I'm not supposed to write about politics

It would be unfair, inconclusive, and unsettling if I wrote about any of the electoral outcomes I have witnessed in Moldova. The mission of my organization is world peace and friendship. On a day-to-day basis, this rural youth-development worker is hardly ever impacted by the political climate of the country. I do not make any concerted effort to contribute to the marketplace of political ideas and solutions. I hear what I hear, read what I read, but tend not understand the implications of everything I'm told. I can practice empathy, but I'll leave economics of developing countries to the experts.

Yet, with local elections for mayoralties and city councils just around the corner, politics are starting to matter in the daily lives of my friends and neighbors. When I first started hearing the stories I'm about to share, my immediate response was to ask "What year is this?! How is this happening?!"

Thankfully, I took some time to unpack these stories and their implications before deciding to share them with you. I now understand my immediate reaction as ethnocentrism and ignorance at their worst. My reaction was ethnocentric because I recognized these stories as replications of history's hardships, and my socialization encourages progress to the point that we attempt (though not always successfully) to avoid those Polaroid-perfect hardships. My reaction was ignorant, because I though I have lived in Moldova for two years, American tax payers are very generous. Never do I think twice about buying bananas in winter, the Peace Corps doctors recommend it! Never do I worry about my house being cold, Peace Corps pays the bill! Though I have lived without many contemporary American comforts, it's not as if I truly had to make it on my own as my Moldovan friends and neighbors.

These stories were told to me by my host mother. Her political affiliation doesn't matter, because both of the political camps chose the methods she described. Let me say that one more time for clarity, both political camps are described below, using the exact same tactics.

First, she told me that our elderly neighbor (who would otherwise never leave home) took part in a political rally in a neighboring town this week. When my host mother questioned her about her motivates, she said the political party sponsoring that rally gave all the participants a chicken, fish soup, and half-liter of wine.  She took the food in exchange for her support of that party.

This is when that ignorant reaction came into play.

The next night, my host mother said the same neighbor admitted she is conflicted about her vote. She really needed that chicken from the rally and committed to voting for that party. But now a different party is offering other goods to potential voters. This party is giving away sacks with a kilogram each of rice, sugar, and flour.

Again, ignorance and ethnocentrism came shooting up my spine, flooding my thoughts with images of Stalin, Animal Farm, and the hammer and sickle icon still hanging on many public buildings in town. But I'll say it again, both political camps are using this exchange of basic commodities for votes. It is not as red as this ignorant American would have assumed. It doesn't matter what party gave my neighbor a chicken and what party might give my neighbor flour. The news merely hit me in that shocking way that stops one mid-breath without knowing precisely why or if it should. The kind of news one must commit to understanding immediately, or it will be forgotten just as quickly.

I suppose hearing this news startled me because I understood it to be wrong, and the exact opposite of the progress my culture promotes. But then I thought, it doesn't matter what I think, I am neither a beneficiary or victim of these tactics.

The only thing I can really know is that a beneficiary of these tactics (my neighbor) is confused, and a victim of these tactics (my host mother) doesn't blame the beneficiaries for participating, but yearns for progress she sees other countries making on the evening news. "How can someone who watches the news still think that giving away bread is something we do to earn votes in this modern year?" She asks, again and again.

I don't have an answer for her now, but try to explain that life isn't a sweet peach in America right now either. That's a lie. How can I honestly say that it's hard for the elderly in America right now too? How can I say medicine is expensive for them and that our government is arguing over how to care for them? I can't. Put in my neighbor's position, a chicken and kilogram of flour would sound pretty good to all of us.

Go ahead, call me privileged and pretentious. The former I am learning to accept, the latter is what makes people write blogs in the first place. 

GLOW workshop: "How to run a youth empowerment camp"

Meet Irina and Marcela, president and vice-president of the Local Youth Council. These two young ladies are standing in the Peace Corps Volunteer lounge the morning of GLOW's workshop on "How to run a youth empowerment camp." They wanted to attend this workshop to see what new ideas they could take back to the council for this summer's upcoming leadership course. 

Dozens of other Moldovan youth and Peace Corps Volunteers came to the workshop with similar intentions. School ends next Tuesday and then summer camp season will officially commence! This year, GLOW is focusing on a local day camp model, encouraging Peace Corps Volunteers to work with local partners to hold day camps in their communities. Day camps, unlike overnight camps, do not require transportation and boarding costs that sometimes prohibit camps from actually taking place. 

At the workshop, participants learned about the logistics of running a summer camp, how to finance a camp, potential activities, instructional topics, and the wide-range of resources available from our partner organizations. The workshop was an all-day commitment and the room was stifling, but enthusiasm remained high for most of the day. As with similar events, this workshop provided time and space for ongoing experience exchange throughout the day and camp organizers learned from one another's stories.

At the workshop, I facilitated a session on local fundraising. I've delivered this session five times in the last ten months, but I think this was my last. As it turns out, one of the Moldovan camp organizers and a Peace Corps Volunteer in attendance at this session heard my talk before and were able to tell me about their local fundraising efforts since we saw each other last. That feels good!

 

When I joined the local fundraising movement two years ago, things were a little more challenging. I'll never remember the first people to come "taste" our chocolate chip cookies, say thank you, and walk away without making a donation to our cause. But now, penny wars are one of the most popular ways to raise funds in a school. Benefit discos are organized for teens, tweens, and children alike. Local fundraising might be the only grassroots movement I've ever participated in successfully.

Once again, big THANK YOU to the organizers of this workshop!

Wedding negotiations

On my soon to be [host] sister-in-law's birthday, all gathered in her family's home for a six-hour dinner party that was much more about her upcoming wedding than her last birthday as a maiden.


In this first photo the bride's father is standing near the center of the table, offering a toast to the couple sitting across from him. He served this night's guests the wine that he will serve at the wedding, of which he has already purchased 60 liters.The couple he is toasting will serve as as the godparents of the newlyweds, an Eastern Orthodox tradition. It is their role to counsel the newlyweds, and with that role comes a few wedding day duties as well.

The negotiations were textbook:
Father of the Bride: "I want you to be really active at the wedding; give lots of toasts, lead dances, and basically never sit in a chair."
Godparent: "Well, I'm not much of a public speaker, but I can dance."
F: "Be really active."
GP: "How about the first speech and a few dances."
F: "Deal! I knew we could come to an understanding about these things. Let's have a drink."

After the meal with so many courses I lost track, and sometime after dusk started turning into dark, the mother of the bride (pictured above, third from the left) took the women on a tour of her home. After seeing the bedrooms, garden, and cellar, the tour ended in the kitchen where "woman talk" continued for a least an hour. Basically, until my host brother came looking for his bride (pictured above, second from the left).

The bride's teenage sister (first on the left), told me a few secrets about the dress she helped her sister find. She might be more excited than the bride, saying with great excitement, "She only gets married once!"

After dessert and a surprise serving of Greek coffee (they really should teach this to their fellow Moldovans), the bride's sister played a few pieces on the piano, much to her protest and Father's persistence.

Posh Corps: The [not so] rough life

 I recently spent a weekend at my host brother's vila (by which, I refer to a vacation home, outside the capital city, on a lake). It is experiences like this that bring to mind the "Posh Corps" label many Peace Corps Volunteers all over the world self-apply when their service fails to resemble the savannas and stricken poverty that appears so restlessly in Peace Corps promotional material.

The vila sits on about an acre of land, complete with gardens, a hammock tied between two cherry trees, the two-story house, a large covered patio, and a cellar full of homemade spirits. I wish I could tell you that the house does not have indoor plumbing, good windows, or electricity. But it really does have it all...and then some.

After three servings of sour-cherry liquor for breakfast, my feet took me just far enough to reach one of the big beds on the second floor. The walk in the woods and flower picking would have to wait until the afternoon. My host family says the vila is a place to relax, but like an amateur, I had not anticipated the relaxation to be substance induced. Silly me.

Perhaps I should have put this photo at the top of the post. Perhaps it could have hooked the reader. Perhaps it explains more about my host country's obsession with beauty and order than I or any other blogging volunteer could accurately convey.

Three men, one ladder without legs, and a  power tool.



All you need to know is, what happened to this tree to give it the look of pom-poms on a stick, was done to it on purpose. 

The annual family reunion: Memorial Easter

The Preparation
My neighbor, Zina, came to use our electric meat grinder the day before Memorial Easter. While I nibbled on a cabbage salad and she worked on her three-meat meatballs, she recalled her husband’s predictable words in the days leading up to a major holiday.

“This doesn’t make any sense.” He would tell Zina. “You are so busy making food for two days from now that you don’t have time to give me something to eat today!”

And such was the scene in our kitchen the day before Memorial Easter. Maria was fixing to stuff the lamb. A neighbor, also Maria, was wrapping cabbage rolls (sarmale). Zina went on grinding away at her pork, beef, and chicken mixture. I stuffed miniature crepes with sweet cheese and exactly two raisins each. Eventually, my host mom gave me the order to make a cabbage salad for us to eat while we worked.
Celebration in the city

The morning of Pastele Blajinilor (Memorial Easter) we raced to the cemetery in our town. The priest was to arrive around 09:00 and Maria was anxious to get her husband's grave blessed as soon as possible so that we could make it to her village celebration as well. We succeeded in getting our grave blessed first because of my host brother's close friendship with the priest's son (uh, Catholicism take note?).

In the photo above, people are lined up around a long table with their food and wine, ready for it to be blessed and offered to others on behalf of the souls of the departed. Eastern Orthodoxy dictates that the fate of the souls of the dead are the responsibility of the family. Rituals are carried out on behalf of the dead to assure their eternity in heaven. 

Celebration in the Village

Throughout this post, readers might notice the tables and benches in the cemetery. Typically, each family has a table near the cluster of gravesites they maintain. Here's a shot of my immediate family and host cousins in the village cemetery.

We stayed in the cemetery for a few hours visiting with cousins and taking part in the rituals. Each grave is decorated with bowls of bread, candy, and red-colored eggs before the priest blesses the grave. Then the family gives away these bowls, often accompanied with a shot of wine, "on behalf of the soul of [insert name]." Thus, many Peace Corps Volunteers in Moldova will tell you this holiday is something akin to trick-or-treating. I always go home with a small collection of dishes and stash of chocolate treats. 

Just like last year, we spent the afternoon at Granny Liuba's house. We had a huge meal, and spent the afternoon relaxing, playing games, and watching my three-year-old host-nephew plant onions in the garden (see above slideshow captions for commentary). 

In this picture, Vitalie (my oldest host brother) and I are playing with our food. It's a simple game, smash your boiled egg on someone else's and see whose egg implodes. Yet another thing America kids miss out on because they prefer those plastic colored eggs instead of the regular ones. 

Misha's 40 Day Praznic

My neighbor passed away on March 22nd. He was only 50 years old. As per Eastern Orthodox custom, we held a feast in his honor on the day marking 40 days since Misha's death.  

Alina, Misha's daughter, knocked on our door at 09:00, inviting us to the feast that was about to begin. Just then the priest came to bless the home. By 09:15, we were taking our first glass of wine toasting Misha, "May God forgive him. May we live to memorialize him."

Given the early hour, our hostess was not too persistent with wine, though the World Health Organization's recent assessment of Moldova as the world's largest consumer of alcohol did come up in conversation. Usually, people tell me the report's not true: "How could they know how much I take from my cellar?" or "But  what about the Russians?!" But on this morning one woman offered a completely original response. With a single shake of her head and her right hand passing from one side of her body to the other she said, "Eighteen liters? That's nothing."

Not that Praznics are usually happy feasts, but this one was particularly tough to swallow. The room was just barely filled with our neighbors and Misha's colleagues from the local water-bottling plant. But his son is away in Siberia, working. His daughter is home caring for her ill mother, despite she herself having a rough time with her first pregnancy. Misha was the glue that held that family together, Dumnezu sa l-ierte!

Sour Cherry Blossoms