Tales of the Marshrutka

As promised, I now bring you two exciting tales from the Marshrutka. For those of you not in the know, Marshrutkas are my primary means of transportation while here in Moldova. Recently the price of a ride on these bad boys went from an affordable 2 lei two an appalling 3 lei. Outrageous price increase aside, they are still my favorite chariot to ride about town.

I'll briefly try to describe these faithful steeds. They are basically vans with seating typically for 11 and a space about five feet, 10 inches high and the size of a twin size bed for standing passengers. I've seen over 30 people on these things. It isn't pretty. It also doesn't smell that great. A picture is worth about 60 words. Here you are.
One last thing and I'll start in on the Tales of the Marshrutka. Some of you know how I enjoy seeing people, especially children, fall. I'm sick. I know. Well, today I hit the jackpot.

As I was walking to the orphanage I noticed two young boys, maybe 8.5 years in age, riding one bike. This had the makings for catastrophe since their collective balance was not much better than that of a toddler. As they turned down a street, a car, yes a car was slowly rolling towards them. It stopped. They did not. In fact, they were completely out of control.

Yes, they crashed into the car. It even made the car crashing noise. They hit the front right bumper and fell to the side. I had about 2 seconds of concern until they started yelling at each other. The people just stayed in the car until the boys didn't get up for close to a minute. Then they got out and assessed the situation. The boys were fine. I was even better. I got to see two kids not only bite it, but bite it because they played a losing game of chicken with a Lada (my favorite Russian car).

Now for Tales of the Marshrutka.

The Marshrutka Tale of the Potato of Providence

It was a day like any other on the 184. I was enjoying a ride home on the marshrutka, getting close to the mustached old lady next to me. How was I supposed to know that blessings from on high were just one more stop away?

The number of passengers had dwindled down to me and my lady friend. You see, the 184 begins and ends very close to the street my place is on. As it ends its journey, the 184 rolls down a large hill. When the driver stopped to let his beloved sojourners off of that crazy ride, a beautiful potato rolled from the back of the machine towards the front.

We all paused, looking at it with eyes of wonder. I reached down and picked up this magical potato. My and the mustached old lady studied the potato. It was so beautiful. I looked her in the eye and asked her if she would like the potato. She declined. Then I looked at the driver, also sporting a flavor savor. He looked right back at me, with a soup catcher under my nose. (I am thinking about how I will change the world through the power of my mustache.)
I asked if he would like the potato. He said no as well.

I placed the potato in my bag.

When I reached home, I set the potato in front of me and pondered. What would I do with this potato? I stood up, cleaned the potato and cut it up into bite-sized pieces. I then began to make a soup. I added the potato, or cartofi for my peeps in Moldova. After the proper amount of cooking, I ate the soup with the potato and it was nothing less than delicious.

The moral of this tale of the marshrutka: my life is sad.

The Marshrutka Tale of the Understanding and Sensitive Marshrutka Passenger

Marshrutka drivers are not necessarily known for their benevolence. It is understandable. They don't make a whole lot of money - that is until they started charging 3 lei - so I can sympathize with their financial stinginess.

I encountered such a man on the 180. I had just climbed the hill up to Doina Street to ride into town. It was hot. I was tired. The marshrutka approached and I used a classic jazz hand to flag him down. Once on board, I was surprised to find that I was the only passenger on board.

I handed him my money and sat behind him. Then he got cut off really badly. A guy turned into the street on our right and just stopped in front of him. There was nowhere we could go.

Needless to say, this made the driver quite angry. At this point, I must bring up the fact that my Romanian is terrible, absolutely terrible, surprisingly and shamefully terrible. I know enough to get by and I can understand it a little when it is being spoken slowly and I know the basic topic of conversation.

I have never heard a person talk so rapidly or with such pure rage. I didn't know what to do. He was yelling these things to me. There was nobody else to talk to. So I employed to simple phrases. The first was "I know" and the second was "I understand."

I simply kept repeating these two things. "I know. I know. I understand. I know." shaking my head which implied that the other driver was an idiot. After a few minutes, the car left and the marshrutka driver's rage went with it. He was still complaining, but was much calmer. I offered two last and comforting 'I know's and then something completely unexpected happened. The driver said "Thank you."

Even more unexpected was what he did next. He turned around and gave me my two lei payment. This ride was on the house. I couldn’t believe it. From then on, we were brothers.

A little later, he picked up a few more passengers, then a few more and a few more until the beast was full. But no matter how full that marshrutka got that day or any day after, it will never be as full as the brotherly love we shared on that gorgeous Moldovan afternoon.

Moral of this tale of the Marshrutka: do what you can with what you got.

This concludes Tales of the Marshrutka. God bless us, everyone.

Enjoy

Anticipating this to be a longer than average post, I have developed a brilliant system or organization to allow you, the reader, to read at both your own pace and leisure. It took weeks to figure out this method. In fact, figuring out how to better organize my disjunctive thoughts is, in part, what has prevented me from updating this in such a long time. I shall divide my thoughts using a complex system of numbers which will indicate when I'll be discussing a new thought thus allowing you, the reader, to read one section at a time (if you so desire, feel free to read the entire post or more than one section. The world is your oyster.). Thank yous are not necessary.

I have been a poor blogger as of late. It is not the first time, nor is it likely to be the last. I will attempt to do better. Well then, enough of this vapid introduction, I shall move on to beguiling you with this new science of order.

1. (note that i've made the numbers bold) What have I been doing?Well, I've been doing several things lately. I am still working on furniture at the orphanage. We are currently helping Dima, Ivan and Artur find jobs (i'll try to devote more time to this later) so I am working with a new group of boys. This work has gone very smoothly and should be over in the next week or two. Putting this furniture together has consumed a great deal of time. I'll be happy to see it completed.

Helping Dima, Ivan and Artur find jobs has been really difficult. It took a while for a couple of them to realize that they do, in fact, need jobs to survive. They all have jobs now and I have been meeting with them periodically to see how they're going. I actually just got off the phone with Dima a little while ago and he told me that he likes his new job. Hopefully this one will stick. He told me it is one where he could be around a while and move up the ladder. Artur has been doing construction, as was Ivan. But it looks like Ivan will be going to driving school as opposed to sticking with construction work. After one week of working a typical Moldovan construction job he told me he wanted to drive a taxi.

Victor, Vitalle and Ruslan have worked quite well. I've enjoyed getting to work closer with these boys. I've had relationships with them but I didn't get to spend as much time with them as I am now. In a really rare move, these boys approached Jamey at camp one night after a day of work. They asked him to find out how they were doing at the job but they didn't want him to ask me directly. They wanted him to work into one of our conversations casually because they wanted to make sure they were working hard enough. What a great encouragement that was. It isn't often that these older boys from the orphanage take this kind of initiative. That is my nine to five situation.

2. I also have spent some time at the orphanage with Dorel and Raia looking at some of the needs the orphanage has in terms of property up-keep. As you can imagine, there was quite a bit of work that needs to be done. But, with the unstable state of Moldova's orphan-care policies, it is hard to determine what to do knowing that the orphanage system has the possibility of being abolished (that is something I haven't written about much, if you are more curious, let me know). There are some things that could be done now. I'll give you a short list.

• In the dorms at the orphanage, the vinyl flooring is flaking off and in desperate need of replacing. They already have the material for a few rooms but there are probably close to 100 rooms that need the floors replaced. I remember being in the orphanage one day and watching a little girl as she was sweeping up the floor, literally. It was one of those images that sticks with you for some reason.
• There are several doors that need replaced. When, I say Sneed please remember that I mean "need" and don't mean "would be nice to improve" like that space above the garage (not that there is anything wrong with improving your home [some times]).
• Some of the walls need new wall paper. The old paper is peeling off and falling down.Most of the bed rooms have no curtains or blinds.
• There are many windows that need replacing. Some of them are broken, exposing sharp edges and providing no insulation, which proves troublesome during Moldova's cold winters.
• The roof to the cafeteria is leaking, needs patching and also a new coat of tar.
• More general upkeep.

As you can see, there is plenty to do. They don't have the resources to do these themselves and get little assistance from the government on many of these things (especially with the aforementioned possible move away from an orphanage system). These things will soon be harder to fix because school starts in about a month. There is a construction team coming in the next few weeks that may be able to work on some of these things (we're still working out those details). I would love to see these things get taken care of some how. Hopefully I'll get to be a part of that.

3. I've been sick the last few days. Mainly, my throat and head have been bothering me. It seems as though I'm on the upswing though. Having throat/cold issues is not that great. Though it is true that my voice gets deeper sometimes. I like when this happens because it makes me feel manlier than I already am (yes ladies, that is possible). However, sometimes it just makes my voice sound more nasally. I don't like when this happens because it makes me sound like more of a dork than I already am (yes ladies, that is possible). Any who, I guess I rather not be sick, barry white voice heat not withstanding.

4. Wednesday, at 5:45 in the a.m. Jamey and I took Matthew and Dane to the airport as they began their journey to America (I like to say America in these types of circumstances with a sort of italian-immagrant-like accent. It makes it seem more magical.) I will miss their company. Matthew will be attending graduate school at UNC in hopes to create even smaller mp3 players and x-ray machines while Dane will be traveling to Iowa, the land of farmers' daughters (to steal a line from Zack Morris), to begin an exciting undergraduate career at Cornell.

It was a strange thing to say goodbye to both of them. They are both, in their own right, outstanding individuals and I have learned from both of them. Playing spades without them will be next to impossible, until the robots are completed that is. Though I fear that no robot or combination of robots will be able to capture the light in their collective eyes. Godspeed friends. We'll cross paths again.

5. On a similar note, I will be moving back to America on August 23rd. I think some of you already know this. For those of you who haven't heard, I'm coming home on August the 23rd. It is a few months earlier than planned. Why would be explained easiest in person but I can give the following as a brief explanation. After several weeks of prayer and seeking consultation from the Word and close friends and mentors, it became clear that the purpose God has called me here for is close to being at an end.

This is a strange thing to say because, in truth, I don't really know why He brought me here. I could look back and come up with things that God accomplished and taught me while here and say that those were the reasons, but I'm not going to do that. Many of the things He is doing, we don't see. I'm sure that there are things invisible that God does right in front of our eyes. God knows why I came here. There are tangible things, yes. But sometimes I think the stuff we can't see is probably the most beautiful. To a degree, that is grace: seeing the invisible.

All that to say, I came over with the peace of knowing He wanted me to and I feel like I'll leave with the peace of knowing He wanted me to. In time God will, like He already is, show me why.

6. Jen Gash, by way of Joe Swing, brought the following to my attention: http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/07/27/happy.world.reut/index.html
Here is a look at the complete list: http://www.le.ac.uk/pc/aw57/world/sample.html

As you can see, Moldova didn't do so well. We were 175 out of the 178 countries. In spite of the fact that this science has proven this place to be dissapressing (oh yeah!), I must say that I am still quite happy. The collective Denmark ain't got nothing on me.

In related news, I've decided that over the course of the next few years I shall live and missioneer (a word for what missionaries do) in countries 176-178, Congo Democratic, Zimbabwe and Burundi respectively, thus proving myself to be the most hardcore mission person ever. Take that Lottie Moon!

To clarify, I am joking. I don't typically make my decisions based on such criteria. My life choices are made using several 9-sided dice and very complicated algorithmic equations.

7. Now, I shall rest. Remember, I am still somewhat sick and need to sleep. Per the request of some folks here in Moldova I shall, in the near future, tell two tales of the Marshrutka: The Marshrutka Tale of the Potato of Providence & The Tale of the Understanding and Sensitive Marshrutka Passenger. Until that time, sera buna.

[On a personal note, I must say that if you have made it this far, I love you. Seriously I mean that. You've always been a good friend, anonymous reader. You're true blue. I appreciate you.]

clarification

i am not a vegan. i made an ill attempt at humor which was evidently taken seriously. i love to eat animal and things from animals, such as cheese. also, soy products i've tasted, especially soy ice cream, are unpleasing to my sensitive and sophisticated pallet.

taco bell is tasty and a friend to all diets.

scrappy-the dog formerly known as vodka- has returned home . he was gone for about a month and randomly returned one day a couple of weeks ago. to my knowledge, he was never a sandwich, sandwhich, or sand witch (i think several spellings are used. i'm not sure which one is correct but i do love the imagery of a dog-witch who dwells in some type of desert or beach or box [that is, a box with sand].)

i am leaving the beard off of my face thus exposing my collection of chins. for a brief spell -roughly 4 minutes- i was the ashamed, as opposed to proud, possesor of a mustache (please pronounce with syllable emphasis on the latter half of the word with a sort of smug tone). i took pictures and may get around to posting them some time, if i can live with the shame.

America and a Messianic Jew

First off, it is the 4th of July and I desperately covet your hamburgers and potato salads. Actually, I don’t covet them since I have become a vegan but I still wish you a happy 4th of July and shall give you one of my favorite stories of the holiday.

Some time ago some of my good friends and I were celebrating the aforementioned holiday. We were traveling towards Downtown Brentwood for some exciting firework action. It was a glorious night, not too warm, a nice breeze comforting us, full of patriotic bliss. A night such as this warrants a strict rolling-down-of-the-windows policy which we were all happy to obey.

As we pull up to a stop-light, my good friend Judson makes eye-contact with a man in an adjacent car. It was the kind of eye contact that demanded verbal engagement. We were all drawn to it. This moment was one that would be special. Call it a 6th sense if you must, but we all knew we were about to have a moment.

After little thought, Judson utters one word, proudly and boldly, to this stranger:

“America.”

Without missing a beat, the man shook his head in agreement, declaring the following:

“You’d better believe it.”

And we did, because that word stood for something. I could throw out the buzzwords but you already know them. Love it or hate it, America is a great place to live. Is it perfect?
Of course it isn’t. It is something for which it is worth being grateful.

Secondly, I feel I am long overdue in giving you an update on things here. Some of it I will be able to talk more about in the next few weeks and days and I ask you to be patient as I wait for the proper time. Some of it I can tell you about, but won’t because I’m a jerk.

I’m joking, if only a little. The homes in Gratieşti, which will serve as the transitional homes for boys and girls from the orphanage into independent life, are slowly moving along. There is some work being done on the girl’s home but the work that can be done is very minimal. Documents and paperwork is still the primary thing being done. I have no idea how long, exactly, this will take. It could be a few weeks or more. But they are moving along well and we seem to have a good company involved in the projects.

We have had a little delay in the furniture we have been building. I’ll be a little wordier on that later in the week. Right now it is just sitting, as am I. I’ve already read two and a half books this week (Into the Air by Jon Krakauer [which I absolutely was enthralled by], How to be Good by Nick Hornby [not as good as some of his other books but an enjoyable read] and Contemplative Prayer by Thomas Merton [I really like his writings on spiritual matters]. I’ve also been spending some time in the Old Testament (mainly Genesis), a place I wish I spent more time in. Hopefully we’ll get some news on the room this week. It has been nice to catch up on some reading.

Speaking of the Old Testament, I had the chance to spend some time with a Messianic Jew named Ghenadie who is an extremely talented painter from Moldova. Some friends of mine bumped into him at the national history museum and they began speaking.

It turns out that he is the president of an organization that works for spiritual renewal through the arts with the children of Moldova from a Christian perspective. They are active with the orphan population here in Chisinau. He was an amazing man and artist. For those of you who have been to Internat 2 in Chisinau and have seen the graffiti murals on the walls, you have seen one of the things his organization has done. He was an amazing man and artist.

We had the good fortune of going to his home to have a private showing of his work. As he led us into his home and studio, I was confronted with a painting of Jesus on trial in the synagogue that was about 8 feet long and 5 feet high. It was absolutely breathtaking due to its great spiritual depth and its style.

This painting was deeply personal. It had a wonderful Jewish perspective of a beautiful yet sometimes painful Christian event. He placed himself in this painting but put his back facing you, the painting’s audience, thus placing you in the theme. There was a visible dichotomy between light and darkness, heaven and hell, good and evil. It was theological and profoundly spiritual, which is hard in any form of expression to get across. I could try to describe it, but I would fail time and time again. A thousand words wouldn’t do it justice. I hope it will suffice to say that it is truly breathtaking.

He and his wife then proceeded to show us some of his other works. They were all amazing. There was one called “John” which I would love to take home. I can’t afford it though. That was what else struck me about this man. He had ideals. When asked how much he would sell his paintings for, he gave us high prices saying he knows they are high but doesn’t want to sell them because they are evangelical tools for him, especially the painting I spoke about earlier. They are ways he speaks of his “rebirth,” the only way he ever spoke about his salvation through Jesus Christ.

He doesn’t want to sell his paintings to someone who would just hang them on a wall to look pretty somewhere. They have stories to tell, deep meanings and dialogues to start about Christ. They are the way he engages a specific culture with the Gospel. How do you put a price on that?

Meeting Ghenadie was a breath of fresh air. I love seeing people who have blatantly been transformed and reborn by and in the Gospel and who express that occurrence in deeply beautiful ways. I hope to be one of those people.

elvis

i look at this picture and see passion, a man absorbed in what he is doing. then he got old, he got fat and finally got himself dead, on a toilet.

what happened?

i think of my life and i don't want this to happen to me. i've already gotten a little fat but i sure as heck don't want to die on a toilet. i want to finish my life with vigor, with passion. i want to be young elvis. i don't much care for old elvis.

paul's letters to timothy are a great help to me. it is a mentor's letters to a young, and from what i've gathered, somewhat scared man who is in over his head (a good place to be to experience God).

it's not just the advice, the wisdom that paul gives timothy that i love. it's the fact that paul is finishing as a young elvis, not the one that could barely squeeze into his gaudy jumpsuits. he still had the passion he did when he declared much earlier in his minisry that "i decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified." (1 cor. 2:2)

it is in these letters, his final writings, that he is able to declare the following: "i've fought the good fight, i have finished the race, i have kept the faith." (2 tim. 4.:7) and the fact was that he was still doing it. look closely a few verses down, he asks for timothy to bring his books and parchments above all (he also asks him to bring his cloak, which may or may not have been covered in rhine stones. we'lll never know). he knew it was just about his time to go but he still sought to know Christ and him crucified through the scriptures (the parchments). seeking Truth until the end.

i want that. i want to be a beat-up old fart who loves Christ with all he's got and who has been going strong since he started all those years back. i pray for the grace to love God passionately, which probably starts in the grace of knowing that He loves me.

of course, if you prefer the bloated elvis, this might not mean the same thing i'm hoping it does. metaphors are dangerous for this reason as. fyi- elvis died at the age of 42, easily the best number in the world.

i'm going crazy

that's about it. i think i'm losing it.

Don't read the end if you like animals.

On Monday evening, I returned to Moldova. In my time back, I've mastered the art of not sleeping at all.

There are so many possible causes. There is the obvious time change, the harder bed, the lower-quality pillow, the chorus of dogs that apparently dwells on top of my roof, the diet I must get readjusted to, the questions that have risen in my time away and, shockingly, the strange man who moved into my room during my retreat (note: he has crazy, yet tender eyes, which glow in a piercing red, gazing right through me as I cling to my blanket for a comfort that would not come. My clinging tis but vanity as we both know that blanket could never keep me safe from his hatred. My only hope, fettered though it may be, is that he will fall into repose first.). These things together could inspire insomnia in any creature, and a strange creature I indeed am.

I wish I could say that things went smoothly these past three weeks with me across the ocean. Obviously, there have been some problems, problems I am working through with some of the other wonderful people stationed here in Moldova. I've been thrown a somewhat expected curveball, but it still managed to take me off guard. That happens sometimes. No matter how well you've prepared yourself for something, some things just don't let you get prepared. I'm told, and even have told people, that these are the times when God is at His best (as if there are times He isn't), that it is in weakness that God's power is made perfect. Those things are, I trust, true. And in my sleepless state, I've been able to listen to His voice even though it was so quiet I had to strain to hear it.

He gave me no answers. For the most part He told me to be quiet, to be still.

I love to fill the silence with noise, some sort of static to keep me from those things. While home, it was voices of friends I haven't seen in too long, bluegrass music on Sunday nights, Sportscenter a couple of times a day, the blue Weezer album in my car (played loudly to help me hit the really high notes) and an enormous box fan lulling me to sleep. Not that these are bad things, especially not that Weezer album, they just prevented me from ever really being quiet and from being still.

I say all this so that if you haven’t done those two things in conjunction with each other recently, you'll consider it. If it’s a nice day, go lie in the grass and look into the sky and just be there. If it’s raining, find cover (or not) and watch it rain. Watch the clouds move past the moon and breathe it in. The heavens declare God’s glory and I feel like this world needs more witnesses to that glory. Just take it in.

In a completely unrelated matter, my cat Chief is missing and probably gone forever. You were a good cat, as far as cats go, and I, for one, will miss you. I’m sorry I didn’t know you better. Godspeed, friend. Godspeed.

Furthermore, for those of you who knew Scrappy, also known as"Vodka" for a brief time (i.e. the dog found in Falesti during January), there is a better than average chance that he has been stolen and, as a result of the theft, has been eaten my some family or dog thief or some innocent person who thought they were getting a more traditional type of meat from a street-side vendor. I'll think of him somewhat fondly and also as something like the following.

Lastly, the two puppies, who I titled Estelle Getty and Chuck Norris and who formerly ran about our place, are also gone. I often would declare "those puppies are so cute, they're edible." It frightens me to think somebody may have thought likewise and then acted upon that thought.

It has been a bad month for pets.

english, glorious english

for about a week and a half, i've been enjoying the united states of america. coming home from any place which speaks in strange tongues is always a relief. even bad conversations are good conversations.
it was quite enjoyable as the customs agent attempted to make me feel like a lesser person because i was not sure which line i was supposed enter this country through. i thanked him for cutting me back down to size. i was being smug, asking him for advice and all. honestly, it was just nice to understand somebody was, indeed, telling you that you were, indeed, an idiot instead of assuming that was, indeed, the case. indeed.

food has, by far, been the most popular topic. perhaps our collectively excessive girth can be attributed to a healthy obsession of food. for the record: soup, moldovans and i eat a lot of soup and seem to be a meat and potatoes kind of place. also, i have eaten at palmas twice, taco bell once (after receiving fillings that were three years over due) and have had pizza twice. cereal continues to be a popular part of my diet, but that shouldn't really surprise anyone.

am i in culture shock? no. i'm not. at this time, this is all i will say. i could talk about my reactions coming back into this culture for a long time and possibly will in the future. it should suffice to say that i am no more dissatisfied with the things this world has to offer than before i left. in any culture, people put things before God. and in any culture, this makes me uncomfortable. whether it be money, junk, looks, roosters, cars, sour cream, chalupas, macs, comfort, careers, alcohol, sugar cereals or jazz hands, anything put before God should make us sick to our stomachs and will never satisfy us like the God who created us to love and be loved by Him could, will and does. the extravagance of these things, on a strictly worldly scale, may change but the fact that they are all fallen substitutes for our relationship with God does not.

the world is groaning, from both poverty and wealth, not to mention a healthy middle class. Christ is the only thing that gives that groaning a hope, an expectancy and a purpose.

grace has sustained me these four months, like it has since i shot out of the womb 24 years ago. i've seen with fresh eyes how true this is and also how beautiful it is. grace isn't just about atoning for sin. it's about sustaining, energizing, teaching, providing, healing, hope, and more than i know. it is a powerful attribute of God's love and how grateful we should be to be heirs of it.

and it is God's love and grace that i pray those guys across the pond encounter in my absence. it is those things i hope they cling to, they accept, they claim and treasure. i ask you to continue joining me in prayer for them.

finally, i must say thank you all for all of the prayer and support you have given me thus far. it would be hard to express what it has meant to me. again, please feel free to email me at tim.bedi@gmail.com or comment below if you have questions or would like to get together. i leave the 4th of june. during the weekdays are the best times. i'll do what i can to accommodate your schedule. thanks again and Godspeed.

i've ruined all chances of future card games

it is about 1:37 am. most nights i would be nestled warmly in my bed dreaming of chalupas and cokes with unlimited refills and enough ice to construct an igloo which would comfortably house an average sized inuet family. i have strange dreams. don't judge me.

all that to say, i should be asleep. sleep, however, shan't come easy. a couple of hours ago, i completed an intense game of phase 10, a game at which i shamelessly and openly cheat. my good friend seth and i get along splendidly, that is unless we are playing skip-bo because i cheat and try to move his cards for him. my brother and i once got in a stupid and petty argument over certain technicalities in the scoring of a little game called rook. if you play any game where a banker is needed, you'd best not assign that role to me. i will launder money. i do this because these games don't really excite me. i will attempt to draw others into my web of deception and horrible gamesmenship and it works more than not.

this stems from childhood wounds i incurred from two people who shall remain nameless, let's just call them my brother and sister.

uno

this is a word which did not escape from my lips as a child. why? because they made up their own rules. they crafted rules which made it impossible to compete. i had no defense. i was young and impressionable. it is the curse of the little brother. now i inflict my wounds on others. i am a sad individual. i know this to be true.

but there is more keeping me awake besides memories of gaming gone awry.

in the neighborhood of 30 some odd hours i'll begin to travel to america, a place where there are no cats and the streets are filled with cheese. it is amazing that this point of time has arrived so quickly. it is a definite landmark. shall we reflect?

indeed we shall.

i leave here feeling close to the guys. we have been through a lot together. we have grown together, individually and collectively. i'm no longer this random guy to them and they are no longer a bunch of names and pictures. they are a part of me and i of them.

which leads me to this thought: i am extremely worried.

i don't know what is going to happen at this point. with these guys, things could go wrong at any moment. they have all made so much progress but that could all be lost on some stupid choice. and i cannot help but wonder if my leaving will somehow enable them to make that stupid choice. they have such potential. to see them waste it would be a tradgedy.

today we had a hard talk. we've had many of those. i had to remind them that they have a job and they are expected to live up to the expectations we set together. the last week or so, they have not done this. so we confronted it, we got it out.

during the course of the conversation, their heads dropped. eye contact became a thing of the past. the conversation was rough on all of us.

whenever we have these talks, they will end with one of them pleading with me not to be angry. they are so terrified that i will stop loving them because of what they have done. they live in fear of that. it messes up their world to have people who have cared about them upset with them.

tonight was no different. the words "i'm not angry dima, i'm worried"came out of my mouth. their faces changed and their posture followed suit. for a moment they got it. for a moment, so did i. i'm not pushing them because i think their worthless. i'm pushing them because they have great worth. when i see them making wrong choices, i'm not upset because they are not living up to what i think they should. i'm upset because there is so much more for them. life can be so much better than what they think it can.

God loves us.

He actually loves us.

in that furious, pure love God longs for us to claim the life He has provided in the resurrection. life could be so much better than we think it could. it could be better because Christ is better, better than anything else we could find.

i've known and classified that as true for a while. encountering it is totally different. i'm starting to feel that truth in my gut and i like it.

in, seven hours i'll be at the orphanage or i'll owe artur one million dollars (he likes me to be on time). it will be my last day with them for a while. it is a day that holds unknown emotions. pray for them. i urge you. pray for them. pray for anybody. just pray.

and mean it.

also pray for my card playing habits, of which i am a tid bit ashamed and for which feel moderate contrition.

mexican in two weeks or so

I have been absent. This would be the point when I would usually apologize for my lack of a recent update. I will not, however, be making that apology for doing so would make this blog feel more like confession and I, despite my fondness of some of the older Catholic mystic literature, am not a Catholic.

Who knows? Maybe a little confession would be a good thing. A confession could fulfill the duel role of explaining my silence and providing a informative, cathartic rant for you good people to peruse. Where have I been?

I've retreated to my head for a spell. It isn't really all that interesting but it is confusing enough to take up a good bit of my time. Those of you who know me well, know that there are times when I'll just disappear for a while. I'll be quiet. I'll be terrible at returning emails. And it appears that I'll also be a negligent blogger.

In two weeks, I'll step off of a plane and into the Nashville airport. My good friend and outstanding person, Judson Abernathy, is getting married and I was asked to be in the wedding before Moldova was on the radar. I'll be home for a few weeks, eating mexican food and drinking absurd amounts of coffee.

I suppose this is a sort of landmark, a time where I'll see my home and myself in a different light. It has started me down a contemplative road. There are hundreds of questions to ask, and for that matter, to answer. I'll get some of those answers and for some of the others I'll be content to wait. These things have made me quiet, my fingers as well.

We've taken a few days off of work. They have been doing work at the orphanage on the side walks and trees. Raia, the administrator we deal with, didn't want us working with all the things going on.

About the trees, they are cutting them down. It is awful. And since I'm in this solitude, quiet state thing, it seems like it should be profound.

When I asked what was going on, I was told they were being cut down because of the fluff. Evidently the fluff is really bad and makes people sick. This is the word they used: fluff. Fluff is making people sick. Amen.

I think about the title of this blog in light of this. And although it seems a little trite or cliche to work it into a post, I cannot resist. "I see people, they look like trees walking around." and we are choking on our fluff. Why do we spend so much time trying to make our lives seem fuller with things that only make them emptier?

Richard Foster, in Celebration of Discipline (a book I strongly suggest absorbing), says in the first part of the book that this world needs deep people. We, those in Christ, are united with the deepest entity that has ever been. It is by abiding in Him that we will find depth and this world will find what it needs. We have poluted it with fluff, with self help books, with catchy bumber stickers, with judgement (ours that is), and with anything but love. We are supposed to be the aroma of Christ in this world. When I say we, I mean I. I am supposed to be those things. I need God to cut off my branches, to get rid of the fluff. I'm choking on it. It is making me sick. And it is making the world sick.

The thing I have to offer this world is Christ. He is, without comparison or rival, the greatest thing I have found while in this world. I pray that we will know the depth of God and let it transform our lives into the sweet fragrance of Christ.

It's alright, 'cause I'm saved by the bell.

For those of you who are not savvy to the phenomenon of the very late 80’s and early 90’s, otherwise known as Saved by the Bell, this post might mean little to you. However, for those of you who relished NBC’s T-NBC Saturday morning lineup, including the aforementioned show, and for even more of you who came to love and adore this show during its countless showings on TBS and WGN during the latter half of the 90’s (unless, of course, the cubs or braves were playing and especially if they were playing each other which meant no SBTB and double coverage of the same game, enough to lead a man to madness), this post will rate high in sentimental value and perhaps, perchance and possibly take you back to Bayside, back to the Max and those brief, yet glorious days at the Malibu Sands Beach Club.

Bayside High School, the petry dish for this glorious experiment, was, at the very least, a utopian high school in which dorks, jocks, cheerleaders, brains, fashion queens and, well, Zack could live together in pure community and even befriend the school’s princi"pal" (How do you categorize a Zack Morris? How do you catch a cloud and pin it down? Both good and fair questions I say.) This was a school where self-imposed social walls were broken down in the name of equality and justice. Perhaps you think my language is too strong. Perhaps you’re right. But I will not apologize for the love and passion this show inspires, not only in me, but in the thousands of Saved by the Bell devotees.

This show struck a chord. I’ve seen people get into SBtB trivia battles so intense that fights almost ensued. A college roommate and I used to get up at six in the morning to catch a couple episodes, go back to bed after the shows and go back to sleep before class. They even did an E! True Hollywood Story on it. So it is with great honor that I write this post. With no further ado, here is the list. [note: there is no doubt i could have overlooked an episode. this was like picking between my own kids (iffin i had any)]

Honorable Mention:
Episode 9.2 “Dancing to the Max”
Episode 10.7 “Rent-a-Pop”
Episode 12.t2 “Teen-Line” (note: all though this episode contains a very memorable quote about keeping the Teen-Line op-en, the Tori-run was, in my opinion one of the worst things, beside the new class, to happen to the franchise. The Tori episodes lacked the chemistry that made the show work. Like my lungs need air, my Zack needs Kelly and my Slater needs his momma. The lack of Kelly and Jessie makes watching any Tori episodes, no matter how entertaining, incomplete.)
Episode 11.16 “Rockumentary” Zack Attack

The Top 5
#5 12.3 “Screech’s Spaghetti Sauce”
-“The sauce a you can have. But the secret she’s a mine.” Start with a delicious spaghetti sauce, mix in Zack’s entrepreneurial acumen, add a little Punky Brewster and you got a winner.

#4 M.4 (the summer run “My Boyfriend’s Back”
-I loved the summer run. I missed my Mr. Belding, but Leon Carosi proved to be a fantastic antagonist for Zack and the gang. Give Leon a daughter, Stacie, who Zack falls for and summer love gets exciting. This episode tests that love when Stacie’s ex-boyfriend Craig Strand comes back to give Stacie his fraternity pin. After an extreme obstacle course coming to fruition in an ATV race, love proves to be enough.

#3 11.4 “Check Your Mate”
- ‘I surrender Screechnivich, you’re too good.” This episode is one part “Searching for Bobby Fisher” and another part “the Sting.” A lucky beret is stolen given to Screech by his lady, Violet (played by Tori Spelling). Zack and Slater stand to lose $300 in a bet they made on the chess championship with arch-rival Valley and their Russian-chess master Peter Breznev. Chess was never so exciting. Will Vinnie & Guy-Guy ever learn? I think not. Go Bayside!

#2 10.13 “The Fabulous Belding Brothers”-

‘We may not have gotten the cooler Belding. But we got the Better Belding.’ Rod is no Richard. In this episode, we see just how well Richard Belding puts the “pal” in principal. Richard Belding is the greatest television principal of all time, hands down. Zack realizes just how much Mr. Belding cares for his students in this episode, and so did we. Richard Belding was a man of integrity and honor. He was a father-figure for Zack, whose father Derek was always talking on enormous cell phones.

#1 10.9 “Jessie’s Song!”

Come on, was there every any doubt? This is, without a doubt, the height of the Saved by the Bell writing. It covers every single emotion effortlessly. It touches our hearts and doesn’t even ask permission. We get a music video for the Hot Sundaes song “Go for It,” we see the great length’s Screech will go to in order to help his friends, Jessie’s hard exterior is broken down after becoming addicted to pills she takes to keep her awake so she can keep up with everything and we see how Zack truly is the glue that holds this show together. This episode will stand the test of time. Perhaps the most famous line in any episode still rings out today. “I’m so excited. I’m so excited. I’m so…..scared.” Aren’t we all, Jessie, aren’t we all?

you never know who you're talking to

a while back i met this guy sasha, one of the cafeteria workers at the orphanage. sasha speaks a little english and likes to practice with me whenever he gets a chance. we have lovely conversations.

normally, he will ask me about the finer points of english: conjunctions, subject placement, what certain explatives mean, and so on and so forth. sometimes he'll ask me about life in america as his eyes glaze over imagining a life filled with an overabundance of restaraunts, hummers, a relatively low stray dog population (thanks in part to the efforts of the Bob Barker) and litter-free streets.

the other day he had another topic in mind. he completely bypassed our usual banter and tedious fustian. this day his mind followed only one track. there was no 'hello.' there was only a 'i need to find a new job.'
i did bite.

why? i asked.
' i only make 40$ a month here. this is not enough.'
[he has been working there for three years. 12 x 40 x 3 = 1,440$ over his tenure.]
well sasha, what skills do you have?
'what is my profession?'
yes
'well, i studied nuclear science in college.'
i'm sorry. did you say nuclear science?
'yes, i worked at a nuclear power plant in russia for a time. after this i began to work for the KGB in a highly secret submarine factory. it was very secret. KGB, gorbachov, perestroika, everything.'
let me get this straight sasha. you studied nuclear science, worked at a nuclear power plant, and then worked at a highly secretive submarine factory for the kgb, the state security committee, whose emblem is as follows

'yes, this line of work is not needed in moldova.'
i guess not. so you did all that, and now you work in a cafeteria?
'yes.'
wow.
'i must go now, good bye.' he said quite abruptly[perhaps he divulged too much information and now fears for his life. old times are gone but not forgotten.]
see you later, sasha. and he fades into the sunset.

moldova. there it is.