A monastery and a castle

Just outside the city of Roman there is a monastery and a castle. The castle was built by a family the family that owns the land. They built the castle in 1880 to replace the house that they had used. They also built a church for the family to use. The church became a monastery. My hosts for the day took me to this place and we had a wonderful time. We ate lunch at the monastery and had the food that they serve to the monks and nuns. The food was vegetarian and it was explained that no meat has been eaten at this monastery for more than 300 years. The food as excellent, especially since it all was picked from the monastery's garden. The head nun, who runs the place sat with us as we ate and talked a little about the history of the place and how it was run. After lunch another nun took us on a tour of the monastery and castle. What an amazing place. We not only went into the big church but also the winter church (because the big church is too cold in the winter for services) but we were able to see them actually painting the inside of the winter church. What a beautiful place. Now you are asking, "Why no pictures?" right? Well my hosts took a video and will give me a copy so then I will share it with you. After the two churches we were allowed to go inside the work areas and see where the nuns sew and knit and paint eggs and also paint the icons for the church. What an amazing insight into the daily running of a monastery. After the monastery we visited the castle. It was used for many years as a home for abandoned children. The inside is pretty run down but still with a little imagination you can visualize what a beautiful place it was. What an amazing afternoon I had today. I hope you that read this can have half as nice a day as I had today.

See ya

Around the countryside

As I have said it is raining here. A lot. This is a picture of a dam at Piatra Neamt. There is so much water in the lake that they are having to let water out to prevent it from overflowing. We were having lunch at a restaurant called the Housewives Club. The food was excellent, and they view was fantastic.

We took the telegondola up to the top of one of the mountains surrounding Piatra Neamt. While we were going up I snapped a picture out the front and managed to catch this picture. The nice woman in this picture is my generous and giving host Sorina Danciu. She has taken care of me and made sure that everything I need, I have. On this ride up the mountain our car and one other car were the only one with riders. Sorina, Constantine, and I were in this one and we noticed one with people coming down. So it was like they were running it just for us. When we got to the top where the view is stupendous we could only see the clouds that we were in. As I said it is raining here. A lot.

Singing

Here is my great class of singers. These guys love to sing songs and recite poetry. This song is the good morning song and they are singing it in Romanian and English. Enjoy.

Reading and eating

Here are two pictures of the students in my late morning class. They are reading from a Reader's Theater book. This group is reading Little Red Riding Hood. It is one way to get them to actually use the English that they do know.

These guys are reading Goldilocks and the Three Bears. They thought it would be cool to be in a group together until they realized that the story had a mom and a grandmother and of course Goldilocks. But they were troopers and managed to get through it.
And last here is what I had for dinner the other night. It is called Clatite Oscar and is the specialty of the house at the Hotel Roman. It was very good. Too bad I ate it all and did not save any to share with you. By the way it continues to rain here, they are all asking what happened to the summer. In the week before I arrived it was hot, since i have gotten here it is raining. Talk with you all later.

Mark

More of my classes and Jiji

Here is Jiji hanging out with my late morning class (they meet from 10:30 to 12:00). Jiji just wanted to help them learn English. The students in this class are 11 and 12 years old. They are working with Readers Theater as well as learning words with multiple meanings.
Just so you don't think the class is made up only of girls, here are some of the boys in class. Just like in Livermore, the boys tend to sit on one side and the girls on the other. I guess cooties are international. Jiji does not have cooties so they will all hang out with him/her (I have not figured out whether Jiji is a boy or a girl). I guess your gender is not important if you are a penguin.

Talk more later, don't forget to post a comment.

Mark

The scenic Romanian countryside

The storks are back. On our way to Durau we stopped and saw a stork nest. The villages build platforms on the top of their power poles for the storks to use. In this picture you can see one of the parent storks standing on the side of the nest and you can see two baby storks in the nest. As I watched for a few minutes there were actually three babies in the nest. The stork returning to Romania each spring is a sign of good luck, so this village must be very lucky.
This was the view from my hotel in Durau. The mountains in the background are very beautiful. It was a very nice day in the mountains it only rained for a little while and did not disturb our bar-b-que. There were about 30 parents there from Roman to pick up their children from a summer camp.

Have a good day.
Mark

Sing along with us

From left to right; Ingrid, Jiji, Vivinna, and Alex. Ingrid and Vivianna are singing a song for Jiji and me.


Here is the whole class of Younger students singing "The Days of the Week". I hope you all enjoy this, especially those of you starting Summer School. Just knowing that Jiji is still working even though it is summer might make you willing to put in the work necessary to improve.

I also went to the mountains at Durau (pronounced Dir-oh) on Friday and Saturday. We had a great time. There were students from Roman who were attending a camp for a week and we went to pick up Corina and Viorel's son Corin. He and several others from the camp will be attending my class for the next two weeks.

Have fun and talk with you all later.

Mark

Teaching and being a TV star

Hi all yesterday in class we were interupted by a reporter from the local Roman TV station. He wanted to film what we were doing and talk a little with me. Unfortunately, his English was as good as my Romanian. But one of my students, Ioana, came to the rescue and translated for us. So she got to be on TV as well. So they asked me a few questions and then filmed the class singing two songs. I did not see the broadcast but I understand that they did air it last night. I was out having dinner with some of my friends. My students did say that they saw it and that I looked good :). They were all very nervous when the man came into the room with a microphone and a camera, but they did a good job singing the songs. On Friday afternoon I am going to the mountains. I promise to take some pictures of the beautiful are we will go to. Talk to you soon.

Jiji on travel

Here is Jiji going to class in Roman, Romania. He is learning English along with his new friends. We are at the Roman Voda school.

Jiji the world traveler at the train station Gara de Nord in Bucharest, Romania. We are patiently waiting for our train to arrive. We took the train from Bucharest to Roman on Monday. Jiji was very patient, he hardly complained at all.

And before we got to Bucharest we had a stop over in Amsterdam. That is our plane in the background. We flew KLM to Amsterdam and then Tarom (the national airline of Romania) to Bucharest. At least Jiji rode with me in the plane and did not have to fly with the luggage. Although several of my students volunteered to go that way if I took them with me. At least until I explained that the baggage area of the plane is not heated. So maybe you will see more of Jiji as I post more.

Teaching in Roman

Welcome to one of my classrooms. The little penguin on the table is Jiji. Jiji came with me this year. We have a computer math program that the students use at school and the company likes to pretend that Jiji is traveling around the world. So, I thought I would bring Jiji with me to Roman, Romania. This is the classroom at the office and is where I teach the adults. Today was the first day of class. There were 8 adults in the class. We had a good time.

This is the classroom where I teach the students. I have two groups again this year. One younger, between 7 and 9 and one older most around 11 or 12. There are a few from last year's class. It was nice to see familiar faces. We sang some songs and recited some poetry. There will be about 25 students in each class. Should be fun. I will talk with you all later. And to all of you who posted "don't break anything this year Mark", I promise not to kick any soccer balls.

Bye for now

Back in Romania

Hi all, I am back in Romania for my 4th year of teaching. Long, but uneventful flight yesterday. Flight left on time, arrived on time, just a long time. I am looking forward to the days of being able to use the Star Trek transported and just arrive. Oh well until then I guess on time and uneventful will have to do. I leave today for Roman, not much sight seeing in Bucharest this time (I saw lots of it last year). I begin my classes right away so will post about those. Remember to post comments so I know someone is reading this. Talk with you all soon.

Mark