Biden visits Chisinau

I’ve been so busy lately that I don’t really have the energy to write all about Joe Biden’s visit to Chisinau so I will let this article and video speak for itself and then just give some of my impressions. You can watch the whole video of his speech and get a good idea of what the event was like.

http://traduno.wordpress.com/2011/03/11/joe-biden-visited-moldova/

Needless to say, this event pretty much shut down Chisinau. It was crazy getting in and Liz and I had to be squashed in a mob of people for over an hour before we could get our Ids checked and make it to security. We managed to create some space for ourselves to breathe for a little while by stepping in the mud surrounding a tree on the sidewalk because there was no way any of the Moldovans were going to get their shoes dirty. This stressed me out as well but fresh air and a smidgeon of personal space was the priority at the moment.

The rest of the event was fun. There was live music for a few hours before Biden came on stage. This was a very Romanian-heavy event which makes sense since the tone was completely pro-Europe. No one sang in Russian and I didn’t hear much Russian in the crowd while we were trying to get in. Biden gave a good speech but didn’t say much that was groundbreaking or unexpected. It was a little funny when he said “You know, Moldovans have something to be proud of…” and I wasn’t expecting that this pride was supposed to come from the fact that Natalie Portman’s grandmother and Rahm Emanuel’s grandfather were both Moldovan. I guess that’s impressive. Here’s a picture of me and Liz with some Moldovan friends we made because the girl wanted me to send her my photos from the speech.

Another important issue that arose from Biden’s visits to Moscow and Chisinau concerns the future of Transnistria. I was a bit surprised that he was so confident that Transnistria’s future must lie in the confines of the Moldovan border. It’s just hard to imagine that happening anytime soon. I guess the idea is that if the US and the EU help Moldova to become a prosperous country with lots of economic opportunities than Transnistrians will want to be a part of it to reap the benefits. I ran into a couple of students from Transnistria when I was trying to get to the Chisinau Assistance and Protection Center (that’s a whole different story) and they agreed that Transnistrians would want to be Moldovan citizens if they saw that the situation there was really that much better. At any rate the politics surrounding Transnistria are very, very complicated and it’s certainly not up to the general population of the region to decide its fate so we’ll see what happens.