The Best of Pictures

The End

My hotel room in Paris was so small, but cute. I felt like a bull in a china shop.

At the airport at 3:00 am.

This is the end of my journey. It sure felt good to sleep in my own bed last night. I’m sitting in my living room at home submitting this last entry to my blog, because I wasn’t able to connect to the internet in Chicago. Later this morning I will try to find a place with high speed internet and add some pictures.
My lost luggage was delivered to the hotel at 4:00 Friday morning, and everything was in tact. Sometimes, it doesn’t pay to worry too much, as it always works out like it’s supposed to in the end.
I feel so blessed to have been part of something so amazing and to also be able to share my experiences with you along the way. I hope that you have all enjoyed by blog. It certainly gave me something to focus on that was fun and interesting and kept me from getting bored. I also want to give a special thank you to Jen Dockerty for helping me to figure out how to actually do this blog and also for helping me pick out the best camera. I certainly have learned more about the power of technology.
I also, am so thankful for all your great comments and for the encouragement that I got from each of you along the way. It made it all seem worthwhile. You are the best group of family and friend that I could ever dream of having.
I hope I didn’t bore you with too many details. If you aren’t to sick of it all yet, I’ll be looking forward to sharing more of my adventures, videos and pictures with you before too long. Oh, and yah the great wine.
I'll make one last post on Tuesday with some of the best of pictures.

Last Day in Paris

Well I'm sitting here finishing up my blog in the hotel room. Paris is totally beyond what I had expected. As you can see from the pictures it is just a beautiful and unique place. I wish that all of you could have been here with me today.
I left the Chisinau apartment at around 2:30 this morning. So, currently I have been up for almost 23 hours. I was so excited to see everything today that I just kept right on going. Kind of like the energizer bunny.
First, from my hotel I walked down to the Arc De Triomphe and then along the Champs Elysees. Then, I went the the Louvre, but I know that I didn't do it justice. You could spend at least two days there. I wanted to see the Mona Lisa so bad, and I thought that this might be my only shot, so I decided to go in a take a look around. I made myself leave after 1 hour, which was sad. Then I walked to Norte Dame and then to the Eiffel Tower. I ended up taking the subway (RER) twice, just because of the distances between.
Sad to say, but my luggage has not arrived yet. It never made it on the flight and they said that it was coming on the 1:30 flight and would be delivered to the hotel at around 5:00. Then we called them again about 8:00 tonight and they said that it had left the airport at 7:30 and should be here by 11:00. But, now it's almost 11:30 and I haven't gotten it yet. I am getting nervous wondering if I'll every see it again. There's three bottle of wine and two boxes of chocolate and other presents in them, so I hope it makes it here before morning. I leave at 8:00 am tomorrow to go back to the airport, to finally make my way back home. I might have to wear the same clothes and I'm going to have to find a least a toothbrush. Yuck!

I'll only add a few pictures tonight, so be sure to check back tomorrow and hopefully I'll be able to add more in the morning.

Last Day's In Moldova

Independence Day



Joh, me and Robin, a Peace Corp Volunteer


An old Soviet map of the Village of Copceau.


The frontier (The border of Moldova and Ukraine)




The party at the border


Wine in the "fancy' golden glasses



A toast (one of many)



John, me and Mr. Alexi from the Ukraine




Riding the field roads




Trying to unplug the combine



Two vounteers at the sign to the town who's name is prononuced volunteer in English



Mr. Valarei and his grapes





Canning Tomatoes


Mihails's grandparents at their summer home


Grandma Dominique




Picking corn from her garden for our lunch



A mural in the Grandmother's house that was done in the 1940's






Homemade wine and "moonshine" from Poland




Mihail's aunt







Strange sculptures in a roadside park

The village cow's


Garden at Mihail's aunt's house (Soon to be a bed and breakfast)



The bed and breakfast house

It's hard to believe that today my adventure of a lifetime is coming to an end. It's Thursday morning, and I am waiting at the airport to fly first to Frankfurt and then to Paris. I'll be leaving about the time that all of you will be going to bed on Wednesday night.
I have so many great memories and stories of my time in Moldova. What an experience. I can feel that I have benefited as much from this trip as the people that I came over here to help. It was very rewarding to have my host tell me that they have had a lot of vounteers come in the past. but that I have helped her the most.
I have open invitations from many people to come back. So hopefully I'll return again for a visit before to long. It's was so hard to say goodbye to all the good people that I have meet. But, I'm also looking forward to getting home again.

Day Thirteen

I've missed a few days with my postings. I'll send more complete details tomorrow. It has been a busy few days and I've been doing a lot.

One Sunday I went to the North of the country to meet Mihail's grandmother and aunt. His aunt is starting a bed and breakfast at her home and also runs a nursery and sells tomatoes. I got some really good pictures of the village. His aunt' s garden was very beautiful and we ate lunch there in the outdoor dining area. We went to the grandmother's house and she picked fresh corn and tomatoes from the garden, which we ate at lunch along with a old family recipe of eggplant, vegetables and chicken. It was wonderful Then we went to visit his other grandparents who have a summer home in the same area. His grandmother was canning tomatoes, which they do outside using a wood fire. His grandparents took us on a tour of the gardens. There was no space in the yard that wasn't used, mainly to grow vegetables. In addition, in addition there was every kind of fruit tree imaginable (apricot, walnut, apple, etc.) These grandparents spoke very good English, so we had a very lively and interesting conversation.

On Monday I traveled with Victoria, John and Virginia to the southern part of the country to Copucea. I'll write more about this and put some really awesome pictures tomorrow. Needless to day, this was a day that gave me really good insight into village life. We meet Mr.Valeriu, who is a very successful farmer in that area and employees about 300 employees in his various operations. He currently has a hog farm, a vineyard, crops and is in the process of trying to start a dairy. After our lively meeting regarding water elevations and manure systems, we headed for a ride through the fields in Mr. Valeriu's brand new Russian Chevrolet 4-Wheel drive vehicle that he had just bought the previous day. We were flying through the fields at about 60 km, it reminded me so much of home. We then traveled over the fields to the frontier the border between Ukraine and Moldova for a picnic. I am now affectionately know as Anna in Moldova. Once you've proven that you can enjoy a picnic in a hayfield, drink vodka and wine in makeshift glasses and then successfully encounter the border guards, you're officially one of them.

Hope you enjoy this quick picture. My battery is staring to die, so I'll add to this tomorrow.

Wednesday is the National Independence Day and its a holiday for everyone here. So, today was officially my last day of work.

Day Eleven & Twelve

Birds going crazy at the Cathedral


Saturday afternoon service



This boy was trying to see how close he could get before the birds took off. This reminded me of Luke when he was young and of Sam.




A wedding party




A building on the way downtown. I'm not sure what it is.



Material for sale at the department store. $150 lei is about $16 US. Some of the really sparkly material was $1500 lei



Sample dresses that you could sew yourself



School outfits for sale at the outdoor bazaar



The flower market is two blocks long and open 24/7

Kids in the park

The map in the office that shows where all the volunteers have came from over the past 5 years. The most are from Wisconsin.

The CNFA FtF people. From left to right Peter, volunteer from Illinois; Violeta translator; Lewayne, volunteer from Kansas; me; Eugenia, FtF employee; John K., volunteer from WI; Irina and Virginia translators; Tatiana, FtF employee. The new person in the second photo in the black dress is Victoria, FtF program coordinator.

It's hard to believe that this is my last weekend in Moldova. The time has really flown by. Last night Victoria, myself and John went to a nice dinner at an Italian restaurant and it got to be a late night. We had the best risotto with mushrooms and a great tiramisu for dessert. And, oh ya, the wine was the best. It was from a winery in the Purcari region. They sure know how to make good wine.
I stayed in the apartment and worked on data and spreadsheets this morning. I feel like there is so much more to do and the time is getting shorter. We only have a few days next week to wrap it up with my two host companies. I want to leave them with some good excel tools that they can use to determine if they should invest in new operations. This seems to be a common problem through out Moldova. It's very hard to plan on anything because the business environment changes all the time. But, I worked up some pretty cool spreadsheets that they use to do different scenario projections using different assumptions. I hope it's helpful, but I'm know that they still have a long way to go. First they will have to learn to trust in each other and to change the system. That won't be so easy.
This afternoon I walked down to the center of the city and took some of these great pictures. It's always a good place to just wander around and people watch. It was hot again today. So, it best to just meander and take your time.
Hope you enjoy these pictures. I was so mad because I think I finally figured out what I am doing wrong when I take the videos. But, it was after this great video of a church service at the Cathedral. I just happened to be going by there and was lucky enough to catch a little of this. I'm just upset that it's not shot the right way. Hopefully I'll get to do this again.

Just Pictures

Sometimes pictures say it all. Hope you enjoy these.