A Severin Weekend

Wow, what an American football can do! All the kids/people say they don't like American football but you break out the pigskin and everyone wants to play. I started playing a little catch with some of the bloc kids and before I knew it, there were a ton of people wanting to play. Next thing you know they want to start learning how to play. Even older people stopped to see what was being hurtled through the air. It was a fun spontaneous day of meeting a lot of people.


La Nunta (Wedding) celebration was going on under my balcony.

My Severin gazda family.

Bringing the Maxwell Street Polish here. One of my favorite things I like to make/eat.

The Final Product

Casa de Piatra

Casa de Piatra is what you wish newlyweds in Romania. It translates to 'House of Stone' symbolizing and wishing a strong marriage.

I would like to wish my best friend Danny and his new wife, Heidi, 'Casa de Piatra' as I was honored to be next to him at the altar while he celebrated one of the most important days of his life, marrying the beautiful Heidi. On his wedding day, he was the one taking care of me, picking me up, and making sure I was all dressed up and ready to go. He's always been like that, making sure that I was set. Outside of my family he is definitely one of the people in my life closest to me, knows my humor, and can probably anticipate my next move (if he hasn't already done it himself). I was always welcomed to be part of his family and celebrated many a holidays with them and have always been accepted no matter what I did (made my share of mistakes). His family is incredibly close and has definitely defined Danny into the solid individual he is today. Just to name some of the few things; He is the person who I bought my first case of beer with (waiting outside the liquor store for someone to buy it for us), went through the growing pains of meeting girls, figuring out that maybe we weren't the best skaters in the world, brought me to my first skiing experience, and in turn I brought him to his first surfing experience, experienced Bourbon Street when we were 18, traveled to Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland, and Luxembourg together and the only person who I can say is better looking than me (just kidding). Definitely one person to try anything once, unless it is riding the American Eagle backwards. He was also there, with Heidi, cheering me on during the cold and dreary marathons and never really had to question my motives for joining the Peace Corps, he just knew the person I was. I've only had fun when I'm with him as he (we) would settle for nothing less and can always find the comic relief in everything, and thus discovered the 'Gluken Spoochen' (inside joke from Germany) at the same time. I wish and can only hope that I could be as supportive as he was to me. He truly was the best man. I can only wish him and Heidi the best and to thank them again for involving me on their special day.

Thanks Dan and Heidi, and you know I love you bro.

p.s. I know I'm trying to teach diversity here in Romania, as my sister pointed the amount of diversity at Danny's wedding. Danny and Heidi, you guys can definitely teach them about diversity more than I can.

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I would also like to wish John and Becky L, 'Casa de Piatra' as they are also recent newlyweds. John has been my good friend since college and we've always kept in touch. Now here is a person that would definitely find the line with everything and pretty much do everything before crossing 'that line' and having the cops called. He did not get labeled the 'Assman' for nothing in college and not because of the obviousness of the name, just the opposite. He was definitely the person who drew a lot of people towards him, as all his friends could testify he has that smooth charismatic personality. He is the person who honestly tried to teach me the Jedi Mind trick, but alas, I can only use it on truly weak minded people as I still have to throw the wave (he doesn't). If that didn't get you, than either his playing the sax or the guitar would, but wait, that's not his true claim to fame, it was KARAOKE ! I discovered this talent actually when we were in Morocco, there was a small karaoke battle, needless to say, John wiped the floor with them. The times I've seen him sing (should've been that lead singer in a band), the crowd (including guys) were going nuts, talk about pure electrifying stage performance (while smoking a cigarette for effect). Something not to be missed if you have the chance to witness.
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Honestly, I feel blessed in life to have such good entertaining friends, I only pray I can keep them and make new ones here.

Blocul Meu (My Bloc) and misc pics

• Hanging out

• Bringing home the bread.
  

• Little one always grabbing my key to stand on his tippy toes to buzz my door open for me, I know how he feels.

• My neighbor with her child and her car in the background.
  

Little bbq dinner. People missing from photo due to European gymnastics competition going on. Need to get more pics...

Checking out the new car - Mitsubishi Colt

Community Activity

Couple of brief updates:
(pictures are coming)

Community
Friday, Sept. 7 - Organized a small gathering with a small group from the Catholic community and my sitemates (two other volunteers in Severin). I wanted to introduce them to some of the people in Severin. We bbq'd mici (the pork type - burger links) and fish. We were definitely struggling with the Romanian type charcoal at first. We used pig fat called 'slanina' to grease up the grill... it was interesting and worked pretty well (since there was no Pam around).

Since it was getting a little chilly we all ate inside and spoke to each other, mostly in Romanian as there was really one other person who spoke English and had to translate at times.

Before this bbq, I got to know them a little better as I attempted to make them a spaghetti dinner before this, it came out OK, realizing a little late needed to make for 14 people, my sauce was a little thin but there was more than enough spaghetti, could've used a little more meat.

I've been also meeting most of my neighbors, as my 'bloc' knows me by now. All the kids will run to me as I come in through the back way and want to try to speak English at times. Hard to break away at times but it's fun and they are all super nice to me.

Work
Work is definitely picking up, as I've met with one of the Rrom (Gypsy - note: using the word Gypsy they don't mind as much but they do not like to use the word 'Tigan' pronounced 'tsee-ghan' as it has a derogatory connotation to it). We had a small meeting with other 'activists' for the Rrom population and we are going to start defining a project how I can learn as well as try to help.

The unemployment agency is in great need of a company car to travel to the county to visit the communities that require social assistance. I will be visiting more of these in the future with the unemployment agency as well as the Rrom representative group.

Cooking
Must say, since there are no real fast food places around me, I've been forced to do a lot of cooking which I am slowly but surely getting the hang of it. Instead of guessing which meats or sausages are the best, I just talk to the ladies in the market and ask which are the good meats?

Timisoara - Romani Art Festival

Elvis Romano Romani Band swinging it up

Unirii Square

My coworker invited me to go to Timisoara since he was buying a new car. In the spirit of trying to get to know people in my community, I turn down no offers. My co-worker, Domnul Traian speaks very good English but only speaks to me in Romanian, which he forces me to speak which really helps a lot as I can speak but still trying to get over a certain hump. He was heading back Saturday back to Severin and I decided to stay and meet up with other Peace Corps volunteers to check out the Romani Art Festival going on in Timisoara.

Although the festival could've used a touch of help in event planning, it turned out to be a perfect day to rome around Timisoara trying to find the events going on with other volunteers. This is probably one of the nicest cities in Romania (in my opinion) and one of the ones closest to me, about 4 hrs away, which doesn't seem like much after travelling 15 hrs by train to the Black Sea (that left a scar).