Me n my Moldovan Mamma as she roasts peppers to preserve for the winter.



































Look at my host dad up in the Pecan tree.



















This Friday I went and picked pecans with my host parents. It was pretty fun, and funny to see my host Dad up in the tree shaking them out so my host mom and i could collect them. They taste good, and makes me want butter pecan ice cream, something i have not seen here.

A far away view of the new church under construction in my town.

Entrance to my house.

Other entrance to my house which leads to my room and also the 'casa mare', where they have their nice dinner parties. I think every Moldovan house has a room especially for large table dinner parties.

Floareasoarelui

A bunch of goats.

My first friends in my new town. Every time I pass their house on my way home from work and they are outside they invite me in and feed me tons of food. They are the cutest little couple ever. They live in this little house with low ceilings, it seems it was built for their size. They have a huge garden and tons of chickens, pigs, and rabbits. (they make a delicious rabbit dish here in Moldova. I got to eat it my first day with my last host family and I never knew it was soooo good) The woman on the left is an English teacher I work with. I walked home with her my first day.

This is the amazing Erika, who flagged down the bus she had been wanting to ride on for so long. It looked just like the Darjeeling Limited bus. It was pretty sweet.

Me and my trainee friends totally stoked to be on the Darjeeling Limited bus after a long hard day.

Playin some American football with my trainee buddies.

My host bro in at my last site. Burning trash I think.
My balcony, last site. Notice the grape vines growing off the right side of the house. They made the best wine.

Me at my last house.

My last host dad working on his truck.

My current host mom and dad, with my school director and her husband and son. This was during my visit to my permanent site while I was still in Pre-service Training.

The well and the huge garden at my last host family's house.
My current host mom and dad. Olga and Gheorghe, in their sunflower field.
The monastery and church in my current town.

Traditional Moldovan dance.

My host sister in the outside kitchen. My previous house.

My first host mom and dad.

A church in my last town. My PST town.

Me 'n' my host sis.

Just a random pretty house with the

cool well.

'Casa Vechi' or 'Old House'. The house next to my house where my host dad's parents lived and where my host parents lived while they were building their current house, just to the left.

Mine and my last host mom's birthday 'masa'.

The side yard of a house I passed on my way to language class. It had a cool well.

Birthday table. Beautiful isn't it?

Another cool well.

Some of the many chickens I live with.
My host Mamma cooking up some tomato juice to can for the winter. We did this all day.



My current host mom outside my house.
Really big Zucchinis that were grown in the garden. My host mom says we can't eat them now, they are too big.

A picture of my previous host mom and dad on their wedding day. They are so cute! Notice no one smiles, and also note the gift to the bride and groom from the groom's mother to the left of the groom. I love this photo.

My peers and I from Romanian Language class, with our Romanian teachers and the man that played a mean accordion for us when we performed traditional Moldovan song and dance for our host families. We practiced hard for this day and I think we did alright.
Road to the next town from my PST town where I ran.
Final destination of my daily run.

My runnin partners. Thank you Bethany for your coaching!

First Bell Has Rung

The first day of school in Moldova is a day to remember. Everyone dresses in their sharpest black and whites. There are many speeches and many flowers handed out. I unfortunately, once again, did not bring my camera. My life does not even exist without my professional photographer cousin Quintin around. I had a teacher friend take some pics so hopefully I can post those soon. I received so many flowers and kisses on the cheeks from students that day, they really know how to make a teacher feel appreciated. Its a good thing considering the fact that teachers here make about a $4.50 a day. I could barely carry all those big red roses home.

I am so happy to have finished my nine weeks of Pre-service Training and to have been officially sworn-in as a Peace Corps Volunteer, although I did have some good times during PST. Getting to know my truly hospitable and cool PST host family was so much fun. My host mom Ecaterina turned forty a few days before I turned twenty-six. She ran the small family shop just up the hill from my house and also worked her but off at home, cooking, cleaning and taking care of the fam. Ecaterina can also assemble a Kalashnikov, all the girls learned at her high school, pretty cool huh? My host dad, Mihai, is forty and drives a truck. He drove that same truck in Russia when he was in the military. Mihai was very nice to me and always served me as much wine as i wanted, but I usually could not understand anything he said to me. He would always say something that seemed like it was probably very funny and everyone would laugh and so would I even though I didn't understand the joke, then he'd say, "did you understand?" and I'd say no. He also looks just like Cesar. My host sister Irina is nineteen and is currently attending a University in Chisinau for cosmetology and fashion design. My host bro Tudor is the sweetest fourteen year old boy I have ever met. My host mom and dad were constantly making him run and get this or that from the store or making him do some kind of housework, and he walked around with a constant melt-your-heart smile on his face. When he wasn't doing a chore, he was playing soccer, and i got to play with him a couple times which wore me out completely, he's fast! He even came and played some American football with me and a few other trainees. It was so fun, Tudor scored the first touchdown.

One of my highlights was when I got to go and help my family trim their grape vines in their plot of land about five miles drive from the house. Almost every Moldovan family has some plots of land where they may grow grapes for wine, or other fruits or vegetables, or sunflowers. My fam was big into the wine and went out to the vineyard and worked a few times a month. The day I finally convinced them to just let me go, and not worry about planning for my practice school lessons or study Romanian for one day, I was stoked. It was pretty lame that day, not hard at all, we just trimmed the vines that were too long for a few hours. The grapes were good though, and I told my mom I preferred drinking the wine. She laughed pretty hard at that.

During PST, I got to hang out with a cool young Moldovan family, learn a bit of Romanian, drink some very good (and very strong) house wine and eat a ton of delicious Moldovan cuisine. I also had some long and very informative technical sessions on teaching English, but I have to admit, that wasn't my favorite part. I personally preferred my chance at practicing the actual teaching of a Moldovan class during our three weeks of practice school. The drawn out lesson plans we had to write were not fun, but I absolutely love working with Moldovan kids.

I also made some great PC volunteer friends, who I think of as my family while here in Moldova. Its nice to have such great people you know you can count on. We can help each other out as we all face the ups and downs of our Peace Corps service together, so far away from our hometowns, friends and families.

All and all, my time here has been pretty amazing and I have only just begun my service.

Anyway... I'm gonna see about how to post some pictures now.