Moldovan Wine
Easter weekend is a long weekend in Ukraine because Monday is a day off. A clustermate and I decided to check out Moldova over that break.
Because she knows volunteers there it made things easier--finding out where to stay, what to do, etc. Informing PC about this trip ended up being quite more of a hassle than usual. Typically, you send in a form and they call you when it's been approved without any questions. As soon as I told my RM about this, she asked if I had a VISA for Moldova. "As of January, Americans don't need one," I answered. "Where will you be leaving from?" she asked. "Odessa" I replied. I was not expecting this line of questioning and was told to contact our Safety and Security staff.
The issue that concerned my RM and everyone else at PC was this tiny strip of land to the east of the Dneister River in Moldova. In the early 1990s a civil war broke out and a separatist "country" emerged--Transneister. Despite having created their own boarders that are patrolled and their own currency, no one else in the world recognizes them as a separate nation. Hence for that reason, and the supposedly overt Sovietness about them, Volunteers are not allowed to travel in that area, so we needed to find a route from Odessa that would go around Transneister.
Thankfully the Safety and Security guys did that work for us and several options emerged and we got approved and were ready to go.
My first impressions of Moldova were that it was different than Ukraine. There were soft rolling hlls in all directions and it seemed a bit more clean than Ukraine. Of course there were grapevines for as far as the eye could see, Moldova probably being most famous for its wine. We passed tiny villages with animal and fruit stencilling on front of their homes. It was similar to Ukraine, but much more "cozy"? "cute"? "pastoral"? Perhaps it lacked the typical Soviet blocks apartments that I am so used to seeing in all but the tiniest Ukrainian villages.
The capital of Moldova (and here you can pick up a bonus point if you know the name of it) is extremely different than Kyiv. There are no skyscrapers to speak of. Even a lot of the tall block Soviet buildings seem to be on the outskirts of town or towards the ends of the main drag. And here too they add a certain quality to the rest of the city instead of taking it away.
We did not spend a long time in Moldova, but enough to meet some volunteers serving there, eat some Moldovan food, walk around the city, and run into the one Moldovan I know within 10 minutes of being in Chisinau. On the way back, we stopped for a couple of nights in Odessa before heading back to reality and back to site.
Because she knows volunteers there it made things easier--finding out where to stay, what to do, etc. Informing PC about this trip ended up being quite more of a hassle than usual. Typically, you send in a form and they call you when it's been approved without any questions. As soon as I told my RM about this, she asked if I had a VISA for Moldova. "As of January, Americans don't need one," I answered. "Where will you be leaving from?" she asked. "Odessa" I replied. I was not expecting this line of questioning and was told to contact our Safety and Security staff.
The issue that concerned my RM and everyone else at PC was this tiny strip of land to the east of the Dneister River in Moldova. In the early 1990s a civil war broke out and a separatist "country" emerged--Transneister. Despite having created their own boarders that are patrolled and their own currency, no one else in the world recognizes them as a separate nation. Hence for that reason, and the supposedly overt Sovietness about them, Volunteers are not allowed to travel in that area, so we needed to find a route from Odessa that would go around Transneister.
Thankfully the Safety and Security guys did that work for us and several options emerged and we got approved and were ready to go.
My first impressions of Moldova were that it was different than Ukraine. There were soft rolling hlls in all directions and it seemed a bit more clean than Ukraine. Of course there were grapevines for as far as the eye could see, Moldova probably being most famous for its wine. We passed tiny villages with animal and fruit stencilling on front of their homes. It was similar to Ukraine, but much more "cozy"? "cute"? "pastoral"? Perhaps it lacked the typical Soviet blocks apartments that I am so used to seeing in all but the tiniest Ukrainian villages.
The capital of Moldova (and here you can pick up a bonus point if you know the name of it) is extremely different than Kyiv. There are no skyscrapers to speak of. Even a lot of the tall block Soviet buildings seem to be on the outskirts of town or towards the ends of the main drag. And here too they add a certain quality to the rest of the city instead of taking it away.
We did not spend a long time in Moldova, but enough to meet some volunteers serving there, eat some Moldovan food, walk around the city, and run into the one Moldovan I know within 10 minutes of being in Chisinau. On the way back, we stopped for a couple of nights in Odessa before heading back to reality and back to site.
posted by Molly | 12:22 AM
1 Comments:
Chisinau
[Takes bonus point]
Post a Comment
<< Home