Grinding out another month

Dear readers,

Again late with the posting which i am very sorry for. Every time i sit down to write another entry i get side tracked by other emails, news and virtually anything pertaining to the US. I suppose now i am suppose to feel "settled" into my site, which i guess i do. I'm still learning names, my host family has a huge extended family. The language is still coming, i understand more and more and try to pick up at least a few new words everyday. My host brother Constel has been going on runs/walks with me now so im learning the names of different trees, animals and every other object found in the woods. I have finally settled into a weekly routine which is great but for some reason I'm not sleeping well, dont know if its just the normal stress that comes with being a PC volunteer or what. It is starting to cool off and the weather has been absolutly beautiful. I do enjoy fall quite a bit because it means my birthday, football and halloween are all right around the corner, granted i dont get football or halloween but i still have my birthday! A big downer is that the all-volunteer conference/ thanksgiving feast was cancelled, which is a pretty big let down, i cant go into to much detail why. We lost another volunteer who was administratively seperated which is also a little sad to see him go. My kids are ok, they are kids and I wish i could now apologize to all my teachers! I'M SORRY FOR BEING A TERROR IN THE CLASS ROOM! I'm finding new ways to keep myself busy like planning for israel and reorganzing my room, those who know me well would be shocked at how clean it is! All for now, thanks again for the emails! They're great! until next time.

Im late in posting i know

Thanks for being patient and here is the long awaited update from my permanent site manoilesti. Am i happy to be where i am, yes. Do i like my family, very much so. Am i lonely because i cant speak english anymore, of course. I do really love my village, it’s settled in between these large steep hills which i have a lot of pleasure in hiking and running up them. The food is more healthy and im still dropping a little weight but the large jumps of 15 pounds and such have stopped. My host family is great and very accomidating and they give me plenty of space! the house is nice and there are no pigs! thank god! only chickens which i can deal with, the do have a dog named clifford and he seems to posses the most cutting nail grinding bark i have ever heard. My school is a pretty typical moldovan school which means that it was built sometime durning the soviet union, which means it looks like every other school in moldova. What is nice is that it is gas heated which i will throughly enjoy in the winter. My partner teachers are great but definitly ask some really probing questions which wouldnt be normal in america such as do you think you could dress nicer? or how much weight have you gained since you have been in moldova or what is your salary? Seeing as i would be uncomfortable to ask even my parents these questions its been interesting in how i choose to answer them. Another thing is the timing of meals, im used to eating lunch at noon and dinner at 6 or 7 but here lunch can be at 2 or even 3 oclock and dinner sometimes not till 9. This poses some problems because im still not comfortable enough to go and raid the refridgerator but there are worse things than being hungry. I have definitly broken some habbits since ive been here for instance watching tv. I cant imagine wanting to watch tv for more than an hour, which is something i used to do quite a bit back state side. Since i havent been able to watch any television ive been tearing through books left and right, ive already ready 21 books since ive been here and thats not including the newsweeks, time, esquire, economists or rollingstones ive been sent. Also i have given the fast food the boot, while some of my friends have given in to the golden arches in the capital, ive held strong! Also i think im starting to slowly change into a morning person, because i run out of things to do by about 8 o’clock and i can only read and talk in my basic romanian for so long im going to bed earlier and earlier and hence getting up earlier and earlier. One thing that has been a real trouble to break is the internet, its hard not to use because it has become my link to home. Also i get to see whats happening in the world outside of europe. So anyways, do you want to know what europe thinks of americans? im sure you do so here is it, We are loud and rich. Which isnt really a big surprise. What is a big surprise is how little ive been asked about foriegn policy and Iraq. Well anyways im not allowed to say anything political because i work for GWB so thats the end of that conversation. Hope this helps and lets everyone get a better idea of where i am and what my life is like. thanks again for the emails and notes, they are really great and its nice to here about my sports teams and what not GO TIGERS. If you dont have my new email its scottrynbrandt1@gmail.com feel free to drop me a note and ill try to get back to you asap. Hai La Revedere O zi buna! good bye and have a great day!

Rain finally and the arrival of mud!

It has finally started raining here and hasn't let up for two days! although this is a welcome relief from the heat, rain causes other problems such as a lack of electricity and plenty of mud everywhere. We are all well under way to swearing in on wednesday next week and it couldnt come soon enough. On top of this we all have a million other things to wrap up, pack, clean and plenty of moldovans to say goodbye to. It strange to think that i have already been here for two months, ok so only 25 more to go! My teaching partner is really great although a little shy at first. Im sure that we will work well together, like peanut butter and jelly or maynaisse and pizza. Some interesting sayings in the moldova, the suns teeth, which i like but means that when its really cold in the winter but still sunny. from easter to easter, which means rarly. On for the horses mouth, which means taking a drink for the road. Today was my final language assesment before my LPI test which determines what my level of romanian needs to be at, you must have an intermediate medium in order to be confirmed as a volunteer. Dont worry everyone i will be fine! Ive been tearing through books here so if anyone can find it in your heart to send me some more that would be lovely, ive goon though 12 since ive been here which is a nice start on my goal to read 100 before im done. Its amazing what you can do when your life gets simplified, no tv, no car, i go where im told, do what needs to be done and make friends along the way! Anyways, ill let everyone know how manoilest is in a week!

The Heat!

So apparently only moldova and romania are in this ridiculous heat wave right now. I dont get it, ive been watching euronews and the only place that is hotter than eastern europe right now is in the algerian dessert which is only 41 celsious. Anyways besideds not sleeping from the heat everything is crawling along. Ive had a couple really long days and training is getting pretty repetitive but we only have about three and half weeks lefty so i guess i just gotta get through it. today is about 110 degrees out and thats not in the sun so my host mom and i went to get ice cream and me a chance to update my blog and complain to everyone who is reading this, thanks for that. So i was walking home from another volunteeres house last night at about 11 and almost ran over this cow that had gotten loose in the middle of the road. we scared the shit out of each other! so besides almost getting trampled the rest of the night wasnt very eventful. I did take a trip to souther moldova and got to see some traditional russian and bulgarian dances which were interesting and we also me the president of gagauzia which is a settlement of christian orhtodox turks, weird i know but they settled in the area about 400 years ago and were converted to christianity so they've got a really different culture. Also we had a cultural sessions with some gypsies or the p.c. term romas. They had a really interesting perspective and i found out that they trace some of their roots back to india. anyways besides missing american food and having zero access to new books to read ive been struggling to keep myself occupied in my spare time. But really everything is great and i am very excited to move to my perminant site august 16! as should all of you because i will have better internet access in which to keep you better updated.

Scott

Back from the border!

First off ill stay that i am feeling a heck of a lot better and thanks to all for the concern. I was healed by the expertise of one kind and gentle doctor known as lica! Lica is probably the nicest doctor i have meet! sorry dad and all your friends but it takes a lot to calm down an american in foreign health care, we think ours is the best! Lica was knoweldgeable, available at the drop of the hat and made house calls, i couldnt have asked for more except possibly the immunizations, i could do with less of those, 6 is a lot in a month. So the exciting stuff now, i returned from ungheni and it was excatly what i needed. not only is the terrian amazing, imagine giant rolling hills building up to the carpathian mountains of romania with endless fields of sunflowers, and quiant european town nestled in between two large hills. It is beautiful! Im a little nervous about the steep roads in the winter but the drivers are old and experienced. As for my host family they are great! the dad is the manager at a carpet factory that is pretty famous throughout moldova. The mom works as a family medical consultant. They have two kids a boy, Costan, who is about 10 and loves video games, he was thrilled when he found out that i knew how to play them all with him but he did beat me, i know i am a nerd. Their daughter Diana is 14 and just entering into the 9th grade, she finds my romanian hilarious when i try to mash sentences together and finds endless delight in correcting me. Also the father was a soldier in the red army as were most moldovans, and had so wild pics of him driving tanks, marching, standing in front of huge monuments and next to generals. Because both parents are in moldova, its pretty common for one or both to work outside moldova in europe and send money back, they are more well off than most. they are adding an addition with a sauna which i am already looking forward to. Saturday was a really interesting day, my guide was the school director who showed me all around town and introduced me to the important people of the town. I went from a sheep farm where i ate some fresh unsalted cheese called CAS, pronounced CASH, next we went to a cucumber and tomato farm and picked our lunch. I had the sweetest and most delicous tomato i think i will ever have. next we went to another farm where i was given three bags of veggies and we drank beer and moved a flock of sheep out graze. It common when vizitors come to have a little wine or beer, nothing usually more than a couple of ounces though. Next we went to the apple and plum orchard and finally ended up in a giant field of sunflowers which i now know always point east kinda like how moss grows on the north side of trees. I now also know and understand the currency trade and am constantly checking the strength of the euro, dollar and lei. Ive mastered minibus and train travel and know all the times and prices to get to moscow, bucharest, budapest and sofia, all fairly cheap and less than 30 USD. the other day we saw a truck driving down the street that had the truck bed in front of the cab instead of behind it and a PC volunteer and i started laughing after he commented that it was no wonder why we won the coldwar. Also some of the english on the t-shirts here are hilarious! a couple ive found were "SEX YES" "Can you afford this money" anyways i will update more soon!

Feeling healthy and doing fine
Scott

Moutain tops and valleys

Hello America!

As you can see from my title of this post i have been having some of the best of times and some of the worst of times to borrow from dickens. I was recently assiagned my site for the next two years which is right on the romanian and moldovan border in a beautiful town called ungheni. It was my first choice so im am extremely excited about that, most people only get their third choice. Along with that my family put on a masa, which means table and also a gigantic feast. Unfortunatly my stomach had other plans... I have been dealing with two back to back cases of food poisoning, which the doctors have diagnosed as ghiardia. I have nicknamed my stomach the dragon...guess why. I am currently in Chisinau undergoing some observation and rest, dont worry its nothing extremely serious just incredibly uncomfortable. Also along wi th my observation ive also been getting physically examined and lo and behold i have lost 14 pounds! a little scart seeing as i havent even been here for a month but that could be linked to the fact that i havent eaten anything but cold rice and water in the last 48 hours. My romanian is progressing and i have stopped putting so much pressure on myself. Also i gave my first practice seminar on leadership which went well becuase this time it could be in romanian and english. In a couple of weeks i meet my host country teaching partner, my medical doctor that i will be working with and my host family that i will be spending the next two years with. It should all be exhilirating and overwheliming. Let see some other small observations, I cant say hello to women who are older than me, most of the water here is carbonated so im getting used to that, i drink black tea with lemon about every meal, all my water is distilled which takes about three hours for 4 liters, oh yeah and i understand the metric system just fine now. I can buy anything i want in the market and also hold a decent conversation. Something else that is pretty insane is the prices of things here, ill give an example. After one saturday class myself and 8 other volunteers went out to a pizza place, yes pizza is every where here but remember they put mayonaisse on it so its really weird and i dont eat it. We ordered, 5 orders of french fries, 5 pizza's two cotunas plates, a traditional moldova dish like ravoili kinda, 4 beers and 5 fantas and 2 ice teas. This entire order came out to 268 lei, roughly 23 USD. pretty crazy huh? Also gas here is about 11 lei per liter so that come out to just over two USD per gallon, a lot cheaper than america and also the import all their gas. Anyways, everyone keep safe and keep the emails coming, oh yeah and i had to change emai addresses so send all mail to scottrynbrandt1@gmail.com.

La revedere

hey hey I'm still alive!

Alright, internet is really hard to come by so I'll try and make this a decent entry. It is now almost week three of PST or pre service training, PC or peace corps loves abbreviations so ill try and explain them as best i can. Also i apologize about all the spelling mistakes but i am being charged by the minute and i dont have a ton of moldovan lei to throw around. This week went a lot faster than the first week so thank god for that. PST is really starting to get interesting and we got our possible site locations or where im going to be spending the next two years. I havent quite decided wether i want to be in the north or south yet but here are some differences. In the north i have a higher chance of it being colder which i am not opposed to and also to have slightly more russian speakers which i also dont mind because as soon as im profeciant in romanian im gonig to learn russian which should be a treat. The north loves their vodka and the south all about the vin, im sure you can figuere that out but its wine. My host mom and sister have been making compot which is like a sweet and stong fruit juice made from a either cherries, strawberries or raspberries or really anything you want. Im getting somewhat used to the food but it is pretty hard to put down a raw tomatoe for breakfast. i cant say that im not eating healthy. I also did my first batch of laundry by hand and it went pretty well. Ill give you a run down of the average day for me. 5:00 am my first alarm clock goes off. this alarm clock has no volumn control, snooze and is a rooster right outside my window. I sleep in for another 20 minutes until my second alarm clock goes off, which is the cow mooing to get out to the fields. Oh and when all the cows come home, i know right i can actually use that expression in context, they know which house is theirs with out the help of humans. it my host brothers birthday coming up which means i think that we are killing a pig which i think im going to do because i am now the man of the house kinda... also i want to work for my bacon. so im in class from 8-1 then i break for lunch for an hour, go running, then study for about another 3-4 hours and talk to my host family, eat dinner and go to bed after watching an episode of seifeld, i need a little bit of american culture. The food im getting used to and is usually borsch, a potatoe and cabbage stew, bread bread bread, they love their bread, cucumbers and tomatoes and onions salad, a kidna of giant hotdog or cooked spam, once in a while chicken or fish, mamaliga which is like corn bread paste with cheese, pork sausage patties and a lot of tea. three days a week im in orhei for 9-10 hour days. all for now or im going to miss my bus back. thanks for all the emails and keep them coming its nice to hear from home, also if anyone wants to send some current events i cant get any news except russian, which i dont understand.

Scott