Romanian lessons

Ok, I know I'm crazy for wanting to take Romanian lessons when I can get by with Russian pretty much 100% of the time, I should probably be working to improve my Russian more than anything, and Romanian isn't the most useful language on the face of the planet, but whatever. I'm doing it. The staff meetings at Winrock are in Romanian and the people in the office speak Romanian most of the time so it would be nice to be able to eavesdrop on them and stuff.

So I want to the Casa Limbii Romane, recommended by a previous Fulbrighter, to ask about lessons. I spoke to the director in Russian and he was a bit confused as to why I would want to learn Romanian if I speak Russian and I'm going to be in Moldova for less than a year. I kind of got a feeling of judgment like when my Bulgarian teacher at the embassy last summer basically told me and Hillary that we were crazy for studying Bulgarian because it would completely mess up our Russian. Romanian is a romance language though so there's nothing to worry bout there. Anyway, after our discussion the director invited me to sit in on a class to see how the group lessons are taught. On Monday I went to the evening class and I'm pretty sure the students were all ethnic Russians. Observing the class was like studying two languages at once because it was a mixture of Russian and Romanian the whole time. I actually saw one of the girls from that class sitting outside my apartment building last night, which isn't because I'm pretty sure I happen to be in an area where only Russians live. I haven't heard anyone speaking Romanian around the apartment complex in the month I've been here.

The class seemed like it would be ok, but the director also said that there's the option to take private lessons and I could try an hour for free to see if I would like that better. So that's what I did today. I got to choose the time and the instructor came right to my apartment so that was convenient. I feel like I made a lot of progress in an hour and I really like the teacher. She said it's up to me to decide how often I want to have lessons and for how long, and she also said that once we master the verbs I'll probably have enough to get by. I think at that point I would stop having lessons and just teach myself while getting conversational practice with my host family and people at work.

I'm probably being too defensive about this decision, but there are actually practical reasons for me to study Romanian. I can already understand about 75% of what I read because of the similarities to French and English, so if I learn to read and write the language then I can help out at work with Romanian-English translations instead of just Russian-English. It'll also help with my research because a lot of documents are only in Romanian.

Not to mention, I assume that learning Romanian will significantly increase my chances of finding a Moldovan husband. And we all know that's why I'm really here.

BEST NIGHT

The Ethno Jazz Festival just totally blew my mind. The final act tonight was a Polish group with dual accordions, violin, drums, bass, clarinet and it was UNBELIEVABLE. I wish I could describe how amazing it was. There's nothing like raucous live jazz music that is just oozing with creativity and passion. So glad I went. My heart is breaking a little bit because all I want to do is play my violin and I don't have it. I'm definitely going to get a ticket at least for Sunday night too. The second group was also great because the singer was this awesome woman from Zimbabwe who really drew in the crowd. But really the last group gave one of the best performances I've ever seen.

Before the concert I went to one of the best restaurants in Chisinau, Grill House, with Frank (a Fulbright scholar who is teaching at Moldova State) and the food and atmosphere was very good there too. Not to mention the weather today was gorgeous. I'm really loving this city right now.

Link to the website of the Bester Quartet from Poland: http://www.besterquartet.com/english.php.

Moldovan Identity

Last night I met a couple of ladies who work for the Soros Foundation-Moldova at Pani Pit, which has a really nice atmosphere and plays jazz music. From what I gathered, the Soros office in Chisinau primarily works to promote democratiziation and good governance and in that capacity they do a lot with monitoring and training NGOs. They ladies I met with are also very interested in the work that is being done to empower women in Moldova, which in turn helps decrease the risk of human trafficking and helps in the fight against domestic violence. Women all around Moldova are provided with trainings about how to start their own businesses, mobilize a community to address different issues, and gain self-esteem among many other things. Winrock is just one of many NGOs that give trainings and seminars with those goals.

We had an interesting conversation about Moldova's place stuck between the EU and Russia and how challenging it is to find a real sense of Moldovan identity. We talked about the benefits of Moldova working towards EU membership just in that it provides a stimulus for reform since all countries are expected to reach certain standards in all areas including economics, political stability, human rights, and so on before joining. However, it is also important for Moldova to maintain strong ties to Russia because you can't just forget that it was a part of the Soviet Union not that long ago, and that Russia controls its gas and has strong influence in the breakaway region of Transnistria.

They also enlightened me a little more about Moldovan sensitivity to language issues and ethnic minorities. Apparently although most Moldovans, especially in Chisinau, speak Romanian and Russian fluently, they make a lot of mistakes in both languages. I'm starting to understand a little bit more about how language is studied and used here. My boss at work said that although pretty much everyone speaks both languages now, that might not be the case in 10 years. Most people are educated in Romanian but study Russian as a second language in school, but actually it seems the majority of Moldovans are now studying French and English instead of Russian. In southern cities like Comrat everyone speaks Russian and that will probably be true for many years to come, but in other parts of the country it seems like you're going to start hearing Russian less and less. One of the women I was with said that it doesn't even make sense historically for Moldova to be its own country, and that it would make more sense if it had been absorbed by Romania again after the fall of the Soviet Union. But then there's the issue of Transnistria and all the ethnic minorities in the country. If everyone was suddenly a Romanian but felt no connection to that culture and didn't speak the language, that would be a very uncomfortable spot to be in. Overall, the national, cultural, and linguistic aspects of Moldovan identity create a very complex subject of study and I'm looking forward to exploring that more during my time here.

We also got back to the topic of my research, and both women shared stories with me about women they have met who have been trafficked. These stories and case studies really provide the best view into the issue of human trafficking in Moldova, so I was very interested to hear what they had to say. One of the women lived with a girl when she was at university who ended up being trafficked. She saw her when she came back to Moldova after a couple of years and she had lost tons of weight and clearly had experience trauma and was struggling with psychological issues. She's abroad again now but supposedly in a better situation. I won't get into many details on my blog with case studies I encounter because I feel like it's very sensitive material, but when you see that you have a small degree of separation between yourself and someone who was trafficked the problem seems that much more real. In Moldova, it really seems like it can happen to anyone, and how the whole process unfolds and what happens in the aftermath varies drastically from case to case.

The Winrock Experience

I started my internship at Winrock Moldova last week and I haven't really written anything about the work I'm doing yet so I think it's time for that. Winrock International is an American organization that has offices all over the world. I'm working on GTIP (Transnistrian Women's Support Program), which is funded by the US State Department, and right now I'm also helping out with anything else that comes up in the office. I'll be helping with monitoring the activities that are going on at our two resource centers in Transnistria, which include trainings on trafficking awareness and entreprenurial skills among other things, plus they offer free psychological and legal counseling and a crisis hotline. I'll also be translating some documents from English into Russian and vice versa. I translated some questions to send to the resource centers from English to Russian today and it was pretty difficult actually because of the terminology used, but I think it will get easier if I do it more often. I'm also reviewing the new proposal to extend the project for two more years and was brainstorming some new ways to raise awareness about domestic violence and human trafficking. They aren't making use of social networking sites at all so far and I think that could be a really useful way to attract attention to these issues. I visited one of my co-workers at home and met her teenage daughter who spends all her time on the internet. She has Facebook and also odnaklassnitsa which is a Russian site. I checked kontakte, which is the primary Russian version of Facebook, and there are probably 100,000 young people from Transnistria on that website from the quick calculations I made. I think if Winrock made an official group on each of these sites and invited people to join, then posted the anti-trafficking videos they've made and other information on those pages they would get a lot of views. So I'll probably suggest that and see what my co-workers think.

Like I mentioned above, I got to visit one of my co-workers (Raisa) at home last night. She has invited me to live with her and her daughter to help them learn English, and I think I'm going to take her up on that offer. Georgeta, the leader of the GTIP program, came over as well with her 3 year old daugther and we all had dinner together. I was a bit nervous when she said she was making fish because I usually say I have an allergy to fish to avoid it, but I decided to try it and it was actually really good with all the vegetables to kind of disguise the fishiness. So yeah that was actually the first time in my life that I've eaten fish I believe.

The best part of living with a host would be learning more about Moldovan traditions and getting practice with both Russian and Romanian. At dinner they already filled me in on a few things. For example, if someone spills a drink (especially on holidays), it means your dead relatives want some too. We also had some homemade wine which is very popular here. Another topic of dinner conversation was whether or not I'm trying to find a Moldovan husband. I knew that question was going to come at some point, but I didn't really answer. They asked me what I think of their men and I said that they seem to be good looking and they were like "Yeah...yep they're handsome but that's about it." Daniela, the 3-year-old, was adorable. Raisa told her that she would get a surprise after dinner and it turned out to be gummy bears, which she called "jelly bones." Georgeta thought that was what they were too so they were both laughing and saying "ooo jelly bones, jelly bones" over and over again and it was so cute that I couldn't correct them.

So that's what's been going on with me and the Winrock crew. Tonight I had a really good conversation over dinner with a couple of ladies from the Soros Foundation but I'll save that for tomorrow.

Festivities

So yesterday I was planning on just hanging out at my apartment after Melissa and Liz left but someone from work called and told me that I should go downtown because there was some kind of festival going on that I probably wouldn't get to see again. I'll let this short video I made speak for itself, but I still don't really know what this event was. All I know is that 90% of the people there were on bikes. And there was breakdancing. The quality of the video is better on vimeo http://www.vimeo.com/15136656. Or watch below.




ADDENDUM:

Apparently if I had read the Embassy newsletter a little more carefully I would have caught the paragraph about this event. It was the annual "Vela Hora" bike rally where people do a 20k loop on bikes around the city and the festival in the center of town was affiliated with this.

Weekend with Fulbrighters

Liz and Melissa came to visit me this weekend and it was great to get to know them better. They are both Fulbright ETAs, which means that they are teaching English in cities/towns outside of Chisinau. Liz is at a university in Comrat, which is in the South in Gaugazia where everyone speaks Russian and also Gaugazian which is similar to Turkish. Melissa is closer to Chisinau in Orhei and she's teaching 6th grade.

Liz came and stayed with me Thursday night because she wanted to check out the Flow Festival that was taking place in Chisinau. The website made it seem like this "festival of conversation" was open to the public but in reality the discussion sessions were meant for people who were nominated by their countries to participate in this event. There were 5 or 6 people from each country, including Bosnia, Ukraine, Moldova, Hungary, and some other places. I met up with Liz in the afternoon to see what it was an I was glad I went because it was pretty interesting. Getting there was a bit of a challenge though. On the website it said that it was taking place on this beach, and when we looked up the location on Google maps it looked like it was going to be right next to this big lake. However, this lake has completely dried up so when Liz went in the morning and was asking people for directions they had no idea what she was talking about. She finally found it though and told me how to get there from work so it wasn't a problem.

Anyway, so I got there and people were set up in groups and each group had a different topic to discuss. They let us sit in and listen even though we weren't participants, and everything was in English so that was good. We listened to the group that was discussing identity, and it was really fascinating especially to hear people from the Balkans talk about their life experiences. Most of the people there were professors, and one guy was a Bosnian refugee living in Germany. After the discussion section, the entire group was going on special tours of Chisinau and Liz and I managed to get in on that too. There were three options, and we went on the tour that was about the underground culture of the city. It was kind of sad because the guide would take us to some place and be like oh this used to be an open-air book market where people would come and exchange books and sit at this cafe and talk about interesting stuff etc. and well now it's a parking lot. Oh and here there used to be this amazing theater where artists would come and perform original works but it was shut down and now it's a restaurant. The last stop was at a cafe that's literally underground and still hosts concerts so it's good to know about.

Melissa came into town Friday night, and on Saturday we met up with this guy Isaac who is in the Peace Corps and lives close to her town. We also ran into a couple that I had met at the labor day bbq at the marine house and some people Isaac knows so it was kind of an American overload day. Melissa, Liz and I cooked dinner together at night and looked up some clubs to go to. We really wanted to go to the one that was rated the best in Liz's guide book and online but we found out later in the night that it doesn't exist anymore. Before that disappointment though we went to a place that Melissa had been to before where there's this big bus in the middle of the room and the bartenders serve through the windows of the bus. That was pretty cool. Then we went to the club "Decadance" where there was a laser light show dance party kind of thing that was fun. We got to dance to some euro house music and that's all we really wanted so it was a good night. I'm looking forward to visiting their towns sometime soon because I really want to get outside of Chisinau and see what life is like in other parts of the country. We're all having very different experiences so it's great to be able to get together easily and hear about what's going on with everyone else.

The Central Market and Shopping Underground

Before I address the markets in Chisinau, I want to talk about the underpasses. Crossing the street has probably been the most terrifying part of my experience in Moldova so far. Yesterday when I was walking I started to imagine crossing the street and being run over by a speeding micro bus and having to worry about getting to a hospital and losing my legs and how much more difficult life would be if I didn't have my legs. So, I'm very cautious. I love the underpasses because I can cross the street without fear. In addition, while I make the short journey underground I can get visa pictures taken, buy a cell phone, have a bite to eat in a cafe, buy laundry detergent and a pet bird, get my hair cut, purchase a flat screen TV, and much more. I could probably do 90% of my shopping at this underpass next to my building if I really wanted to.

However, it is also an experience to go to the Central Market. The market is huge, it's only a 10 minute walk from my apartment, and it's open every day except Monday year round. Here, you can also find all the basic necessities of life, but more than anything it is the best place to buy fresh fruits and vegetables. If you read the book "The Geography of Bliss," then you know that although Moldova is the unhappiest place on earth according to some studies, you can find very fresh fruits and vegetables here. Although the Central Market is pretty wonderful, I can't really say I'm a big fan. I don't like the big crowds and being pushed around by babushkas. I think it would definitely be a better experience to go there knowing exactly what you want and where to find it, but right now I just wander around feeling totally overwhelmed. Also, it's a great place to go to buy in bulk, but since I'm the only one consuming this food I can't get too many fruits and vegetables or they will spoil. I saw one couple buy at least 40 bananas at one stand; I imagine that was a really good deal. They were probably going to resell them. Or they just really love bananas.

Well, here are a few pictures from the Piata Centrala. There is also an art market on the main boulevard where you can buy paintings, matroshka dolls, jewelry, and all kinds of things like that.

Working with 3 languages...

Last night I met up with Matt, the volunteer coordinator for Winrock, and some of the Moldovan university students who volunteer for the organization. We went to "Andy's Pizza" which is a Moldovan restaurant chain that looks very, very American. The new menus are all just color pictures with names in English and they look like they could have come out of a Denny's. The food was good, there was a lot of it, and it was inexpensive. There were six or seven of us there in total, and it was really nice to meet some new people. I spoke to the girls near me in Russian, and Matt spoke to the students across and next to him in Romanian. Then we spoke in English too, of course. So language wasn't really a problem at dinner.

After dinner, Yulia invited us to her apartment for a birthday party because her birthday had been the day before. We took taxis there and had some Moldovan salads and different appetizers that she had prepared. She also had some really good tirimasu for dessert. Yulia's older sister was there, and we started to encounter some language difficulties around the table because Matt speaks Romanian but no Russian, I speak Russian but no Romanian, and Yulia's sister doesn't speak any English. We made do talking in different languages and someone would translate once in a while, but that was a situation I hadn't been in before. I guess that's what happens when you have 2 official languages. I enjoyed hearing them talk in Romanian though and I was able to pick up a few phrases.

At any rate, I'm glad that I met some people who work with Winrock. One of the girls, Olga, is a project assistant and will be working right next to me in the office during the afternoons. Matt's last day is this coming Tuesday so I'll be taking his desk. Should work out well!

Ora International & Love and Care for Moldova

Yesterday I went to visit Catalina at her office and she told me all about the work she does for NGOs and charities in Chisinau. She definitely keeps herself extremely busy. She works for Ora International and also for the British charity "Love and Care for Moldova." Here are the links to the two websites.

http://www.love-and-care-for-moldova.co.uk/home/
http://www.ora-international.org/index.php?orga_id=30&setcookie=Go

She showed me a couple of movies they made and it was very eye-opening to see what life is like in the poorest villages in Moldova. She took Christmas gifts to children in one village that you can't access by car; they went by horse and carriage. The children she visited were dirty, had no adult supervision, and had only the clothes on their backs. Some of the young children can't go to school because they have to tend to the animals. It's a pretty dismal picture. She invited me to go along with her on one of her trips and I think I will do that at some point this year.

At her office building they also have a tailor shop where young women from the villages come to learn how to tailor and start their own businesses. They also have access to a psychiatrist and they teach English in the building. They are involved in many other projects, including managing an orphanage and nursing home. Catalina and I talked for a while about the work people are doing at NGOs in Chisinau. In her opinion, there is not enough coordination between organizations. It is difficult to do very much with minimal funding, and there could be a bigger impact if organizations joined forces more often. Instead, there is a feeling of competition that doesn't really benefit anyone. She also said that she's learned that the most beneficial aid she can give is education. A one-time donation of some books, food, or clothing is much appreciated, but won't make much of a difference in the long-term. A lot of the young people she has seen already have rotting teeth just because they haven't learned about personal hygiene.

Catalina is very interested in women's issues and empowering young women to change their lives, which is an important aspect of my research as well. Hopefully we will be able to work together on a project at some point during my time here.

Listening to lectures or giving them?

Well I went to ULIM today to find out more about auditing courses but the lady I talked to on the phone thought that I wanted to find a time to give a lecture to the students and faculty in the International Relations department. So, she wants me to give a lecture sometime next week on any subject related to IR. Another Fulbright Scholar is giving one of these public lectures this Thursday on the US Supreme Court so I'm going to go to that and see what kind of presentation she gives. The people at the Embassy said that we'd be called upon from time to time to do this kind of thing but I wasn't expecting it to come up so soon. Not really a big deal though.

The lady at ULIM did give me the contact information of another professor who teaches courses on the EU and has research interests in EU enlargement so I e-mailed her to see what courses she will be teaching this semester and to see if I can sit in on them. I'm sure something will work out. I'm definitely getting anxious to get some sort of schedule together though and to find out more about what I'll be doing at Winrock.

Catalina just came over to get me to sign my rental agreement for the apartment and she invited me to go visit her at work sometime this week so I might go in on Wednesday. She works at Ora International, which is a British NGO that she said focuses on helping orphans in Moldova, so it should be interesting to go check that out.

Oh on a final note, the referendum failed due to low voter turnout. Catalina was one of the people who was in charge of observing the election to make sure there wasn't fraud or anything like that and she said it was very boring. Looks like Moldova will be without a president for an indefinite period of time.

Constitutional Referendum

Today is an important day for Moldova. Voters are asked to answer the question "Would you agree with the Constitutional amendment, which would allow the election of the President of the Republic of Moldova by the entire population?" If the referendum passes, this will be an important step for the country's aspirations to join the EU in the future.

In other news, the party at the embassy was a lot of fun last night and I met a bunch of new people. Apparently Chisinau is known as a good post for families because it's so safe, so most of the people who were there are married and have kids. I did, however, meet a girl who just joined the Foreign Service in the management cone and I think we'll be good friends. She's interested in going to the operas and ballets so I'll have someone to do that stuff with. I was also able to talk to some people about their jobs and about joining the foreign service so it was great to get more insight about the career. I picked up a sim card on the way over so I was able to exchange contact information with people and I already have new contacts for my project.

Coincidentally, I ran into a couple of American missionaries who are also working on a project related to the issue of human trafficking when I was on my way to the barbecue. When I got off the bus, I wasn't totally sure that I was in the right place and I heard people in front of me speaking English so I asked them if they were going there. That wasn't where they were headed, but they lived close by so they walked me part of the way there and gave me directions. The lady gave me their business card and said that she knows someone who has been working with trafficking victims for the past 5 years and would be a good contact for me.

Finally, I want to note that public transportation is extremely inexpensive. It cost 2 lei for a ticket which is about 15 cents. I thought 10 rubles for a ticket (about 30 cents) in Vladimir was cheap. So it won't be expensive to get around if I use public transportation, but I'm lucky that I live right downtown so I'll probably walk everywhere even in the winter.

Back with the Embassy Crowd

Today I went to the US Embassy to check-in with the Public Affairs Office. I finally got to meet Valerie, Irina, and Valentina in person and they were all very nice and helpful. They told me that different organizations and universities in Chisinau might like me to come in to give presentations in English or lead conversation groups and I would definitely be interested in helping out with that because I will meet a lot of new people. Irina also gave me the contact information of a lady at the International Organization of Migration who said she would help me out with my research in any way possible. The office had been trying to get me an internship there because that was the organization I identified in my proposal, but it wasn't going to be a good time for them to take on the additional responsibility of an intern. This woman should be able to get me into meetings and give me some good information though so I'm looking forward to meeting her.

Anyway, it was fun to be back in a US Embassy. This one couldn't be much different from the embassy in Sofia. In Bulgaria, the embassy was located really far away from anything and the security was way more intense. That embassy was also enormous, and this one is very small but in a much prettier building. Valerie said one reason she chose this post was because she heard the city is very safe, so that was good to hear. She's been here for a year so far.

I didn't meet many other people, but there is going to be a Labor Day Barbecue with live music tomorrow and I was invited to that so I'm definitely going to go. Irina and Valentina aren't going but they said all the Americans will be there. It's at the Marine House, just like all the events were when I was in Bulgaria. The address is farther from the embassy though; in Sofia the building was practically attached to the embassy. They gave me good directions though so I think I'm going to take public transportation for the first time and I'm sure I'll find it ok.

I think next week I will start to arrange meetings and figure out what classes I might be able to take at ULIM. I know this week wouldn't be good for everyone because there were a few holidays and then the semester just started up so it would be really busy at the universities. Next week things should start to come together, and I'm excited to meet more people tomorrow.

No longer afraid of the gas stove

I faced my fear of lighting the gas stove today and made scrambled eggs for breakfast and Russian pelmeni for dinner. The package of frozen pelmeni that I bought cost less than $2 and could easily feed me for a week but I would probably get very sick of them. Its not my favorite food, but its familiarty was comforting. Maybe I should try the package with the penguins on it instead of cows but I didn't know what kind of meat would be in that one. Not that I really know what kind of meat is in the ones I bought either. That's the fun of eating meat-filled things in Russia and Eastern Europe.

In other news, the weather was nice and cool today so I spent a couple of hours exploring the city and figuring out just how close I am to everything. I was pleased to discover that I am in fact very close to everywhere I might need to be because the city isn't really that big. There is also a big shopping center right across the street; I can see it from my window but didn't realize what it was until today. So I bought more food there, and they have tons of stands to buy whatever you need inside. I was just walking around without a map to see what I would run into, and I think I happened across all the universities in the city except the one I might be auditing classes at (ULIM). I'll find that and the U.S. Embassy tomorrow. I did see the Russian Embassy, and it's enormous, which was to be expected.

All of the young people I saw on the streets today were dressed up in suits and ties or dresses, and I immediately knew that this must be the first day of the new school year. My friends in Vladimir had told me they do the same thing in Russia, and everyone starts classes on the first of September. I guess the same is true in Moldova.

Anyway, I went to the main park today that's right on the main boulevard, where I live, and it was really beautiful. Here are some pictures from my wanderings today.