June 4, 2008 (Wednesday)

I’m getting really sick of my Tae-Bo workout tape. It’s barely even giving me a workout anymore, and I have it completely memorized – I wish someone would go running with me! Most of the girls don’t really care to workout, and if they do it’s once in a blue moon– so TaeBo it is…My mom (Mia) said she would send me a workout tape in the mail. I’m pretty stoked! I hope I will get it soon.

At the orphanage I talked to Tao (she is involved with management of the orphanage) about Andrei and the situation with his parents not giving up their rights so he can be adopted. I told her I wanted to know if there was anything I could do for them to relinquish their rights - after all they don’t want him. She said that I shouldn’t try to do that until after he has surgery on his ear so he can hear. His surgery is scheduled to happen in July. Apparently since he is under the care of the orphanage the government will pay for the surgery. If the parents give up the rights before the surgery and he is adopted the new parents would have to pay for it…it is extremely pricey. So apparently I can’t do anything for another couple of months. I’m going to pray the Lord will help me figure out an answer to this situation. It will kill me to leave him in August without anything solved. He deserves so much more than he has right now.

Iulia has been one of my orphans that I have had a harder time connecting with. She is very moody and not real active. However, today I was so excited because I figured out something she loves to do. I tilted her wheelchair back and went in circles around the room and she was laughing so hard she could barely breathe. I loved it! So cute. One of my other kiddos – Valentina didn’t feel well today. She was extremely sedate – at least for her. I just rocked her for a while. Then Maria was her usual self today. I’m really starting to figure out her personality. She’s full of surprises. Each day I learn a little something else about her. Today I kept giving her toys and if she didn’t want it she would throw it…it wasn’t real funny – but it kind of was. She didn’t really understand what she was doing. P.S. Sera avoided me again today – problem solved.

After the orphanage I asked Kenz to run with me to the mall in between the orphanage and the hospital to buy a wallet – I need a small one. The one I brought is huge. Anyways, we went to the mall, and I went into a store and she went into another store. Then the next thing I knew I couldn’t find her. I started walking around the floors, and I couldn’t find her anywhere – which was weird because I had just seen her. After searching for a few minutes I decided that she must have gone home so I headed home. I got home and she wasn’t there. I started panicking. I hate it that whenever situations like that occur your imagination goes crazy and it makes up the worst possible scenarios. I kept thinking “what if she got kidnapped by gypsies?!” Some of the other girls came home and after she didn’t come home for another 15 minutes I asked Annie to go with me to go back to the mall to look for her. Luckily on our way back to the mall we ran into Kenz. I almost had a mild heart attack. We decided that we must have just missed each other. We were both looking for each other at the same time. Not having a cell phone sucks sometimes.

It was kind of a weird day at the hospital today. I went and visited Florine with Elyse. That little boy is a trickster. He will pretend that he doesn’t have money when he does. Then he will try and get you to pay for his items at the store outside the hospital. He thinks he is hilarious. In our half an hour of being outside walking around he managed to get free crackers from the truck driver that was unloading snacks and drinks, and then he managed to get a couple of lei out of the security guard. Yesterday he tried to get us to pay for his snacks, and we knew he had money. We called him out on it of course. He is a little stinker! We have to watch out for him, but I love him anyways… I just have to remember that he was probably brought up this way. Not that it’s okay or that I will put up with it, but it’s easier to understand where he gets his logic from. When we all went outside there were a bunch of random puppies in the park area (if you can call it that) and Florine just cuddled the puppy for a while…he loved it. He’s a sweetheart, but he will push your limits. Anything we let him do he will try and take it one step further. If we say we can go outside for half an hour he will ask for an hour. Such a kid! He tries my patience with everything…

As we were walking outside to play I went to throw the gum I was chewing in a bush. To my surprise when I walked around the bush there was a family of gypsies there. Whoops. I think I might of hit them with it on accident when I threw it through the bush. Hopefully not. I didn’t expect a family of gypsies to being laying there…

After Florine we played with Alexandra for a while. She has been in the hospital for months. Talk about horrible…I can’t think of a more miserable place to be. She is adorable, and she has been through several surgeries on her feet. She can’t stand, walk or use her legs at all. When we hold her she can’t even wrap her legs around us so she doesn’t slide off our hip easily. So sad – there are so many things we take for granted. She does have the cutest laugh though, and she adores when we hold her in our arms and dance… Annie and I took her outside and she loved it. Then she listened to Disney music on my IPod. She was quite amused…

On the way home from the hospital Annie told me that Mindy and her had toys stolen from them when they were on the sixth floor. Apparently some of the other kids in the room got a hold of her toys (which isn’t normally a problem) but then the moms took them. The toys are supposed to be for the kids without moms. There was a boy in the room who spoke English and he was translating between Annie and the moms. Annie said the moms asked her to give her ring and all the toys she had in her backpack to their children because she was “a rich American girl” and their children were poor. Annie told them “no” but they refused to give back the toys their children had been playing with. She knew they had them, but they denied it. Everyone here assumes that because we are American we are rich. Annie and Mindy are too nice. I was so mad at the moms when she told me that! What nerve! The majority of the people here only care about themselves. I honestly think the mentality here is “survival of the fittest.” I told Annie I would go with her tomorrow. I am not as nice as either one of them. One of my biggest pet peeves is when people take advantage of people I care about which is not okay. I think I get that attribute from my dad. I have never had a problem with the moms there. I have always been stern when they have asked me for things and they never pressed the issue. Maybe I look mean and that’s why they haven’t messed with me. Who knows. All I know is that it will not happen again – at least when I’m there.

Tonight was my night to cook dinner. Once again it was a success (much to my surpise). I made hot ranch, chicken, bacon, cheese sandwiches with homemade fries. It was pretty good if I do say so myself. I’m so excited that I’m learning how to cook here…To be quite honest that was probably one of the last things I expected to learn while in Romania. If I can cook meals in Romania I can definitely cook them in the states – it’s all just a matter of having time. Not that I really have it here – there are just less disturbances.

After dinner I was doing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen and all of a sudden I heard Kenz cracking up. She comes over to me laughing and said she was tanning outside in a tank top and guys across the way in another block (apartment building) saw her and started whistling. In answer to their whistling she came up with the bright idea to go outside in every article of clothing she could find. She thought it was hilarious. She went and put a jacket, long pants, hat and blanket on. Then she went outside, threw open her blanket and waved at them in all her bundles. She was like “and they thought they were gonna get a show!” The gals in my apartment are crazy. I love it! We all laughed for like an hour. I got some awesome pics too. However, I don’t think the guys across the way were very amused.