My Name is Car-rie!!!

Last Tuesday was site announcement day. This is the day where all of the volunteers find out where we will be living for the next two years. My ARBD group, the majority of which is male and avid college football fans, viewed this day kind of like draft day. So we all wore suits and looked awesome!!! Literally, I think all the other groups were in actual awe of us. Just look:



Our country director pulled names out of a hat and then announced the site. The first names drawn got a huge applause as all the other volunteers waited in anticipation for their site to be announced. As more sites were announced there was less and less applause because the people who already knew their site were busy looking through the information they had been provided about their assignment. My name was drawn roughly third to last, so virtually no applause. Feel free to clap for me in the privacy of where ever you may be reading this from...



Now that you have clapped, I can tell you I am going to the Oras (City/Town) of Hincesti.

On Sunday Morning I left my PST village for a three day site visit in Hincesti. I was really excited, but I was also worried about getting there. I meet up with another ARBD PCV and we went together to the Gara de Sud (South Station). This is were all the buses heading south from Chisinau leave from. I didn't really know where the Gara de Sud was, but I saw my neighbor, Lubia, and her niece, Rachel (I think Rachel is 7 or 8) on the rutiera on the way there. Rachel goes to school in Ireland and speaks perfect English; however, she generally refuses to speak with me in any language. As I was trying to persuade Rachel to ask Lubia if we had already passed the Gara de Sud, someone else heard me speaking English and said that they would tell me when to get off. So with the help of several people, I made it through the first half of my trip.

Hincesti is a large Raion center (County Seat and/or State Capital), so buses leave for there every twenty minutes or so. I bought a ticket for the 12:10 bus and waited for a half an hour or so before attempting to board the bus. However there was no bus to be found, there was only a ruteria going to Hincesti. So I got on after unsuccessfully trying to ask everyone on the ruteria, if this was the 12:10 bus to Hincesti. On the bus I called my partner in Hincesti, Angela, to let her know that I was on my way. Our three sentence phone conversation seemed to go fairly well. I arrived in Hincesti and paid the ruteria driver again, because no one besides me seemed to have bought a ticket in advance and there was no way I would have been able to communicate about paying on the ruteria vs buying a ticket. After two gypsies separately tried to do something with me that involved money and tarot cards which caused me to grab my bag and yell “Nu nu nu!” at both of them, my partner Angela finally found me.

Angela took me to our office where I met my other partner Valentina. We discussed my family, where I was from in America and what I did in America. This conversation basically exhausted my repertoire of Romanian words and phrases, so then we sat in awkward silence for a while. I then learned that a lot of the Hincesti Raion is on the Prut River and has had fairly severe floods. I thought that I understood that we would me going to see that part of the Raion during my stay, but that never happened. I am not sure if this is because my Romanian is so bad or because Moldovans change there plans frequently.

Angela and Valentina then called a cab (my first Moldovan cab experience) and took me to meet my host family. When we arrived, my soon-to- be-host mom, Tamara, was making placenta (pronounce plachenta, no I am not eating after-birth). I must say that I have had a variety of placenta since I arrived and hers was the best!!!! We all sat around a talked, well they talked and I tried to decipher what they were saying. I think I understood my host mom say she was glad that I was not fat and that I was frumoasa, which supposedly means beautiful but seems to be used to describe everything. My host dad, Constantin soon came home with my host sister, her husband and their child (Christina, 2 mo.). Diana (host-sister) spoke English and showed me my room and talked to me a bit. Eventually, every one but my host mom and dad left. We then watched the World Cup final and went to bed.

The next day, Monday, I drove to work with my host mom. She works across the street from where I will be working. Angela came to get me at my host-mom's building and we headed to my future office. That morning two men stopped by, one was named Vitale and I have not idea what he did the other was a farmer and I have no idea what his name was. During the time they were there, I understood that I was being signed up to go to a farming conference in Chisinau in August. Hopefully my Romanian will be much better by then. After a brief time at the office, I went to the Hincesti museum with Angela. What I understood of the tour was very interesting. I failed to take any pictures in the museum so here is a picture of the post card that I received as a souvenir:



Next, Angela the took me the the home for girls. This is an orphanage for handicapped girls that is located near the edge of Hincesti. One of the women who worked at the home spoke excellent English and gave me a tour. It was very interesting!! The home is run by the state, but an Irish organization gives a lot of assistance in money, expertise and man power. It was a real treat and very motivating to hear about all of the positive changes that had been made at the home with assistance from the Irish organization.

Later, I meet back with my host mom at her office to go home. When we got there, my host family told me to change out of my work clothes. I then went out to the garden where I found my host dad making some weird contraption, which I soon figured out was part of a bee hive. Then he told me we were all going somewhere by car. On the way, my host dad stopped by the magazin (store) and went in to get three beers. We then drove to the forest and I discovered that this was where the bee hives were. While my host dad worked on the hives, my host mom and I taught each other words about bees in Romanian and English, i.e. honey, sting, hive ect. She thought the word bees was hilarious, “ beeeeze, beez, beeeeezzzz.” I then got to eat some of the honey, Soooo Good!!! Finally, we sat in the forest and had a beer.

Tuesday morning I left Hincesti with Angela to go to Chisinau, but not before my family fed me cake for breakfast (just like home!!!) and made me clean my shoes. Clean shoes are very important in Moldova. When I arrived at the conference center in Chisinau, I was far more excited about seeing my fellow volunteers than I thought I would be. It was so exhausting not being able to communicate in English for the majority of the time I was in Hincesti. Angela and I only got to the conference center about half an hour before the workshops started, so I had little time to catch up with the other volunteers.

We began the workshop by introducing ourselves, our partners and speaking a little about the organizations that we would be working with. We had to do this completely in Romanian, so it took around an hour and a half to finish the 15 introductions. Then we had a well deserved break. During to break our program manager, Vitale, approached me and said, “Katie, why does your partner call your Katie.” Several people here call me Katherine, so I thought maybe he was asking why my partner was calling me Katie instead of Katherine. Therefore, I responded, “because my name is Katie.” Vitale then said “No, Katie.” to which I responded “Yes, Katie.” At this point a few other volunteers near me came to my defense and insisted my name was in fact Katie. Finally, Vitale clearly and deliberately says, “Car-rie!” So, apparently my new partner/my new host family/everyone I met in Hincesti thought that my name was Carrie, and I never corrected them because Carrie and Katie sound exactly the same when said with a Moldovan accent. Being such a passive person, I then prepared to be called Carrie for the next two years; however, Vitale explained the situation and my partner is now aware of my correct given name. Whew!!!

The rest of the conference was pretty uneventful, aside from the Moldovan hotel party and the worst pizza I have ever eaten. I am glad I had such a great site visit, aside from that whole Carrie thing. I am really excited about my future site and learning more Romanian!