Romania 2001

More time, more news

8 August 2001 06:59

I should get more time to do email now that I'm in Ramnicu Valcea. The Internet cafe is a lot closer and the schedule here is not so ... long, I guess. The bus trip from Timisoara took nine and a half hours, but the vents worked occasionally so the trip was a little easier than the last time, when I returned to join some of the other volunteers here to go sightseeing at Castle Bran (the claimed Dracula's Castle). I think I mentioned in a previous email that during that trip even the Romanians were complaining about the heat, and they are known for not wanting windows open on long hot trips.

There is thunder outside at the moment. We hadn't had any storms in Timisoara for a couple of weeks. It only got up to about 30 deg C today, 54% humidity. On my second to last day in Timisoara one of the Romanians who was helping me said that the 36 or so deg C temp that my meter was reading was not a good indication of what we were working in because the meter was in the shade. So we moved it into the sunshine and watched as it climbed steadily up to 50.0 deg C. And then we moved it back into the shade so we wouldn't get too discouraged. That at about 11am.

Being on compulsory rest at the moment (thanks, Margie) I took the opportunity to read a book called Re-Entry. It's a help for short-term mission people when they return to their own culture again. It's a very good book, with a lot of helpful stuff in it. I've figured out that a lot of the feelings I have about the workshop back in Timisoara are typical re-entry feelings - disappointment about not getting everything finished, etc.

There are not very many streetkids here, but what there are are just as needy as anywhere. (RV has a third the number of people as Timi.) One of the volunteers here recently found a young girl in a park after a very wet night. She looked about 7 but could have been 9 or 10, and was shivering and covered in goosebumps. He fed her and later found a jacket that would fit here but she hasn't been seen since.

Ciao.

Ian
8 )

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