Week of 21 April

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The Monday we got back from Turkey, I was excited to see everyone and to be able to catch up with everyone and go for a drink later that evening. When I went to the office to meet Mikkel and give him his picture DVD from Berk and start to upload pictures, Connie informed us that everyone was going to see 10,000 BC tonight. It wasn’t exactly what I was hoping for, and I really didn’t have any interest in seeing it, but I wanted to spend time with everyone else, so I decided to go anyway.
This was also the week that the 3 boys discovered that they had off the following week for Orthodox Easter, since the kids were going to be on holiday. Mike and Elliot immediately started planning their own trip to Istanbul. They invited Mikkel to come with them, but he didn’t want to be in Turkey 3 times in a month and a half (God forbid!). Also by the time we came back, the weather had also finally started to get nice, so that Tuesday, when I ran into all 3 boys in the office, they invited me to come with them to get a Frisbee and then find somewhere we could all play for the afternoon. Unfortunately, I had already promised Dani that I would start at the Codlea day center and had to leave to meet Connie in just over an hour. I told them I was sorry I couldn’t, but maybe tomorrow. They kept telling me that it was going to be “totally awesome” and that I was going to be missing out. When they left, I checked my email, and then went to the bus stop to go down to Stadion Municipal to meet Connie and go to Codlea. When the bus pulled up, I could see Connie through the window, and she waved. When I got on the bus, it was ridiculously crowded, and therefore also very hot and stuffy. I was sandwiched on the steps between a bunch of Romanian boys, and at one point, my foot got caught in the rotating mechanism of the doors, and I couldn’t even get off the bus to let others on or off. That was a awkward.
When we finally got to Stadion Municipal, Connie and I got off, and I showed her where to get the shuttle to Codlea. We got off at the second stop after entering Codlea, and I walked the same direction that Dani had showed me 2 weeks earlier. About halfway to the day center, I saw Loredana and the kids walking down the hill. She said they were going to another school where the kids could learn music and that we could come with them. As much as I was really hoping to be able to unload the huge bag of arts and crafts supplies that Dani had sent with us, I agreed to go with them. We walked down to the small town square, where Loredana left us with the kids to go borrow a camera to take pictures. She was gone for a lot longer than we were expecting, and Connie and I had to look after 12 kids we had just met all on our own. They had clearly just had an English lesson also, because they kept asking “what’s your name?” and answering their own question with “my name is ____”. Some of the boys took it further by saying “my name is spinaci (spinach)”, or “my name is flore (flower)”. This entertained them for quite a while. Then one girl asked me if I spoke Spanish, and I said yes. Then she asked “Donde esta Loredana?” I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to answer her back in Spanish, English, or Romanian, so I took my chances with Spanish and replied “No sé”. Then she laughed and said “nu ştiu!” I suppose I should have answered in Romanian. Anyway, finally Loredana came back, and we continued on our way to the music center. All the way the kids were chatting and asking questions and trying their best to communicate with us, but it was not going well. Our Romanian was worse than their English, and they found that to be very frustrating. When we finally got to the music school, we found out that it was closed, and that apparently they thought the children were coming on a different day. So we stopped to take a few pictures, and then we walked to a park across town where the kids could play for a little bit before going back for the afternoon. I was pretty frustrated at this point because I felt like the entire afternoon was wasted when I could have been having fun with the boys, playing Frisbee. We sat watching the kids on the playground for about half an hour, and then it started to look like rain, so we headed back to the town center. Loredana said we didn’t have to walk all the way back to the day center with them, and she would just see us Thursday.
By the time Connie and I got all the way back, it had started raining really heavily. Neither of us had an umbrella, and I didn’t even have my rain coat with me. Connie wanted to go to the little cake shop up the road from me since we had gotten off early, so I asked if I could stop by Elisabeta’s on our way to get my coat and change my shoes. She said sure, and waited under the tunnel for me to come out. When I came back, we ran as fast as we could to the little shop to avoid being drenched by the rain. Then we sat there for what turned out being hours just talking about lots of different things. Connie was really worried about starting uni next year and fitting in and dealing with all the people who drink and party. I tried to assure her that she had done a great job coming here on her own and making friends, and that at least she didn’t have a problem being around people who drink. That seemed to cheer her up a little. We also compared school systems in the US and the UK. When I finally looked at the clock, I realized it was 7:00 and we should probably go, because Elisabeta would be expecting me for dinner. Later that night, the only one I could get a hold of to go out was Mikkel, so he met me for bruschetta at Bistro De l’Arte after meeting his hospitality friend.

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