The Simple Things in Life

It is amazing the way little, unimportant things can have the biggest impact. I have been in the worst mood all week and have actually considered coming home. It is funny because I had the best day ever since being in Moldova this past Monday. I started the day with passing out questionnaires to the kids at school so I could find out what type of activities to start, then I taught a group of kids to fold origami after school, and then I was invited to play volleyball with the girls at school the following day. I went home Monday with this amazing high knowing that I would finally start doing real things in my community. The high didn’t last long though. My counterpart smashed it Tuesday when I talked to her about starting clubs and that we needed someone else to work here all the time instead of me (I didn’t come here to make copies, type documents for teachers, and take money from kids all day, I am NOT a secretary!). She proceeded to tell me that there is no one else to do the job and that in more or less words this is what I will be doing for the next two years. If this turns out to be true, I am on the first plane home. So since finding out that I can’t do anything here that I want to do I have been in the worst mood. And it wasn’t until last night that my mood lifted.

There is something about snow that seems to make everything all better. I left work yesterday night in the foulest mood after the guy that was supposed to take over came an hour late, so I didn’t leave until 7pm. But as I walked outside I saw that the ground was blanketed in white and that the snow was still coming down strong I immediately became giddy. I love the snow so much! And guess what?! It was still snowing when I woke up this morning! But that is not the end of the story. After I got home and we ate dinner (which was a yummy Italian pasta dish) our power went out. This was a problem for my host mom who had just made a bunch of dough to bake bread in the electric oven. I was a bit sad there would be no fresh baked bread but felt a hundred times better when she started making placienta on the gas stove.(If you don’t remember placienta is a pastry type thing that I am totally in love with and it can either be baked or fried). Oh I was in heaven! Snow and Placienta all in the same night!

My mood has dipped a bit today after coming to work again to just sit and stare at a computer all day but I just make myself look outside at the snow, and now sun, and I immediately feel better. And I keep thinking of the Mexican masa me and some other volunteers are planning to prepare tomorrow night. Food always makes me feel better!