No worries, faithfull readers, I am in fact alive and well, if not a little bit frost bitten! The weather has taken a dive and it feels more like an end-of-the-season football game than September. Val, one of the closest volunteers to me, told me to get me some baba (grandmother) pants- apparently very ridiculous looking, but very very warm. I also just asked Alex (a member of Team Bardar, graduated from UVA with a degree in costuming and is our resident fix-it woman) to make me a fleece jumpsuit, with built-in booties of course, but I don’t think she took me seriously. By the end of December I’m going to look just like Maggie Simpson. I could complain about the cold for the rest of the entry, but I won’t because that would be aggravating for all of us! *Freshman year I was so cold that whenever dad would call that’s all I would whine about, until eventually he just stopped calling.
School is going great, knock on wood. This week we’re teaching about the heart and the director of the school, who was formerly the biology teacher, wants to ‘assist’ which means she’s sitting in on a few to evaluate us! I don’t really mind, because honestly what are they gonna do?! The director swings by the office once a day to check in with Rodica, who is also the school nurse, and see if I’ve lost any of my belly yet! The second day at school she sat me down and said that I was just a bit to chubby for a health teacher. Initially I was shocked and just a little bit horrified that someone, let alone my director, would have the gall to say that to me. But she prefaced it with how beautiful I was –flatery is always good option with me- and now every time we pass in the hallway she calls me ‘pretty margareta’. Really she’s trying to be friendly and I can laugh with her now. Especially because, despite my belly, the school’s cleaning lady has deemed me good enough to marry her son, yay! She proposed him to me last Friday and I fully expect me to jump at the offer. Unfortunately this little daisy- that’s what Margaret means in Romanian- is still single.
Yesterday I went into my Rayon to get money. However, the bus I take home decided not to go, because it was a little too wet and cold!?!? So me and a few others from Tripoli had to hitch a ride home. And let me tell you as fun as it is, it’s not so pleasant when you have to stand for a bazillion hours (maybe an exaggeration) in the wet and cold. I made friends with a woman at the station and she took me under her wing. Her and her friends are living here, in Tripoli, collection potatoes. So once the harvest is over she’ll move back home. They were really nice and eventually we caught a van back, I’m not sure what I was sitting on, but it resembled concrete toilet paper roles. I got home, ran to my bed and stayed there until this morning.
Sorry for the break, btw did you know that if you write three –‘s it turns into that lovely line you see above?!?! I’ve just come back from my ‘excursie’ with Loriona. I’m not actually sure if that’s her name, but I’m gonna run with it… most times people think that it’s my accent anyways. Her entire family lives in Estonia and is only here to help bring in the crops. Lorina is the only one who speaks Romanian, so when they’re all together it’s a jumble of Estonian, Romanian, Russian, and tonight they threw in some English just for me. It struck me as funny, and I know I shouldn’t have laughed, but as I’m finally feeling a wee bit comfortable with my Romanian, I walked into a household of people speaking Estonian. They did however like my futskalita joke (because Hungarian and Estonian are similar), or more likely they were just being polite. Also, they fed me lamb for the first time! Poor little guy.
Babi called me today and filled me in on what’s going on with the election! I can’t believe how awful the Mcain campaign machine has been run. I’m not supposed to talk politics so I’m going to leave it at that, except to say… Going into the general election Mcain was loved by the liberal press- he was on the Daily Show more than any other guest. Instead of doing what he really believes with Iraq, abortion, the economy and almost every other issue he decided to appease the evangelical right and will ultimately piss everyone off!
Also, in the back of last week’s newsweek was an interview with Butho’s (don’t know how to spell) husband who will become the president of Pakistan. It’s pretty amazing how much faith he has put in the healing powers of democracy. He really believes that Pakistan can change, though it may take awhile. It was a great article to read because instead of selling himself as an instant fix or spouting get rich quick scams, he honestly told voters and the people of Pakistan that it was going to be a long, hard road and that it would be many years until there was any significant difference. But I think that by the time David graduates college, maybe even high school, there will be a different Pakistan. A reasonable, profitable, powerful Pakistan. Meanwhile Iraq will have be cratered by our nuclear arsenal.
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