July 1, 2008 (Tuesday)
The Lord’s Hand In My Life: My phone card finally worked!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Time zoomed by at the orphanage today. Our day started off with a chat with Mario. I love Mario! She does so much for us. She is our Romanian liason over here. She gives us language lessons and helps us out if we ever get in trouble. She’s so amazing. All us girls love chatting with her. We told her about our trip and the trip we are planning to the Black Sea in a few weekends. Then we reaffirmed to her that none of us had gotten pregnant while on our week break. Before we left she jokingly said “don’t come back pregnant!” Obviously she doesn’t have to worry about that… Then through the course of the conversation I found out Mario lived in Greece for six months. That is my dream place to visit! After talking with her I am more anxious to visit Greece someday. She said it is absolutely gorgeous and that she loved the culture and people. I wish we had time to go there…oh well I can’t win them all.

I got to play with Irina for a while today. She has the cutest giggle. I loved just sitting there holding her. She seemed so happy and content to be with me. One of the workers made the comment that they could tell she liked me a lot. It always feels good to be liked and wanted.

I practiced jumping again with Valentina today. I was afraid she would forget how to while I was gone, but she still remembered. She understands the motion of jumping, but she still has a hard time doing it by herself. However she did push off the floor with her legs today. She is starting to understand the more force she puts into the jump the higher she will go…we’re making progress!

Something exciting happened today. Elisa, Whitney S. and I got to go see the pool. Sera came in and told us to come swimming with the kids, but none of us brought our suits or water clothes. He said we could swim next week when he swims with the kids. Then he said that the kids can’t play in the pool if they have skin problems, colds or are on medication. That practically eliminates every child in the orphanage, but I asked him if I could take Andrei and he said yes…so I’m excited! Andrei will love it. The pool is an indoor pool that they let the kids swim in during the summer. When we walked in we were all expecting a real pool – it was more like a baby pool that was about two feet deep, but the kids were having fun playing around. Only a couple can go in at a time, because they need to be watched closely.

Alex was in the pool. He was having the time of his life. Sera was really good with all the kids as well. He was splashing around, playing with them and challenging them to do various exercises in the pool. Sera is a really good guy – I wish everything between him and I could have been solved less awkwardly. Oh well. Too late.

After watching them all play for a while Teo waved for us to come in – so we hiked up our scrub pants and got in the pool and played with the kids. Needless to say we were all soaked by the end, and we definitely didn’t have a change of clothes – not to mention we still had a couple hours left at the orphanage…so we ended up air drying. The workers thought it was hilarious that we were all wet.

The topper of the day was when Maria (one of the middle aged workers) attempted to give us a lesson in Romanian on going through puberty. I thought it was awkward when my mom gave me that talk…this was way worse. We all just looked at each other unsure of how to respond. Thank goodness we don’t understand half the things people say to us…haha…it can turn out to be quite the blessing sometimes.

I found out that I am going to get to start going to the apartments on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons with Elyse. So now I go to the orphanage every morning; the hospital Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoon; then I will go to the apartments with the orphan kids Tuesday and Thursday afternoon. I don’t know Elyse real well because she lives in the other apartment, but I went with her to visit the kids in the apartment today, and I had a blast talking with her. We actually had a lot in common. I’m excited that we are going to be able to go to the apartments together for the next several weeks.

Apartments were excellent. Mateline is adorable. He has autism and he loves to be swung around in circles. I think I’m starting to get old because I can’t do that for long anymore or I start feeling sick. Not to mention he is an extremely tall and lengthy little boy. It’s easy to get worn out. Then poor Sergio was woken up from his nap when he arrived and he just layed on the couch trying to sleep for half the time we were there. I kept trying to get him up, and then he would lay back down and sleep.

At the 7th floor apartments Laura decided to do my hair. Every time they do my hair I don’t know how I have any left. They are a little rough…but they mean no harm. Costica was really cuddly with me today. He has Downs syndrome, and he is so sedate. Boy is he flexible. He was sitting on my lap, and he would sit in what looked like the most uncomfortable positions ever, but he was happily content.

For the rest of the evening the girls and I did internet stuff…it’s a lot of work to keep everything updated. I hope people take time to read it…Right after I updated my blog I got a note from Elyse on my Facebook. Apparently I accidentally gave Elisa credit for the interpretive dancing on our street performance and I meant to say Elyse. I was cracking up. I quickly fixed it on my blog. Then Mindy blurted out “Oh and you called my dance moves absurd and awkward!” (they were but that’s what made the street performance so popular). I have video proof…haha… It was nice to know that people read it though. I love getting comments.

Then Mindy and Elyse threatened to put an entire album of awkward pictures of everyone up on the Facebook. I could so see them doing that. The entire time we’ve been in Romania those two have been trying to get bad pictures of everyone. Finally I started to fight back on our mid semester retreat. I got some AMAZING photos of Mindy on the trip. I could see this turning into a picture war…it could be dangerous…haha

OH AND THE BEST NEWS EVER…Mary figured out why none of our phone cards have worked. It’s because of the type of phone we have. Mary and I went and tried our phone card at the other apartment and it worked with ease. I was jumping up and down for joy! I left my best friend Kendall a message, but she didn’t answer. I’m going to call all my close friends very soon... I’ve missed hearing their voice. I can’t believe I’ve been trying for two months and that was the reason…GRRR! But at least it’s fixed now.

P.S. I’m excited for Annie’s birthday…we chatted today and made assignments. It should be great!

P.S.S. Bug bites are starting to get atrociously bad here. I have a mosquito bite on four of my toes on my left foot…can you say painful? Whitney S. had a bunch on her thighs too…Nu distractiv! (No fun!)