Updates!

1. Wine is fun.

Last weekend was Chisinau’s annual wine festival! Because the Soviet Union loved specializing industry by republic, Moldova was designated as the main wine producer for the entire USSR. In Gagauzia, this is particularly true. (If I had a lei for every grape arbor I saw walking around the city, I would be one rich Moldovan.) It seems like everyone makes homemade wine. Bottles of wine in the stores usually cost between two and three dollars, so it’s pretty cheap! At any rate, since the fall of the USSR, a lot of their distribution networks were disrupted, but they still provide a lot of wine to former Soviet countries.

I headed into Chisinau last Friday with Stephanie, the other English Teaching Assistant. We initially had major problems securing an apartment to rent, which caused us to rue the day we’d decided to even try to visit the wine festival. During our troubles, we got a brief introduction to the world of Peace Corps in Moldova. They have a headquarters in Chisinau with showers, computers, U.S. military television, and a whole room full of English books. It’s pretty awesome.

Anyways, things got a whole lot better when Amy, one of the Fulbright researchers here, called us and invited us to stay with her and Brian (another Fulbrighter). We crashed at Brian’s amazing Moldovan pad, which has three nice, big rooms and a kitchen with a breakfast nook! It was awesome, mostly because we could relax and just be American for a while.

After a couple of hours of relaxing, we went to the wine festival. It was outdoors, in this exposition area in a nice park. All of the leaves were changing, which was particularly pretty. Along the roads in the park were elaborate stands set up by every wine company in the country. Best of all, the wine was twenty cents a glass! Amazing. Unfortunately, a lot of Moldovan wine is very vinegary, so there was a glass or two that went into the bushes. We had shish kebab for lunch and cherry pastries for desert. There was folk music and dancing. The longer the day went on the more intoxicated dancing there was for us to watch!

After dinner, we went café- and bar-hopping, which was a lot of fine. Comrat has almost no nightlife, so it was fun to just have a beer in a bar. The bars we visited were pretty cool and I hope to explore more of them soon!

The next day, Amy moved into her apartment and Stephanie and I accompanied her. We walked down to the wine festival for another round of drinking, which was quite worth it. We sat down at a stand that had snacks, hoping to buy something to munch on while we drank our wine. Awesomely, they started giving us all of their “young” (not totally fermented) wine--for free! The young wine is like semi-sweet, slightly alcoholic grape juice. It is almost bubbly and basically tastes like something out of Harry Potter. We polished off a pitcher or two, and then realized we were running quite late to a meeting, which necessitated some unpleasant speed-walking while tipsy.

All in all, we had a great time. Chisinau went up several notches in my estimation...but it’s still not as awesome as Odessa.

2. I have a sinus infection.

I hate being sick in foreign countries because there’s this whole incomprehensible culture of sickness everywhere you go. In the U.S., when you are somewhat sick (allergies, cold, etc.), you are usually expected to tough it out and show up for work/school/whatever. You can expect some sympathy, but not much. Basically, you haul around Kleenexes for a week and make the best of it.

In Moldova, when you are sick, there’s a whole other set of rules. You are actually allowed, even expected, to stay home when you are sick. You should not show visible signs of sickness in public. This disturbs people and will prompt them to insist that you go home. Being sick in public will also elicit great amounts of advice on various home remedies. The most popular remedies for colds: lemons and honey. Also, you are not allowed to eat things from the refrigerator if you are sick.

There is a nice side of people fretting over you constantly, however. Anna, the girl who works in the American Center, insisted on going with me to the pharmacy to find some medicine. Although the medicine I purchased was of dubious value, having someone accompany me to the pharmacy made me feel loved. :) Thanks to a large supply of American Mucinex, my sinus infection seems to be manageable right now, although my treatment of it is being hindered by the problem below.

3. Our water is scary.

The water in our city has been turned off since Monday. Apparently, there was some filtering/sanitation procedure that had to be done, which meant no water.

I am always confused about what to do when there is no water. Each family has secret stores of bottles of water that they save up for these occasions, but I never seem to know where they are. Also: can you drink the water in these bottles? If I use it to brush my teeth, will I die of giardia? If I wash my face with it, will I be considered a “bottled-water-hog”? Very perplexing. My solution so far is to use limited quantities of the bottled water and then buy some of my own for brushing my teeth. I think the people I live with don’t understand how bizarre this is for me. I’m not sure if they appreciate that this NEVER happens in America.

Yesterday, the water returned! Unfortunately, it is extremely, extremely chlorinated. Our bathtub is full of this water right now, and it is aqua-colored and has some chemical floating at the top. I’m afraid to do anything with this water but wash my hands and flush the toilet, but this is a big improvement over yesterday. I am hoping normal water will return soon.

Days since Erin has taken a shower: 4. Let’s hope this number doesn’t get too much higher.

Communal Apartment

According to a Russian broadcast of "Vesti" (Вести = news) that I just watched, about 200,000 families in Moscow still live in communal apartments. (I think the region was Moscow...my comprehension isn't always that amazing.) Talk about crazy! I though those had been consigned to the dustbin of history, considering how much people universally revile them.

There seems to be a government push to get people out of these communal apartments. However, they interviewed some people who lived in communal apartments, and they didn't seem entirely keen to leave. Some people complained about feeling like they lived "in a train station." An old lady said she never actually bathed in the apartment, but preferred to go to communal baths instead. Still, a young woman explained that she doesn't want to leave the apartment because it is in a good location in the city. She'd rather live in a communal apartment in the center than a private apartment in the boonies. Given the sprawling size of Moscow, this is understandable.

My fellow Fulbright colleague here said she had seen such apartments in Poland. I myself have never actually seen one. Interesting issue! The more things change, the more they stay the same...

For a compelling depiction of the, ahem, romantic possibilities of living in a communal apartment, see the excellent film East-West.

This picture is from a site (http://kommunalka.colgate.edu/) that has virtual tours of communal apartments.

Happy Teacher's Day!

It seems that every profession has a holiday here in Moldova, and professors are no exception. Today we celebrated День педагога, or Teacher’s Day.

I was at first somewhat underwhelmed by Teacher’s Day, as it required that I pay 15 lei ($1.40) last week for the celebrations. I argued that if it was my day, they should be paying me, but to no avail.

Today, I was happy to discover that one of my classes gave me some pretty white flowers in honor of the holiday, which was quite touching. They are my literary analysis class, definitely one of my favorite groups to work with. The whole department also got cake and champagne from one of the groups, which I very much appreciated.

Then we went home and changed and then returned to the university for a concert and presentation. Several of the students sang and the rector gave a speech. Teachers nominated by their departments also got awards. After the concert, we had a fourchette, which is basically a banquet with lots of different small dishes for snacks. This being Gagauzia, we celebrated with champagne and homemade wine. After many toasts, the dancing began.

I certainly hadn’t danced that much since the Person-Rennell wedding! It took me back to the old days of dancing on Armenian buses. All of the professors got out on the floor and showed off their dance moves. My dance moves are a motley combination of Armenian, disco, polka, and hip-hop, with some skanking thrown in during songs with horn sections. I consider it my patriotic duty to dance the night away in order to represent America well. It’s also in the Hutchinson genes...we don’t let a dance floor stay empty for very long. At any rate, my colleagues all seemed to think I was sad any time I wasn’t dancing, so I didn’t have much of a choice. Natalia, Oxana, and Lyudmila were quite the troopers. Their dancing stamina was very impressive.

I think we danced for three hours! It was pretty hardcore. The only familiar songs were “The Macarena” (I remembered the dance in its entirety) and a weird Russian remix of “Mama Mia” by ABBA. I also had to give a toast in Russian and totally screwed up my prepositions. I’m blaming the champagne. I danced with the rector, which caused me to crack up somewhat embarassingly. (For those unfamiliar with the terminology, this was like dancing with Comrat’s Michael Crow.) I also danced with Maxim, a professor of European law. It was very junior high! Except for in junior high I wasn’t required to make small talk in Russian. Quite amusing.

We arrived home at 8:45 PM, a full 6 hours after we left the house. For $1.40, I think it wasn’t too bad!

Calling Music Buffs!

Since I got so many great suggestions last time, I was thinking I'd send out another all-call for help designing another lesson.

This time, I'd like to demonstrate how an author can create tone and setting. I'd like to use songs again because they are nice and bite-sized for students. Additionally, I think that songs tend to use more conversational language which is more useful for students than the sort of language used in most literature.

For tone, I am thinking that a great example would be "Brick" by Ben Folds Five. Although the subject matter of abortion is controversial (not to mention depressing), I think it will probably translate pretty well to my class. Plus, Ben Folds handles it is a very subtle and non-controversial way, so I think it will be okay. Ben Folds' word and imagery choice is very apt in this song and I think it's fairly easy to understand if you first (a) explain what it is about--I think most people who hear this song initially misinterpret it--and (b) translate some of the more conversational phrases. Still, I'm open to suggestions if anyone thinks they can top "Brick"!

I am also trying to think of a song that conveys a sense of setting. It's harder to find pop songs that are about a place, although a couple come to mind. Unfortunately, they tend to make a lot of allusions that my students won't be at all familiar with. "Why You'd Want to Live Here" by Death Cab does a great job of conveying setting...but it also only makes sense if you are familiar with Los Angeles. I think something like the old standard "New York, New York" might work.

Thoughts?

I was also looking for a song that could convey setting, but it's pretty

Looking for Course Materials...

So, I thought it would be a good idea to use a song to demonstrate types of characterization to my Literary Analysis class. I thought it would be fairly easy to find such a song, but in fact it is quite difficult! It seems that very few songwriters these days actually write songs about people! Here are some potential choices and why they got shot down...

"Kate" by Ben Folds Five: While this song is awesome, there are just too many confusing references (Bhagavad Gita?). Also, I'm not sure if the class will understand why the narrator loves a girl who smokes pot and wears the same clothes every day...

"Cath..." by Death Cab for Cutie: Just too depressing. I don't really want to have an in-depth discussion about Cath settling for an unsatisfying marriage at 8:00 AM.

"Lua" by Bright Eyes: See above. While this song is brilliant, I feel like the bulimia and drug issues might be a bit much to explain.

"Heroin Girl," "Amphetamine" by Everclear: I'm seeing that drug themes are a definite problem for basically every song I can find. I don't know how much I want to rock Comrat's world here. Plus, am I allowed to drop the f-bomb in a college classroom? Even if no one knows what it means?

"Jeremy," "Off He Goes," "Better Man," "Elderly Woman Behind the Counter In a Small Town" by Pearl Jam: Once again, too depressing! Teenage murder is another topic I don't want to discuss in-depth. "Off He Goes" seems too subtle, although I actually think it would be awesome in a native English speaker class. "Better Man" is basically a proto-version of "Cath..." so I'm going to nix that one. Plus, Eddie Vedder just doesn't enunciate enough. "Elderly Woman" actually is a really cool song and I think people would relate to it, but I think it doesn't actually give enough examples of characterization to use in the class.

And the winner is..."Candle in the Wind" by Elton John!

While this song is actually very depressing and also has drug themes, I think the fact that it is (1) famous and (2) about Marilyn Monroe will be interesting for the class.

If anyone has any suggestions for songs that display characterization in its many forms (direct, indirect, etc.) I would gladly consider them! Remember that songs have to be fairly comprehensible for people who don't speak colloquial English.

PS: This is rather unrelated, but did anyone know that Simon and Garfunkle did a take on "Richard Cory"? Would definitely be interesting to use in an American literature class.

Adventures in Feminism

September 27th, 2009

Things have cooled down a bit here, which is pleasant. I have turned in the final versions of two scholarship applications, so I have been relaxing and enjoying Tolstoy and lesson-planning. My chili turned out pretty well, by the way. I didn't have any cumin and the grass-fed meat had a different taste, but it tasted fairly authentic. I found spicy chilis at the market (although not Homer's special chilis, unfortunately), so all was well.

When not working or cooking or reading, I have had some run-ins with women’s issues so far and I thought I would share.

Part I: The World of Women

The main problem in rural Moldova is that you just can’t make a living. A very good salary here is $500 a month, and a teacher’s salary is much less than that. Food is very cheap, but utilities, rent, and clothes are not. Even if you have two incomes coming in, it’s hard to buy more than the basics with your paycheck, especially if you have kids. So, in a phenomenon you can observe throughout the rural periphery of the former USSR, many of the men who should be living here are working somewhere in Russia. The result is a sort of feminized countryside. (I should note that some women do work abroad, particularly in care-taking professions, but they are not the norm.) At the university, all of my colleagues are women. There are a few men who work at the university, but they are few and far between. We have a couple of guys in our classes, but what’s the point of learning English if you’re going to be working on a construction site in Russia in five years? So, most of the people I come into contact with on a daily basis are women.

I’ve yet to make any solid determinations on the impact of this migration on the role of women, but logically it would seem that women here are forced to be more self-sufficient and independent than many women elsewhere.

Part II: Patriarchy?

Russian morning television is pretty entertaining, as a rule. When I have the time, I like to watch this pseudo-Today Show that has both serious and light news programs. Last week there was a program on--gasp!--women paying for dates! This is still a pretty up-in-the-air issue in the United States for a lot of people, but I thought it was funny that there was actually a news story on this. I guess it must be breaking news? There was supposed to be some kind of discussion after the news story, but it seemed fairly one-sided. This lady kept saying that feminism had killed humor. I was like, um, what does that have to do with the topic of paying for dinner? Like, maybe this would be relevant if women were refusing to go on dates to comedy clubs because of feminism.

In a related note, Sofia, my host mom, told me her story of trying to buck the system and keep her own name when she got married. Her husband’s side of the family got too upset, so she caved. I explained to her that in U.S. people tend to freak out about this as well, as I’m sure Nicole and Chris Person-Rennell can attest to!

Part III: Women’s Organizations

I had the happy opportunity to meet up with Christine, a Peace Corps Volunteer here in Comrat. She is currently working with two organizations, a youth volunteer league and a women’s rights organization, to help them build capacity and apply for grants. They are currently working on getting a grant from UNIFEM to strengthen the inadequate enforcement of women’s rights laws currently on the books in Moldova. They would like to start up a business center and microloan program to empower women entrepreneurs in the south of Moldova with the UNIFEM money. I hope they get the grant, because it sounds like a very worthy program.

They do a lot of active, hands-on trainings to teach people about domestic violence issues and human trafficking. Human trafficking is especially a big problem in Transnistria, so they train people to recognize behaviors that could make a woman an easy target for traffickers. They did a small summer camp for kids to teach them about equality in the home and techniques for conflict resolution in relationships. It even got a positive write-up in the local paper!

Part IV: Avon, the Company for Women

Every time I travel to the former USSR, I always find another surprising example of globalization. This time around, it was Avon ladies. We always have an Avon catalogue floating around our office, which I use as a resource to learn the Russian names for things like nail clippers and conditioner. I randomly got pushed into going to a big Avon meeting yesterday, which ended up being a rather interesting cultural experience.

I have mixed feelings about Avon in general. On the one hand, it empowers women to make money through social networking, which seems like a very positive thing. On the other hand, the company does this through convincing women they need cosmetics that they probably don’t have the money to buy (at least not in Moldova).

The meeting was held in the “House of Culture.” I went with Tatiana, a German professor, and Lyudmila, our secretary. Lyudmila’s five-year-old daughter provided comic relief. We waited a good hour before things actually got underway. Annoyingly (and somewhat illogically), the majority of the presentation was in Moldovan, so I didn’t understand much. But it seemed pretty standard. There were dancers. We all got free “Curlacious” mascara. We watched videos on new products like Patrick Dempsey’s cologne “Unscripted.” (Ugh. What hath Grey’s Anatomy wrought?) Avon representatives who sold over a certain amount of Avon products got flowers. After that, there was a pretty cool concert with a Moldovan folk singer. Overall, I would have to say that it was pretty entertaining, and I won’t look a free mascara gift horse in the mouth. I’m still not sure whether Avon is good or evil, but I think that their marketing department is very smart.

I have killed the most magnificent centipede

There was a gross centipede haunting my room and I have conquered him.

Or rather, Sofia has killed him with a towel.

Thrice, I have fought the dread centipede.

Twice, it evaded me. But not this time.

I have to say it was the most attractive centipede I have ever seen. It was golden-colored, with thin, long, multicolored legs. But still, gross.

Like, Beowulf, we have slayed a monster. Huzzah!