Journey to the Netherlands

We have left Moldova for a journy to visit our family in the Nimegen, Netherlands for the holidays. Chrisna's sister, Belia and her husband Bart have just had their second child, her name is Lieve, 3 weeks ago today. So we are going to help out with whatever needs doing and give them some family cheer.

We left Moldova and arrived at the airport in Milan. A very cool and modern airport where we walked all over the place trying to find our connection on EZ Jet to Amsterdam. They should have named it NotSO EZJet. What a bunch of chaos. We left the nice modern terminal #1 via the tunnel below, and waited on the street for a bus to the outcast budget terminal #2 where we clawed our way throught the EZJet crowds.

Well, by midnight, a plane and two trains later, we finally made it. It was great to arrive to see the smiling faces of family. Below is Belia and Chrisna and Lieve.
On Sunday, Bart took me to see NEC (the Nimegen pro soccer club) play Feyenoord, a very good team from Rotterdam. It was cold at the stadium, but we had great seats just 6 rows up from the field, thank to Bart's company who does the graphic design and advertising stuff for NEC. Bart actually designed the team logo. The game started with lots of home for an upset, but unfortunately, we lost 0-2.

A Visit to Kiev, Ukraine

David, Liliana, Chrisna and I took off for a long weekend in Kiev at the beginning of December.

I was hoping to meet with a colleague who develops centers for entrepreneurship in Ukraine, and see if there was a possibility for some similar efforts in Moldova.


Kiev was COLD.

Kiev was GREY.

Kiev was EXPENSIVE.



We stayed at the flat of a friend of Liliana's. We learned that folks with basic jobs cannot afford to live anywhere near the city center. We were 15 minutes walking to a subway station, and then a 30 minute ride into the city from there.

So we walked on the ice in the cold wind, past block after block of huge gray apartment buildings near nothing but other huge gray apartment buildings, past street side vegetable vendors to the subway.

We took the trains, which were really quite ok, until we reached the center of the city. When we got out, were must have been hundreds of feet underground. The escalator going up was the longest and steepest I'd ever seen in my life. Sure enough, we emerged on a broad hilltop, covered with cathedrals, nice buildings and fancy shops. We saw the surrounding city from high up in a cathedral clock tower.

For the most part, we were not that impressed. In the summer or spring, this would likely be a much nicer place. But the winter under-emphasizes the trees and rivers, and over-emphasizes the course blocky architecture and lack of attention to exterior aesthetics. It was my second visit, and Kiev is remains in my mind an expensive, ugly, unkempt city with beautiful people walking about when the weather is nice.








We ate street food. The picture at the top shows Chrisna and I at our absolute happiest moment of the trip. We found a Turkish Kebob stand just outside of an expensive food market, and boy was that good!


Getting a Haircut
And the cultural highlight of it all for me? I got a haircut. That's me in the first picture waiting, looking at the newspaper as if I can read Ukrainian. I found the sports page immediately. Now that's living baby! I've gotten a haircut in all kinds of places. It's one of the things I like to do when I travel. If I find a plain old barber shop, or simple salon, I'll make sure to go and get a haircut. There are lots of reasons this is a good idea, and a few reasons why it is a bad idea. The good is that hair salons and barber shops are gossip centers and a great way to get some local flavor and information. Second, hair style is highly regional cultural specific. The differences between a foreign and a local haircut can be very subtle, but completely obvious to a local. Getting a local haircut immediately helps you blend, certainly not completely, but at least enough not to stick out quite so much. Third, each haircut in a foreign place is an adventure for both oneself and for the barber or stylist. What will it look like? Who is this person? How can we communicate? Fun fun fun.

At this place, the poor stylist had just put curlers in her hair, and she was so embarrassed that she yelled at David for taking a picture. Then her friend ran out of the back laughing, and got another picture of he cutting the American's hair. Chrisna waited outside completely nervous about what this was going to look like.

Snow in Chisinau

Well we have had our first major snow in the city. It is really quite nice. Out at the Academy of Public Administration, on Str. Ialovini on a hill at the edge of Chisinau it's been snow covered for over a week. However, here in centru all we had before this was a couple of snow flurry events that produced no accumulation. The night it began snowing in earnest, we met the other Fulbrighters at Symposium restaurant for a knowledge sharing session and also a farewell to Valery Mock, who was leaving at the end of the week. After dinner and discussion about conference papers and so forth with the group, Chrisna and I went for a long walk in the middle of the snowy night. It's got to be one of the great urban pleasures -- walking alone down the middle of the street late at night -- and when it's all covered with fresh powdery snow it's an even greater pleasure. It's cold, no doubt about it, but no more cold the Washington D.C. or New York or Cincinnati in winter. Below is a slide show of snowy Chisinau.

Tour and Wine Tasting at Milistii Mici Winery Caves and Tunnels, Ialovini, Moldova.
Our friend Anna, a local who works as a program coordinator for the Peace Corps, set-up the reservation, negotiated a good price, and had her brother drive us over in the family van. After we left the city it took about 30 min for us to get to the winery… As usual, we passed mile after mile of vinyards, but now covered in fresh snow. While sitting in the back of the van, bouncing around like beer cans on all the bumps and pot-holes, and after almost catching some air going down and up a hill in the snow at 120, Mark did ask Anna’s if it was her bother’s first day driving. We made it alive and no one got sick.

Entering the vineyard we got directed to the office, at this time is had started to snow again ever so lightly. Anna hopped out to find our tour-guide, and once she got back she said that we we’re going to drive the van into the caves? The tour guide hopped in and they opened a gate to the underground caves and there it was an full underground “city”. It as absolutely amazing. The winery has about 200 employees that work underground in these caves all day, everyday. These tunnels were started about 200yrs ago to mine limestone. In1968, when Russia brought in machinery that was able to dig through the lime stone and extract building blocks, they spent the next 40 yr making 200 kilometers of underground tunnels –all big enough to drive through. The winery currently only uses about 50 km of the tunnels. The temperature underground stays constant between 12 -14 C and also has a constant humidity level of 85-95%, and it's dark, making it the ideal environment for storing wine. The deepest point in the tunnel is 80 meters underground, with the restaurant where we ate and tasted wine at 60 meters underground.
So, as we drove through the tunnel, we first stopped at a underground spring, that created a waterfall in the tunnel. Per our guide the water as fit to drink, which I did try and it was nice and fresh. We moved on to see miles of roads with big wine barrels on the side in which wine is stored. (and these are only the barrels, they also store over 2 million bottles of wine! The largest collection in the world.) The oak barrels were built from oak that was obtained in Russia. The barrels (6000 liters) are still in use, and after each wine has finished it’s time is the barrels (about 20 years in the barrel), woman climb into the barrels through a tiny door in front, and scrape the insides of the barrels clean and raw before new wine is placed in the same barrel. Supposedly they clean the insides of the barrels always by hand.
We found it very interesting that Milistii Mici did not grow their own wine grapes until 2000. Before that they made the wine from unprocessed after-the-crush wine juice from vineyards around the country. The grape juice was blended by their wine makers then placed in barrels and turned into wine.

While driving along the barrels I asked our guide if they all had wine in them. She said only those with a passport did. She explained that a passport was simply a white piece of paper placed on the outside of the barrel, describing the wine and date the wine was placed in the barrel. We continued on and our second stop was at the underground wine cellar. This is the largest underground wine cellar in the world. It is the most impressive cellar I have ever seen, and so much wine. Walking around this cellar was a beautiful experience. You could see bottles that were covered in dust and growth around the corks of all sorts, and others that had more recently been placed there. The wine that was stored here was wine that had spend maybe 13-20 years in wine barrels and was placed in these wine bottles in 2000, for their second aging. Many of their wine’s for sale are from 1986 and 1987 at the latest. That means that the 1988's have not yet been released! Incredible!

We continued on, and our guide told us that during 1985-1987 Mikhail Gorbachev, then leader of the Soveit Union, banned or greatly limited all forms of alcohol, and people had to hide alcohos products or they would be taken away to be controlled or destroyed. At Milestii Mici, they hid the best wines in a secret tunnel within the cellar, because corrupt officials would take that first. With that she pressed on something and a whole stone wall moved back, about three feet thick of solid stone. While it was automated now, people used to have to push the whole wall back by hand. And behind the wall there was another smaller cellar tunnel with more wine (small being relative to the rest of the place). In this tunnel the oldest wine is stored. There were bottles from 1968. Our guide told us that Steven Segal, who was visiting Moldova last week to invest in a movie production faciliy, also took a tour of the wine cellar and purchased 4 bottles of wine that were from 1968 for $10,000. As I stood in front of the bottles of wine from 1968, all covered in dust, and nasty assorted detritus, I was wondering how those wines would taste, and whether they were really worth spending $10,000 on. As our guide told us about which specific wines he had bought, I could see how proud she felt being able to tell that story. She told us that becuase the storate conditions are so idea, the wine would last and last as long as the corks were changed every 25 years.

We wandered through the cellars that seemed never ending. And our guide kept pointing things out and telling us little tid-bits of information like when she pointed out their Negru de Purcari wine , she said that they ship this wine to England since it’s one of Queen Elizabeth’s favorites. At this point I was thinking that I should have brought a corkscrew, they would never notice one bottle missing?

Then she said that we were going to our final stop to taste wine…YES!!!!
So, we walked back to the car and drove to our final stop. As, we got there we entered this beautiful hallway, and you could hear live music from a violin and accordion. We entered this nice room, that was beautifully set with wine glasses, bread,cheese, meats, fruit, and vegetables. We were going to taste seven wines. So, as we got poured a little bit of wine for tasting, our guide explained that we should be smelling hints or currants for their Sauvignon, a bouquet of flowers for the Pinto Gris. More food arrived. Then we moved on to the reds, we had a Purpliu, a Codru- which is a mixture of Cabernet and Merlot grapes, then we had their 1986 Carbnet Savignion, which was fantastic. We ended the tasting with a sweet wine – 1987 Traminer, really creamy. As she finished explaining about the last wine, she said well enjoy your food, and just let the waiter know which wine you would like to drink. Basically, all seven bottles we had purchased ( as part of our $50 fee) and we were able to drink them all. So, there we were, sitting 60 meters underground, with beautiful food, and great company making our way through six bottles of wine. For two hours we talked, ate, drank and when the musicians came to our room, we also danced, Blidi even played the accordian! To conclude our tasting the last bottle was opened. This was a bubbly, which I liked very much. As, we wrapped things up, our guide came back and brought us the two bottles per person that we got to take home. As we had planned to go wine tasting I had though that $50 was not inexpensive to go taste wine, but my vision of what it would be like was purely based on my wine tasting experience in the US. The whole experience was nothing like anything I had imagined, or possibly would have been able to imagine.

So, we made our way back to the car, taking photos along the way and laughing. Anna’s brother drove us out of the caves back to a white snowy outside. While we had been down in the tunnels it has started to snow hard, and everything was covered in snow. Our final stop was the wine store, where Mark and I bought 6 bottles of wine. I made sure I picked up on of those Negru de Purcari bottles. Whether the Queen really drank the wine or not, I was sold on it and wanted to try it.
As, we can out of the store in was snowing hard and it was beautiful outside, laughing, we took one final picture and do I have to say more………………..

Getting some work done: Politics vs Education, Round 3

One of the most impactful circumstances here, for me, has been the way my work role is embedded both in an educational setting and in a political setting. Firstly, because Moldova is so small, the Fulbrights in Moldova are administered through the US Embassy. Thus we are tightly associated with the US Embassy in the minds of our local institutions. (In other countries, Fulbrights are administered by separate Fulbright administrative offices, and are not tightly associated with their US Embassies.) Secondly, my placement is with the "Academia de Administrare Publica, Pe Linga Presedintele Republich Moldova." That means Academy of Public Administration under the office of the President of the Republic of Moldova. Can't get more political than that for an academic institution. So I'm a Fulbrighter, working with the U.S Embassy (and thus State Department), certainly seen as a representative of the US Embassy, placed in the President's academic institution for government employee training and future public administrators and international relations employees. While I certainly have no political agenda whatsoever, and while the US embassy has in no way tried to influence me with their political agenda, I'm still stuck in the middle of those who do most certainly have strong political agendas. And now I'm also training the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who have their own strong political agendas and perspectives, and who report not to the President but to the Prime Minister. So in a way, I'm stuck between President's interest, Prime Minister's Interest and U.S State Department interests, and I'm sure the three do not all see eye to eye on all things. To put it nicely, it's been interesting. I think I'll work backwards from here to explain more. Those of you who know my history of getting somehow stuck in between in these odd ex-patriot situations and coming out on the tail end of things (think ping-pong with the minister of justice) can understand my discomfort.

Friday, Dec 7th, 8pm.
It was a cold December Eastern European Friday evening, while having dinner with my wife Chrisna, the phone rings. Against my instinct to not answer the phone, Chrisna (who NEVER picks up the phone) says, "it's Friday night, it could only be a social call, it won't be work-related, pick it up and see who it is." I do, and it's work. No wait -- it's politics... again. This time a ministry representative telling me that they are discussing pulling all of their employees out of the training program right in the middle, just not showing up anymore at the Academy of Public Administration (my host institution.) Would I think about finishing the sessions at their place? They had a big meeting and would like to continue with "The American Professor" but don't like anything about the rest of the program. Not that I wasn't already of the opinion that they were very disappointed -- I was aware that at least some were unhappy -- but to pull out right in the middle? OY! Nice way to ruin a relaxing Friday night. More politics getting in the way of getting some positive work done. Imagine how rude that would be for the training group to simply quit right in the middle and for them to just kind of steal the one professor they like? It's now even an ethical dilemma: to whom is my loyalty and duty, what team do I really belong to here -- my host academic institution? my students? the US embassy? the host nation? my colleagues at the Academy? I hung up after saying just wait till Monday, talk about it again and tell me what you guys are going to do.

Chrisna and I agreed this was (hopefully) not our issue, but something to be worked out between the brass at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the US Embassy, the President's office, and the Academy of Public Administration. However, I knew in my heart that I was stuck right in the middle, and that I might have to make a choice and stand my ground. The problem is, I don't even understand what's going on. Communication, both horizontal and verticle is so poor here in administration it's a wonder to me anything gets done right at all. Coordination is often a matter of lucky guessing. Plus, there are so many layers of b.s, and so much face saving and ass-protecting behavior (as I see it) in these organizations, that a direct truth speaking and seeking professor can gain only very limited, and perhaps skewed information. The truth is hidden. So this Fulbrighter is living very much in the land of bounded rationality. Choices to be made when I can barely make sense of the situation.

Thursday Dec 6, 3:30 PM
When class meeting #2 began, after getting a 1 1/2 hour lecture from the Dean of the Faculty of Foreign Affairs, there were only seven students left in the audience, out of 18 who were supposed to be "required" to attend the training. Three apologized before I began that they simply had to get back to their office, they could not spend a full afternoon with their country desk unattended. Despite having a meeting of only seven, the class went very well. It was enjoyable, we learned from each other and we had some very frank and open discussion. Everyone participated. They shook my hands and thanked me at the end of class. All genuine smiles.

There are other kinds of smiles and thank-you's you know, and since I've been here, I've become decently proficient at discerning one from the other. These were actual real smiles and handshakes of appreciation. And to tell the truth, one of a teacher's best received compliments. I've been learning that politicians, ambassadors and embassy types are really good at not letting you know which is which. Between trying to figure out what's actual truth from sideways or slantways truth, and trying to figure out cross-cultural differences in non-verbal language, and cross -cultural differences in verbal indirect cues, and cross-professional cultural differences, it's been tough figuring out what's what around here.

Thursday, 2:15pm
In the office of international cooperation at the Academy of Public Administration before class, I warn the administrators in that office that I sense there is a problem, that I believe the Ministry audience is disappointed, annoyed and even agitated; I tell them it's odd that we are not coordinating material at all across lectures; I tell them that there may be a higher level political battle going on that is derailing this very prestigious program.

These two woman barely let me get our the words as they vocalize their disbelief and denials and explain to me that they know exactly what is going on, and know exactly what they are doing, and that they've been told things are going well, and that I worry too much.

I think, hmm, maybe they are right, I've really only heard this from some specific people, they could just be the vocal or disruptive minority, maybe I am exaggerating and escalating things. Maybe I'm the pawn in the middle of a gross miscommunication. Maybe things are fine. Maybe it's another of those times when your intuition is just plain wrong and fooling you. Perhaps I am misinterpreting cues coming in a different culture. Look Mark, they say, seeming to pity me and my unsophisticated-ness, we run training programs all the time for civil servants; this is the setup and how it works; this is the way it always works around here; you may do things differently in your country, but here, this is what people want and need. I start to buy it. While those of you who know me know that the last thing I am is a person who worries too much, I figured that maybe I was not so much worrying as perhaps being snobbish and right-seeking, creating a stink that was not there. Perhaps I was exaggerating and thus getting everyone worked up over nothing.


Wednesday night Dec 5th
I'm at a nice function at the Ambassador's residence in honor of the new deputy POA, who will now take over duties administering the Fulbright program among other things. So we get invited. I'm hanging with Carly, and David and Sean and Norma, meeting their colleagues, and there's across the room is the Recteur from my Academy. Boy would I like to avoid him, given that a dissed him severely by not attending his lecture or his introductions on Monday. After a while I think I notice that neither the PAO nor the Ambassador have spoken with him. Something's up. During the evening I get pulled aside twice by the power brokers, asking me what the hell's going on over there? What's this big mess all about?

So there I am with the power brokers. I'm on the one hand feeling a bit vindicated, feeling that nice spiteful I-told-you-so feeling from the dark side. On the other hand I am thinking: oh shit I am in the middle of powerful political people damn getting worked up over each other and I probably should be far away from and this always ends up bad for me and what should I say should I try to be smart and show that I'm one of them and don't believe in power distance or should I just try to be humble and make believe I believe in power distance and nod and apologize because this might just be my fault, and just in case they think I should or it is and well it can't hurt I wish I were over there by the snack table mmm that smoked fish looks good. I eventually focus, and I end up doing both, alternating between trying to impress them with my sophistication (of which I have none) and be one of them and apologizing profusely in between. I sure I came out looking foolish and I deserve it. It was nice to hear them assure me this was not my fault, that I was doing fine, and that they agreed with me. Then again, I don't know if they were speaking straight or slantways.

Monday Dec 3rd 3:15pm
I start my lecture early because the Rectuer is finished early. The room is completely tense, overly formal, and full of stress. I refulse to start until the bosses leave the room. That was our agreement, and I decided to be a bastard about it. They are not happy with me, but I feel it's the only way to save the program. Stick to the agreement I made with the students. No superiors or subordinates in the room; fully confidential. Some students leave before my lecture begins, a couple say sorry we've got to go, others just dissappear. One takes me aside and tells me the group is nothing short of furious. What a waste of time the lecture was. How mad they are to be forced to leave work all afternood for this stupid welcome to the academy lecture. How they tried to be polite, especially because their superior was there, but boy that the group was ready to rebel. I was a bit shocked, but not that shocked. I felt a bit of that I-told-you-so pleasure, but then realized i was faced with an angry resentful group of ambassadors, like a bed of angry oysters closed up so tight there was going to be now way to have any sort of decent discussion.
I pulled out all of the tricks from my teaching bag and when out of those, I just made up new ones. After a hour, I think someone participated. By the end, I thought I kind of had them. If it could just be us from now on.... but it won't be. Damn.

More to come.

Monday Dec 3rd 2pm
I purposely do not go the the Recteur's lecture at 2pm that opens the program. I had told them I might show, but they said I did not have to be there until 3:30 when my lecture starts. So I decided against attending the Recteur's lecture. It was a show of disrespect, and frankly the only thing I could think of in my power to do to communicate my displeasure for how the program got railroaded, and the lack of communication and coordination, and my feeling that I want to be dis-associated from this portion of the program so that the students will see me as different from the authoritarian ego gratification and political currency seeking behavior of the administrators. At the time, that's how I felt, and that's what I did.

At 2:10 I got a call: WHERE ARE YOU! The Recteur is waiting to introduce you! I'm thinking: Well why didn't you tell me he was going to do this? Why didn't we coordinate? Why did you not even send me a copy of the program? What I did was calmly say, I'm not coming for his lecture, mine starts at 3:30 "I'll be there around 3:00pm. Panicked and insulted silence on the other end of the line. "Ok" they say. I feel badly, but not that badly.