Picnic

Video of a traditional Roma dance

In Moldova, credit is tough to come by. If you can get access to credit through a bank, the rate is going to be from 22-28%. A common family in Moldova doesn't have access to credit. Unbelievable, I know. Therefore, the people in Moldova build their houses for periods of 10 years or more. They build it with their own hands and with the help of brothers, cousins, etc. When someone has some money to purchase more materials, they'll add a little more to their house. After 10 years, they've got a beautiful home. Here's a few pics of what you see all around Moldova. There are many different stages of construction depending on how long the family has been building it, how much money they have, and how much help they have from friends and family.

Piles of stone waiting to be added to the walls of the house.

A house in it's final stages. I'm not sure about this specific house, but a house looking like this could have been sitting here for many years. However, they have no house payments :)

We had a picnic this last Sunday in the woods for the current PC Trainess. We pretty much sat on the dirt, drank wine, and ate moldovan food all day. Here's a pic of me with some of the coolest people I know.

Moldova 24 - We're the 24th group to come to Moldova with the Peace Corps.

Riding through the fields

Yesterday was really cool, so I'll give a quick recap: At school we had a verbal language assessment for the teachers to monitor our progress. Basically, we sat at a table with a native speaker and carried on simple conversations. We were given four grades on a 1-5 scale. I received all fives, so I'm keeping up to par on my language study so far. In three weeks, at the end of my pre service training, we have to be speaking at a Intermediate Mid level. There are low, mid, and high levels for each of the three categories: Novice, Intermediate, and Advanced. Once I get to the Advanced Low level, hopefully next year, Peace Corps will let me change from a Romanian tutor and start learning Russian.

After school, I came back and drank some wine with the family, and then we went out to the fields to pick some peaches. The peach orchard is beautiful. There are rows of trees as far as one can see. My family went with our neighboring family, and I was told that my neighbor owns two rows of peach trees at this field so we could eat anything from those two rows. Two rows of peach trees is enough to feed all of Wal Mart's employees. Not really, but it's a lot. This was suprising, because we don't have this type of land ownership in the states. I asked why did he only own two rows (there was hundreds of rows all around us), and I found out that the mayor distributed this out in the past: for example, some people received peach trees, some apple, some cherry, etc. Our conversation got too lost in translation for me to fully understand the details, but I think that maybe my neighbor received these two rows when Moldova became independent from the Soviets and most of the land was privatized. Anyways, the peaches are incredible and keep me in a good mood. As I'm typing this, my host mom is downstairs boiling a pot of water with peaches and sugar to make "compote." Compote is an old traditional drink in Moldova. You drink it hot, and you drink it with every family. I think of it as a natural Kool Aid.

After the peach trip, I went with my brother and about 15 of his friends to the woods to have a picnic. There's no charcoal, so we gathered sticks from the woods, burnt them, and cooked beef ribs on top of the wood coals. We ate the ribs with ketchup, which doesn't come in a plastic bottle. The ketchup comes in a pack simliar to a Capri Sun and is spiced with pepper. When we were done eating all 15 of us walked to a community well, wrenched up a bucket of water, and freshened up.

As an American, you never know what to expect in Moldova, and that's the fun of it all. There are certain things I get used to, and there are certain times when I can't help but to step back and just soak it all in. For instance, yesterday I was riding in a 1980 model tan Russian car, windows down, with my host brother and three other Moldovan dudes. We were shirtless, as are most of the dudes in the village. We were riding through the fields listening to Moldovan music, speaking in Romanian, and as far as you could see were rolling hills of nothing but orchards and wine vineyards. More and more things are starting to feel natural because Moldova is now my home. However, there are still times like this where I laugh to myself and realize how different this culture is.

Back from the North

Just to give everyone a heads up, please keep in mind that lots of Moldovans may be reading my blog. I make lots of new friends every day, and they all become part of my social and professional circle just like you all are back in the States. As the Peace Corps constantly reminds us, try to be culturally sensitive with your comments. Everything you all have written so far has been great, so keep the same attitude with your future posts. The Peace Corps' mission is "to promote world peace and friendship", so the last thing I want is for one of my Moldovan friends to get offended by an innocent remark that got misinterpreted. Ok, I've mentioned the administrative jargon the Peace Corps wanted us to relay, so that should take care of the next two years.

I traveled to the north of Moldova to my village for three days this past weekend (can't say the name for security reasons, but it's near Drochia if anyone is interested in looking at a map). When I got off the bus and greeted people with the typical "Buna Ziua", which is Good Day in romanian, everyone responded with "Zdsarfuite", which is hello in russian. That's not how it's spelled, but the russian caryllic alphabet is ridicuously difficult. The point being, I'm studying romanian during training, but I am definately going to pick up on some russian very soon. I am going to continue to study romanian after training with a tutor in my village, but it's inevitable that I learn some russian soon. Julia, if you're reading this, I wish I would have studied some russian with you before I left :) Anyways, it shouldn't be problem, because everyone in the country is biligual.

I gave my host dad some Tabasco sauce the other day. He ate three bites, and pushed his chair back from the table and starting laughing. His first tabasco experience was his last. My host brother, on the other hand, is halfway through the bottle. A typical daily diet for me usually consist of lots of bread, homemade cheese, salomi, cucumbers, tomatoes, mamalinga (somewhat simliar to grits), buckwheat, sarmale (rice filled cabbage rolls), oatmeal, placinta (pastries filled with cheese, potatoes, or fruit) and all the fruit and tea a human being can consume. The national dishes are mamalinga, placinta, and sarmale.

I have some pics at home on my camera that I'll post later, but I'm in the neighboring village at a internet cafe at the moment without my camera. When I leave here, I'll jump on a 15 passenger van with about 35 other Moldovans, and I'll ride back into my village of Milestii Mici for one or two (yes two) dinners with family. Most evenings I help my host family in the garden or my host dad with his tractor. Life is real busy now with language training every day, but my life in one month is going to change dramatically once I'm the only American in my village and I'm actually "working". I'm really excited, because I received a very warm welcome when I visited my permanent village this past weekend. As soon as I got in, I was taken around the village for a quick tour, and then we went to small bar where we served a feast. The mayor joined us, and I got to try out some of my fresh romanian language with him. He is predominately russian speaking, but spoke romanian for my sake :) He seems like a great guy and hard working, so I'm looking forward to teaming with him on some projects in my village.


Fii sanatos - be healthy.

Future site

In the morning, I am leaving on train to travel to the far north of Moldova to the village of XXXXXX. As I mentioned in my last blog post, this is where I'll be living for the next two years. I've grown so close to my current host family, I hate to leave them. For now though, I will only be visiting XXXXXX for three days. Yesterday, I had to call my host partner (director of the humanitarian organization I was assigned to) to confirm that I will be arriving by train on Sunday. This was hilarious, to say the least. We have only studied romanian for four weeks, and we all had to call our non-english speaking partners. I actually think I did well. We'll see.

As for my new host family, I will only have a host mom. We were given info sheets so that we have an idea of what our new situation will be before we get there. Some of my friends received homes with hot, running water and even indoor showers and toilets. Here's the info I got:

Check the appropriate box below:

Cooking facilities in the house:

Gas Stove

Stove with Gas Container XX

Electric Stove

Reliablie source of water:

Well XX

Running Water

Type of toilet:

Indoors

Outhouse XX

Bathing Facilities:

Bathroom with tub & running water

Bathroom with tub & no running water

No special bathroom, Volunteer will need to buy a plastic tub XX

Bring it on Moldova.

My site.

We are almost half way through with PST - pre service training. Yesterday was a big day, because we received our site placements. I was assigned to the village Zgurita. Beginning August 9, following pre service training, I'll be living with a host mom in Zgurita for two years. From site history reports of previous volunteers, I have learned that Zgurita has about 3,500 villagers. The village is like many others in Moldova, in that agriculture employs the majority of local economic interests; apples, corn, potatoes, and watermelon are the most common crops. There are three neighborhoods in the village: the center is mainly Russian-speaking, the western end is mainly Romanian-speaking, and the southern end is a Ukranian community.

I am assigned to work with ONG Fortuna, a humanitarian aid and development organization, and ACSA, an agriculture extension agency. It will be a while before I know what kind of projects I can initiate in the village, but I'm sure there's a lot I can do for small business (predominately farmers), community infrastructure, and with youth development. When I become a Volunteer, I am expecting to focus on my primary job first, which is Agribusiness and Rural Development, but I'll have lots of time to work on secondary projects. I'll most likely focus most of secondary projects on working with kids.


The Peace Corps staff drew a map of Moldova with sidewalk chalk, then they placed our chairs where each trainee would be placed for the remaining two years. It was pretty intense, because we had no idea where anyone was going.


Some of my fellow trainees and friends anxiously waiting for their name to be called for site placement.

I dream in Romanian.

I am now starting to think in the romanian language. I know this because I had a dream the other night and no english was spoken by anyone. The Moldovans are very patient, and they get excited when you try to speak in their native language. Funny thing is, my 3 weeks worth of intense study has only taught me the tip of the iceburg, so I walk around saying phrases like: "My shirt is blue", "The weather is nice", "I am not a tourist". I'm sure it's hilarious. One of the first things I've learned about myself is that I'll be much more patient with immigrants learning english in America. Learning another language is one of the most excited things about being in Moldova, but in no way is it easy.

My host sister, Anna, invited me to her high school graduation ball last weekend. It wasn't simliar to an American graduation at all. The presentation of diplomas lasted only about 20 minutes, and they did not wear cap and gowns. I guess they saved their money for the "masa". "Masa" translated means meal, but if you get invited to a "masa", be ready. I would recommend not eating for the two days leading up to it. I have never seen one long table of food half the size of a football field. We ate, drank, toasted, and laughed until it was time to start dancing. Everyone was doing the hora, which is the national dance. Teachers, students, families, friends, and even the principal danced the hora. I danced until 3:30 am until I called it quits, but when I left most of the crowd was still in a circle. The video below is from the graduation ball.

A pic taken while we were celebrating my host sister's graduation from high school.

This week we made a few cultural learning trips. I visited a beekeeper who has been raising bees since 1978. He started with 3 families of bees and now has 28 families producing honey. This honey is not "high fructose corn syrup", this is the real deal. I'm going back in the next week or so to buy a kilogram for my host family.

The pic above was taken in the garden of the beekeeper. Each box contains a bee family.

We took another trip to visit a volunteer who has been in Moldova for a little over a year. I got to meet him, see his office, and see one of the projects he is working on. It helps to meet experienced volunteers, because it gives me ideas on projects that I can start once I finish training and become a Volunteer. First though, I have to learn the language before I can initiate a project in my community. Anyways, while we were visiting the volunteer, we took a small trip to the Nistru River. I was very excited about this. If you take the time to read anything about Transnistria, you will be amazed. To tell you a little about it Transnistria, it is a "country" within Moldova that is not recognized as a country by the rest of the world. The Nistru river, which we visited, seperates the rest of Moldova from Transnistria. When Moldova gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, the Transnistria area was supported by Russia and they established their own separate entity. They have developed their own currency, government, military, and they elect a president every four years, but since they are not recognized by any other country in the world, no organization oversees their elections. I was amazed just to stand on one side of the river and take a picture of this type of place. I highly doubt they would allow US passport holders inside their border, but Peace Corps won't even let us try to go there. I'm bummed about that. I think it would be surreal to walk in those gates and see Soviet statues on the town corners. If you're interested in reading more about Transnistria, there's tons of info on the net...or you can just ask me.

This is a pic of the Nistru River. I am standing in the mainland of Moldova and across the river is Transnistria.

My village of Milestii Mici is still treating me great. We've eaten and canned all the raspberries and cherries, but apricots and plums are in full bloom now. The fruit is always delicious here, and there is a tree every ten steps. I went out today and picked some apricots and plums for Doamna Tatiana, my host mom, so that she can make some compote. Compote is boiled fruit, water, and sugar, and it's an old tradition in Moldova. They make compote out of every kind of fruit, and we drink it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We'll drink a lot of compote this summer, but we'll also store a good bit for winter.

I just got back from the garden. We had the whole family picking the potatoes out of the ground. We ended up with 12 crates full, and Domnul Andrei (host dad) said this was a good harvest. Last year he came up short. They are so funny to work with. The entire family works together, and they joke with each other the entire time. I guess as long as the potatoes are plentiful then there are no worries. Also, the language lessons I get working in the garden seem to be more successful than the formal lessons in the classroom.

I found out some cool news today about my village of Milestii Mici: I am living on the largest wine collection in the world. No kidding, the soil my house is built on is literally on top of a huge underground tunnel of wine. Milestii Mici was entered into the Guinness Book of World Records in 2007 for having the "Largest Wine Collection" in the world. Finding this out has answered a lot of confusion I've been having lately about trouble with water. I've been helping Domnul Andrei by pumping water out of our well, transporting it with our tractor, and pumping it into a friend's well down the road. I was told today by a history teacher that there are water problems in this section of Milestii Mici because it was built on top of the wine tunnels. Who would have known?

Another typical sight on my walk home from school.

Most Moldovan homes have a canopy of grapes growing for shade (and obviously for wine).

Moldovans have a holiday once a year where all the families go to the cemetary and have a huge meal and drink lots of wine in honor of their loved ones. Hence the picnic tables.

Fruit trees everywhere.

This is a pic of Juan. He gave us a tour of his house and showed us the handmade quilts his mom makes and sells. Juan, like most of the Moldovan kids I've talked to, is a true gentleman. He walks his older sister to the bus stop by my house every day and his manners are superb.

Some of the houses are full of colors. All of the houses are full of plants.

Outdoor shower. Fill the metal container up with water and let the sun heat it up.

Until next time, I love you all. Peace.