So September was a blur. Jen visited. We did everything - under the pinkish-haze of a good Day-Quil buzz. I picked her up in Bucharest and then we headed, via overnight train (with a 4-hour delay on the border to switch the wheels - where I had to exit the train car and RUN back over the border at 6am to go to the bathroom in Romania), back to Chisinau, Moldova. She saw a bit of my weird capital city and then we flew, MOLDOVA AIR, to Moscow (Domodedovo airport which had just had 2 planes hijacked & blown up by Chechen sepratists the week before). Three days in Moscow where we saw all the stuff (minus Lenin in his tomb), Boris Historical, Olga - the Polish tour guide to the Diamond Fund where all the tzars' jewels are held, the international arts and crap fair, all-you-can-eat-sushi, the Dirrrty nightclub 'The Hungry Duck', and ate fried mozzerella at TGIFriday's an hour after a subway bomb blew up. From Moscow - it was on to a less hostile (although the hostel was more hostile! ha!) St. Petersburg. The 'Hotel Zimmer Frei' and its host, Igor, were sucky - but that was the only bad thing about the whole city. The parks were cool, the people spoke english, Propaganda - the restaurant - was amazing, secret boat trips around the canals were cheap, Swan Lake ballet tickets are easy to find and Sbarro is making a serious dent in the international market.
We loved St. Petersburg - it was pretty, cheap, and a great get-away.
Then we took a train back to Moscow (1st class this time - not 'special' first class which meant we just paid to sleep in the train conductor's cabin) for another day and then back to Moldova.
Once we got to Moldova, I showed her my town (Cimislia) and Topala (my adopted village that is about to get water). After a few days in one place, we headed back to Bucharest (another train, of course) and more sight seeing/recuperation. We were so sick by this point that Jen, being the gainfully employed financial analyst she is - sprung for a fabulous room in the Hotel Opera - which came complete with everything from a mini-bar to white terry-cloth robes.
I bid her adieu a day later - and cried my eyes out. I balled much harder when she left than when I left the US. Maybe it has something to do with being the 'leave-ee' -- or maybe my sense of adventure has dulled a bit in the year I've been here. And the hefty doses of cold medicine weren't helping either.
FYI - My 1 year anniversary in country was September 13. I spent it travelling on the train BACK from Bucharest to Moldova - I thought it was pretty cool that I had entry stamps for Moldova on the same day - but one year apart.
More news:
Topala is fully funded, thanks to individual donations and SPA money. www.geocities.com/topalawater
I'm planning a Halloween party for the Topala school (160 kids) on Oct 29 - all donations welcomed.
Still losing weight - am in a pair of jeans 4 sizes smaller than when I arrived (yes, they have some lycra in them so they strech - but SO WHAT?!).
Just got over PNEUMONIA. I was sick for the whole month of September - starting with the Russia trip and ending with an all-night baptism. (I was a guest of honor at a baptism for Dennis (the newest resident of Topala) and that required showing up at the church at 5pm on Saturday night and partying until 7am Sunday morning. Then a brief nap. Then back to the party by 11am Sunday morning for more wine and chicken soup.). I never got well and that left me open to the big P. I've just spent the past week in the PC sick house - watching European MTV and wishing there was Chinese delivery in this country (I was craving egg-drop soup).
I'm not smoking these days (ok, so its been a week and a half so far) but I'm pretty committed to it this time.
My rabbit, April, died of a bunny flu a week after I got home from Russia. I will not be getting another pet.
I helped Jerry pick out a baby dachsund (her name is Stellutza - or Stella for short - it means little star in Romanian).. Actually, I talked him out of getting a funky bulldog at the pet piata the day after Jen left. He took me there to cheer me up. Lots and lots of big scary guard dogs and a ton of cocker spaniels. Who knew cockers were so popular??
I'm the consumate financial analyst at the dairy coop. I've put together numbers for my partner to prepare her for court -- she's suing our former milk factory for non-payment and disruption of business. Weirdly, this is the first such case in Moldova's judicial history. If we win, maybe I'll become famous. We've got a pretty good case and I've laid out (in EXCRUCIATING) detail how I arrived at our damages amount. Wish us luck.
Health Expo planning has got to get going again - but I think I'm going to put it off until after the Halloween Party.
Moldovan Update
Its wine season again here. The kids of Cimislia have been picking grapes the past 2 weeks instead of going to school- and getting paid slave wages for each bucket of grapes she brings in. Its called the 'coles' (pron.: cole-ess) which means 'collection'. I'm really surprised all the kids do it with the blessing of the school - considering its more of a village tradition and we're a town of 18,000 -- but that's what Virginia's been up to.
Natasha (host mom) has been doing repairs on the first floor of the house. This means that she hired 2 ladies to strip all the wall paper, spackle, re-sand, and put up new paper. In the Moldovan twist to things, it meant that the 2 ladies also ate dinner with us and slept in the upstairs TV room. FOR A WEEK!!! Totall wierd. And, because of wall-paper-paste thermodynamics, we weren't allowed to walk through the downstairs hall -- instead we had to go OUTSIDE first to then cut through the garage if we wanted to get to the kitchen or bathroom. NOT FUN FOR THOSE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT BATHROOM RUNS! It was the first time I considered the outhouse more convenient than the indoor bathroom.
I'm trying to get EVERYONE comfortable with the idea that I'm going to be moving out soon. As Moldova uses gossip as its #1 energy source (joke - really its coal), I have had to convince Natasha that no one will be talking badly about her when I move. She's concerned the town will start whispering that her house was horrible, or that I hated her, or that she was a bad cook - if I leave. To counter this, i'm running around telling people what kind of an awesome hotel it was to live there - how good the food was (in general, it was pretty tasty and low-meat) - and how pampered I was. All of this is true. Just telling people I want to live by myself doesn't work here as people never chose to live alone if there is the option of living with family. So I have to just be more verbal. Now, mind you, I HAVEN'T FOUND A PLACE OR MOVED OUT YET!!!
Overall - I'm alive and kicking - and almost off the antibiotics. Thanks again to everyone who's written/sent/thought about me. Special mention to Todd Wallin for the Twizzlers and Debra for stuffing my replacement credit cards into boxes of Jell-O and FedExing them to me (did I forget to mention my wallet was taken on the street about 4 hours after we got to Moscow? This caused Jen to be my reluctant sugar mama for the trip (short-term-non-interest-bearing-loan-type-sugar-mama)).
SEND HALLOWEEN STUFF IF YOU CAN!
TRUST CAMP
I'm so glad we met & spoke; About a lot of things; And we shared our good thoughts; Played in the teams.
Though the time was very short; And it passed so fast; We had managed to learn in fact; What is a business cast!
It was interesting for me; And I wish move back in time; So we could do again; All activities, SEANNE!