Chisinau Apartment

We’re finally in our new temporary apartment. The apartment is located on the 13th floor of one of those sweet-looking Soviet style bloc buildings. Even more sweet is that all the modern amenities from Soviet times are still in the apartment. I’ll give you a virtual tour right here on the blog! Let’s start with the elevator. Most of the time the light is not working in the hallway so you have to feel your way around for the button that calls the elevator. Either that or use a flashlight.

One of the two elevators will come and get you. It will either be the big elevator or the little elevator. You don’t get to pick. Both of the elevators seem equally unsafe and after you reach the 13th floor with your teeth and fists clenched, your arrival is signaled by a loud “POP!” from the button on the wall. We still haven’t gotten used to this. I think it shaves a couple months off our lifespan each time. The doors on the elevator squeek open and you are let out into the hallway. You go to our door and after you undo about 40 locks you get into the apartment.

The apartment isn’t exactly as modern as our last one but at least we have hot running water. Actually we only have hot water. To flush the toilet you have to put some water in a bucket and pour it into the toilet until its contents go away. Laundry is done in the bathroom by hand. This is my job. After Amanda’s battle blister from de-kerneling the corn I didn’t want to subject her to further war wounds as a result of washing laundry. Amanda pretty much takes care of all the other cleaning chores.

It almost seems that when the Soviet Union fell, the people who lived here just vacated the premises ASAP and didn’t have time to take their commie stuff with them. Our oven is all-original with “CCCP” written on it as are half the radios in the apartment. There are Soviet Kopeks (money) lying around all over the place. We even found some cans of calamari in the fridge with CCCP written on them. That means they’re at least 18 years old. Mmm. I wonder how much I can get for them on Ebay…

The best discovery that I made, in my opinion, is a book called “English for Everyone Part 2”. It offers a glimpse into state-controlled language learning in 1977. It teaches people how to speak with stuck-up London dwellers about crappy Soviet art and provides loyal Party members riveting stories about the horrible life that Negro New Yorkers have to live in the great “City of Contrasts”. At the end, the writer “can’t wait to get back to good old Moscow”. I think my favorite parts are the discussion questions. Here’s a sample: 1. Joint actions of the socialist community countries in the struggle for peace. 2. Further strengthening of friendship and co-operation among socialist countries. 3. The celebrations of the Great October Socialist Revolution and May Day in the Soviet Union. I know I can’t wait to discuss!

Back to the apartment, I have to say that this is probably the creepiest place I’ve ever lived in. If anyone ever starts a Chisinau “ghost tour” then the 13th floor of this building needs to be on the itinerary. I can probably make up a pretty good story about the owners of this place flinging themselves to their deaths out of the window, not being able to bear the ensuing chaos of the fall of the Soviet Union. But, with the exception of my (possibly) unmerited fear of an earthquake happening in the night, this feels like it’s a fairly safe place to be.

Our location is pretty good and although it’s in a part of town that we’re not familiar with, it does have almost everything that you could ask for. It’s got some good restaurants, including a McDonald’s down the street when we have those occasional McNugget cravings. There’s a memorial park right next door dedicated to the memory of the Moldovan men killed in the Afghanistan conflict. It’s weird knowing that our country was the one who supplied the guns who killed those guys. It adds to the creepiness factor I think. There is a wooded area behind the apartments where you can go have picnics, complete with a man-made mosquito lake. There is a Wal-Mart type “supermarket” down the road when we need something that is hard-to-get (no BBQ sauce though…ugh).

So now our time is spent helping out with English lessons at the American Counsels Language School although the lessons are finished for this these particular set of classes and everyone is getting ready to take tests. We are working out a new marketing idea with the director that may involve us going to businesses posing like American customers and speaking in English, only to give a flier at the end of our conversations offering lessons at the language school. I’m sure we’ll write about this later.

We have been exploring our possibilities of work in Romania when we go back for the second time around. I emailed some former Peace Corps Volunteers who have a tourism business in Transylvania. I am crossing my fingers that they can help us out somehow as this seems like the best possible work we could find. We also heard back from Berlitz, the company who gives English lessons in Romania. They want to interview us in Bucharest sometime. Once we figure out when we’re gonna be going through there again we will set up the interview. We will probably work in Bucharest or Timisoara which are big cities not located in Transylvania. But at least we will have work and an income.

So here’s our tentative schedule for the next couple months: June will be spent here in Chisinau working with the language school. In early July we will go to Brasov for a couple days and reserve rooms for people and a place for our party. Then we will go out to Serbia for a series of concerts from July 8-11. After this we will head out to Croatia for probably a week. Then it will be back to Bucharest or Brasov depending on what we need to do for the job interview and setting up for our party and getting married and all that. Then in August we will have our party and after that we’ll be on to bigger and better things! Wow!

Ok. We’ll write again soon.