Site Visits

October 17th, 2007
I was away from Orhei since last Friday visiting Comrat, the city I’m moving to at the end of November. It’s in the South of Moldova in the territory of Gagauzia.
(Quick background on Gagauzia – it’s part of Moldova constitutionally but considered an autonomous state. It gained autonomy peacefully in 1994 and the baskan/governer has a seat in Moldovan Parliament. This place is really interesting- Gagauzian people are descendants of Turkey and speak a Turkish based language influenced by Russian, called Gagauzi, along with speaking Russian. I was able to practice my minimal Russian knowledge, since barely anyone I met in Comrat knew any Moldovan. Language Politics are a touchy subject in Moldova. The official language of the country is Moldovan, basically the same as Romanian but with a different accent. Most people outside of Gagauzia speak Romanian and Russian, but there are pockets of land around the country where only one or the other is spoken. I also mistakenly offended someone in Comrat by calling the language spoken in the North Romanian. They were like, umm no, It’s Moldovan. But back to Comrat…It also has the only Gagauzian University in the world and the largest statue of Lenin in Moldova- you heard correctly…Lenin).

So I went for a few days to meet my counterpart (basically boss for work) and stay overnight with 3 different families to pick which one I’d live with when I move there. Akward? Umm, no not at all. All of the families I stayed with were really nice, but I ended up choosing a tgani/Roma family with a woman in her 60s and her 10 year old grandson. When I walked in the door she was elated that I was Indian and plopped me in front of the TV. There’s a channel that plays Bollywood films 24/7, so I’ve gotten this reaction frequently in Moldova. That’s right, I’m the Indyanka. My new host mom is also the head of an NGO in Comrat…I wasn’t able to decipher what the NGO does, maybe anti-human trafficking work, but it could be something totally different. I did the nod and smile, nod and smile. The 10 year old boy started teaching me words out of his English workbook. It went like this: He points to a word in Russian. I say it with my funny American accent. It sounds like ‘blahdipoopelahdi’ to him. He laughs at me. I point and laugh at him. I tell him to pronounce English word. He pretends to ignore me. I was having way too much fun with him that I forgot to ask the prepared questions about the apartment (and now that I think about it, I don’t know if I saw a refrigerator in the kitchen. Oh well).

My counterpart for directs an NGO for youth. They have done seminars and trainings on tolerance, anti-racism issues, and want to start a resource center for youth. Again, not sure what I’ll be doing with them, but don’t have to worry too much about ‘working’ until my language is a little bit better. I’m really excited about my counterpart since she seems to have a lot of energy and was happy to have me there. I’ll also be able to do side projects I’m interested in/ the town wants like an English club, grantwriting, jazzercise.