This is extremely frustrating: working with the new tools in blogspot.

However, it must be done. ______________________________________________I am adding this entry, with great pains (I had to delete and reconfigure earlier entries to have enough space to alter my closed blog) to compile environmental work I was involved with while in Romania.

I had to learn how to compost due to necessity, and after I saw results, I promoted it throughout my community: mayor's office, schools, neighborhood, and even to family and friends in the USA. My grandparents and mother still compost to this day. I learned that things like: paper, bread, fruit peels, and even hair can be great compost. We built compost structures at every school in the community and educated students on their usage.

I met people who worked with waste management in Austria. Austria is really ahead on how to manage waste in a sustainable manner. It was a great exchange. They came to consult Romanian communities because both countries have to follow strict EU regulations.

I was introduced to a plastic company, that said that if people in our community would collect and consolidate our trash, they could turn the waste into recycled plastic bags. It was a step in the right direction. I took samples back to my community and presented them to the mayor with several small project proposals.

When I realized that while people smiled and encouraged my grand ideas (they really weren't that grand or unattainable, they were very grassroot) they weren't keen to actually participate or to help me instigate them.

I found enthusiasm and hope working with the children and sometimes (sometimes) the teachers in the community. I initiated several projects working with children such as small camps during the summer involving environmental stewardship mixed with: first aid training, leadership, technology, and water sanitation. All of these projects were funded with fundraising, local sponsors, or community donations. Peace Corps says that the strongest deters/emotion volunteers face after their service is the feeling that they didn't make a change in their community. That their 2 years of drive to help others have a better life was a waste. I know I made changes in my community. I know I tried my hardest to advocate and teach others on maintaining a clean community for children to live and play in. Like all the returned Peace Corps volunteers, I wonder if I could have tried harder. I don't have the resources to measure the changes before and after I was there, but what I can measure is how much I've changed and how much I've learned from my work in Romania. Those 2 years weren't a waste, it was a giant lesson on appreciation and acknowledgment.Romanian stray doggy recyclingRomanian chicken (probably dinner) standing in underdeveloped sewage system

There's a site: http://bcmastacani.blogspot.com/

and I LOVE IT!! and Mihaela submitted this slideshow she made and won a small scholarship! Hurray for her! I love how she is continuing to develop the community =)

I am back in San Jose, on USA soil. Whew. It was a long journey and tiring. After I woke this morning, I continued reading my travel book and it's a fictional novel about characters who live in English court and it's from the viewpoint of one particular character who discovers that she doesn't like the pretense and intensity of courtly life but she prefers the harder but simple and rewarding life that of a farmer. While reading that, I thought about my last 2 years in Mastacani. - While I would never want to say I was living like a peasant/farmer life there was poorer than my life in the techcenter of the world in CA, in the USA, but it's true that once upon a time, I'm sure the ancestors of the people living in Mastacani were peasants to the Romanian royal family.- I also found it more real and rewarding. Now though.....it feels like I was living in a storybook. The cold and hot, the change and hardship and beauty is something that is harder to fathom when surrounded by this industrialized cookie cutter world of the US.

I'll miss my vegetable garden. I tried making a deeper ditch to hold the water, like how I saw Croatians do when I was traveling with my family in August 2009. Sadly, they weren't grown enough to be harvested before I had to departure.

I had to separate Kiki from Nemo. They're both about one year old now (so about 7 human years [Each year x 7 = human years]) and just starting to be more in love than just kitten fighting. I'm a bit sad over this, but I had to take my kitty with me. They both grew up together romping in the countryside, chasing birds and taunting dogs and running up trees and have always been together since childhood. Again, I couldn't leave her behind though and I do think she'll be happier being a city cat and be happy to be with me. Otherwise, I'd have left her with Nemo and in the country.

Goodbye to co-workers at the mayor's office. I had lots of fun being there. It was like hanging out in a cafeteria or detention hall than a workplace often times. Which is all part of why that world seems so easily fictional now. There were good and enthusiastic kids out there. To me, they seemed in general so self assured and self aware. I hope they all find happiness and stay healthy. I envy their childhood environment. Mine was very restrictive due to the nature of where I lived. I was never allowed outside to play with the other children and my surroundings was nowhere near as rich. While partially, it was my parents' decision, I acknowledge the dangers of my neighborhood too.

Beautiful forest areas, animals, frogs, small streams and big meadows. Full seasons of snowy winters, leafy falls with warm wines and apples and pumpkin pie deserts, spring full of flowers (which children were forever giving to their teachers). *sigh*.... Maybe not moneytary, but they are rich in other ways.

And the freedom to do what I wanted almost whenever I wanted. I was just lucky that what I wanted to do was also what Peace Corps also wanted me to do. I wanted to invite Jeanelle to my village to see the place and play with the kids, and it happened. Kids brought Easter left overs to share: Eggs, cake, soda, and etc... and we had a great time. I'll miss the support from teachers too. Usually, they were 100% behind me when I wanted to do something with their kids. I often didn't feel comfortable imposing, but I wish I had utilized that authority more often. There's more I miss of course, but it's best not to dwell. It was a great experience, a memorable one. For a girl who spent her childhood engrossed in her books, to get away from the mundaneness of suburban life, it was an adventure.

The cat's in the cage, and the destination's been reached. It's time to start living this life, and put the book away. Maybe in the future, I sincerely hope so, I'll be able to visit that world again......As of now, I am a bit confused. Which world do I like better? Does it matter? In actuality, if I could choose, which one would I choose? ?

Every day Vasile would ask me this, all last year.

I would reply: Face bine (He's doing well), E obosit (He's tired), Are nerv (he's angry), danseze (He's dancing), etc...

During the campaign, before, after, night and day, he'd always ask about how Mr. Obama was doing.

SO, while I was visiting the PC office, I saw this "almost bobble-head" Obama on a shelf, and I exclaimed! It would be hilarious if I gave this to Vasile. Obama doesn't know it! But Vasile is his biggest fan.

Vasile btw, is the Mayor's secretary's husband. He's duty is to be a chauffeur to the mayor. And he raises rabbits. Big white and brown ones. Bunnies sell for $5 for a baby and $20 for a big bunny at the market now.

Anyway, I presented Vasile with Obama, I made introductions, and I took their picture together.

Now I get to ask Vasile "Ce face Obama?" every day now.

His responses go like "Are manele sus, asa" (He's dancing with his arms raised like this), "Face plaja in masina si e alb" (He's tanning himself in the car and loosing his tan), and now Obama is Spring cleaning at his house this weekend.

The people love him here, and it's not cause I'm talking about him all the time. They tell ME what's going on with him.

So Tina, my neighbor told me immediately when I got arrived home to my apartment yesterday, that a lady of age 42, got a sponsor. She said "o fata a fost sponsorizat." Which...means, a girl was ..I thought "sponsored."

Romanian is a latin language, if I don't know something, I can usually get clues from the roots. Economy = economie, crisis = crisa, foundation = fondatie, etc...

So, after a 10 minute conversation of me asking who sponsored that lady and for what? A marathon? college?....and Tina telling me that she didnt' know why that woman was sponsored. I finally just nodded and gave the *that's cool* shrug.

____________ the next day after work____________

Someone drops me off at the main road and I see my neighbor standing with 4 other momish looking ladies at the entrance to the cemetery. I asked them "what are you doing?" and they answered "we're watching" and I asked "what are you watching?" and they answered "other people watching a burial, " and I go "oh, another person died? or is this the same body I saw 5 minutes ago?"

Turns out that they were watching the sponsored lady of 42 years old get buried.

Clockwheels turned in my head and I understood that "sponsorizat = suicide" at least that's what my neighbor meant (I tried to google translate suicide and it does not = sponsorizat!).

So ...the lady committed suicide..and I asked why, and they told me it's because she's a concubine.......

Which I understood to mean she's an adulteress, or a slut, or a prostitute...and at the time I didn't want to assume the air that I was judging her (she was dead and needed respect, not judgment).

The ladies see my all too familiar face of confusion and tell me that her boyfriend of many years (she's not married to him, so she's a concubine?..odd choice of words) would beat her all the time, so she hung herself 2 days ago. She had no kids.

Which made me recall my meeting last week of a brother-in-law who was caring for the 3 children of his sister-in-law who's husband also drinks a lot and was taking a liking to electricuting his wife (while drunk) with smashed but plugged in light bulbs, on the head.

It's a touchy subject here, a very sensitive one, but it's scary and I would never ever ever stand for any kind of domestic violence. I actually have had guys here, young guys my age tell me that they of course would beat their spouse or girl friends to have them behave!!!

That's a dealbreaker! Not all guys are like this! here! lots of them don't hit any women or children! Granted, the domestic violence in my village (that I've recently been aware of) have all been under the influence of alcohol. eh.

So....my day: got a shipment of wood because it's started snowing (again) and the truck got stuck in a pit of mud in my yard, so we spent 30 mins shoving the car out of the mud and using my new wood blocks to prop the wheels, then I went to teach Chinese for 2 hours at a school (only 5 kids showed up..oh well) with my clothes splattered with mud, then I went to the mayor's office to find out that I got stood up...and my person didn't think to call me and save me the journey thorough the snow, and then I got dropped off and met the ladies...then went home to start my fire, and clean clean clean cause there's mud EVERYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYWHERE!

I saw 2 funerals today, one in front of my work and one next to my house (I live..300 meters from a cemetery). It reminded me of when our co-worker Vicktor died. He had a stomach ache at age 60, and he thought he'd fix it by drinking a shot of very strong Romanian whiskey (tuica) and then he vomited blood and didn't make it to the hospital and he died. I saw him Thursday at work, and he died on Saturday, and we had his funeral on Monday.

I kissed his cold dead hand and forehead, cause all my other co-workers were doing it too. He was a co-worker, but we weren't that close, but it's sad he died while I was there. Here I got to participate and observe a full on Romanian funeral. His co-workers were his family, so ergo, I was a part of his family during his funeral. Not a lot of pictures were taken by me because I felt uncomfortable doing so. Just a few in his memory:

There's never really a boring day in Mastacani. My story went on a tangent...but it's because there's so much to share still, that I want to share, but that I haven't shared yet.

I'm sorry.

I will try to get ALLLLLLL my pictures and stories up before I get back to America.

I will be leaving Romania for good at the end of April/beginning of May.

There's so much to post, and still more to do.

-Cynthia

Tuesday morning I awoke to snow. It was snowing; soft bits of dust.

All over...

That morning, was the beginning of a long but festive day.

The day before, I went and saw a class give a Christmas presentation to their parents. They dressed in the appropriate Christmas apparel and presented about the history of Christmas in Romania and sang carols.

Then I went to another school and saw more caroling, and dancing goats dancing to the beat of a drum...and they were tall and were made of trash bags...or they can be made of hay.

The next day! That LAST DAY OF SCHOOL! (okay, not my last day, but the kids')

I saw little kindergartners sing and dance!! So cute! and they had to say a poem too but some can't speak well yet, so it was way cute. P.S. That little girl is a goat, and she was a sad sad little goat who wanted out of the costume. Awww. I give her credit for keeping it on (a brave face) until the very end.

Then scary Santa was bashing on the window from outside and came in to give all the kiddies their gift from Santa. In Romania, there's Saint Nicolas who comes and leaves a gift in your boot on the 6th of December, and then there's Santa Clause who comes and leaves a gift under the Christmas tree on the night of the 24th. Ergo, you need a Christmas tree. In general, people here have sobas/ceramic stoves or a heating unit in apartments (no chimneys).

Those were the small kindergartners ages: 3-4.

THEN: I went to Mastacani and I watched 8th graders read an epic poem about Christmas, and I took lots of pictures. More like I gave "trained" students my camera so I could be in the pictures =)

Muahahahah

Then we were playing in the snow =)

I don't even know if the kids had class...maybe it was recess, maybe not, but oh well, I'm not their teacher.

See! Not the photographer! I'm being photographed!

When it got too cold: Run to the Soba! Warmth warmth!

Pictures pictures with all. What would we do without my digital camera?

,

Kapow! In the head! But I still love the kids.

To top it all off:

The teacher's van slid backwards when at the intersection to the highway.

Instead of lending then a hand, I decided to take pictures. Watching teachers and school principles push a van is funny. I'm terrible.

Let the good times begin! -11C tonight! But there's snow!! Hurray!

Why I left:

They were swine flu paranoid. Just kidding...but the people and government are addressing the issue a lot more seriously than those in the US. Alcohol swabs are applied to every door handle and they have even provided the kids with face masks.

Just kidding. Like the rest of America, I'm indifferent, nonchalant, about this virus. While an epidemic is a cause for worry, the fatality is low.

I left for a wedding.

On my journey home, I saw surprising sites. (Note to self: I am not bringing my cat through Amsterdam)

The flight was nice, where we all got our own "Amusement" screen with TV shows, movies, music, games, news, etc..

The only international flight I've been without this: United Airlines >_

My hens are starting to lay eggs!!! It was a false positive last time (it was my neighbor's chicken laying eggs in my coop). I found 2 eggs rolled onto the ground, and then...I put them outside on the ground while I cleaned...and the 2 hens and rooster cracked the eggs and ate them....

They are all about reusing resources (they eat their own poop and their own kind too) o_O

And the weather has changed from Fall (taken in late-October)

To now Winter. This was the surprise I got when I looked out my kitchen window today.

Yes. I do believe it is a pig carcass in a tree. In my backyard.

Amazingly, a friend was able to drive me all the way to the airport by car =D. Meaning, I was able to leave Friday at 1am, versus Thursday at 1pm (via public transportation during daylight hours).

It was a foggy night, where I noticed Romania has no reflectors on their streets = it was hard to see the roads. I also noted that white lines are great and yellow lines serve no purpose for guiding cars at night, but having any street markings is better than none.

I got onto the plane on time and I took KLM back.

The first trip was Bucharest to Amsterdam, then Amsterdam to San Francisco. The 2nd trip was cool! because we went OVER the planet.

I saw a lot of ice.

And a red sunset.

____________________________________________

Now the journey back to my site in Romania...

After Thanksgiving dinner at the U.S. Ambassador's house, Jeanelle and I missed our train, so we wandered around in Bucharest with all my luggage trying to find this hostel (but we later realized the google map was wrong) and after 1.5 hours of walking, we found a taxi and he drove us to the place and it cost us like $1.5 (sheeze, we should have tried that sooner). The hostel was completely full of other PCVs, so the dude let us sleep on the couch in the common area, and we didn't have to pay for lodging. Oh! The taxi driver didn't let us pay that $1.5 either! = What a thankful day!

It was warm and safe and free. I couldn't has asked for more.

On the brigher side of wandering in the dark in Bucuresti lost and with almost no cell phone credits: Jeanelle and I got lots of exercise, I wasn't traveling alone because I had Jeanelle, and we saw lots of new and cool Romanian monuments. There was this large erection with a next speared through it.

This is a picture of him last week. He was the biggest fattest greediest and most needy chicken in the yard. He followed me around. He came when I he heard me come out my door. He came running when I would call for the chickens in the morning for breakfast.

He loved the sound of running water and loved to drink the water out from the hose while I was washing things or filling water trays. When it would rain, he would be standing in the puddles because he loved wet feet. I was forever refilling water trays this summer because Verde loved to stand in the trays and would knock all the water out. He had a lot of personality.

Yesterday morning I noticed that he was still in bed after all the other chickens had left. I swatted him out with a broom, but I was concerned. I gave him more food and I let him be.

I saw him later that day sitting under a tree, and he didn't really move from that spot.

I put food in front of him...he's normally a mean pig about food. So last night, I made him a nest and I hoped he would make it to the morning.

He made it. But he didn't make it past noon.

Everyone told me to kill him and make soup. A sick chicken is edible, but a dead one is bad.

I couldn't do it.

Let us watch Verde's (V-air-days) baby videos in his memory.

One is Green and the other one is Blue..but I forget which is which.

My neighbor's cat Nemo felt my pain and helped me dig the hole. Kiki supervised...as usual.

Good bye Verde. Life in the garden isn't the same with you gone. =(

So here the trip really begins:

One of these pictures is taken before our first stop, and the other is after. Katie and I traveled day and night! Lowest class and not the lowest class! Compartments and wagons! With others and alone!

I'm sure her expressions here don't represent the quality of the trip, probably just the quality of the mode of transportation.

But let me start from where we left off....

Katie wasn't feeling well, and I had bought her every bacon related snack I could find in Romania.

Which we started to test out on our train ride to our first castle. She claimed her throat could handle bacon chips.

It was a beautiful trip through a region I had not been before: East to West through the middle of Romania. Those are the Carpathian mountains under the clouds.

Old watch towers, hotels in this Transylvanian area (yup! West Romania is Transylvania, I live in the Moldavian side of Romania and I have an Moldavian accent too).

Katie saw the coolest thing and got a picture. A cross built high on the mountain top! It looked so ......I can't find the word. Awesome is a poor description.

We were lucky to have such great weather. Pretty.

We arrived in Sebes (where a fellow PCV lives) and were planning to visit a castle in Hunedoare the following day.

Julie was sweet and showed us around her small town. Transylvania; it's a place of its own.

We ate at a nice restaurant where Katie enjoyed her 2nd? 3rd? Vegetable chiorba (Romanian veggy soup that's sour).

We then took a walk around and saw some amusing sites.

The next day we left Sebes and took a train to Deva, and then a short bus ride to Hunedoara.

There was something cool on top that hill in Deva, but we didn't have time to check it out.

We had only that day to get to the castle and continue on our journey. So the search for this castle begins. I only knew about it from online and it's not a top tourist side so it was a bit hard to find.

Here was the only sign we saw at a T-intersection.

So we took a left.

This building wasn't it. Impressive, but mayor's office.

Also grand and tall with several towers, but this is a chuch.

THEN! We see a castle-like building, that's pink and says Castle! but then we saw the title "restaurant" too.

Then! after more walking and no sign of any more "signs"..we saw this thing:

And then we're like..."hey, let's just keep walking still and maybe this tower isn't an active nuclear plant."

And then we found this!! on the left and...

Before us we see TADA!

OoOooOO

Here's the walls of the castle and paths in case we wanted to walk around it.

Nope, we want to cross the bridge and enter through the front gate.

In we go!! (this wasn't the real front entrance, it was a door from the wall into the courtyard)

Here is the main hall. Kings and royals probably entertained here. It was big and there's a long table there. We saw banners and took some pictures, but there wasn't a lot of printed information around.

We went exploring whereever we could go. See the very very bottom? We tried going down there too but go stopped.

Outside view was nice too. Here's a real authentic castle courtyard. As Katie said "this is a real castle because castles are really fortresses for village folk to run into when armies attack." I can imagine a crowd of people down there, waiting for the battle to be over.

He's a path but behind the castle. The villagers can then Run into the forests over yonder, to safety.

We were up, and thoroughly checked the bottom level too.

To the deep dark places.

Guess what room we're in.

Then Katie and I deducted that it must be the bottom floor defense fighting room, not a prison. The spikes from that cage overhang probably allowed the person inside to shoot attackers below without getting slashed.

There was some information written about knights.

Pretty cool stuff! Real stuff!

It wasn't extensive...and Katie and I tried so hard but we couldn't find our way into the other rooms: bedchambers, servants' quarters, stables, etc... =( boo to that.

BUT, it was a real Castle. Not like a museum, but a defensive building for the villagers below.

With its own ar...OH! I forgot to mention that Vlad (the real prince dracula) was held prisoner here for 7 years so he couldn't become king. That's his only connection to this castle.

Towers. =( Which we couldn't find the entrance to.

This was interesting.

That last picture was the well, not part of the animal pit. In the following picture, I am standing IN the wall of the castle.

Here I am shoting a pretend incoming army, and Katie is turning her back to them.

The army left, and Katie managed to live.

OK. CRAZY CIRCUMSTANCE. So Katie and I saw all the tech people setting up and we were thinking: wedding? Goth concert? movie set? wtf?

Turns out (I forget who gathered the gutts to ask) that Microsoft was going to rent the whole castle for a conference that following weekend. Fog makers and all.

I tried looking online but I was never able to find the article on that. I believe it was ~June 3-6th.

Those secret treasures tucked away. I think this was an amazing castle castle. Untarnished by tourism..but I wish we could have seen more of the unopened rooms. The entrance fee wasn't bath either and there were maybe only 4 souvenir shops (which isn't a lot for a castle!).

So: We woke, left Sebes->Deva->Hunedoara (so about 9-4pm). Then we had to make our way back to Sebes to catch the train for our next destination: Budapest, Hungary. But first, we needed a bite to eat.

It was a 12 lei meal = ~$4. Not bad eh? Oh, Katie's was an 8 lei chiorba (so like ~2.75).

Lol to our wait for the train that night.

We got to Sebes at 8pm, then caught the 9pm train from Sebes ->Alba Iulia...and from there ect.. to Budapest, but my point is we were in this small station to about 1am just sitting there inside this one building in the middle of nowhere. This was a personnel train (I tried to shield Katie from these, but this one was inevitable). It was a short and memorable ride. I told her not to use the bathroom even if she was going to pop, and we stayed away from the door that wouldn't' close.

We were very glad! to be on our second train where we had couchettes (beds!). Then we slept the night away to arrive in Budapest at about 9am. Night.

We traveled by train and went through 4 countries on this trip, and saw many castles and ate many ice creams =D

We bought train passes that allowed us to travel whenever we wanted as long as we started from Galati in Romania, and we ended up in Bremen in Germany. We had 30 days to make use that route. It was a pretty sweet ticket.

So our path took us from: Bucuresti, Romania->Galati, Ro->Mastacani (my site), Ro->Sebes, Ro->Deva and Hunedoara Castle, Ro->Budapest, Hungary->Vienna, Austria->Salzburg->Austria->Bremen, Germany->Hanover, Germany->Oradea, Romania->Bucuresti, Romania

Again, all by train and sometimes we slept on the trains too. Sometimes we paid for the full bed, sometimes we had the reclining chairs you get in airplanes, and once we just slept all night on the train benches to save 80 Euros.

Here is me picking up Katie from the airport. I was right on time to pick her up. She's napping on the big box of goooodies she brought me =D

It contained 5lbs of Bull's Eye bbq sauce, 2 bottles of sparkling apple cider, a whole bunch of marshmellows and other fun surprises! I'm happy that nothing broke.

So I first dragged Katie to an environmental international conference in Galati. I'd been looking forward to this event all Winter and Spring and we'd planned it so Katie and I could both attend.

We stayed at a hotel, and here's Katie's Romanian breakfast. Yum yum, hot chocolate from a machine.

See! Here's the conference. I understood more than 1/2 this time! It was being translated from German to Romania and there was English sometimes. I tried my very best to translate for Katie. We had headsets and listened in on the translator.

The conference took place mostly at the Gradina Botanica Muzeu (the Botanical Garden Museum, which is also the city aquarium too). I like it there, and it has a beautiful view from the terrace. We also had our catered lunch there too. It was a very different atmosphere from my daily setting in the village.

We did our share of mingling with people from all backgrounds in Romania, and with some people from other countries too (this was an international conference).

Oh! About alternative wastewater treatment (examples from Austria) and solid waste management (because Romania is being forced to comply under deadline, and needs ideas of how to tackle this large problem).

During a coffee break, Katie and I paid a visit to the aquarium (we couldn't help it because we're science nerds at heart). They have few, but really well cared for displays.

pretty.

Yes. Our catfishes here are very large.

After that, we took a walk to the gardens. Then aliens landed and tried to befriend us.

OR, it's a coco cola promotion for girls to wear eye helments and give us free cans of sodas and eye patches.

Beleive what you want to.

Katie didn't like what they served her (it had delicious sauteed mushrooms), so we switched.

We were both VERY happy with desert. We also got wine, so I traded the dude across from me for his desert with my wine =D mauahahahaha

Here is the car that Stelian (one of the organizing staff members) was driving. I thought it was a funny car to be officially driving around.

ANYWAY, then I took Katie to my village to see my pets. Here are the chicks when they were sooo soo small. Tiny. Here's a horse cart.

Unfortunately, Katie caught...the flu? or more likely Strep throat when she got here. She got to my site and the symptoms started to hit her. It was better that she got sick at my place than while on the road. She was very sick while at my home and I mostly just let her sleep. Unfortunately, she didnt' get all better immediately, but we decided that we wanted to get on the road anyway. She's a trooper.

And look at ALLL the bacon themed foods I found her in Romania. The bacon chips lied. They tasted nothing like bacon and they lasted very much like Chinese Shrimp Chips (which also taste nothing like shrimp).

AND THE READ TRIP BEGINS......more to come

My attempt to organize football games between schools.

Kids came to me, and made a beautiful poster...I took a picture, but I can't find it. Announcing the time and place where we would play American football.

I inherited a bag of flag belts from another volunteer and we put them to good use.

One school has played football with me like 5 times, so they won. 19 pts to 0 pts. The kids understood the rules had fun.

I'm not a football player, so I tried my best to get the rules straight.

9am on a cold Saturday morning. That's how devoted we were.

That kid in the checkered jacket took my bike (I had told him to go away several times because he was being a dickhead/ass while we were trying to play) and f*ed with it until he twisted the tire and messed it up so that I had to walk the bike home. I'm sorry if I'm still bitter, but...

Kitten picture to sooth my anger.

Here was the Sunday (the next day). It was an European football game between the same schools and more students came. One school's color was red and the other yellow.

I made them score cards. They're waving around 5's but no one scored 5 points.

I gave up trying to limit the number of kids that could play. I had talked to: the mayor, the vice-mayor, the chief of police and 3 other cops about having some other adult supervision during that game.....

Most of the kids were good kids that just wanted to have fun.

Some kids helped me out by volunteering to be referees.

Some kids didn't want to get their leather jackets dirty while playing...

We agreed on 20min halves, with a 5 min break in between. I brought 6 bottles of water for the kids from my house, and I bought them a box of cookies.

During our 5 min break, some of the obnoxious boys ran off with the ball I had purchased because no one had brought one. That ended the game. I went with some kids to tell the cops (whom were standing at the other side of the market).

This was the final score. The bad kids all go to the school that had earned 3 points. Kids are kids. I'm sure I'm much more upset at the authorities than the children here, but I think I gave it my best. There's not much more I could have done.

I would like to try this again, but I can't without more community support. I feel bad for the kids that were having fun. It was fun while it lasted.

This took place 2 weeks ago.

PROLOGUE:

I went ....I was at Nancy's place (come to remember) to talk to a couple of her English classes about how it is to be a "young" American and to talk about fashion and food and films, etc...

It was fun. Anyway, on my last night there I got a confirmation from Melissa that Habitat for Humanity Was organizing a volunteer program for foreigners (non-Romanians), and I was to be part of the pilot group.

So I told Nancy and Dan, and saw their enthusiasm and envy, and asked Melissa if there was more space, and Nancy concluded that bringing me to her village equaled a week's worth of work, so she decided to not teach the following week and come with me instead.

We then told Dan that if Nancy wasn't going to work, and if I wasn't going to work, then Dan really didn't have a reason to go to work too. He said his colleagues hate him anyway, and there was someone on call to sub for him, so after too little reassuring, he decided he wanted to come too.

WE HAD A BLAST!! ONE OF MY FAV. VOLUNTEERING EXPEDITIONS EVER!

We stayed at a "sports hall" so a gym, and unfurnished gym besides lockers. We slept on relatively inflated mattresses and we had a boys' side and girls' side too. We were 6 PCVs. Oh, and we paid our own way there = true altruistic volunteers (you never know).

These were the houses we worked on building. We were working on 3 townhouses. (Where's Waldo? the pork)

We were going to work with lots of fiber glass...but first. So we were to be "foreign" volunteers from another country, to come assist this Habitat branch with building houses with families that applied. The families were also there building the house (a requirement as part of the program). Besides the coordinators, the people spoke no English, but it didn't hinder our work.

We had to go through a quick training program so we didn't hurt ourselves and each other with Mihai (in the blue). He was a quick man but a strong and organized leader.

So, the boys really wanted to wear the jumpsuits...so we let them. I wore the clothes on my back, goggles and a face mask. Ouch! to the fiberglass after our work was done for that day. And DOUBLE ouch! when I had to put the same clothes back on for another day of working! and then the 3rd day too! (I didn't bring that many change of clothes, and where do we wash them?, oh well).

We were well fed. Melissa organized us breakfast and we had fresh milk from the cow kept out back.

We were hard at work, discovering where out talents lied. I failed at stapling to the high ceiling (I am short), but I excelled at cutting dry wall (thanks Mom! for having us practice all our own home remodeling!).

We met another volunteer from South America who is currently studying in Romania (why? I don't know, but okay) and we're facebook friends now.

We worked pretty hard, with few breaks, but Melissa was always making sure we took our brakes: drank some water, ate some snacks =D We agree that Melissa is the larger, older, whiter version of me, because if I were her I'd be doing the same thing; amongst other reasons, but I had a worry-free time having her watch over us.

We got along great with the future house owners. There was a bit of awkwardness at first at figuring how we would all be working together, but we all had the same goal so it became fun.

And what's a Cynthia's Blog without the mentioning of what we ate?!?

On our first night, Melissa hosted us and we had a cooking party! Italian-American =pasta, garlic bread, salad, and ice cream!

During our stay there, Melissa claims the families were actually ...demanding?/were insistent that each of them would be given the opportunity to host us.

We had lunch in the empty houses, and the families brought in food from relatives.

We were invited to people's relatives or current residence to be served dinners. I ate sooooooooooo many stalks of onions and garlic. Apparently that's a different tradition that my region. You can see the stalks of onions in this picture. They dip it in salt, or in soup: sip of soup, bite of onion, sip of soup, and repeat.

I had caffeine to help me blog AMAP today! I am writing at last!!

Here we are at dinner!

While we were at this home, they mentioned they had a cow, and someone? maybe me? It could have been me..because I would ask something like this, but I don't remember cause it's been 6 months. Anyway, that we'd never milked a cow, so we all went back there and tried to milk the poor dear. I did better than some, but this was still my first time and I didn't get much out of Steaua (Star - the cow).

There was some GREAT foods!

Someone even served giant tubs of ice cream! I'd never eaten ice cream served after dinner in tableware before that night. Someone also made something like BBQ sauce on chicken, but it was made with tomato sauce and red peppers? Crazy.

See how much I enjoyed the food? We enjoyed the food?

On the last afternoon, we had a large BBQ where there was lots of meat served and beer, and someone kept stealing my pear juice and replacing it with a draft of beer, but in a joking manner because we'd bonded that much and it was okay.

We got diplomas for our hard work (my first and only diploma in Romania), and we took some fun group pictures.

Oh, and the kids there liked me. Like I mentioned, we slept at the sport's hall, and that means we were sleeping in the middle of school grounds. Yes, they were curious kids and I gave them my yahoo messenger ID. Can you find me among them? 5 points to you if you can do it within 10 seconds.

So that was that.

My type of Volunteering: to do something good for others, being well taken care of and loved while working, and having a unforgettable experience with old and new friends =D

I dedicate this blog to Dan and Nancy. I'm glad I convinced you to play hookie (in a responsible manner) and I'm sure you guys thank me too. We were so hard core.

Oh, and special thanks to the families that let us use their showers to clean ourselves, which was nice because we didn't have an alternative way to stay ungross (sweaty, itchy, powdery, yucky) otherwise.

I don't know why, but things are changing every day...probably it's me and when I'm bored, I can afford (as a volunteer, who volunteers her time and energy and thus can revoke it) to change my occupation when I do get irked by something.

I will catch up from this SUMMER!

But this week:

I didn't go to work yesterday because a coworker (60years old) died unexpectedly...from my understanding: a stomach ache soothed with really strong Romanian alcohol = vomiting of blood and death. Maybe a ulcer?

He worked with the mayor's office for 40 years of his life, and we were all there at the whole ceremony from his doorstep to the burial. I felt it was inappropriate to take pictures (at any death), but I didn't feel bad about taking the sign they have on their home for the 3 days while the body is resting there. Since I was his co-worker, I got to go in the procession and wear a black ribbon and everything.

We have many cemeteries here, and his was atop the highest hilltop in the village (I'd never been there before, and it's a beautiful and serene view).

And today I didn't go to work because people are here rebuilding my soba. yaya...

See! No wonder black smoke was fuming from it and my CO alarm kept going off!

Here's the working soba that I've been lighting on and off for the last week. Tis colder now. I kinda took 1/2 days of work on Thursday and Friday because men where here chopping up my wood. They were sent by the mayor to help me and I APPRECIATE! True, it was my only exercise last year, but I couldn't refuse the offer.

I made the men hot teas and omlette lunches too = I was a nice host.

More stories to come! It's too cold to plant stuff anymore!

Habitat for Humanity trip - to Bachet (small town south in Romania near Craiova) with other Peace Corps volunteers for about 1 week of hard but fun fun labor.

Danube River Appreciation day - so I was invited to take about 5 kids from my village to the Nature and Aquatic Museum in the city for some games and free tickets to see the whole museum and aquarium.

Sharing Culture in another town at 2 schools with Nancy - I went to her site and talked to a couple of her English classes about my life.

Then Katie from the US came! and we went to explore some cool places - Hunedoara Castle (aka Corvinesti castle, or Corvinlui Castle), Vienna-Austria, Salzburg-Austria, my site and a International Environment workshop in Galati, Budapest-Hungary, Bremen-Germany, Hannover-Germany, Bucharest airport-Romania

Summer Camp 2009 - kids representing all 4 schools in my community, the red cross came for the first time to teach first-aid to about 40 kids, the ex-ex mayor talked about how to be a good leader in the community, and I was so proud of this camp and my co-coordinator Miss Mariana Onu! I couldn't have done this without her and she pushed me to get this project moving! It was hard going...for real

Then my Family! My mommy, and Sissy, and brotherlysy came to Romania to visit me!! AND we were together for 3.5 weeks!! for 24 hrs/day (almost) and that in itself was an adventure. This trip was probably the most adventurous trip of my whole summer = there are lots of stories to tell, so many stories. And it being my family...soo many pictures too.

captions: Sister bradishing success at reaching the park in Croatia. Brother walking alone on the dried lake in my swampy village. Family picture in front of a waterfall.

After my family left me/I got rid of my family, I was invited to attend a "conference" at Costanta on the Black Sea - here I danced, and ate well, and played beach volleyball and my team lost, but I had lots of fun. Tune in to find out the purpose for why I was there (this picture is a clue).

Then I came home to site for a bit and some village kids wanted to take me out to the canal for a picnic - *giant giant grin* It was fun and I was proud of them for preparing all they did! The oldest kid was maybe 12!

Amazing Race! Roxana's idea, and it was a lot of work that took all Summer to prepare. It started as an idea, then an art project, then fundraiser in the village market, and in the big city of Galati.

Amazing Race did happen! Hurray! It was 4 instead of 5 days, and it's cause Roxy and I have work and traveling and etc.. and I give us credit for pushing and actually doing it and having it turn out decently well. The kids loved it a lot.

Then came CHARM! AND SCOTT!! and we went to Cinque Terre (where the retired people hang out, and all the British girls, and honeymoon couples) and to Venice and a thunderstorm followed us all the way from Romania.

and now I'm home. Taking care of my cat and birds, and cleaning and I have this list of stuff to do, but I'm pumped to work again! yay! my vacation...er...summer fun that had relaxing moments but was busy also. I'm tanner and skinnier and a vegetarian now

Vacationing is done! Now i can blog! and maybe work too, but also blog, and boy do I have lots of pictures to share! and STORIES, and general facts to share too.

=D

Also, the new addition to my family: KiKi (named by Yulla) and a brand of Croatian candy.

She's the right one, then the left one. The boy is a pretty boy, and I have a "poofy" girl.

So this isn't him. It's a her. It's a her that just showed up one week before Bijoux died. Highly suspicious, but this girl is pretty dumb, too dumb for espionage.

Her name is Fiona.

She tries to be cute by smelling flowers and rubbing herself on everything.

She's tiny though, and has a short and stumpy tail.

She's not Bijoux.

He had a long and cute tail...that til even after 1 year, he was still chasing, but wasn't ever able to catch it.

How did it happen? Car accident, and him frolicking in dried leave of Fall, and him dashing across the street in front of a car. I heard that Cosmina saw it happen, and Tina came to rescue him, but he didn't make it more than 5 minutes after the accident. He was born just as I came to my new home, and I eventually fell in love with him too. He had a great heart, and really the best home available to any cat. We miss him dearly.

He caught strange and scary large insects and mice! and rats!

He didnt' eat live chicks or chickens and he had several favorite sleeping spots, and 1/2 of them were in my yard.

Most evenings he would wait on my window sill either for food, or sometimes just for a pet through the screen and he would purr and keep me company while I cooked.

He was fully supportive of my Fall compost piling.

How loving is He! When I asked him "to kiss me", he would nudge me with his nose, and when I asked to "let me kiss him," he would dip his forehead down for me. =D

He was everyone's friend, except the other guy cats'.

You were special to us kitten, and we know you're in kitty heaven.

We'll try our best to move on and keep you in our thoughts.

I have a new girl kitten who's scared of me. We'll see if she's still around tomorrow morning because tonight she escaped the shed, but she was gnawing on the chicken head I had cut off last night.

Tina is frantically searching for a boy kitten who is similar to Bijoux because she was to fill the void.

Also we have lots of left over meat and dairy stuff, and the one 10 year old cat can't eat all the left overs alone. He is round and he hurts, but he keeps trying to eat it all himself. He needs a young stomach to help.

Pictures to come. Animals. They're everywhere here.

So what happened these last two days? Big choices.

First, I decided to become a vegetarian, or just not each chicken for the next few months. We'll see how long I can hold out.

Why?

I had to behead another rooster last evening. It was beating up the other roosters (I had 3) and it was being very rough with the hens.

Seriously the choices were: 1). the cute one that comes when I call it that cooes at me, 2) the gentle, but biggest and toughest rooster that has the best crowing skills (crowing every 5 minutes all day), or 3). The one that would fertilize the best eggs and is pent on raping every hen it can find.

As I ate the meat, I could taste the meat, and I didn't feel all that hungry eating it...so I think I'm going to pause from the chicken eating.

Next, today I was doing the same old stuff at work (socializing, sitting at a computer, and searching for the mayor to discuss projects) I found out that the Red Cross was coming, so we all took a class and got certified for First -Aid.

We also got a first aid kit, that will be stored in the shed so no one will steal it....though I tried hard to convince them to leave them in easily accessible areas. They (librarian, and that dude who watches me weirdly) told me people would steal the gauze and bandages if we left it out....whadda we gonna do *shrugs shoulders.*

Then I continued to work at the mayor's office, but stopped at my emailing to eat 2 watermelons and a whole lot of bread (some guy gave us watermelon).

Then I went home at about 4pm.

After I had rewatered my chickens (I have 5 left), I decided to hang out with my neighbors and we talked about Bijoux, and what an awesome cat he was: loving to all people, good mouse hunter, eats everything, soft and playful, and how we missed him.

I was then playing badminton with my neighbor Yulla, when her dad honked his horn and Tina went and found a kitten in his trunk that looked like Bijoux. Tina loved her look (she has a nice long tail and big eyes) but they don't want a baby making kitten, so ...I took her in. She was scared and shivering, but we hope she'll get over that.

So I decided to adopt a cat (lots or responsibility, and money, and I think then, she'll come back to the US maybe, when I go...we'll see) and Yulla will name her and Tina will teach her some manners.

There will never be one the same....Bijoux died in a car accident 2 weeks ago. We (my neighbors and I) were only able to talk about him starting today. I miss his ears.

So those have been my last two days, and I've done other stuff too, but you got the highlights.

(30 minutes later)

The kitten has escaped from the shed, so we'll find out tomorrow if she's still around. Later.

So I was at the beach on a business trip (so to speak) and it was an experience.

It was a very nice and fun and relaxing and also educational business exchanges.

I can't bEEELieve I was invited to it Because of how awesome it was!

Anyway, I will be home for a bit over a week and then Charm and Scott will be here and OFF we go to another adventure!!

blog: tbp soon! (maybe this week, we shall see, OR I will be planning a mini-Amazing Race with a girl from Romania from 9/3-7th)

I've been on vacation and I'm still vacationing (or we can also call it working because I'm really showing Americans more about Romanian culture and telling them about my life over my 1 1/2 years here doing Peace Corps: Peace Corps Mission goal #3 and some of #2:

#2. Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.

#3. Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.)

Anyway, so after I'm done traveling, it will be Fall and then Winter and then I know I'll have plenty of time to go online. The summer days last until 9:15pm, and I remember Winter days do end even at 4:00pm.

To blog:

Habitat For Humanity in Romania Craiova in AprilTrip with Katie through Europe in June5 new volunteers from the US here to visit MastacaniProgress of ChickensDeath of a loved petTraveling with Family the AdventureFamily visiting my village here in MastacaniLeadership Camp Summer 2009

So, different than last year, but similar.

I've been busy lately planning for my trip with my family starting next week. We'll be caravaning through Europe: Italy, Croatia, Slovenia, Hungary, and then Romania.

I've been good though since my last trip with katie (blog is under construction, but almost ready to be posted ;) ). Mostly, I've just stayed at home. All the other volunteers in my area have gone back to the states to move on with their lives...so it's not like I have anyone to visit anyway. Anyway, I'm sad and happy for them, but I know they're more sad and scared than anything else. The US sounds like a scary place, and for them: a place where we have to make decisions for the future again. Here we're in limbo, and we don't have to really think about "later." Yet.

Anyway, this was the only picture we took at our "good-bye" luncheon. Emily and Nils took off (from my group) and Nancy and Dan took off a week after (from an earlier group, and they finished their 2 year service). Em has a fetus in her, and Nils got accepted into his dream job and got a 1 month notice, so they had to leave quickly.

Oh well. Meanwhile, in the village....

I cleaned 1 of my sour cherry trees of its cherries, and I spent 9 hours in total pitting them, and removing any worms while watching movies, then boiling them in sugar until they became jelly. *sigh* and out of this giant thing, I got 5 small jars. It was fun...but I can't say I think it was worth the loss of sleep.

We remember the corn maze I made? The corn is done!! and so so sweet!! yaya!!!

Now the chickens. By the way, I'm not running around in the forest with kids so much now because I somehow obligated myself to a whole bunch of weeding, feeding, watering, greaving over my yard, which is rewarding in itself, but takes my time away from the community too.

So anyway, chicks are crazily well behaved! They go right to their bed at 9pm fixed! Every single evening, rain or shine, early Summer or late Summer. All by themselves!!

Unfortunately, you see how those chicks have grown too big for their coop? Well...the little dudetta: Bandita died because enclosed spaces over Summer heat = chicken mites, chicken worms, and etc...At the autopsy at the vet she said my chicks had it ALLLLLLL. *shudder*

So I got little pills I had to jam into every single beak, pesticide to soak their coop in, spray for their little bodies, vitamen suppliments, etc... It was actually pretty cheap too: less than $10 for it all. So now I was down to 8 chicks.

Oh..I was wondering what those grey dots on me were. LUCKILY, THEY DON'T LIVE OFF OF HUMANS! They may get on us, but in 10 days they die. This one is grey because it didn't have any blood inside it. I am mite free at the moment =D, But of course I have at least 15 mosquito bites on me. I put spray on, but...I live in a swamp. I think my itch tolerance has gotten stronger.

A SAD, BUT ONE DAY COULD BE PUBLISHED IN CHILDRENS' BOOKS, STORY:

There once was a special chicken. He wasn't a rooster yet because he couldn't crow yet. He was more special than he knew. When he was just a little chick, he slept nice and comfortably next to a warm light bulb next to his brothers and sisters. He lived in a yellow world, where sometimes a giant being would come and supply him water to splash in, and food for him to peck at. Unbeknown to him, the giant being was part of even gianter being: a human. This human was responsible for 10 little chicks, and for what would happen to them when they would be grown, she didn't know, but for the moment she would clean and feed them and keep them warm and secure. Days passed quickly and the chicks began to grow and have more energy. Word got out that this human had small chicks. In the human's home world, not many people had chicks. One friend asked the human to pick the best female and male and she would adopt them. So the search began.

One morning, our little chicken woke up to see an elastic around his little foot. At first he found that he waddled a little strange because one leg was heavier than the other. There was also the problem of being tangled with small branches if he didnt' lift his foot correctly. Eventually, he got used to having it with him. He later realized that he wasn't the only one with this new assessory, but it wasn't the future hens, but all the future roosters that got it. However, all of them were different colors. His was green, the big bully's was red, the fatty one's was blue, and the boring dude's one was yellow. The red chicken loved to show off his nice band and how it matched his crest. As he grew larger, the band ceast to exist, and he gave no more thought to it. As he grew larger, he also realized that the hand that fed them, was actually part of a whole being, much much larger than the hand. He also realized that his yellow world was a place he was later free to leave. In this green and brown world there was lots of stuff for him to peck and consume. He quickly learned that not everything green was edible. The human tended to throw rocks and hard objects at him and his family when he pecked at her vegetables too. At first it was fun, but later he learned that the human was really aiming at them and he stopped entering in the forbidden area.

And that was his life. He hopped out of the coop in the morning, ran to the Human when she woke up to accept breakfast, bathed in the sandy spot in the yard, and sat in the shade and slept during the hottest part of the day. This he did every day.

Of course there were moments in his life where he had to deal with some loss. When he was just 3 weeks old his first brother died due to a heart attack (he was afraid of cats, and he had a weak heart). When he was 2.5 months old his baby sister died to mites and worm infection because she was too small to hop onto branches to sleep like the older sisters and brothers. She stayed sleeping in the coop and the bugs got her in her sleep. Verde, is what he was named due to the color of the band on his leg, greaved over her for a long time and vowed to never let the mites get him as they got her. To this day, Verde sleeps on the high branch available, and sometimes on top of the coop.

And this was the way that Verde thought life would be. The human would always be there to give him his breakfast and late lunch. His days would pass by eating bugs and napping in the shade, and his nights would pass next to the warm feathers of his close family.

What he didn't realize was that the decision had been made by the human that she couldn't keep 8 chickens anymore. She had initially wanted just 3 chickens for fun and for eggs. She had bought 10 because she was told that the majority would die.

Now she had 8, and she had not 4 males and 4 females, but 5 males and 3 females.

That was going to be a problem. Males started to fight when they matured, and on top of that, 8 beaks to feed was a lot of beaks.

There was still that decision of which male and which female were to be adopted. Over the months, the chicks were being observed and finally the decision was made: Verde would be kept because he was the most behaved, the smartest, and the most curious. Jackie was named and enlisted to be adopted because she was the most "bad-ass"- hands down. All the females would be kept because they could be utilized to produce eggs until they could breed no longer. Their eggs would be stolen from them to make omelets, and they would never be allowed to raise any of their young because the human had no need for new chicklings. This would be the life of the hens once they were no longer chicks. The males, there only needed to be one. Verde will be this chosen rooster, as long as he stays in the human's favor. That leaves 4 young males to be made into dinner, and soon, because eventually they will grow into cruel agressive angry jealous and dangerous males that will claw and gorge at each other until one by one they'll die.

None of them know about their future yet, but they may have a hint of what's to come. Starting last week 1 of the heavier males was turned into dinner.

The human didn't know if she had it in her to do it. Would it give her nightmares? Could she stomach it? Would she tremble? Would she change her mind? Was she an animal lover or a cruel hearted giant raising creatures, plumping them up only to consume them when they were ripe for the picking? She was born in the city and her chickens were bought in styrofoam and seram wrap.

We'll....it was done, and there were no nightmares.

Watch out Verde, keep being a good bird, the sweet bird that runs up the human every morning, every time he hears her footsteps. Females birds, keep being mean to the human because she's gonna eat your babies one day.

Better question yet: will you realize what's going on Verde? can you save your brothers? would you save them?

_______________________________________

The featured stars of this story:

No worries: Jackie and Verde are still alive today. Jackie is Amanda's adopted girl. She has one white left streak on her right wing, and Verde loves me. He's always aproaching me to see what's up, and he's called Verde for now because he has the green rubber band on his leg. Verde = Green. Dude, what do I name him? He does respond to Verde at this point.

Well, what do you think of this story?

From Budapest, Hungary, Katie and I made our way to Austria: the land I want to come back and visit one day.

See Windmills: Sustainable Energy: Austria.

All the baggage we had for 10 days of travel, and Katie's 2.5 weeks in Europe.

I met a lady named Johanna in Romania, and she once invited me to stay with her if I ever wanted to visit Austria. When Katie and I were planning our trip, the opportunity came for me to contact her. She was very welcoming and even picked us up from the train station!

We took the metro and then we took her car and got the layout outside of Vienna. (She lives in a small commune outside of Vienna...kind of like a rural suburb).

The building she lived in actually was a factory built 150 years ago. People were still refurnishing the place to be appropriate for living.

It has a cool chimney, and here is a picture of a catwalk. I don't know why it fascinates me, but it does. I don't remember the last time I've seen a catwalk (a real one without models).

Then Johanna decided to do some grocery shopping and I went along with her to pick up snacks and lunch for Katie and myself the next day. The plan was for Katie and I to go visit Vienna with Greg (...a college student in Vienna we had not met yet) as our tour guide. People put in a 1 Euro-coin to use a shopping cart (like how Romanians put in 50 bani to unlock a shopping cart). I think it's a brilliant idea! It's an incentive for customers to return carts after they're done using them. People bring baskets and their own bags to the stores: apparently a very European thing to do, which I hear is catching on in the US too.

Austrian coffee =) At least inside the home. You have the drip system, or the makko espresso maker. This was my 2nd time using the espresso maker and I love it! It's super fast to make, strong, and the espresso is sweet without sugar.

She separates her trash very well. She told me most people do 5 types of separation: glass, paper, compost, plastics, and ...I forget the last one. She has a compost pile in her yard and a vegetable garden.

Here's the courtyard, which the whole facility shares. I have no idea how many families live in this building, but I know there are several. There's a gardening area too where people also keep rabbits and chickens and maybe more that I didn't see.

Back inside, here are cloth bags where she stored fresh grains, and when she needed things like flour she has this small machine which grinds the grain! In the house! Why don't we have stuff like that in our homes?! I've never seen any in the US nor in Romania...as a normal appliance.

See, here's the grain.

Katie was sick, so Johanna was so sweet and made Katie a delicious tea mixed with all sorts of herbs (I think basic stuff like mint, and stuff, I don't remember, and there were some things with names we couldn't' translate, but they smelled familiar). Katie said it was good and warm and she was happy. That's our room. I was nice, I gave Katie the bed. It was a comfortable room. Oh! Their hot water is heated by a solar water heater! The water tank can keep the water up for 3 days if there's no sunlight, and if the water isn't hot enough, electricity heats it.

Greece and Austria! Solar water tanks! Hum....

Katie and I used the internet to check email, and to look up bus routes to get to Vienna the next day.

So we went to Station H the next day and waited. We were told people use the public transportation a lot because its good for the environment. I couldn't help but notice the cleanliness and comfort of all the public transportation systems. The buses and trains and metro looked brandnew, but they're probably just well maintained.

Our ride going to Vienna, and look! TICHY Ice Cream. Only sold in Austria, or at least the real recipes are Austria, and all else are with worse quality ingredients (or so we were told). We were also told it's the best ice cream in the world, even better than gelato. *gasp*

Yeah, the weather was a bit iffy, but it was warm and not wet.

So here is the foot of St. Stephan's cathedral at the stop: Stephansplatz (fun to say). World famous, very large and very impressive building. According to our tour guide, the cathedral is always under construction because the cathedral isn't made with limestone, which isn't the most durable material. That's why in real life, he said either one or another part of the church is covered under the tarp.

I don't remember if there was an entrance fee, and if there was it must have been reasonable because Katie, Greg and I went in.

Intricate, no?

Look at those organ pipes. Wow. The phantom of the opera would have been happy there.

Few facts about St. Stephan: It contains the 2nd largest swinging bell in Europe, the largest in Austria. It's a Romanesque and Gothic style cathedral first constructed in 1147 and has since been modified and extended. The church's original color is white, but years of pollution has given it a black coating.

There are many areas in Austria where cars aren't allowed, only pedestrians and bicyclists.

So we walked all day, walked walked and metroed. Katie and I bought a 2 day Metro pass where we could take as many rides as we wanted. It was EXpensive! More expensive by far than SF. Granted we were in the country's capital and another giant tourist town.

Greg, on the left, took us to Cafe Drechsler (odd how these places have webpages...I don't think any Romanian places I take people to have webpages: http://www.cafedrechsler.at/en/home.php). Greg and I ordered "coffee" and Katie order a "mocha." What Greg and I got was what we call a "Latte" (espresso with milk and foam) and Katie got a what we call "espresso shot" (a shot of espresso with chocolate syrup or powder). All of them were served with a glass of water. Cause that's how Austrians do it. Coffee with a glass of water. I approve.

Katie's mug and my mug =)

Then a famous desert: Black cake with apricot sauce with a flop of whipped cream. I approved again. Pricey, but if I turned those Euros into dollars it was reasonable for a famous experience, but I would never throw my Lei around like that! 20 lei for a coffee!?!? I pay 1 leu for a coffee out of a machine! psh! and 5 lei is my MAX at restaurants.

Back to Austria. We walked and saw impressive buildings. Tall and august.

Then we arrive to the Winter Palace, excuse me, Hofburg Imperial Palace. Tis the winter home to the royal family dating back to 1279. wow! It looks large from the outside, but so much LARGER on the inside!

Hercules!

Hercules!

Seal of the famous Spanish Riding School. Bummer that they wanted us to pay 9 Euro to watch the ponies prance and do tricks =( That set Katie dead against going with me. So, I looked at the seal and that was it. These "Lipizzan" horses are rare and special...but who knows how special because I never got to see them in action. The fee wasn't even to see them perform, it was to see them eat and move about. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lipizzan

Let me just say that I saw lots of tableware in this castle. Forks, spoons, bread plates, soup bowls, etc... They were made of gold, porcelain, jade (gifts from Asian and Turkey and etc...), silver, emeralds, and lots of other things. I saw gold gold gold everywhere!

Oh it was an audio tour, and there were stories to go along with all the tableware. There was a room of animal themed tableware, painted plates and their makers....There wasn't much on that tour except table ware UNTIL

We went on the Sisi tour....

She wasn't a large part of the Habsberg's dynasty, but Hollywood glorified her, so we went on her tour. Her story was of beauty and of tragedy, it honestly reminded me a little of Princess D's story (both real life princesses struggling with strict court etiquette, and then dying tragically), but where as Princess D seems more down to earth, Princess Sisi is portrayed for being more aloft. I liked her tour a lot! It was thorough and it was also an audio tour, and it was given as if Sisi was telling you her story. (all of a sudden I have a craving for fruit gummy snacks...but where would I find them? =( oh well)

Okay, I've just spent 20 mins trying to figure out what buildings these are, and I am going to conclude that the two pictures above are of St. Stephen's cathedral, and the bottom picture is the back of Hofburg Imperial palace. I recall Greg saying something about it being where the President stayed...maybe I'm wrong, maybe we're both right...sorry.

Then we had a lunch break! On these weird lounge chairs at this plaza where other people were sitting, reading, and eating too.

We ate the cheese sandwiches we had prepared and some snacks too. What kind of cheese? Strong odorous cheese that I don't think I enjoyed. Katie ate my share cause she's part mouse. I think I made a jam sandwich too, whew! Sugar and fruit over bread = almost always safe.

After that energy refuel we found:

Muh huh. More Viennese Ice Crem de la crem.

This blog entry is long...

Okay, so we then did more walking.

I'm sure this globe has significance, but I don't recall now. Then we went to this cute/cool market. There were restaurants and lots of shops.

Fruit stands. With dragon fruit.

I saw crazy white asparagus! Never saw them before then.

We also saw this giant selection of vinegar which Katie was tempted to by, but she didn't and she's probably kicking herself for it now. Vinegars are great for cooking and salad dressing. Too bad.

Here was this giant cheese store full of different cheese.

And then stands that sold nuts and dried fruits, and a fresh juice stand, but no jamba juice =(

There seems to be a lack or bias against frozen fruit drinks in Europe or at least East and Mid Europe.

Walk walk...there was something amusing about that sign.

Saw these two buildings that looked exactly alike, on either side of the street, but the statues on top are different. One building is a library and the other is a museum.

Walk walk.

Walk. Weird owl figure. Here is er...a greek fountain? Hercules, Alexander, Hades, I don't remember.

Here is the Vienna metro system.

But they have this AWESOME bike system too! So you register online and you pay 1 Euro per a year to rent any bike you want at their bike stations (around Vienna). You go to a station, swipe and take a bike, then get to a station close to your destination and check the bike in. It's like renting a car, but so much cheaper and healthier. I wish we had this kind of system.

Lol to the crosswalk lights.

In the Metro halls they have facts. Such as: Population, number of hungry people in the world, US dollars spent on war in Iraq...

That concluded our tour of Vienna. We spent 1 full day there, and the day wasn't over yet.

Johanna and her husband prepared us some traditional Austrian foods for dinner!

We ate out in the courtyard. We had fresh salad from her garden, that uses compost from their compost pile. They even had this elderberry yellow syrup that you put in fizzy mineral water and it's yum!! Italian soda, but it's Austrian! and Johanna made the syrup herself. She said it's not hard, maybe I'll try it one day. Hum...I recall eating baked potatoes and some other baked veggie. Wonderful, homecooked, organic Austrian meal. Who were the lucky travelers? We were!

Ops, so er, these are dumplings. Austrian dumplings. I found this site if you want to try making some: http://www.annamariavolpi.com/austrian-knoedel.html

We had a rushed dinner BECAUSE Johanna wanted to take Katie and I to an open air concert at Schoenbrunn Palace!!!!!!

The BIG summer residence of the royals! and it was going to be a classical concert with MOZART! Who was born in Austria! How cool is that!? I love once original things, and that was going to be a once in a lifetime thing for me: listening to an open air classical orchestra at the largest palace in Vienna.

We ate and Johanna's sweet husband Peter cleaned up for us. We went quickly to the metro (because it was a free concert = probably would be traffic if we tried driving directly there).

The walk from the metro to the castle was really short. The sun was setting.

And then it was dark (we were walking through the massive baroque garden) and there weren't any street lights...because it's a garden.

But then we arrived and the massive flood lights made it day again.

See: day.

There's the back of the palace.

We tried to get as close as we could, but there were lots of people there.

Here are how Austrian people look like. Some of the people in my village were asking me about people in the different places I went to visit. See the height? They are all taller than me. So sad.

I tried to take picture above heads, or I think Katie with her long appendages took this one. We ALMOST didn't get to go because Johanna thought Katie would feel to sick to go. I thank Katie for mustering up the energy to go because I really really really wanted to go.

We watched the concert from the giant TV screens and more importantly, we heard the beautiful music.

The sky looked really cool too.

We then decided to try and get on the hill to see if we could hear the music better. I don't know where we were going, I saw Roman ruins and other strange things in that dark baroque style garden. I felt like we were wandering about in an amusement park.

Then we found the hill. Here's the side of the fountain where they were shooting off fireworks.

See my boots and Katie's boots? We sat on this hill and imbued the moment. Then we took off with everyone else and we got a little lost in the garden because everyone we were following other lost travelers, but we got out and home.

The next day. We woke, we said thanks Peter for his amazing hospitality and we took the bus to meet Johanna at work.

She took us out to one last ice cream =) before she sent us off. I wanted to see her work place because she works for a waste management education organization which is relevant to what I need at my site in Romania.

yum. I haven't gotten to Italy yet, but I'll say it, Austrian Ice Cream may be better than Italian Gelatto. Good stuff.

Then onward to Salzburg. When Johanna found out that we were looking at hostels in Salzburg, she called up a friend to pick us up and host us =)

Katie and her Austrian over the counter drugs.

Here's the view of the Austrian countryside from the train.

We also saw castles, but there was no way for me to distinguish them. Cool though. Towers, castles, fortresses scattered about the countryside.

Goodbye Vienna.

I don't care that I don't like the whole movie series as in comparison to the books!

I don't care that there's an economic crisis at home!

I don't care that people are dying of starvation while people are waiting in line to buy tickets for this movie! (I normally do, but at this moment not really)

I'M JEALOUS!! THE MOVIE IS COMING OUT TOMORROW!! AND IT'S GONNA BE IMAX AND IMAX 3D!!! WAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!

I'm pRETTY sure it's not opening in the Cinema here...we have 1 theatre...Alien versus Extraterrestrial is playing...it's the only movie playing for the next week. *crosses fingers* It's a population of over 300,000 so you'd think there'd be more than 1 theatre that plays more than 3 times a day. hum.

This country doesn't care about Harry Potter *sniff*

In retrospect...I don't think I understand why Americans care so much (but I know it's not just Americans...maybe it's just Romanians who DON'T care).

It's a new meaning this year (because those of us overseas, in general, are feeling a new sense of pride this year).

I didn't host a giant bash, but I did go out of my way to organize a small BBQ that involved Bull's Eye BBQ sauce on ribs (which were hard to find, but we found some) and hamburgers =)

We also got some watermelon because WATERMELONS ARE AMAZING IN ROMANIA!

Preparation of meat outside.

Bogdan the Great was in charge of the grill because he's Great at it (apparently an expert on the grilling of all foods and clatites too). We took the table outside and it was nice.

I cut my hair again cause my bangs were bugging me and I messed up =(

I look ugy, but oh well, it will grow out.

I remembered I had something in my apartment, that would be awesome and American and perfect for a 4th of July BBQ = marshmallows!

The older people were confused, but the girl: Simona was a pro cause she had seen it done hundreds of times on TV. =)

I like Dan's marshmallow campaign picture: "Only you can prevent marshmallow fires."

Yes, this hamburger was the first for many of the guests. You can see the apprehension in Bogdan's expression, but then he took that bite and he smiled. Maybe in the first picture, it wasn't apprehension, but maybe the hamburger was talking to him.

Nuti seemed to like it too. Here's the close up: beef and pork mix, Romanian tomatoes, and iceberg lettuce with mustard and ketcup. (Buns were hard to find! We found some "American buns" but they were 10x the cost of a pack of bread the same amount!!!)

And we bought a Romanain Watermelon off the side of the road to complete this National Summer celebration.

I also managed to find some ribs and we used some BBQ sauce katie brought me and it's a bit blackened due to the sauce, but it was Yum yum tasty!

Someone came by to visit our table and then decided to nap 10 feet away, then 8 feet, then 5 feeet and then soon....

Then 2 feet away... (the chickens decided against attacking the humans and tried for the unguarded grill).

Silly cat. He was very friendly to all my guests though. He's a very agile cat too, and Dan doesn't have very swift foo

Then we cleaned up and we were all done. Dan left a bit early to catch his ride (which we found out he missed, but VERY LUCKILY he did make it back to his place before mid-night).

He's leaving for the states very soon (within 3 days), so I'm glad he could make it here to visit before his trip home.

HAPPY FOUTH OF JULY!! Hope you guys all had great weather!!!

So a new from the city has the energy to plan an Amazing Race here in Mastacani. I will be her helper, but this project will be planned and done by the both of us, and whoever else wants to come out here and help organize.

Our target participants will be kids, but it can involve whoever wants to participate.

So...we're thinking 5 days in a row, out here in the village at the end of July.

We're calculating that we could do all this: transportation for maybe 5 organizers and materials for 5 days for maybe about 20 participants will be $120.

I am looking for grants, do you guys know where I can find a small source? Or Amazing Race enthusiasts who'd be able to help us?

Remember my past problems with water?

Last year,

I had a boiler that was attached to the whole apartment complex which gave me a huge electric bill. Some one burst a pipe while trying to fix the boiler which flooded my apartment for 10 days before my landlord came with someone to fix it. (I had a water floor between the cement and my plastic tiles)My waste water backed up into my bathroom and they had to clean it out. Sometimes I didn't have running water for a couple days at a time (which is good water from the village central system).

This year,I went 8 days with no running water and I was getting upset. I finally stalked down someone to come over and fix the electric water pump so I could at least get flowing well water. During this time I went to the closest well to help my needs. Drinking water, I had filled bottles at an earlier point and I was buying soda and juice for hydration. Presently, I've been forced to use the nitrate (500ppm) filled water since the other water system has been down for the last 2 weeks. (US regulation: 5ppm, and EU regulation: 50ppm) But nitrate is great for the plants!(Here's a video of me getting water at the presently closest well. Apparently I waddle and I was listening to Blue October that evening to pass the time. My plants were dying, so I made 14 rounds that evening).

Then my toilet septic was full and I had to pay quick a large sum to get it emptied (1/4 of my month's pay) and you know what I learned?! They just toss the waste in the nearby forest! I am presently working on a project to promote a waste water treatment center...and I don't think people are connecting the two. So forest: dead dogs, lots of pampers and other trash, and now septic waste...great. Now, my landlord and the neighbors are making a bigger septic tank so I can't pour water down the drain anymore. At least I have running nitrate water! So I can't clean myself over a drain, I can do it over a bucket if I want to do it inside my home...or maybe I'll just clean myself out in the open. Lol. That water stuff, back in my old life it was very much taken for granted. I am surprised how many water related problems I've experienced this last year and 1 month.

They're 1 month and 1 week and my! how they've grown.

Updates:

1 chick died of unknown cause or heart attack. They put themselves to bed promptly at 9pm.I have 4 roosters and 5 hens.I have 1 chick so much smaller than the rest.Here is Bandita (she's a girl) and she used to pass out under that light bulb after a full day.

Like, she would face plant (so cute).

Here they are at 1 month, and they're all buddies now. I left them out of the coop now cause the threat of crows stealing them away is less. Bandita is way small as compared to the rest.

They do my weeding for me.

REALLY! Look! They are in bed! It's daylight at 9pm, and the chicks are in their coop. They're better behaved than kids.

Cute story told by my neighbor Cosmina:

So, a chick somehow got a plastic bag stuck to its foot, so it was scared and running around trying to get away from this monster. It saw Cosmina, ran up to her panting, and tweeted at her to help it. Cosmina said that it was the most adorable thing because it was really panting and scared and knew to come to a human for help. She told me she thinks my chicks are smart. Uh oh, plans for chicken soup.....

So here is Bulgaria's rural area. There were lots of tunnels we went through.

I thought it was flat, but there's lots of elevation.

Here's our next train. We got 3 beds per a room here (so here Emily and Nils tried to squash onto one bed) and there were 4 of us. Oddly, the bed on top was shorter by a foot than the other two, so I got it.

In our train, there was no English written on these signs. This corner table is a sink too! What a surprise. Thinking back, we think we had sinks in our previous trains too (but didn't know about this secret until our almost last train).

Here we are in Sofia! The capital of Bulgaria, like the capital of Romania is Bucuaresti, and like...do we have a capital of the US? I don't think so, so, like how California's capital is Sacramento.

So...we arrived in the morning and we had a train leaving that evening. Ergo, we had the whole day to explore the city of Sofia. Would it be enough? Look. Mountains in the horizon.

I got this plastic bag that showed us all the important landmarks in Bulgaria. jk. There's probably more.

Looky. Another country that celebrates Martisor (by the way, I don't know if I mentioned that the word Marti-sor means "little march." "Marti" means the month of March, and "-isor" is one of the diminutive suffixes you add to words to make them small. That's latin.

We walked for a bit, then we took a rest. I saw a honey faire. It was expensive expensive honey, but they all tasted so different. Pretty awesome to taste sweet in so many different ways.

We found 1 of the monuments on the platic bag. *checked off the list* Then we saw this building in the distant too. I think we did walk up to it eventually.

There were these old stones with Latin on them. Man! In so many of the places I've been: Austria, Bulgaria, Romania, Germany, the really old scripture is often in Latin and I can't read latin! I can guess at it, but apparently it's worth learning still even though it's a dead language.

We decided to take a food break and where did we go?

Well. We didn't' know what traditional Bulgarian food was, and we didn't' really see any Bulgarian restaurants, so after 30 minutes of following signs to get to a KFC then being disappointed because the place was still under construction (we decided that it would make more sense for KFC to build the place first, then advertise its location), we went to the safe fall back restaurant of McD.

Cool how the menu is all in Cyrillic and they have free internet.

After lunch, we did so much more wandering cause what else is there to do?

Orthodox church or Catholic or other?

Hallu Bulgarian flag.

Here are old statues outside. I wish there was information on a sign next to them cause then things would make more sense. Why statues of old people? Why there? why?

Park Park. I think we passed 5. Here we decided to settle for a little while.

We took naps. It's hard to get fully rested in trains and this last ride was particularly short.

We took shifts taking watch. Lol. We must have been a sight, 4 middle aged people passed out on a bench for 2-3 hours.

Nils needed to pay for this port-a-potty. (Yet, another reason McDonald stops are so important: use of facilities is free (with purchase of something)).

More wandering.

Saw this old prison that was used during a war.

That was pretty cool, but so random. It's next to a restaurant. We also saw a very old church. I think it dates back to 1400 or 1500. It's weird how there's a whole building build around it though.

All around it.

Then we saw an important political building with the Bulgarian flag draping down.

We had a pleasant evening stroll through the market place. This place is supposed to be cheap, but the prices I saw were high. I did get decent priced sweet Bulgarian bread for the break-fast home. Bananas were super super expensive here!! 11 Lira/Liva for 1 kg of bananas! That's like 24 ron/kg of bananas, or $8 for 1 kg of bananas. We are so fortunate.

Before we left, we found a fast food Bulgarian place and food wasn't too expensive, or that that fresh (it being evening and we know how buffets food are usually kept til eaten), but it was tasty and different. I'm glad we ate here because I love my food and I want to try exotic foods.

Chicken with creamy soup, stew with potatoes, potatoes baked and rolled about with spices and ham bits, and meat balls in sauce.

Nils got fried rice. Bulgarian fried rice.

Here was a receipt, and it's here so you can see Cyrillic. That was our day. Off we went back home.

Our 7 days, 7 nights trip. 2 nights in a hostel in Turkey, 1 night in a hotel in Greece, and many-a nights on sleeper trains. It was a good trip. Nils did all the planning and I appreciated that for my first international traveling experience.

Here was the view on the train ride home by myself. It was Easter weekend = equivalent of pre-Thanksgiving, or pre-Chinese New year. I sat on my suitcase the whole way back because thankfully, the transportation system doesn't feel bad about overselling seats.

So, I am not at work cause you know what!

Mission#2, or #1 of my job = educate people about Romania...which as a Peace Corps volunteer...I did do a lot last year...and anyway, I went to Greece, so *check* that off my list and here we gO!:

Here's is the night train we took from Istanbul to Greece. We went not to Athens but to Thessaloniki (2nd biggest city and not a touristic destination, bo).

Sleeper train from country to country.

So, the scenery was way way pretty. The soil there is reddish which was interesting.

Our ride lasted until like 9am, so I had time to enjoy the view from our window. Look at how those clouds roll over those mountains.

This was the first station I saw with the greek alphabets and all!

So that was that. Apparently blocks aren't just limited to Romania. With my new experiences, I can safety say that the US is spoiled with all it's room because at lot of Europeans reside in apartments. Even in Austria, they have shared houses (even though these houses look like million dollar mansions).

THE OLYMPICS was here!!! That's cool.

Yeah...on this trip we stayed at 1 hostel, many trains and 1 hotel. Here's the view from my window. It was stuffy but it wasn't expensive and it was the best bed of the whole trip.

Okay. Well after we had washed ourselves (no showers in trains) we went out to explore.

We saw a statue of Alexander the Great *yay*, then this tower *yay* and there was this church and that was it. People weren't so helpful to us tourists and I had 3 people really rudely reject my plea for directions. I don't think it was racist, just people not wanting to help us. *shrug* That'w how we felt and it was unanimous.

So someone really really recommended us to go to Pizza Hut in Tess. and so we did. It was expensive and ....way way not worth it. Sorry adviser. On THE other hand EVERYONE, everyone was drinking this foamy brown thing.

So I wanted one too.

I got one, it was expensive I guess, but it was authentic. It was a: Frappy. Basically instant coffee and water and blended. It's way popular here. Nalgene bottles, milk bottles, EVERYWHERE!

I didn't see babies drinking Frappies though.

It was alright. Needs more sugar and some dairy (in my opinion).

It was bright and sunny, then the sky feel. More like a bucket of water was tipped over, but it was a warm rain.

So here's a small lake that wasn't a lake. And some pretty flowers that maybe are Greek, who knows. I'm not a flower expert: Botanist. (I'm watching 30 rock...sorry if this text may be a bit weird. Disclaimer).

Emily attempts to walk through this cute park without getting wet feet.

So....yeah, that was a cool first day, but I really didn't want to be there a 2nd one and we were all of accord: SO! We took a trip to the bus station to see if we could find a ride out of this city and out to the country (the pizza adviser had also suggested these monistaries on top of some mountains, but it would be a 3 hour drive...or 4 hours? I've forgotten).

Here is where we were and wanted to leave. It was a pretty beach, but it's more of a harbor becausde there's a drop-off and no beach.

We found out that it would be 35 euros per a person for a trip there and back. We sat and pondered. 70x4=140 euros.

Then, after much serious pondering (30 mins). Emily got a great idea!! Let's rent a car!!

As PCVs we aren't allowed to rent cars in PC serving countries, but Greece doesn't have any peace corps volunteers. What's more: as US citizens we're allowed to rent cars with our licenses if we're older than 25: Nils and Emily and both know how to drive stick! (the majority of Europeans drive stick = I need to learn!).

After all that hard deciding, we decided to treat ourselves to a nice meal.

We continued to follow our list, given to us by adviser, and we think we went to the correct restaurant. We had baked cheese which was pretty yummy.

Tasted like some kind of hot cheese dip that would be good with triscuits (I had to look this word up, I'd forgotten such things existed...and yet I used to be addicted to them...yum).

Heehee. So we ate some normal and new stuff. Guess which food I ordered.

Top left: pork and stuff, think it was sauteed, and top right: skate = some kind of edible shark, bottom left: greek salad, and bottom right: dessert of some kind of jelly and nut and crumbly grains (tasted light and crumbly..in a jelly sort of way).

I had ordered the skate =) of course. Tasted fishy...and lemonyzesty, and it had soft bones, but it was a slimy texture and I ate it, but it was weird and I don't think I'll order it again.

Bum chica bow bow. Here we go our next day! 60 Euros for a car! We filled the gas ourselves. I think the total cost was 90 euros by the end of the evening, plus bridge tolls.

Yes, we rented a car, and no, we did not drive to Athens.

See the moutains we're heading towards. Looks cool eh?

So for this trip, we stopped at a store and bought food. Cheese sandwiches, juice and weird chips. Romania = sour cream and dill, in the US we eat = sour cream and onion, and Greece...= sour cream and oregano. Weird.

The landscape was really cool to me cause it's so different from Romania's and California's landscape. Trees grow out of rocks and they're all crooked looking. These trees reminded me of the mythology that two people were so in love that as they got older they became trees and were intwined together for the rest of eternity.

Then we saw a bundle of stones atop a hill. We never did found out what it was...

Guess what this is!!!

Really? No! Really? YES!!!!

AHHH!! We really found Mount Olympus! and dude, it is a far hike. We didnt' have a lot of time to spend there, but maybe again one day. I would love to hike it there. I bet it's hard to get it, or it wouldn't have been chosen as the spot where the gods lived.

Weird Mt. Olympus organisms.

We had to pay a pretty large toll (I guess not as bad as in the US now-a-days) to get over something, and people were handing out advertising to us. That's something new to me.

You know what Other craziness I saw!?

Solar panels EVERYWHERE! On every house and building. Even on top of shacks and barns.

And to the horizon we saw peaks, broken ones. This rock was cool too.

Road was nicely kept for tourists.

Pretty?

View between the monasteries.

The were a sight. Magnificent and old, just like things you thought would exist in movies but not in real life, but here they are.

Amazing to wonder, how they could have been built: lots of work and lifting.

Stairs leading up to a monastery. Emily and I atop a plateau peak.

Hee. Here's our traveling group of 4.

World at their feet.

A hah! and a solar panel hiding! Found ya!

I had to change into a new shirt and Emily put on a skirt (and later I had to borrow one too). Istanbul, Greece...it seems like every holy place we'd been asked to change clothes to be more feminine and conservative even thought they were touristic.

Here we go. Into the tunnels, up the carved stairs and into the mountain monasteries.

I don't know what this means, but it looks like my name.

See. Had to borrow a skirt to go in.

Some info, and view from the top. Don't it look philosophical? Does to me.

Yep, it was cool just to be there. There, I did feel more able to banter about the meaning of existence. If only I had a toga on.

View from the tipity-tip-top.

Here they celebrate "Martisor" too. It's the celebration of the arrival of Spring. It's on the 1st of March traditionally boys give girls these red and white entwining strings with a charm to wear on their breast or as a bracelet. We celebrate it in Romania, and I knew about Bulgaria, but I didn't know that Greece celebrated it too. Some regions of Romania tie these strings in trees, and apparently so does Greece.

We got to see other parts of this 1 monastery: water jugs and wine making.

*sigh* Europe. Wine.

Lookie, and Chinese gords. I thought only us Asians used them. Maybe the Turks introduced them? There was also a room of bones and skulls..........we felt like it was unappropriate to take a picture. It was a door with a small window and the room was filled with selved bones...........

Modern day technology has made it easier for the remaining monks to transport necessary services. yay for them! whew.

I also got some pictures of a couple flowers growing up there. Here are Greek flowers:...flowers found in Greece (maybe not natives, just tourists):

Here's the Greek flag, you may have seen it at the 2004 Summer Olympics.

This was a niche at the base of the mountain on our way down. The monasteries all close at 4:30pm....so we didn't have time to see the nunnary or anything else fun. Oh well. It was a bit of a drive back. We did encounter a herd of goats along the way, and Nils almost ran over a turtle, but he didn't flatten it.

I found the street signs highly amusing on this journey. The second one...lol.

Here we were, going on the train for the next destination. 2 days in Greece = we didnt' see it all, we didn't see a lot, but we saw some good stuff and got a small taste. Thanks Greece!

Of course, I had to have 1 more Frappy before I left, even though I didnt' really like them all that much: powdered coffee, fluffed with water. BUT everyone drinks them!!

So:

1 international conference, 4 countries, 3 castles (we tried to get 1 castle/palace in every country, but due to wet laundry...), more than 7 ice creams, 8 rolls of toilet paper, 1 night in a hostel, 2 girls traveling by train, 4 times at McDonalds, 1 Japanese pond, a gAzillion! forks, plates and spoons, 2 colds and 1 strep throat, over 80 hours on the train, AND MORE!

Just wait for us to get the pictures up!!

In the meantime, I just got back from the airport today, and my electricity had apparently gone out = fridge smells like dead meat, and I've got 9 teenage chickens, and my garden became a small jungle (I couldn't see the cat or find my chicks...or my bike).

Ciao for now!

I heard squawking outside, so I thought a cat was bothering my chicks and I ran to the window and pounded on it (maybe I should have directly gone outside).

I hear then silence.

I grab a flashlight to scope out their coop, but too slowly.

I look inside their cage and I didn't expect to see one chick lying on its back with it's neck straight and feet in the air.

I opened the door (again, maybe too slowly) and.........poke it.

It's still warm.

I shake it, and then feel along its neck.

I then knock on my neighbor's door and ask Tina for help cause she's my chicken pro.

She tries to give it semi CPR...but she says it's dead.

No marks, no evidence of cat, no broken anything and a very very healthy looking chick (one of the biggest). Maybe it's the food? water?

p.s. Dogs shouldn't eat maybe sick birds, so the little guy is in a plastic bag right now, and I'm supposed to find a hole to put it in tomorrow morning.

p.s.s. I am off to Bucuresti to get Katie =) Then she'll be here and our: Castle Trip will begin! Castle in Romania, Hungary, Austria and Germany. mauahhaah

p.s.s. In this period of excitement, it is clouded/overshadowned by a death. I have grown too attached to them...but not all of them. It wasn't Bandit nor Jack.

http://www.mrsb.org/chicks2008.php

I have other things to post...but chick responsibilities make me wake early, and all this garden work...carrying buckets for water makes me more tired and I have less time to sit here and write now. =(

I'll make an extra effort. Once the chicks are bigger. ::sigh:: they are cuties though. I made them a ...habitat today and yesterday. They're playing area looks like a zoo habitat. There are things to climb too!

I'm getting way too attached to the chicks. HOw am I supposed to kill them and make them soup if I watch them sleep and play and grow.

So no more pictures. I've grown too attached and I really don't have time for 10 chickens. They're all so cute and alive. Oiy.

His name is Jack.

He's a mischief chick, and I tried to make little horns for him with sunflower seeds but he turned out looking cute instead.

He's Amanda's adopted chick.

I swear I'm doing other things besides playing with chicks!

IT'S A BOY!!!!!

IT'S A GIRL!!!!

Apparently, it's really that easy.

How many do I have? 3 boys and 7 girls.

We'll find out for sure in 10 weeks.

Puii [pooh-eeee] (the chicks)

Not an obsession, but these are my first chicks/pets.

I didn't know how chicks looked alseep so I took a picture. One dude has his beak in the corner. His? Her? I dunno.

Oh, so Dude (friend from home named Amanda) has dared to name like 4 chicks. I think they were...Blacky? Tacky? Macky? and something _ _cky.

But I am willing to let her name 1 chick and I'll tie a green thread or something, maybe a bandanna around it's head, so we know that one is her sponsored pet. I wanna see that $1 a month you promised dude so I can afford clothes and food for your chick and I won't eat it. You want a male too right? And yes, I think they will grow up to be black chickens.

So, since I don't know how to let you pick one (they're all babies still = blobs of black puff), name qualities in your chick and as they develop their own personalities, I'll match you two up (like in a reality love sitcom show): hoppy, sleepy, sneezy, really fluffy, small feet, etc....and I really have no idea how to know if it's a boy or girl. Hum...

*googling*

How can one tell if a chicken is male or female? In: Chickens and Roosters [Edit categories] [Edit] [Edit] You lift it up by the neck and if it's feet hang it's a boy but if it goes to the body it's a girl but be very careful with it's little neck!!! :)

Additional.... It depends how old the chicks are. By 4-5weeks, males will be large, aggressive and have tall, bright crests. Females are shyer, with not as bright crests.

By 10weeks the roosters will be obvious.

______________________________________________

*let's go test and see*

What do you think?

I was pushed about with 50 old people to get my 10 chicks this afternoon.

It's a bit late in the chicken season, but I managed to get some still.

They need a light bulb at night to stay warm, and they'll sit in the sun outside in a box I built during the day.

Today was overcast and they were shivering in a large heap. Poor chickies.

No naming them allowed.

There are 10 and all look healthy so far. However: I blinded 1 with the flash of my camera, dropped a pan lid of 3 of them, and 1 walked off my desk and fell (I was web-caming it and it rebelled).

Let's hope they live long enough to give me some eggs.

So...these aren't my chicks. They're cute, but they're not mine yet. You see, farmers (people with chickens) can wake up early and they buy all the chicks. Me..I was raised and born in a city, and I came out of college studying bio-chemistry.

My point is, let's hope I get some chicks Wednesday =) Cause they're smelly and fluffy and I want to see eggs made and then steal them from the confused mom chickens. Then make soup.

Here are some flowers of Spring-time in Ro-mania. They're called Snowballs..more or less. They ssmell nice and they're cute. My counterpart (I'm sure it was him) put one in my hoodie at the office cause I guess he really couldn't help himself. AND here on the right is my garden. I got to til that soil, then put seeds in! My grandma did gardening, and I've heard rumors that my mom is trying it out too, BUT this is my garden and I've not really eaten vegetables all Winter cause they're A.) WAY expensive, b.) imported from different countries so they're not all that tasty, c.) and c.) the only stuff I could buy consistantly and locally were carrots, potatoes, and onions.

This running into backyard, and yanking food out of ground, then washing and then eating it = so much better when it's harder to get.

I've put in seeds for: red peppers, carrots, beans, radishes, lettice, dill, basil, onion and garlic.

Oh, I also received about 120 white corn seeds from another volunteer who has connections. So I prepared myself a cornmaze. It needs about 74 days and I started it on Thursday of last week, so hopefully I'll have corn and a maze on: July 20th, 2009.

Then I also tried to build a chicken home for when my chicks get bigger. (=/, I'm still debating cause raising chicks can be a responsibility...and I have to work and travel and not be home)

We'll have to see. Hopefully they'll learn to take care of themselves by the time I go on my next trip.

Here's some weird looking purple flowers that bloomed about 1 1/2 months ago. Flowers bloom at different times here; weird.

Okay: GAME = FIND THE LETTICE

So, my little patch of lettice has baby lettices too small to make a real salad, but I keep spotting random things of lettice. So, can you guys find them?

It's like seeing Waldo when you don't suspect him. Anyway, that's how my salad is being made for now.

That'll teach them to now grow where they're supposed to!

Here is the first leg of our journey. By sleep train and about 22 hours.

Here is their currancy the Lira: 1 Euro = 2 Lira = 4 Ron

Humble Hostel where we stayed 2 nights. It was about 10 euros a night and found by our trip organizer: Nils.

So our first hostel was in the basement down wobbly stairs. We each got a bed with clean sheets that provided sufficient warmth. Here is how showers looked liked but it had hot water = great! I love hot water! Oddly though, we found out that first night why our room was slightly cheaper than those upstairs: the manager slept in a cot next to our beds. He didn't snore = we saved some money.

All the stairs were trippy like this: really steep and many levels!

One is the down shot and then the up shot. Lots of places had these kind of stairwells. Pete hit his head a couple times where he walked into low ceilings. lol.

At the top, we had this great view. B-food = same as in romania: hard boiled eggs, olives, cucumber slices, tomato slices, bread with toppings: honey, butter, butter cheese, and nutella. Oh with cai (hot black tea) [chai].

Then we went off for our walk. We did lots of walking.

So, on a whim I borrowed this Lonely planet tour book and we ended up looking to it for help and advice. There were some objects (like this random erection) that I thought was pretty boring until I read up on it. I forgot what it means now, but if I had that book again...

First real cool thing: Blue Mosque (which we had thought for the longest time was Aya Sofia). I had to (or was really encourage to with a large sign) to cover my head before entering and we ALL had to take off our shoes. I was pro-aware and I'd brought a scarf just in case.

Perdy?

Then we got hungry, and went around to find our first good Turkish food.

For lunch, we saw Donor Kabas and that's where we went to eat.

That man was temping us with this crazy ice cream.

What did I order? Some chicken off that giant split and yogurt and some cabbage with this wrap. So: I ate a Turkish burrito is what I'm saying, a chicken one with yogurt.

And of course with the hot chai/cai/ceai/ and in Chinese: chah

Ok, so them we continued the day of "looking" by going to the Topkapi Palace. The entrance looks like ...a castle, but it's much more open and HUGE.

Yup, we're in a pretty Palance and that's probably real gold foiling behind us.

(Ah! I have 1 month of traveling pictures to post and write about...so I am going to fly though this a bit faster)

So the palace was cool. There were places we went into like the royal treasurey where we saw riches I didn't know really did exist (I thought it was hollywood's lie). BUT, we weren't allowed to take pictures. Security reasons, privacy reasons, they're something pictures can't capture, so you'll have to see for yourself.

This place I thought would be interesting to see. *snicker* BUT my travel buddies still wanted to see Aya Sofia, and that afternoon would be their only chance, so we split up.

Lots of interesting stuff, but not as fun to see alone.

People had audio guides, but you had to pay for them, so I didn't do it. I had my tour book too.

Yum Yum, and that man was roasting chestnuts!! Roasting on an open fire. Lots of men were roasting chestnuts actually, and I loved it! I did splurge and i buy a packet = yum! But mine were kinda undercooked and not super sweet, but they were good enough!

We found a nice park after the Palace and AS tours.

So, speaking of Turkey, there was the Tour of Turkey going on too. It reminded me of trical and race events. I used to volunteer at race events. I miss it. Maybe I'll organize a race in my village, but that's just wistful thinking.

Gar to the policemen for not managing the public better. We actually got in the way of a biker and had him stop for 1 minute! while we got out of his way. How unprofessional! That would be un-acceptable at a trical event!

So we wandered/strolled more. We heard mass. Look, more food in carts. We have these unsalted soft pretzels in Romania too. In Romania, it's a very popular snack and breakfast food.

We then wandered to the Mediterranean Sea, and saw a very small fish market. I wasn't convinced the fish was actually from that sea, or at least off that shore. Everything was placed too perfectly. But, it was interesting to see foods I wasn't familiar with; like the colored clams.

The boardwalk was pretty, but it was cold too. There were lots of small clumps of lawn chairs where people offered us hot ceai/cai. We didn't end of doing it though.

Look, a dude selling nuts. I was tempted, but I was looking foward to dinner.

We found an "adult" park on the boardwalk. We each did some reps on the different structures, and called it an evening.

And that's how my first "Day" ends. I did eat, but that's another story to come.

PLEASE give me some feedback on what you want to here. there's just too many pictures and I don't want to bore you all, but I don't want to leave out interesting info either. I mean, I could talk more about food, what I thought, small incidences and stories, etc...

Another Romanian article involving ME =)

or if you want to click here to look at it: http://www.gdsvl.ro/Ultima%20ora/2009-04-29/Americanii+lucreaza+pe+santier+pentru+patru+familii+din+Bechet#comLink

It has a picture, for those of you who can't read Romanian. =)

or ask google translator to translate it for you.

Ciao!

A long time ago, before I knew where I was going to end up, I posted information.

I went to Turkey, Bulgaria, and Greece last week, and my dear friends Charm and Scott realized that I could be dead and there was no way for them to check.

So, here is some new information that will keep me safe and thanks for caring y'all.

Emails and mobile numbers of two of my closest volunteer friends:

"Nils O' Bergeson": nils.bergeson@gmail.com, +40 754 59 7293

"Emily O'Hara": ohara.emily@gmail.com, +40 755 19 7249

(the +40 = country code for Romania)

Okay, say Nils and Emily, you can't reach at all and you've been trying to reach them for 24 hours and you're really concerned.

Here is the Peace Corps Romania's office numbers: +40 74 599 6207, +40 74 599 6208

And if you are super desperate to know why you haven't heard from me in 2 weeks after I'd promised you that I would contact you after I got home and you're sure I'm kidnapped and working in a Harem (I was in Istanbul last week and I took pictures of an old harem) or I'm lying dead in a lone village street.

Here are the emails of my program manager and the country director for dire circumstances, and be brief and polite please.

"Oana Boingeanu": oboingeanu@ro.peacecorps.gov,

"Ken Goodson": kgoodson@ro.peacecorps.gov.

None dire situations, again my personal information is as follows:

cynthia_s_yeh@yahoo.com or cynthiasyeh@gmail.com

Romanian mobile number: +40 74 287 2141

or my landline: +40 23 634 6414

skype ID: hey.cynth

and if this indeed a "DIRE" situation:

Family Emergencies

Parents should call Peace Corps' Office of Special Services (OSS) at any time (24/7) if they need to advise their Volunteer of a critical illness or death of a family member (telephone: 800.424.8580, ext. 1470). OSS, in coordination with the attending physician, will determine whether the situation is critical enough to grant the Volunteer special emergency leave, at government expense, for two weeks. Even if the situation does not fall under the guidelines for obtaining special emergency leave, OSS will inform the Country Director so that the information is passed on to the Volunteer as soon as possible.

I drew a line

so you could see

That our destination

was near the sea (Black Sea)

Here is our troupe. Nils, Peter, Emily and Myself.

Nils and Emily are my closest friends in PC and they also live really close to me (2 hours travel 1 way). Peter is studying in Germany and he's there to visit his brother Nils.

So of the 7 nights of traveling: 4 nights sleeper trains, 2 nights same hostel, 1 night hotel.

Pros of sleeper trains: cheap to travel and sleep at the same time and saves time.

Pros of hostels and hotels: showers.

The first room we got had 6 beds: 3 per wall. But others we stayed in had 3 beds on the one wall and a sink and a ladder on the other wall.

Getting up on the bunk beds (the topmost level) was a bit of work...specially when people like Nils is trying to pull you down.

Here we are suffocating, until we combined the power of 4: Pete's (short for Peter) foot, Emily and Nils' combined body weight, and my right bicep and my leatherman ; to open the window.

Nils then went around rescuing other suffering passengers after we won.

He abolished 4 close windows that trip.

We left at 12 noon. We arrived to the boarder of Bulgaria and Turkey at 1am? (at some point there was a Bulgaria and Romania boarder, but that's a boring story).

---We got a knock on the door. --We handed over all our passports. --Went back to bed. --Got a knock later and our passports handed back to us. --Went back to bed. --Arrived at the other border. --Got a knock on the door. --Was told to go outside and buy a visa and have passport stamped. --Walked outside in PJs in search of visa buying window. --Paid 15 Euro. --Got stamped. --Went back into train. --Put passport in my marsupial pouch (my security pouch I wore the whole trip), and passed out til our 10am landing.

Oh, and they give us clean bedding; we got them every train ride.

I saw Turkish flag in the morning.

Here is the local currency: LIRA. Which is about 2 LIRA = 1 Euro.

So like 1.5 LIRA = $1.

Look at this happy couple. Anyway, they have all their luggage in those two backpacks. His backpack was the "backpacking" "travel" backpack other tourists were using too.

I had my stuff in this backpack =)

But I had a warm jacket in a plastic bag too, which I never used on this trip.

Turkey, Greece, and Bulgaria are warm now, but not Romania yet (burrrr)

Guess what I saw...

Exciting things were happening while we where there, AND WE DIDN'T EVEN KNOW!

Tour of Turkey!

and Festival of Lilies!

Here's a map of Istanbul which I thought was pretty. We were on the European side (the most tourist side) and we went on the Asian side too (more on this later).

SO, sights to see in Istanbul!

We did see lots of old things, look at this wall of dirt for example: OLD. And actually the smaller streets were cool too. They were very clean cause tourists basically crawl through everything around here, but still holds a certain charm.

Here is an experience of Prayer. The Muslims living here pray 5 times a day, but I only managed to hear 4 prayers a day. I am probably unconscious for the 5th, so I can't tell you if it goes on mornings or nights. This is the after 4pm one.

I'm not sure what's in the left picture, something about...yeah, it's in the Lonely Planet: Turkey guidebook, and the right picture is an old public fountain I believe.

It was funny to see how many Lonely Planet guidebooks were being used, and in ALL sorts of languages!! Japanese, German, Italian, French. There were all sorts of tourists there!

AND after having the book for Turkey, and not for Greece and Bulgaria, I'm not a 100% devotee, but I am a believe.

Flag picture, with cute puppy who wants to play outside.

Okay, more to come!!

So here is a good map of possible places I will visit my time here in Europe.

See it, learn it, know it, smell it. Good.

Next, let me share about my Peace Corps conference, my 1 year mark conference AKA MST (Mid-Service Training).

It wasn't too bad actually. 3 days at a fancy hotel in the mountains in Sinaia - I've been here before, 1 year ago actually.

We (as in 15%) of us lucked out and got jacuzzi bath tubs. I live in a village, so this was so good to lie in.

There was a bowling alley in this small tourist town, so we gave that a try. It was 50 lei per a lane per an hour = $12.50 and shoe rentals included. I scored a 50 the first time (with like 5 gutter balls in a row), and then a 76!

I hiked up again and saw the outside of Peles Castle.

And some of the Peace Corps staff saw a family of bears during dinner one of the nights, but I just saw signs (as in posted one, no sightings of feces or claw prints).

We of course had our intense training sessions: language exams, language classes, grant sessions, project presentations (I was 1 of 4 presentations out of 37 volunteers to make a presentation! and I think I did well too! about Intercultural week), political updates, program updates, etc...

And every evening, after our 7am-6pm program, we had our own time to do our own thing. We're given food stipends at these conferences, so usually we go out to eat. I had dinner here with Janet and Lee and Erica. Then we got ice cream too! It was warmer here than home.

Our 1 year group picture!

I am sad cause 2 of our key staff members are leaving our program. Peace Corps' policy forces people to serve only 1 or a couple years at a time at the different locations.

Technically, as an American you can only work in the management positions for only 5 years before you have to go back to the US and live there the equal number of years before you try again. Interesting, but sucky when you have good leaders.

Point is: they're in the picture too: volunteers, staff, and some super-volunteers (ones who've extended an extra year to be 1/2 volunteers and 1/2 staff)

Plans were canceled due to political tension between some parties, anyway, as far as I understood, that's why plans were canceled.

For the Republic of Moldova, it's probably for their best interest that a foreigner, still a little sick, doesn't carry it to their boarder....and into their capital.

There will be another time, and if not, oh well, I'm heading out in 1 week anyway.

On the other note: guess what I got from a fellow PCV: A MUFFIN TIN!! It traveled a long long way to get to me, from Bucharesti, to Sinaia, to Galati, and then it reached me. We shall do great things together...after I get some more butter.

Here I also inherited a football from a PCV. The thing is, out of the 7 volunteers in my general area (within 2 hours travel radius) 5 of them are expected to leave this summer. I am sad, but now I have a football. It reminds me of America.

So there really just isn't much to post about. The stuff is boring old home stuff.

The only big difference is that I caught the flu this weekend, but I feel a lot better now. I even got the shot.

I may go to Cahul in the Republic of Moldova tomorrow...but I haven't heard from anyone yet, and we'd be leaving in 12 hours from now, so we shall see. It will be my first trip out of the country, even though it will be for just 1 day. =) Excited! I went with Nils and Em to buy our tickets for Istanbul:Turkey, Tess___:Greece, and Sofia:Bulgaria! Since I'm younger than 26, some of my deals were 1/2 off!

It looks like this 6 day trip with accommodations and travel looks like: maybe 350RON, which is about $115. Talk about deals! I think the other travel buddies are looking at 400RON.

Anyway, more to come on future trips.

I had the shivers all night, nausea, etc.... and 102F temp, but it's dropped by now. My neighbor found out and came in and yelled at me, gave me food and tea and lit my fire for me. I am grateful that I have such wonderful neighbors.

I say puttering about, cause now I'm almost done with this library project, same old same old.

Taught kids about testing nitrates, same old same old.

One of my favorite pictures of all time. I asked her to pose while she read our local newspaper which I helped start. Okay, I'm modest here, I created and put together and I hope it continues, so now I have to hand it over to Romanians so it will continue even after I leave.

I finally got funds to print a lot more copies, and look, I finally got people to put some ads in it too. Many were shy at first and I didn't have any ads in the first paper.

I have a trash pile in my garden...because there's no trash system in my village, so finally I decided to build something so dogs/cats/and chickens couldn't tear into my trash.

Plus on windy days.....point was: it was built and I'm quite proud of them. Not bad though right? for 6 months' worth of trash. NO idea what to do when they're full though.

Yeah...same old stuff. 1 year down, 1 more year to go. We shall see...

Morning started: Going to work at the Primaria (mayor's office)

-chain of bike got tangled and I was dragging and huffing and rearranging the chain all the way to work.

- 4 dogs chased me on my bike on my way home from work.

- my project with my organization suddenly became "my" project and I was "informed" in the "it's not you, it's us": there's no help in funding it...and I realized I have to do everything myself to keep it working: research costs, printing, distributing, etc...

After that fun, I had to go to the city to get some stuff done, and here's what had to get done:

1. Pick up a muffin tin from a girl, a muffin tin that was bought in the capitol of Romania and has had to travel between 5 intermediates to reach me.

2. Pick up 3rd book to the Twilight series form a lady.

3. Print out 200 copies of our local newspaper to distribute in my village.

4. Pick up a package delivered to the city post office.

How many items got done? => 0

-Muffin tin girl was out of town

-Book was inside a closed building

- All the employees got the day off and I found out the morning of on my way there.

- I arrived 10 mins late and my plea of "I live in a village and this is a far ways go travel," did not melt the icy heart I faced.

Ergo, I went shopping, for food cause that's comforting and I wanted to make the trip worth something.

Then I got home from my long day: 1/2 at the Primaria and 1/2 in the city and realized it was too late to buy gas for my stove...

Then I had to get wood ready for warmth, and I got a nice deep splinter in the middle of my palm while trying to shove wood into the soba.

At that point, I realized I was having a bad day...and then I took a hot hot shower, and decided to just watch a movie and have a downkey evening,

then sleep.

Oh, and I was afraid that my chicken of 2 weeks old in the fridge would go bad, so I attempted to cook it and it wasn't charred black!! I was surprised, and so my 11pm snack was an okay ending to my day.

Do you A. Cook the 1/2 cooked omelet (egg, mushroom, celery root, and garlic) over a candle?

or B. Stick the mixture (which is in my coffee pot by the way) into the Soba, and try not to cook my hand...or have the pot melt and bend.

Well..."A" looked too weak to work, and so I attempted B. Nothing was burnt! and my hand smells non-cooked. All is well, and let's hope better once I get the tank replaced.

Point is: I have hot water! That's all that matters.