Kishinev - Not Half Bad
It's not as bad as everyone said it would be. It's not as cold. It's not as dark. And it's not as dangerous. People smile more than in Israel and they're more friendly to me. It's cold, but nothing worse than Boston, and my decision to wear long underwear under my jeans has made me more comfortable outside than I was at Harvard.
Still, my host parents, who have decided to stay here even though they could easily have left for Israel long ago (the man explained to me that the community here needs him and that's why he's still here), live very very modestly. They very much conserve the use of their boiler, seemingly only turning it on for special occasions like my arrival and when I insist on taking a warm shower. Other times they just boil up some water on the stove and use it to take a sort of pot and tub shower. I'm not sure how they do it, but it was pretty impossible for me to wash my hair like that two nights ago. I'm trying to buy them as many products as I can which we all use (like bread and milk and toilet paper), but I'm going to leave them money when I leave too, since it's obvious that I am a significant burden on their resources. Apparently their pensions completely go to gas and electricity. If the old man didn't work (and if they weren't receiving help from the Hesed, funded by the JDC) they'd probably starve.
Most people here speak Romanian as their first language (though not the old people, and not so much the Jews), but everyone knows Russian and they understand my requests perfectly. I really like practicing my Russian and I haven't really had any problems communicating with people, except that my hosts really like to complete my sentences when I can't think of Russian vocabulary, which is a little frustrating. I'm having a little bit of a problem figuring out how to refer to people - with their patronic or with only their first name, and with the familiar vs. the polite form of "you". Still, no one yet has said anything that has made me think that I'm making the wrong linguistic decisions and I feel generally very good about my Russian skills. Less people here are laughing at my Russian than did in Israel. And people at bars seem not to have been lowering their quality of service below the already very low level when serving me.
The people at Kedem, which is the Jewish community center here which has the Hesed welfare center, the Hillel, and other services, have been extremely welcoming. I could never have imagined that everyone would be so willing to help, and so excited about me being there. I was lucky. The guy I'm living with is an important writer in the Yiddish community and an important musician and teacher at the conservatory here. He's very involved with the center, so this has been an in. On top of that connection, and the contacts I had established there from New York, it turns out that my mother's cousin in Israel (who I stayed with near Tel Aviv) still has a friend here and by chance it turns out that she works at the center. She was there when I showed up with my host and adding together what she knew about me from the cousin, she figured out who I was. Right away she grabbed me and welcomed me with a huge smile and hug, inviting me to one of the programs she runs for the elderly there called "Warm House" - basically a lunch gathering and conversation hour with ghetto survivors.
I've made some friends at the center already around my age - a Peace Corp volunteer and some other employees who basically write grants and do other things for the center. It's a very friendly place to be and I managed to stay there all day yesterday for 12 hours, being invited to all sorts of events as well as having to stand in front of large groups of employees (and clients too) and describe all of my wodnerfulness. I spent the first half of the day at the Day Care Center, which serves a rotating group of elderly people who visit once every two weeks. We painted plates with them, had a shabbat lunch, excercized in chairs etc. I think it's probably the highlight of a lot of their lives. A few of the guests were very obviously seriously poor, one of them taking all the extra food (from all of the plates) home in one tupperware container. As bad as everyone's situation probably is, it's not visible to me except in the situation of the old pensioners. My host mother's pension is the equivalent of 30$ a month. Most things here are much cheaper than they are in the states, but imported food products and toiletries are comparably priced to the US (gas is worse, I think). It surprised my host that I was willing to shell out the equivalent of 2.50$ for a nice new map of Chisinau instead of using the one they had with the old Soviet names probably made in 1975.
Monday I've scheduled my first interview. The employees of the center have hooked me up with some interesting people to interview who have connections to the places where my grandfather was born, was during the war, or are in other ways relevant to my project. They're all really old - over 80 - but apparently verbose. They're all clients of the Hesed and I'll be visiting them at their homes all over Chisinau. Tomorrow I'm taking a Jewish tour of Kishinev given by a Hesed volunteer and I plan on visiting the location where my parents grew up and where they went to school. I also am going to sit on some stone lions in one of the central parks for my mother - I haven't found them yet, but I will tomorrow mom.
Still, my host parents, who have decided to stay here even though they could easily have left for Israel long ago (the man explained to me that the community here needs him and that's why he's still here), live very very modestly. They very much conserve the use of their boiler, seemingly only turning it on for special occasions like my arrival and when I insist on taking a warm shower. Other times they just boil up some water on the stove and use it to take a sort of pot and tub shower. I'm not sure how they do it, but it was pretty impossible for me to wash my hair like that two nights ago. I'm trying to buy them as many products as I can which we all use (like bread and milk and toilet paper), but I'm going to leave them money when I leave too, since it's obvious that I am a significant burden on their resources. Apparently their pensions completely go to gas and electricity. If the old man didn't work (and if they weren't receiving help from the Hesed, funded by the JDC) they'd probably starve.
Most people here speak Romanian as their first language (though not the old people, and not so much the Jews), but everyone knows Russian and they understand my requests perfectly. I really like practicing my Russian and I haven't really had any problems communicating with people, except that my hosts really like to complete my sentences when I can't think of Russian vocabulary, which is a little frustrating. I'm having a little bit of a problem figuring out how to refer to people - with their patronic or with only their first name, and with the familiar vs. the polite form of "you". Still, no one yet has said anything that has made me think that I'm making the wrong linguistic decisions and I feel generally very good about my Russian skills. Less people here are laughing at my Russian than did in Israel. And people at bars seem not to have been lowering their quality of service below the already very low level when serving me.
The people at Kedem, which is the Jewish community center here which has the Hesed welfare center, the Hillel, and other services, have been extremely welcoming. I could never have imagined that everyone would be so willing to help, and so excited about me being there. I was lucky. The guy I'm living with is an important writer in the Yiddish community and an important musician and teacher at the conservatory here. He's very involved with the center, so this has been an in. On top of that connection, and the contacts I had established there from New York, it turns out that my mother's cousin in Israel (who I stayed with near Tel Aviv) still has a friend here and by chance it turns out that she works at the center. She was there when I showed up with my host and adding together what she knew about me from the cousin, she figured out who I was. Right away she grabbed me and welcomed me with a huge smile and hug, inviting me to one of the programs she runs for the elderly there called "Warm House" - basically a lunch gathering and conversation hour with ghetto survivors.
I've made some friends at the center already around my age - a Peace Corp volunteer and some other employees who basically write grants and do other things for the center. It's a very friendly place to be and I managed to stay there all day yesterday for 12 hours, being invited to all sorts of events as well as having to stand in front of large groups of employees (and clients too) and describe all of my wodnerfulness. I spent the first half of the day at the Day Care Center, which serves a rotating group of elderly people who visit once every two weeks. We painted plates with them, had a shabbat lunch, excercized in chairs etc. I think it's probably the highlight of a lot of their lives. A few of the guests were very obviously seriously poor, one of them taking all the extra food (from all of the plates) home in one tupperware container. As bad as everyone's situation probably is, it's not visible to me except in the situation of the old pensioners. My host mother's pension is the equivalent of 30$ a month. Most things here are much cheaper than they are in the states, but imported food products and toiletries are comparably priced to the US (gas is worse, I think). It surprised my host that I was willing to shell out the equivalent of 2.50$ for a nice new map of Chisinau instead of using the one they had with the old Soviet names probably made in 1975.
Monday I've scheduled my first interview. The employees of the center have hooked me up with some interesting people to interview who have connections to the places where my grandfather was born, was during the war, or are in other ways relevant to my project. They're all really old - over 80 - but apparently verbose. They're all clients of the Hesed and I'll be visiting them at their homes all over Chisinau. Tomorrow I'm taking a Jewish tour of Kishinev given by a Hesed volunteer and I plan on visiting the location where my parents grew up and where they went to school. I also am going to sit on some stone lions in one of the central parks for my mother - I haven't found them yet, but I will tomorrow mom.
posted by duckie at 12:55 PM
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