A nice day to be out and about

 It was a nice day to be out and about, or just fishing. This photo is from one of the many lakes that surround Bucharest. I took this picture at around 6pm. Now the question of the day for Ms. Nunes class and anyone else who wants to join in; what time was it in Livermore when I took this picture?

If you look closely there are a lot of people out on the banks of the river. In the background there is a large park with lots of areas for playing. Also behind the trees is a sports stadium when the Bucharest Dinamo play. Anyone know what sport the Dinamos play? Answers to the above questions will earn you my undying gratitude as it means that there are people out there actually reading what I write. I will provide answers, along with some new questions tomorrow.

7th Time teaching English in Europe

Hi all, no pictures yet as I have just arrived here in Bucharest. I will be here for one week before going to Lugoj to teach English, like the title says, for the 7th time. When I first did this I thought it would be like a once in a life-time experience. Well obviously that was not the case. So here I am back again. To the students in Mrs. Nunes Summer School class I say hi, as well as hi to any other students who are lucky enough to be in Summer School. One of the things that I enjoy doing is posting pictures and asking questions (I guess that is just the teacher in me). Feel free to join in and answer the questions. You can reply to the posts. Thanks to all of you who read this, it is more fun writing knowing that out there someone is reading this.

Some of the stories told in the murals painted on the monasteries

 Here is one of the sides of the church at Suceavita. This side tells the story of how one gets in to Heaven. In the middle of the mural are the scales of Heaven. All of the good things you do in life are in one scale and all of the bad things are in the other. If you can enlarge this you will see that the devils are sitting on top of the scale on their side trying to make it even heavier. Those darn devils will do whatever they can to get more recruits. If you are good then you go down the left side of the mural and enter into Heaven, if you are bad you go down the right side in to Hell.

 Here is a close-up of one part of that mural. Here is Saint Peter opening the gates of Heaven. As you can see there is a long line of people waiting behind him to get in. On the right of this picture you can see an angel taking the soul of a person who had been good in life.

In this one if you look at the part in the upper right you can see the story of the Garden if Eden. They are the pictures with the white background. The first shows Adam in the garden alone. The next he is with all the animals, then Eve is brought in. The fourth is when they discover the tree of knowledge. After that is when the serpent shows up to tempt them. Then they are shown covered with fig leaves and being banished from the garden. In this way regular people who could not read or write could access the stories that were in the Bible. So these monasteries are like giant picture books for non-readers.

Four of the World Famous Painted Monasteries of Bucovina

 In the area around the city of Suceava, Romania there are some world famous painted monasteries. Painted on the outside and the inside. These monasteries were all built after battles won by Stefan Cel Mare, the first ruler to bring together what is not Romania. The monasteries are painted on the outside with scenes from the bible. This was important in the 1500's since most people could not read. Thw first one here is the monastery at Suceavita.

 This one is the monastery at Moldovita. It is amazing that the paintings on the outside have survived for over 400 years. The paintings on the north side of the monasteries are mostly faded and degraded but the south side, protected from the weather has survived remarkably well. Also the round end of the church, like you see here always faces east.

 This one is the most famous of the group of painted monasteries. This is the one at Vornet. It is most famous because of the blue color that can be found on the walls. It is a blue that they are not sure how the painters of the day were able to make. Since this was almost 500 years ago, they did not write down the formula of what they added to make the color.

The last one is the smallest of the monasteries the monastery Humorului. So on Monday I took a tour around the area and was able to see these 4 monasteries. I visited them all on a whirlwind trip in 2007, so it was nice to be able to spend some more time enjoying and marveling at how old they are and how well they have held up against the weather. I have more pictures of the pictures on the outside of these monasteries if any one is interested. Tomorrow, Wednesday, I will be heading back to Bucharest for my last week of this year's adventure, doing a little sight-seeing and resting up from my adventures before heading home.

In Suceava, Romania

 I am in Suceava, Romania for a few days. In Suceava there is a fortress that was built by Stefan Cel Mare in 1508. They are currently restoring it, a fact I wish I had known before paying to go inside. Anyway, here is the sign outside the fortress. Cetatea, means fortress.

 Here is the fortress showing the outside of the fortress, the main defensive wall. You can see some of the inside walls also.

 This view shows the three entryways into the fortress. Each of these entries is located on another defensive wall. So there are three defensive walls in the fortress. If you breach the first wall, you find the second wall and so on.

This picture shows some of the restoration going on. Unfortunately, the restoration is going on everywhere in the fortress and therefore you can not actually go anywhere. I am sure that it will be a great place to visit once it is finished.

My last class in Varna

 Here is my class hard at work on the last day. We were finishing the U.S. History class that I taught for three weeks in Varna. Their final assignment was to create a poster about what we had learned. I envisioned a paper with some cute pictures drawn on it with little captions for each picture. I guess that is why i am the teacher and not the student. What they came up with you can see below. They went on their own and looked up more information on what they had learned and created this poster.

As you can see I gave them a lot of information over the 18 hours of class. We started with the first inhabitants of the America's and how they got here and continued from there. They were great students, not only was all of the information presented in English, but they even took their class notes in English. I was impressed. Now it is back to Romania and a visit to the painted monasteries of Bucovina. Stay tuned for some impressive pictures.

Hanging with the Vista Language School Day Campers

 I had a lovely morning and afternoon today. I was at the Varna Library in the American Corner. There is a part of the library that is dedicated to an American section, with American books and reference material. It is supported by the American Embassy here in Bulgaria. This was my second trip there with with Vista campers. The first day I presented a lesson on the similarities and difference of life in Bulgaria and America. Today there was a short lesson on Native Americans and then some arts and crafts. The campers made a teepee and a totem pole. Here you can see one of the examples of the work they did. The cut out the pattern for the teepee and then decorated it. The totem poles were also a lot of fun for them.

 Here is another example of a personalized teepee. This one he made for the tribe's chief. We showed them some examples of the kinds of things that would be drawn on a teepee and they then used their imagination. We spent a couple of hours working at this, and they all had a blast.

Here is the work of the group, along with the campers. I want to especially thank the Varna Library and the American Embassy for helping to make this day possible. I had a great time.