaries I’ve ever met, but that sells them short

Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008?

That denying your hopes to avoid disappointment is an act of cowardice. It is the refuge of the weak and of the fearful. If your goal is to change you the world for the better, you can not do the work without the hope that the world can be better. If you try to do the work without hope and belief that the world can change, then you’re breeding resentment and you’re wasting your time. It’s easy to be a cynic. It’s much more difficult to be effective.

What will you always remember about 2008?

When I heard "as of 11pm eastern time The President of the United States is Barack Obama" and though technically he's the President Elect I could tell Jon Stewart was so happy to say those words. It was Wednesday night, November 5^th when I heard those words out loud for the first time instead of just reading President Elect off of a screen, and I was filled with such an amazing feeling of pride, and gratitude and hope.

Aspirations for 2009...

What do you want to do in '09 that you couldn't in '08?

Go home! Seriously, I want to travel a little bit more if I can (Greece and Turkey) and then successfully get Bella home to the USA.

And I want to manage the below without going crazy or spiraling into depression

Any resolutions?

To pray every day. Eat better. Learn more about vegetarian nutrition. Drink less coffee and more green tea. Go back to doing yoga every day. Join a gym and work out, when I get home. Go on a two week vegan fast when I get home so I won’t pig out too much right away. Listen more. Take the GRE and apply for grad schools. Spend 3 months in

Mexico

becoming fluent in Spanish. Keep a journal. Write more. Write more letters to my family. Update my blog more often. Make some money. Read the news. Get up early. Join a church when I get home.

What will be different about 2009 than 2008?

I’ll have to manage this whole saying goodbyes with uncertain futures attached, going home, dealing, sorting all my crap, probably have to buy new clothes, apply for grad school, get a new phone probably, and maybe get some kind of a job or else I’ll have no money at all thing – without going totally crazy.

Where am I going to live? Where are me and my cat going to live? How do I go visit everyone? What am I going to use for money? How am I going to afford to pay for grad school applications and the GRE? What about travel? Who’s going to pay for my prescriptions? My phone? These are some of the questions I have to answer without going totally crazy in 2009.

Anything you want to change about yourself for 2009?

I feel like I want to have for the first time in my life a really organized wardrobe. I want to have clothes that all fit together with a certain style that all look good on me. I guess to do that I’ll have to spend some money. I also want to go back to working out and doing yoga which I did a lot of in ’05 and ’06 but not so much in Peace Corps. I also want to work on being more spiritual and less grouchy.

Do you want to make more friends in 2009?

Yes, but only if they’re awesome friends like the ones I already have.

In 2008 I:
[x] stayed single
[x] got kissed
[] kissed someone new
[] kissed in the snow
[] kissed in the rain

[] kissed in a pool
[] kissed under the stars

[] kissed under mistletoe
[] fell in love
[] fell in love with a fool
[] had my heart broken
[] broke someone else's heart

[] lost my true love
[] lost faith in love for awhile
[] had a stalker
[x] lost a friend. Can’t say this is final, but when I hear the Mica song “I don’t care if I never talk to you again, and it reminds me of one person, it’s a good sign there’s not much worth hanging on to.
[] had a good relationship with someone
[] got pregnant
[] got married
[] had a divorce
[] got engaged
[x] kissed someone of the same sex There’s a lot of cheek kisses in Romania.
[x] met someone that I will never forget
[x] did something I regret
[] got a promotion

[x] got a pay raise We all did. To deal with price inflation.
[] changed jobs
[] lost my job
[] quit my job
[] got fired from my job
[x] did something I was proud of
[x] proved myself an idiot I’m sure in some way
[x] was involved in something that I will never forget
[] painted a picture
[] wrote a poem
[] ran a mile
[x] listened to music I couldn't stand
[x] double dipped I’m sure I did. The fried green tomatoes with ranch and potato chip breading come to mind. Unless that’s not what double dipped means and I’m proving myself a foodie.
[] skinny dipped
[x] went to a sleepover
[x] went to camp
[] threw a surprise party
[x] laughed till I cried
[] laughed till I peed my pants
[x] flirted shamelessly
[x] visited a foreign country
[x] visited a foreign state...state as in state of mind
[] cooked a disastrous meal
[] lost something important to me

[x] got a gift I love
[x] realized something new about myself
[] tried to gain weight
[x] dyed my hair
[x] came close to losing my life if you count “could have potentially lost my life”
[] someone close to me died
[x] read a great book
[x] saw a great movie
[] saw a movie so scary that it made me cry
[] saw a favorite band live
[] did something that I want to tell everyone
[x] experienced something new
[x] made new friends
[] found out who your real friends are
[] lied to your parents
[] snuck out
[x] went to a party

[x] went to a wild party
[x] had the time of your life

[x] got in trouble with police They tell me I was the reason the cops showed up, but I never saw any cops.

[] got arrested
[x] danced
[] fell out of love
[] had a crush on someone
[] swam in a pool
[] made a snowman
[] went snowboarding
[] went sledding
[] slept in past 2pm
[x] held someone’s hand
[x] held someone’s hand that you care about
[x] told someone you like them as more than a friend
[x] gone on vacation
[] gone on vacation with a friend
[] driven a car Wow, it’s been over two years since I’ve driven a car.
[] played strip poker
[] danced in the rain
[] seen someone get in a car accident
[] got in a fist fight
[x] laughed until you couldn't breathe
[x] had an amazing year
[x] missed someone
[] got hit by a car
[] sent someone to the hospital
[] got a new pet
[x] enjoyed this year overall

2008-12-29T11:59:00.000-08:00

The Mighty Mighty Update
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Lest you think I have spent all my time since the November 5th (in Romania) election results (4:45 a.m. to be exact) gazing into the distance with teary eyes and a sappy grin - here's what I've been up to. I'm sure some of you have already heard about it - or seen some of the pictures.

Stand by for the upcoming 2008 A Year in Review Personal Survey! and Happy New Year, everyone!

Hello all, Happy Holidays to all! As donors and friends supporting our event here in Romania, we wish to give you this overview of the weekend. Attached is a slide show of photos with helpful captions to guide you.

And here's our project on the Romanian news, although two more news stations covered us, we don't have the links and haven't seen the clips. Pay no attention to that girl speaking English who is waving around a pamphlet for the Peace Corps Institutional Development Program.

By the Numbers:

20 kindergarten - high school groups came to perform carols, dances, poetry, and skits on Christmas themes.
20 NGOs came representing various causes and organizations: orphanages, Parkinson's Disease, the Handicapped, Women's Shelters, and more.
12 Peace Corps Volunteers were in attendance
2 Newspapers and 3 TV stations covered the event - both local and national
400 people voted in our Christmas Tree Contest
1 Gingerbread Castle was on display
20 Christmas NGO Christmas Trees entered the Christmas Tree Contest
2 out of 20 middle schoolers won in a simultaneous game against a national chess champion

The Gingerbread Castle and Decoration:
The event was a success with a lot of work put in by volunteers of various nationalities and ages. For the construction of the gingerbread dough, 12 of us gathered at a bread factory to use their large ovens and mixing machines. We had 2 Mormons working in Deva with us, 3 women from a Catholic organization coming from Argentina and France and the U.S., a Romanian-Hungarian as photographer, and the usual assortment of PCVs (Peace Corps Volunteers).

Later that same weekend, we had two girls from Austria come to help us and 10 teenage Red Cross volunteers create posters for the event. About 4 of those same volunteers later came on three separate weekends to help us put up tables and chairs, hang the posters, garland, and lights, and put the finishing touches on the gingerbread castle.

Micah and I worked at the castle over three weekends. It's finishing touches were applied over one all night session at the castle. Micah had to ensure a steady stream of Aretha Franklin to remain oblivious to the fact that I was one of two people within those cavernous, cold, and creepy walls. A reality show once recorded there looking for ghosts and other supernatural phenomenon. It's obvious why. It doesn't get creepier then a medieval castle at night.

Wrap Up
Micah and I are still in the process of contacting winners from the children's coloring contest, NGO winners of the Christmas Tree Contest, and delivering certificates to our many volunteers. She will be on her way here for the holidays when we will gather all our materials from our October Skills Sharing Meeting to provide NGOs along with our survey. Those of you who donated to our event can also expect an official report as called for by PCPP funding rules. We are both very happy to have the event done with and have all of you to thank for it. I especially wish to thank our parents for their support. My mom donated Santa hats for all our volunteers and Halloween candy (with Reese's peanut butter cups!!!) for free games, among other gifts and her father gave generously to our fundraiser. My folks helped close the funding gap at the close to our fund raising time frame and helped me out this month as telephone and travel costs went over our usual stipend.

Future Event Prospects
We're now in the process of evaluating the success of the event by surveying participating NGOs. We hoped to draw NGOs together in a collaborative spirit and offer the public an opportunity to learn about the good works that NGOs provide. To this end, with a total of 5-600 visitors and lots of news coverage, we felt this goal to be well reached. We were very impressed by the professionalism of the NGO's games and Christmas trees. We had given them lots of suggestions and photographs to work from, and many of them took our ideas to the full degree. Because of their efforts, the event had a very strong and professional look. We'll soon find out if they would do it again next year. Preliminary feedback from the orgs has been positive. Micah and I are both trying to extend, but prospects for us being here next December are unlikely. We will provide the castle with a guide on how we organized the event, however we hope to find a leader among our invited NGOs to perhaps take the lead in organizing for next year.

Lessons Learned
Something this big cannot be done without its fair share of lessons learned. We have a much clearer idea now of the best way to build a gingerbread castle. I know now just how important it is to put performers and NGOs into one place. Getting an audience and performers together in a place as large as our castle is no small feat.

Thanks all who supported us!

2008-11-04T22:10:00.000-08:00

Sail on, Sail on, Oh mighty ship of state
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

"Democracy"
Leonard Cohen
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OETwbVBPI1U

It's coming through a hole in the air,
from those nights in Tiananmen Square.
It's coming from the feel
that this ain't exactly real,
or it's real, but it ain't exactly there.
From the wars against disorder,
from the sirens night and day,
from the fires of the homeless,
from the ashes of the gay:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.
It's coming through a crack in the wall;
on a visionary flood of alcohol;
from the staggering account
of the Sermon on the Mount
which I don't pretend to understand at all.
It's coming from the silence
on the dock of the bay,
from the brave, the bold, the battered
heart of Chevrolet:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

It's coming from the sorrow in the street,
the holy places where the races meet;
from the homicidal bitchin'
that goes down in every kitchen
to determine who will serve and who will eat.
From the wells of disappointment
where the women kneel to pray
for the grace of God in the desert here
and the desert far away:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

Sail on, sail on
O mighty Ship of State!
To the Shores of Need
Past the Reefs of Greed
Through the Squalls of Hate
Sail on, sail on, sail on, sail on.

It's coming to America first,
the cradle of the best and of the worst.
It's here they got the range
and the machinery for change
and it's here they got the spiritual thirst.
It's here the family's broken
and it's here the lonely say
that the heart has got to open
in a fundamental way:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

It's coming from the women and the men.
O baby, we'll be making love again.
We'll be going down so deep
the river's going to weep,
and the mountain's going to shout Amen!
It's coming like the tidal flood
beneath the lunar sway,
imperial, mysterious,
in amorous array:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

Sail on, sail on ...

I'm sentimental, if you know what I mean
I love the country but I can't stand the scene.
And I'm neither left or right
I'm just staying home tonight,
getting lost in that hopeless little screen.
But I'm stubborn as those garbage bags
that Time cannot decay,
I'm junk but I'm still holding up
this little wild bouquet:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

2008-10-31T04:32:00.000-07:00

Christmas at the Castle Project update
(what we've been working on)
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Dear friends and family,
Micah and I are proud to announce that we are 50% complete with our "gingerbread castle project": Christmas at the Castle. We're delighted to have your support with this project and proud to involve you in this photo update of the work we have done so far.

The Practice Gingerbread Castle, 1st weekend of August, 2008

The first weekend of August another volunteer made the trip to Deva to help Micah and I bake for two days in my kitchen while the oven temperature reached 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Many cold glasses of water (with ice! were consumed.) Thank you, Anne!

This is what gingerbread looks like when made without molasses or brown sugar. We used honey as a substitute. The dough bakes a lot thicker and we realized we could carve it into the shapes we wanted rather than baking many many tiny pieces and gluing them together with frosting.

Determining the level of detail is difficult. The castle is really approximately 15 different buildings.

This practice castle is 1/2 the size of the complete model we hope to create for the December event. We determined at this practice session that we should try to make arrangements with a professional bakery for the use of industrial ovens. We're working out the details on such and arrangement now. We were still in the process of fund-raising for the greater project when we build the practice castle so the supplies for this phase of the project was not part of our budget.

The Skill Sharing Meeting 24 October, 2008

Micah and our translator Monica, a Red Cross volunteer, ask representatives from Romanian NGOs to get into groups and discuss the state of cooperation between organizations.

More than 27 people attended at least part of our meeting which was held at the Red Cross in Deva. Some people came representing organizations from as far away as Timisoara and Cluj (five hours by bus, but I'm not sure of the time by private car.)

The day was divided into 20 minute workshops on skills NGOs need to acquire or want to improve. We learned what areas were important to our partners through a survey when we invited them to take part in the Christmas event at the castle, then invited those who indicated they were willing to speak to share their organizations best practices and success stories. In the event that no one wanted to speak on a particular topic, we tracked down professionals in the week leading up to the meeting.

Holly, another volunteer in group 22 and a good friend with professional grant writing experience gives a presentation to the members of NGOs. Holly has raised over a million dollars for her community in the USA and gives her advice and basic tips in her presentation.

A presenter from the office of E.U. Integration speaks about the resources available to NGOs from the European Union and how to access those resources. At the end of the project we will collect information from all of our speakers and create a CD of resources for each participating member of the project.
Brindusa, a colleague from the Gender and Development board speaks about planning events for a nonprofit organization and the importance of evaluating events and projects. Brindusa traveled from Turda for the meeting and was a great help to Micah and I with last minute translating. She recently left a well known NGO in her town to start her own animal protection NGO.

2008-10-22T02:10:00.000-07:00

It's like the end of a love affair...
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

More like a death in the family, but that's cruel to use as a headline unless it's actually true and I don't know about you but with the election so close I don't need another thing to get my heart pumping faster than usual....

Last Monday night my computer Kwarou decided to be sick again. I'm sure it's a hardware problem with the monitor and I'm sure it can't be fixed in Romania. I have to send Kwarou back to the USA again, to be fixed again, because the last time I sent him to the US they replaced the motherboard, I assume without even noticing the occasional flickering of the monitor and when I got him back in February was all good for two weeks and then the problem started again.

Now the problem is much worse. I turn the computer on and I'm faced with a black screen that never turns into my desktop. The worst thing is the first time I took him in to one computer shop here in Deva he worked fine, so I brought him back home and was faced again with blackness.

Now my life is thrown into total upheaval. I'm really emotional about it. I'm two weeks behind in the Daily Show and the Colbert Report, I can't call home using Skype, I can't conference call my fellow Peace Corps volunteers for free which has led to my spending more than 100 lei on phone calls due to the increasingly busy nature of the project at hand.

Mostly I'm upset at not having my email at a finger tips all day.I miss knowing where all my files that have to do with this project are and not having to dig through my sent messages for a backup copy in my email. I miss not having episodes of Supernatural at my command.

I miss music and stupid Youtube videos. I miss political ads and blogs. I'm about to burst into tears when I think about where I'm going to be and what I'm going to be doing while election returns are coming in - probably taking a hot bath with a paperback and a bottle of wine at two in the morning and then pacing frantically - probably naked and crying!

I knew I spent too much time online before. In some ways this could be seen as a good thing as this is one of my two busiest weeks in Peace Corps preparing for the NGO skill-sharing meeting on Friday which is part of the Gingerbread Castle project. I don't need an youtube or video distractions. But I miss my online lifestyle. I miss being connected. More than anything I'm frustrated with all the obstacles this creates not just for my job but for my life - with a friend's laptop that doesn't get the internet, another laptop that does get the internet, but of course doesn't have my cache of downloaded TV shows and movies, neither of which connect to my printer or camera.

Also, since it cost 60 lei to get rid of Bella's fleas (I hope once and for all but she's scratching more than before she had them, less than than when I knew she had them last week) and because my ATM card is expired and its uncertain when I'll get a new one it's questionable at best when I will have the money to send Kwarou back to the US - braving the Romanian and US postal services so he can be repaired and returned to me.

And (this is the kicker) HP sent me a reminder that if I do send Kwarou in to be repaired I need to take responsibility to back up my files in case they get erased. Now how am I supposed to back up my files when I can't see anything at all on the screen?!

So I guess this is farewell, my friends. It'll likely be mid-November before you hear from me again.

2008-10-12T03:56:00.001-07:00

"Many of the truths we cling to, depend greatly on our own point of view." -Obi-wan Kenobi
The contents of this website are mine personally as usual do not have anything to do with the US government, the Peace Corps, or Romania, and therefore do not reflect any official position thereof.

I just watched The Return of the Jedi, the last part in my impromptu Star Wars marathon, which came about something like this, Me thinking: I could watch the debate, but that will just depress me and make me angry. What's something uplifting I can watch that will give me hope? A New Hope...Star Wars: Episode IV: A New Hope.

Later, though I did watch the debate, as I also watched the first debate and the VP debate and have been following the news as closely as I can. It is disappointing to me how much our political discourse is theater. The debates are really not about engaging the American people so they can learn each candidates position and make the best decision. It's about repeating stock phrases and trying to beat those phrases and two-second ideas into the heads of the audience. If you repeat something often enough it will become true.

McCain's campaign keeps saying Obama would sit down with leaders like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, when my understanding of what he said is that under his administration high level members of the government would engage Iran in discussions, not that the President is going to have a one-on-one with Ahmadinejad, who isn't even the most powerful leader in Iran. Obama's campaign just keeps repeating that McCain voted with Bush 95% of the time. Both sides point to each other and say "Oh, he's a terrible person because he voted against funding our troops" even though McCain voted against funding the troops in a bill with a time table and Obama voted against funding them in a bill without a time table.

Something occurred to me watching Return of the Jedi. The Rebels could easily have been called a terrorist army by the Empire. I wonder if they were. I wonder if the people in support of the Empire thought the Emperor could protect them from "those who seek to destroy us." I wonder what those people wanted to be protected from in the big scary galaxy a long time ago far away.

Did they know that the Empire was a military regime in which ranking officers who screwed up could be summarily executed and not just fired? I wonder if the subjects of the Empire had rights. I wonder if they hated The Rebellion, if they thought the Jedi religion was a cult that sought to destroy their values, if they ever talked with anyone in the Rebellion. If there was any exchange of ideas between the Empire-Supporters and the Rebels.

Obi-wan's quote from the top of this post stuck out to me more than usual this time around. I have heard the term Post-Fact Society recently and it suddenly makes sense to me. We living in a time when if you don't like something- you can simply dismiss it. Judges you disagree with are "activists", an ethics violation investigation that began before Sarah Palin was nominated for Vice President is now "politically motivated." People who believe in Creationism are opening their own museums. Objective facts have lost all meaning. Paris Hilton is correct when she says "Sound bites, not sound policy determine our country's course."

We are in the Post-Fact world where education is undervalued and you can dismiss the voices of intellectuals as elitists in the pursuit of your own version of American-truth. I have heard it stated by people seeking to dismiss dissenting opinions, the ACLU and Sean Penn hate America! That we're not allowed to say Merry Christmas. There's no such thing as the separation of church and state. We should just blow up Iraq. People damning theocratic governments abroad while pining for one in the USA.

It frustrates and saddens me that this is the level of discourse in the United States today. People seem to have this notion of a democracy as a "majority rules" establishment. That it's a society of "us" versus "them" - the good guys and the bad guys, and if we can just get enough people on our side then we win. But that's not what democracy is about. It means we have a voice with which to elect our representatives and the right to express how we wished to be governed to those people, but we also have an obligation as a members of a free society to be respectful of minority opinions. There are protections, or were, in a democracy against the "tyranny of the majority." That's why we have constitutional limits on powers, and the bill of rights. That's why we have freedom of speech. That's why the first line of the first amendment is "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free expression thereof." That's why we don't live in a theocracy. And that is why, unfortunately, sometimes decisions regarding the rights of the people are made by the courts and not left to a popular vote.

"Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view." Unfortunately right now the point of view held in the highest esteem by too many of us is our own point of view. Rather than seeking to hear another point of view, we immediately dismiss either the person or wholesale dismiss the facts on which their argument is based. Because we now live in a time when no fact can sway us and no argument must influence us unless it reinforces what we already believe and everything else can be thrown out, or better yet called "gay."

In a Post-Fact Society, I am longing for a real discourse. I'd like to enter into a real conversation and have my opinions challenged intelligently. We know I'm tired of being called names and having my values attacked (See former post September 7th). Use the awesome power of The Force to persuade me that your side is right. Don't make education the enemy. Don't change the subject. And don't call me names.

With the shameful lack of discourse going on, and appalling lack of statesmanship, I have to let go of my anger lest it consume me. I turn to past and fictional leaders for their wisdom to guide me through these troubled times.

Because, that's all I have. May the Force be with us all.

"I think it's better to have ideas. You can change an idea. Changing a belief is trickier." - Rufus the 13th Apostle, Dogma

"Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars... Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that." - Martin Luther King Jr

“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” -Yoda, Jedi Master

2008-10-01T10:05:00.000-07:00

Brother, can you spare some peanut butter cups?
The contents of this website are mine personally as usual do not have anything to do with the US government, the Peace Corps, or Romania, and therefore do not reflect any official position thereof.

The holidays are fast approaching, the first one being Halloween. I'm helping my Missionary friends start a high school club where we reinforce Romanian high school students' English skills while also doing fun things watching movies, having discussions and doing activities that promote confidence, self-esteem, creative thinking, problem-solving and critical thinking skills and also foster cultural exchange. And we want to promote these evening activities as an alternative to alcohol and drugs. That is the hope, anyway.

To kick off this club we're planning a Halloween party, and let me tell you I am psyched for showing these kids a real American-style Halloween, complete with scary movies, pumpkin carving peeled grapes and oily spaghetti. Maybe even 80's Karaoke.

For the party, I'd really like to make some of those chocolate chip cookies with the peanut butter cup in the middle, as a matter of cultural exchange and also to show these Romanian kids that Americans do junk-food deserts right. Who needs alcohol and drugs when you've got chocolate chips cookies with peanut butter cups sticking out of them? However, chocolate chips, cookies, peanut butter and cups (peanut butter cups) are all foreign to Romanians. I don't expect they'll be nearly as excited as me, my Missionary friends and my volunteer army in charge of making this Halloween a very happy one.

So does anyone think they could put a bag or two of peanut butter cups in the mail - soonish, that it might get here by Halloween?
If so, you'd have the thanks of a grateful community of volunteers and maybe some culturally enriched high school students.

2008-09-28T08:43:00.000-07:00

Purr Baby
The contents of this website are mine personally as usual do not have anything to do with the US government, the Peace Corps, or Romania, and therefore do not reflect any official position thereof.

I've been thinking for weeks what should my next blog post be about? How hard I'm working on this gingerbread castle project? My other "secret projects" none of you know about? How surreal my life sometimes is? The pictures I saw of Hurricane Ivan and how it made me feel? More about the problems in my country? What I'm thinking for the future - after Peace Corps? The Supernatural Marathon weekend I just had with two Peace Corps friends that involved Chinese food, delivery pizza, potato chips, coca-cola and the Winchester brothers Seasons 1 & 2?

As I debated in my mind I recalled I wanted to post on September 18th - the day we celebrate Bella's Birthday. The one year anniversary of the day Bella came to me. We celebrated with a whole packet of Whiskas Supreme Sardine cat food, and I toasted her with hot coffee. To one year together and many more.

I would post a picture of how big my baby's gotten, but for the time being my camera is being repaired in Bucharest and I don't have it here, so you'll just have to me due with this kind of cute old picture.
In the meantime Bella and I have been at odds lately. Last week I hosted a family of couch-surfers , a mom, a dad, and their 8month old baby boy for three nights. Bella seemed to be both interested and afraid of Baby and seemed to have fun playing with the other members of the family. Her personal space and patterns of sleeping were invaded I thought minimally, and even though everyone of the visitors warmly appreciated Bella I still tried to give her as near the same amount of attention I would normally.

However, when visitors left on Friday evening Bella, I guess decided to tell me exactly what she though about me inviting overnight guests into her apartment: She took a dump on my bed.
This is an unusual turn of events for Bella. I punished her with a time out in the kitchen and much later made sure she had some "mommy time" to know I wasn't still mad at her and hadn't abandoned her.

Then my weekend-guests arrived and the Supernatural Marathon did commence and once again, the guests appreciated and enjoyed playing with Bella and aside from two more people sleeping in the apartment than usual, I thought Bella's daily interactions changed very little. ALthough I did notice her scratching herself much more frequently when our first guests were here. I announced that Bella needed a bath. That her itching was worrying to me although she couldn't have gotten fleas because she's never outside. A joke was made that the couple with the baby brought fleas to my cat. I commented that that would be some trick because I think you'd have to go through a lot of specific actions or troubles to bring fleas inside to someone you knew would have a cat.

Well the itching increased and Sunday morning after my fellow Supernatural fans departed Bella got her bath. I was concernedly drying her and in fact picking newly discovered parasites of some kind off her skin when I smelled it...She rewarded me for my weekend guests in the same way she appreciated the couch surfers!

I don't know what's going on here, but my cat has fleas and has taken to crapping on my bed. This is worrisome behavior for a cat that is coming to the USA with me someday and is going to have to learn how to cope when "mommy" gets a job and is hopefully out of the house from 8-5 regularly.

In the meantime, she's had her flea bath and I can go pick up some emergency medication against fleas on her body hopefully tomorrow. The only explaination of how I think she could have gotten them is that flea eggs survive in my apartment - and necessity has forced me to be somewhat OK with that. I tried to wash one of the cushions Bella's been so fond of sleeping on lately but whether or not the washer actually washes things with water is touch and go - so when I pulled the washers contents out dry earlier I said "let that be a worry for another day."

Since my tools for cleaning the carpets is a broom and I beat and washed these rugs already this year, there's not much that's going to be done there, and since I have actually zero disposable income - i.e. income not already budgeted for something else, it's going to be a hard sight to see how we swing this flea medication. In the meantime I'm sleeping in my dish-soap cleaned bed because it takes two-days for the sheets to dry on the line if the machine uses water so usually I only wash them when I'm going away for a while. Besides Bella has done so much sleeping on me or with me that there's no way I could claim avoiding exposure for flea eggs and a massive laundry overall would just be too little too late.

The best I can do I figure is bathe her again if she continues to scratch, find a way to pay for the medication that will kill all hatching fleas on her for a number of months, and pray I don't get fleas myself .... until I do, I guess I have to be Ok with that.

2008-09-07T07:33:00.000-07:00

Something productive with my anger...
The contents of this website are mine personally as usual do not have anything to do with the US government, the Peace Corps, or Romania, and therefore do not reflect any official position thereof.

I have just been told by the Republican Party that my country doesn’t value me; doesn’t want me anymore; thinks people like me suck.

Imagine finding that out after dedicating three years of your life to volunteering in her name.

Apparently this RNC was all about touting the values of people from small towns. I am from a small town: population 10,000, so you would think I would score there. But apparently, as I have been told before, I don’t have any values. The last Republican National Convention 9/11fest was in New York City, because that’s small town America for you. However this year, only “real” people from small towns in America count. But not me.

I’ve volunteered for 1 year in Americorps, for three months on the Gulf Coast and so far a year and a half in the Peace Corps, and this experience has taught me that I want to go back to school. I want to be a Community Organizer and work in underprivileged areas in the U.S., to start my own nonprofit and help the poor help themselves but Republicans tell me this is a joke and waste of time.

Also, I can’t be a patriotic person because I have always believed that loving your country is trying to improve it. I shouldn’t have been trying my damnedest to “ask not what my country can do for me…,” instead I should have been going along with the status quo and never let anyone say anything negative about my homeland.

I worked for minimum wage out of college – less than 20 hours a week which was considered full time by the company I worked for – but I found a way to use my money to send care packages to anonymous soldiers I didn’t even know because I may hate the war but I support the troops. This doesn’t make me patriotic, though. Hell, I’ve practically committed treason by showing dislike for the war my country is engaged in and expressing that opinion to the very soldiers I support.

And because I think my country could do things better than the way it is doing them now, I am anti-American.

I didn’t just attend church, but enjoyed going to church in my community in Minnesota before I left the country. I miss being involved in Bible study, volunteering for summer Sunday school and serving pancakes at Churches United for the Homeless. But I believe that Faith is belief in things for which we have no evidence and if a new thought can shake your faith it probably wasn’t very strong to begin with – so my textbooks don’t need disclaimers, and therefore I’m anti-God.

In fact, I’m so anti-God, I’m willing to listen to what other people believe and not tell them their wrong. I think that even though I have faith in one thing, we should uphold the constitution and not tell everyone they have to believe the same thing as me! That makes me even more anti-faith and anti-American. Because after all why even have faith if not to push it down the throats of others? And being a Christian first and foremost gives you the right to believe you’re better than other people.

I believe that abortion is a very personal, private, individual, moral decision, but – like John McCain believed in 2000 – I believe that if Roe vs. Wade were repealed thousands of young American women would be in danger of death and injury due to illegal and underground abortions. This makes me anti-family, because in a Culture of Life, we don’t value the lives of women who’ve had sex – especially if unmarried or unable to afford a doctor. The wealthy will have a greater chance of affording procedures that won’t leave them butchered or prone to die of infection, but those who were struggling day to day without the prospect of raising a child? Well, they’ll have to take their chances. Should have thought of that before you had sex with limited access to birth control (I’m looking at you South Dakota.)

Because believe that a Culture of Life includes looking out for working and single mothers, working families and people who can’t afford health care; because I thought I remembered Jesus teaching something about “caring for the least of these;” because I remember learning somewhere either in my small town or at my small college that among Christians the people are what make up the church and the people love and care and sacrifice for each other; I’m probably a Socialist and therefore a danger to America.

I hate PG-13 movies because by definition PG-13 movies aren’t allowed to show blood as consequence of gunplay and most PG-13 movies are produced so middle school kids have something to do on dates, but I think there are many good, decent, well-made Rated R films that can teach us about the human condition, so therefore I’m pro-Hollywood, and to be pro-Hollywood is to be pro-gay so add that to list. (Majorly looking forward to the movie Milk, though need it be stated?)

I also don’t believe in traditional marriage and don’t want to get married. In my “traditional family” and in my small town I saw many traditional marriages end in divorce and I really don’t care much for the institution. But that’s because I’m anti-marriage, anti-family and anti-“traditional values” even though I don’t know what you mean by that. If this post hasn’t shown you enough already, every time someone says “traditional,” “American,” “family,” or “our shared” values I stop listening because rarely are they talking about me, my values or my family.

I don’t count because if I don’t believe the same thing as someone else I don’t have values. In fact, I’m beyond that: by valuing diversity, acceptance, pluralism, education, and peace, I am anti-Values. I’m a feminist, vegetarian who supports gun control and wants to be a foster parent someday. I’m one step away from being the Anti-Christ.

Is it any wonder I feel alienated from my country?

Any wonder why I can’t automatically parrot-chirp Yes, when asked if I’m proud to be an American?

I’m not proud of being called names, I can tell you that.

The Republicans have made it quite clear that Patriotic America has no use for people like me.

But I will not surrender my country so easily. All though it is hard, I have to forge ahead and make a place for myself there – no matter how demoralized I am and tired I am of being told that I have no values.

I know that I have worthwhile values. I know that I am a worthwhile American. And no one is going to take my country from me like this. If they think the U.S. will be better off when the people like me all leave – they can make me. Just as soon as I get back.

2008-08-24T03:27:00.001-07:00

Carry on my Wayward Son
The contents of this website are mine personally as usual do not have anything to do with the US government, the Peace Corps, or Romania, and therefore do not reflect any official position thereof.

Having strayed far from my "comfort zone" into completely alien territories of faith by studying and attending church with Missionary Group #2, my mind has recoiled at the utter lack of balance in my life. Reeling and grasping for me to put something "normal" within sight; some indication or reminder of who I am and where I came from; which as I recall is "just another freak in the freak kingdom."

In response I decided to become obsessed with Supernatural, a show to which I was briefly dedicated in January and February of 2007 before I left for Romania.

Supernatural is a good reminder to me that I do have a lot of faith and a capacity to believe incredible things. It also makes me feel more sorted out to have "treatment" of Sam and Dean every evening with an episode (or three). Because when you distill the relationship between the Winchester brothers down through all the duty, and demon-induced pain and grief, what you have is basically one hot guy telling another hot guy "I can't live without you" - just not in so many words.

And Heaven knows I will lap that up. I will eat up with a spoon. I will drink it with straw.

However, I have opportunities to challenge my firmly held beliefs and find contention here too. While surfing the abundance of Winchester brother videos on Youtube (I really make it sound like I don't do any work at all, don't I?) I came across a video someone made for Jensen Ackles about his character's pet peeves; one of which is when people assume that because Dean and Sam are always together, they are ...uh, together. Now I can't demand a gay-positive attitude from all my fave fictional characters (see Leo McGary from the West Wing). I sometimes do know when I'm asking too much of the world. Besides what person in their right mind, what gay person, wouldn't be offended if someone suggested they were gay ...with their brother?

However I was shocked and disappointed when in the video, typed across one of the stills is, the quote "When I find out who invented Wincest I'm going to burn that bitch." The quote is not attributed to Ackels and I dearly hope it is not his. The maker of the video sourced their material from an Ackels fan site, which I scoured (by which I mean glanced at to not find the quote or the attribution on the home page, so I left).

I sincerely hope he didn't say that. I would fall to my knees and howl in lamentation if he did. I would be gravely disappointed. Possibly to the point of tears and rending my garments. Not because I'm a fan of Wincest. It's not my cup of tea. But I understand those who might go for it. I sincerely doubt the majority of Wincest fans are in it because of the brothers. (Ew). I think it's just an excuse to get two hot guys together in a fan fiction story. It's not my thing, so I personally leave it alone. It may not be you're thing either, but really is it hurting anyone? It's a bunch of made-up stories, probably terribly written stories - about fictional characters. Probably horribly written. (Shudder).

So in the meantime I wring my hands and wonder why all the condemnation in the world? Sigh. At least I have my sweet sweet show to cling to - until I watch all of season 3, which only has 16 episodes.

2008-08-21T00:40:00.000-07:00

You're not the boss of me!
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

I was probably the only person in North America (when I was in North America) who anxiously awaiting the day a proud Muslim person would come knock on my door and ask it I'd like to learn more about the Prophet Mohammad. I would love to learn more!

Because I have a sincere interest in other people's faiths, and I think it can never hurt us to learn more about faith and what our brothers and sisters believe, I have entered into study-relationships with two different sets of missionaries. I have been doing Bible study for about eight months now with a Romanian girl who speaks English that I met because she knocked on my door, and I recently engaged another group of American missionaries that are in town. I'm interested to know more.

It probably doesn't help that all of my Peace Corps friends went on vacation at the same time and I am working from home on the internet so that doesn't leave me anyone to talk to. And its amazing how much you have in common with other Americans you have nothing in common with once you're in Romania together.

I was enjoying weekly talks with both sets of missionaries. It was nice to have someone in my life to remind me that spiritual pursuits require time and energy which should be dedicated to study, prayer and self examination. Fine. But now both groups are making greater demands on my time. One group wants to see me three times a week including church on Sunday, and my other friend whom I've known longer - who's never invited me anywhere not even on Easter - has finally invited me to church this Sunday. When I told the other missionaries this, they seemed offended. They weren't outright mean, but they definitely put pressure on me to come to their church. I thought I could just go to one church this week and another one next week and then I realized: they both want me to come to church with them every week.

At first I was kind of shy and embarrassed. I tried to think of something placating to say. I wondered how I could get out of going to church with the other person. I felt like I owed them. They made me feel like I had broken a promise. Like I was disappointing them. Then, later I got angry. I don't deserve to be stressed out about this. It isn't a competition. Both of these Christian denominations should just be glad I'm going to church at all and not trying to convince me that theirs in the one true church.

This I think is representative of everything I find frustrating about Christianity. And while desperately trying to remain a Christian, increase my knowledge and my faith, this kind of thing really makes me want to chuck the whole thing and stay home and watch cartoons in Romanian. Although I don't exactly feel justified since the missionaries weren't outright mean about it. They just made me feel kind of bad.

They said it was an opportunity for me to ask God to reveal to me which house I was supposed to be in on Sunday. So I did. Though, unhappy that they were putting me in this position I asked God "If it's important to You which church I go to on Sunday please indicate to me where you would like me to go."

We'll see what happens, but until then I'm shaking off this pressure by reminding myself that this is only One Sunday of my life and really, which church I worship in is so not important. They're both going to be in Romanian anyway.

2008-08-12T08:00:00.000-07:00

The Pitch...
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

At last the time is right to inform everyone about this incredible project I've been working on, which I know I have not mentioned or explained thus far. Read on to find out about this extra special project and how you can be part of it!

In cooperation with the management of Castleul Corvinilor (the Corvin’s Castle) in Hunedoara, Romania my friend Micah and I are organizing a Christmas fair for local children involving nonprofit organizations which benefit children at the often-pictured-on-this-blog castle December 12-14th.

Organizations such as local orphanages, associations which benefit street children, groups for parents of disabled children, Special Olympics and Habitat for Humanity will come together for a weekend long fair, and offer an activity or craft for children for a small amount of money. We intend this event as an opportunity for nonprofits to solicit donations, recruit volunteers, and promote their mission and services. There will be a chance for each organization to invite its child beneficiaries to decorate a Christmas tree for display.

As a centerpiece to the event, we will create and display a model of Castelul Corvinilor created out of gingerbread. The gingerbread castle will be a project of Peace Corps volunteers and will be donated to the event as a media showcase, and will remain on display at the castle along with the decorated Christmas trees for the rest of the season.

Communication and cooperation between Romanian nonprofits often fails in an atmosphere of competition and tension. Past-dependence on foreign donors has made the work of many nonprofits insular; their work often left unacknowledged and unassisted by their communities which may not even be aware people are working toward solutions to local problems. The objectives of our event are to raise the profile of Romanian nonprofits benefiting children and families, while providing them a networking and local fund raising opportunity. A secondary benefit is the media attention to Hunedoara, an underprivileged community, as a tourist point of interest.

The castle administration is eager to work with us and has agreed to donate use of the castle for the three-day event and to make admission free to all who wish to attend. We will also be inviting local dancers and musicians to perform and food and drink vendors. There will be a coloring contest with a prize for the winner and other special events throughout the duration of the Christmas fair. Maybe even an appearance by Santa Claus himself!

We invite you to help us fund this this event through the Peace Corps Partnership Program so that we can provide organizations that would not otherwise be able to participate the cost of materials for their activity at the fair. In addition to supporting our nonprofit partners who ask for assistance, our main expenses with this project are printing and advertising the event and the cost of creating the gingerbread castle. We are additionally seeking in-kind donations to support the project although the culture is not on where businesses are usually involved in the community.

If interested, click here to go to the Peace Corps Partnership Program web site and make your tax-deductible donation online with your credit card. It's that easy and you can donate any amount!

I look forward to continuing to update you on the progress of this project. In fact if my camera hadn't broken last weekend I would have some pictures of our "practice gingerbread castle" which we constructed and of "days of the castle" a medieval celebration in Hunedoara.

2008-08-12T07:38:00.000-07:00

Laundry Day!
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Today is laundry day and I am thrilled! Why am I thrilled? Because somewhere around the second week of June my last washing machine broke. It was very old but I think I overloaded it and it started to smoke. Sadly when I informed the landlord of this over the phone I initially said correctly in Romanian, "Smoke from the washing machine" and then I went on to say "I am smoking the washing machine."

Sometime in early July the landlord actually showed up to fix it. It was not entirely his fault it took so long. We had problems coordinating our schedules and I've been making frequent trips to Bucharest and since its summer there are various festivals going on which take me out of town on the weekends. The weekend before last weekend was one that I was home, however.

I have to hand it to my landlord. He really gave fixing that old washing machine the old college try. He made two different trips here to fix it, on the second trip he left with the machine, only to return it, instruct me to put the clothes in it and wash away. Then he tried to take it apart with my clothes in it before informing me that it was still broken and leaving with the machine - and me with a tub full of wet towels and jeans.

Now I have no right to complain about having no washing machine since most of my fellow volunteers have no washing machine and have been doing their laundry by hand for over a year. I've been doing my laundry by hand for only a little over a month. What I was upset about was the fact that I was long waiting for him to come and fix it so I could wash the jeans and towels I'd been saving for when I had a machine again. If he had said right away - too bad no machine, I could have washed those jeans and towels by hand much sooner. Truly, I ran out of towels at one point and when the point came when I needed to shower and still couldn't justify pulling a towel out of the laundry bag, I dried myself with what can only be described as a super-absorbent bathroom floor mat that a guest had left here.

I was also especially upset about the landlord leaving me with that pile of wet jeans and towels because he told me he would call me last Tuesday or Wednesday and bring over a new machine. Well he didn't and both of my buckets were already full. I had to leave last Thursday for Bucuresti for my last shot in the series of anti-rabies treatments, so I put the wet towels and jeans in the tub and filled it up thinking damp clothes can't mold if they're underwater. However, I forgot that my bathtub leaks so instead of damp laundry moldering on the bathroom floor, I had sopping wet laundry moldering in the bath tub.

But today the landlord brought over a new machine, Praise the Lord! It only took two cycles for each of two separate loads to get that aquarium smell out of my disturbingly slimy jeans. Soon I will be rich in clean dish towels - which I haven't seen since early June and my bathroom floor will be free of buckets of dirty filthy smelling water and soaking clothes. My balcony is already crowded with drying towels and pairs of pants. I am very excited and still unable to overlook my good fortune at having a washing machine!

2008-08-07T02:26:00.000-07:00

Romania is not the United States >:<
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

For the first time I have been really annoyed that Romania is not the United States. It started around 4 am this morning when a car in my neighborhood's car alarm when off - and proceeded to blare for two hours until 6:05 this morning.

Usually it is screaming cats. bloody snarling dog fights and occasionally a rooster cockadoodling at 5 am which make up the annoying noises heard in my alley, and I've learned to live with it. This car alarm pissed me off though. I lay in the dark with a second pillow and my arm over my head trying to drown out the noise waiting for one of my neighbors to call the police. I imagine no one did.

I didn't call the police because a) I don't have a non-emergency number for the police department
b) I don't know if they would understand my Romanian, and because
c) I'm not sure if letting your car alarm blare for two hours in the early morning is illegal.

But it should be. It doesn't seem fair that one person's car alarm falsely going off should deprive people in three bloc buildings of a night of sleep - and for the record that's a lot of people. And I can tell how many people were up by how many lights went on in the apartments in the other building.
In fact, at one point I put my headphones in, flicked on the lights in the bedroom out of solidarity with the neighbors and to show the police should they ever show up just how many people were disturbed by this, and buried my head under the pillows and tried to sleep in the living room.

After breakfast this morning I sent an irritated email to our Safety and Security officer describing the situation and asking what I can do should it re-occur. I not so sensitively pointed out that this is illegal in the US, that playing sirens to deprive people of sleep is a torture technique, and told him I might call him at four in the morning next time it happens so that he can call the Deva police for me.

I signed off, Tired and Cranky, Laura.

Luckily as daylight broke the wailing siren stopped. I popped a couple of ibuprophen to help get rid of my screaming headache, put my eye pillow over my face to simulate darkness and turned off the alarm so I could sleep in till 10. Unfortunately at 9:30 I was awakened by someone in my hallway cutting metal with a chainsaw because they are making some renovations I don't understand to the building - but that is what I am used to.

2008-08-04T23:52:00.000-07:00

One weekend, four musicals and these clips
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

A working weekend, but I managed to listen to Godspell, Mama Mia, Tommy, and watch Sweeney Todd (finally!) Also, discovered these priceless gems. Can't wait to get involved in Improv Everywhere when I'm back in the states!

2008-07-25T03:56:00.000-07:00

OH Sweet Hell, Batman!
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

I saw The Dark Knight last night. I felt a little bad that it such a dark movie and I was cackling obnoxiously through a lot of it. It is funnier than I expected, and let me just say the Joker has some lines that completely satisfy! At one point I gave a dirty look to some other Americans in the audience that were talking out loud in English during the movie - but I didn't really have a leg to stand on with my burst of maniacal laughter (let me say in my own defense though, in this movie, maniacal laughter is not out out of place.)

I heard an American girl say during one seen "couldn't they have found a better Alfred?" which made me consider leaping out of my seat and grabbing her by the throat. I wouldn't have had very far to go because she was sitting in the middle of the aisle (apparently you can do that) but I decided against it because I wanted to see the rest of the movie.

Heath Ledger's Joker is hands down my favorite character and my favorite performance. Knowing me, and my sense of humor you know that if Ledger's Joker wasn't so sharp there could have been a moment during his scene with Maggie Gyllenhaal where I would have thought "HA HA! He totally made out with her brother!" but as it was that didn't occur to me till the ending credits.

I love the Joker's voice, which I read was Ledger's biggest challenge with the role. The whole performance is just incredible. If you put this movie next to anything else the Brother's Grimm, Brokeback Mountain, A Knight's Tale, - I'd never guess it was the same actor if I didn't already know!

I was SO SAD it's the last movie I'll ever see him. I wanted to cry during every seen he wasn't in. I wore all black to the movie theatre. If I were in the states I would have worn The Joker makeup too - but I can't do that here because A) I don't have my Ben Nye kit and B) People would talk - "I saw an American at the cinema wearing The Joker make up. That's because they're all homicidal maniacs, Americans." And they'd only be half right. (shh! I didn't say that.)

Even with all Ledger's amazingness Gary Oldman also stole the show for me. Could be that he's got a bit more screen time than the Joker, but also the subdued Jim Gordon, stands out next to the energetic performances of Ledger, Christain Bale, and Aaron Eckhart. It made me love Commissioner Gordon even more than I did after the first Christopher Nolan Batman movie.

Funny thing is on the train on the way to Bucuresti (for the fourth out of five anti-rabies shots) I had a dream about Adam West and the Batman tv show that I watched in the second grade. After walking out of the theatre last night the following occurred to me: Batman-still cool. Nolan really packs the punches when it comes to questioning the goodness of human nature, heroism, and the struggle against evil internally and externally. This is not Adam West's Batman.

2008-07-22T04:51:00.000-07:00

Nature Girl
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Hope isn't easily killed. I have tried to kill her many times, never really believing I'd succeeded, and still she refuses to die. That's a good thing, for the most part. But Hope has a dangerous twin sister Expectation.

In the life of every woman (and I expect also, every man) there comes a time when you look to the future and ask yourself what you want. At this point you separate what you were told you wanted and what you actually want. You also examine the horizon and make note of the difference between how you were told your life would be and how it is. For most of us I believe involves hearing a lot of "When you grow up and get married and have kids" and then looking around going "huh?" or "when?" and "Whaaa?"

For me I don't have a lot actual guides to reference when I think about ideas like "relationship" "happiness" and "forever" so I look to The Movies to be my guides. It occurs to me lately that several movies involve people reminiscing about happiness from their youth which is over. Happiness the character expected would continue to the end of the storyline and are now looking back on with fondness and regret.

Then there are the enormous multitude of movies that end when the couples get together and we presume they live "happily ever after." I have often commented that movies like this build false expectations - most of our stories end when a couple get together at the end of a film and we never see the complicated trials, or the work of maintaining a relationship.

But which is it? Should we expect that happiness will just come and that one day after some amusing pitfalls, some crying and a big comedic moment (Julia Roberts stealing a truck and proposing to her best friend) it will all fall into place and happiness will just arrive?

Or are we constantly wary, avoiding false expectations, eschewing disappointment and pain...and wrestling with hope?

There are things that I was told all my life - and I never believed them. I turned a cold eye to all romantic comedies which build dangerous expectations. The ones I don't admit to watching - and have done so only under duress. I told myself happiness can't be found in another person. Love should never be calculated in terms of what you "deserve" or think you deserve, and any time I ever heard someone say that I forced my interior monologue to shout "SHUT UP, SHUT UP" because people don't always get what they deserve. I think, rarely, they do. I repeated Eponine's lines in One Day More "Not for me, Not for me," until they became true for me and still I tried not to dream, tried to have no expectations. I tried to kill hope.

I did this because it was easier than maintaining that fragile faith. My faith in this area is almost gone. But then...

Where's the line between hoping and creating false expectations? What is tempting fate, setting yourself up for failure? And what is sitting on the bench, staying out of the game? When is it true that if you don't expect to find happiness you won't find it? What amount of hope, or expectation of happiness is reasonable?

I joined Peace Corps because I've always wanted to serve. But also for a bit of adventure, and maybe also to "find myself." And instead, maybe I'm finding something else. Something all those innocent - I believed naive grandmothers and well meaning Old Ladies said I would find, and I didn't believe them. Something I didn't know existed. Didn't think could exist. Still don't know if it does....
but maybe it does.
Maybe.
I hope.

No one but you.

2008-07-14T08:56:00.000-07:00

Twice Bitten
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

And not by mosquitoes although I have plenty of those bites to go around. Yes those are my two-year pale calves up there with the bruises that hardly show up when photographed. Yesterday they looked worse, today better. The big bruise on my right leg is already yellow in the middle so healing well.

Here's what happened: Last Wednesday at 6:45 in the morning, I was on my way to the bus that would take me to the train station that would take me to camp in the village, when I turned a corner near my apartment and surprised a pack of wild dogs some guy was feeding from his doorway. I didn't know they were there, but one on the outskirts of the pack was apparently surprised and threatened by my sudden appearance. I'm sure with my big backpack and the big tent in a bag I was carrying I seemed like a large threatening human coming up behind him when he wasn't too sure he wanted to get closer to the human in front of him with the food.

He never growled. But barked threateningly and charged. I had time to back away, tell myself not to run or he would chase me, and realize even if I didn't run he was still coming for me. He bit twice. Once on each leg. And ran away. I screamed, fell down, was going to cry - decided not to cry - realized I couldn't bet back on my feet with my big backpack on and the guy feeding the dogs had to come and help me. Among my thoughts were - Did he bite me? I never thought a dog would bite me. If I'm bleeding I have to go to Bucharest for the rabies shots.

I was bleeding, but not a lot. My first thought was "It's just a scratch. I've had worse falling off my bike." I think it was the dogs equivalent I think to shoving someone out of the way so you can run down the stairs and out of the house before the cops show up. It wasn't until I was on the bus to the train station, trying not to bleed on the car, that I realized my legs actually hurt. Later the bruises started to swell and show up but and once I got a band-aid one of the punctures bleed for about half a day. I count myself lucky, though. If the dog had been angry he certainly could have done more damage.

Rabies shots - for those of you afraid of needles, injections, and long grueling amounts of time spent on trains you should probably not read on.

I ended up getting on the bus to the train station, buying tickets then dumping my water bottle on the wounds before getting on the train to camp. On the way one of our high school student leaders insisted on cleaning the wounds again with my bottle of hand-sanitizer. Peace Corps doctors insisted I come to Bucharest for the anti-rabies shots so rather than going out to the camp ground with everyone else I had lunch in Baru Mare and got back on the train. Nine hours later I arrived in Romania's capital where thankfully I met a friend and went out to dinner rather than dragging my sorry self to the hotel and finding food alone.

Thursday morning at 8:15 I saw our Peace Corps doctor and received four shots. One in the arm, one in the butt and one in each bite (yeah, and I got bit twice!) And a schedule telling me I had to come back four more times for the rest of the anti-rabies treatments. Took an afternoon train home for seven hours spent the night at home at my apartment and early Friday morning set out for camp - made it there by Friday afternoon.

Saturday night, we ended camp around three, was back on a train at nine. Midnight took the overnight train to Bucharest, got to the office at 7:00, 7:30 had a shot, 9:45 was on a train back to Deva - arrived in Deva at 7pm.

The thing about the anti-rabies shots is I'm glad they have them and that Peace Corps makes us get them if we're bit by an animal. However, I don't have any reason to suspect that the dog had rabies and when I think about it not having rabies, I just get upset at all the time I have to spend traveling for these shots. In other PC countries you can get three shots when you show up in country so you don't get rabies in the event that you are bitten (like the vaccines you give your pet dog so they DON'T get rabies.) I'm not sure why we don't do that here because three shots is ultimately less than six (or in my case nine) but then again I only know of three other volunteers who have actually been bitten by dogs.

Getting bit by a dog is surely going to make me hate trains. I have to go back to Bucharest again overnight train Wednesday night spend three hours in Bucharest and come back Thursday night. And again next week, and then again in two weeks. At least hopefully by August 7th The Dark Knight may be playing in Bucharest and if that's the case I won't be in such a hurry to get back to site.

2008-07-08T13:20:00.000-07:00

The Babies are Gone!
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Christina came to pick up the kittens an hour ago and now it's just me and Bella again. So another project over, and again not the way I anticipated, but accomplished nonetheless. I feel bad about their missing "escapee" brother and sisters, but I'm very happy that at least Chuckles and Hugs will be going to a good home. I tried to give Christina some advice about socializing them but she said her mother has cats and knows how to take of them. And I'm sure she does.

I hope the little girls will be happy and will continue to make progress. Today we went to the vet because of Chuckles puffy firm stomach, made me expect stomach worms. Later, I had them both in my arms and they were playing with each other and then they both fell asleep. They purr when I held them, but disliked being picked up - so I had to chase them because they'd never come to me. Still hissy and spitty, but hopefully on the way to long happy domestic lives.

I hope your new guardian will give you the vaccines you need to be healthy and hopefully will have you sterilized. I hope you'll be happy with a yard to play in and when you're tempted to go exploring this big crazy dangerous world you'll remember not to stray too far from the food bowl. Good luck guys! I miss you already.

Now I'm getting ready to leave for camp for four days and Bella goes from Big Sister to ruling the house all alone. I hope she doesn't get too lonely!

2008-07-07T11:37:00.001-07:00

On Failure
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

People are uncomfortable with failure. Americans in particular do not accept it. In Romania there is a cultural stigma against failure that says its better not to try than to try and fail. Someone described it as Americans will start out saying "yes" and Romanians will start out saying "no." I think that's accurate.

I think one of the most valuable things we have to teach as Romanians in America is that you can fail - the only redeeming point about America's attitude toward failure is that we have an underbelly of "at least you tried" which doesn't exist here. As a postcard I found in my apartment left by the previous Peace Corps volunteer says "Even if you fail, at least you are trying to succeed. You could do nothing." I think if we can impart that value to Romania, we will have accomplished a lot.

I have had a couple of experiences in my life where I've completely failed at something - and when I say "failed" I don't mean "blew it off" or "didn't do what I could have." What I mean by Failure in this instance is that I gave 100% of everything I had - there was absolutely nothing more I could do - and still I failed. Many people if they find themselves close to failing, find the resources (either within themselves or in friends and family) to pull themselves out at the last minute. Therefore I don't know many people who claim to have this experience of Failure and very few people I have met in life can relate to Failure. It is like hitting a wall.

Therefore, when I relate my experience starting out in a "this is what happened to me" style, I quickly become assertive. Because it has been my experience the other person needs some convincing that I did in fact Fail - that there was nothing I could have done to try harder. Maybe it's because of my assertions, but the other person almost always argues with me my experience was not actual Failure (capital F) but just failure on my part to do something more.

Example:"I'm sure if you went to therapy and overcame math anxiety you could do math."
No. I have math anxiety and a learning disability. While Math anxiety may be treatable, a learning disability is not something that can be cured. I'm sorry you don't believe me but it's not a matter of not having tried. It's not a matter of not wanting to learn.

This treatment of my experience - making it invalid - is incredibly frustrating on top of the experience of Failing. I do realize that tat it's not my failure that they disbelieve, it's the idea that people can fail that they don't want to believe. Because if it happened to me it could happen to them and they don't want to think about what it's like to have that incredibly frustrating experience like beating your head against an immovable object.

But I don't have to think about it what that's like. I know.

So when you encounter someone sharing an experience with you from their life, and incredibly frustrating experience of Failure, don't try to convince them that there's more they could have done. They are probably more than anything else just looking for someone to acknowledge and validate their experience. They are looking for someone to say "I understand that it was very difficult." They don't want to hear, "I'm sure there was something else you could have done."

And in the meantime chances are when someone is telling you about the worst period in their life - the story is going to be negative. I bet the story of the worst thing that ever happened to you isn't a positive story. So don't assume the situation was a negative one because of this attitude. Attitudes are shaped by circumstances and someone who starts out with a good attitude in a situation can change their attitude over time. When the good attitude receives no nourishment, it bears no fruit and it dies.

I have learned to appreciate my failures. For one thing they taught me to identify and understand what other people in unjust circumstances are going through. It can be very helpful to know that failure is possible - even when you are trying your hardest, and I find it useful to be able to identify with what people in other situations are going through.

But for now, I have to figure out how, when I get this response of someone trying to invalidate my life experience, how not to let it take me right back to that darkest time in my life when the Failure was actually happening. If anyone has any advice on that, I'll happily take it.

I can't mull this over in my head anymore, so I had to write about. Now I'm going to go take a shower and stop feeling this way.

2008-07-06T10:09:00.001-07:00

Two Sisters
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

This is Hugs (the hissy and spitty one)

This is Chuckles (the one with the eye problem)

Two kittens found after an interesting night-long adventure which involved lifting up the bed and also crawling around the living room with the flashlight on my phone at 3:30 in the morning while my friends who were crashing over slept, unawares.

They now wait in the no-places-to-hide kitchen for my work colleague Cristina to call and say when she's picking them up to take to their new home outside of Deva with her mother.

Their sister, Precious, who is white with gray tabby-striped spots seems to have disappeared, and by the uneaten food left about in bowls sequestered in various rooms at different times I have concluded she is no longer in the apartment. How or when she left I have no idea. I believe it was probably sometime after I lost Tiger on Thursday night, but actually Thursday night was the last time I saw her (maybe it was her, maybe it was Hugs) and it could be that Tiger followed her out the window. I didn't hear another jumper - but I can't be certain. As my friends pointed out, if Hugs could sneak into the living room without us knowing it - Precious could have sneaked out the window or the front door. I feel bad for having lost her.

My worst fear is that she's dead somewhere in the apartment. (Poor Precious!)

More on last night's adventure: We caught Chuckles here, and confined her to the cat carrier in the bedroom and put out a bowl of fresh food to tempt her sisters out. My friends crashing for the night went to bed on the couches, and I took the fold out chair-bed so as not to sleep in the bedroom and disturb the kitten(s). Chuckles started crying and I was hearing responding cries. They sounded like they were coming from under the couch I was sleeping next to, but sometimes I have a hard time telling where sounds are really coming from. Then I moved somehow and heard a hiss and I knew I she was in the living room. So I sat up and picked Bella up from where she was sleeping by my feet and told her to go get the kitten under the couch. When I acquired my flashlight I didn't see her under the couch anywhere, but heard Bella growling across the room and realized she was under the TV. But with all the large backpacking packs around the room and shopping bags, what a great place for a kitten to hide. Twice I saw Hugs under the TV and twice she proved very disappear-y until we (Bella and I) finally cornered her and imprisoned her with Chuckles in the carrier.

Bella proved very embarrassed by her lack of ability to hunt other cats in her own territory and decided to stay up for the rest of the night and prove herself by getting into the spices my friends brought over from other exotic locals, and knocking the chocolate sprinkles all over the floor. However, Bella has been very gracious about giving up her kitchen so I could move the kittens, bowls and litter box into that space and close the door.

This experience has also taught me to appreciate Bella's even temperment. All that I know of Bella's origins is that my second host mother found her crying in the rain with two other kittens, caught her, brought her to Deva from the country house where her garden is and gave her to me covered in fleas, yet Bella had a friendly disposition from the beginning after being socialized for all of a few hours by my host mother. I suppose it's completely possible she was already at that time someone else's cat who got away in the rain. But if that was the case someone else wasn't looking after her with eye drops and flea medication. Yet Bella first purred for me the first time I gave her rice boiled in milk (because I didn't yet have any cat food) and on the second day she was more inclined to climb up my pant leg than to run into the corner. She never hissed or spat at me.

Anyway, this experience has taught me that no matter how good our intentions are, sometimes we can't help the kittens that don't want to be helped (hence the two that ran away.) I'm very lucky to have so quickly found a home for the two that remain, but whether they will stay there or run away to live out their lives in the wild I have my doubts - and also no control. I have to console myself knowing I did only the best I could for them, and even though I held them both today and stroked each one of them until they stopped shaking and started to purr - they probably still hate me and hate people. I broke up their family. And the knowledge that their family was going to break up soon naturally anyway doesn't comfort me much. It does make me feel good to think that maybe I could help these two beauties have better, longer, healthier lives, but I'm also worried because until Christina picks them up I know I'm not off the hook.

I told myself getting into this that we all must make decisions knowing we have to live with what we did or did not do. And I chose to do this. I think maybe its because my parents never let me rescue animals off the street when I was a kid and now that I'm on my own I'll do what I want and no one can stop me. In any case I learned my lesson about feral cats and now I believe people when they say that they don't like people and don't want to be tamed. When Bella and I say goodbye to Chuckles and Hugs I'll know that I've had my "rescuing" experience for Romania and I won't need to do it again. Until I'm back in the U.S. and can work through a rescue organization.

2008-07-04T10:43:00.000-07:00

And then there were 3?
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

I think this little guy is the one who escaped last night. I never saw which one it was, but this guy is the darkest and his sisters (all calico, therefore I assume female, but they could also be sterile males) have some white on them - which leads me to believe it was the Tiger, here.

Last night the kittens came out - I actually saw three of them - and emptied the bowl of food I put out.Three were all standing in the window crying. I caught the two who needed their eye drops. That's when I took this picture.

I didn't think the kittens could climb up the chair to get into the window because it seems when Bella was their size she had trouble jumping on to the couch, and the chair is higher. But maybe they're more motivated out of fear. I didn't think much of it at the time. After a while I gave up on the catching the other two to check on them, I settled on administering the eye drops and went to bed.
Then I heard a noise and something made me think "I bet a kitten that could climb up to the window could make it through the kitten-size hole in the screen." So I got up to nail the screen in the two places I saw that it was loose, in the process discovering a much bigger kitten gap than I had seen before. So I decided to go out on the balcony and investigate. What I should have done is gotten the flashlight and scanned the balcony for kittens, because when I stepped outside I heard the crashing sound of a kitten jumping off the second story balcony into the very bushes where I had seen large dog sleeping earlier in the day.

I know the kitten landed on his feet though because I heard him crying on the ground after that. One of his sisters whined a little in response and I felt very bad that he was separated from his siblings.

And bad about the convention of barking dogs that proceeded to take place in the alley below my window. But I think from the sound of it the local pack was turning on one of their own rather than hunting kittens.

Ironically this guy was the one I originally named Lucky. Is he Lucky to have escaped domesticity? I don't know. Free meals, free medical care and someone who cleans up your poop in exchange for sleeping all day. I don't see a downside. At least he gets to remain wild at heart.

I hoped for for him that he would find his way back to his mother. But then I thought she will just get fleas on him again. The medicine I gave him will make him immune to fleas for six weeks but Mother will probably get the flea eggs on him and they will hatch whenever he finds himself not immune anymore. Maybe he will find himself a new home in the six weeks in between.

If not, I hope that he will make it. He was a tough guy. He was the biggest of the litter. I named him Lucky, but I started calling him Tiger because he was so feisty. He was the brave one. He once ran out from under the bureau sacrificing himself so I wouldn't go after the little sister, and thus he was first to get his medicine. He bit me once, and he was not afraid to hiss and spit but once you got him in your hands you could put him on his back and and he would show the bottoms of his little paws, how pads were black and not pink. He also had a cute little black nose.

Godspeed to you, Tiger. May all of your nine lives be long, healthy and happy. I'm sorry if I made you afraid and miserable. So afraid you were willing to jump off the balcony and chance life on the street. I hope being parasite free and having your eye goop cleared up and a few meals brought you some brief happiness. I will miss you.

2008-07-03T03:45:00.000-07:00

Cat Lady
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

I'm about to relate a story which I already consider to be a mistake. In fact I was well aware that this was probably a bad idea when I set out to do it - but do you ever have an idea and before you can reason yourself out of it, your mind is "wedded"* to the idea. It's like "too bad-you thought of it. Now you have to do it." *PC term

There were four kittens living down the street in what would be like a man hole, only it didn't have a cover and it was square. I say "were" because I caught them and now they're living in my bedroom. I think. All four of them are MIA at the moment which leads me to think they must have gone under the bed and crawled up into the box spring. Otherwise I have no clue.

I thought I would take in these four adorable babies and sequester them in my room, since I'm sleeping on the couch anyway, and foster them until I can find homes for them. I already bathed, trimmed the claws and flea shampooed all of them, and applied the necessary medicine which prevents them from getting fleas again for 6 weeks. However, I thought they would be a little more social - or easy to socialize. These babies hate me. They are hissy and bitey.

I thought they would be like Bella who when she was that age stayed all night in the cardboard box I put her in - even when she had to stay in the kitchen. These guys take off for the nearest corner as soon as I put them in the box. Two of them need eye drops like Bella did when I first got her but those two were not to be found this morning. And I thought they would take to Bella like a new mom. Bella is curious about them, but they are scared of her.

Last night I was plagued with guilt about how their poor mother must feel after I stole her four babies! Even though I know I did it because for their own good! I thought a flea bath and regular food would be good for them. I was dead set on finding them homes (before next Wednesday when I leave for the next camp). Now I'm having nightmares about dead kittens being stuck inside my furniture. None of them have eaten any of the food I put out for them yet, and I'm afraid I made a bad experience for them worth with the bathing them, and the twice catching them from their hiding places in the bedroom so I could administer the flea and eye medicines. Now I can 't find a one.

This may have been a mistake. But at least I realized catching their mother so I wouldn't have to separate her from her babies was a worse idea. She too would need a flea bath before she could become a guest in my lovely home and I don't think she would have been as accommodating as the kittens. I think she would have killed me.

Rest assured I have no intention of living with 5 cats, so even if these guys don't find homes and I have to get a sitter while I'm at camp, I'm still looking for a volunteer or a Romanian family to take them in. Unfortunately there's only room on the plane home for one cat, but there's room in my heart for all of them. If I can't find homes for them I have a lead on a Deva animal shelter where they can go.

In the meantime everyone I know in Deva has been mobilized to find a home for these feral kittens. I even have my number up on the bulletin board at my local vet's office. Now let's hope they come out from hiding so I can give them away!

2008-07-01T09:01:00.000-07:00

Inner Rock Star
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

I've never been someone who listened to music everywhere I went. I was kind surprised by this ear bud phenomenon. I've never been someone who walks around "plugged in." Even when I got my shiny MP3 player for Christmas I often forgot to bring it with me or forgot to put on some tunes if I was with other people. Therefore, sadly my last year in Romania has been mostly music-free. However, I recently took a train trip and realized the appeal of the ear bud culture. Now those ipod commercials with the dancing people finally make sense to me. When I have the ear buds in I don't have to give a care about anything. I don't even have to listen to my own thoughts! It's amazing.

I had forgotten how much energy one can get from music. It's like being plugged in to a battery, constantly recharging my strength and motivation to make through the day - like a strong cup of tea or a good fruit smoothie - and right now my fruit of choice is Queen (pun intended. Freddie forgive.)

I have been a Queen fan for a long time but I couldn't say I've been a big Queen fan. They are one of the bands I always liked but never owned any of their music, with the exception of the Bohemian Rhapsody single one side and Show must go on the other. However, by now I am proud to say that I am very close to accomplishing a goal I've had for my life since I was in high school - which is to learn all the words to Killer Queen.

For various reasons last week I decided it would be a good time to electronically acquire all of Queen's Greatest Hits Platinum Collection disks 1 through 3. And that last Tuesday would be a good day to listen to "Somebody to Love" for 11 hours straight. Then Saturday when I got on the train it was a nonstop jam session. The second train ride was about a half hour long and I couldn't sit still. Well today on the way home it was the same thing. My train was originally 20 minutes late. Not a good because I had an eight minute layover to make a connection. When I finally got on a brand shiny new train, I was told it was direct to Deva. Great! Especially considering I slept all of 3 and half hours the night before. Did I sleep? Not at all. It was a 100% Queen concert in my head. This was a nice train but it was what is call a cattle car. It's all open seating inside, no private compartments. And that was fine. It was happily lip-snyching and fidgeting in my seat until the very delayed train started moving again after an inexplicable 40 minute stop at a small village station, and I realized that I was the only one in my train car. Time to sing. I sang and sang whatever I wanted for about 35 minutes when I got up to walk to the back of the train car and wait for my station. That's when I noticed that the front of the car I was in opened up right to the train conductor. Not the guy who comes and checks the tickets - the guy driving the train, was listening to me the whole time.

Nothing to be too embarrassed about. I went to the back of the train and shut the door so I was in the little private room waiting by the door for the train to stop at my station. Two stations early. And I closed the door so I figured now I was really safe to belt out "Somebody to Love" at the TOP of my lungs. And I was standing in the moving train with the hand rails by which I could hold on to as I danced/prevented myself from falling. Then I noticed that though the door closed, the space above the door was completely open and I was not sealed in my happy little compartment.

"I try and I try and I try! But everybody wants to put me down..."

Maybe I would be more embarrassed if I had actually seen the train driver and made eye contact with him or if I knew that he understood English. It's possible he was driving the train with his own ear buds in.

2008-06-29T11:10:00.000-07:00

I Love Deva
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Last Thursday was a big day for me. I took out my red bicycle I bought last August (and haven't ridden since last August) and had two guys fixing a car pump up the tires, and rode my bike to the Deva swimming pool. I've vaguely known that Deva has a city pool for a long time, but I've never been. I've heard from a lot of other volunteers reservations about Romanian public pools, but I thought I should at least go check it out.

It is so nice! There are actually three pools. One kiddie pool, on "middle" pool and then a pool that's two meters deep. I didn't actually find out how deep the other two pools are because I spent all my time in the two meter pool. In addition to three swimming pools, the whole pool-area which costs 5 lei to get in has a volley ball net, outdoor showers for rinsing off, and lots of outdoor bars and restaurants where you can get a beer and mici (sausages), corn on the cob, or ice cream and a variety of cold drinks.

And the water in the swimming pool is cold too. I hoped in and thought Wow! This is as cold as I wish my cool-aid would get in the refridgerator, however the cool-aid remains as cold as tap water. I swam laps across the two meters deep pool for two hours. Flotation devices are allowed and had I one of those floating rafts it would have been quite nice to float in the pool from which you can see our ruin of the ancient citadel in the hills.

I noticed, however that no one really swims acrross the pool the long way. Some guys were swimming across the pool the short way, but mostly everyone hangs around the edges of the pool and jump in and out. It's a lot of teenage guys thinking of new configurations of ways to fling themselves over the top of or into their friends and then into the water. And they don't always look at where or who they're jumping on to. And there are no life guards, so there's no mandatory 20 minute rest period - which would have been nice when swimming laps for two hours in water so deep you never once touch the bottom.

But the only bad thing about the pool is that there are no lockers. So I had to leave my bag with my bike helmet in it on my towel. I was actually expecting a phone call, so I went back to the towel repeatedly to check on my phone - but I guess I didn't check on my wallet. After I got dressed I left the pool and maybe I imagined I put my pool ticket into my wallet and my wallet in my pocket but when I arrived at the closest grocery store minutes later my wallet was nowhere to be found. And I had no minutes on my phone and no computer as mine was in the shop being fixed. And no money to recover my computer. Luckily at that moment when I was standing embarassed in the checkout line admitting I had no money, a friend called me and I was able to ask him to call Peace Corps and have the safety and security officer call me. But strangely, not two minutes later a collegue from my office called me to say someone had found my wallet and called the office. First I thought he had only my ID card. He was at the huge Super grocery store on the outside of town. I didn't know how to get there by bike and had no money on me for a cab so my work colleges drove out to meet him and he gave them my wallet while I waited at the office for them. I recovered my entire wallet, cards, IDs, and cash! I felt very lucky. And I immediately bought myself an ice cream cone!

Strangely enough, the amount of money in my wallet was about the exact amount that a pool pass costs. I think one might be a good investment. But regardless I'm looking for a friend to come with me on the 4th because I plan to spend the day at the pool - and I need someone to watch my bag.

2008-06-16T13:05:00.000-07:00

Writer writer
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

If you asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up when I was five years old, I would have said an author illustrator. If you had asked me when I was in fifth grade I would have said the same, and when I was a junior in high school and a sophomore in college. I don't remember when things changed and I started to think being a fiction author wasn't a viable career option. Maybe it was when my manuscript was rejected from the First Young Adult Novel Contest and I realized the winner had an MFA in creative writing. I didn't realize you could major in creative writing because it wasn't a major at any state schools. And I figured that if someone with an MFA had to win a contest to get their novel published maybe I didn't have much of a chance.

Last year I decided to write my autobiography as a cook book some time in the future.

Some friends of mine and I decided to start holding each other responsible for writing goals (some of them said 10 pages in a month - I personally set no page limits for myself) but I don't think any of did much personal writing this month. I for one, I hadn't even realized it had been a month and was still thinking about my personal writing. I wasn't even going to mention it in this blog until someone just brought it up.

What I was going to say though was that I've recently realized that about 89% of my job is writing - and I seem to be doing a lot more writing than usual lately. Sometimes I'm writing introductory emails to random people I've never met hoping that we can collaborate. Other times it's finely tuned letters stating this is what I want, this is why you should give it me. I've written more than three proposals in the last five months. Last week was a perfect example of finding out the funding is available on Monday, sending out a proposal on Wednesday. That felt good. And then there was writing the same letter 22 times to send to different people. Not so good.

In my down time between writing for work - I actually do write letters and postcards home. And when work is slow (or like next week when I'll be recovering from camp) I write to Congress. (I'm not kidding I actually write letters to my congressional representatives.)

I've got to go work on another proposal now, but even though this blog is not a good example of my best writing (sometimes) it's nice to think that maybe all my talents haven't gone to waste.

2008-06-02T07:54:00.001-07:00

Berry Bliss!
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

I think for the first time in my life I went to the piata and bought only what was on my list and nothing else. That's because I made sure that my list included fresh strawberries. Because in late May and early June when the strawberries are ripe, life isn't worth living if you can't have strawberries. The strawberries are so ripe that the air in the market even smells like real fresh strawberries.

And they are delicious. I ate one as I was leaving the market and I swear it was sweet perfection in strawberry form. The ultimate strawberry. True berry bliss!

I waked home dipping into my bag of berries thinking about what I'm going to do with my whole kilo. Should I buy yogurt? make vanilla ice milk? add whipped cream? You know what I think I'll do. Eat them one at a time.

The whole kilo, you may ask. No, some now, and some later.

I was walking up my alley thinking of how this could be better. If I had fondue-set and some chocolate? If I somehow would have time this season to make strawberry preserves? If there was somehow a hammock in my life and a constantly replenishing bowl of perfectly ripe strawberries?

I was walking by the blooming roses and my alley is heavy with the perfume of tea rose - that is when its not smelling inexplicably like jasmine. (I don't know what the jasmine bush looks like, but it smells exactly like the time I made jasmine candles with a jar of candle fragrance purchased off the internet...good.)

And I decided not to think about ways to make this experience better. I have strawberries and good weather, pretty flowers. Why complicate things?

2008-05-29T03:24:00.000-07:00

Woa!
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Some weird things happened this week. First of all two friends came to visit me during the week, bringing their friends with them so we could meet and become friends (isn't it nice?) and moreover so they could crash and my apartment while visiting the local tourist sites, one of them being the Castelul Corvinilor or The Corvin Castel in Hunedoara about twenty minutes away by car.

The funny thing is both these friends came with me the first time I saw the castle the Saturday after my birthday. Jesse came over on Sunday night with his Romanian friend Dragos who had never been to Hunedoara and wanted to tourist it up at castle. So Monday, after my meeting at the office the tree of us visited the castle, took a lot of pictures, and noticed while we were there there were a lot of old-fashioned looking wooden carts around, quite a bit of hay and an abundance of ladders made of tree branches.

Jesse left on Tuesday and that day Micah called and said he was visiting with his friend-from-home who he wanted to take to the castle as well as the famous Deva citadel. I wasn't sure if I'd go back to the castle since I'd just been there Monday but I decided to go, because believe-it-or-not Micah and I actually have a project going on with said castle so going there together would give us a chance to discuss work while boring his friend to tears, as I did to Jesse's friend who is not involved in our project.

When we approached the driver of our taxi wasn't allowed in the gate. We'd noticed a lot of trucks and trailers in the street leading up to the castle as well as a few guys in medieval costume, and also horse crap everywhere. Someone at the gate told us if we wanted to go in to the castle we had to hike around to the back entrance.

Once inside we noticed about two dozen people dressed as medieval knights, knights on horseback, and flags and banners that hadn't been around when I was there on Monday. But they still allowed us to pay admission to enter and walk around inside the castle. It turns out the castle was being used to film an Italian movie called Barbarossa (or Red Beard). The castle courtyard was being used as a holding area where the knights with banners, the horse mounted knights, and the horse drawn covered wagons would line up and wait for a signal to come over walkie-talkie, march out of the castle and across the bridge, then turn around and do it again. We got to watch this process about eight times. I counted 22 knights on horseback. I was fascinated by the horses. Big, shiny, healthy, beautiful looking horses the likes of which I haven't seen in a while, neighing loudly in the echoing courtyard. It was so exciting to see! Even though I know nothing about this movie or the actors in it I was instantly star-struck by being surrounded by a production and also suddenly filled with a five-year-old girl desire to always watch the horses - whatever they were doing!

The guy guarding the gate when we crept around front to try and sneak a view of the castle's main entrance didn't understand the question when I said "does the castle pay an Italian castle in the movie?" What I meant was: Is the movie set in Romania? I doubt it, though I was happy to see so many Romanians working as medieval soldiers in the movie.

It was an exciting and unexpected treat. Too bad I left my camera at home because I thought, (shrug) I've seen the castle. I was there days ago and I have pictures of it already!

But if you happen to see the movie Barbarossa - the saddle blankets - totally not period, but I doubt you'll be able to see that in the "storming out of the castle on horseback and across the bridge" scene.

Me and my new friend, Dragos

2008-05-23T11:38:00.000-07:00

Yikes!
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

It's times like this when it's hard to be so far away. To know that things are going on at home, you wish you could be there but you can't. Can't do anything about it.

This fire happened in my hometown Wednesday night, Thursday morning, leaving 70 people homeless. One of them is my brother. His apartment burned down and he evacuated with his hat, his wallet, his phone and his car keys.

I'm just glad everyone got out ok and no one was hurt.

But my brother's living at home again. Starting over from nothing. And there's nothing I can do for him from here but ask that you send him positive energy. If you have a couch or somehting that would be nice, but positive energy is more likely the order of the day.

2008-05-17T12:37:00.000-07:00

What am I obsessed with today?
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Usually the answer to that would be Schwepp's Bitter Lemon. Oooh, I love me some Schwepp's Bitter Lemon...

Those of you who know me well, know I don't get in to new music easily. Usually it takes a cd player and at least a five-hour rode trip. See, for me, the purpose of music is to sing along with it (if it's show tunes - like it's your audition) so it's hard for me to get into new music because I almost never listen to anything I don't already know. Then last weekend a friend introduced me to this:

This is Mika. And this:

I realized that finding actual official - released by the band music videos on Youtube can be difficult, but I don't care I want to encourage this.

I was all excited to introduce you to Mika because as I said I don't get into new music very often, so for all I know this guy could be brand new - cds hot off the lazer writer. you guys are all still listening to cds, right?

Then the title of Sam's blog post shattered my image that I was into something new that you guys stateside don't yet know about. There's going to be years of you guys talking to me about movies like Bucket List that I don't know about and have never heard of.

Well, bring it on. Because I challenge you to name the song on this album I am completely obsessed with. I'll give you two hints - A) it sounds like Killer Queen and B) It's me, c'mon guys this shouldn't be hard.

2008-05-06T04:37:00.000-07:00

Flat Broke
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

I was thinking about what to write in my blog entry when I remembered I'm flat @$$ broke this month. Seriously. I shudder to think of it.

What happened was when I got back from vacation last month - I had just enough in my account to pay my rent. But I don't have to pay my rent on any fixed schedule, just whenever I see my landlord. So the last week in April I decided to take some of my rent money out of the bank and buy groceries. I didn't even spend it all. Just a little bit more than half.

Then at the end of April I either got paid for April or got my "allowance" for May - however you like to look at it, but since my landlord came by to drop off a brand-spanking new stove and oven last week I thought I should pay him the rent for April and May out of the same chunk of money which was automatically deposited in my account at the end of April. At the same time I withdrew 400 lei to pay the bills for April.

Recently my internet/cable company has decided to start charging people every other month for two months at a time. Which means I probably didn't pay a cable/internet bill in March - but what happened to the money? Who knows? Or more accurately I probably spent it on coffees and deserts when I was on vacation.

So after rent and bills I was already left with 71 lei for the month of May - and May hadn't started yet. That's about $29.58. And food is roughly the same price here as it is in the USA (so when I a jar of spaghetti sauce is roughly $3 in the USA - it's roughly 7 lei here.) Luckily I already bought enough groceries to (hopefully) last me the month.

That and I got 25 lei out of my change jar, and I had about 8 lei left over after I paid the bills.

However, I have two problems.

1) I went out for pizza today - because when a friend comes to town and you actually have someone visiting that you can sit at a table and speak English with, someone who is regularly denied pizza as much as I am denied opportunities to leave my apartment without spending money - you get 10 lei out of your change jar and go out to lunch with them.

2) I'm leaving on Thursday to go to a Peace Corps conference. Well, I'm leaving Thursday to visit a friend and going to the conference Monday through Thursday - but as I'll be gone for six days I need to show up to the person watching my cat with a week's supply of cat food and cat litter and I'm pretty sure to make it through the week I'm going to need to buy toilet paper, matches and yeast.

I'd like some milk for my tea too, but that's just silly when I'm leaving Thursday. A liter of milk will spoil and I can't afford it.

But I do need bus fair because tomorrow morning I have big meeting in another town at the time I'm usually opening my eyes and trying to decide if I can reasonably hit snooze for another half hour - and it's probably going to be about 10 lei round trip not to mention it would be good form to pay for the friend-who's-going-with-me-because-she-speaks-Romanian-better-than-I-do-although-English-isn't-her-first-language-either.

So I'm in a bit of a bind.

Also, I eat only fruits and vegetables. Or rather, because I'm a vegetarian I like to think I eat only fruits and vegetables but I actually eat mostly Schwepp's bitter lemon, banana peanut butter and honey sandwiches, potatoes, cheese, eggs and olives. But if you buy a month's supply of fruits and vegetables, specifically if you buy them at the end of last month - they go bad quickly. Which is why right now I have half a pizza in the fridge along with a big bowl of Greek salad, four carrots, and all the necessary ingredients to make another pizza - but all of which should be eaten before the end of the week.

Thankfully I have the unnatural luck of having a freezer so I can make another pizza and freeze it because I'm going to need to eat something later in the month. Too bad I can't do all my eating these first two weeks when I have access to good fresh food and then just not eat the rest of the month.

Which brings me to the point I wanted to make. No matter how low funds are I always have to remind myself that my needs will be met. Even when I've been really broke, I've never been totally broke. I mean, yeah, I've eaten nothing but rice and popcorn for a week. But I've always had a Safety Net - in college I would say I'm just going to eat this bag of apples and nothing else, but then I could go out to dinner and put it on my credit card. Here I have the option of using my American bank account (which I have only done three times and once was so I could buy medicine for my sore throat and which only has money in it because I found a wealthy pirate named Magwhich to be my patron). Or there was that time I was contacted by a collection agency because my health insurance never paid a bill I thought they had paid and I split the bill three ways with my parents.

Anyway, I attribute my ability to get by - to find a way to meet my needs - to live on a corner of a dollar more to privilege than to my own intelligence. In Moorhead I got to ride the bus for free - lucky me. Here, well I get reimbursed by Peace Corps for that medicine, eventually, so that will help me make it through the month.

So I'm not complaining. It's nice to know when you're broke that you're not really going to go under. It's an amusing challenge to see how far you can make it. Am I going eat plain baked potatoes with nothing but salt at the end of the month? Maybe. But I know I won't starve.

So if you're reading this take a moment to appreciate all the times you've had a Safety Net and then maybe go to The Hunger Site or something. Do something for someone who doesn't have a safety net. I know I will be doing that - after I make it through the week.

2008-04-26T07:47:00.000-07:00

I hate being a responsible adult!
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

Tomorrow is Easter in Romania and I don't have any plans to celebrate with anyone, but I was walking through the piata yesterday and everyone everywhere was selling rabbits. Live rabbits!
Little rabbits by the boxfull, big rabbits - three times the size of my cat, white rabbits, brown rabbits, gray rabbits, dirty rabbits, cute rabbits, rabbits in plastic bags (still alive).

Now I strongly suspect theser rabbits are...um, not being sold as pets, but every time someone called out to me in Romanian, "Domnishwara, Buy a rabbit for Easter!" I was tempted.

The rabbit could live in carboard box in my apartment. I could buy fresh sawdust for it at the pet store. It could eat the vegetable scraps from my cooking - or I could just go outside and pull up some fresh grass for it like everyone else is doing.

Bella and the rabbit could be friends and play together - because basically she's got nothing on a rabbit of decent size. She could be fierce to one of the little baby rabbits, maybe but otherwise I'm not worried. Besides, I'd be there to protect little Pipkin or Fiver.

I don't want to take a home to the USA. I just want a rabbit. Now. To play with for a while and after a couple of months I could take it to the top of the hill and release it into the wild (if I thought it could survive in the wild) and spare it being dinner.

I've never before been in a situation where getting a rabbit could be so easy. And you have to understand that I've wanted a rabbit all my very own for my whole life!!

But I know none of this would work out. None of it is a good idea. It's not good for me, for Bella, or for the rabbit. So I'm not getting a rabbit. And I hate being a responsible adult.

2008-04-24T02:11:00.000-07:00

Spring Fever
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps, of which I am a proud volunteer.

I am still not feeling 100%, I'm sad to report. My sore throat has persisted for what is now a week and three days. I've tried everything. I have Dr. recommended sore throat lozenges, Cold Remedy Tea, Magic Potion - that concoction of ginger, cinnamon and clove that I brewed up on Andy and co.'s stove in New York. I'm gargling salt water. I'm taking ibuprofen. I'm drinking Tuica.

In less than two weeks I've consumed nearly all of a 1,000 gram jar of honey in various mugs of piping hot beverage and honey is a natural antibiotic.

All this going back and forth between I-feel-better-because-I'm-up-and-about-and-probably-also-because-of-the-drugs and the waking up in the middle of the night with a throat so sore pain is radiating up to my ears and I don't even have to swallow for it to hurt is wearing me out. I must admit I have shut off the alarm several times this week and slept in later that I wanted to. I have been napping on the couch in the afternoons. I have engaged my cat in a lazy-off and I am winning.

We were even when we both fell asleep on the couch watching The Shawshank Redemption the other day but when I discovered I could watch Too Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar in 11 parts on YouTube and pulled the computer up so close to my face I could open each successive window by rubbing my eyelashes on the touch pad while drool pooled on the keyboard - I pulled ahead.

It's not that while feeling like crap-ola I'm ignoring my work as a volunteer. I can still send plenty of emails from right here - mug of tea in my hand - and right now sending emails is pretty much my job.

The other half of this post, however is about how my cat needs to get a job. She needs to do something because the green on the trees and the chirping birds outside the window is calling to her and she is whining constantly to go outside.

But it can't be helped. I can't let her on the ledge outside the kitchen window anymore. And not because a neighbor told me I can never open my kitchen window because she has her kitchen window open every day and if I do my cat will go out, cross the ledge go in through her kitchen window and eat her cheese (which she had done except for the cheese-eating part). But because once I let her out on the ledge and she crawled down a drainage pipe and was frolicking in the grass yard in front of our bloc and crossing the alley before I caught her.

I can't let her out on the balcony unsupervised because she could jump into the nearby tree, slide down it and be off and away on the ground.

I can't open the window in my room because she could push the mosquito-net held in with thumb tacks out of the window frame and be on the balcony (see above.)

Now, your cat getting outside might not seem like such a huge ordeal but Outside she is in Danger of being eaten by Stray Dogs, Hit By Cars, Attacked by other Wild Cats, trampled by Angry Horses, Tortured by School Children or perhaps just getting Lost and unable to find her way home.

You may think I'm exaggerating but I hear the alley cats screaming in pain through the window at night. It disturbs me that Bella has never given any indication of recognizing the cries of her fellow species.

I understand she's a cat and has an animal's desire to explore nature and breathe fresh air. There's no way I can get this cat to forget there is an Outside and accept being an Indoor cat because she was born outside and spent the first 6 weeks of her life there. And her babysitters thankfully have a too-high-to-jump-off-of balcony where she can go in and out as she pleases. So its no wonder she's not happy to be home.

I know she she wants to climb trees and chase pigeons but it's too much of a risk. Too many bad things could happen to her and frankly I don't want to lose her and have to go back to living alone in this apartment. The thought of it is too depressing. Maybe that's selfish and over protective but its the way it is.

So now we've got some problem solving to do. Last summer I hardly ever had the windows closed. And now Bella is crying and moaning when the weather isn't even nice. The sky is gray and it's rained all but one day this week. So for now I'm considering getting her a collar and one of those free-range leashes. We'll see.

Something tells me we have a long season ahead of us.

2008-04-19T02:32:00.000-07:00

Am I sick or just lazy?
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps.

I usually get sick about once a year. In 2007 I used up my sickness before I even came to Romania on a cold I got in New York while visiting for new year's. After that the worst health I experienced in Romanian was two separate days of flu-like symptoms and painfully swollen lymph nodes. Not bad for moving to another country.

It makes sense that sickness would immediately follow my four-week intense vacation. Too many days of waking up at 6am and going to bed after midnight. Getting caught in the rain and snow with no garlic soup to boost the immune system. My body was quite sore and stiff from carrying all that baggage around until I treated myself with yoga and then had to repair the total soreness caused by yoga with a massage.

Right now I have a sore throat. I've had it since Monday and none of my usual natural rememdies are helping it go away. I'm drinking fluids, water, tea and now "magic potion" since I spent the money on fresh ginger. I have doctor reccommended throat drops. The gargaling salt water isn't helping at all.

I can't bare the thought of eating anything cold so all my nice firm tomatoes I bought for greek salad have gone soft in the refrigerator. I also can't muster the energy to cook anything hot like mashed potatoes so it's been bananna and peanutter sandwhiches. (thank goodness mom brought me a 4 pound jar of peanut butter!)

It's more than just a sore throat. I can't tell if I have a fever becasue somewhere in this apartment I lost my thermometer. Sometimes I feel hot and cold at the same time. Wednesday I felt energy returning, but Thursday I slept on the couch for part of the afternoon.

Yesterday I called my French friends who volunteer in Deva just to tell them I'm back in town and maybe we'll to to a movie sometime, only to find out they were having a party Friday night. I knew I should go. One of the reasons I called them was because I've been hanging out alone in my apartment with my cat all week. But they live an hour's walk away. I called them back and said no, thanks. I'm too sick to go out tonight. After all, I didn't go to my office Friday because my throat hurt so bad in the morning I really shouldn't go to a party and walk home alone after dark. Plus it looked like it was going to rain.

But I will get out the apartment and see a movie today. It looks like it's going to be a nice day - so maybe I'll get a coffee and sit outside and write a letter or two. My throat is feeling a little better, so maybe I just needed one more night to knit on the couch and be lonely in my apartment.

But then again I slept for 12 hours so maybe I really am sick.

2008-04-16T05:45:00.000-07:00

A Month of Travel by Bullet Points, continued
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps.

Wait, there's more

Part II: Romania
March 31st, Timişoara

Friend in town: Cameron, a volunteer I met 1 time for 3 minutes who said we can keep our bags at his house
Arrive in Timişoara at 7:30ish a.m after switching trains at 4:30 in the morning in Arad. It was not immediately apparent to me we would have to switch trains.
Relived European Daylight Savings again by jumping ahead another hour in the time difference between Romania and Hungary which no one will tell you about.
Miraculously I got all of our luggage aboard the second train by myself while mom was in the bathroom - thinking the train was about to pull out of the station. Memorable quotes: Mom -How did you get all the bags on the train? Me- I don't know.
Walk to a coffee shop that is open for coffee and pastry, then cross the street with baggage and have coffee in another coffee shop this one with a bathroom. It is now time so that if we get a taxi now it will be a decent hour by the time we show up at Cameron's
After taxi gets lost, then finds the apartment we haul baggage upstairs with Cameron's help while taxi driver continues to argue with a lady in front of the building who said she didn't know the name of the street she apparently lives on.
Scenic walk at a brisk pace gives us the highlights and historical landmarks of Timişoara ending at Cameron's school
Limp around the park
Briefly shop the sparse Easter market because Easter is not for another 3 weeks in Romania
Saw Piatia Victoriei where the Romanian Revolution began in 1989. Bullet riddled building is now a McDonald's. Guidebook said there was a plaque on McDonald's. Saw no plaque.
Went to the church across from the Opera at Piata Victoriei and lit candles for those who died in the revolution
Ate lunch at a cafeteria-style restaurant with Cameron. Mom's first experience with Romanian restaurants that don't have what's on the menu. Also, I order for her in Romanian.
Cameron walks us to beautiful Piatia Unirii although it's too early for the terasas to be out yet. We see the pillar built as a memorial to the Plague and also the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church which stand across from each other
Go to a coffee shop and order juices
Buy postcards. I have a World Wise Schools Partnership Program classroom I write to once a month and I'm determined to send them as many postcards from my touristic ventures in Romania as possible despite the fact that I've never heard from them and don't know what grade they are in.
Fret about how to find Cameron's apartment and retrieve baggage in time to meet him and give him back his keys. End up taking another taxi to his apartment, retrieving bags and having taxi take us to meet him at the McDonald's near his school
Get yelled at by Cameron's neighbor in Romanian - Why are you throwing that suitcase down the stairs!? -I'm sorry! Excuse me! -Where are you from? -I'm from the United States but we lived in Budapest and now we're moving to Transylvania! -You're moving to Transylvania? -Yes, we live in Transylvania now. I think moving is the only acceptable explanation for the amount of baggage we have.
Take yet another taxi from the meeting place with Cameron to the train station
Meet Dan a volunteer from my group at the train station and chat with him for approximately 6 minutes.
Board the 3:00 Rapid train for Deva. Yay! All goes well despite my temporarily misplacing the tickets while on the train. Made friends with two helpful Romanian young men eager to help us with the baggage but surprised by its mass and volume.
6:45 arrive in my city of DEVA! take a taxi to my apartment
Duration of stay in Timişora: About 7 hours
What we ate: Strudels, I had the vegetarian non pizza Romanian restaurant standby: fried cheese and french fries, and a very cheesy Greek salad on the side. Forget what mom had beside cabbage slaw. In Deva I prepared Mamaliga cu branza, the Romanian national dish - which is pollenta with cheese and fried eggs. Although we didn't eat until like 10:00 at night. It's a good thing mamaliga doesn't require much chewing because I was almost too tired to swallow and chewing was right out.

April 1 -2 Deva

Mom slept for 13 hours
Have coffee at best café in Deva, Café Amigo, while writing out postcards
Repack baggage for the rest of the week - much smaller now.
Visit the local piata and look at the flowers, fruits and vegetables for sale
Walking tour of Deva - this is where I pay my electric bill, this is the vet's office. Walking tour includes paying the bills
Visit my 2nd host mother in Romania. Watch and episode of Medium with her on TV in english with Romanian subtitles and have a long chat in Romanian. Mom intelge nimic.
After visiting with my gazada I take mom to Presto for desert.
Visited my office and met the ladies from Fundatie Mara, presented them with Austrian chocolate and gave them the update on the trip so far but had to breeze through to catch the train to Sibiu
Duration of our stay in Deva: 2 nights and 1 day
What we ate: Strudels, and papanasi, a desert which is a fried donut filled with apricot jam and drizzled with sour cream and berry sauce.

April 2-3 Sibiu

Friend in town: Dan, an American who lives in Sibiu who is not a Peace Corps volunteer. Had lunch with him at an Italian place, chat him up about life, Romania, girls who've broken our hearts...just kidding
Checked into a nice Pension
Somehow get back to the old city center and climb the famous bell tower which seems to go upward infinitely but is a great place to take pictures of the beatiful city despite the fact that it was rainy and cloudy
Looked at the old church
Went out for coffee
Walked back to the pension looking for a restaurant - found a church and asked a passing couple in Romanian where we could find a restaurant in the area. They responded - Do you speak German? -No. (Continuing in Romanian) Go back the way you came across the intersection with the roundabout to a hotel on the other side of the stadium
Have a nice dinner at the hotel with the waiter who tries to impress us with his english
What we ate: Fried cauliflower which I've been craving since Christmas, Romanian dumpling soup and rosemary potatoes. Mom had the same but with Chicken Kiev instead of cauliflower. We ate a lot of bread. This marks the first chicken for mom in a long time.
Duration of our stay in Sibiu: 1 night

April 3, Cluj

Friend in town: Iulia, a Romanian college student studying American Literature
Travel to Cluj by bus. Bus arrives half an hour early so we get off at some random place not knowing where the bus station is. Luckily I recognize the National Theatre and we are a short walk to the center of town and then our hostel
Check in to hostel
Stop at University bookstore famed for large selection of books in English
Walk to Marty's a restaurant and bar I know from the only other time I've been to Cluj
Find the Romanian Folk Art Gallery, a store which preserves and educates about the authentic and traditional crafts. Mom breaks a dish there. We both buy a bunch of stuff - I buy a surpriza for someone....
Meet up with Iulia and Micah, who came to Cluj just for the evening to hang out with us, have a beer
Hike to the Cluj botanical gardens even though it's an hour before closing
Mom has the typically Peace Corps experience of Where the hell is the bathroom?
Pop into St Michael's church in time to catch the end of a concert going on there
Eat traditional Romanian cabbage dinner at a little known restaurant I don't know the name of, but Iulia referred to it as the Cabbage Shop - though that's the name of it.
Walked to the Romanian Orthodox church and insisted mom take pictures of it as well as the Catholic church
Visited another bar in Cluj, Micah and I catch up on business
Next morning: continue shopping for a book about Romania in english for mom. Don't find it. Take more money out of an ATM. I freak out about time and take a taxi to the bus station so we don't miss our bus. Get to the station in time but the bus is sold out so we have to wait for 1 hour
What we ate: Salads, at Marty's - not very Romanian. Sort of expensive strudels and coffee at a bare bones café right next to Breakfast and Coffee a very swanky looking café with a GAP inside of it, Sarmale - traditional cabbage rolls served without me for me because it's Lent - first time I've ever had it at a restaurant. Mom has Varza La Cluj - a kind of Lasagna with cabbage instead of noodles and stewed tomatoes instead of red sauce, and pork. Also wicked awesome baked potatoes with cheese and cream. And gogosi - Romanian donuts which are like a chocolate, fruit or cheese filled elephant ear at Gogosa Infuriata (the angry donut - a chain)
Duration of our stay in Cluj: 1 day and 1 night

April 4-6 Baia Mare

Friend in town: Todd, volunteer in my group who was busy and we didn't originally plan on spending so many days in Baia Mare but he was very helpful in finding us a pension with an all purple room
Slept hardily on the three hour bus ride, my mom tells me I missed beautiful scenery but I may be back in Mara Mures county sometime...
Walked around to Piatia Revolutiei, did a little second hand shopping during a spontaneous power failure
Walked through the large park. Saw a guy that was at least 7 feet tall. Todd tells us he's an American who plays basket ball in Baia Mare
Ate at a very slow restaurant in Piatai Liberatti
Photographed churches around St. Stephen's tower
Walked through the piata, by which I mean the one where they sell vegetables
Visited the Village Museum with old buildings from around the Mara Mures region preserved on display including the wooden church from 1630 which we didn't get to see right away because it was Sunday and services were going on inside but it was full so people were standing around outside following the service
Visited the Ethnographic Museum which typically displays traditional folk art and crafts from the rural area surrounding Baia Mare but is now under new management and temporarily closed except for a visiting exhibit of wax figures of celebrities ranging from Christ to Osama bin Laden and Bill Gates. We were planning on seeing the ethnographic museum for its typical offerings but were particularly encouraged to go to the Special Exhibit by the proprietor of the Village Museum as we didn't have correct change to pay our entrance to the Village Museum until we saw the Wax Exhibit first.
Bought a coffee and an apple from McDonald's so we could use the bathroom then realized their bathroom wasn't actually locked
Visited the unique Baia Mare art museum with its particularly interesting textile exhibit and also paintings of the city of Baia Mare during every season
Got on the train to Deva at 5:00 - arrived in Deva at 1:30a.m. with a two hour Layover in Dej. Hiked to a truck stop where I ate french fries and mom tried Mici - little sausages - for the first time.
What we ate: Omelets at our piata with french fries in them - what great idea! I had mamaliga with sour cream and cheese, mom had a salad made mostly out of ham, at a Medieval themed Romanian restaurant she had a kepbob and fries while I had onion soup and natural potatoes and fried cheese - thank goodness I didn't also order the corn! Beer, and a desert I can remember the name of that was like a plum paste with sand in it.
Duration of our stay in Baia Mare: 3 days, two nights

April 5, Sighet - Day Trip -

Took a bus to Sighet for the day Saturday, worried about getting the last bus back to Baia Mare at the end of the day
Toured the Memorial to the Victims of Communism and the Resistance which is in a former prison from the Communist period. A very unique museum which offers a lot of resources in english, but it is a lot of reading. I'm told its the closest thing Romania has to a Museum of Communism at the moment.
Toured the Sighet Ethnographic museum where the masks for the Winter Festival Dec.27th our stored when it's not festival time. Also an impressive display of traditional weaving and embroidery done on leather
Photographed a Romanian Holocaust Memorial - a rare display
Debated visiting Elie Weisel's childhood house, Although it was supposed to be closed according to guidebook, the woman at the museum told us it was open and wouldn't sell us the two page english booklet about it when we could just go there.
Instead we hiked to the River Izei which is the northern boarder between Romania and Ukraine
Bought way too many snacks for the bus on the way back to Baia Mare - no time to eat in Sighet!

April 7-8 Deva

Walked through the old city center where the prettier buildings are like the Mayor's office and the post office, visited the large park
Had breakfast at the place I've been told has the best "pancakes" in town - really they're crepes
Had dinner at the insanely popular traditional Romanian food restaurant in town that's in a converted garage and has only 4 tables
Took the maxi taxi to the nearby town of Hunedoara and photographed their castle even though they wouldn't let us in the castle because it's closed
Had a beer at a bar that appeared next to the castle since I was last there in December
Went back to café Amigo for coffee and wrote out postcards again. Brought our own strudel in again only this time it was from the good strudel place that was closed the last time.
Searched out some Hunedoara postcards
Went Romania souvenier shopping at the grocery store
Repacked all the baggage that was going home to the USA
Climbed up to the Deva Citadel, built in 1269. Didn't even die on the hike up, and took the telecabina down
Ate a desert and coffee at the good desert place at the bottom of the hill
Immediately left the desert place and walked to the sandwich place and ate lunch because mom wanted a sandwich
Hurried to get the train to the village of Baru Mare because I'm always nervous we're going to miss the train. had time to buy drinks before getting on the train. Managed to wrestle all the baggage on to the Personel train. Unfortnately was trapped on the hot sunny side of the train.
What we ate in Deva: Mamaliga at La Biatul for me, Pork Cutlet with French fries for mom, At the Sandwich place: chicken wings with sauce and cabbage slaw and french fries and lipie (flat bread so you can make you own sandwiches, but mom for some reason doesn't like sandwiches with cabbage and french fries) a personal pizza for me. Mom had a cheese and apple crepe at the pancake place, I had a spinach and mushroom crepe which would have been great if it wasn't drowned in garlic mayo. I had a desert that was like rasberry fluff on a pie crust, and mom had some kind of pie cookie thing that are usually purchased by the kilo because the woman kind of freaked out when I ordered 1. Coffees. Strudel.
Duration of stay in Deva this time: 1 night and almost 2 days, leaving on Tuesday at 3:40

April 8-10 Baru Mare

Friends in town: Dru, another volunteer in my group and her roommate Sara. Volunteers in closest proximity to me and the babysitters of my cat
Jumped off the personel train at the Halta - where the train stops when there's no train station at the little villages, and it doesn't stop long - and dragged the baggage down the rocky hill with the dirt road. Enlisted the help of the neighbor to carry the baggae up the three flights of stairs to the apartment.
Visited my precious kitten, Bella, who'd been with Dru and Sara since March 15th
Hiked to the hotel with Sara's counterpart Miss Anna a teacher at the school
Patronized both of Baru's two restaruants the hotel, and the cafe which serves mici and fries
Memorable quotes: Mom- Do they have something normal like spaghetti? I want spaghetti. And I want a sandwhich. I want a spaghetti sandwich. Also: Mom- I need air! Me- You can't have any air, it's Romania. There's no air on trains.
Visited both Casas (orphanages) House of Hope, and House of Joy where Dru works
Visited Sara's school and did a day of activities (games) with the 5a and 8a classes (the higher classes of 5th and 8th graders)
Slept on the floor - totally Peace Corps though my cat slept on my mom
Took a nature hike to the hill but not all the way up
Hiked toward the Strei valley in the dark. Met a very accomodating woman shepard who wanted to do everything possible to help us get a good picture of the sheep when mom showed in a in interest in photographing them
Encountered a lot of people in the village who wanted to know who we were, where we were going and why
Mom napped while I went to adult excercise class - but I didn't try to hard
Dragged luggage back up the rocky hill on the dirt road and wrestled it on to the Personel train. This took 3 of us.
What we ate: Mici. Fries. Mom tried ciorba de burta (tripe soup - insanely popular Romanian dish), I had sarmale de post (for Lent) again and bread, and bean ciorba. Don't remember what else...
Duration of stay in Baru Mare: 2 and 3/4 days

April 10 Petrosani

Friend in town: Karla, a very busy volunteer in my group who has 3 organizations. I was hoping we'd get to do more in Petrosani like job-shadow Karla, but because she was busy with donors and we were tired we decided not to come to Petrosani until 6:30pm
Mom saw the Petrosani bridge over the train tracks and refused to try to get the baggage up the stairs so we got a taxi to Karla's
Taxi driver didn't understand Karla's address so he asked me to call her and put her on the phone
Went out for dinner and desert at Bella's in Petrosani
Hung out with Karla in her Peace Corps famous apartment for 1 person. It's famous because it's little more than 1 room and a married couple of Peace Corps volunteers once lived there for two years.
Demonstrated that volunteers can talk about anything openly no matter how disgusting...
Got on the midnight train first class to Bucuresti
What we ate: ice cream, pizza with anchovies, four cheese pizza and cake. At some point on the trip my mom started drinking Coke which I'd never known her to do before. it was always strictly Pepsi...
Duration of stay in Petrosani: Sadly only 6 hours

April 11 Bucuresti, Romania's Capital. Home to 4 million people and 2.5 million registered cars

Friends in town: Carol from my group is in Bucuresti at the moment, and Silvana a friend from another group - as well as all the Peace Corps staff at the office.
It's not that I slept on the overnight train to Bucuresti, it's more like I just lost time
Bought a ridiculously expensive muffin at the McDonald's at the train station so we could use the bathroom because this bathroom is locked and where else are you going to find muffin in Romania?
Wrestled all the freaking luggage throught the Bucuresti metro system to Flowers B&B then checked in to the Peace Corps office for coffee and couch
Chatted briefly with Ken Goodson, Peace Corps Romania Country director - also known as "everybody's boss" after arriving sweaty and tired and some would crabby at PC office around 8 a.m.
Mom gets some well-deserved sleep on the couch in the Volunteer lounge while I go on a two hour walk to pick up an order of postcards placed by the GAD committee. This is my BL leave for the day
But I shouldn't have race-walked for two hours worrying we wouldn't have time to be tourists in Bucuresti because after that walking experience I couldn't walk right for about two days
Went back to the B&B to check in where the luggage was carried upstairs to the second floor by two adult men under duress, although one sang "Hi Ho" from Disney's Snow White while doing so
Had lunch at the nice place I discovered close to the PC office which is not too expensive for Bucuresti
Bought mom her book about Romania in english on my way back from my walk
Went to the Museum of the Romanian pesant and left after about 45 minutes for my dentist appointment - made arrangements to meet mom in the park after the museum closed
Took the metro then walked to my dentist appointment, had teeth cleaned while I sat in a chair and I'm sure fell asleep a few times for seconds at a time
Met back up with mom and took metro to Piata Unirii to look for the People's Palace - 2nd largest building used for administrative purposes in the world. Built by Ceausescu - well, he didn't build it personally
Mememorable quotes: Mom-Oh there it is. Do we have to go up to it? Me- Yes, we have to go up and take a picture. How else are you going to know you've been to Bucuresti?
Went back to the little restaraunt close to the Peace Corps office and to our Bed and Breakfast for dinner
Made it back to the B&B in time to watch Brokeback Mountain on Romanian TV but once I smelled myself, decided it was more important to shower
Packed mom's suitcase and carried it down the stairs with the help of B&B staff the night before so that we wouldn't have to drag it down the steps at 4:45 am.
What we ate: baked vegetables with garlic and oil, bread, tomatoe soup, creamy vegetable rice, baked potatoe with cheese and sour cream, mom had a salad and chicken schnitzel? And imported German beer.

April 12 Homeward bound

5am taxi to the airport
Mom's luggage officially weighs 44 kilos
I have to say goodbye and grab a taxi at 5:45 so I can get my 6:30 am train back to Deva
Arrive in Deva around 2:15 in the afternoon after drooling a big pool of drool on my sleeve and sleeping with my mouth open on the train
Mom travels on three planes and a bus for 24 hours arriving at home at 11:30 pm local time - 5am sunday Romania time.

You made it this far! You can see my pictures at www.picasaweb/google.com/theonlylunchbox

but you might want to wait til later because I'll send a personal email invitation when I've finished captioning the pictures.

2008-04-15T00:18:00.000-07:00

A Month of Travel by Bullet Points
The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps.

I'll try to keep it to the highlights, but it's in the details where the fun is.

Part I: Europe
March 17, Munich Germany (The First time)

Flew from Bucharest, and got myself to the hotel
Met up with my mom who looked drastically different (at first) after a year
Packed my backpack with all the summer clothes she brought me (5 pants plus 13 shirts
Duration of our stay: one night
What we ate: I ate coffee and beer and some noodle stir fry my mom brought me from the city. The breakfast at the hotel was indescribable but I'll go out there and try absa-fan-tac-ular as shot at it.

March 18, Nurnbuerg Germany

Shopped the Easter market, bought postcards, gingerbread and spices
Climbed the hill to the castle
Duration of our stay: a couple of hours
What we ate: A pretzel as big as my head, a cup of tea/coffee
Life Goals accomplished: Have now been somewhere in Germany that's not Munich or Dachau

March 18-19, Prague Czech Republic (the First time)

Got lost trying to find old town center, drank wine in a basement club advertising jazz but hosting a folk music band instead
Memorable Quotes from our cab driver: The St. Charles bridge was built in the 14th century. In the 14th century, your country was only Indians and bison.
Toured the city of Prague
Toured Prague Castle and the accompanying Cathedral where we saw the final resting place of St. John Nepomunk (?) after which my grandma's church and my mom's elementary school was named.
Visited Easter market
Took pictures of the city square from the clock tower
Bought the book The Good Soldier from Kafka’s bookstore
Enjoyed an evening performance of traditional Czech dancing and singing with the Moravian bagpipes, a Slovakian shepard’s whistle the size of an Esuzaphone, and the Dulcimer table - in addition to the violin.
Tried to engage other tour-goers in teaching our tour guide a third song in english, Take Me Out to the Ball Game - but no takers
Walked across a significant bridge while snow and hail blew in my face - photographed St. Charles bridge obscured by show and hail
Memorable quotes from Mihaela, Czech tour guide: In front of tower is ditch with water, Around the corner is a statue of a naked boy so in 25 minutes I meet you at Naked Boy. Over there is Museum of Communism but I can't tell you if its any good because I live 26 years with communism and I've had quite enough.
Made plans for second trip to Prague
Duration of stay: 2 nights

March 20 - 21 Vienna Austria

Toured the city in the afternoon to snow accompanied by thunder
Mom bought for me an emergency scarf to cover my head which was later lost in Prague (I think in the bathroom of the Museum of Communism)
Attended a concert of classical music including some ballet and some opera singing in some beautiful Palace featuring the "Emperor's staircase" and drank a glass of champange
Heard a lot about the Hapsburgs, viewed their "winter palace" from the outside
Had coffee in a Viennese café (this is the thing to do since Vienna has over 300 coffee shops
Watched the horses of the famous Spanish Riding School cross the street for morning exercise, but didn’t attend morning exercise for €12
Emailed family about trip so far from an internet café with very expensive Schwepp’s bitter lemon but 1 hour of net time for €1 plus the cost of a drink
Duration of stay: 1 night
What we ate: Mom ate schnitzel twice. I ate Viennese Zacher Torte, a famous Austrian chocolate cake.

March 21-23 Budapest Hungary (the First time)

Walked around Pest trying to find a fancy restaurant, found a cheaper restaurant that didn’t require a reservation instead, discovered mom left her wallet at the hotel, prayed they’d accept my credit card in Hungary which they did but had no cash to pay for service or tip the musicians
Learned two words of Hungaraian which are Egészségedre! (cheers) and Köszönöm (thank you)
Chatted with our Budapest tour guide who was born in Romania and speaks 9 languages
Toured Budapest by bus and walking, but mostly by bus in the rain and saw the Hero’s Square
Had coffee in a café at the top of castle hill
Spent a cold rainy afternoon in Hungarian Baths heated by natural hot springs
Intended to go back and tip our waiter but instead spent the money at a wonderful outdoor market featuring the work of local artists and great food.
Bought gifts for friends, handmade soap, and a pretty shirt. Mom bought wreaths that smell exactly like the delicious hot wine at the market, and some linen placemats.
Learned that 1,000 Hungarian florintz is equal to two cups of coffee
What we ate: Hungarian goulash (mine with beans, picked the meat out), Shom-loss cake – don’t know how to spell it, but it’s fantastic, langos a kind of fried bread covered with oil, garlic and cheese, fried potatoes at the outdoor Art Market, Hot wine, mom had a kabob.
Duration of stay: Two nights

March 23rd Somewhere in the Austrian Alps

Visited the huge and beautiful Melk Abby
Photographed the Austrian countryside
Stayed the night at Pension Schwaighofen
Planned to get up early and walk around in the snow and look for deer, slept in and saw the deer anyway in the morning before the bus left.
Ate dinner with two ladies from the country Bahrain, and had a nice chat
Drank beer
Duration of stay: 1 night

March 24 Salzburg, Austria and Munich

Found a store selling handmade wooden crafts that I had been to four years ago in 2002, but they were closed
Walked around the main shopping street perusing Austrian goods including a Christmas store.
Considered buying a nutcracker but the wooden crafts store was closed.
Stood in front of Mozart’s birthplace
Took the funicular train up the mountain to the fortress
Photographed Salzburg covered in snow from the fortress
Breezed through the fortress museum – wishing we could have stayed longer
Stopped at a museum of marionette puppetry on the way to the bus – fascinated, bought a book and postcards
Duration of stay: 4 hours, about
What we ate: Had coffee and strudel at a café in a hotel, mom has a wurst and beer at the outdoor food market

March 24 Munich Germany (the second time)

Walked to the metro station
Accidentally took the metro to the airport
Got on the right metro line and went to the train station, bought our train tickets for Prague
Walked to the Hoffbrauhaus, Remembered how to get there after was last there in 2002.
Ate dinner at the Hoffbrauhaus including each of us drinking 1.5 liters of beer.
Got back on the metro however our train going to the hotel had stopped running for some reason.
Ended up back at the airport after waiting around in the snow at the metro stop before the airport which was a parking lot with no taxi cabs.
Spent €30 on a taxi cab from the airport to the hotel.
Learned that Munich can somehow justify charging €8 for a ride on their metro!
Walked into the hotel at 1:30 am and requested a 6:00am wake up call
Memorable quotes: Mom: Ok, we'll take a Taxi? Das es goot? Laura: Das es damn goot!
What we ate: I ate spatzel for the first time, and I remember a pretzel. Other things I’m sure but I can’t remember them right now…
Duration of stay: 1 night

March 25 - 28 Prague Czech Republic (the Second time)

Took a cab to the metro station
Mom had to get more cash at an ATM after the taxi the night before
Took very slow metro to the train station
Arrived at the train station with 8 minutes until our train departed not knowing where to go
Boarded train with baggage with 0 minutes to spare
Learned through perception that the train was not going all the way to Prague although the railway worker refused to help us find someone to explain the situation in anything other than Czech or German
Got off train in Pilszen, waited for a new train which was going all the way to Prague
Arrived in Prague 1 hour and 45 minutes late from the expected time of arrival
Went to a bar with a sex shop in it and the internet to send a message to the people who we thought were going to meet us that we would wait in the train station until 8:30 and after that find our own accommodation and get in touch later
Went home with an old lady who ran a pension out of her apartment with a door like a vault.
Shared a room just the two of us as opposed to the hostel which had 1 room for 5 people and shared a bathroom with another person. Had free cups of tea. Used spare clothing as a towel
Read email the next morning and realized we’d arrived in Prague a day earlier than we told the relatives we would. Went back to train station to check luggage in lockers and went out to lunch.
Met the family (Steven and his cousin Michael) at the train station and checked into a hotel
Visited the church with the stature the Infant of Prague
Saw the famous John Lennon wall although Lennon’s portrait no longer there
Tasted famous Czech beers, Pilsner from Pilszen, Czech Republic and Budweiser, not related to American Budweiser.
Went to the National Museum in St. Wenceslas square
Toured the Jewish Quarter, museums and synagogues
Shopped in the Old Town center, bought a garnet ring to wear on my middle finger that one day will hopefully one day be an heirloom for my children
Realized the exchange rate to dollars was not quite what I thought it was
Fretted and remained confused about the exchange rate for the rest of the day
Bought gifts for friends at the Easter Market in Old Town square – mom bought Moravian painted eggs
Visited the Museum of Communism solo while mom and Michael went shopping for books
Missed going to the Czech ethnographic museum – will have to do that next time
What we ate: mom had stew just like her grandmother used to make. I had potatoes au gratin with broccoli in St. Wenceslas Square that replaced that baked potato in Belfast as The Best Potato I’ve Ever Eaten and Kuba which is baked barley with mushrooms and garlic – very tasty but if I eat a meal without potatoes in it I get agitated!
Duration of stay: three nights (surprise!)

March 28-29 Vlčnov Czech Republic

Took a bus to a town where we were greeted by Eva (Steven’s sister) and her father.
Learned that 30 years and 1 month earlier Eva’s father met my uncle Rick at the same bus station
Had a coffee and walked around this old town where the bus station was
Went to Eva’s mother and father’s house and chatted with the relatives
Learned the Eva's mother, Donna's grandfather is my grandmother's cousin
Met Eva’s son Jacob who is almost one?
Did shots of slivovitza – twice distilled plum brandy which sounds like palinka to me
Walked around the village in the morning, saw the little houses used as wine cellars
Stopped in a little shop and were gifted with souvenirs of Vlčnov
Visited and took pictures of the village church. My great-grandmother’s house is behind the church but it started to rain so we didn’t see it
Looked at old photographs and learned about the Ride of the Kings tradition in the village at the end of May – maybe I’ll be back next year!

March 29- 30 Budapest (the Second time)

Eva and her husband give us a ride to Budapest and help us get our baggage to the hostel and get us checked in
I can add Slovakia to the list of countries I’ve been to because we ate lunch there
We realized Europe’s largest synagogue is actually quite close to our hostel so we could take pictures of it without even coming back the next day
Did a dry run of locating the train station we would need the next night and bought our train tickets for Timisoara the next night
Walked the city of Pest, discovered where and when we had to be to buy our tickets to tour Parliament the next day, ate ill-fated dinner at the Italian restaurant
Were first in line to buy our tickets to tour parliament at 7:35 a.m. The doors open at 8 a.m.
Moved our baggage out of our room and checked out of the hostel
Toured the beautiful Hungarian Parliament building
Photographed the historical Hungarian crown, scepter and orb
Bought tickets for a boat ride on the Danube and in the meantime ate strudels at the fabulous Art market which was still going on – bought my apron and some fabulous postcards
Didn’t find the open-air market but I think we were close to it but I didn’t know how to get there
Took a boat ride tour of Buda and Pest from the Danube (the only way to see Budapest – is from a boat. You have to do it!)
Had a guided tour around on Margaret island in the Danube between the two cities, and had an ice cream
Walked across the Chain Bridge
Took the funicular train to the top of castle hill
Bought a lot of paprika
Thought we were out of money so we got more from an ATM, later mom found 200,000 florintz in her wallet
Photographed fisherman’s bastion and Matthias church at sunset
Went BACK to the art market one more time so I could support a cool woman artist who made this necklace, got there just before the market closed and I was glad I could support her work. Wish I had given the lady a hug or taken my picture with her. Sie la vie!
Found the restaurant recommended by our hostel at which we had a 10% discount
Duration of our stay: More than 24 hours, but we only slept 1 night at the hostel
What we ate: more langos with garlic and cheese, strudels, fried camembert cheese with fruit and rice, stuffed mushrooms with cheese and ham
Experienced European Daylight Savings and jumped ahead 1 hour when we got on the train
Collected our massive baggage and went to the train station for our 11:30pm overnight train to Timişoara, Romania

2008-03-15T04:09:00.000-07:00

Out of Office Response
Disclaimer: The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps.

Hey all - I had high hopes for being more regular with updating my blog but this past week - well past two weeks have been very busy, although busy and productive. After meeting a new group of people I see as potential project partners just last week, I did a lot of devloping of ideas and research only to discover the way I had originally envisioned the idea just can't happen in time - before June.

And after some soul searching I realized it's not all my fault. Even if I weren't leaving for four weeks of traveling I don't think the project could have happened the way we orginally pictured it. So it's back to the drawing board - we have a new idea already and when I return in April I have a grant to write.

All that said, later today I'm leaving on vacation. Well, today I'm leaving to take Bella - her toys, over 10 pounds of cat litter and two pizzas on the train to the villiage where Bella will be staying while I go meet my mom in Germany on Monday. (See below for a list of ridiculous things I've found myself traveling with and cat.)

We'll be spending 10 days touring Austria, the Czech Republic and Hungary - then mom and I have a weekend trip to catch up with some distant family in the Czech Republic, a day in Budapest and then we're on the train to Timisoara to spend two whilrwind weeks traveling in Romania.

We will be back in Deva for two days - or at least 1 day + 12 hours so maybe I'll have a chance to send you some updates.

In the meantime Kwarou is still sick with the blinking monitor I sent him to the US to be repaired for last time (Damn that company that begins with the first letter of Hal, and the second word begins with the first letter in Pig). But since Kwarou is a good computer and he's mostly well behaved i may just to decide to ignore the problem since it hasn't been too big a deal so far. I haven't yet decided what to do - so you may not be hearing from me as often as I'd like.

In the meantime Big Birthday wishes going out to all the people who may or may not read this while I'm on my trip. Happy Birthday Sam! Happy Birthday Andy! Happy Birthday Brent! Happy Birthday Matt Herzberg volunteer coordinator at Camp Victor. I will do my best to send you all postcards from where I am on your special day! Even though I'm pretty sure Brent and Matt don't even read my blog!

Take care, y'all. And cross your fingers Kwarou is in good enough shape I can post a lot of pictures when I return!

List of ridiculous things I find myself traveling with
1 a cat in a cardboard box inside a shopping bag before I had the carrying cage. She was surprisingly good when small enough to lay on the floor of the box. She slept all through her first maxi taxi ride.

2 a cat in her travel cage and in my other hand a pumpkin pie which has lost its aluminum foil

3 a bag of clothes, a computer, a two liter bottle of hyperconcentrated coffee and a pumpkin

4 a cat, all her necessary cat equipment and a wreath center peice (this was easier than I thought it would be because even though she wanted to eat the wreath when we were home, when it was on the luggage rack she didn't much care.)

5 a cat, a two liter bottle of scwhepps biter lemon, a liter of milk, and my knitting

6 and now a cat, three weeks of cat food, one 10 pound bag of litter of litter attached to the outside of my bag (and about half that inside the bag), four outfits for me for me, two pizzas to eat tonight in the village and a bag of books to drop off in Bucharest at the Peace Corps office.

What will it be next? keep reading to find out....

2008-03-09T05:01:00.000-07:00

Grab Bag
Disclaimer: The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps.

Here is a grab bag of pictures I've been waiting to post. Starting with New Year's Eve...

Volunteers from France, Belgium and Argentina who also live in Deva.

Having a party, that's right that's Taco Dip and homemade tortilla chips. The chocolate chip cookies weren't bad either. Obviously those empty wine bottles are just candle holders. (really, they are.)

Music and dancing...

and a concert, sort of thing in front of the Casa Cultural.

A rocket a guy lit here on the security fence. I'm sure he didn't mean for it to go right towards the stage. The guy operating the sound board appreciated it none too much.

Not bad for an almost totally random show of fireworks...

Ringing in the new year

with our dance moves.

Can-can 2008 be the year we hope it will be? (ok, that was lame even for me.)

Jan 1st 2008 we hiked up to the citadel despite some seriously inconvenient frost.

This is my "Join the Peace Corps" photo.

Deva after our second snow fall. I really want to take a nice picture like this where you can see our "Hollywood" style Deva sign.

Oh, poor baby. Bella convelesces on a hot water bottle in a pillowcase.

And still looks cute despite having to survive the agonies of the funnel collar.

After a full recovery she quickly resumes getting into mischief.

On a trip to the village Baru Mare, Laura experiments with soya tacos.

Further proof that Peace Corps volunteers will go to any lengths to find "Mexican" food.

My friend Dru and I in Hateg, outside Pizzeria El Sombrero. The pizza is good.

2008-02-28T01:45:00.000-08:00

The Return of Kwarou
Disclaimer: The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps.

As of today I've had Kwarou, my beloved laptop back in my possession for two weeks - and I still haven't updated my blog. I have been busy. Other peace corps volunteers in my class that I talk to say that they've been busy. I feel like around March of your second year you suddenly become busier than ever before.

And then I remember that it's not March yet.

Well, I am planning a rather intense vacation for March and the beginning of April, but until then I want to recommit myself to blogging about serious things having to do with my experience, my projects and Romanian culture - less about movies and internet videos and things my cat does. That, after all is what facebook is for.

I would write a serious post right now, except I'm busy today. I'm cleaning my apartment. Due to my suggestion Deva is hosting the next Gender and Development Committee meeting this weekend and I have six people staying with me. I handled the hostel reservations for the committee (mostly) by myself in Romanian and made a dinner reservation for 20 at a local restaurant and invited my "French" friends from New Years to hang out with a bunch of Americans and Romanians over pizza tomorrow night. (I call them French because they all speak French, but truthfully one is Belgian and one is Argentine.) And I'm baking cinnamon rolls Saturday morning.

So this weekend is pretty busy too - like my last three weekends, but I promise you a serious post on the outcome of my project proposal which will be voted on by the committee on Saturday.

Thanks for sticking with me. I promise to try and make it more interesting or at least relevant from now on.