Waking up to snow

I woke up this morning like any other morning and followed my routine... shower, dress, do something with my hair, throw on a little makeup, go to the kitchen, look out the window to see what the weather looks like, get some cof....whoa,wait, back up WHAT IS ALL THAT WHITE STUFF ON THE GROUND?!?!?!? Oh, its snow!! Oh, its snow (picture me excited, then concerned about my walk to work). Yes kids, today 9 December 2009 was the first day (since my arrival) that it has snowed in Floresti. Now granted, 1 November we did have a few little flecks of snow, but it never stuck and only came down for about 5 minutes so I don't really count that.

The walk to school wasn't bad other than being really cold (although the walk home was even more cold). The snow was really a lite dusting, but enough to write my name on the table in the snow and to stay for several hours on the ground, cars, trees and houses. I like the idea of snow, but I am not sure I will like/enjoy the reality of it haha Well, at least I know that winter is getting ready to join me here in Moldova. Glad I have plenty of layers to wear and got my boots that my parents sent.

Notice the frost on the shirt that was drying on the line.

Our garden with a side of snow

The Metric System, More School, Thanksgiving

First let me say:

Now, to my first topic-the Metric System. One thing I have not really talked about is that I am having to completely change my way of thinking when it comes to weight, height, temperature and distance. As most of you I'm sure know, we use the metric system over here. America needs to get on board with this. It would make things so much simpler since most of the world uses this system of measurement.

I decided not to tackle all of the metric system at once. I have opted for the two areas I use most: temperature and weight.

Temperature, because well basically I want to be able to understand weather reports and not be scared when it says that today will be 10 degrees (which is 50 degrees Fahrenheit). Knowing that 10 degrees Celsius is equal to 50 degrees Fahrenheit is not so scary. What is scary is when my host family says typical winter tempertures are around -10 degrees Celsius. (Note: see Becca frantically pull out calculator and compute -10C x 9/5 + 32!) It also helps when needing to convert American baking recipes to Moldovan stoves!

Weight, because my family and school colleagues are obsessed by me losing weight since thin is mai frumos (more beautiful). And my host mom is very happy to tell all the neighbors how many kilograms I have lost since coming to Moldova. (The formula is lbs/2.2)

Having both of those down now and having a decent reference point so that I don't always have to do a mental calculation I have decided next to tackle distance. This is going to prove a little more difficult since I never had a good judge of distance in American measurements. Having a point of reference will not help me like it did with temperature and weight haha.

I am assuming that I will have the metric system down by the time I leave, just in time to come back to America and lose it all!

Happy measuring!

As I posted previously, N1H1 (the Swine Flu) has come to Moldova. But they have the cure or at least the way of prevention-garlic, onions, vodka, alcohol soaked fabric wrapped around door handles and masks! Also, we had an additional week off from school after the Autumn break which was great. But the downside of that extra week is that we need to make up the lost time.

Some schools are making up the time by holding classes on Saturdays (5 Saturdays, one for each day missed). Other's are adding a zero period to the daily schedule. My school decided to add an extra 5 days to the end of the semester. What this means for me: The last day of the semester is Thursday, December 24. The make-up week will begin the next day-Friday, December 25 and will go straight through the weekend until Tuesday, December 29. But it is worth it, because as soon as that last day is done I am on a bus to Chisinau! December 29 is the day we leave for BARCELONA, SPAIN!! (Please note: the picture above of the child is just something I found online, I didn't actually see a child licking a pig-although if I had and was able to get a picture of that, I would have been happy I carried my camera that day. I just found the picture humorous!)

Thanksgiving is this coming week, something that is not well known or even cared about in Moldova(for obvious reasons!) For example, I teach all week-school is not cancelled Wednesday through Friday like in America. Because of this, Peace Corps volunteers will be celebrating this food festival on Saturday. I will be leading one of three cooking teams. Me and 3 other volunteers will be preparing 1 turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy and stuffing at the home of our Country Director-Jeffery. After our food is prepared, we will meet everyone at the Peace Corps office for lots of food and fun! My friends and I have already booked an apartment for the whole weekend so that we can relax and enjoy the good company and holiday festivities without trying to rush off to catch the last bus to our villages. While I am going to miss spending the holiday with my family and friends at home, I am glad that I will get to have a little piece of home here in Moldova with my new family and friends! Hope you all have a good Thanksgiving.

First birthday away

The first week of November was autumn break for all of the schools in Moldova. I was excited since this happen to coincide with my birthday (the first birthday I've had away from family and friends). As it worked out, we (the English Education volunteers) had an IST-In Service Training that week as I have mentioned in a previous post. This meant that I would at least be with all my friends for my birthday!!

Sunday, November 1st found Erika and Matt (two of my closest friends in Moldova) staying in Floresti with me. It was a great way to start the autumn break. We three went to Chisinau on Monday together and I was able to see another friend Tom since he was still in town. Me, Tom and a few other volunteers went out that night to a bar which turned out to be a karaoke bar. Let's just say, Becca sang karaoke with Tom...it was not good and completely laughable!! (And before you ask, we sang Alien Ant Farm's version of 'Smooth Criminal'). There are pictures somewhere. If I can get my hands on them, I will post em!

The training did not start until Tuesday, but the few of us volunteers who were facilitating presentations/discussion topics had to be in a day early to prepare any materials and go over any last minute changes needed.

The training went well. I enjoyed that it was volunteer led and mostly discussion based versus lecture based. Made it all more interesting! It was also nice being back with my group of volunteers and hearing about their schools, partners and sites. We had a lot of fun being back together.

So, Wednesday was my birthday. After training that day, we all went to a restaurant for dinner and of course drinks. Afterwards, we headed to another bar. It was a really great night and was a good distraction from not celebrating with friends and family back home. Highlight of the night however, was getting to talk to Staci. She called and I was ecstatic that I got to talk to her!! I have posted pictures from that night on my Facebook page and will include a link.

First Moldovan Birthday!

The remainder of the week went well. Not too much to talk about that. Towards the end of the week we heard rumors about schools being closed the week of November 9-13 because of the N1H1 Virus. There was a big outbreak in Ukraine (and as of right now we are not allowed to visit Ukraine). So in response and to allow the schools to implement some precautionary measures, classes were rumored to be cancelled. This did take place. I have not taught for the last two weeks (vacation and school closures). On one hand it was nice to have a week off and feel like we got to have a vacation/break of sorts since the original was filled with training. But on the other hand, I am now bored and a little listless because of all the downtime. However, the week was not all downtime and boring. Dan, one of the other volunteers and a good friend, came for a visit for three of the days. I showed him Floresti and on his second day here, we went to Balti and met some others. It was really nice having a friend visit. I took pictures of the day in Balti and added them to the Moldovan Characters album on my Facebook page. I included that link as well, just go all the way to the end of the album.

Here it is Saturday. There were talks about extending the school closures one more week as the number of N1H1 cases has risen here in Moldova. But the official word now is that we will return to schools on Monday. From there we will just have to see how things play out. Now, this next part is mostly for my mother...Peace Corps will be providing all the volunteers with the N1H1 vaccine. It should be arriving shortly and I will make my way to Chisinau to get it. They have already given us the seasonal flu vaccine. So you don't need to worry about me MOM!! hehe

On another note. While I was in Chisinau visiting the medical office to get my flu vaccine and pick up some misc cold medicines (just in case since winter is here) I decided to weigh myself. I know that I have lost weight (about 4 pant sizes) but I was not sure of how much. I was astonished and even asked the doctor to double check that I had correctly used the scale. Since arriving in June, I have lost about 50 lbs!! This makes me very happy, but the doctor was concerned so she is going to monitor things for awhile. I am not too worried though. I eat throughout the day decent amounts of food. I just credit the 25 minute walk (one way) up and down hills to my school everyday! Trust me, that walk alone would make anyone lose weight.

Halloween-Best holiday in any country

We celebrated Halloween (American style) today at school. I have included a link to the photo album I created on Facebook with all the pictures from today.

I did my best to make a costume-I was a cat. I made cat ears from index cards, a tail from a black sock and drew a cat face with my black eyeliner, then dressed in black and white. I was the only person dressed in a "costume" but I am getting used to being the odd man out at my school. Everyone seemed to like it and I got a lot of cat calls (hahaha, pun intended!)

In each of my classes we played bobbing for fruit (oranges in one class, apples in another), the toilet paper Mummy game, Halloween word searches, made masks and drew scary pictures. I also read them a spooky story and my partner translated it.

The students made jack-o-lanterns (which were really creative and very good) and brought drawings from home of halloween images.

All week we have been working on saying:

Trick or treat

Smell my feet (which they think is hilarious)

Give me something good to eat!

I was so proud when all of the students in the school (including some that are not mine) were saying this in order to get their candy from all the teachers. Students during each of the breaks would go from classroom to classroom "trick-or-treating", but they knew they had to say the rhyme. My 5th graders even sang it instead of just saying it!!!

Tonight there is a dance at the school, so I will be heading back there. Hope everyone enjoys their Halloween weekend!!

Halloween 2009

New photos

This is only a post to let you know I have now added more pictures to the seasonal changes album and the Moldovan characters album on Facebook. In the Moldovan Characters, you will find group pictures of each class I teach.

Seasonal Changes

Moldovan Characters

Hope this post is finding everyone well and happy. Love you all!!

A quickie

This is a quick one. I have posted a bunch of new photos on my Facebook page. Some of the pictures are already posted on this blog, but if you get past those there are some new ones.

My Peace Corp Life

Things are going well here. Only a few more days and then school is out for the Autumn break (Nov 2-6). However, since we are volunteers 24 hours a day, we have training that week in Chisinau. It will be nice to be with all of my English Education friends for my birthday. Although would have been nice to enjoy a week off, but that's the life of a volunteer! It should be interesting.

Plans are coming together for our Spain trip. Looks like we will be gone December 29-January 8!! Woohoo!! We will spend part of that time in Barcelona and part of it in Majorca.

As a side note, I would love to hear from you all. I get excited whenever I get emails, letters and packages from home. I don't care how boring you may think it is, I would love to hear about it! So please keep the information coming to me. Even if you are telling me about the weather, I want to hear about it, cause I'm freezing over here already haha!! My first winter might be a bit tough for me. We'll see!!

Festivals, Parties and General Revelry...oh and holiday plans!

This past weekend was spent primarily in Chisinau for the much anticipated Annual International Wine Festival. A large majority of volunteers were in town which was great to be able to see everyone. And on Saturday morning, the Peer Support Network (its exactly what it sounds like-a volunteer support network) had a 5k run/walk to raise some money. Lots of volunteers came out to help set up and participate in the race.

Later in the day, myself and some other volunteers from the English Education group headed to the Peace Corps office for a meeting about facilitating presentations during out IST (In-service training) in November. It should be interesting and I'm looking forward to being with everyone in Chisinau on my birthday (that's when the IST is scheduled).

Of course, as soon as the meeting was over, we all dispersed with some haste to catch up with all the other volunteers are Wine Fest. It was a great time: the food was delicious, the wine tasty and varied, and the company extraordinary. It was so nice to be with mostly everyone again and have the chance to meet and talk more with others who I don't see on a regular basis.

Follow this link for pictures I have posted on my facebook account for the weekend:

Wine Festival Weekend

Here is another link to an album I created on my facebook account of how my house/garden looked in the Summer and so far in the Autumn. The colors seemed to change over night and are beautiful!

Various Seasons

This is a link (again to facebook) to see some of the people I have been spending my time with.

My New Friends

I will update these albums from time to time and let you all know when I do!

Sunday morning started out really nice and laid back, which I needed after the fun and festivities of the night before. I had breakfast and walked around with my friend Tom (another volunteer who lives in the south). Then headed home for my host nephew's Cumatria (cu-ma-tree-a). This is a big party for all of the god parents (they have multiple god parents for each child here). Having partied the whole weekend and had very little sleep I was already exhausted when I got home. But here in Moldova, they know how to party! I arrived at the restaurant/party room around 3:30pm. I did not get home until 12am!!! And again, much celebration, drinking, fabulous food and of course dancing! I am working on getting these pictures uploaded and will post a link soon.

By Monday, I was drained. But I still went into work grateful that I only had two classes that day!

Tomorrow is Hram for Floresti. This is a town/village holiday (so I do not have to work tomorrow) that celebrates when the town/village was blessed. I have bee helping my host mom prepare food for the inevitable guests that will be coming over tomorrow. I made the tort (cake) and she was is impressed by my baking skills that she commented what a good wife I will make one day! I just laughed. But it was nice to be able to cook a bit and I had a nice time with her.

As for the last part of my title...holiday travel plans. I was a bit worried about my first Christmas away from my family because Christmas here is celebrated more on January 7 rather than December 25 (and frankly the idea of snow scares me a bit too so being able to get away is great!!) So Erika (another volunteer) and I came up with the glorious plan of going to Spain for Christmas!! We are still getting travel plans together, but originally it was going to be from December 25-30. However, after talking with another volunteer this weekend, the trip is going to longer and I will be ringing in the New Year in Spain!!! Will write more as the details come together.