Gazda!

This was a big day. We met our gazda (host family) today and it was a little nerve wracking to drive away from the luxurious hotel and all the supportive friends I've managed to make in less than a week in a taxi cab with a person I had barely met, could understand maybe five words from, and was entrusting my life with. But really, every day for the past week has held just as much weight and anxiety as this day, the only difference is that my experience is now becoming individual and up to me. Until this point, the group has pretty much shared in the same events and occurrences, we all went to the same training sessions, we all sat on the same plane for 7 hours, we all went through the uncomfortably thorough security check that is Frankfurt airport (which we were lucky enough to experience twice), we all battled with our luggage and the odd heat at the Bucharest airport, and we all ate in the same room for every meal for the past two days. All of this has of course been from different perspectives, but everything's been basically the same. Now we're dotted throughout the training city, each with our own gazda, our own little corner of Ploiesti to get to know, and the beginning of our own separate take on life as a volunteer. It holds a bit more weight now. My thoughts so far? It's extremely difficult to communicate when both communicators understand very little of the other. Here's what I'd tell my gazda right now if I could: "I'm sorry I can not understand anything you are saying and that you have to repeat yourself sooooo much and then, five minutes later, I can't remember what you had been repeating. It's been a long week and I'm hoping that after a good night's sleep I'll retain all your words a little bit more. And thank you. Thank you thank you thank you. PS - can I wash some clothes? I'm running out..." I guess the biggest relief right now is that I'll (hopefully) only get better at the language and this is the most awkward gazda day. Even with our limited communication capabilities, I think we got it planned out that we'll go to church tomorrow morning. Church has always been an elusive mystery to me, so hearing it in another language won't be all that different, but it'll be in a really old building and I'm stoked for that.

Also, it is considered rude to wear your shoes into someone's home, but it is also believed that if your feet get at all cold, you will get sick, so you must take the shoes off and put on little slippers provided by the host. I'm glad the trainers warned us about that one.

Thanks for the comments. It's very comforting to read them right now, when everyone and everything I see is new and different.