Got Scabies?

So, bad news...I contracted Scabies from holding the kids at the orphanage. I thought they all just had flea bites, but it turns out, they have scabies. Now I do too. I have it on my back, legs, stomach, and worst on my neck. Three of us girls have it for sure, but since it takes 3-4 weeks after you get it to have an outbreak, the other girls probably have it and just don't know it yet. We were given some really stinky, toxic cream that we have to rub over our entire bodies to kill the mites, and have to soak all our sheets and clothes. The most depressing part, is that even though we can keep killing the mites with treatments so the bites don't get worse, we're going to keep contracting more scabies until we leave. Then I'll have to do a final treatment about a month after I get home. We can't just stop holding our kids, so it's something we just have to deal with.

What is Scabies? (From a website)
Scabies is a contagious disorder of the skin caused by very small, wingless insects or mites called the Human Itch mite or Scabies itch mite Sarcoptes scabiei var. hominis (Hering). The female insect burrows into the skin where she lays 1 - 3 eggs daily. A very small, hard to see, zigzag blister usually marks the trail of the insect as she lays her eggs. Other more obvious symptoms are an intense itching (especially at night) and a red rash that can occur at the area that has been scratched. The most common locations for scabies are on the sides of fingers, between the fingers, on the backs of the hands, on the wrists, heels, elbows, armpits, inner thighs and around the waist (belt line). If untreated, the female will continue to lay eggs for about five weeks. The eggs hatch and the new mites begin the cycle all over again. The mites themselves are too small to be seen without magnification. One of the great problems with scabies always has been misdiagnosis. Scabies is spread by personal contact, e.g., by shaking hands or sleeping together or by close contact with infected articles such as clothing, bedding or towels. It is usually found where people are crowded together or have frequent contact, and is most common among school children, in hospitals, and in childcare centers. Scabies can be spread by the insect itself or by the egg. Prompt action is required to rid a person of the insects and eggs. Sulfur has been used (6 - 10% in lotion or cream) since Roman times as a scabicide, but you might be allergic.

Picnic With the Branch

Us girls with some of our Romanian Friends

Today we took the tram to Dacia and had a picnic with the branch. It was right behind the Dacia 7th floor apartment where we work, and out past the gypsy camps in the hills. It was such a beautiful day. Up in the hills, there are cows and horses grazing around and everything is so green. The sister missionaries were the only ones who couldn’t make it. Sora Rosenwall was bitten by a street dog and couldn’t get the right rabies shot she needed here. They had to go all the way to Germany to get it.

We ate pizza and juice, not much of a traditional picnic, but the last group got really sick from the food they had at their picnic so they wanted to play it safe. After we ate, a few people went out and rode Genina’s four wheeler around and the rest of us played ultimate Frisbee in the field. The grass was really tall and stickery, not to mention we were all in shorts and flip flops, so it made it kind of interesting. Someone would be running to catch the Frisbee and suddenly start screaming and jumping around after realizing they had run into a giant weed patch. Besides losing my sandals a million times and feeling all itchy, it was tons of fun. We had a huge group playing with us.

The scariest bridge ever...

After the picnic, we decided to hurry back to the city to catch “Indiana Jones” at the theater. We had walked back to the tram in two separate groups, and thought the other group had already gotten on the tram. We saw it leaving and sprinted to make it on just in time. When we got to the theater, the other girls weren’t there, so we assumed they decided not to see it after all. We walked to the Buc apartment, but they weren’t there. All of the keys to that apartment were with girls in the other group, so we couldn’t get in. We ended up sitting out in front of their building for 2 ½ hours. We found out later they were on the next tram after us and still went to the movie. At first we were annoyed waiting so long, but in the end, I think I had more fun sitting outside their apartment than I would have at the movie. We ate gogosi then talked about everything from most embarrassing moments to what everyone thinks our husbands will be like.

Hospital Pics (more added)

Florine being a stud. He got to go home!

Hanging out with the boys. We had a movie day and watched Spider Man 3 on my laptop.

Me & Whitney ready to get to work!

Taking Florine outside. He had five lei and we took him to the store across the parking lot to buy candy.

Me & Florine (not the Florine from previous journals- he went home) This florine has severely clubbed feet and cannot walk, but he loves to go outside.

This little boy, Marion, has failing kidneys and cannot get a transplant. The doctors said he is slowly dying. We don't know how long he has, but he sure has fun playing just like any normal toddler. Right before this picture, he was counting with me, yelling "Doi!" meaning two, and suddenly fell asleep mid-sentence!

Nothing is wrong with Marion's hand. They've just been doing blood transfusions from his hand and keep it wrapped up after.

Marion before he fell asleep.

Alex, Florine, and another boy in their same room had the greatest time playing a computer game on my laptop that Alex got in the Happy Meal we brought over to him. Then they were distorting their faces on Photo Booth and laughing so hard they cried.

The baby in the middle is the one I grew most attached to in the hospital. He didn't have a name, so I just started calling him Octavian and it stuck. He recently left the hospital and we don't know where he is now. The two older kids on the ends are sisters, Alexandra and Roxanna. When I first started playing with them, I thought they were boys. They keep all the kids hair short for hygienic reasons. The two girls were only in the hospital a few days, then got to leave. Alexandra on the left, gave us 1 lei (which is about 40 cents) and asked us to buy something for Octavian. Here, Orthodox Saints are expected to be charitable and give to the needy. No one asked her to, and I was impressed by her strong desire to help out.

Octavian & Roxanna

Me & Alexandra

A Drastic Change...

So I did something sort of drastic with my hair...it was kind of spare the moment. Dad I know you'll hate it, but it will help me to blend in with the crowd. Obviously people can still tell I'm not from Romania, but now at least I won't stand out so much. I miss my blonde already.

Scroll down... (FYI: It went way darker than I anticipated)
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My Kids! (Pictures)

Here are a few of my kids at the orphanage. These are copies of the pictures we had in a binder with each kid's profile and background information. I have about fifteen kids in Isolation, but these are just the few they had.

This is Alexi, the one I always talk about in my journals! He is almost completely blind. You can kind of see that he has one huge eye and one that never opens. He is secretly my favorite!
This is Cosmina. She only has two front teeth, but they are the biggest beaver teeth you have ever seen. Its so hilarious. I wish her mouth was open in this picture. She loves to be held and will just stare at your face for the longest time.
This is David. He gets ignored the most by the workers, because he is way in the back room. He is 14, but definitely doesn't look like it. He has severely deformed legs from laying in a crib all his life. He smiles so big when I help him stretch!
This is Ionuts (pronounced yo-noots). I absolutely love him! He is always grinding his teeth and has a really funny personality. I had to hold him down while he got his booster shots.

This is little Mihai! He is 6 1/2! Can you believe it? He is so tiny, yet he has the longest and skinniest legs I have ever seen. He rubs them together like a little grasshopper. He doesn't walk or talk, but he is so fun to interact with. He has parents that come visit him at the orphanage on weekends.
Oh, how can I sum up Radu?!? He has downs syndrome and is the most content and chill baby ever. When you tickle him, he has the most hilarious laugh you've ever heard! He giggles so hard, he can't breath and then lets out a huge sigh. We call him the 'starfish' because he is so floppy and lays all sprawled out in his crib.

This is Emanuela. I think she's four. She doesn't really interact at all, so it's harder to come up with things to do with her. We do get her to smile once in a while though.
Denis earned the nickname "gogoasa" which means doughnut. He is the fattest baby, way fatter than he was in this picture. He is completely normal, but we still give him lots of attention so he doesn't start developing disorders.

Daniel used to have clubbed feet, but he had surgery and is learning to walk. He also has hemophelia and bruises so badly from the tiniest fall. Right now, he has a giant black eye!

My Little Maimuţă, Alexi

Thursday, May 15, 2008

We took some of the babies outside again today. They let one of the little boys go that they wouldn’t let me take out yesterday. I finally learned that his name is Alexi. I've just been calling him "Little Maimuţă" because he hangs like a monkey with one arm from the crib bars and is always moving. They wheeled him out in his seat, and I took him out to let him move around. He’s never held by anyone, because he is so squirmy and hard to hold onto. He also doesn’t like to interact. I think he has pretty severe attachment disorder. I also discovered that is almost completely blind. He only has one eye that can kind of see and he kept holding my hand up really close to his face to see it.

I took him out of his seat, and carried him around outside, having him feel the texture of leaves and bark. After a while, one of the orphanage workers told me to put him back in his seat and said, “He is blind. He can’t see.” I couldn’t see how being blind was reason for him not to be able to play. He needs to be able to explore the things around him, but I obeyed the worker’s wishes and put him back.

Even though Alexi couldn’t be outside his seat, I wanted to interact with him some and let him know that someone was there. I noticed Alexi hunches far forward whenever he is in his seat and rocks himself really hard. I tried placing my hand on his cheek and allowed him to rest his head on it. Then I started lightly rocking his head in my hands and would pat his head lightly every few minutes. I couldn’t believe how well he responded to this. He started rocking with me and even placed his hands over mine on his head. When I stopped, he put his own hands where mine had been and tried rocking himself. Then he felt around and found my hands and placed them back on his face. I rocked with him for about ten to fifteen minutes and loved every minute of it. I am so excited that I found a way to connect with this little boy.

After carting some of the babies back inside, I took Alexi out of his stroller and rocked him a little longer before putting him in his bed. While he was rocking, he kicked his foot out and accidentally knocked over a baby bottle that a worker had set next between us. She was feeding one of the infants next to us. The worker got really annoyed and acting brashly, she raised her hand up to hit Alexi really hard. Luckily she stopped her hand right before touching him, but probably would have, had I not quickly made light of the situation and laughed and said, “Opa!” (which means “oops”). I don’t know what I would’ve done had she smacked him, but I know it would’ve been hard to just sit there.

It’s only taken a couple of days to discover a distressing truth about the orphanage here. It has become more than apparent that the workers have their few favorite children that they hold and love and devout all their time and attention to. Ironically enough, these few children happen to be the youngest, and most adorable infants in Isolation and have no mental or physical impairments. There are about four babies that have won this sort of affection with the workers. The other children are completely ignored, never held, and never talked to. They are only given attention long enough to be quickly fed and changed. The workers also handle these children differently. They are not carried and held delicately like the adored ones, but are sometimes grabbed by a single arm and are jerked around violently. Yesterday, I even saw a worker fling one of the severely handicapped girls into her crib by one arm. It made me so angry.

It’s no wonder there are so many non-functioning children. They are never nurtured and held. It was a sad realization for me today, knowing that if it weren’t for the BYU volunteers, some of these children would never leave their beds at all. It’s hard with only three hours to get to every child, but it’s so critical that they all get out at least once to be held and their muscles moved around. I look at Cristi and David and want to cry. Their limbs have completely deformed and their backs feel as stiff as boards, because no one bothered to give them the time. The damage has already been done to these two, but there are so many others who await the same fate if something does not change.

I met two more amazing patients at the hospital today. There are so many incredibly strong children I come across. It just blows me away. We went to visit with a boy a few doors down from Marios and Fluorine who has been hanging out in halls and waiting for the American girls to come see him to. His name is Alex and is ten years old. He is the sweetest boy and has the most beautiful bright blue eyes. He is having some problems with his lungs. We talked with him and drew pictures. We also met another boy staying in the same room named Andrei who is seventeen. Andrei speaks English very well and was able to inform us of Alex’s situation. He said Alex is very sad a lot, because his mother recently abandoned him. He had siblings and everything, but because of money or whatever reason, she left him and never came back. Alex lives with only his dad, who works and lives very far from the hospital where he has been staying and doesn’t come to visit.
Alex (playing Alisa's DS)

Andre’s situation is a little sad as well, but I was very impressed by his maturity and for looking out for Alex, even while he is the hospital himself. Andre’s appendix recently exploded and he had to have it removed. He just had the surgery three days ago and was very weak when we were visiting with him. Andre’s parents both live in Italy, because they were able to find better jobs there, while Andre lives with his aunt and uncle in Romania. He does very well in school and wants to finish high school in Romania really bad. His family wants him to move to Italy to live with them though. I was touched when he said, “I don’t want to go to Italy and leave Romania, but I have to stick with my family through hard times.”
Andre

Tonight, we walked to the Villa to be set apart for our callings. Elder Meilkie laid his hands on my head and gave me a blessing while setting me apart. He said that my family members are always praying for me and for my health and safety and to trust in their prayers. He also mentioned my ability to be an example to the ward members here, particularly the young, and the other interns as well.

The "Grinch" Baby & Florine

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

I woke up in the middle of the night last night with the most stabbing stomach pains, and couldn’t go back to sleep. There are two foods that I have been eating more of in the past three weeks than I have in my whole life- bread and cheese. They are cheap to buy and come in every variety and kind you can imagine. I think all the cheese is what’s making my stomach upset. Almost every meal I have eaten has had both included in it. It’s just hard to eat much of anything else. Fruits, veggies, and eggs have to be bleached first. We have no microwave, we have no way to tell what temperature we are baking things at in the oven, and we have limited kitchen supplies. We also don’t have a lot of time during the day to cook while running between the hospital, orphanage, and apartments. The girls and I in my apartment, though, do take the time to make good dinners. That gives us at least one good meal a day.

Because I didn’t get very much rest last night, I stayed at the apartment and caught up on sleep in the morning instead of going to the orphanage. With being around so many sick kids, I need to be getting adequate sleep and stay as healthy as I can, so I don’t end up getting really sick!

In the afternoon, I walked over to the hospital with some of the girls. I went to several floors today. I try and visit as many orphans as I can each time, but there are a few in particular I make sure I see every visit. One of them is a little girl we all like to call “The Grinch”. She’s the most adorable thing, but she is always frowning. When we try to make her smile, she fights so hard to keep frowning and covers her face when we start getting her to crack. The first day we visited with her, she frowned the entire time. Then yesterday, she seemed a little happier when we came by and even laughed a little bit. Today, she got a big grin on her face as soon as we walked in the door and stayed happy the whole time. When I held her, she clung onto me really tight and laid her head on my shoulder. She cried and cried when we had to leave. I am glad she is getting to trust us!

The condition of the other little infant I always go see, absolutely breaks my heart. I have kind of a hard time going to see her, but make sure I always do anyway. She breathes really loud and is constantly gasping for air. It’s like she is suffocating all the time and her mouth and nose are almost completely blocked with mucus. I have never seen her not crying. She is constantly gasping for air with tears just streaming down her face. Every few minutes, she also stops breathing and makes a face like she is choking. When this happens, she cries a lot harder but no sound comes out for a few seconds. It’s scary, but she always will let out a huge gasp and starts breathing again. She makes this quiet quivery noise all the time that just makes my heart break. She seems so helpless. I’m thinking that the hospital can’t really do anything for her, and she just lays there and suffers.

Today I placed my hand up close against her face and just gently rubbed her cheek, so she at least can feel someone there with her. I also lightly rubbed her legs to warm them up. She was sweating like crazy, yet she has really bad circulation in her legs and feet and they are always ice cold. I did this for a long time, and finally to my surprise, her crying slowly stopped and her breathing stabilized a little. After only a minute or two, she had to take a big gasp of air which made her start crying and choking again, but at least I know now how to help her stop crying for a minute. I am going to bring one of those blue suction things tomorrow and see if I can clear some of the mucus out to help her breath better.

Before leaving the hospital, I made sure to stop in and say hi to Marios. He was watching a movie when I came in, so I ended up visiting with another patient in his room named Florine. He is 14 and also severely burned, but from the midsection down. I don’t know how his happened. Like Marios, Florine is a very optimistic boy. He is smiling all the time. One intern took her picture with him and soon he was asking to have one taken with every intern individually. Then he wanted to know how soon we would give him copies to hang on his wall. We’re going to develop them this week and bring them by his room.
Florine (He had candy in his mouth)

I remembered I had a pack of colored pipe cleaners in my backpack, and decided to give Marios and Florine a couple. When I pulled them out, a mother of a third burn victim staying in that room came over and asked what they were. When I showed her what to do with them, she took a few over to her three year old. Florine got to work right away, braiding a bunch of pipe cleaners into one big one. Marios couldn’t bend his own, but had fun picking up and looking at the ones we made for him. The kids kept asking for more and used almost the whole pack of pipe cleaners. I was glad they got so much entertainment out of them. We also blew up a big red balloon and it cracked me up when Marios and Florine started smacking it back and forth between their hospital beds. They really got into it. They both have been in the hospital for so long, and I think it’s great when we can help them find little things to do to keep them busy.

My volunteering assignments were changed just slightly again, but are finally set. I will still be going to Isolation on Monday through Friday in the mornings, but now instead of going to the hospital every afternoon, I will just go on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday or Sunday. On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoons, I will go to Dacia 3rd and 7th apartments for an hour each.

Buying Diapers & Visiting Marios

Well, I survived my first day of volunteering at the orphanage. It was quite the job to dive right in to, and definitely a little uncomfortable. After changing into scrubs and having a quick language lesson with Mario, everyone was hurried off to their designated sections and that was that. We were given very little direction, so I wasn’t even really sure what my limitations were as far as working with the kids in my section.

The Romanian staff ignored me entirely, and only spoke to me when I asked them a question. For the most part, they were caught up in their own duties and just worked around me. I guess my only hesitation came from all the words of caution that past interns gave us about not doing anything to make them mad. They also said that on random days the workers will not allow you to hold the kids, because they say it will make them cry more once you put them down.

I felt a little bit more at ease after a while, and one of the workers told me that I could hold any of the kids who hadn’t just been fed, so I just went from crib to crib and held and talked to as many of the kids as I could in the three hours we were there. I quickly discovered during that time how difficult it is to give quality attention to 20-25 babies in just three hours. I didn’t get around to every one of them, but I did get to know a few faces pretty well.

About five or six of the infants and toddlers in Isolation are normally developed and healthy and the remainder are pretty severely disabled. Three of these kids are much older, but you would never know just by looking at them. They are 6, 7, and 13. The majority of the others are between 1 and 2 years. Many of the children suffer from Cerebral Palsy, respiratory trouble, clubbed feet, and epilepsy, but there are many other diseases and disorders.

Matei was the one I spent the most amount of time with today. He is 6 ½, but only about as developed as a one year old. The workers were all watching t.v. next to him while he just sat in his seat, crying silently with tears streaming down his face. I picked him up and rocked him and talked to him for a while and he finally calmed down. After holding others in his room, I peeked my head in another room to get familiar with some other faces. This room was all of the youngest infants. Most were all sleeping, but one baby was crying and held out his arms to me as soon as he saw me peeking in. Some of the other babies were starting to stir a little, so I picked him up and started singing and he immediately quit crying and just stared into my eyes for the longest time.

All these kids just long to be held and loved and it breaks my heart to know they can’t have that whenever they need it. What kills me too, is that there are two newborns in one of the rooms who are still absolutely perfect. The damage of being raised in an institution has not yet started, and I just wished I could take them away from there and preserve them just the way they are.

My spirits were lifted a ton by 7 year-old Cristi. This little boy lights up the room and is the happiest kid I have ever met, which astounds me considering his circumstances. He is severely disabled and cannot talk, but every time I even look at him, he gets the biggest grin on his face and coos really loud. His breathing is extremely loud and croaky sounding. It was a little scary at first, but I got past it right away. Every time I touch him, he starts laughing hysterically. I have a good feeling this one will be my little lifesaver on days that are difficult.

After finishing at the orphanage for the day, Elisa, Elyse and I took a taxi to the “Cosco” of Romania and used some of my donation money to stock up on diapers and wipes to take to the hospital. We piled two carts full of giant packs of diapers and wipes and still only ended up spending the equivalent of $300. We definitely got a lot of strange looks throughout the store, at the checkout, and especially from the taxi driver when we loaded it all into his tiny compact car.

Once we got all the diapers divvied up between the two apartments and put away, we walked to the hospital. It was an extremely difficult day for me at the hospital, but I was blessed with one of the most touching experiences I have ever had.

There’s a 9 year-old boy named Marios staying there, and a few of the girls in our group have been visiting with him for the past couple of days. He was in a fire about six months ago, and his parents and all but one sibling did not survive. He was severely burned over his entire body, but the worst damage was done to his face. He has no nose and the skin is completely scarring over. His fingers all had to be amputated. He couldn’t wear any clothes, and just his legs were wrapped in gauze. All his other burns were exposed. A few girls from last semester’s group visited him on a regular basis, and now one of those girl’s family is paying to have him flown to California in about a month for skin graphing and a face reconstruction. I am so thrilled for him.

It was Melissa’s and my turn to go visit with Marios for about an hour today, and left unbelievably moved by this courageous boy. Whitney asked me to go in her place, because she couldn’t handle looking at him yesterday. I was a little nervous walking in to see him, because I just didn’t know if I would be able to handle it either. It was a shock seeing him in that condition, but was surprised at how instantly I was able to put all my reservations and fears aside. The first initial shock was immediately replaced with a deep love for him and I could feel the Lord strengthening me.

Within minutes, I saw how incredibly normal Marios was for any nine year old boy underneath the burns. Melissa and I took turns reading to him, which I think provided him with far more entertainment than the storyline itself. We completely butchered it, and realized how horrible we were at pronouncing all the hard words when he’d randomly burst into laughter. We asked him if he understood the storyline though, and felt a fraction better when he said that he did. As Melissa read, I sat at the end of his bed and every once in a while he would look over and just smile at me. At one point, my eyes filled up with tears and I had to quickly look away so he wouldn’t see me crying. Once while I was reading, too, he reached out and touched my arm. I will never forget that.

After reading to Marios, he showed us a cell phone he had and all the pictures he had stored on it. I was amazed that he could press all the buttons without any fingers or knuckles. It did take him some effort though and there were a few times he couldn’t get the right button and needed our help. He had individual pictures of all his stuffed animals and told us their names. Then he had about a million pictures of his mom. He pointed and said, “She’s up with God now.” Again, I just smiled and struggled not to cry.

Right before heading out, the mother of another patient in Marios’s room came in and began applying medicine to her little toddler’s severely burned legs and side. The little girl cried out like I have never heard a little kid cry before. I could only imagine what excruciating pain she was in. I had to hurry and leave the room, and could hear the little girl pleading with her mom to stop the whole way down the hall. It broke my heart.

As I walked down the flights of stairs towards the main level, and saw parents walking around with children in hospital robes and a little boy being rolled in on a gernie, the same thought kept going through my mind…how is it ever possible that I was blessed so much!

Stuck in the Elevator

I think culture shock is finally starting to sink in. The major differences from home that were fun to experience in the beginning are now started to feel more like annoyances; things like having to hang out our clothes and ride the scary little elevator up to our apartment floor. Now the stiff clothes, and getting stuck between floors every other day are not quite as amusing. More than anything though, we are all getting so sick of people staring at us everywhere we go. When we first got here, we kind of liked the attention that we drew everywhere we went. Now we’d just give anything to be lost in the crowd. We can’t go anywhere without people whispering and pointing.

Everyone in our apartment woke up a little irritable this morning and remained that way throughout the morning. However, coming back from the Piata later, things lightened up a little and we were all able to laugh. We somehow managed to squeeze all four of us, and our bags of groceries into the elevator, as near impossible as it was. A man at the bottom with us couldn’t fit and decided to wait till the elevator came back down. The elevator arrived at our floor just as it always does, but then suddenly started going down again before we even had time to open the doors and climb out. We arrived back at the bottom and quickly pushed the button to go up again before the guy could open the doors and find us still in there. I think he knew we were anyway. We arrived at our floor a second time, relieved that the elevator had actually stopped. But the relief quickly faded as we tried to push open the doors and realized that we were stuck inside. So…crammed and crowded with bags of groceries and bodies in our smelly little elevator, we decided to make the most of the situation and take a picture. The memory was priceless. Afterwards, we starting getting claustrophobic and frantically starting pushing buttons to get the elevator moving somewhere again…and down we went…yet again. This time we opened the doors at the bottom and the man just rolled his eyes and somehow managed to cram his body into the elevator with us. How this was ever accomplished will remain a mystery. We were so far beyond our limits of comfort at this point. He asked us what floor and we tried to explain that the elevator was broken, but we only had it in our vocabulary to say, “No Work!” He pressed the number to our floor and when we arrived, the elevator of course functioned flawlessly. Embarrassed and relieved, we quickly scrambled out.

This afternoon, we went over to the Villa to meet with President Popovich and received our callings in the ward. It was weird being in a bishop’s interview with a third person. One of the missionaries sat in and translated. I was asked to be the young adults sunday school teacher. I was hoping to get to teach for one of the classes, so I am so thrilled.

Visiting the Orphanage

Our train finally arrived in Iasi around 8:30 AM this morning. It was a really long night, and although we were all able to get a little bit of sleep, we were crammed together and would wake up every time someone stirred or the train wheels screeched to a stop at each station. The heat was also turned up way too high in each train car and it felt like a million degrees.

During the nine-hour trip back we tried to relax and sleep as much as we could, but we did talk a little bit at the beginning with a couple in our train compartment; mostly about religion. They told us that their daughter had taken free English lessons from the missionaries.
They asked us who the head priest of our religious group was, which took us about ten minutes and a dictionary to figure out what they were asking. I told them that we don’t have priests and that Thomas S. Monson is the prophet of our church without realizing that he had really just wanted to know who was overseeing our small group of nine on the trip. Due to the misunderstanding, he replied, “Oh, is he on the train?” and we all burst out laughing.

When we finally got off the train this morning, we were quite the sight to see. We were wearing the same clothes from the day before, our hair was all messy, and we had huge bags under our eyes from being so deprived of sleep. What made the situation even funnier was that as soon as we stepped off the train, we had to get straight onto a local tram to meet up with Mario and go visit the group homes and orphanage. So for the next few hours, we did a lot of walking and bus riding between places, and still had had nothing to eat besides bread that we bought at a stand.

As tired and dirty as I felt, I quickly forgot all about it as soon as I got to meet the kids! We went to the Dacia 3rd floor apartment first and met the three orphans there. We were greeted at the door by a loud, enthusiastic squeal from one little girl who immediately fell in love with us. Her name is Elena, and she is just like any other normal five year-old girl. The only difference is that Elena has a severely deformed face. Her mother tried to have an abortion, but it didn’t work. The child I really connected with in the short time we were visiting though, was a little boy named Sergio. He is deaf and almost completely blind. He climbed up into my arms, and the remainder of the visit, I stood in front of the window with him and we made puppets with our hands. He loved this, because he can see the outline of hands really well when contrasted with the bright sun shining in from outside.

Our visit to the orphanage wasn’t very long and not all the kids were in their rooms, but it was so exciting to finally get to see the place that we came all the way to Romania for. My first impression of the orphanage was that it is nicer than they had made it sound. The sections are all given character names; Mickey Mouse 1 & 2, Bambi 1 & 2, and Donald Duck (Isolation).

On Monday, Elisa and Mario will decide what section to assign each of us, based on where they think we will work best. I liked all the sections, but really hope I get to work in Isolation with the infants and failure to thrive children. It just looked as though many of the older kids had a lot more workers for how many children there were in their sections and it looked like they were in good hands. In isolation, there were so many infants and not a ton of workers. Some of them were crying to be held, and the workers were just sitting and watching television. I think of all the children, the infants are the ones who need the most one-on-one attention and the ones with failure to thrive really need it too. I feel like I would have the greatest impact working in isolation, and pray that that is where I am placed to work.

Orthodox Cemetery

It’s been much colder here in Brasov than we anticipated and none of us brought warm clothes. We didn’t really take into consideration that the altitude is higher. I have been freezing since we got here. The hostel doesn’t have heat, so whenever we’re there, I stay all bundled up in blankets.

We didn’t do as much touring around today, but we did go look around an old Greek Orthodox chapel. When we got there, a funeral that was being held there was just getting out, so we had to wait out on the street for a little bit. When we finally went inside, no one was there. I started walking around to look at all the beautiful paintings on the ceiling and an alter at the very front of the chapel. As I was looking, a priest came back in from outside and yelled at me. Apparently, only women are allowed in the back half of the chapel and are not allowed past a certain point. Then only the high priests are allowed in a little sacred room behind the alter. Luckily, none of us had made it that far yet.

After looking around, we browsed the souvenirs that the priest was selling at the very back of the chapel on a little table. I bought a little metal bracelet for 3 lei. As we were all paying for our things, an elderly man walked in the chapel and began talking with us and asking us where we were from. He didn’t seem to be completely all there, but was so adorable and friendly. All of a sudden, from behind the table, the priest grabbed his straw broom and smacked the old man really hard on the butt, almost knocking him down. I’m guessing he didn’t want a crazy man in his chapel. Luckily, the old man just started laughing, so we started laughing too. It’s not every day, you see a priest smack an old man with a broom.

Outside the chapel, the old man told us that we were all really beautiful and to be careful everywhere we go. One girl asked to take a picture with him, and pretty soon, the old man was posing for tons of pictures and making the funniest faces I have ever seen. For some reason, he kept opening his mouth really big, so we had to show him how to smile.

We told the old man goodbye then decided to go walk around in the cemetery right next to the chapel. We started walking that direction and the old man got really excited and motioned for us to follow him. He walked us through the cemetery and stopped at one particular grave. It had a few different names of members of his family on it. He set a candle he had alongside the grave. In the Orthodox Church, they believe that lighting a candle will carry your prayers up to heaven. He couldn’t light it, because he forgot a match and got frustrated and tears welled up in his eyes. We could tell this was really important to him. A couple girls ran back to see if there were any matches inside the chapel. The rest of us sat with the old man as he explained that his brother was buried there and had been killed by gunshot. As he was telling us, he put his head in his hands and began to sob. We didn’t really know what to do and there was little we knew how to say to him, but he seemed so lonely. I noticed there were flowers laid on many of the surrounding graves but that his brother’s was bare, so I picked a big, yellow dandelion and asked the man if I could lay it on the grave. He smiled really big and whispered ‘thank you’ through his tears.


The other girls came back with a lighter the priest had given them, and we helped the man light his candle. He cheered up a ton. We asked him if he wanted to pray, but he didn’t seem to understand, so we just sat with him a little while longer and listened as he told us more about his family. Again he started to sob. I will never forget the look in his eyes. They were filled with so much sorrow. We couldn’t really understand what he said had happened to his family, but we could tell the man had experienced a tragedy. He kept pointing to the grave over and over when he knew we didn’t understand and was trying so hard to tell us something. I wanted so bad just to be able to bear my testimony to this man and tell him that he would see his family again. We all just gave him hugs. It was all we could do. As I hugged him, I felt a lot of sympathy for him, and gained a small sense for what it is like to mourn with those that mourn.

We told the man goodbye and began to leave. I stayed a couple of steps behind the rest of the girls and shook his hand. Before I let go, I looked him in the eye and asked him in the little Romanian I could remember, “Do you know that Jesus Christ lives and that he loves us?” Tears streamed down his face as he smiled and nodded then thanked me over and over.

Later tonight, we played cards and went out for gogosi. As we were leaving the hostel, I discovered that my flipflops were missing. Everyone has to leave their shoes at the front door of the hostel. I was a little worried since they were the only pair of shoes I had brought to Brasov with me. I had to borrow someone’s bright pink crocks until I could look for mine, and when we went out on the streets, people were laughing and pointing at my feet. Later and literally only minutes before leaving to catch our train back to Iasi, I saw a girl walking around the hostel in my flip flops, and asked for them back. I wasn’t exactly willing to walk around the train station barefoot.

Dracula & Pelis Castles

We finally got in to Brasov late last night and walked to our hostel. We are staying at Hostel Rolling Stone. I’ve always had this image in my head of what a hostel looks like, and although it’s not a place I would call home, it is much less intimidating than the name lets on. We are in a small room with about six metal bunk beds and a few lockers for our backpacks. There is a living room with a small television and a computer with Internet, and a kitchen where they serve “breakfast” every morning. The bathrooms are kind of gross, because the floor is always flooded with about a half inch of water from the showers, and you can’t flush your toilet paper. The septic tanks here and everywhere else, including my apartment in Iasi, are not sophisticated enough to handle it.

Last night, we went out to dinner at a restaurant called Casa Romaneasca. The service here was pretty bad, but the atmosphere was fun and we weren’t in any kind of hurry. We all ordered Fanta to drink, which I have quickly discovered is pretty popular thing here. It’s on every menu. I ordered Snitel and sautéed mushrooms for dinner, which I enjoyed very much. Snitel is basically just breaded chicken. While we ate, we were entertained by live music. There was a keyboarder, a saxophone player, and a female singer.

Today we took a tour around Brasov and got to see the Bran Castle (Dracula’s Castle) and the Pelis Castle (pronounced pay-lish). We paid Greg, the owner of the hostel, and he drove us around to all the places we wanted to see. Bran Castle is very pretty and not anything like the depiction of it in the movies. In fact, we learned as we were walking through it that the man who the Dracula fable was made up about, never even lived in the castle. It was occupied by various kings and queens. To be honest, all the other girls and I were a bit disappointed upon hearing this, and found the history of the royalty who lived there to be pretty dull. As we wandered throughout the castle, we focused on the fable and imagined that Dracula had really lived there to make things a little more interesting. My favorite part of the castle was the secret stairs, which were dark and narrow and hidden inside one of the walls. After going through the entire castle, we walked around outside and looked at all the little souvenirs the gypsies were selling at their stands. We also got to taste sheep cheese.
The next stop was the Pelis Castle, which was way up in the mountains and quite a lengthy drive to get to. I learned that sheep cheese, windy roads, and a brake-happy driver don’t mix. I felt pretty nasty by the time we got out of the van, but luckily didn’t throw up. As we were walking to the castle, Elyse fainted, which gave me a few minutes to sit down and let my stomach settle while they were helping her. Between sites on the tour, it was go, go, go, so Elyse and I joked later that she had fainted to buy the group some time to relax.

The Pelis Castle was so immaculate, down to every last detail. Outside, there were beautiful gardens with giant statues and a huge terrace. Inside was a guided tour in English by a man with an accent so thick, it sounded like he was speaking a different language. We had to put special slippers on so our shoes wouldn’t scuff the marble floor, and we weren’t allowed to take any pictures. We learned that the castle was built for Romania’s king Carol, who was obvisouly ridiculously wealthy. We walked through a lot of rooms, and they only made up a small fraction of the castle. Everything was made of wood and carved with the most intricate detail; the floors, the walls, the furniture, everything. There were dining rooms, sitting rooms, a music room, a library, a theater where the first Romanian film was made, and dozens of other kinds of rooms. There were beautiful rugs, paintings, and statues everywhere. One of my favorite things was the giant metal knight in one of the hallways.

Driving back to the hostel, I felt a lot of anxiety in the car. All the people here drive kind of crazy, but until today, it hadn’t really gotten to me. Sometimes there are lines to mark lanes and sometimes there are not. Everyone ignores the speed limit, weaves in and out of each other, no one signals…ever, and no one stops until the very last second. I also noticed living in Iasi that drivers frequently run red lights, so we never immediately start crossing the street after the light turns red. Watching people drive here, you would think they have no road rules. They also park on the sidewalks, but they have to. When the city was built, none of the people had cars, and so they didn’t leave room for parking lots. Today, it’s a big problem and everyone just parks in random places.

Tonight, we relaxed and walked to the main square back in town. There was some kind of music festival going on, and there were folk dancers and performances by a young singing group. Tons of people were dancing to the music and there were kids playing in a fountain. While we were there, we ran into a big group of senior missionary couples who were ecstatic when we told them we were students from BYU. We talked to them for about an hour, and one of the couples said they were transferring to Iasi in a few weeks and promised to come visit us.

We went to dinner at Bella Muzica and I basically ordered the same thing that I did at the other restaurant last night, but it was even better. We had flan and crepes for dessert that were so amazing. When I went to the bathroom at the restaurant, I was shocked to see motion censored faucets and paper towel dispensers. You would never find them in Iasi. As weird as it sounds, a few of us girls didn’t want to leave the bathroom and just talked in there for a few minutes. We’re all starting to experience culture shock to some degree and are missing all the everyday comforts and luxuries from home. That bathroom was the closest thing we could find I guess.

Later tonight, after hanging out at the hostel for a while, we went to a small grocery store and bought snacks. On the walk back, we saw two huge rainbows stretching over the mountain with the Brasov sign on it. We all stopped and just stared, and a guy passing by, taught us the word for ‘rainbow’.

Train to Brasov

Right now we are on a train to Brasov (pronounced brashov) , which is nine hours south of Iasi. We can’t get into the orphanage or hospital yet, so we decided to go on a three-day trip. We have four more hours to go, but the ride is going quickly. I have been staring out the window for hours; there is so much to see. The countryside is so different from the city where I am living. In the city, it’s just apartment bloc after apartment bloc, but out here, it’s so open and green.

Every few minutes we pass another village. The people out here live on small plots of farmland and have shack-like homes with bright, shingled roofs and picket fences. Many homes look as if they can scarcely stand on their own. In almost every yard, there is loads of bright colored laundry strung up to dry. Throughout the village are small dirt roads on which farmers are driving horse and buggies stacked with hay and wood. In the fields, are whole families, including grandmothers, working in the garden or driving herds of cows and goats. Small groups of children are playing soccer in the streets.

We made a new friend on the train named Nicolae and one of the friendliest Romanians we have talked to so far. He’s an older man and doesn’t speak any English, but has made it his personal duty to visit our train compartment every half hour and make sure we are seeing this hillside or that mountaintop, while giving us a thorough rundown of his personal history again and again. We are having a difficult time understanding him, but have probably heard the word ‘frumos’, meaning ‘beautiful’, come out of his mouth about a million times. We are debating whether or not he is slightly intoxicated, but either way, he is quite the character. He told us that his sister works in the hospital where we will be volunteering and gave us her name. This could be a huge blessing to us, because connections with workers at the hospital are everything. The more they trust you and have a relationship with you, the more they will allow you to do with the children.

Soccor & Street Kids

Since we couldn’t get train tickets to Transylvania until tomorrow, we didn’t really have anything to do today, we kind of just had the whole day to kick back and relax. We walked to the internet café in the midmorning to email and update our blogs. The café is not my favorite place in the world. It’s dark and smoky in there and they play really loud and repetitive techno music, so I’m usually in a hurry to get in and get out. The computers are kind of slow though, and today we had a really difficult time uploading pictures and getting the computer to do what we wanted. I wish so bad that we just had internet in our apartment, but I guess it’s a blessing in disguise, because I can’t allow myself to sit and waste half my day on the computer when I can be out interacting with the people.

After going to the café, my roommates and I decided to go for a long walk around the city. It was so nice and sunny out today, and after all the rain the past couple of days, we had to be outside. We walked up past the Hala and decided to go try another pastry, a covrig, which we had heard so many good things about. It is similar to a giant pretzel. Unfortunately, we were a bit disappointed and they were all soggy on the bottoms from sitting too long, so we threw them away.

Continuing our walk, we went past a broken fence and could see two young boys playing soccer on the other side. We stopped for a quick second to watch before continuing on. Moments later, however, one of the boys popped his head through the split in the fence and squealed with delight, “Blondes!” Then he and the other boy climbed through the fence and came over to where we were. They started talking and talking and we told them we spoke very little Romanian. We still managed to make conversation with them though. We couldn’t understand most of what they said, but they kept saying to one another, “Frumoasa!” which means ‘beautiful’. They were so intrigued by us.

They showed off their soccer skills for us and were eager to let us in on their passing game. They would kick it up in the air as many times as they could without letting it hit the ground. Within a matter of seconds, about ten other street children appeared out of nowhere, and pretty soon, we were completely bombarded with little street kids all trying to win our attention. They all watched as I kick the ball as many times as I could, and laughed when I mess up after just a couple of times.
After a few minutes of playing, I saw one of their mothers watching us and smiling. She came over and talked to us a little too. She seemed surprised when I told her we were from the U.S. I asked her if it would be ok if we took a picture and she nodded, but then when I tried to get her to be in it, she shyly backed away and pointed to the kids.

Taking a picture sparked a whole new level of excitement in all the kids. Before we knew it, they were all posing and smiling so we’d take their picture. The little leader of the group, Roberto, began flexing his muscles and started a trend that caught on quickly with all the boys. My favorite moment though, was when one of the smallest boys had been having trouble getting in any of the group pictures with the older boys. When I glanced over, he was standing frozen in a pose, frantically grabbing at another boy to join him, all without breaking his pose, so we would know to take his picture.

Church at the Villa

It started pouring rain and we got drenched!

Church is held at 10:00 am on the second floor of the Villa, a beautiful three story building that functions as a factory, a church meetinghouse, and an apartment all in one. It only took us about ten minutes to walk to church, and needless to say, we somehow managed to get a little muddy in that short of a time. On the way over, we were greeted by three adorable and friendly street dogs who decided to follow us the entire way to church.

Sacrament meeting was a whole new experience. The branch is very small; only about ten members plus three sets of missionaries. I am curious to find out why they have so many missionaries in such a small branch. During fast and testimony meeting, a couple of the missionaries sat by us and translated the meeting so we could understand. I wanted to bear my testimony really bad, and the missionaries said they would translate for us if we wanted, but I really wanted to bear it in Romanian. I almost built up the courage, but decided to wait until next month when I’ve practiced and can remember how to say a little more.

I was so touched when President Popovich stood and bore testimony of his gratitude for us girls who traveled so far to serve his people. This man has so much faith! He has been branch president for ten years now, and although the numbers aren’t growing and retention is nearly zero, he has so much faith in the branch. I was so impressed when he said, “Someday, we will be like the U.S. and there will be so many people here, there won’t be enough time for everyone to bear their testimonies. That will be amazing!”

The relief society women are so strong! During the lesson, most of them expressed how their husbands are not members or are not active in the church. In Romania, men are dominant and the women are much more submissive to the men than you would ever see in the U.S. One sister explained how she never bears her testimony to her husband with her words, but she reads scripture stories to her family and sometimes he listens. She also expressed her love for her children and how her husband looks down on her for playing with her boys. Here, they believe that parents should play the role of a discipliner and a teacher, and not a friend. Her husband told her, “They can feel love when they sleep.” As difficult as it is for the sisters to raise their families in such a society, they seem so faithful.

There are only two active youth in the branch, a brother and sister. I was so sad when their mother told us, “My children have no friends. They live a very isolated life. Maybe someday they will, but not for now. All the kids smoke and drink. I always tell them that they must live one life or the other; that they cannot be on both sides.”

I am in such awe of the members here. After seeing the faith of these members, I realize I had it so easy growing up as a member of the church. Even when I thought I had it so hard, the challenges I faced now seem so insignificant compared to what these youth deal with every single day. They have willingly sacrificed so much for this Gospel, and it is so evident by the different light they have in their eyes.

As we started walking back home, it began pouring rain! We tried to stay dry, but our efforts were worthless. We got soaked from head to toe! Without a clothes dryer, getting wet is a huge pain, but we decided it was just another adventure to add to our Romania experience. Slipping in puddles and covered in mud, we laughed hysterically the whole way home.

Open Market

Today we got to see a lot more of the city. I had been wondering ever since we got here, why things didn’t seem quite as bad as they had let on in prep class. We found today though, that outside the few blocks radius from where we have been, the conditions are dramatically different. Where I am living, there are tons of apartment buildings, small businesses, a few restaurants, and two malls- the Moldova Mall and the Hola Centrala. Just a couple blocks further behind the Hala, is where things change. We walked over there to go try Gogosi. It’s like a giant scone filled with chocolate, cheese, jelly, or some other filling. They are even better than they told us they would be.

Behind the Hala, people live in shack-like homes rather than apartments. Many of their homes are falling apart. There have laundry hanging everywhere and laid out across fences. In one yard, I saw two very expensive looking winter coats hung on a chain link fence. This is where most of the gypsies are seen. They hang out in groups on the streets during the day. They don’t do anything but look as we walk past. For the first time, a young street boy approached us to beg for money. I had already decided before I came that I wouldn’t hand out money to street children since it usually does more harm than good. It was still really hard not to though.

We also saw a boy sitting and playing a recorder for change. We noticed he had a very dead look in his eyes. When we walked up to listen, he didn’t even seem to acknowledge that we were there. He had a little cardboard mat next to him with a miniature black dog sitting on it. The dog was so adorable and dressed in a tiny pink bonnet, and smiling with it’s little white teeth. It just sat there with a frozen look on its face while the little boy played his flute inches from the dog’s ears. We all agreed that it looked as if the dog was thinking, “This is the eighth time you’ve played this song and why do I have to wear this gay little pink bonnet?”

Later in front of the Hala, a small gypsy girl about six years old, begged us for money too. She was very dirty and her sandals were on the wrong feet. She started pretending to cry so we would have sympathy for her. We told her we didn’t have any money, then tried to make conversation by telling her that her shoes needed to be switched, but she didn’t seem to care.

This afternoon, we finally got to go to the Piata (pronounced pee-aht-zuh). This is by far my favorite place in Iasi! It’s an open market where people bring fresh produce to sell that day. There are tables and tables full of fruits and vegetables picked that morning. There are also tables of fresh flowers. The majority of the vendors are gypsy, but if you go inside some doors right next to the open market outside, there are Romanians selling produce and cheese on tables as well. They let us taste some of the cheeses. There aren’t any yellow cheeses or parmesan, but there are dozens of soft, white cheeses to chose from. Most of them look like giant blocks of cream cheese and they all look the same, but they taste very different. Most taste either salty or bitter.

Today we bought oranges, bananas, apples, pears, onions, a pepper, a few potatoes, and a bundle of flowers. They weighed everything on a little scale, and we had to watch carefully so they couldn’t try and rip us off. Annie got ripped off buying the pears and apples. Whitney and I thought we were getting ripped off with our oranges, until we realized that when the scale says 34. lei, it really means 3.4 lei. That took us a while to figure out. We were embarrassed, because we had been telling the lady that she was charging us too much. The thing that stinks is that we cannot buy any of the produce that we can’t bleach or peel, which eliminates things like strawberries and lettuce. They would absorb the bleach.

When we left the Piata, we were sitting with our bags, waiting for the other group of girls to meet up with us. Another small gypsy girl walked up to us, holding her baby brother, and asked politely if she could have one banana. I had bought the bananas and had a whole bundle, so I decided to give her one. She smiled and told me thank you. She walked only a few steps before she peeled it and started sharing it with her brother. As I sat and watched them devour this banana, my heart went out to these children.