Time is seriously ticking away. We have been here over a month now which means we only have about 10 weeks left. I can’t believe how quickly time is flying. On a good note, Dr. Porter came and brought great tidings of joy – AKA package from my Momma! She sent me more toys and balloons for the kids, luna bars, thank you cards, soup packets, medicine, licorice, fruit snacks and candy. I couldn’t be happier! And of course, more T-shirts! Thanks Mom, you are the best! It even smelled like home!
We watched conference on and off for a few of the sessions here. Since we are 9 hours ahead, the live conference started at 7 pm, then 11 pm. It was too late to stay up and watch the second session. I hope to be able to finish the rest of conference this week.
Dr. Porter was my infant development professor last year. He was probably one of my best professors. I absolutely loved his class. I can’t tell you how excited I was when I found out he was coming because he is one of the few SFL professors I actually know. It’s been good to have a familiar face here. He arrived last night and we cooked him a good old spaghetti meal, accompanied with french bread and salad. Mario and her daughter Ioanna joined us.
Mario asked me last night if I would be in charge of taking Dr. Porter to the hospital today. I figured out beforehand where all of the girls were and I also translated a few phrases in Romanian in case the nurses wondered who the random man following me around was!
We went to each of the different floors so he could see where each of the girls had been working that week and the kids we had been working with. Hopefully it wasn’t boring for him! He is a great resource and so knowledgeable. If anything, it was good to see the rest of my group and understand more about the kids, their situations, their floor, etc. I have been on the 7th floor the whole time and hadn’t really seen anything else. On our floor, we typically see the kids who are sick with temporary illnesses – colds, fevers, etc.
When I was walking around with Dr. Porter visiting everyone else, there were a few times I started to get a bit woozy either from seeing things or hearing about some of the kids my roommates had been working with. A lot of the other girls are pre-nursing. I may come from a family of nurses, but that is not my cup of tea. I was holding a baby today and my roommate said – look at how strange his umbilical cord looks! Nope – last time I really looked at a brand new infant’s umbilical cord was when my little brother Ben was born, I passed out on the floor and had to be pushed in a wheelchair out of the hospital. If anything, I know I was blessed to be working on the 7th floor – as dirty and gross as it may be, I couldn’t have handled some of the other places.
Well, this week is going to be a busy week. I think we will be taking an all day trip to visit some monasteries, having lots of meetings/dinners with Dr. Porter and Aaron (the international internship coordinator) and trying to stay on top of language/schoolwork. Tomorrow, we will be meeting with Dr. Ciobanu (the head of Section 2) in the morning and then Dr. Porter will be coming with us to Tomesti to see where we work. Another great day, in Iasi Romania!
I realized a lot of my journal has been more of a schedule – this is what I do everyday, this is what I see everyday...
I thought today I would write a few of my feelings and emotions to mix it up a bit. However negative or positive, this is how I feel:
I can’t tell you how great it is to not be sick anymore. There is nothing more frustrating than being sick in a foreign country where you aren’t in your own bed, you can’t throw up in your own toilet, you don’t have your comfy sweats to sleep in all day– on top of that, when the only thing I wanted was water, I accidentally bought carbonated water. Ugh.
I am feeling much better and settled in now. I like the routine we have everyday and that things aren’t so foreign.
I LOVE having the feeling of being able to navigate by myself. I know the tram route to Carrefour, I know what I need to do to take a taxi to Kauffland, I know where the malls are, I know how to do the whole bus/tram ticket thing. I know the difference between the buses where I pay when I am on, versus the ones I need pre-paid tickets for. I like the independence. I like being able to figure things out – if I don’t know where it is or how to get there, I’m gonna ask around or do something about it until I do.
I like that I have learned lessons outside of working with the kids. I have learned the importance of setting an example for those around me. It has taught me the importance of preparation and planning. It has strengthened my organization skills. It has made me more confident in myself as a person. It has taught me tremendous patience – something I have not yet mastered and am still working on. It has taught me not only to serve the children here, but to serve those who I am working with. It has strengthened my ability to trust in others and to delegate. It has taught me to look for the good in others.
I hate that I don’t have a dryer, and I hate that we have a gas stove that needs to be lit with a match. I don’t like the fact that I never really get alone time. Yes, I can escape with my ipod or through reading my scriptures for a few minutes, but I am with someone 24.7. I hate not being able to straighten my hair, as vain as that is, it just makes me feel better. I feel like I am going to look like an orphan when I get home. I hate going to the grocery store and not being able to understand things. Then, even when I know what I am buying in Romanian, the instructions are in 6 different languages, none of which are english. I hate the way everything smells like smoke here. I hate that I can’t communicate and convey my feelings to the workers, to the branch members, and to people I meet because of the language barrier.
Even with a hate list, I still can’t get over the fact that I live in Romania and I am here for a good cause, doing something I have wanted to do since I was 12 years old. This was something I said I would do from the time I was a beehive. A group of older women who weren’t married had come to speak to us at girls camp about some of the amazing things they had done while still being single and that we shouldn't get into this mindset that we have to have the cookie - cutter life: go to school, get married, have kids, done. We should have the mentality that there are things for every one of us to experience and we all have different timelines and callings in life. I made a goal that day that someday, somehow I would travel somewhere foreign and work in an orphanage. This is the real thing, and I am finally completing one of my life long goals. I need to remember that everytime I am having a frustrating day. I also need to remember the day I sat in Dr. Porter’s class over a year ago talking about the effects of institutionalization and the research that had been conducted in Romania and having an overwhelming feeling that I needed to do this – even though at the time, it was completely impossible. On top of that, one year later, sitting at an info meeting for the internship and being asked, “Are you seriously considering going to Romania for this internship during the fall?” and without hesitation, saying, “Yes, I’m going” without even realizing what I had just said. Miracles have occurred to get me here and miracles are happening here. It’s easy to get caught up in the everyday routine and the logistical stuff. However, from a larger perspective, I can already tell that being here, even for a month, has made a tremendous change in me as a person.
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