Come Take a Walk With Me

During the weekends I try to get some exercise. Codlea sits at the foot of a 1300 meter mountain (approx. 4500 ft.) called Magura. Luckily for me, I live near the foothills leading to the mountain itself. Every Friday, Saturday and Sunday I try to take a walk to the trailhead leading to the peak of Magura, hike up as fast as I can for 30 minutes and then go back down. It's a good workout and the fresh air can be rejuvinating. This flatlander is going to miss having a mountain, albeit a small one, in his backyard. So, here's a photo narrative of my hike last Saturday...oh yeah, and don't forget to click on a pic if you want to see a larger view.


I live at the top of my street and about 25 yards from an open field that leads up to a large pasture hill. An orthodox cemetary has been placed in this area recently (about a year ago). When I make a left out my front door and turn the corner, I come upon the cemetary. Romanian Orthodox graves have little patches of soil on top in which people plant flowers, plants and grass. Quite frequently I see people tending the gravesites, taking out dead flowers and plants and replacing them with fresh ones. I go to Ica's parents' grave (in a different cemetary) once in awhile and help tend the little garden on top of the grave.



This is the street that I make my left turn on to get to the trailhead. Many streets in Codlea, including mine, are not paved. As you can probably imagine, it can get a little muddy around here. The cemetary is to the right. A horse-drawn wagon or "cartuţa" passed me by on its way back from gathering wood in the forest. Many people in Codlea have caruţas, as they come in handy for hauling stuff around. For some, it is their primary mode of transportation. In the winter sometimes, the tires come off and the sleigh blades are put on. Yes, I've seen the Romanian Santa, as he's sleighed by my house before...reins in one hand and a bottle of god-knows-what in the other.



Hot car right? This is a fine example of the ubiquitous Dacia. They're everywhere. My guess is that this is an early 80's model. It's hard to tell because the body style hardly changed from about 1972 to 1989. My friend Ovidiu has a white one just like this. Her name is Margareta. The Dacia is based on an old Renault body and Renault engineering. Rumor has it that Romanian spies posing as engineers stole technology from the French over a number of years while working at Renault during the late 60's and early 70's. Good work. After the revolution, Renault bought Dacia from the State for about 50 million dollars. That's when the body style changed. Things are going well for Dacia as of late, as the demand for the Logan in Europe (Victor has one, see previous posts) is greater than the supply right now. Forza Dacia!



Continuing down the street we find some neighborhood chickens out for an afternoon walk, just like me...


Some local art adorning the side of...

some blocs. These are nicer than most in Codlea.


Now I've made a turn up an old street and away from the blocs into the neighborhood by the trailhead. This is a good example of an old Transylvanian peasant home. If I made this photo grainy black and white, took the tires off of the caruţa and got rid of the car in the right-hand corner, maybe this photo could pass for late 19th century? Oh, I forgot about the big, nasty industrial smokestack in the background. We'd have to get rid of that too I guess.


A useful sign. A rarity in Romania. If you look closely, you can see that it was put there by a German. Go figure. Where would Codlea be without its Saxon heritage? "Spre" means "towards" and there are three different colored trails leading to three different places. I've only completed the yellow trail, which leads to the "Strand" complex, a large mountain spring-fed swimming pool. It'll get the blood pumping, let me tell ya. I do plan on taking the blue and red next spring to the Black Castle (Cetatea Neagra) and the summit (Vf. Magura), respectively. It's about a 10 minute walk from my door to the trailhead. It's nice. I like.


Up the trail we go. As you can see, it was a bit foggy. However, as I climbed higher....



the sun started to show itself through the trees. As I hiked above the fog the temperature began to rise. I had to take off my winter hat and gloves and un-zip some layers. Higher and higher I went and then the payoff...



A spectacular view. It was sunny and warm up here as I looked down into the cool, foggy valley below. I had this exact same view the day before and brought my camera this time, hoping that the weather conditions and view would be the same. They were, and I got the photo I wanted.



The fog had cleared by the time I made it back down. This is a shot of Codlea from atop a hill near the trailhead. In the background and to the right we have the 15th century clocktower and Saxon fortified church complex. On the right is an old neighborhood, the way Codlea looked before, well, you know. It is so sad to think of all the nice old houses that were destroyed to make way for those ugly monstrosities on the left.

I hope you enjoyed your tour. Come visit me and see it for yourself....

Romanians Angry With Borat

If you've read my previous post, you may have clicked the link to the Borat video. Funny stuff. Well, apparently some Romanians don't think it's so funny. Below is an article from The Mail, a British newspaper:

Borat film 'tricked' poor village actors
By BOJAN PANCEVSKI and CARMIOLA IONESCU, Mail on Sunday

Last updated at 21:25pm on 11th November 2006

When Sacha Baron Cohen wanted a village to represent the impoverished
Kazakh home of his character Borat, he found the perfect place in
Glod: a remote mountain outpost with no sewerage or running water and
where locals eke out meagre livings peddling scrap iron or working
patches of land.

But now the villagers of this tiny, close-knit community have angrily
accused the comedian of exploiting them, after discovering his new
blockbuster film portrays them as a backward group of rapists,
abortionists and prostitutes, who happily engage in casual incest.

They claim film-makers lied to them about the true nature of the
project, which they believed would be a documentary about their
hardship, rather than a comedy mocking their poverty and isolation.

Villagers say they were paid just £3 each for this humiliation, for a
film that took around £27million at the worldwide box office in its
first week of release.

Now they are planning to scrape together whatever modest sums they
can muster to sue Baron Cohen and fellow film-makers, claiming they
never gave their consent to be so cruelly misrepresented.

Disabled Nicu Tudorache said: This is disgusting. They conned us into
doing all these things and never told us anything about what was
going on. They made us look like primitives, like uncivilised
savages. Now they,re making millions but have only paid us 15 lei
[around £3].

Cambridge-educated Baron Cohen filmed the opening scenes of the Borat
movie in Glod - a village that is actually in Romania, rather than
Kazakhstan, and whose name literally translates as 'mud', last
summer.

Its 1,000 residents live in dilapidated huts in the shadow of the
Carpathian mountains. Toilets are little more than sheltered holes in
the ground and horses and donkeys are the only source of transport.

Just four villagers have permanent employment in the nearby towns of
Pucioasa or Fieni, while the rest live off what little welfare
benefits they get.

So when a Hollywood film crew descended on a nearby run-down motel
last September, with their flashy cars and expensive equipment,
locals thought their lowly community might finally be getting some of
the investment it so desperately needs.

The crew was led by a man villagers describe as 'nice and friendly,
if a bit weird and ugly', who they later learned was Baron Cohen. It
is thought the producers chose the region because locals more closely
resembled his comic creation than genuine Kazakhs.

The comedian insisted on travelling everywhere with bulky bodyguards,
because, as one local said: 'He seemed to think there were crooks
among us.'

While the rest of the crew based themselves in the motel, Baron Cohen
stayed in a hotel in Sinaia, a nearby ski resort a world away from
Glod's grinding poverty. He would come to the village every morning
to do 'weird things', such as bringing animals inside the run-down
homes, or have the village children filmed holding weapons.

Mr Tudorache, a deeply religious grandfather who lost his arm in an
accident, was one of those who feels most humiliated. For one scene,
a rubber sex toy in the shape of a fist was attached to the stump of
his missing arm - but he had no idea what it was.

Only when The Mail on Sunday visited him did he find out. He said he
was ashamed, confessing that he only agreed to be filmed because he
hoped to top up his £70-a-month salary - although in the end he was
paid just £3.

He invited us into his humble home and brought out the best food and
drink his family had. Visibly disturbed, he said shakily: 'Someone
from the council said these Americans need a man with no arm for some
scenes. I said yes but I never imagined the whole country, or even
the whole world, will see me in the cinemas ridiculed in this way.
This is disgusting.

'Our region is very poor, and everyone is trying hard to get out of
this misery. It is outrageous to exploit people's misfortune like
this to laugh at them.

'We are now coming together and will try to hire a lawyer and take
legal action for being cheated and exploited. We are simple folk and
don't know anything about these things, but I have faith in God and
justice.'

If the village does sue the film-makers, they won't be the first.
Last week, two unnamed college students who were caught on film
drunkenly making racist and sexist comments took legal action,
claiming the production team plied them with alcohol and falsely
promised that the footage would never be seen in America.

Many other unwitting victims of Baron Cohen's pranks have also spoken
out against the way they were conned and - unsurprisingly - the
rulers of Kazakhstan have long taken issue with the image Borat
paints of their vast, oil-rich nation.

The residents of Glod only found out about the true nature of the
film after seeing a Romanian TV report. Some thought it was an art
project, others a documentary.

The Mail on Sunday showed them the cinema trailer - the first footage
they had seen from the film. Many were on the brink of tears as they
saw how they were portrayed.

Claudia Luca, who lives with her extended family in the house next to
the one that served as Borat's home, said: 'We now realise they only
came here because we are poorer than anyone else in this village.
They never told us what they were doing but took advantage of our
misfortune and poverty. They made us look like savages, why would
anyone do that?'

Her brother-in law Gheorghe Luca owns the house that stood in for
Borat's - which the film-makers adorned by bringing a live cow into
his living room.

Luca, who now refers to Baron Cohen as to the 'ugly, tall,
moustachioed American man', even though the 35-year-old comedian is
British, said: 'They paid my family £30 for four full days. They were
nice and friendly, but we could not understand a single word they
were saying.

'It was very uncomfortable at the end and there was animal manure all
over our home. We endured it because we are poor and badly needed the
money, but now we realise we were cheated and taken advantage of in
the worst way.

'All those things they said about us in the film are terribly
humiliating. They said we drink horse urine and sleep with our own
kin. You say it's comedy, but how can someone laugh at that?'

Spirea Ciorobea, who played the 'village mechanic and abortionist' ,
said: 'What I saw looks disgusting. Even if we are uneducated and
poor, it is not fair that someone does this to us.'

He remembered wondering why the crew took an old, broken Dacia car
and turned it into a horse cart. He said: 'We all thought they were a
bit crazy, but now its seems they wanted to show that it is us who
drive around in carts like that.'

Local councillor Nicolae Staicu helped the crew with their shooting,
but he claims he was never told what sort of movie they were making,
and that they failed to get a proper permit for filming.

Staicu, who had never dealt with a film crew before, said: 'I was
happy they came and I thought it would be useful for our country, but
they never bothered to ask for a permit, let alone pay the official
fees.

'I realise I should have taken some legal steps but I was simply
naive enough to believe that they actually wanted to do something
good for the community here.

'They came with bodyguards and expensive cars and just went on with
their job, so we assumed someone official in the capital Bucharest
had let them film.'

Bogdan Moncea of Castel Film, the Bucharest-based production company
that helped the filming in Romania, said the crew donated computers
and TV sets to the local school and the villagers. But the locals
have denied this.

Mr Staicu said: 'The school got some notebooks, but that was it.
People are angry now, they feel cheated.'

It's a feeling Glod is used to. The village, like others in the
Dambovita region of Romania, is populated mainly by gipsies who say
they are discriminated against by the rest of the country.

Indeed, when local vice-mayor Petre Buzea was asked whether the
people felt offended by Baron Cohen's film, he replied: 'They got
paid so I am sure they are happy. These gipsies will even kill their
own father for money.'

No one from the 20th Century Fox studio was available for comment on
the villagers' claims.

But feelings in Glod are running so high that The Mail on Sunday saw
angry villagers brandishing farm implements chase out a local TV
crew, shouting that they had enough of being exploited.

It is small comfort that few, if any, of them will get to see the
Borat film. Not a single villager we spoke to had ever been able to
afford a trip to the nearest cinema, 20 miles away.

Perhaps that's the real reason why film-makers chose Glod in the
first place.

A Window to my World

*Please note that this post refers to a video clip that has been removed

Technology never ceases to amaze me. As I mentioned before, I have recently discovered the wonders of YouTube. For those of you who haven't heard, YouTube allows people to very easily upload their video clips and share them with the rest of the world. Man I wish this stuff was around when I was back in high school. We (you know who you are) would have been famous. I like to thing that we pioneered the show "Jackass" before it even exisisted.

Anyway, my first video installment was taken yesterday at school. As you may remember, I've referred to my school as a "zoo", myself as a "zookeeper" (see comments section, Oct. 8th post) and the students as "animals". Well, click here if you want to see why...

I would like to emphasize that, while the students are aware of the prescence of the camera, this should not lead you to believe that their behavior in the clip is any different from when there is no camera present. It's like this everyday. Seriously. I didn't do anything but walk down the hall with the camera and say "hi" a few times. The whole thing was spontaneous.

You see, there are 10 minute breaks between class periods, officially. However, most of the time these breaks stretch to 15 to 20 minutes because the teachers are busy chatting, smoking, drinking coffee or trying on clothes that some guy brings in at least once a week. Yes, the teachers' room is a flea market sometimes. Teachers in Romania do not have their own classrooms, the kids do. So when the bell rings, the teachers take their sweet ol' time to get up and go to their next class while the children make their way back to their respective classrooms. Unfortunately, this usually results in 10 minutes of lost class time per period, which adds up to a whole class period a week. Add it up and that's 36 class periods lost per school year. But hey, gossip, coffee and cigaretts are surely more important than teaching the children, right?

The kids have to be in the same room with the same classmates every day of every hour (with a few exceptions). They don't even get a lunch break. As a result, they are kind of like caged animals. When the bell rings and the teachers retreat into the Teachers' Room or "Canceliare", anything goes. It's not like America where students have to spend the passing period going to their locker and getting to their next class. Oh no. Every hour on the hour, for 15-20 minutes, chaos ensues. Running, yelling, wrestling, grab-ass, full on fights and brawls, kicking stuff down the hallway, dancing, swearing, you name it. They are completely unsupervised, as there are no teachers monitoring the hallways. Either the teachers don't know, don't want to know or don't care about what goes on. But guess who witnesses it all on a daily basis? That's right. Yours truly.

Of course, you may be asking yourself why? Why am I not in the Canceliare with the rest of my colleagues having a coffee and gossiping. Or why am I not having a smoke outside of the building in plain view of the students, or inside the school for that matter? It is because I spend my breaks in my room talking to students, running my English library, setting up the laptop/projector, preparing for the next class, etc. Sometimes I actually walk the halls and go out into the play yard. I recognize the fact that I am lucky to have my own room and all of its resources. However, even if I didn't, I would rather be amongst the kids, as they are clearly starved for attention. The teachers just don't see this.

Unfortunately, the teacher-student relationship in Romania becomes very cold and impersonal after elementary school (1st through 4th grade). The system is authoritative and is based on rote learning of facts in which the teacher-student exchange is simply call and response. Teachers generally project an intimidating air of authority and don't really communicate with the children on a personal level. This is really a shame, because children, especially young adolescents, need more than just facts and information from their teachers; they need positive social interation as well.

As you saw in the video, I get mobbed when I walk the halls or go outside in the play yard. I'll say it again, they act like that even when I don't have a camera in my hand. And I've come to realize that it's not just because I'm different, the American. It's because I actually talk to them. I show intrerest in them as human beings. I don't treat them like objects. Sadly, they don't get this from many of their own teachers.

When I look back on my school days, I know that my social interaction with my teachers was just as, if not more, important than the information that they presented to me as part of the curriculum. I wish that it could be the same for the students in Romania. Hopefully it will change one day. Maybe I'm part of that process of change? Maybe one day a student of mine will become a teacher and remember the positive social interaction he or she had with me, and will thus do the same for his or her students? I sure hope so.

On a lighter note, many of you may know about the comedian Sasha Baron Cohen, otherwise known as "Borat". He's got a new movie out and it looks hilarous. Can't wait to see it. Anyway, the character Borat is a TV journalist from Kazakstan. However, the scenes from the movie that are supposed to be in Kazakstan are actually filmed in Romania. Click here to see the first four minutes of the movie, filmed in a Romanian village, not Kazakstan.

The language you hear is Romanian. The car is a Dacia. I've been to places like that. It's nice. I like.

Welcome Back Winter

Oh, how I didn't miss you. The weather took a turn for the worse on Friday, as I woke up to find a lot of white stuff outside. Needless to say, I haven't ventured outside too much this weekend save for a trip to Metro and some time spent near the grill last night with Victor. Here are some photos taken yesterday afternoon:

You're looking down my street right now. Visibility not so good. Snowstorms tend to do that. Our house is the first one you see on the right. The big building in the background is the Codlea hospital, a place that I never, ever want to visit.

Doing a 180 from the previous viewpoint and at the top of the street we have some fine examples of the Romanian haystack. Beyond that we have the "dealul" and "padure" (hills and forest). I try to do some hiking up there at least twice a week in order to get some fresh air and exercise. Looks like I may need to go buy some snow shoes.

Victor and the 2006 Dacia Logan, nicely equipped with a roof rack and front bumper icicles. Come join us while we navigate the frozen streets of Codlea...hey, at least we've got enough snow now to fill in the potholes.

For those of you who read my previous post, a rant about how I think PC needs to leave Romania, well, I decided to take it off the blog for now. I wasn't in a very good mood last week and didn't have much else to do while I was home sick from school. Oh yes, did I forget to mention the flu shot that PC gave me? It gave me the flu. Nice. Hey, at least we know that they gave me the right shot. In retrospect, maybe it's just me who needs to leave Romania? It certainly would make my life a hell of a lot more pleasant. Wah.

Anyway, I'm rewriting the essay a bit, trying to take some of the venom out of it and, like Fox News, trying to make it a bit more "fair and balanced". God, I can't believe I just said that. However, I will say that my gut still tells me that my basic argument is informed and fair. Maybe I'll post the new version one of these days. The idea of submitting it to the volunteer newsletter was a bit hasty. Two level-headed individuals whose opinions I greatly respect advised me against it. I'm lucky to have people to rely on that can save me when I want to spit hot fire.

In fact, I think I know why I went on that diatribe last week. See, I'm dealing with this issue at school. The teacher that I share 12 of my 16 hours with is a drunk. He comes to school liquored up. In fact, he was so liquored up a couple of weeks ago that I had to tell the principal about it. I had kids running up to me, telling me that he was drunk. One of my students brought me his jacket after the principal told him to go home. I played dumb and pretended not to know anything. They gave him a week's vacation without pay. Obviously I was upset by this and felt compelled to do something about it. However, what is even more disturbing is that I'm apparently more concerned about it than they are. The school "can't do anything about it".

That's right folks, the Romanians let 50 year-old drunk men come to school and teach their 11-14 year-olds. They all know he's a drunk, but nobody does anything about it. They've known about his drinking for years! He just waltzes into the teachers' lounge half-cocked, red-faced and nobody says anything. "Oh, it's just him the drunk. No big deal, right?" Apparently, it is the fault of the school inspectorate and "the system" that they can't fire him. My school has "tried to to everything they can". Call me crazy, but maybe they need to try a little harder? He would have remained in school that whole day if I hadn't said something to the director. Oh yeah, by the way, she doesn't speak English. Even more frightening is the possibility that the director accepts bribes from him in return for inaction on her part. I'm not being paranoid. This is a real possibility. There is no institution in this country that is immune to corruption.

See, I'm just sick and tired of this "we can't do anything about it" attitude. It is this very attitude that has prevented Romania from developing as a nation, both socially and economically. What kind of a message does their inaction send to the children? The students know that their teacher comes to school drunk and nobody does anything about it. Logically, a child may deduce that this must be socially acceptable. In this situation, I can't, in good conscious, make any excuses for these people. I put my foot down now and say no.

Now, while his presence doesn't necessarily effect my ability to do my job, it is, nonetheless, discouraging to me. My motivation to help these people takes a serious nose-dive when confronted with a situation like this. And while I do realize that my primary obligation is to the children, I'm just one American alone in a sea of Romanians.

I guess I'm just in a bit of a state of shock. The fact that they don't care enough about their children to do something about this angers me. It's really hard for me to look a lot of them in the face these days. I mean, I just don't believe that nothing can be done about this. If the school administration, teachers and parents got together and agressively pursued a resolution to this problem, they could get this guy out. They could go to the media, etc. The school inspectorate would be forced to do something. But, unfortunately, this will never happen. The shame of it is that I am powerless. This is a very sensitive situation that I, as a PCV, cannot do anything about except go to the school director when I suspect that the guy's been drinking. I suspected it the other day, but wasn't convinced. So, like them, I did nothing. I have to make hard compromises here.

I haven't mentioned any of this to PC, as I'm not sure that would accomplish anything anyway. I'm debating on whether or not to confront this guy in private about the situation. One thing I do know is this: If he shows up totally wasted like he did a couple of weeks ago, I'm going to have to go get the other half of the class (we split classes) and pull them out of the room. At that point I'll have to drag his ass down to the director. That will be embarassing for both him and the director. Maybe they'll be shamed into action? Dare to dream.

Look, it's sad that the guy has a drinking problem. I feel sorry for him. It's none of my business what he does during his free time, but the line has to be drawn at the school doors. Period. By allowing this situation to continue, they not only fail their children, but they fail themselves. Somebody has to take a stand on this. Unfortunately it looks like it's going to be me, the lone American.

Again, in the spirit of Fox News (I can't believe I said it again) I feel like I should offer up something that is not all "gloom and doom". Oh, the irony. Anyway, I showed the little darlings "Corpse Bride" and gave them chocolate for Halloween. The name of the brand of the little chocolate bars was, quite appropriately, "Zoo". I got a chuckle out of that, as that's how I feel about the place most days. The kids enjoyed themselves and were wowed by the laptop/projector setup.

I'm working on an English Library/Book Club project. I've got about 50 kids so far reading books. I'm going to try to form a formal club, have them write book reviews and try to get them to make a website that will have all of their reviews posted on it, member photos, etc. I'd also like to try to get a grant for more books. An upcoming in-class project will have them create their own personal "coat of arms". I bought large-sized high-grade drawing paper for them. I hope to have their work posted on the walls of their respective classrooms. I think that they'll get into this because, after all, they live in a former medieval land of castles and warrior kings. Even Codlea has its own coat of arms. Plus, they'll get to flex some creative muscles.

So, that's my report for now. Stay tuned for more of the "Takin' you back" posts, as there are many photos that still needed to be posted from September and October. And be on the lookout for exclusive Fenblog video clips. I've recently discovered the joys of YouTube and hope that it will bring even more excitement to your FenBlog experience...