It's Christmas Again

New Year’s Eve in Chişinau with a bunch of the volunteers from my group was a blast. It was by no means glamorous – we ate dinner from the local supermarket, stayed in the cheapest hotel possible, went to the free concert in the central square, and had a dance party in our room. Such is the life on the budget of a volunteer! But we were together and had an absolutely wonderful time. The central square had a gigantic Christmas tree and some live music. The adjacent park was light beautifully, and had a section where people could take pictures in various Christmas scenes. Popular scenes included Spongebob and Patrick Star, a limousine, and giant mice (2008 is the year of the mouse, you know). The little tykes could go on pony rides, or get a ride with Santa on a motorized bed. (??)

On my way in to Chişinău for New Year’s, I stopped in the village where I spent the 10 weeks of training and visited my host family there for a few hours. It was kind of like going home – everything and everyone was familiar. I arrived in time for lunch, and as usual, my host mom was busy in the kitchen, preparing for the evening’s festivities. My sister was home from Bucharest, where she is in her final year at University, my dad was out getting the car washed, and my brother was still sleeping. I sat at the table in my usual spot as my mom filled me in on all that has been going on with them – how her husband is sick but doesn’t want to go to the doctor, how her son has a girlfriend and finally admits it, and how she’s annoyed that her daughter’s boyfriend never talks with the rest of the family. And of course I filled her in on how life is for me in my new home. One by one the rest of the family wandered into the kitchen, and we all enjoyed a wonderful lunch. My mom had saved the last head cauliflower for me because she knows I like it, even though my dad had been wanting to eat it for awhile. That’s when you know you’re loved! They scarfed down the chocolate chip cookies and snickerdoodles that I had brought, and I scarfed down several clatite (cheese-filled crepes with honey, mmm). The whole time I was there I conversed freely in Romanian, and my mom complimented me on how much better I have gotten! I mean, I was actually able to have a regular conversation with my host dad, something I never really was able to do while I was there before. After lunch we took a family photo, and I headed on my way with the invitation to return again soon.

Christmas (Jan. 7) was a white one. It snowed about a foot, so naturally nobody went anywhere except on foot. That killed our plans to go to grandma’s house, in a village about 5mi away. But of course we had made food for an army over the weekend (which, if we weren’t planning to be home for Christmas, why did we make it?!), so the 8 or so relatives who live in our village came over and we ate all day. I even got adventurous and ate some of the meat jello. The little kids in the village came caroling in pairs or trios, which was so cute! The would yell from outside, ‘Can we sing?’ and my mom would shout back through the window, and then we’d watch them through the window as they sang (or shouted) their little hearts out, all bundled up in their winter coats with the fur around the hoods. Then my mom would bring out the bowl of candy and cookies and give them each one leu (the smallest unit of paper currency). Just after dark we heard a commotion at the gate and saw two large figures walk past the window. Then I heard a man’s loud voice yelling something, and I was sure some other jolly uncle had arrived. But then the door opened, and in walked the village priest, all dressed up in his splendid blue robes with gold trim, the huge gold cross around his neck contrasting his black beard, carrying a picture of Jesus and chanting some sort of prayer. Immediately everyone in the room jumped to their feet, made the sign of the cross (backwards), and formed a line to kiss the picture. I was a bit startled, but joined right in like this was perfectly normal. And then he left. The whole thing couldn’t have lasted more than a minute. Merry Christmas.

It was nice to go back to ‘work’ on the 9th after about 10 days of vacation. The first morning I spent talking with the social worker about life – problems, love, work, family, the Avon catalogue, hopes, and a variety of topics. I feel like we really connected on a personal level, which is a big step for me, because I so badly want to have relationships beyond the superficial level. After lunch her son came in, having finished school for the day. I adore Victor. I gave him a dollar bill for Christmas, and oooh, was he excited about that! I have the cutest video of him listening to my iPod and dancing and singing along to O-Zone. He’s not afraid to correct me when I say something wrong, ‘Noooo, Kate, not like that!’ And he’s so cute when I ask a question and he thinks about to explain it to me. He likes to play with my hair, and he always wants to sit by me. Yup, I’m so cool. In the afternoon our little town hall community celebrated one of the accountant’s birthday, which had been the day before. These people can throw together a beautiful spread in no time at all! And we had everything laid out nicely and switched offices three times before we finally settled on the accountant’s office. There was much laughing and shouting and singing, and more and more, I’m starting to feel like a normal part of it all. Victor pointed out how my cheeks were a little rosy after drinking the champagne, and his mom and I looked at each other and burst out laughing. Later when we were singing there was one line that I didn’t know, so I just opened and closed my mouth a lot and then sang the last word really loudly. I looked around to see if anyone had noticed, and caught Domnul Viorel’s eye (the funny guy who works at the town hall) and he gave me a wink and we both laughed.

I really love the school community in my village – both the teachers and the students. The forty or so kids that are in my English class are so cute! There is one boy who sits in the front row who is so enthusiastic. Any time the class is repeating words, he practically shouts, and sometimes he gets a little ahead and instead of repeating with the rest of the class, he is leading and saying the word at the same time as I am. If I ask a question, sometimes he’s so excited to give the answer that he jumps out of his seat a little bit and reaches out over the desk and points with his pencil. If only everyone were that enthusiastic about learning! The teachers are great too. The other day I was walking home for lunch, and all the kids were walking up the road from the valley where everyone goes sledding. There was a group of three boys pulling a sled behind them, and as I got closer I heard a grown man’s voice yelling ‘faster!’ As I passed the boys, there was the phys ed teacher on hands and knees on the sled as the boys pulled him up the hill!! Hilarious! All the ladies who work at the school are wonderful. They all know me (although I can only remember about half of their names) and talk to me like I’ve been speaking Romanian my whole life. I’ve even joined them for sauna night on Thursdays, which is a whole other experience which I feel I cannot accurately describe here, but suffice it to say that I feel welcome.

The holidays ended with the St. Vasilie’s Day on the 13th, and the Old New Year’s Day on the 14th. I went over to my partner’s house again for St. Vasilie’s Day, and we sat at a huge dinner all day, and random carolers came by throughout the day and into the night. I mean, these people are hardcore caroling! One group of women even had and accordion, and we all went outside and danced the circle dance, and then my partner brought out some wine and a big plate of cake and everyone dug in! So apparently they used to celebrate New Year’s in the spring, because it was for blessing the planting of the new crops. So now on ‘New Year’s’ everyone throws seeds at each other and wishes a good harvest, everthing great this year, etc. etc. I was told this, but I forgot, so imagine my surprise when I passed a police car (which had come in from the city) on my way into work, and a policeman got out at threw something at me! I let out a little yelp and ducked and thought, ‘What the &%*# did you do that for?’ But then I saw the little seeds raining down and he was saying something to me, and I remembered. Hehe. I love Moldova.