If you're looking for a cheery post - go elsewhere.

So here we are. We are exactly one week away from the first leg of our return flight home. A home we haven’t seen in 6 months. We left Atlanta on January 9th and will set foot in our home sometime in the early evening on the 5th of July.

We haven’t been gone as long as a lot of people but we’ve been gone long enough. We dream of our home, our stuff. Sitting on our couch. Sitting on our deck. It will be nice to be home. We are a little worried about the dust that will surely be covering every inch of our place. A little worried about our car (signed up for AAA the other day so that we can have them come and boost our car). I’m a little worried about finding work. Swell already has a few days a week from the week after we get home until the day we leave for Florida. She will be going back as a fill-in person to her previous job. Easy work. Good pay and she doesn’t hate-hate it. I’ve been looking but haven’t been all that successful.

The truth is people like her a lot more than me. I’ll be lucky if McDonald’s hires me.

The big (or more likely not-so big news) prior to an update about our going ons here in Romania - we are NOT returning to Palestine.

I emailed our concerns about the previous offer and heard nothing back for a week. Swell was really leaning to not going back so the lack of response made her lean even more toward not returning. I then sent an email indicating that we had made our final decision and that we would not return. The next day I finally heard back from the dean who indicated that she was very confused by our two emails. That the first needed to be answered by the administration but she felt that the second cancelled that need. (I thought I was pretty clear?) She then indicated that it had been a busy week for her and that she was unable to respond to our email earlier because she was just so busy.

Our decision was thus justified. We cannot go to a place where we have no administrative support. I just don’t understand what they are thinking. They never looked in on what we were doing while we were there. They never met with us. We rarely saw anyone that was to be there long term. I really doubt that they will make it through the next semester without a foreigner coming in to do what they wanted us to do. You cannot have one person teach classes for an entire optometry school – especially when she will be there only three days per week.

We thought they would be jumping to address our concerns, to ensure that we would return, rather we got more of the same – inaction, and no answers. I know it is a tough situation there. We are not unaware, but they fail to see our difficulties. Lying to get in and out of the country. Lack of money. Lack of direction and support. I could go on but it becomes repetitive and boring. Stuff you don’t really want to hear about.

I will say that I am disappointed to an extent. Most of the disappointment stems from ego. I hate doing what people expect.

When stating to people that we were considering going back I heard, “No, don’t go back. You already did it and you don’t need to go back. It’s stupid.” I know it’s a silly thing but I just don’t like people thinking they’ve got what I should or should not do figured out. Just because you think it’s a bad idea or a waste of time does not mean that I think the same way or that you are correct. In fact, odds are you are incorrect.

I also really liked being able to say that we were teaching in Palestine. It does impress some people – no, it really does. Now I have to go back to saying, “I’m just an optometrist”.

I’ll stop with those two silly reasons for my disappointment. I know we shouldn’t go back but I can still be disappointed. It’s my right!

So in a week we’ll be back in Atlanta and we’ll take 6-12 months to figure our lives out. Then we’ll move somewhere. Hopefully Alberta or Washington but we have to go where the jobs are.

I started a post a long time ago. I only wrote a page or so. The past two weeks have been very difficult/disappointing/sad.

Not difficult in a way that is funny 20 minutes later. Just plain difficult. Probably the worst two back-to-back weeks I’ve ever had.

Ever.

Reasons are plentiful but I won’t go into them here. Suffice it to say that the use of a car did not save us from Bucharest but rather teamed up with Bucharest to beat us to a quivering pulp of anger, despair, and sadness.

Here is the short post I wrote a week or so ago.

I swear I don’t make this stuff up. I’ve been accessing the internet while standing in the middle of the street. I’ll admit it isn’t a terribly busy street, but it is a street nonetheless.

Why do I have to risk my life to access the internet? Well for the simple fact that we’re in the country again… and I’m bored.

So bored.

The first time I visited Romania was three years ago. It was the spring before the fall that Swell and I moved to Atlanta and I started public health school. Upon our arrival in Romania we were whisked off by a crazy French priest to meet up with some French Canadian Optometry students. We spent the next week doing a disservice to the population of Romania by conducting poor quality eye exams and giving poor quality spectacles to the population of Tergoviste.

Eventually we made our way to visit Swell’s family here in Donesti. We stayed about a week in the country that year. Last year we spent a little less time. This year I could have done without even coming out here… at all.

It kind of loses its charm after awhile.

I’ve said it before but let me review what life in the country is like.

Outhouse.

No running water. We bring bottled water (although the first time we were here we were a little unprepared. We thought we would buy water here in the village. They only had carbonated water, which I cannot drink. It just tastes bitter to me. I lived on Orange “Tutti Futti” (Not as good as it sounds). This time we have plenty of bottled water.)

Flies everywhere. The door is always open and the magic keep-the-flies-out sheet spanning the door doesn’t really seem to work.

Old, old furniture held together with hopes and dreams.

Dirt everywhere.

A smell that is indescribable but probably a mixture of mothballs, old people, dirt, and farm.

To get to the kitchen (with three stoves and no working oven) you need to exit the front door, turn to your left walk 5 meters and enter through another door.

Now just so you know I’m not put off by the rustic nature of living out here. I’m not opposed to roughing it. Backpacking, camping, being sweaty and stinky are fine by me. It’s just that Swell’s grandparents have been unable to keep up with the demands of being rural folk (or, and this is just between us, have absolutely no idea how to be farmers). Things are falling apart all over the place. The animals are cared for but not in a manner that is probably conducive to their best development. It’s not so much a farm as an agricultural disaster.

The animals live in the people area (or do the people live in the animal area?) Manure of different sizes and types can be found in the people area. The goats snuck into the house more than once while we were visiting last time (the goats have since been put under the care of the goat-herder. He takes them to far off fields and enjoys some quality time with a herd of goats… for ever?)

Standing water everywhere. The just pull the water from the well and leave it in open containers. The dogs, cats, chickens, etc drink out of said containers and then the people folk wash their hands, drink(?), and use this water. As someone who has studied public health and has an ounce (just barely but I do have an ounce) of common sense and half an ounce (on a good day) of intelligence I am aghast, disgusted, dismayed, sickened – you get the idea – by the way they live here.

By the way, sleeping with fleas is not the good time I was promised.

There isn’t much to do around here either. It is far too hot to go for walks around the village. Swell should really spend her time visiting relatives – Grandparents, Aunt, various other relatives that fill the village. I’m not really that useful in visiting, as I don’t understand what is being said so I mostly just sit around here.

Normally I would have a book to read but not so much this time. I’ll sleep. I’ll play videogames. Write. But all in all it’s pretty boring.

Not much else going on. Shower was installed at the city house and is okish.

end of past post

We did do a couple of touristy things this weekend. We drove with Swell’s parents to another city (Brasov) where Swell’s dad has a cousin. We visited their family and then went with them to a couple of castles on Sunday. On Monday we took our time driving back to Bucharest and saw the outside of another castle and did a couple of other things.

Nothing exciting happened on this trip. I learned some stuff that I didn’t want to learn. Saw some stuff I didn’t want to see. Heard some stuff I didn’t want to hear.

This morning we were up at 3 am (after staying awake until midnight or so watching an amazing storm. We were just hit with the edge of it but the images on TV are pretty crazy. It killed one and injured 100. Weather here has been crazy. Worst summer in 50 years is what they are saying. No rain. 40 degree (Celsius) weather! People are selling their pigs (because they don’t have anything to feed them) and are getting paid what they would normally receive for a chicken.) We were up at 3 am because Swell’s parents were off to the airport to go home. For reasons I do not entirely understand we went with them to drop off the rental car and then came home in a taxi.

Don’t ask. Don’t tell.

Works for the military. Works for me.

We got home by 7. Swell visited with her g-parents who left at 8 to run some errands. We went back to bed and got up when g-parents returned. We spent a few hours trying to organize a truckload of sundries that Swell’s Mum bought the folks here. I counted 25 1 kg bags of sugar.

Dude. I don’t think we use a bag of sugar a year. I think they’ll be good for a while on sugar. We also cut down the 100s of plates they had in the cupboards by picking the microwavable ones and storing the rest. It looks better but they sure have a lot of stuff here.

Depressing post I know. It is time to go home.

We will visit Swell’s dad’s Dad on Friday and then visit her cousin after that. Until Tuesday we’ll just hang out in Bucharest and try to fit our stuff in our bags. We will also do some stuff with the sick one.

Sorry no funny today. I haven’t been in a funny mood for sometime now. Dang. I need to go home.