the people you kinda meet

i meant to write this a while ago . . . here goes. sometimes when i can convince myself of the merits of this, i wake up early and go to the park for a morning constitutional. its lovely - i walk/run around the lake and smell the flowers and watch the sun rise and feel that all is right in my world.

now while i do this, i say greet (in romanian) the other joggers and dog walkers. well, a couple of weeks ago i said good morning to an older gentleman (me being diplomatic) strolling in the opposite direction. towards the end of my jog, i saw him again and attempted to nod. he decided that me needed to speak so he grabbed a hold of my hand and offered me some flowers he had picked. it was sooooo sweet and i was having shiny, happy - warm, fuzzy thoughts about people. but his greetings continued. he dumped more flowers on my head, then he pulled the collar of my shirt (dont worry i was wearing an ultra sexy sports bra) and dropped more flowers inside, then he gave me an uber hardy pat on the back. i had no idea what he was saying to me.
and i have no idea the purpose of this. maybe fertility well wishing, maybe we're married now, who knows. what sucks is that this dude is totally regular with his park walking habits. so now i see him ALL the time and he always has flowers. this may be the impetus for me to learn to run faster.

good times

last night i hung out with a friend and some of his friends. it was a fun and interesting experience - kinda like college but older - you know with the preparty before you party? as a lightweight, i could not participate fully but i have to say that i enjoyed watching - included in this was a bandoleer of premixed shots in small bottles (seriously like Rambo but without the bullets) , confetti as it was someones birthday, something akin to extreme yoga shots and of course dancing. i have to say that these guys have a serious and i do mean serious love of disco and funk which i find funny given their ages but hey i have serious love for the beegees - especially the one who seems to do nothing and gets paid for it.

then we went to a club i hadnt been to before where everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves and dancing rather than posing and being seen.
ah . . . the people one meets in clubs. this included some dude who tried screaming politics in my ALL NIGHT LONG e.g. Romania is communist shit, America and Britain ruined Africa, etc. How does one think to have a political discussion on the dancefloor. all it does is send copious amounts of spit into my ear - totally not appreciated. then there was one dude who asked me to dance - i had to decline (song not that good among other reasons) then he attempts to persuade me with some disjointed ramblings that culminated with "my dream is to have a black girlfriend." sadly, i had to leave his dream unfulfilled (how does anyone think that will work?). I also had the pleasure of meeting another dude with shirt unbuttoned to the navel, lots of chest hair peeking, and the dance moves of a luuv-a. after i recovered from swooning at his hotness, i realized that he was just toooo potent or little ole me.

one of the guys i was with showed me how to waltz and i have to say i was totally pitiful. dancing a little vigorously led me to lose an earing and i was lopsided until a friend put another one in.
all in all, great night, great people (the ones i went with) and a nice taxi ride home around 5.

good taste?

today i went a money spendin'. okay it is hellaciously hot here and my feet just cannot stand confinement in such cases (i got a doctor's note). so on the lookout for shoes i popped into the electronics store - you know, just to make sure they werent hiding some in the back. and i remembered that bjork, who i luuuuuuuuvvv recently released a new album so i went a huntin'.

since she is touring this summer, am willing to offer my first born child to anyone who can get me tickets. am gonna be truthful and 'fess up that i've tried this first born child offer before and havent any takers that i remember so really is on a first come first serve basis when i finally pop one out. have to say that am sure this kid is gonna be awesome so its a really really sweet deal compared to the price of Bjork tickets.

onward to the whole cd thing. now, i didnt find bjork (total evidence of taste lacking) but i did find lots and lots and i do mean lots of billy idol. truthfully, was the single largest artist in the 'B' section. seeing how i do love him something awful - i decided to take this as evidence of good taste. so i guess that store is taste neutral?

bummed

i wrote up an entry - pictures and everything. then it went byebye. dont have in me to try and recreate it. losing stuff you spent time on totally bums me.

beer beer beer

as you know, noble and intrepid traveler that i am, when i visit someplace i endeavor to learn about and explore the culture of a place. therefore, i boldly set forth to plumb the depths of germany's greatest cultural achievements.

so i made sure that i had some beer. i was ready to imbibe in attempts to discover all the varying flavors and textures that minute but very real differences in ratios of ingredients can confer upon the beverage. sadly i am a retard and therefore unable to connoisseur anything. also am a lightweight (cheap date) and i mostly think beer tastes like buttock.

luckily and heartily for me the germans seem quite egalitarian about this unlike some other countries i've been to though i totally took advantage of the fact that beer is cheaper than water while in the czech republic. there is a special type of beer which is used to make very very tasty drinks that include such lovely combinations as beer with coke. some might say that its a misuse of the high and holy coca cola but i say its a pretty good way of making beer not be nasty. i also had lime beer. its kinda like limeade but with beer. ever so magical.

what i learned is that germans have found a way to bring culture to everyone, even girly girls who can't really appreciate the centuries of tradition, trial, error, blood, sweat, and tears that every glass of beer contains

Mogosoara

yeah. . . well i've not been busy so no excuse. we had a four day weekend cause its labor day (i totally love national holidays) so i did pretty much nothing but relax cause i've been at work for two weeks since the last vacation and . . . well one can always use a holiday. but today i got off my buttocks and went on a wee trip outside bucharest to visit Mogosoara palace. Its not quite a palace but a venetian style house built a few centuries ago by a prince. it over looks a pond and has lovely gardens and a surrounding forest. my friend jennifer and i hung out, walked, talked, and enjoyed the pretty scenery and weather. the palace passed through the hands of the prince's family but was later given to (stolen by) the state and turned into a museum. it was a little bare inside as Ceausescu as some point decided that the stuff inside would better serve the people as his own personal possessions and he took it all. aside from the whole dying by firing squad thing, I have decided that its good to be a dictator so am looking for a country - a small one would do - of my very own. also there was a statue of lenin and a communist governor of bucharest. after the revolution they tore the statues from where they were standing and dumped them on waste ground behind the palace so its now known as 'the grave of 'lenin'' kind cool so jennifer and i enjoyed it.

on riding the tram home i was reduced to childhood again. we saw this little old lady and tried to give her our seats. she patted our cheeks and i think told us how nice girls we were. jennifer's romanian is way way way better than mine so she spoke to her but it and she was sooo cute. ah lovely day, but sadly the monstrous head of work looms over my tomorrow.

back from Germany

am back home now. its good to be home and sleep in my bed and not share space with people and have clothing be optional but it sure does suck to go back to work. am tired of working and am ready to be saved from it. i could use a longer vacation - luckily summer is just 7 weeks away.

i really enjoyed this trip. the people i worked with were pretty cool with great senses of humor. we all developed catch phrases that would send others into peals of laughter - dont think they make much sense to anyone else though. will hopefully be able to visit some of them at some point. plus i had lots of fun.

observations on germany

- very very clean
- very very law abiding (rarely did anyone cross the street against the light)
- environmentally conscious - lots of well planed bike lanes and people using them
- not the most fashionable people in the world
- the women wore very little make up (right on!)
- people were really nice - i seem to get lost alot and people always took time out to point me in the right direction sometimes even walking me the way.
- german women have ginormous feet - large sizes are pretty easy to find
- very pretty and well maintained.
- they surely do love their sausage
- good girly beer (more on this later)
- german is a very difficult language to pronounce
- nothings open on sunday - which drove me crazy.

i liked germany and i liked the workcamp experience. hopefully will be able to repeat the experience

happy easter

ok its a bit late but Happy Easter

<---- these were some friends visiting us for easter, but sadly no one has seen or heard from them in a while.

On saturday, our local partners came and cooked and had dinner with us. they made some traditional german food to eat with potatoes and eggs. there was also an easter egg and chocolate hunt.

sunday was a nice day with the weather deciding to warm up a bit and show that it is spring. i went to church and it was all in german so i understood things like und (and), mit (with), and thats about it. but it was a lovely small church.

later on the group went to the park and cavorted around, i saw some art and stuff. was pretty nice.

easter here is a massively scary experience for an american. everything is closed for friday, sunday, and monday. i mean everything - no shops, grocery stores, nothing except parks and museums. i cannot understand how you close everything like that. what happens if you run out of food? do you start eating the weakest members of the family?

kassel - working

so we're working on our benches.

its kinda cool because as always there are logistical problems and we have to solve them so am using a different part of my brain. plus we're sort of learning some stuff about landscape architeture and stuff. the project involves groups of people from Documenta - a modern contemporary art extravaganza hosted by the city of Kassel every 5 years, architecture students - a school project, social works - increasing communitcation within communities, and the communities themselves. its really great that these different groups are working together to create something.

but then there's us . . . working our little hearts out and hopefully making something that will function and not fall apart.

the first set of benches we are building are in front of a church. the church let us use their kitchen so we had hot food every day (sci provides the food and wee take turns cooking). it has been quite cold and have realized that construction is not a viable career alternative (very hard work and you know, am lazy) here are some pics of us hard at work.

will write more on people later - there are some characters

kassel welcomes us

this was really nice and i feel kinda bad for what i'm about to say but oh well.

basically, i am working with a volunteer organization SCI that does work with communities all over the world. you develop the program and they provide the people and some of the money for operating costs. There is a wide range of things that they get involved with. I am here working in Kassel helping to build benches to help turn used green spaces into someplace where people can gather and stuff.

on the first day we were welcomed by the community we were gonna be working with and were invited to a get together with us as the guests of honor. Last year, a community got and received a SCI group to come and help build a wall to create a garden area from a parking lot for a group of apt blocs. its also a space they use for things like neighborhood barbques and such. so they decided to welcome this years group. it was really really sweet but a bit of torture.

first we got lost cause em the directions included looking for a large wall with holes in it and nothing about street signs. then we get there and the neighborhood puts on entertainment for us. dear lord!

there was a woman who recited poetry - in german. half of the group has no knowledge of german and it seems like to brought out every poem she had ever written. i am not a big fan of poetry and it loses whatever charm it had in a foreign languges. interspersed with the poetry wa music. again sweet but em . . . again in german. the singer reminded me of Dieter - you know the mike myers character from SNL but with black glasses and a red shirt. the band consisted of Dieter on keyboards and some dude on clarinet - need i say more?

they went on with this for an hour and the food was on a table only a few feet away. sometimes i curse the fact that my mom managed to drill a few manners into me since it would have been nice to just reach over grab some food and tell them to quit it. but they looked so happy doing it and it was so sweet to go through all that trouble for us, so i sat and paid attention during the poetry and pretended to feel the music.

here's a pic of us waiting for the performance and other party goers to come. Dieters in the back.