Today I went to work at around 12 o'clock to find that it was locked and didn't really know what to do. I looked in my wallet to find about 28 lei, and figured I would go for a walk and get a haircut to waste some time. I arrived about 10 minutes too late for a haircut, and ran into this funeral ceremony. Here they carry the body through the village and to the cemetery for burial. Everyone stops on the streets, both cars and people in respect. In the back of the crowd is two people. One person has a basket of treats and walks up to everybody on the street. As you can see I got biscuits and some candy. The other guy has a bucket full of wine and he walks up to everybody offering a cup to honor the dead.
Here you can see the candy I was given. It was very interesting to observe how everybody stopped and paid respect. The experience was also very interesting due to the pure spontaneity of it all.
A fellow volunteer Ryne is coming to visit me today, so my host mom hurriedly cleaned my room for him/me. Moldovans are really big on being good hosts, and want things to be really nice for them. I feel bad, and tell her this, because I simply wanted her to help me shake-out my rug, but instead she scrubbed my floors and much more. Spring is out though, and as you can see my dog 'Tîmcă' is enjoying the sun. Another nice indicator is that the flowers have peaked through the dirt, and are reaching out of dormancy. As am I. I decided today to get a tutor for my language. Which is an interesting tale in itself. This basically entailed me walking to a strangers door, pounding on it, and explaining that she was recommended to me as a good teacher. She seemed pretty nice, and it will be cool to meet with her this coming Wednesday to get a move on and a bump up on my language skills.
