A little bit of everything (I apologize, this one's a bit much, but worth it, especially towards the end!)

The day before yesterday it poured and I mostly stayed in the house, where I do not have internet. Yesterday I managed to make myself extremely busy somehow. I have also decided to disassociate myself completely from the internet cafe near me as they were sketchy and I've amassed several places I can now use the internet for free. Therefore, this is my first real opportunity to write in a couple of days.
It's pouring again and has been all day. In fact, there's been significant flooding in certain parts of Romania due to the weather (Sinaia in particular), although I couldn't find any articles on the internet about it yet.

OK so, the last three days have been full of getting used to day-to-day things, seeing family and friends, and getting a little acquainted with the people at OvidiuRom.

Tuesday
After spending time early in the morning on the internet at my sketchy cafe, I met with my Aunt, Marica, who lives about a ten minute walk from my house. She came over, introduced me to one of my neighbors, and then showed me the best place to do my grocery shopping. We also went to her apartment and although I didn't really remember it until I entered the building, when we entered her apartment all of these memories from my first time in Romania suddenly came back. For some reason, I have an almost photographic memory of the apartment.

Around mid-afternoon, I met up with the volunteer coordinator, David, for the OvidiuRom* office. David is from Cali and has been here for about two years with peace corps. He took me to the office where I met several of the other staff. Leslie was there, as well, although she is currently in the US.

*How I got involved with this org. in particular: About a year ago, when I was first considering coming to Romania, my cousin Alex (LA Alex not 16 year old Alex from Philly- for those of you that know my family a little) put me in touch with the head of the organization and her New York counterpart. The organization was founded by Leslie Hawke (Ethan Hawke's mother), I believe after she had done a few years of peace corps work here in Romania. I went to one of their events in NY and although I fell out-of-touch after that, I decided to contact Leslie before I came. She invited me to the office and put me in contact with David.

After discussing a bit what I could do for them while I am here, we left it that I would go and see some of the program (visit the sites, meet some of the other staff etc.) and that we would go from there. That was basically it for my Tuesday - I stopped at the grocery store* and grabbed a few things (I found soy milk!) - and headed home for the evening.

*Note on money in Romania: For some reason doing math in another language gets me all flustered. What's worse, is that unless the cashiers look at you and can tell immediately that you are foreign, they will probably quote you the price in old lei as opposed to the new currency, RON (new Romanian leu). I mean, the basic difference is remembering to cut off three zeros from the end and essentially the numbers are the same. Still, I get flustered sometimes. Not to mention certain things are sometimes quoted in dollars and now, more often, Euros - such as the phone cards.

Wednesday
Again, spent most of the day indoors, mostly teaching myself how to use my washing machine. I was eventually successful after having to call Alina, who takes care of the apartment when no one is there, to show me. I also learned how to recharge credit on my phone, which is actually probably my biggest expense at the moment. In the early evening, I received a visit from Lidia, a cousin, and she stayed and chatted for a while. After she left I met up with two of my dad's closest friends, Andrei and Monica. They took me out to a new Belgian bistro that recently opened up in Bucharest. The food was excellent and then we stuffed ourselves full of deserts. There was so much desert I even had to take some home! Still haven't had the opportunity to eat it though, mostly because I want to share it rather than pig out on it myself. I haven't seen Andrei and Monica since I was here in 2000. I had a great time with them and we got into an interesting discussion on several topics, including the change in attitudes concerning work ethic and education since the end of communism and what impact the concept of extreme consumerism has had on young people. Everyone has been really candid and willing to talk to me about these things, although I haven't quite had the time and ability to sit and process everything that I've learned in the last three days. Sometimes I think I should carry around a notebook and take notes...

Thursday
Yesterday was probably the most intense and thought-provoking day that I've had thus far, not to mention the busiest.
On Thursday "morning" (I got a bit of a late start and also a little bit turned around while trying to find the office), I went to the OvidiuRom office where two of the staff, Nadia and Oana, took me to me by car to their main education center in Bucharest. In Europe, as in many places in the world, you have the opposite phenomenon than in most major American cities. The impoverished communities are on the outskirts of the city and you have less of the "inner city" poverty. The OvidiuRom center is located in two rooms of a school in one-such community. I decided not to bring my camera and take pictures for several reasons, but I believe there are some on the website. The school itself is recently renovated, and the two rooms that were donated to the Organization have been completely redone. However, the school is just across the street from several 'blocs' (communist style apartment buildings) where the poverty of at least part of the community it services is apparent. These buildings do not have running water and people live about one or two rooms per family (of about five or six people). Nadia and Oana took me just outside the buildings, where we met Nicoletta*, an extremely opinionated cross-eyed girl (she looked like she was around 7 or so) who then accompanied us to the school.

*Nicoletta: Oana has acquired a particular affinity for Nico (as they call her) and took her to the doctor to have her eyes looked at. The doctor said that she would need surgery eventually, but that until then, she should wear glasses. Oana then took her to get glasses from a store in the city and, without even asking the situation in particular and without Oana saying anything to them about it, they allowed Nico to pick a pair of glasses and gave it to them for free (they're pink, with barbie on the side). Nico keeps her glasses in school, in order to prevent something from happening to them. When I told Nico where I was from, she exclaimed, "I think that everywhere must be very clean in America!" I told her in broken Romanian, that it certainly was not clean _everywhere_.

From then on I shadowed Oana, who I will say for now was super nice to me and is a super cool human being all around. I'm sure I will have the opportunity to describe her better another time, as I think I will be working with her a bit more in the future.

The two rooms that the organization has in the school consist of an office where there are computers for the IT classes, as well as training for local volunteer social workers and a place for counseling the mothers who come in, as well as a class room where the kids have their activities and do their work. I met the staff that run that office and work there regularly and then we went next door to the classroom, where I met the kids in the after school program. The kids were particularly agitated because things were not quite running on time and there were problems with the cassette player (Oana comes once a week to play a movie and discuss it with them). They were also particularly excitable, because there was a new person in the room (me) who clearly wasn't from around there. There were about fifteen or so elementary school age kids who showed up for the movie. Normally they are expected to do there homework in order to be able to watch. Afterwards, parents and relatives come and pick them up. We saw Alba ca Zapada (Snow White) with Romanian subtitles. Oana read the subtitles and explained the story. Anyway, I'm sure that I'll have more to say about this particular experience at some point. When it was time for the kids to go, Oana and I headed back towards central Bucharest.

After stopping in the office again to grab my laptop, I headed to Marica's house where I met Jack (her husband) and also talked to my dad a little on Skype. After eating etc., I headed out again to meet David and several of the other OvidiuRom volunteers at a pub for a volunteer get together. Almost everyone who works at the center, as well as most of the volunteers, are Romanian women. We hung out for a bit, I got to know a couple of the girls, as well as David and another American peace corps volunteer, Kat. Kat is actually based in Constanta, and I have to say, we got along particularly well. I'm sure I will get to see her again at some point.

So, two hours later, I think I've managed to transmit at least some of the things that have been going on in my life thus far. I've had some particularly interesting discussions about education, both in Romania and the US that have resulted from getting to know this organization a bit (it's amazing what people do not know about what's happening in the inner-cities in the US) and I continue sa ma descurc (to figure things out - loosely) with things in Bucharest. My Romanian is getting better I think and I'm even starting to be able to read and write a few things. My English, as you can already tell, is getting worse.

Best to everyone at home and elsewhere!