Week Three: Random Observations

1) Life is just a bowl, basket, bag, hat of cherries. It's cherry season in Romania! You've never seen so many cherries--everywhere: market place (farmers' market) and every little sidewalk shop. The teens at the high school where PC holds classes carry them around and generously offer them to us. I, however, have my own stash since Andrei and Stefon picked at their grandfathers' farm in the country last weekend. Love them in my lunch bag--along with country cheese and bread. I've been thinking all week of Alice Friman's wonderful poem "Cherries" about Catherine Hyde, Duchess of Queensberry who died of a "surfeit of cherries" and wondering just how many it takes! 2) The "wild dogs of Romania" are mostly sweet and docile, searching us out at break and lunch for scraps. They actually look pretty well fed and I've been told they're a significant part of Romania's waste management. They also provide demonstrations in acrobatic mating, questionable entertainment at lunch. 3) One can make excellent coffee with just a pan of water, a gas stove, and coffee. 4) My young colleagues give me hope in our country's future. 5) People laugh in the same language. 6) In addition to words having to do with technology, Romanians have adopted "weekend." ;-) 7) The second fastest train in Romania is the sageata albastra--the "blue arrow." 8) If you don't have a "name day" because you don't share a name with a saint, you get March 9, a day of great celebration nation-wide, complete with special round pastries like doughnut holes. Sort of a very merry unbirthday. I can't wait. 9) This weekend we visit a PC site where a volunteer will host us overnight. My UU friends will be interested to know that my hostess will be a fellow UU!! Ive met her and she's terrific. More later on our site visit.