Back in America

After three and a half months of being in Romania, I am finally back home in Massachusetts. The flights were fine, except for the fact that I hate flying and I had a 6 and a half hour layover in London when all I wanted to do was jump on a plane home. We drove to the airport Friday morning at 2:30 am, which is 7:30 pm at home. From that time until I finally fell into bed at home around 10, I got maybe 2 hours of sleep, but I honestly did not care because I was home. My parents laughed at me because pretty much the only thing I could say as soon as we left the airport was 'I'm in America.' I'm back in the routine of being at home at Christmas time. The first night I was home I went in to count money from the kettles and today is toy store day, my favorite day of the Christmas season. So this ends my need for a blog, thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed my stories.

Last Day

Today is our last day in Sighisoara. We leave tomorrow morning. So I figured it was about time to post some pictures of the town I've been living in for the past 3 and a half months.

These are the ridiculous stairs that I had to climb everyday. They may not look it, but they are a killer and they wrap around the corner that's not in the picture. Also in the picture you can see that they were digging up the stairs, and everything else, for about 3 months

Casa de Dracul. I thought it would look a little grander than it does. It was a lot like seeing the Plymouth rock for the first time. You think it is going to be this huge grandiose thing, and then it turns out it's just a rock. Also, the restaurant inside is sort of pricey, but worth it.

The clock tower in the center of town-that is four minutes slow. It's great on a big tourist day they all crowd around it with their cameras waiting for the hour to strike when a puppet comes out and bags a pot-really not that impressive, especially at 1.

House on the Rock, where all of our classes were, and the computer lab. It looks pretty with the snow, but a couple of days after this picture was taken it rained, so now it's just really muddy outside again.

The outside of the house I've been living in for the past 3 and a half months. Ali was so excited the first day we pulled up in front of it because it's pink and green. At that point it wasn't hard for her to get excited about something here.

My sisters, who I will miss dearly. Anita is in front of me on my left, Timmy is right next to her. Rahel, Rachel in English, is next to me and of course in front of her is Ali.

I will definitely miss my family here, and my supervisor. But I am more than a little excited to get back to America where I can understand what people are trying to say to me, where I can read signs again. The girls and I joke that we'll probably just sit in a restaurant staring at the menu because we'll be able to actually read what the menu says.

Romanian home

I only have one week left in Sighisoara, the final two days before we fly out of Romania will be spent in the city of Bucharest. My mother has asked me more than once to post pictures of the house I've been living in, but I've never gotten around to it. So here they are. I don't have a picture of the outside of the house, but I'll probably post that later on in the week.

Here are Ali and my beds-I sleep in the little one-the one that has no frame and is simply one mattress stacked on top of another. Those blankets may not look like much, but cocoon yourself in one-don't move because moving causes cold air to come in-and you're toasty warm all through the night.

Ali and I have been pretty much living out of our suitcases for the past 3 months. There isn't a dresser, or drawers anywhere to put our clothes, so we sort of stack them. Sorry Ma, I know it's not the neatest.

This is the sight that greets us as soon as we walk through the door. Our room is immediately to the left, the door isn't shown in this picture. Down the hallway on the right is the bathroom I've already posted pictures of, and directly across the hall is the kitchen.

Ali and I spend a lot of time at that table, since we don't have a desk or anything in our room, of course this table is in the kitchen which usually means we feel the need to eat something while we do whatever it is we need to do.

Full view of the kitchen, where again Ali and I spend a lot of time. Particularly if we haven't enjoyed whatever our family served for dinner that night. We wait until they go upstairs and then we raid the kitchen.

That is pretty much the entirety of the downstairs, which is where I spend 98% of my time when I'm home. The upstairs is simply Mama C and the girls bedrooms. The stairs up and down are outside-no stairs on the inside. Which is always fun if the girls invite us upstairs to watch a movie or something Ali and I have to get all bundled up and put on our shoes, or just put on our shoes and make a run for it.

Budapest

For the first time in my life I wasn't with my family for Thanksgiving. It wasn't as bad as it could have been, for one thing I was in Budapest, Hungary, and for another I spent it with girls who have become like family to me. We left for Budapest Thursday morning at 3 am- it was about an 11 hour car ride-with stops and Hungary is an hour behind Romania so we gained an hour. Thursday night the students went out and found a place to eat Thanksgiving dinner. We found a place that was decorated like a submarine and if we had gone after 10 it becomes a dance club. Which explains the music in the background and my favorite quote of the entire trip which came from Amanda 'Nothing says Happy Thanksgiving like 50 cent' Friday we spent exploring-which pretty much means we just did a bunch of walking, but Budapest really is pretty. Saturday we went to a museum about the Holocaust in Hungary. Then immediately afterward we went to a mall to eat dinner. We left Sunday morning at 8 and didn't arrive home in Sighisoara until 9:30 that night. I always forget how exhausted you can get simply by sitting in a car all day.



All of the students before crossing the bridge over the Danube River.















Me at the Fisherman's Bastian, which has no real purpose, it just looks nice.


















Me with the Parliament building on the Pest side of the Danube River in the background.














Heroe's square at 4:30 in the afternoon-yeah the moon was out then.













Under no circumstances are you to hold a small child's hand.












One of the buildings we went into had different exhibits-this one was called the immortal blue jean. I wish I were kidding. There was also a back room that was almost completely dark, the radio was playing and all around the room were large blue jean bean bags.

What's Missing?

So I know it's been a while since I've posted but there is a Romanian television station whose slogan says it best 'I live in Romania and that takes all of my time' So I told my brother about the bathroom at the place I'm staying at and he told me I should post about it. If this is only interesting to him, I apologize.





















As you can see in the picture all we have is a bathtub with a shower head-no shower curtain or door of any kind around the shower. You may ask how we keep the water from getting on the floor-everyone I've told has asked that. The answer is...we don't, at the bottom of the picture you can see a drain on the floor. The floor is soaking wet for a while after anyone gets a shower so I don't even want to know what the floor would be like without the drain. The good thing is the towel rack that's in the right side of the picture is attached to the heater and therefore heats the towels on it.














Here is the toilet, it took me a second to figure out how I was supposed to flush it-there's a button on the top-not clear in the picture, but it's there. In the bathroom upstairs there's something that looks like a button on top, but instead of pushing it in, you have to pull it up. It's interesting.

Here is the German washing machine-it may look like a similiar to an American one. For the most part it is, but all of the words on the knob are, obviously, in German. So the first time we did laundry was fun.

Ali and I have our own sinks-on the left hand corner of the counter you can see the orange scented toilet paper I blogged about earlier.

For the most part this bathroom is nicer than the one I have at home. It was just really strange when we first walked in. I don't know exactly what I was expecting when I first got here, but it wasn't a nicely tiled bathroom with our own sinks. While I had a primitive idea in my mind I was still expecting some sort of cover around the shower.

Romanian Hospitality

I've gone on at least 6 home visits since being here in Romania. One of those home visits was when I did my very first real intake interview. I was nervous but I figured since I don't speak the language if I made a mistake my supervisor/translator would reword the question for me. But of course it turns out that the woman understands English, she just doesn't speak it, so the translator was completely for me. But I think it went pretty well considering it was my first time being the primary interviewer. But I've found while going on these home visits that Romanian people feel as though the weren't very good hosts if you haven't had, at least, something to drink. So while in Romania I've had more cups of coffee than I've had in my entire life-which isn't saying much since I've only had 3 full cups. It's sort of growing on me, it's not terrible if you put a lot of sugar in it. I've also had some sort of pear nectar juice and pink grapefruit soda. Since I never know what's going on at the home visit anyway-I can pick up a few words here and there but not enough to get the whole conversation- I usually don't know I'm being offered something until it's put in front of me. Then I sort of feel as though I have to drink it. But again, lots of sugar in the coffee has helped and the pear nectar and pink grapefruit weren't that bad.

Halloween in Transylvania

I'm well aware that this post is a few days late. On Halloween, which they don't actually celebrate in Romania, Ali and I decided we wanted to dress up anyway and go to Vlad the Impaler's birthplace-which is now a restaurant. We got just one other girl in our group to agree to go with us, although I'm pretty sure Ali and I would have gone by ourselves if no one else wanted to go with us. We didn't know what we should dress up as, since we didn't exactly pack costumes. We talked to our host sister about it and she suggested going as gypsies-she even let us borrow a couple of Mama C's skirts to put together the outfit. So Ali and I dressed up as gypsies and Amanda dressed up as a soccer player. We definitely got a few strange looks walking down main st. We went to Dracula's restaurant and it turns out that apparently a bunch of people decided to come into town for Halloween and eat there- so we didn't get to eat there that night-we did take a couple pictures in there. We also went to two of the American households we know in Sighisoara to go 'trick-or-treating' and they actually had American candy to give us, and that's really all that matters.
















This is us at the Nazarene pastor's house-we didn't actually think she'd give us candy, but we weren't complaining.














Ali wanted to go to a graveyard-thankfully they are closed after dark. Then she got the brilliant idea to jump into one of the many holes that have been dug all over town. Still have no idea how deep that hole actually was-but what kind of a room mate would I be if I made her jump in a hole by herself?

Pictures from Rome

The Trevi Fountain-it had water in it this time





















Me at the Colloseum-dorky, I know













I really was this close to the Pope






















Me at the Mouth of Truth-it's the pose everyone does at the Mouth of Truth, very touristy

The outside of the Pantheon, it was huge and crowded-but still cool

The outside of the Colloseum, sorry it's sideways, I didn't know how to fix it

Inside the Colloseum on the first level

The pyramid that is in the middle of Rome, sorry again for the sidewaysness

I have a lot more pictures, but the computer is really slow in loading them, so I picked my favorite ones and ones I thought would show the basics of what we saw in Rome

Roamin Rome

This was the joke Ali told about 20 times the day we left for Rome. If I had known how true it would be, I still would have gone, I think I just would have gotten some of those gel thingies for my shoes. I'm slightly ashamed to say it, but the first thing we did when we got to Rome was go to McDonald's so I finally was able to get a Big Mac-about halfway through said Big Mac I started to remember again that I don't like hamburgers. But the fries were good and so was the milkshake, since I also haven't had one of those since mid August. We stayed at the Nazarene Church for the first three nights, so on those nights we made our own pasta because it was cheaper than going out. The four nights, three were spent at a hostel, which offered free breakfast and free pasta dinner, and the last night was spent on the airport floor, because it saved us 24 euro. Things we saw: The first day we spent pretty much trying to find our housing and then we went out at night. The first night we saw the Spanish steps-still trying to figure out what the big deal is about them. We also saw the Trevi Fountain-the one girl with us who had been to Rome before went running ahead, the Trevi is her favorite, only to find them cleaning it. Apparently someone had thrown red paint into it. But on the bright side, we got our very first gelato that night, which was amazing. The thing I found interesting about gelato places, and we went to enough of them since we got at least 1 gelato everyday, was that the servers would be astonished if all you wanted was one flavor. Certain sizes got certain amounts of flavors, so if you said one flavor, they would say 'and'. The first few times I was so shocked that I just pointed out other flavors, then after that I just said 'nope that it, just that flavor' Any guesses as to what that flavor was? And surprisingly, since I know this would be the number 1 guess, no it was not chocolate. On our first full day in Rome, we were taking the bus to the center of town, there were no seats so we were just standing in the middle part of the bus. All of a sudden a man gets on with his guitar and comes and stands right next to me and starts 'serenading' us, quite energetically too, since I almost got hit in the face with his guitar at least 5 times, what a way to start off our day. That day we saw a pyramid in the middle of Rome-again, have no idea the significance, but it was sort of shocking to see a pyramid in Rome. On Sunday we went to the Nazarene church service-seemed only right since we were staying right above the church-but the whole service was in Italian, so none of us understood a word. But at one point the pastor asked us to say something about ourselves and our visit to Rome, which was interesting. That afternoon we went to an old church-it seems everyday we went to an old church-but this one had a crypt underneath that had five rooms decorated entirely with human bones-4,000 people worth of human bones. One of the creepiest things I've ever seen, and photos were not allowed-so I bought a postcard because I didn't think anyone would believe me when I told them. On Monday we moved into our hostel, we were put on the fifth floor- and the staircases were pretty but a pain in the butt to climb. They had an elevator, but next to the elevator on every single floor was a sign that said 'This lift is faulty, we are not responsible for your safety if you decide to use it' so I decided not to use it. The rest of the week is sort of a blur on what we saw when. We did see the Trevi when it actually had water in it, and it was cool. We went to Vatican city on the day that the Pope speaks, and I was right next to the fence that he drove by, so I was about 3 feet from the Pope for about 10 seconds. We were also stupid enough to go to the Sistine Chapel that day-when everyone else was at the Vatican City to hear the Pope speak and would naturally go to the Museum while in that area as well. It took forever to get to the Sistine Chapel, and it didn't look the way I had pictured it in my mind. Maybe that is because the room was crammed with people and was a lot dimmer than I thought it would be. We saw the Colloseum, which was really cool even if only 20 to 30 percent of it is original, all the rest is restoration over the years-one of the many facts we learned on our guided tour. We went to the Pantheon-also crammed full of people, but I'd hate to see it at the peak of tourist season. At one point we went to a National Museum which was interesting but it was also at the end of a really long day, so most of us were exhausted. In between all of these things we saw about 8 more really old churches- including the oldest church in Rome dating back to I think 341 AD, and a ton of fountains. It was an amazing trip that I'm glad I was able to enjoy. I hope to post pictures later today.

Rome

I won't be able to post all next week, and before I get more comments about how I'm just like my brother I figured I would warn y'all. The reason I won't be able to blog is that tomorrow morning myself and four of the other girls are all going to Rome for a week. Nope, not Rome, New York, the other Rome. Personally, I'm going so that I can eat some gelato, but I hear there are other things to see and do there as well. Also I remembered a difference that I really wanted to put in the list, but I had forgotten it. The paper money here is practically indestructible, one time at Monday night dinner, we actually passed around a leu-which is worth about 40 American cents-and took turns trying to rip the bill in some way. No one succeeded.

Things I've noticed

So I've realized that I've been in Romania for about 6 weeks now and I figured I should probably post the list of differences that I've noticed. At this point I've even forgotten some of the differences I noticed in the very beginning, so I may post with another list later on. But here's the current list:
- When in America I hate hamburgers. I don't eat them, if that's the only thing being served at a barbeque then I don't eat. In Romania, perhaps because they aren't readily available for me, I'm really craving Big Macs.
- Toilet paper is rarely white-I've seen pink, orange, and gray. The orange was even scented-peaches.
- Nothing ever starts on time. Interestingly the focal point of Sighisoara is a clock tower. When Ali and I mentioned this to our host sister in relation to lateness, she pointed out to us that even the clock tower was four minutes slow.
- Most families don't have microwaves. One host family did buy one-probably for the students living with them. After they bought it, they gave cold food to the students so they would use the microwave and then watched them using it with fascination.
- No chocolate chips. Enough said.
- Potatoes or rice with most meals, with the exception of breakfast.
- Bread with every meal, including breakfast. Sometimes it's the whole meal.
- Every lunch we have soup or chorba. No idea what the difference is but some lunches they say here's some supa-the word for soup- and sometimes they say here's some chorba. Tastes exactly the same to me, but they say there is a difference.
- They don't eat dessert here-at least not in my family.
- They have a carbonated drink made from flowers and tastes like it too. Incredibly wierd to smell flowers in your drink. Not exactly fun to taste it either.
- Seeing sheep being herded down a road and being forced to wait or go around is not unusual.
- Most Romanians don't go out to eat, ever, they just don't see the point.
- They have chips that are advertised as being chicken flavored. They taste like gravy, and not chicken gravy either interestingly enough. Ali was about to say they tasted odd, but we're not supposed to call anything odd or wierd, so she changed it to interesting.
- You can walk on the train tracks, I was a little apprehensive following someone as they very casually walked across the tracks-then I realized the electricity was in lines above.
-Viva, the most addictive snack ever. It tastes like chocolate rice chex filled with cocoa.

Dracula a Social Worker?

So last week we had the equivalent of senior seminar. Or as close to the equivalent as you can get in a different country, with just 3 seniors all of whom are from different schools. Ali came along as a guest to this particular one. We were talking with the social workers that work with the agency we work at and they were telling us about the history of social work in Romania because there are absolutely no books in English on this topic. At one point we drifted off topic and one of the seniors asked about Vlad the Impaler-thought to be the legend of Dracula. So the social work staff were telling us about Vlad and how if there had been any crimes he would just shove the criminal through with a large pointed stick. Apparently Ali hadn't been paying very close attention because she looked up at one point and said 'Wait, so he was a social worker?' What a way to get rid of poverty-just shove the people through with a giant stick.

The oldest of my house sisters is a teacher in the German school here. She teaches an English class and asked Ali and I to come in one day to answer some questions the students have about America. So Tuesday morning we went in. These kids know at this point at least 2 languages, and they are working on a third. They asked us if we knew any Romanian. We sort of just stood there thinking in our heads, we can tell you what is in the kitchen, words like cupboard and spoon, but even knowing the words we still butcher the pronunciation. We know some numbers, but obviously not that well since on Saturday when we went to a little village and were shopping, I thought a woman was telling me that something cost 12 lei, when in actuality she was telling me it cost 100 lei. Needless to say, I did not buy that particular product. Last night Ali dragged me to the neighbor's house because she has this dream of milking a cow. We didn't get to milk the cow, but we got to watch the process and then we drank milk right after it came out of the cow. It didn't taste nearly as disgusting as I thought it would.

I resemble that remark

I have been informed that people are comparing my blogging to my brother's. Which ok, it's been a week, but really he can go months without blogging. I really haven't had much to tell. I'm well aware that I'm in another country and that in and of itself is exciting, but I think y'all would get sick of reading in my blog 'I'M IN ROMANIA!' over and over. That being said, there have been a few funny incidents since the last time I've blogged. At lunch at the family center one day, one of the Romanians wanted to know if Rebekah, one of the students, wanted a plum. Rebekah said no thank you, but the woman persisted going so far as to basically climb up Rebekah and shove the plum in her mouth. Not something that happens everyday here and one of the funniest sights I've seen. This past weekend Mama C's-who the first time I met I wanted to call Mrs. C, but I didn't think anyone would get the Happy Days reference- brother in law was visiting. We were at dinner on Saturday night and Ali was asking Mama C, Anita-our sister, and me what animal we would be if we could be any animal. Uncle came in and sat down next to Ali and Ali, assuming he didn't speak English, turned to Anita and asked her to ask him what animal he would be. Anita, laughing, turned to her and said 'ask him yourself.' Yeah, he definitely spoke perfect English. This week a woman from America who is on the advisory board is visiting and today gave a seminar on teaching techniques. Since my secondary practicum experience is going to be in the kindergarten starting in October, I was required to be at this training seminar. Most of it felt like an art class. At one point the advisory board woman was talking about different supplies you can use to help the child recreate something they've seen. She mentioned chicken wire. One of the Romanian woman, who speaks pretty good English, turned to me and said 'chicken wire? there's wire that comes from chicken?'

Oops!

So I almost fell in a giant hole today. Apparently it's OK here to dig up holes all over the place and just leave them open. It's like they are digging up the entire town. There's quite a few of these holes from our house to the building where we have classes. One in particular only has a small piece of ground to walk on next to. This small piece to walk on is made entirely of dirt, and it was raining today. So there is this pile of mud and a hole. Ali went over first and kind of slipped but made it to the other side OK. I went after her, and in the middle I started to slip. Luckily, Ali grabbed my arm and I just slammed into the ground. Causing me to punch a wall, and cover the entire bottom half of my pants in mud. It was pointed out in class too, because it's sort of obvious I didn't throw these pants on this way this morning. But it's OK, it's easier not to be embarrassed here, somehow.
The latest thing on the interesting, yet delicious, menu: rice boiled in milk and sugar, topped off with cocoa powder. Maybe I won't lose weight while I'm here after all.

Random Things

Yesterday Ali and I decided it was time to do our laundry, and we actually figured out how to use the German washing machine. We didn't really master it however, since we have no idea where the soap was supposed to go-there were at least 3 different places we could have put it. So we just sort of threw it in with the laundry, which was only slightly disastrous since it was a front loader, so a little bit of the powder came back at us. We had to leave pretty soon after we had put our laundry in. When we got home that afternoon we saw that someone in the family had hung our clothes up outside. I just laughed off the fact that I practically ran into my long johns-yes it's been that cold already. Not sure Ali saw the same humor in the situation that I did. Then last night, we decided to wait for the family and eat dinner with them. They had bread-shocking I know- and zacusca, which apparently is a big thing here in Romania. It's eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, onions, tomato paste, and a little bit of oil blended together to make a paste that goes on bread, or on potatoes which some people here make an entire meal out of...a giant baked potato. While it looked like something some had regurgitated up-my roommate's words, not mine- it was actually really, really good. Lastly, I would just like to say that I feel like Rocky with the amount of stairs I have to run here everyday-since I've been here I'm constantly running late and I have no idea why, hence the running up the stairs, otherwise I definitely would not be running, or even walking fast.

Field Trip

On Saturday, we went on a little trip to Sibiu (pronounced C B U) which is about an hour and a half drive from Sighisoara. Which meant that I had to get up at the ridiculous hour, for a Saturday, of 7. When we got there, Dorothy just sort of brought us to the main street and told us she would meet us at 12:30 outside of the town hall. I still don't know where the town hall in Sibiu is. We just sort of wandered around for 2 and a half hours, going in stores, but not really buying anything. I discovered that they have notebooks here in which every page smells like chocolate. We specifically went on this trip to Sibiu because there was a German festival. Apparently, Sibiu used to be mostly populated with Germans, who knew? At one point there was a parade, with all of the couples that were in the traditional German garb and we followed. However, there was a point that Dorothy had us following side by side the parade so closely, that we were practically in it. On the drive back, Dorothy had us go into a Romanian grocery store, saying that it was part of the cultural experience. It's interesting that she said that, because the inside of a Romanian grocery store looks exactly the same as the inside of an American grocery store. On a completely different note, today in language class we learned a song and dance in Romanian. The song was either about walnuts or small boys dancing. It wasn't really clear. Apparently, our teacher wants us to put on a small show before we leave. I hope she was kidding, because the vision I have of us performing the song and dance we learned is laughable.

Games

Today in language class a girl, who often wants to know how to say strange things in Romanian, asked Alana, our teacher, how to say squirrel. Alana didn't quite understand what a squirrel was, so this girl and her friend decided to act out a tree and a squirrel to help her understand. Then someone commented that it was like charades, which we had to explain to Alana as well. Her eyes lit up and she decided we should play charades using the words we know in Romanian. Considering our limited vocabulary in Romanian, it was interesting to watch. This is the second time we've played a game in language class. The first time we played UNO to reaffirm our numbers and to learn colors. I think charades will forever stick in my mind though as the most ridiculous sight I've ever seen. A few examples: A girl acting like a cow, but since we don't know the word for cow, she was trying to act out milk. Two girls on the floor spooning, looking for the word spoon. And myself, on my knees and with my arms curled over my head trying to act out the number two.

What's for dinner

So Ali, my roommate, and I would look through the kitchen every night to try and find ourselves something to eat for dinner. We would do this so that our host family wouldn't feel obligated to wait on us all the time. The only thing we would ever be able to find is bread. I can't tell you how sick I am of just plain bread, because on those days I would eat just bread for breakfast and dinner. Two nights ago we decided to wait for the family to get home and just eat with them. The first person to get home was the 10 year old and we waited until 9:30 to eat 3 pieces of chocolate and a bowl of popcorn. S0 last night we scoured the kitchen and found some pasta. We didn't know if they were going to use it for something specific, so we went upstairs to ask if we could use it to make our dinner. Anita, the 20 year old, said yes, but then insisted she make it for us. It was really sweet, but again we didn't want to make her feel as though she had to serve us. Anyway, last night we had pasta with sugar. That's all it was topped with, and it was pretty good.

Almost Lost in a Strange Land

Yesterday I went on a home visit with Imishaye, my practicum person, to visit someone from the disabled group that had been in the hospital recently. It was a long walk and once we got there, of course the entire meeting was in Romanian. So I just sort of sat there, feeling really out of place. Then I walked back to the family center with Imishaye, but from there I had to find my own way home. I didn't exactly know which direction to go, so I just sort of picked one. Thankfully, it was the right direction, though I have no idea how. Then today I had to find my way from The House on the Rock-where my language class is-to the family center. All I know is that the family center is through an alley that is under an arch of a sea foam green building. You'd be surprised at how many sea foam green buildings there are in Sighisoara. And again, I wasn't exactly sure which direction I was supposed to go in. Then I saw a sign with a four leaf clover on it that looked familiar, you don't see many of those around here, so I went that way and miraculously found the family center. I'm so directionally challenged so I'm not surprised I've gotten turned around. Although, it is very good that I've been able to find my way because the only thing I know how to say in Romanian is 'how are you?' and 'what time is it?' I'm pretty sure neither of those phrases would help me if I were to get lost. Interesting things I saw and heard on my way to the main st.-I know my way there. I heard a British woman say she killed someone last night and I saw a very pretty old building with old time shutters with a dragon emblem on them. And above the dragon? The words Fast Food.

So all of last week was orientation, and a lot of it was common sense, but it was still good to know the basic dos and don'ts of Romania. But today I finally was able to observe the group I will be working with for my practicum. It's a group of disabled-some mentally, some physically-Romanians who meet and try to learn about computers, english, and on one day a week, they do crafts. So today while I was there, the leader had me reading an English book to help them learn English. Or, one of the members would read and I would correct them if they were saying a word incorrectly. Then after they had said a sentence they would translate it back to Romanian to make sure they had grasped the meaning of the sentence. At one point, the leader left the group and a woman had just translated it back to Romanian and kept asking 'Da? Da?' So of course I had to do the whole, hands up and shrugging of the shoulders because I don't know if she properly translated it back to Romanian. The only thing I can do is say 'da' when they say something correctly in English, and at one point I understood that she was asking what back meant, so I patted my back with my hand, and she understood that. It was interesting though, all of the members introduced themselves in English.
Interesting little tidbit-in Romania if you buy something in a store and they don't have enough money in cents to give you change, they'll just give you a piece of gum or a small piece of candy, and you can't do anything about it.

Pa-Pa

Eu Sunt Obosita

Pronounced Oo Sue-nt Obo-c-ta. It means I am tired. We haven't really been given a chance to recover from the fact that we are currently 7 hours ahead of the time it is at home. It's been good so far, it has just been exhausting. Last night we moved into our host family's house. The family seems incredibly nice, it's just the mother and 3 girls. A 20 year old, a 16 year old, and a 10 year old. The house is...different. It's really nice, don't get me wrong. It's just when you go in the front door you have 4 bedrooms and a bathroom. Then you go outside to go down the stairs where there is another bedroom-a very nice one, it's the one my roomate and I are in, the kitchen, and a bathroom that apparently is just for my roomate and I. We spent last night just hanging out with the girls, the mother had to work late. It was definitely good to be able to unpack and not be living out of my suitcase anymore. Today we had an 8 am meeting to meet the rest of the Veritas-the program owned by the Romanian Studies Program-staff. At one point we had to do the exercise where you go up to someone you don't know and find out 3 things you have in common with that person, and be able to find out enough about them that you are able to introduce them to the rest of the class. I'm not a fan of this exercise incidently. But the person who picked me was actually the woman who is teaching us Romanian. It was good because she made me do the first part of the conversation in Romanian because she knew I knew the words. So we introduced ourselves, we asked each other how the other person was, and we said where we were from. Thus ends the basics of what I know. Then this afternoon we went on a hike up a mountain, I call it a mountain-the person guiding us called it a hill. While it may not have been a huge mountain, it definitely was not a hill. We didn't have a choice, I don't know why but after lunch we were just told you will be doing this at this time. It was long and it was painful since I wasn't exactly wearing proper shoes for a hike. It was good once we got up there, the view was amazing of the entire city of Sighisoara. And we went to a little playground area, where we played Red Rover, Red Rover, and swung on swings. There was a little restaurant at the top, and some of the girls and I had to use the bathroom, so we went in the door marked toilets and realized-these bathrooms were unisex.

Pa-Pa

Buna Ziua

Pronounced Boona Zewa. Which as I learned in my first language class yesterday means good afternoon. And by the time y'all are reading this, it will be afternoon where I am. So much to say and we only just got here two nights ago. This particular post is likely to be long and all over the place, so bear with me. The plane trip-while way more time than I have ever wanted to be on a plane-wasn't bad. Considering I got a call at 4:30 that my 9:15 plane was delayed and they were worried about me not making my connecting flight but that there was a flight at 6 I could be on if I could make it there in time. Thankfully, we made it there in time. I had a fun time observing the people around me on the flight-I know, I have too much of my mother in me. Apparently, there are magazines on airplanes that are actually catalogues that you can order things from and they bring it right to your seat. I saw a woman order a piece of jewelry-from an AIRPLANE!! I got to London at 5 am their time, which is about 12 am at home. I found out quickly that I would not enjoy the London airport. First of all I had to take a shuttle from the terminal my plane had landed at and the terminal from which my connecting flight would be departing. On a good day, I can maybe figure out how to get somewhere that I've been 20 times, when it comes to new places, however, I am on of the most directionally challenged people you will ever meet. So functioning on no sleep, I watched movies on the plane, I was supposed to figure out where I'm supposed to go? I figured out which shuttle I wanted and rode the seemingly long trip to the next terminal. When I got there I was trying to read the signs for connecting flights, but they were all contradicting themselves, so finally I became a lemming and followed the crowd. It was then that I found out that in the London airport you have to go through security again, which was odd to me. Then I went to the British Airways booth to ask where the heck it was that I was going, and the guy simply said downstairs. I went down the stairs and found myself walking down the longest hallway known to man. I noticed one of those moving sidewalks, and nearly cried for joy, until I realized it was going in the opposite direction I was, fan-flippin-tastic. My connecting flight wasn't until 9:55 am, so I had to sit around for several hours doing absolutely nothing. About 40 minutes before my flight I saw 4 girls looking slightly lost, I realized they were four of the girls going to the Romanian Studies Program, so I joined them. We got to Romania at 3:10, and had a surprisingly easy time getting out. We then had a 5 hour drive to our town. We stopped about halfway through to go to dinner-at McDonald's. But after almost 24 hours of nothing but plane food, I was ready to eat almost anything. The first night was a bit of an adventure. Myself and two other girls were put into an apartment a street away from the head of the Romanian Studies Program-we won't be meeting our host families until later this afternoon. We thought we would be staying with someone, but no, it turns out it was just us and apparently they had entrusted us with keys to the entire building-which they suggested we lock up completely. So we did just that. After having devotions together we were all getting ready to go to bed when we heard this loud banging. We looked at each other and concluded that the knocking couldn't possibly be for us. The banging continued and we realized it was coming from the door at the end of the hallway from the apartment we were staying in. Thinking it was someone from the Romanian Studies Program, we opened the door to the apartment. At the end of the hallway, there was a man and as soon as he saw one of the girl's head pop out he started speaking loudly and very fast-in Romanian, which none of us can understand. Then we heard pebbles being thrown at our window, we went over to investigate and there was a woman outside. What we think happened is that the man lives upstairs and we locked his wife out. However, we didn't feel comfortable going and unlocking the door at the end of the hall and giving him the keys-especially when he started to get a little agitated and started to rattle the door. After trying to communicate with him, using an English to Romanian dictionary, we slowly closed the door. There were two beds in a room with one window and one bed in the other room with two windows-we moved the one bed into the room with the other two beds-it made us feel slightly better. That and the fact that they couldn't possibly get to us-the windows were pretty high up. The next morning, someone came to wake us up and found the doors unlocked. So thankfully, the angry man found someone to solve his problems. Yesterday wasn't nearly as eventful, but it was busy. We had orientation all morning, then language class, then a reading assignment, then dinner followed by devotions together. By the time we were done, we were all ready to fall into bed. Which is pretty much what we did when we got back to the apartment and thankfully nothing exciting happened.

Pa-Pa (pronounced the way it looks)- bye-bye

Leaving on a Jet Plane

Ok, this day was never actually supposed to happen. I heard about the Romania Studies Program in one of my classes and brought the pamphlet home to my mother. She was supposed to say no within the first two minutes, stating valid reasons on why it wasn't possible. She was not supposed to flip through the pamphlet and say 'ok'. WHAT?!? And now the day has come where in a little over 7 hours I'll be getting on a plane and flying to Romania. My bags are all packed, although I have that pesky feeling that I'm forgetting something. I have my ticket and passport ready. So material wise, I'm prepared-emotionally, well that's a different story altogether. I'm incredibly anxious, but I have faith that this is going to be an experience of a lifetime and that I'll come home with pictures, stories, and the desire to never, ever leave again.

Blog Launch

From September 3rd through December 14th, I will be living in Sighisoara, Romania for my final semester of college. I will be doing my practicum in social work during the day and living with a Romanian family, in which perhaps only one person speaks english. It is, hopefully, going to be an awesome experience. Which is why I decided to start a blog, so that friends and family can share in this experience with me. More posts will be coming in 3 weeks, after I have arrived. After which, hopefully posts will come more often than that.