My last day at site

Today is my last day in Cahul. I know that it has been coming, but it feels like time has been moving so fast, and although I know logically that it's my last day here, it's hard to imagine what it will feel like not to walk these roads or see these people anymore. One thing I am super grateful for is modern technology and social media. I know people say both have their downfalls, and I suppose that is true. But I see them as tools, and tools are only what you use them for. I use social media and technology to keep connected with friends and family across distance. I remember the first time I used Skype. I called my dad on his cell phone in Seattle from a computer in Cape Town. Both of us were in awe. His mother, my grandmother, spent her career working at the phone company and retired in the 1980s. In her younger days, she would carry lines across a room to manually connect calls. I imagine that she would be pretty amazed at what the current technology is capable of. I am so happy that I joined Peace Corps now, at a time where I will still be able to stay in touch with my friends here in Moldova even when I am gone. More than a decade ago, I spent quite a bit of time living in the Balkan region, and I have been able to keep in touch with many of my friends there over the years because of social media and technology. I hope that it will be the same for Moldova. One difference is that the people I got to know in the Balkans all spoke English, which was by necessity since I didn't speak any other language at the time. Now, my challenge will be to maintain the Romanian I have learned so I can communicate with my Moldovan friends. Once again, I'm thankful for technology like the Duolingo app to help me with this. In the meantime, I'd better get back to packing. Unfortunately, that's not something technology can help me with yet!!

One week left in my Moldovan home

It's very hard to believe that I will move out of my host family's house in Cahul a week from now. Today is the first day that this has started to feel very real to me, and I even teared up a bit thinking about it. Of course, I am excited for adventures ahead, but it will be very bittersweet to leave this place.

Cahul and this house have become home to me, and I am very appreciative of how my host family has accepted me and made me feel comfortable here with them. I had never lived with a host family before I came to Moldova, so I didn't know what it would be like. I remember knowing exchange students in the U.S. and thinking how it must be difficult for them to live with people who had different cultural norms and language. It was challenging for me at first to be able to communicate and to adapt to my host families' patterns of life (both during training in Ialoveni and at my permanent site in Cahul), but over time we have developed a rhythm and I have gotten quite used to having my host family around. It will be very strange not to see them all the time.

Yesterday, my site mates and I had a picnic at the lake for some of our close friends and colleagues here. They also feel like family to me, and I am used to seeing them frequently. It's funny because as Peace Corps Volunteers, we spend our whole service actively working to integrate, build relationships, and become part of the community in our sites. And now here we are at the end of our service, fortunately having succeeded in doing so, suddenly having to extract ourselves from the networks we have created. Of course, we will keep some relationships into the future via social media and hopefully some in-person visits. But others will fade into memory, as happens every time we move into a new phase of life.

Regardless, my memories of Cahul and the people who made this place feel like home will always be fond. I hope I can visit again someday. In the meantime, I will carry the photos and memories with me for a lifetime.

One month left

I didn't even realize - it snuck up on me. I was counting in weeks and I still have approximately 5 weeks left of my Peace Corps service in Moldova. But today I was chatting with one of my M32 cohort buddies who already COSed, and she told me I have one month left.

One month. It sounds like so little after I have already been here for this long. I have grown accustomed to Moldova, and have learned to navigate it geographically, linguistically, and culturally well enough to get by. Things are just starting to get somewhat easy (at least easier...). And now I'm done. I submitted my DOS today, and I have my exit interview with the Country Director on Monday.

And coincidence of all coincidences?? Today I was offered (and accepted) a Peace Corps post in Albania beginning in January 2020! The next month will be an interesting mix of wrapping up my service in Moldova, preparing for my service in Albania, and finalizing travel plans for the time in between.

I'm realizing now how much I have grown to love Moldova. I will miss this place when I leave. I'm looking forward to some vacation time, and certainly I am already looking forward to my service in Albania. But for the next 31 days, I am going to appreciate Moldova and etch some good Moldovan memories into my mind.

2 years

Two years ago today, I first stepped foot in Moldova. Now it feels like home. Back then, I had no idea how I would learn a new language and be able to communicate with host families and counterparts who spoke no English, much less get work or projects accomplished. Today, I have (according to my last Language Proficiency Interview) achieved an Intermediate High level of Romanian - despite the huge amount of "Moldovanesc" and Russian language that infiltrate the Romanian I hear in Moldova - and can carry on conversations with people in my community. It was hard work to get to this point, but worth it.

Today also marks one year that the group after me - the M33s - arrived in Moldova. And tomorrow, the new group - M34s - will arrive. The days are long but the years are short, as they say. It feels like each month passes faster than the last, and as I sit tonight in my room in my host family's house in my town in Moldova, it is hard to imagine that pretty soon it won't be home anymore. I'm thankful for this comfy place I have called home, and I will miss it. Which is good, because one of my goals for my service in Moldova was to miss this place when I leave. Thanks to the amazing experiences I have had here and the wonderful people I have come to call friends, I can say: Goal met.

Why did you become a Peace Corps Volunteer in Moldova?

This is a question I get asked a lot, not only by Moldovans and Americans, but also by people from other countries. I am really lucky to have other PCVs who live in the same community as I do, and we are all in different program sectors and different phases of our lives. So as we are a few months away from closing our service here, I asked them to help me explain some of the reasons we decided to become Peace Corps Volunteers, and talk a little bit about our respective program sectors, how we ended up in Moldova, and what the application process is like.

I hope this video will be helpful for you if you are considering joining Peace Corps at any point in your life, or if you want to learn more about Peace Corps.

Thanks so much to Valerie and Okxy for your willingness to participate in this video and for your friendship and partnership throughout our time in Peace Corps Moldova. You have made my Peace Corps experience so much better, and I am truly grateful for you both!

And huge thanks to our friend Alexxa for filming and editing this video. We really appreciate you!

59 days... but not really

Somehow, time keeps slipping by faster and faster. I have been marking the 100-day countdown to my COS date on social media (eventually I hope to post those here) but haven't managed to find time to post on the blog, and today I realize that it is only 59 days until I board a plane to fly out of Moldova officially as an RPCV. Only 2 months. That seems like such a short amount of time now that I have already lived here for 2 years.

As the fates of Moldova would have it, though, I will return only a few days later to help with Wave Week as I did last year; only this time I will not be a PCV. I am really thankful for the opportunity to participate in Wave Week again, and also to return to Moldova. July 19, 2019, has always felt like the right COS date for me, but Moldova has rooted itself in my heart and I am glad that when I leave it won't be forever - or even for long.

As I near the end of my Peace Corps service in Moldova, I am continuing to reflect on what this experience has meant to me: what I have learned, how I have grown, what I have been prepared to do next. I think I mentioned before that I would like to serve in another Peace Corps post, and in early December I submitted an application. One government shutdown, one application transfer, and 6 months later, it feels like I am not any closer to finding out where the next chapter might start.

Long story short, I was offered an interview for a post in Macedonia, only to then have my application moved from the Macedonia country desk to the Albania country desk (because the Macedonia post received 10 times too many applications and couldn't consider current Volunteers, so they told me). So I am currently waiting to see if I will get an interview for a post in Albania. The application deadline for this post is June 1, so there is still more than a week before I might hear something. Even after the deadline, there is no way to know when or if I might be offered an interview. And, of course, there is never a guarantee of being offered a Peace Corps post.

Nevertheless, I don't feel in a hurry to know what will be next. I am honestly trying to savor these last 2 months in Moldova. To focus here. To live intentionally. To be present. To experience this place, and spend time with people. To build memories that I will cherish no matter where the future takes me. 8 more weeks. Plus a bonus week that I have been granted. For certain, the future will come. And things will work out. I don't have to know now where I will be then. And when all is said and done, Moldova will always be part of my story.

VRF

The VRF - Volunteer Reporting Form - is part of every Peace Corps Volunteer's service (at least if they served recently). It's how we report to Peace Corps what activities we have done in our communities, who was involved, the goals, and the outcomes. My program submits VRFs 3 times per year, and one of the deadlines is coming up this week. As much as I believe in the importance of Monitoring and Reporting in community development work, it doesn't make it easier to get my VRF done!