I crossed the Serbian border into Romania May 19. My route was Belgrade to Timisoara - one of Romania's westernmost cities and, incidentally, where their 1989 revolution started. I rode in a mini-bus with three foreign students; two from Portugal and one from Finland. They were on their way to Cluj, in the heart of Transylvania. They ended up missing their train in Timisoara, though, because we were held up at the Romanian border for about 1,5 hours waiting for the computers to kick back on. While annoying, this delay was worth it since I had the experience of listening to a Serb (our bus driver) curse at the border guards and then turn to all of us and say, "Welcome to the European Union".
This delay was notable because I had crossed seven borders in the Balkans without ever having a delay. I was almost disappointed at how slick and smooth all of the border crossings were. No half-wild canine units intimidating us, no torture and no bribes. It was surprisingly tame. Then, as soon as we got to an EU border (Romania) we entered a land of considerably higher dysfunction. Beyond the border crossings, I would say that, all in all, the Serbs, Croats, and even Bosnians, to a degree, have their country in order more than Romania.I might be a little biased though. After "getting to know the Balkans" for a month, familiarizing myself with the language and culture, it was a big shock to come to Romania, where the language is completely different and I am hard-pressed to find similarities. I'm having to start over here, which is a little tougher than when I arrived in Serbia.
I stayed a night in Recas (just outside of Timisoara) with a peace corps volunteer who was friends with Chelsea, my friend from Austin who is one year into her 27 month term as a peace corps volunteer in Romania. I met Chelsea in Bucharest on May 20 and then we came back to her town in eastern Romania - Barlad. After traveling all the way across Romania, I will say that transportation is much easier here. Compared to the Balkans, where mountains make train travel very limited and bus travel extremely bumpy, gliding along smooth tracks across a very (mostly) flat Romania for the same price as in the Balkans has been a welcome relief. The trip from Bucharest to Barlad was plagued by a broken WC that filled our whole wagon with the stench of sewage, but if you sat next to the window, you could hardly tell.
Star-Students dancing the Charleston
I've had an amazing time in Barlad so far. Chelsea teaches English to tenth graders here and I've offered my limited teaching skills in exchange for a place to stay. We came up with a lesson plan Sunday night on the train and have been implementing it to all of our classes so far this week. The lesson basically consists of handing the students a piece of paper with instructions on how to do The Charleston (the dance, youtube it if you aren't familiar). So after they figure out the vocabulary and what all the words mean, we all stand up and actually do the dance together. Hopefully, by the end of the 45 minutes, everyone has perfected the charleston, we put on some White Ghost Shivers jazz music from Austin and we partake in what is technically called "cultural exchange". If the class is particularly quick, they will teach us a traditional Romanian dance as well. Only two classes out of five have managed this though.
This was one of the most enthusiastic classes. They were a really fun bunch.
Getting into a rural Romanian classroom has been fascinating. The most shocking thing so far has been when, a few times when Chelsea is calling role, we find out that a certain student (female) is no longer in school because she has dropped out and gotten married. This doesn't seem the least bit strange to the kids. Chelsea and I try to stifle our surprise, but it's tough to do.
It seems like each class has a few students who carry the lesson. About 10% of the class really, whole-heartedly participates while the rest sit in the back wearing aviators and playing games on the cell phones. Chelsea admits that discipline is a problem. Apparently, they've been on better behavior for me, their guest. It doesn't help that the classrooms are little echo-boxes of tile and concrete so that the slightest shuffle of papers consumes the whole room. Some carpeting in those rooms would really help the noise levels.
I was talking to Chelsea last night about my impressions of the first day of class and my general observation was that, like in most small towns, you can tell that these kids' world is pretty small. They have grown up with a very small, limited number of people surrounding them and, as long as they can master these people with charm, humor, flattery or whatever little tricks, they have won. I see an inability to think beyond the borders of Romania and sometimes even beyond the borders of Barlad. English is a very abstract idea to them - a kind of plaything and they aren't really sure how it can be applied in life. I tried my best to teach them that they needed English to talk to me since I understood no Romanian, but I don't think it really got through to them. A few kids engaged with me and responded to questions - mostly after class when their classmates were out of range. One kid came up to me and volunteered "Osama bin Laden. Shot in the head."
"Yes," I replied,"do you think it will make a difference?"
"Yes... difference... no more September 11"
Then he smiled and walked away. I guess this was a success. It was about a deep as a one on one conversation I've had with a kid here. I don't tell this little story trying to make the kids look dumb, I really just want to get across the idea that it's hard for these kids to relate to anything in English when the only time they speak it is in the classroom. In cities like Belgrade or Budapest, there are English language movies, tv shows, advertisements and all, but out here, you don't see any signs of English (there is no movie theater) and so they are victimized by a centralized education policy that says they must learn this language without them really knowing why they need to. These kids aren't the type that want to learn for the sake of learning (they are at the second tier high school - not bound for university), so their question is valid.
Their worlds are smaller because of it. These kids aren't diplomatic. They don't see much value in interacting with an American beyond making fun of their funny talk in order to impress the girl sitting next to them. This sounds too harsh now that I write it - it's not like every kid is an indolent country bumpkin. You can see in the video that some kids really did want to participate. It's just that most kids know their audience and who they need to please to make it in this little town. I am not on that short list. I'm ok with that, it's just an important thing to keep in mind when traveling around rural areas.
This delay was notable because I had crossed seven borders in the Balkans without ever having a delay. I was almost disappointed at how slick and smooth all of the border crossings were. No half-wild canine units intimidating us, no torture and no bribes. It was surprisingly tame. Then, as soon as we got to an EU border (Romania) we entered a land of considerably higher dysfunction. Beyond the border crossings, I would say that, all in all, the Serbs, Croats, and even Bosnians, to a degree, have their country in order more than Romania.I might be a little biased though. After "getting to know the Balkans" for a month, familiarizing myself with the language and culture, it was a big shock to come to Romania, where the language is completely different and I am hard-pressed to find similarities. I'm having to start over here, which is a little tougher than when I arrived in Serbia.
I stayed a night in Recas (just outside of Timisoara) with a peace corps volunteer who was friends with Chelsea, my friend from Austin who is one year into her 27 month term as a peace corps volunteer in Romania. I met Chelsea in Bucharest on May 20 and then we came back to her town in eastern Romania - Barlad. After traveling all the way across Romania, I will say that transportation is much easier here. Compared to the Balkans, where mountains make train travel very limited and bus travel extremely bumpy, gliding along smooth tracks across a very (mostly) flat Romania for the same price as in the Balkans has been a welcome relief. The trip from Bucharest to Barlad was plagued by a broken WC that filled our whole wagon with the stench of sewage, but if you sat next to the window, you could hardly tell.
Star-Students dancing the Charleston
I've had an amazing time in Barlad so far. Chelsea teaches English to tenth graders here and I've offered my limited teaching skills in exchange for a place to stay. We came up with a lesson plan Sunday night on the train and have been implementing it to all of our classes so far this week. The lesson basically consists of handing the students a piece of paper with instructions on how to do The Charleston (the dance, youtube it if you aren't familiar). So after they figure out the vocabulary and what all the words mean, we all stand up and actually do the dance together. Hopefully, by the end of the 45 minutes, everyone has perfected the charleston, we put on some White Ghost Shivers jazz music from Austin and we partake in what is technically called "cultural exchange". If the class is particularly quick, they will teach us a traditional Romanian dance as well. Only two classes out of five have managed this though.
This was one of the most enthusiastic classes. They were a really fun bunch.
Getting into a rural Romanian classroom has been fascinating. The most shocking thing so far has been when, a few times when Chelsea is calling role, we find out that a certain student (female) is no longer in school because she has dropped out and gotten married. This doesn't seem the least bit strange to the kids. Chelsea and I try to stifle our surprise, but it's tough to do.
It seems like each class has a few students who carry the lesson. About 10% of the class really, whole-heartedly participates while the rest sit in the back wearing aviators and playing games on the cell phones. Chelsea admits that discipline is a problem. Apparently, they've been on better behavior for me, their guest. It doesn't help that the classrooms are little echo-boxes of tile and concrete so that the slightest shuffle of papers consumes the whole room. Some carpeting in those rooms would really help the noise levels.
I was talking to Chelsea last night about my impressions of the first day of class and my general observation was that, like in most small towns, you can tell that these kids' world is pretty small. They have grown up with a very small, limited number of people surrounding them and, as long as they can master these people with charm, humor, flattery or whatever little tricks, they have won. I see an inability to think beyond the borders of Romania and sometimes even beyond the borders of Barlad. English is a very abstract idea to them - a kind of plaything and they aren't really sure how it can be applied in life. I tried my best to teach them that they needed English to talk to me since I understood no Romanian, but I don't think it really got through to them. A few kids engaged with me and responded to questions - mostly after class when their classmates were out of range. One kid came up to me and volunteered "Osama bin Laden. Shot in the head."
"Yes," I replied,"do you think it will make a difference?"
"Yes... difference... no more September 11"
Their worlds are smaller because of it. These kids aren't diplomatic. They don't see much value in interacting with an American beyond making fun of their funny talk in order to impress the girl sitting next to them. This sounds too harsh now that I write it - it's not like every kid is an indolent country bumpkin. You can see in the video that some kids really did want to participate. It's just that most kids know their audience and who they need to please to make it in this little town. I am not on that short list. I'm ok with that, it's just an important thing to keep in mind when traveling around rural areas.
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