27 Luni

This is the calm before the storm, my final cushy weekend in Tărgoviște with my Gazda family before moving to my permanent Peace Corps site and kicking off a series of activities involving summer camps and site integration.  This is the final weekend of amazing home cooked meals, comfortable surroundings and familiar faces that I have come to know and love.  Since I will more than likely not have Internet access immediately upon arriving in Valea Călugărească this is the best opportunity to provide updates on recent events.  As you can imagine, a lot has taken place in the last week with our Language Proficiency Examinations (LPI), swear-in ceremony, and an overnight in Romania’s capital city of Bucharest.  The time is blurring by at an unbelievable pace, only ten weeks ago we landed in Romania, a strange new place, and now many of us are comfortably calling it home.

As a rite of passage, each member of Peace Corps Group 28 underwent a one-on-one interview with a Language Instructor to determine our proficiency level in Romanian.  This test identifies how much of the Romanian language we have acquired since arriving here and acts as a barometer for how successful each Volunteer is likely to be with site integration and accordingly, community project collaboration.  Each of us was assigned to a specific thirty-minute time slot, with a predetermined instructor, on either Monday or Tuesday of this past week.  I was given the final slot on Tuesday, a potential benefit to having a last name that starts with “W.”  While our Colleagues were testing the rest of us participated in continuing language instruction that largely focused on our general conversation skills.  The LPI itself is designed to simulate real conversations that Volunteers are likely to have on a regular basis.  Over the past ten weeks, our language classes have strived to prepare us for this moment, covering topics through the “Communicative Approach to Language Instruction.”  Learning in much the same way a child would learn we were introduced to images and their corresponding Romanian words with very little English translation.  This methodology focuses on teaching its students the basics of day-to-day life skills; how to order menu items in a restaurant, how to utilize public transportation, how to communicate who you are and what you are doing here, etc.  Of course all in Romanian, some of the questions that I was given during my LPI were: “Tell me about yourself,” “Tell me about your hometown in the United States,” “Tell me a story about a time when you were in school,” and “What are you plans after Pre-Service Training.”

In addition to direct, open-ended questions we were each given a specific scenario to act out.  These ranged, based on a volunteer’s perceived skill level earlier in the interview and can include situations like “You have fallen ill with stomach pains.  Call the Doctor and tell him what has happened,” to more advanced topics like “The Mayor of your town has asked you to give an impromptu speech outlining your latest community initiative.”  I was asked to explain why I was late for an important meeting with a group of Community Leaders; I went with the plausible excuse that the bus broke down and then asked to reschedule.  As I understand it, you are given points for creativity and how existential responses are.  The wider a volunteer’s vocabulary and the more complex their communication is, the better.

In addition to broken down buses, I talked about one of my favorite books, “Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor Frankl (Thanks again Ashley for the lend).  This book served as an inspiration early last year as I was contemplating Peace Corps service.  The book is a biography about a Doctor of neurology and psychiatry who was captured during World War II and taken away to a concentration camp and the methods that he used to survive.  In summary, the author indicates that the meaning of life is to have a life of meaning.  In other words if we have meaningful events, people etc to look forward to then those in themselves are our meaning for living.  As I recall, for Mr. Frankl, his ‘meaning’ was his love for his wife and it was the enduring hope of seeing her again that gave him the strength to push on.  Of course I was not able to communicate all of this in Romanian but I was able to explain the basic plot of the book and its inspiration on my decision to become a Volunteer.

The methods for scoring, though thoroughly outlined on paper ahead of time, seemed subjective and not truly representative in the end.  The final scores for some Volunteers did not seem emblematic of their true skill as demonstrated over ten weeks, but rather characterized one good or bad thirty-minute session.  Although I am quite happy with the outcome of my interview there are certainly others in my group who I feel have a stronger grasp on the language and I was admittedly surprised to hear of their lower than expected final grades.  In the end though, the final LPI score is largely meaningless.  In my mind the LPI itself is an important goal to work towards and has more meaning than the actual score.  When told that you are required to pass a test with at a certain level you will inevitable strive harder than if there was no bar to reach at all.  To this end, though stressful, I am glad that we had the opportunity to participate in the LPI experience.

Once our final LPI scores were confirmed and it was made clear that we all managed an acceptable score, it was time for the swearing-in ceremony.  Bright and early Thursday morning all volunteers, and two each of their Gazdas, made their way to the Peace Corps Hub in Tărgoviște to take a series of buses to the United States Ambassador’s residence in Bucharest.  Ninety minutes later we pulled up out front of a large and elegant building surrounded by tall walls and ample security.  Though photography was forbidden from the street outside of the compound we were allowed to take pictures of the pink house from the back garden, which alone was an amazing site for an inner-city dwelling.  In the backyard tents were setup to house the ceremony, waiters weaved in and out of the crowd with soft drinks and reporters with cameramen buzzed around Volunteers and Dignitaries as is often portrayed in the media.  The day was beautiful, with clear skies and though the sun was piercing, comfortable sanctuary could be found under the tents and in the shade of huge trees occupying the backyard.  One noteworthy lawn ornament was a two story mechanized, functional volcano that had been constructed to perform during the preceding week’s Fourth of July party.  Apparently each year’s Independence Day celebration represents a different State of the Union; with this last year meant to highlight Hawaii.

After an hour of mingling, interviews and taking in the grandeur of the Ambassador’s residence the day’s purpose was underway.   Following the Romanian and then U.S. National Anthems, our Director of Peace Corps Romania began with opening remarks, acknowledging those in the audience there to witness the event and she offered thoughtful words of advice for the soon to be Volunteers.  Next the U.S. Ambassador himself addressed the crowd, briefly discussing the recent decision for Peace Corps to withdrawal from Romania at the end of this group’s two-year tour.  With that we took the oath of office and we were sworn-in as Volunteers.  Following the Ambassador was the Romanian Secretary for Global Affairs, from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; a witty and charming gentleman with an understandable though awkwardly placed British accent.  Our Director then introduced each of us by name, to which we were to individually list our city of origin in the United States and the town or village in which we would serve for the next two years.  The highlight of the event, for me, came next when two of my colleagues, chosen by the group, gave separate speeches.  The first was a young gentleman from New York City that gifted the crowd with his poetic take on the pre-service training experience.  The second was a young woman, with roots as much in Colombia as in Chicago, who recounted a story from her youth that inspired her all those years ago to live a life of service to others.  As quickly as the ceremony began, it came to an end with additional emotional inspiration in our Director’s closing remarks.  Following the formalities and speeches of the ceremony was a reception where food and drink was served; the quintessential American food of hot dogs was served in typical ballpark fashion, lots of ketchup and mustard.  Though perhaps a thoughtful gesture, to give us a taste of home, I would have preferred the Romanian equivalent of sarmale.

Leaving the Ambassador’s residence, now as true Volunteers, we made our way across town for a tour of the Peace Corps Romania Headquarters.  The main office, which coordinates Peace Corps activities to help build the future of Romania, is fittingly a grand old house, built with classic French overtones.  The office consists of one main building and a few separate smaller buildings, each housing different divisions of the Peace Corps, including our Medical Officers.  There is also a Volunteer lounge that provides us with a central location to relax, check our email and catch up with other Volunteers while visiting Bucharest.  The streets surrounding the office in this part of town are very tight with sharp turns, a nightmare for any driver.  As parking is limited, many resort to leaving their cars on the sidewalk; towing is clearly not enforced here.  After a brief tour of the office, several of us made our way to a hostel a few blocks away, called Wonderland.  A quirky little place, it had enough room for the ten of us, though was short on showers, etc.  Fortunately, the hostel was close to the part of town known as Central Vechi or Old Center.  Here there are many restaurants, shops and bars to serve as distractions after a long ten weeks of training.  It was quickly decided that we would spend the remainder of our day and evening in this part of town.

Today I say my good byes to a host family of which I am very fond and tomorrow I head off to my new home for the next two years.  Fortunately, my site is not the twelve-hour journey that other volunteers experienced this weekend.  At most it will take one hour to make the trek from Tărgoviște to Ploiești, from there my means of transportation are unclear, though there are a plethora of MaxiTaxi’s and buses that I can navigate to complete the trip.  The real fun begins when I collect my key from the school Secretary and see what form my new residence is in.  As I understand it, the apartment has been undergoing renovation throughout the past couple of weeks, though some concern lingers in the back of my mind as to whether or not it will actually be complete.  Regardless, I will have a week to settle in before heading off to my first of three, weeklong summer camps, Simbrea, Sangeorz-Bai and Snagov.  Following those, at the end of summer, we are all called back together in the city of Sinaia for a TEFL conference.  Shortly thereafter our first semester of school will start and that is when the true test begins.