True to Title

Today, I thought I would stick with the title of this blog and simply write some random things that I’ve seen/heard/learned in my short time in my village. And I’ve had a lot of free time, so this monster checks in at over 3000 words. Get yourself comfortable. And one point of clarification first - my host brother is engaged and will be married soon, and his fiancee basically lives with us. So throughout I refer to her as my ‘host sister-in-law’ because 1)That’s basically what she is, and 2) It’s a lot easier to say than "the fiancee of my host brother-in-law."

- People ask me all the time - more than you can imagine - if I like Moldova: when I tell them that I love it here, they in turn ask me a difficult question: ‘why?’ It’s a question I can’t really answer in English, let alone Russian, but I’ll give you a story that illustrates one reason why I love it so much.

Last Monday I was on a bus at the central station in the capital- the one bus every day that goes right from Chisinau to my village - and as we were pulling out slowly there was a delivery-type van at an angle to us (and right outside where I was sitting) also backing up, and I distinctly remember thinking that if the driver didn’t see us he would hit us: he was going very slowly so it wouldn’t matter much, but it could get interesting if contact was made. And sure enough, he backed right into us.

Now, I was in downtown Minneapolis once on a bus when it got hit by a car, and needless to say it was a disaster. There was zero damage to the bus (but the car was banged up a lot) and every passenger was unhurt, but it still took an hour to sort out - the police came as well as an ambulance, and I didn’t get home until 9:00 at night - and that was after getting so frustrated that I took another bus number home and walked a half-a-mile.

This time, we did things the logical way - our driver got out, looked at his vehicle (spotless) and the other (a large dent above the back-right tail light), shrugged his shoulders, and we left; no harm, no foul. It was as simple as that. No one was hurt, and it was simply a waste of time to do anymore than leave and get the passengers home as soon as possible.
Mark it up as a top reason why I really love life in this country.

- I finally bought a cell-phone the other day. Actually, I’ve always had a phone, but I finally bought a SIM-card to go with it. However, there’s one problem - I get zero reception in my village. We’re in a bit of a valley in what is a low point anyway, so I get nothing, although I do get reception in the regional center. And because we’re in a valley, I learned that if I go walk in the woods to a high enough elevation, I get service.

There is good news, however - much to the disbelief of me and the two Volunteers who I bought the card with, if I receive a call from America or another country, I actually get minutes added to my account - at one store the seller told us this in English, then at another store my friends asked in Romanian if it was true. When told yes, I asked in Russian just to be positive, and sure enough it’s true.

So if anyone is considering calling me, you’ll actually be saving me a bit of money. Just warn me first so I can either go into the regional center or go for a walk in the woods (although there are rumors that a tower is being put up some time in the fall - there is a large resort near and apparently people complain that they can’t get service while staying there).

To call my cell phone, just dial 011-373-698-258-27. If we’re lucky, I’ll have service. Otherwise, you can reach my house at 011-373-244-732-80, where someone will answer in Russian but should understand my name - you can get an international calling card for as low as four cents a minute. I welcome calls any time, but just be mindful of the eight hour time difference.

- Last Monday I went to Chsiniau so I could get my permit to work legally in the country. It’s easy enough to get there - two busses leave the village at 6:00 in the morning, bringing me into the center of the capital by 7:30. And getting back isn’t bad: there is only one aforementioned bus from Chisinau right to the village that leaves at 1:40 in the afternoon, and the last bus leaves from the regional center to the village at 4:30 in the afternoon and busses to the regional center are easy to get. So if I want, I can stay in Chisinau until 3:00 - not bad.

At first when I learned all this on my first visit to the village, I was really surprised and frustrated by how tough it was to get home. Then I talked to other volunteers, one of which lives in the far north and whom it takes six hours to get to the capital. Then I felt better. Even on Monday when I went, I woke up at 5:00 to get to on the bus, and I thought that it was simply the first of many times in two years that I’ll have to make the trek. And when I met friends at Peace Corps office, they told me that they had gotten on a bus as early as 5:30. So how can I complain?

- My new host family, because we have a farm, has a lot of work to do, and they are slow to ask me to help, with the exception of the sister-in-law. So on Monday when I returned from my trip to Chisinau I spent two hours in the evening cutting tomatoes with everyone, putting the slices into jars so they can be preserved for the winter. It was a good time, talking and actually feeling like a productive member of the family. I told my host brother too that if he needs help with work around the house, in the yard, with animals, to just tell me and that I’d be glad to do what I can.

- The other question I get asked all the time (aside from how I like Moldova) is if I’m either married of if I have a girlfriend in America. When I say that the answer to both questions is ‘no’, people get intrigued and expect me to instantly find a woman, marry her, and bring her home. I just let them think that and never really tell them that acquiring a wife is just about last on my list of things to do in Moldova.

A story about how odd it can get - a week ago, I went with my host brother and his fiancee to a get-together in the forest with some of their friends. Well, there was a girl there who’s in her second year at the university, who lives in Chisinau and who wants a chance to practice her English. So I chatted with her at the get-together and before I left, I gave her my e-mail and told her that if I’m in Chisinau and have free time we can meet and she can practice her English, which she thought was a great idea. That’s it.

So the next day I checked my e-mail and sure enough, she wrote me a note and gave me her phone number and told me to call her next time I’m in Chisinau. Well, I told this all to my host soon to be sister-in-law, who instantly predicted a future and within an hour had told everyone worth telling that of the series of events: she’s predicting a wedding already, despite my attempts to downplay the situation.

Every male - and almost every female - volunteer in this country has a person of the opposite sex thrown at them. I know of one story in which a girl stopped someone in her village and asked for directions to someplace and, before she know it, she was being ushered inside to meet the nephew of the woman of whom she had inquired. Also, its not uncommon for parents of students to approach American teachers and suggest, not so subtly, that perhaps they should spent more ‘one-on-one’ time working with their child, even offering to pay for private tutoring lessons (something which Peace Corps volunteers are not supposed to give). We were also all told from day one that for many Moldovans look at a single volunteer and see a Green Card tattooed to their forehead. Thus, we’re constantly aware of ulterior motive of the opposite sex.

That being said, however, I’m not going to absolutely refuse to help someone of the opposite sex who wants to practice English. That would be ridiculous.

- I finally know what grades I’ll be teaching, at least in the fall - 4th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 10th, and 11th. Sound like a lot? Trust me, it will be - the first month especially should be tough, but after I settle into a plan I should have few difficulties. As a friend of mine says, "I came to Moldova and the Peace Corps to work." I’ve never really shied away from hard work, and I don’t plan on doing so now. Plus, it’s only eighteen hours a week stretched over five days, I’ll teach no more than four classes in a day, leaving me plenty of time for preparation.

- At the central market in Chisinau I finally bought a flashlight, the best fifteen lei (just over a dollar) I’ve spent so far. Now I can get to and from the outhouse without problems at night and can even drink water after 6:00 - I had cutback in my pre-flashlight life to minimize potential trips to the outhouse. And the batteries were cheap too, as a pair set me back about sixty cents. Unfortunately, their life cycle is about as long as you would expect from sixty-cent batteries.

I also went to a stand to buy some sunglasses, and it took the vendor there about ten seconds to pick up on my accent. After talking her about her products in Russian, she suddenly asked me in English where I was from (she also asked me, of course, if I like Moldova and why or why not). It was quite a surprise, to have this young lady who sells sunglasses in the central market in Chisinau speaking really good English. I actually didn’t like anything that she was selling, but I felt compelled to purchase something. So I did.

- As much as I’m really like and appreciate the simplicity of life in the country - getting water from the well daily, bathing by pouring water over myself from a pitcher, brushing my teeth under the stars every night, even the outhouse is starting to grow on me - I’m very interested to see what winter will be like here. The Peace Corps gives each volunteer a space heater to use, and I’ve already decided that I won’t be using that - as anyone who lived at 1501 Sherburne in St. Paul surely knows, I don’t mind living in cold weather.

But in general, life will be interesting. All of the aforementioned activities that I really like will get significantly more difficult as the temperature drops. But I figure that everyone in the village - and hundreds of millions of people in the world - live in conditions like this during every winter in their life. The least I can do is live this way for two years. The people I really fear for are those of us from the warmer parts of the USA - there’s one guy here from Texas, along the Mexican border, whose seen snow twice in his life, and never more than an inch or two. Start praying for him now. And another girl from the West coast told me that she’s never really experienced weather colder than 30 degrees - when I asked her if she meant above or below zero, she thought I was joking.

- In my family, every scrap of food that is prepared and uneaten (or uneatable) by humans goes straight to the pigs. We have a small bucket that sits in the kitchen and which all such food goes into, things like the brine of a watermelon (which are really cheap - a large one costs fifteen cents) or the hard pit of a tomato. Even after each meal, all the dishes are first rinsed out with just water and that water goes into the bucket: if there’s enough time at the end of the day the bucket is boiled for a few minutes, but usually it just goes right to the pigs.

Two more interesting things about living in the country: 1) We bake bread here in an outdoor oven with fire - very interesting to see. And you know what we use for a fuel? Corn husks (the corn being stripped). Actually, everyone here uses corn husks for fuel; the corn is usually stripped and given to the animals, and to not waste anything the husks are burned. They actually make a great fuel, burning long and hot. 2) Last Sunday my host mom and I ate breakfast together and she left the table early - when I walked outside she was plucking the feathers from a freshly killed chicken, one that was twitching. About ten minutes later a turkey went down - my only regret is that she didn’t tell me about it before hand - I’ve seen a pig take a metal rod to the heart, and I wanted to see a chicken get it’s head cut off. But alas, I’ll have to wait for another day . . .

- We’re told as volunteers that we always need to have our official documents on us, either our passport or our green cards, especially in Chisinau, where the police are prone to stop any person speaking English. If a person has their documents, it’s not an issue - I know of one volunteer who lived in the capital for two years and been stopped dozens of times, and it’s never been more than a two minutes conversation. The police simply ask for papers, they are shown, and everyone moves on. It’s very simply if all documents are present.

And, as some people in my group learned a week ago, much more complicated if documents are not had, as a week ago two people in my group were stopped in Chisinau without their papers. After trying for a few minutes in broken Romanian to explain what had happened and to convince the police not to arrest them, their attempts failed and they were summarily led away in handcuffs to the police station. The Peace Corps gave us training on what to do in such a situation, as it’s happened before, and within two hours someone from the US Embassy had arrived to release them.

It wasn’t too big of a deal, but it did lead to a great story and two hours of terror for some friends of mine.

- There is something that happens to all volunteers here - some people are really annoyed by it, but I don’t really mind. It’s when members of the host family serve as a sort of spokesman for the volunteer in social situations. It happened with my new family already - we were at an event and people started asking my host sister-in-law questions about me, which she politely answered. But what these people don’t realize is that the only reason she knows these answers is because I first told her in Russian.

- All "Seinfeld" fans who stumble across this might be interested in knowing the following: there is an episode in which Jerry meets and starts dating a Romanian gymnast, and at the end of the episode they go to the circus to meet a Romanian friend of hers. When they meet they start speaking Romanian to each other, and I’ve always wondered if they were really speaking Romanian and if so, what were they saying.

Well sure enough, I have the DVD here with me with that episode on it, so I showed it to my Russian teacher (who actually speaks Romanian as a first language). Yes, it’s Romanian. The gymnast jokes with her friend, "are you so important that we must always wait for you?" and everything else is indistinguishable. Just thought that was interesting.

- One thing I was excited to see when I got here was how well I could communicate - I distinctly remember just how much I could understand when I was here six weeks or so ago (and it wasn’t much), but now I understand about 60-70 percent of what is said to me and about 40 percent of what is said to others. I feel like I have a firm grasp on all the language I know, to the point that I usually don’t have to think of what has been said, it’s just translated automatically in my mind (anyone whose studied a language knows exactly what I mean). Speaking is a different story - I can think clearly in Russian, but when I speak it doesn’t come out so clearly, but that is just something that will come with time, as the more often speak the more smoothly things will flow.

Now, the challenge is simply adding to my knowledge of the language

- Two final notes on economics in Moldova:
1) In Chisinau - like any large city - there are a lot of beggars on the street. But in talking with my Russian teacher, she said there is a general rule of thumb - the worse off a person looks, the more likely is just a scam. It’s basically common knowledge here. On the other hand, here are often seen old ladies out on the street, dressed in nice clothes with their hands out. These women simply have no money to buy bread and a hungry, and they dress up to maintain their pride. To these women it is always a good idea to give money.
2) My new village seems, at first glance, to be very poor - certainly much poorer than my previous village. But there is one big difference - my current village is largely agrarian. We are too far from Chisinau for people to work there, leading most people to work in the village on their farms with animals or in the fields. And it seems to me that "poverty" has a very different meaning for those in the city and those in the country. Whereas someone in the city is may be so poor that they are unable to buy something meat and it’s a problem, someone in the village might be so poor that they are unable to buy piglets to raise so they’ll have meat in six months. Basically, it’s very difficult to compare socio-economic status of those who live in the two economic sectors. That being said, I still love my new home and new setting. I can’t wait to get to work on Friday.