Alanica Fara Frica

Well, today the mayor and I met with the local news station so they can do a story on the project.  I am making some images for them to put on screen, but I think they are just going to talk about it behind the desk… you won’t get to see my pretty face tripping over the romanian language in an interview.  I was surprised that the mayor allowed this interview to happen.  It is a really good sign of progress because once the images get shown to the public, they are going to hold him accountable for its completion.  The story should air next week, as soon as the engineers office is able to estimate a budget for the project. 

Many people have asked me to see images of the project I have been working on and I kept putting off posting them because I am constantly improving on them.  However, I will post what I have so far.  The project is in the central park in Reghin.  There is an old fountain that hasn’t worked in decades and it creates a major hole in the park.  So I am hoping to demolish the fountain and replace it with a new one and a gazebo.  The gazebo can be used as a stage for small events, which now they bring in temporary stages for.  The new fountain will be in the shape of a violin (the towns pride and joy) and will actually be more of a reflecting pool more than a fountain.  I haven’t worked out too much of the plan for water jets seeing how I don’t know too much about the insides of fountains.  So here are two pics of the existing site…

And here is an model of what I am purposing…

Well that’s enought excitement for now.  I showed these images to the head of the landscaping department and he really liked the ideas.  He has worked for the city for 20 years and hopefully will be very instrumental in pushing the project through.

Well, I must get out and enjoy the beautiful snow!

The mayor put off meeting till next week.  However, I did show some sketches to the head of the parks and the head of urban development and they both liked the idea.  They said they would set up a meeting for us all to meet with the mayor and talk about it.  So now Im just trying to pull together budget estimates so we can bring this project into reality.  I think the percentage that this project is going to happen is moving from 35% to 40%. 

You may have noticed that I haven’t posted much about my project with the mayor’s office on the site.  Well, that’s mostly because there isnt too much to say.  For those of you who didn’t take notes, I am hoping to demolish the old fountain in the central park and replace it with a new one, pavilion/stage and viewing area for small events.  I have some designs drawn up and I’m starting to really like what is happening with them.  I decided the mayor needed to see them after weeks of both of us putting off a meeting.  So I stayed up late last night making some graphics to show off the designs and “casually” stood outside of his office until I “bumped” into him… he was busy.  Supposedly we are going to meet tomorrow morning.  So tomorrow I’ll either have a post about where I see this project going or how nothing ever gets done around here. 

In other news, when I returned from ambushing the mayor, I was invited upstairs because a collegue of ours had a baby.  We go up there and he has some snacks and pop for us to drink.  It still feels wierd that people throw parties for themselves. 

Also, I will accomplish one of my goals for my Peace Corps experience in June.  I’m going to a wedding!  My counterpart is getting married to her boyfriend of, like, a decade.  Of course I was excited for her, but I couldn’t hold in my own excitement of getting to go.  I have heard of other weddings here and they sound like quite the celebration including many meals, all kinds of homemade drinks, dancing till morning and (of course) kidnapping the bride and holding her for randsom to the groom (the randsom is usually having to do something embarassing).  Oh, and I also saw a wedding celebration on the street once that involved a gypsy band, a small tree with candy bars hanging off it and dancing in the sidewalk so that no one can pass.  Either way, they sound like my kind of parties.

Many of Romanian’s youth learn english in school, but the only other experience they have with it is through television and movies.  With Romania’s accession into the EU just around the corner, learning english is extremely important for future economic and social development.

The organization A Thousand Books sends books to volunteer teachers teaching english anywhere in the world.  They have sent thousands of books to Peace Corps Volunteers in Romania since 2004, including Reghin.  They are always in need of donations to help with the high costs of shipping books overseas.  Please take the time to check out their site and help our cause.

My apartment took a major step towards completion as a permanent residence today with the addition of a full stove.  Before I only had a table top two-burner, but now I have four burners and an oven.  The most impressive thing is that the city of Reghin actually paid for a brand new stove for me… I have to say that I am a little surprised it happened.

Another pleasent surprise is that my project is starting to develop further.  I am moving ahead on a design project to replace the old fountain in the center park with a small stage area for events.  I also hope to design a new fountain that will be located in the center of the park.  If anyone has any experience in fountain design, please share.

Also, here’s a little Romania culture tidbit.  Last week, there was a birthday in the office. This person holds a pretty high ranking role in the office so all employees came down to the center courtyard for food and drinks, all of which supplied by the birthday guy.  Whenever it is your birthday, you are expected to supply food to others.  Also, if you go out for drinks, guess what… you’re buying. 

So this week I started getting some projects rolling at the office.  Basically everyone (the Peace Corps and the Mayors office in Reghin) told me to “do something that you see fit.”  I had plenty of ideas of what I wanted to do / thought I was capable of doing / saw what needed to be done, and they all pretty much relate to design ideas for the parks here in town.   Coming up with project  proposals isn’t the problem, executing them has proved to be a little more difficult.  I have little knowledge of how to best implement my ideas. 

For example, one project I am working on is designing a permanent structure in the central park for the flower sellers to sell their flowers in.  Right now they are just under some umbrellas.  I have drawn up a design but don’t feel I can move foward until I speak with the sellers themselves to find out their needs.  But we don’t want them to know I’m working on it until we know it is going to happen, and we don’t know if it is going to happen untill I show some final designs and building plans and budget to the city council and they approve it.  It seems very easy to get things done in public administration if you just totally leave the public out of it. 

I also hope to change the space around the broken fountain in the central park into a small stage area for events.  Water has not ran through its veins since the Communists were in power (1989).  The need for the change is something I have noticed and think would be nice.  Although, I have only lived in Reghin for about… 2 months.  What do I know?  When I ask around the office I hear “that would be nice” and “how much would it cost.”  I don’t get very favorable responses when I ask if it gets built, is the city prepared to use that space. 

I’ve decided just to move forward with all my ideas and turn them into graphics.  Once I have tangible documents, I can begin to peddle them around the office and get some excitement about them.  Once that is in place, hopefully I can push for some sort of public involvement events so that the projects can be tweeked to be more valuable to the city, and so the Mayor’s office can get a little more face time with Ionut C. Public. 

It differs from projects I worked on in school and in firms stateside because we were trained to get as much information about what we should do before we started drawing it up in plans.  The problem seems to be that I have too much control over these projects and the only checks and balances over my proposals are going to be the will of the Mayor and city council and the budget.  My job is to fit a few more stakeholders into the process to make sure that not only can these projects be done, but should they.

-alanica fara frica

Again, I must apologize for how long it has been since I posted last. A lot of internet fraud comes from Romania so it can be difficult to access certain pages from Romanian IP addresses. Alright, enough nerd talk. I have been a busy Alanica since we last spoke. I now have my own apartment, a nice studio apartment on the edge of town. I have a big balcony with a wonderful view of a parking lot and a steel factory. The apartment is owned by the mayors office and they are responsible for furnishing it, which… of course, means that I have lived there for three weeks and still dont have any drawers, shelves, chairs or even a full stove. I only have a table top 2 burner. Oh, and my fridge lacks a freezer and smells like rotten fish. I am promised all the issues will be solved soon, but right now it is certainly livable. It has been remodeled in the past few years and isnt stuffed with junk from the owners grandma, like other volunteers’ apartments. I am keeping busy working on the place, installing shelves in my pantry, a shower curtain, laundry lines, etc.

I also recently got internet at my place. So I should be able to be more responsive to emails now and hopefully post some pictures soon. I havent posted any since before July 4th. That will change, although I make no promises for when. I also have bought a guitar from the guitar factory, Hora. It is a very nice handmade instrument that I purchased for the equivalent of $70. In the states a guitar of similar quality would cost 5 times as much. They also sell mandolins and violins. If anyone is interested in and instrument, it’s only a 17 hour flight away! So I have been finding ways to keep busy living on my own (the first time!).

I have also made some friends with some kids in town, all high school kids. There arent too many people my age here, there is no college so they all go to Targu Mures or Cluj Napoca. But I am happy to meet high school students because I know I will be using them as an asset for some of the work I will be doing in the future. Maybe you are wondering what kind of work that will be? Well, so am I. I have been coming to the office for about 3 weeks now and I havent really gotten the ball rolling on any projects yet. It is slow going, but I dont want to push anything to hard this early, I am just sitting back and observing. Observing the needs of the town, and observing how things get done in the mayors office. I dont want to jump into anything without having a good idea how long the fall is.

If you want to send me any postcards or letters or peanut butter, send me an email and I will send you my address.

Pace, (peace)
alanica

Our presentation to the city went great.  The head of the urban planning department liked our design that we presented with one of the students.  There were certain elements of the plan that they agreed were important to discuss with city officials.  They are planning a presentation where some of the students we worked with will present to the city council.

On the weekend I went to the town of Sighisoara (pronounced Sigishoara).  It was a beautiful, historic town of about 30,000.  It was the hometown of Vlad the Impaler who the character Dracula was loosely based on.  I spent the whole day on sunday relaxing by a pool with some volunteers from group 20 (I’m in group 21).  Check out the pictures at www.828pm.com/photos.

Today we had a 4th of July party at the school with PC staff and our gazda families.  It was great to grill out and listen to some classic American music that I, of course, got to DJ.

Tomorow is the big day where we learn our permanent sites.  I have no idea where I am going to go.  Don’t know if will be a big city or a small town.  During my site interviews I focused more on the type of job I would do and not where.  All I know is that I will probably be working at a mayors office which tends to mean that I will be in a smaller city, possibly around the same size as Sighisoara.  Well, I’ll let you know as soon as I do!

I have a cell phone.  I can watch Desperate Houswives on the TV at my house.  I can manage my website, watch movie trailers and listen to NPR on the internet.  I can go to the beach, go skiing or hiking.  I’m working on a project designing the central park for the mayor’s office.  Not quite the Peace Corps experience many of you thought I was in for.  You probably thought I would spend all my time here digging ditches. 

Well…

This weekend I was digging ditches.  About 30 volunteers went to Pitesti to work with Habitat for Humanity.  We dug a trench for a water main pipe around 3/4 of the house.  We had a fun time and it was nice to do a little manual labor.  I was also glad to get out of Ploiesti to the slightly nicer city of Pitesti.

Great news!  Instead of me akwardly trying to write about the experience at habitat, you can see it pixel by pixel.  I have finally set up a photo portion of this site.  Check it out at http://www.828pm.com/photos  I am slowly uploading pics from here and the states.  You can add comments to them, send e-cards, download full files, rate them, create favorite lists and even upload your own photos to the site so I can see what is going on in your life.  I know… it rules.  Soon I will be connecting this blog and the photo page to a more unified website, but I wouldnn’t have high expectations of it happening very soon.

Now I must work to finish our graphics for our park design.  We present it with one of the high school students to the office of Urban Development.