Fred Flintstone Bowling

We got to do a little bowling in Iasi. This place was pretty incredible, the lanes were alright, the pins were a bit outdated, but my second-favorite aspect of this adventure was the surface of the bowling balls. I'm pretty sure these were rocks that someone had whittled down for days on end, until they closely resembled spheres. Then they cut out little pockets for fingers. You need to be careful when picking these up, lots of jagged edges.
Little did we know that the professionals next us would be putting on a show. The video shows my favorite part of the experience.

The Road to Iasi

Desperately in need of a road trip, Paige, Sean, and I decided we'd spend a weekend in a little Romanian town called Iasi (pronounced Yawsh for all you foreigners out there). It's not too far from the border of Moldova, and the road is smooth and clear. Ironically, the president of Moldova had this road resurfaced and it is now the nicest road in Moldova, and also the road that leads out of the country. This irony is not lost on Moldovan citizens.

We ended up hitching a ride with a band of wandering missionary nomads. The video really tells the tale. They were kind enough to let us share a van with them, help us through the border, and even made us pancakes in the morning!

Meeting the Neighbors

This is a video from a few weeks back. We came home to find some unexpected visitors in the Buddhist meditation center/apartment we were living in.

Human Trafficking in the News

There have been some important articles recently regarding human-trafficking. They'd be worth checking out through the links to the right.

no smoking unless you want to

So we're here, stomping the streets of Chisinau, trying to make a difference in the former Soviet Republic. And I think we're slowly carving out a little niche for ourselves. We've become regulars at a little Greek restaurant called "Opa." The food's great and relatively cheap, the service is sub-par, but all in all it's a great place to sit down next to a "No Smoking" sign, light up, and eat a gyro.

Saving up your money for a rainy day...

I've been in Chisinau for a week now - actually I got here last Thursday morning at 1:30 am, so almost one week. I figured I might as well start a blog of my own while I'm here. The video really lets you know what that experience was like, arriving for the first time after a relatively challenging experience in Bucharest.