So the last few weeks after site visit were somewhat interesting. They certainly passed quickly. The weekend following site visit I went to București to poke around, check out the city, etc. I have some photos in my PST album on the Book. It is a bit difficult to sum the city up but I will try in as short a time possible: enormous parliamentary building, high prices, very cool metro, beautiful architecture everywhere, roads crowed with cars, gorgeous "Parcul Carol". It was only a day trip, too.
There was more class and sessions the following week. We had a session on the Roma ("gypsies"), some disgusting medical sessions, and more language. I was placed back in Simona's class, thank goodness, and got in some good practice.
However, it was post site visit that I hit a wall. A brick wall. I had difficulty speaking in Romanian and finding energy and inspiration to participate in class. Pre-service Training is difficult and exhausting, never mind getting along here without the language and cultural fluency that I would like. I snapped out of it though as my brain rebooted and got back on track.
It was a good thing that I was able to climb those bricks and start trudging forward again because at the end of week eight was our practice LPI language interview. This involves walking into a room with a professor, one on one, and having a conversation in Romanian for twenty minutes to a half hour about ourselves, our homes, our families, what we do in our spare time, and so on. It is a language assessment method. I scored intermediate mid, which isn't particularly fabulous by any means. This was practice for my real interview, which happened a week and a half later at the beginning of week ten. I scored the same, intermediate mid. I am not discouraged by the results however and I am optimistic about moving forward with the language learning.
The "Swear In" ceremony was the Thursday of week 10 (yesterday) and was a beautiful event. It was held at the ambassador's residence in București, a huge house and lawn, gated, with armed guards, tennis courts, indoor in-ground pool, etc. Two of our group, Kevin and Andrea, gave speeches, both of which were excellent and quite moving. I am glad we picked those individuals to represent us. We took the oath, which was pretty cool, I had never done that before (to my annoyance I was forced to say "so help me god" at the end, which made me feel ashamed and angry that my govt excludes non-believers of the monotheistic deity, and threatens the wrath of Yahweh if I choose to betray my country and constitution ... absurd).
I just returned from a night in București with some volunteers. It was a pretty good time but nothing spectacular to report. I leave tomorrow for Negrești, my permanent site for two years. I am a bit nervous I freely admit. I am anxious about the settling in process, the struggles with the language, and an uncertain living situation. It is a great site however and I am thrilled to be working with this community, so I know that it is merely a matter of time, work, optimism and energy until I feel settled and comfortable.
I think what I will miss most about Targoviște (my training site), besides training with a great group of Americans everyday, is my Gazda family. They have treated me with such kindness and generosity, anything I put into words in this forum would fail to convey my gratitude. They introduced me to Romanian culture, helped me develop my language skills, and most importantly, opened their homes and hearts to a stranger without reservation, with genuine curiosity and interest.
My Gazda family taught me that character and integrity, kindness and generosity, are cross cultural, are inter-human, are based in goodness and respect. I now know why reaching across borders, grasping arms, and staring your neighbor in the face is so important: there are bonds of solidarity that run deep in our species, far deeper than language and culture, whose revealing really will save this world.
Get out your shovels my friends and start digging.
