For the first few weeks that I was in Moldova, I had an average transit time (to anywhere) of about two hours. I'm pretty sure it doesn't take two hours to go from one side of Chisinau to the other and back again, but the rutieras and I weren't so well acquainted yet. What can I say, I didn't inherit Daddy's navigator skills, but then again, he takes a lot of "scenic detours" too....
Anyways, I've decided to share some of my "scenic detours," cultural mishaps, and general errors in my thought-process. Hope these bring a few smiles to your face :)
22) Saturday I was so blessed to be able to help out with the birthday celebration for my friend Nina. A few days prior, I had made brownies for a dinner with Evelina and Nina, and Nina requested them for her birthday. So we gathered in her apartment to prepare all the food for her bday party, and I set about making three batches of brownies. Nina just moved into a new apartment, and well, there were still a few things to figure out, aka, where to light the gas oven. N & E did a thorough search of that oven and still couldn't find it. Improvising, I suggested we try the microwave. Amazingly, it worked. We did all three batches (well, minus all the finger dipping in the batter) in the microwave!
21) The fruit is out in all the piațas. As the berry season was ending, I decided I would pick up a half kilo of raspberries on my way to work. Later that day, I had to go meet my landlady and pay rent, so I needed to leave straight from work to get down to her street. I stuck the raspberries in my bag, next to my computer case, and forgot about them. After meeting my landlady, I met up with my intern to do her midterm review over dinner. When I went to pull my laptop out of my bag, the case was damp with a sweet pink liquid. Turns out raspberries are a lot softer in Moldova than in the States, and my raspberries had quickly turned into raspberry juice. My bag and the contents were soaked. Thankfully my computer case saved my computer and my planner wasn't soaked and our waiter was super gracious in collecting all the pink napkins from our attempts to soak up some of the mess.
20) One night, Tara and I had to leave work a little early for another engagement. Since the CLO (chief loan officer) normally waits for us so that he can lock up the office, I went in the main office to let him know we were leaving. I stuck my head around the corner to see his desk and said, "Bye, have a good weekend." Normal, right? Except that the office was actually full, and Gregorie called me out, "Emily, have a nice weekend just to Dan or to all of us?" Oops, I blew that. "No, Gregorie, to ALL of you." "But you looked in Dan's eyes and said it!" "Have a good weekend to you, GREGORIE!" Laughing, all I could think was "No, I don't love you any less, and I'm not playing favorites!" I love these people.
19) My allergies have gone haywire here. Seriously. I don't think I've ever felt this sick from them before. So I finally went to the "farmacia" to ask for antihistamine. The pharmacist seemed to understand and handed me a box of "Vermox." Despite my foggy state of sanity I was in, I did think that it would be better to translate the Russian on the box then to just pop a few pills on the way home. Good thing I did. Vermox is for worms. No worries, I don't have worms, and I did eventually go back to the farmacia and got claritin instead.
18) I forgot about my hot water heater. Again. Five days. Cold water. All the while.....
17) I caught my sleeve on fire. Yes, on fire. I'm not really sure how. I though the gas stove and I were getting along just fine, but apparently one of us got careless. My arm was fine, but my shirt smelled a little funky after that.
16) I went up a downward moving escalator. It was quite the feat. It was undignified and completely lacking in grace, but what can I say.... I had been shopping in preparation for my cruise and having finished my shopping in Malldova, I stepped onto the escalator heading back down to the first level. As soon as I stepped on, though, I realized that my scarf was missing, my favorite scarf from my aunt DeeDee who has exceptional taste, the one with golds and burgundys that went so well with my tan coat. It must have slipped out of my arms as I was shopping. In sudden reaction, I turned to go back and search for it. I'm pretty sure I practically fell into the guy behind me as I made a mad scramble backwards on the escalator. I started to panic and trip and somehow, miraculously, I made it back up those two or three steps of the downward moving escalator. Why I didn't just ride the escalator down and then go back up the other side, I don't know. And sadly enough, I never found my scarf.
15) After my Christmas trip I slept really hard for about two days. The second day I woke up late and realized I needed to rush out and pay our electricity bill. I showered, and in my typical South Georgia style, I didn't think about drying my hair before I left. Note, at this point about two feet snow was covering the ground. As I trotted across the street, I heard dry swoosh and felt something hitting against my jacket. I reached up and touched my hair only to discover that it was indeed frozen. It eventually thawed out and dried, but I couldn't help but think about how Mama Peggy would've fussed at me.
14) The day after I returned from my trip to Prague and Vienna, I decided to pick up dinner from the deli section of Green Hills. I purchased a baked chicken and what I thought to be eggplant and mushrooms. I tasted the dish when I got home, and well, it wasn't eggplant. But now I know that I don't really care for chicken liver.
13) Did you know people can get freezer burn too? Well, we can.
12) Right before Christmas break, I received a call from our lawyer (who speaks very little English) telling me that I needed to be at his office the next morning with a translator to finish the paperwork for my green card. The notice was a little bit last minute, but my friend Nina was wonderful and agreed to come help. One of the forms required my personal data: eye color (always remarkably hard to pick), birthday, full name, height, etc. My height had to be given in centimeters though, so I pulled out my handy-dandy, super cute, pocket-sized, bright blue moleskin planner with conversions on the front page. I gave Nina the numbers, "Sixty-three inches times 2.54..." And she entered them into her phone's calculator. "Oh," she said with a slight gasp tempered with a look of disbelief. "What's wrong?" I asked. "A hundred and sixty....that's so short!" "Nina! That's my height!" "Well, maybe we should add a few....that's really short....." We added one or two centimeters....what? I could always bump the hair up a little :)
11) For the entire month proceeding Thanksgiving, Brandon and I were planning it out. There had been three sweet potatoes sitting on the shelf at Green Hills with our names on them since I arrived. Sweet potatoes casserole with the crunchy nutty goodness on top was one of our essential menu items. Of course, when we were actually ready to cook, the sweet potatoes were gone. I decided a carrot souffle would be a decent substitute and resigned myself to making that instead. The night before thanksgiving though, Suz and I went to a smaller grocery store on the other side of our street. That store sells smaller amounts of vegetables already bagged and priced (normally you select your amount and have it weighed like in the states). In the middle of the shelf, I spied long round brown vegetables with an orange undertone. I was ecstatic. There were only two bags, so I picked them both up and purchased them. As we were walking back, I was expressing my disbelief to Suz, "I'm so excited that we have sweet potatoes!!!" Pausing as I examined the new purchases, "They're really narrow sweet potatoes though...." Suz in her delicate, yet wise way,"Are you sure those are sweet potatoes?" After reading the label on the bags, "Oh my gosh, I just bought more carrots!"
So the carrot souffle was little bit bigger, but I swear those were the dirtiest carrots I have ever seen.
10) My landlord and landlady are wonderfully sweet people and have been so good to Suz and me. Early on, our landlady, Alexandra, came over to sign some paperwork for Suz's organization and to teach us how to record our utility usage on our bills. As we were standing in the kitchen, Alexandra looks over at me, says something in Russian, points at my feet, and starts swatting my leg with the paper she had in her hand. I just happened to be barefoot, and in her funny grandmotherly way, Alexandra was going to make sure that I put some slippers on!
9) After returning from the market one day, "Suz, I got the best deals on tomatoes and onions and apples." I had a kilo of each one. "Why did you get so much?" Suz asked. "Well, honestly, because I don't know the word for half..."
"Jumătate." New favorite word :)
8) Brandon and I have some really random conversations at work. I can't explain it other than to say that, we are two restless Americans sitting behind desks almost all day in a country halfway around the world from our own and dealing with spreadsheets and requests that really make me wish that asbestos wasn't a concern so that I could freely bang my head against the wall. Whew, that was a long sentence. Actually, I don't think our office has asbestos, but you get the picture.
Anyways, one day I had one of those deep thought moments that always begins with one of us gazing out the window with a distant look on our face. "Do you ever get tired of being human?"
Brandon gave me one of his classic stare-downs as if I had just said the most absurd thing in the world, "What? What would you rather be than human?"
I matched his stare back. "What? I don't know! I mean, I wasn't thinking of being anything else. Just sometimes, I get tired of being human. You know having to eat, and sleep, and breathe."
Starting to laugh, because now I had said something really absurd, "Ah, first of all, eating and sleeping are two of my favorite things."
And then I laughed, because he was telling the truth. My argument clearly was ineffective on him. "You've really never had that thought?"
"Well...."
"Ok, what would you rather be?"
"A lion." Or at least, I think that's what he said. It was an animal. I accidentally found a quiz on facebook that just happened to be called, "What would you be if you weren't human?" I would be the ocean, a completely satisfactory answer.
7) I am a South Georgia girl, born and bred. In South Georgia, we don't get snow. Ok, except for this year apparently. In Moldova, it snows.
And then, when the snow melts, but the temperature gets below freezing again, it all turns to ice.
Fascinating. Really makes you pay attention to where you're walking.
The entrance to our office has a ramp and stairs. Above the ramp is a postal box for outgoing mail. I had some mail to send out after work one day and completely aware that the ramp was iced over, I stepped out on it anyways. Wheeeeoop. Down I slid! It was a very slow motion, very gracefully done slide down. To my relief, I didn't have an audience, though I did take a minute to laugh at myself. And somehow, I did manage to get those cards in the mailbox.
6) During one trip to Green Hills, I was browsing the chocolate (believe it or not the dark chocolate selections are rather limited) when one of the staff, dressed in a fashionable bright red, fur-lined Santa style skirt, vest, and boots, handed me a flyer and proceeded to explain in Romanian what the advertisement was saying. I tried really hard to understand, but I really had no clue. Sometimes I apologize in Romanian and explain that I don't understand or that I understand only a little, but when it's really overwhelming and I don't want them to think I'm just being difficult, as in this case, I just confess in English, "I'm sorry. I really don't understand." "OH!" she replied, "Why didn't you say so, I would have explained in English."
5) We have an hour lunch break at work. Most of the time, Brandon and I go back to our apartments during this time. It's nice to get out of the office for a little bit, have a short walk, and make something at home. The gas stove and I had been bonding pretty well, so I thought I might venture out to establishing a relationship with the oven. I had bought some pastry dough and filled it with spinach and other veggies in my rendition of a common Moldovan food, placenta (plah-cheen-tah). I turned the knob for the oven, lit a match, and managed to light the oven. Much easier than I thought. I put my placenta in the oven to bake and turned down the setting. Twenty minutes later, they weren't looking very baked. Strange. hmm.... Checking the oven, I discovered that I had turned it down so far that the flame had cut off, but not far enough to turn off the gas. No worries, the oven didn't explode or anything when I re-lit it, and I don't think I vented that much gas into the kitchen. My lunch break did end up being a little bit longer than an hour though.
4) About a month into living in Moldova, my organization held a series of training seminars. Brandon and I prepared the handouts and then went attended the seminars as the camera crew; he had the videocamera, I had the digital camera. During the breaks we were able to talk with the participants. After one of our evening seminars two ladies were talking to me, asking about what we were doing here, and how I was liking Moldova so far. As they went to leave, I thought I would use some of my limited Romanian knowledge and say goodnight, "Puftă bună!" One of the ladies looked at me and smiled, "Oh, you speak some Romanian...yes, la revedere!"
Half an hour later it hit me. Goodnight is "Noapte bună." "Puftă bună" means "bon apetite."
3) Then there was the other scenic detour... I had made a trip to the lawyer's office to handle green card paperwork. Getting there went pretty smoothly, as I had looked up the correct bus number on the most handy website: www.md4ever.com. However, I forgot to note that the bus there takes a different route back. Turns out the lawyer's office is on a one way street anyways, so I would need to find a street with buses going the other way. Hmm....I decided to head to the main street in downtown Chisinau. Good plan, theoretically, except that most buses don't stop on this street; they stop on the run along the side streets instead. No problem, I'll just walk along and find the street with the bus numbers I know. Ha. After walking the entire length of downtown, I decided to call my brilliant roommate who seems to know downtown Chisinau like the back of her hand. She suggested I just take a trolleybus back. I found the right trolleybus and got on. We went one block and then the bus jerked forward and slammed to a halt. Small children and bags of produce went falling forward. Ok, maybe not the small children.
As we regained our balance, the loudspeaker on the bus came on and the driver spoke, "Scuzați." It means "Excuse me" or "I'm sorry," but it came across pretty clearly as "Oops." I tried hard to stifle my laughter. The reason for the sudden halt? Apparently the wires of the trolleybus had caught one of the recently hung Chirstmas decorations and knocked it down into the street. After waiting a few minutes for the bus to continue, the doors opened and everyone got off. Guess, I'll have to find a new plan.
I decided to keep walking at the end of the main street, spotted more rutieras. I'm honestly not sure how I picked one. I think I recognized some numbers from watching rutieras pass by in Botanica. Realizing I would be already be quite late in getting back to the office, I stopped on and climbed on. A good twenty minutes later, Brandon called me,"Where are you?" "That's a good question. I'd tell you if I knew." "What?! You're lost?" "Not really. I'm in a rutiera, and I think it'll take me back." "Well, what are you near?" "Um....I don't know. We're on Hincesti." "WHAT! Emily, Hincesti isn't in Chisinau!!! That's like 45 minutes outside the city!" "No, no, it's a street!" I did get him to look up the route of the bus I was on, and another twenty minutes or so later, I finally made it back to Botanica only a few hours after I left the lawyer's office....
2) Basic grocery shopping was more like an exploration of the Amazon those first few weeks. Not only had I been warned of various products that aren't known to suit American tastes (or digestive systems), but products were labeled in Romanian, Russian, and sometimes German. The Romanian was the easiest to figure out, but Russian at this point was completely unintelligible to me, and my German vocabulary consists of sauerkraut, wienerschnitzel, bratwurst, and music terms (real helpful in the grocery store). I'd also been warned that produce goes bad much faster in Moldova, because less preservatives are used.
After one quick run through of Green Hills with Brandon and Meredith the first day I was in Moldova, I was left to navigate the deceivingly familiar looking store. Coffee, of course, was on my kitchen basics list. I thought I would buy some milk to put in it. Remembering that Brandon bought milk in a bag, I spotted bags and picked one out. Back at my apartment, I opened the bag to a strong sour smell. Man, I must've bought milk that had already expired. So I tried again. This time I bought a carton. I got so far as to put it in my coffee, and then this big curds floated to the top. Gross. Not how coffee goes.
Later at the office, I expressed my frustration to Brandon that I couldn't seem to buy fresh milk. He said I must be doing something wrong, "Are you sure you're buying the right thing?" "I'm buying what ya'll showed me..."
Then my dear roommate moved in, and we went to Green Hills. I had already explained my milk problem to her, and when I went to pick up my third attempt she stopped me, "THAT's what you've been buying?" "Yeah, why?" "That's not milk!" Huh. Go figure. Turns out I had been buying "chefir" basically a plain sour milk/yogurt liquid. "Lapte" is the word for milk. My coffee and I are much happier now.
1) The first attempt to visit the central post office. Good news: I did eventually find it! I just happened to take the right number bus in the wrong direction. I was concerned watching the buildings pass, but I was never really sure where I was going in the first place so I decided to just hang tight. When we started to climb a hill overlooking the city, I knew something was wrong. Botanica does not overlook the city. This I knew for sure. And then the bus stopped. Not for a red light. Not for a pedestrian. It pulled into a parking lot and stopped. And then the driver told us, the three people left, that we had to get off. Hmm...great. Thankfully this parking lot seemed to be a sort of terminal for the buses. So I found another number that I thought went to my end of town, stuck my head in the bus and "Botanica?" "Da." (Yes) Sweet! I climb in and start to feel odd that I'm the only one in this bus. Not to worry, within minutes we had stopped and picked up enough people that I begin to feel quite altruistic. Seriously, think of all the people that would have been standing on the sidewalk waiting, if I hadn't started a bus....
