BLOG ENTRY - Arrival in Chisinau (written June 14, 2009)

Hey guys, I think I have about four or five publishable blog entries backlogged. I think what I will do is post one every few days until we are up to the present. This one was written after my first few days in Moldova...it's really just a status update - pretty standard stuff, and I tried to keep it short.

An Extremely busy few days…

Hey all, I write this on Sunday evening at my host family’s house. That is a long way from Wednesday in Istanbul. I do not want to bore you with everything that happened between then and now, so I will again attempt (hopefully with more success this time) to keep things brief. Let’s get right to the highlights:

1. Arrival in Chisinau @ 6:30 pm: Chisinau airport is the only international airport in the country. It is tiny. When we arrived, rather than the jet pulling up to a gate at the airport, it stopped on the runway about 200 yards from the main building. A shuttle bus came out to meet us when we stepped off the plane.

The entire group, though dragging, found new energy in the adrenaline of arrival. Awesome, impressive, exciting….I don’t really know what else to say in this small amount of space, so email me if you’re interested to know more eloquently expressed details – I’d be glad to tell you.

2. The Peace Corps Mentors Program is a group of current PC volunteers in Moldova who greeted us at the airport to assist the Peace Corps staff in our arrival. Once we cleared customs our group of travelers walked through a set of doors to be met by the applause of dozens of mentors holding signs with our names on them. We might as well have been the Moldovan national futbol team returning home from a glorious world cup victory.

3. We stayed in the Hotel “Turist” in downtown Chisnau. It’s not a beautiful hotel, but it’s not terrible. Fairly unremarkable. Again, email me if you want more observations.

4. The first 36 hours in Chisinau were filled with more meetings and paperwork, plus time with mentors. Each mentor assists with three trainees. As luck would have it, my mentor is the head of the Mentors Program. The other folks are great, but she is outstanding. Her knowledge, effort, and kindness must be mentioned here – I am both thankful for and impressed by those gifts.

5. I am having fun – Through all of the description, I should mention that I am really enjoying this experience so far. It promises to get more difficult, but everything to this point has been awesome.

That's all for now. Next up: an entry about my new host family, my training village, and the surreal experience of arriving in this town.