Thanks for the new year + Christmas wishes! Germany was a lot of reading, relaxing, taking walks, swimming at indoor pools, shopping in Munich, eating, and a bit of traveling. Johanna's parents are interesting people. I loved meeting her family. Her mom is really cool. She's a doctor and has done medical work with leprosy patients in Pakistan. She loves the idea of something like PC and wanted to hear all about my work. She said she would like to work as a doctor in a developing country when she retires, so that was very interesting to talk about. Johanna's sister, Annika, will be doing medical work in Guatemala this October. She's currently in medical school and spent a day with me in her university city showing me around. Regensburg, I believe. Johanna will be doing research at Cornell this coming spring / summer and leaving for NY in Feb, so I'm glad to have seen her before she leaves. I'm really excited for her. Maybe our trips to Raleigh will overlap?

One of my volunteer friends ended up on my flight to Germany so it was nice to have someone I could spend my layover in Romania with. Johanna came with me to the airport then I flew back alone which was okay. I ran into a few guys from my group at the airport on their way back from Istanbul. We all admitted we wanted to cry a little. Ah, the post-vacation slump. The volunteers who came back from America had it the worst. It's such a double-edged sword. You need vacation for your mental health, (and I hadn't felt so clean since last spring!!!) but coming back to the village after vacationing in a developing country is rough. I was (am) in Chisinau for the weekend for a GLOW (summer camp) meeting, and next weekend have a training session on how to write grants.

Things going on:
Haven't written much about this, but it's taking a lot of space up in my brain: dry well. Our village's main well is dry. Has been for months. I have the well in front of the house I'm living in so I don't have running water, anyway where I live, but our school has been without water since October... and it took months to assess the situation and finally announce that the water is not coming out not because the pipes are broken, but because there is no water. Enormous problem. It's shocking still how many people don't even realize this is the issue and they're without running water now in their homes. Asking the mayor what is going on doesn't really seem to cross many peoples' minds. I spoke with PC and this issue is too expensive for a PC grant alone to finance. Apparently the old well that we had been using in the village had broken pipes a few years back and a company was paid to fix the pipes, but the people who received the money (all donations from everyone in the village) messed a bit with the pipes and then left with the money. A lot of money. So people aren't eager to pool their money again. I honestly don't think there is enough money in the village to be pooled to fix this. I went to the mayor's office and I'm not sure if they either take me seriously or want me to get involved. If I were to help with a grant we would have to find organizations / donors outside of PC. I think there are NGOs in Moldova that can grant money, but I know very little about grant writing in general. Hopefully the training session on grants next weekend will help. I invited the English teacher from my school to go with me to the training.
The outhouses at my school are the other issue I'm happy to confront, but dreading because I know it's going to be a LOT OF WORK. A hardworking teacher at my school sought me out because she wants me to write a PC grant with her to have the outhouses rebuilt. They're about 20 years old and cleaned once per year. I always try to go home to use my outhouse unless it's an emergency. They're that bad. And combined with the no-water, kids-not-washing-their-hands bit, it's a disaster. If we want the outhouse project to be finished before I leave Moldova, we have to start this month on the project.

Just to let those of you know who have been reading news, I do not have gas in my village so I'm not affected by the Ukrainian / Russian gas conflict. Last I heard no resolution to the conflict has been reached. Once gas is turned back on it will take at least 36 hours for the gas to start reaching these homes again in Bulgaria, Ukraine, Hungary, Germany, etc. I won't exactly express my views on this, but I will say that a lot of problems seem to come up between other countries and Russia. Hmm. Some of my friends don't have gas in their homes right now (but they have sobas/fires to compensate), but I have a friend in Bulgaria who is experiencing this more... anyway, for the most part the volunteers in Moldova aren't without heat. I wake up in the morning blowing smoke now, but that's just part of having a soba. It gets cold. I filled up my water bottle with boiling water the other night and that was nice. I can't wait until summer....

Trip to the grocery store then back to Pepeni. First week of classes starts tomorrow.