The Day from HECK!

May 22, 2008 (Thursday)

It was a bleak, strange and weird day for everyone. It started off with Mary falling in the shower – she pulled the shower curtain and rod down with her…so we will be showering with no shower curtain for the next couple of months. What’s funny is that it didn’t even phase me. Everything around here breaks so easily I think I just expect it now…Then I broke another dish – this time it was a ceramic bowl. I’ve never thought of myself as clumsy until I came to Romania. Then we all walked out the door to head for the orphanage, and I realized I didn’t have my scrubs with me. So I had to run back upstairs and quickly grab them. Then the elevator wasn’t working right and once we finally got onto it Mary made the comment “hopefully this isn’t a omen of the rest of the day”….yes, yes it was – it only got worse…way worse…

We all got to the orphanage and for some reason ALL of the workers were grumpy. It’s not fun to be in an environment where you feel you are disliked. We walked in and started playing with some of the kids and one of the workers Christina seemed extremely annoyed with our presence. Whitney Scott, Elisa and I were thinking “what is their problem today?” I even asked one of the workers if she needed our help with anything. She just looked at me, shrugged her shoulder and didn’t respond. Whitney Scott and I just looked at each other and were like “okay”...

When we went to the next room the workers weren’t any happier. Andrei instantly ran to me, but the workers get mad at me if I hold him long at all…it’s so frustrating. I’ll hold him for like 30 seconds, and they’ll tell me to put him down. Then he just cries and reaches up for me. Grrrr….so frustrating. Then they stuck him down for a nap so I barely got to play with him. I did get to play with Maria though. Maria is a lot more aware than people give her credit for. She will constantly try and grab my hand every time I walk by her now. I think she recognizes my presence. She’s a little sweetheart.

The girls continued to tease me about Sera’s new interest in me. Luckily he wasn’t there today so they didn’t have anything new to tease me about…Elyse kept asking me when the wedding was. We are all so immature together. It’s great. I get teased a lot, but what goes around comes around…I’m gonna laugh when his new interest is one of them.

More bad news continued to come throughout the day. While we were playing with the kids in the orphanage I started talking to Elisa about how I was excited to go to the hospital later that day. MacKenzie and I have been planning all week to bring our laptop and watch a movie per request from Alex. Then we were going to have a dance party. Alex has been so excited about it all week…that’s when I got the worst news ever. Elisa goes “that would be fun except we can’t go to the hospital today.” I looked at her very confused, and she was like “did I forget to tell you?” I was like “yes.” I had no idea what was going on. Then she told me what had happened. Apparently when Mindy went to the hospital yesterday she had mace in the pocket that holds her water bottle - her family wanted her to carry it around to be safe. While she was attending to Marius and Florine a little gypsy boy in a bed next to theirs had stolen it out of her backpack. Then apparently when we left the hospital he went into the bathroom and sprayed himself with it and injured himself. Poor Mindy, I know she didn’t mean for it to hurt anyone at all…it could of happened to any of us, but she shouldn’t of had it within easy reach of a child. We all know it was a complete accident, but we may be permanently kicked out of the hospital. Us girls were talking about the incident, and we were just grateful he didn’t spray it in the hospital room. Mace could kill babies or small children if they inhaled it. They would definitely never let us come back then. I kept thinking about how this situation is a public relations nightmare – since PR is my major. This event reminded me of something that would happen in a PR case study I have studied in my classes. I wish I knew the details of what was going on and what was being said between both parties so I could help solve it somehow…if Mario (our Romanian liason) doesn’t figure out a way to help mend our reputation we aren’t going to be allowed back. We need a strong spokesperson.

In conclusion the hospital didn’t want us coming back today. Mario has a meeting to speak with them sometime today. She was not happy about the situation at all. We have no idea what the outcome will be. I’m going to pray that whatever is supposed to happen will happen…I can understand why they are upset, but at the same time it was a complete accident. I don’t know…but I do know that I will be very, very, very sad if I don’t get to go anymore. That’s half the reason we are here.

If things weren’t bad enough another weird situation happened. As four of us were leaving the orphanage we crossed a petite street located directly in front of the orphanage. About five seconds after we finished crossing we heard a high pitched screech. It stung my ears. I quickly turned around and all I saw was a car desperately trying to stop. The driver’s arms were tense and he looked panicked. Then I heard a huge crash. My heart started racing and my blood pumping. There was a building blocking my view so I couldn’t see what had happened. The four of us rushed over to the scene. I was afraid a pedestrian had been hit or someone was badly injured. I was silently praying that when I turned the corner that I wouldn’t see a person plastered all over the road. For some reason drivers in Romania are CRAZY. They don’t stop until the last minute and they rarely follow any laws. The other day some guy got mad at another driver and he threw a bunch of water into the other guys car while he was in his. Road rage is ridiculous here. Drivers are vicious.

We got to the scene and the driver had hit two cars on either side of him. One car he hit had been parked with no one in it and the other car was a van with a very angry driver. Both drivers had gotten out of their cars. Thank goodness they were unharmed, but they were both angry. A bunch of people started gathering around including several construction workers who had been close by working when they heard the commotion. After we saw that everyone was okay we quickly left, and I’m glad we did. People can get violent here. Elisa told us a story about when she was a passenger in a taxi and the driver hit a little kid. The child ended up being okay, but the parent pulled the taxi driver out of the taxi and beat the crap out of him…Elisa didn’t know if the driver was alive when she left.

When we got home from the orphanage us girls decided that it would probably be best to hang out at the apartment. Too many crazy things have been happening today. So I ran with MacKenzie to pick up some groceries. Then we went home and caught up on some school assignments. I feel bad about not seeing Alex today. I hate breaking promises, but there was nothing I could do about the situation.