This week was with the Sancrai kids who live in town outside of Targu Mures which is appropriately named Sancrai. They live in about 12 group homes with about 8-10 kids in each house all together. Some of them came from one of the largest orphanages in Romania in the town of Ludus, called Big Blue. I don’t know why, but it was closed about 6 months ago and all of the kids from Ludus were placed in other homes such as Sancrai.
Before the week we took a mini-vacation together to Sovata, a salt lake in a town about an hour from Targu Mures. The lake was a place where the Romans used to relax and enjoy the water. Around the lake were spots for people to lay out and get some sun, but there was hardly any room because of the fat guys in Speed-O festival that was going on that Sunday. When we found a spot we got into the water and every little cut on my body started to tingle and sting because of the salt water. It helped the cut on my toe and some scratches and bug bites. It was my first experience swimming in really salty water and it was really great. It took little effort to float to the top of the water. There are a large number of Romanians who can’t swim at the pool, but they could swim at the lake because it was nice and easy to float. When we tried to touch the bottom of the lake with our feet we tried to sink ourselves and got a meter or so down and our feet felt the water get hotter. It was different than what I’m used to in Lake Springfield or any other lake that I’ve been where it gets colder when its deeper. Geothermal things are so interesting. Sorvata was a good time and I got to work on my pasty white tan some more.
Team Brasilia
On Monday we went to Sancrai and I met my team of kids, volunteers, and Irish people, who were from a church called The Edge in Ballymahinch Northern Ireland. My team of leaders:
Me
Andrada – really sweet 16 year old Romanian volunteer who has a passion for little kids and worked wonders with a little cute 5 year old girl during the first week. I really saw some great things from her and she told me that she didn’t come to camp for the money, but came for the kids. I got to know her very well and sit next to her at meals. Awesome.
Sorina – another 17 year old Romanian volunteer who was hard working and connected well with the girls on my team. She did a wonderful job this week and got the award for volunteer-of-the-week.
Adela – 17 year old Romanian volunteer who was working her first week this week but seemed like she had been working with kids for a long time. She was energetic and always helped. Just like the other two volunteers, she knew excellent English.
Leanne – a great 16 year old girl from Northern Ireland who was very quiet throughout the week but had a great sense of humor when I would poke fun at her for being quiet. At first I was worried that she might be hard to work with, but as the week went on I saw her open up to the kids and loved them.
Sharon – one of the leaders from The Edge who was 38 and was wonderful to have on a team with me. She was always excited to be with the kids and connected with a couple of the girls on a deep level. When we had our morning meetings to pray Sharon would always pray and acted like a matriarchal leader that our team needed.
The kids:
Ana Maria – 17? – very quiet girl who wasn’t very interested in competition, but was very sad at the end of the week because she connected so much with the head translator Alexandra. She was quiet and very nice.
Calin – 18 – a.k.a. “chili bowl” – our older “problem child” who was energetic and our athletic leader. He was a good break dancer with some of the other kids from Sincrai. He smoked and didn’t like to be quiet. He was rude, but wanted to be loved. He had a sweet side that I saw occasionally and had to remind myself of constantly. He influenced some of the other younger boys to do either good or bad.
Alex – 15 – one of the younger boys who was influenced by Calin. When I told him to do something he did it. He was at the stage of life where he was trying to find someone to look up to. He was impressionable and sweet when you wanted him to be. He had one of those sweet European mullets.
Roxi – 13? - Came from a not so great family situation. Her brother and sister are some of the more badly-influenced kids at camp and Roxi was very sweet and kind. Every morning she had a big smile and was happy to see me and always said hi to me
Loredana – 18 – older girl who for whatever reason loved me. She was always excited to cheer in line and was a great encouragement to me. If I wasn’t cheering very loud Loredana would poke me and tel me to jump around and start screaming Brasilia! Bra-sil-ia!
Tereza – 18 – another older girl who ran around camp all week chasing Jake and had a huge crush on him. She was sweet and was never ever a problem. She cheered for our team and was great to al of our leaders. She had a great time at camp and I wish I would have gotten to know her better.
Ana – 14 – a girl who was pretty and dated one of the older boys from a different team. She and Sharon were together throughout the week and became very close. Ana told Sharon at some point that she loved her more than her own mom. Sharon being as great as she is, took her under her wing and comforted Ana when her boyfriend broke up with her towards the end of the week because of lousy teenage boy reasons if you know what I mean. On Friday, Sharon talked with Ana through a translator and Ana made a decision to become a Christian and to allow God into her life. She was great and I was so happy that Sharon and Ana became so close.
Florin – 6 – young baby of our team who is absolutely adorable. But because he is so cute he always gets his way and consequently is a big brat. So during the week it was hard to control him. There were plenty of times that he was being an annoying 6 year old on a team of older kids. There were other times that he was great. He loved to sit on my shoulders. At one point during the week he and I fought with one of the other big guys who put a little kid on his shoulders. It was a pretty fun game of chicken. There is a pretty great story about Florin that you’ll read in a paragraph.
So my team was very cohesive. While last week was hard because my team didn’t want to “play” this week was great because my kids were constantly yelling and wanted me to yell. It was easy to be the energetic crazy one this week because I was surrounded by kids who wanted to be there to act like kids. We were a good team, we did decent in the competitions and we made a good video about Brazil which included “The Thong Song.” We ended up getting 7th place but still had smiles on our faces. I was very happy this week even though it was the worst that I’ve done thus far in the Olympics.
The Florin Story
So on Friday we go to the Veekend with the kids. It’s the giant pool that I’ve blogged about before. I picked to have Florin because I know that he would be a challenge to watch. I could run around with him all day and just chase him wherever he went.
Right when we got to the Weekend, Florin took off and ran away. I knew it would be a long day, but I was excited because I was ready to run around. So he was being a very good boy playing with the ball in the pool and lounging around. The first thing he did when he got into the pool was pull down his shorts a little bit and take a look at his cash and prizes. It was such a funny 6 year old thing to do and I laughed. It was turning out to be a fantastic day. He got back in the pool again to play and one of the first things he did was pull down his pants again. I was standing next to Jake and I pointed out that it was pretty funny how Florin was so interested in himself. Then I saw him pull down his shorts to start taking a pee. I would have yelled at him but every other kid in that pool had been doing the same thing and its just funny because he’s Florin. Then I saw what I thought was a toy float to the top of the water. My mouth dropped and Jake and I looked at each other because we both knew the truth. Florin had pooped in the pool. He pulled up his pants, turned around, pointed at his floating fudge dragon and laughed as if someone else had done it. I didn’t know what to do, and I must have said that 5 times before I jumped in the water and grabbed Florin and took him back to our towels where he would get in trouble. As for the floating turd, I learned that there is a fundamental difference between American and Romanian pool culture. Whereas everyone in America would scream and jump out of the pool, nobody got out. Everybody just avoided it. The pool staff took their sweet time before they got around to getting rid of the evidence. Nobody left the pool and some unknowing Romanians swam around in an orphan’s poo water. Florin was in trouble for a long time. But after lunch he was a good boy again and we got to play by the side of the pool together. It was definitely something I won’t ever forget.
This week was some of the volunteers’ last week. Next week there will be so few kids that we won’t bring any Romanian volunteer translators, so my last week of camp is my last chance to get to know the volunteers well. It was sad to say goodbye to them, but I’m really happy to have met all of them. On Friday I went out to the Irish Pub to have a Pepsi with Ioana and Onuka, both volunteers that I have worked with. It was great to talk to them and spend time with them. After the other interns, I’ll miss the volunteers the most when I leave.
Paul and Fiona, the camp directors who have had a tremendous impact on the community of Mures are leaving to go to Ireland this week. On Saturday there was a going away party at a bowling alley for them. It was great to see everyone come out to Paul and Fiona's party. Orphans, community people, Americans, Irish, and lots of other people were there and it was just a testament to how much this organization is doing here in Romania. It's a little known organization, but it is doing so many good things. It's sad to see them go, but they have been an inspiration to me and to many others because of their serving attitude.
Another great week, and I’m glad I have another two weeks left here. For any of the interns who left after 4 weeks, we talk about you all the time and miss you a lot too. I miss home, and thank you to everyone who is still praying for me and supporting me. You guys are great.
Here's a song that's popular here and is actually a pretty good Romanian song:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=yHbPnzmmLBU
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