Disclaimer: this blog does not reflects my personal views, and not those of the Peace Corps, the Peace Corps Romania program or the United States government.

This is by no means my first attempt at starting my Romanian blog, but hopefully this one will actually make it to the Internet. If you are reading this you can thank both my friend Laura, who told me that I should write a blog because “people will read it”, and my mother, who keeps threatening to get a facebook account if I don’t keep her up to date with my adventures. So here you go. I am now a little more than two weeks into my Romanian life. The experience in many ways reminds me of being a child, in that there is so much I don’t know, and in that I am learning at such a fast rate.
So far most of the things l have learned are very basic, such as where the woman’s bathroom is at my school (as opposed to the men’s), a lesson I learned after using the wrong one for about a week and a half, at the expense of one very surprised Romanian boy.
The bathroom education continued today as I learned that when the city has turned off the water for the day, the water that you will find on the bathroom floor is likely bleach. My tom’s shoes will carry the evidence of this for years to come.
On a more serious note, in the last 14 days I have learned an insane amount of Romanian. That being said, I am only now becoming capable of putting together short sentences and only understand 1/16th of the Romanian spoken in my Gazda (host family), but compared to where I started this is nothing short of miraculous.
I have also become very comfortable in my surrounding and routine. I am living on the ninth floor of a block building with a Romanian man and woman, and occasionally her 22-year-old son and his 13-year-old daughter. They love rock music and dark chocolate, two things I can appreciate. They have all been so welcoming and inclusive that my transition has been fun and easy. I really couldn’t ask for anything better. Even, Their cat, who, at first, made his distaste for me known through a series of displays of rather violent behavior, seems to have finally put down his claws, which I greatly appreciate.
My schedule too is becoming second nature. A regular week day consists of waking up and having awesomely strong Romanian coffee and some breakfast, then out the door by eight with my gazda made sack lunch in hand. My walk to school takes about 30 minutes, a feeble attempt to “keep my figure” but at least it is something. The first four hours of class are made up of language class. The classes are very interactive, and there are only six students in my class so we get a lot of practice. The second part of the day consists of lectures and discussions ranging anywhere from the Romanian economic situation, to English teaching theory, to what to do if bitten by a stray dog (more likely than one may think, as one of my fellow trainees already knows too well). All of that is broken up by lunch and the occasional frisbee or volleyball break. At 5pm it is either time to go home to study and socialize with the Gazda, or out to socialize with fellow PC trainees.
This here, is a hardly adequate description of my day, and more importantly my experience in Romania in general, but it is a start. I will do my best to better fill in the picture for you in the weeks to come, and remember, friends and family, I want to know how you are doing too, so don’t be strangers!