Sometimes It’s Hard To Work With Moldovan Priorities

I had mentioned how my school has given the English department a classroom to use, which will also be a place where I can work during and after school. And this past week, the priority of the English teachers was to prepare the room. When I first saw the room, I thought I would be able to have some freedom with setting up the room in a functional way so that resources are stored well and in a logical order. And since I would be the one working in there, I thought I would get to plan the basic set up of the classroom. I was looking forward to having a classroom to arrange and decorate with my partners.

However, things weren’t going as I thought (as with most things here), nor are they going so smoothly. My partners all have their own opinions about how the room should be put together, but many of their ideas collide with one another. And many times, they turn to me to take their side. This is the whole reason why I want my focus this year to be getting my partner teachers to work together. They don’t understand how to work together without just letting one person have her way.

Furthermore, I haven’t been able to express what I want with the room. My goal was for the room to have a library-like set-up: lots of bookshelves with resources and some tables to work at. Plus I was hoping to decorate it with lots of posters teaching English grammar and vocabulary. However, my partners are not showing any interest in my opinion. When they ask my opinion, they just want me to support their idea.

Since this is the English department’s room, not just mine, and my partners will (hopefully) continue to use it once I leave, I am trying to be compromising. But right now, it feels like I’m the only one not getting heard. I was hoping to have a room that reflected all of us. And so far, all the opinions I have expressed haven’t been honored.

Even though the opinions of my partners are clashing, the one thing they all agree upon is that the priority of the classroom right now is beauty. When I first started talking to my partners about what I wanted to do, I was talking about how to have bookshelves for materials, a place for the posters, etc. But they wanted to talk about what color the curtains should be. In fact, as I sit here writing this, one of my partner teachers sent two students to clean the plants.

I’m trying to be understanding since part of the reason they’re working on the appearance is because the director wants to show the room to some officials who are coming tomorrow. But it’s really hard to be understanding when I can’t express my opinion of how to efficiently store resources in the room. I keep telling myself that this is a room for them so I need to let them set up how they would like. But many Moldovans have poor organizational skills, and I was hoping to help with this room organization.

I just have to let it go sometimes. But the room is starting to lose some of its functionality because beauty keeps being prioritized. This makes me wonder what the purpose of this room is; to develop and store resources for the English department or to impress others with a pretty room. Sometimes it is very difficult for me to work with Moldovan priorities, and I often feel like I'm working against them. I am hoping that once tomorrow has passed, I can slowly start to change the room to be more functional while keeping up the beauty Moldovans value.

Moldova in a Nutshell

While visiting American this summer, I had to explain a lot about Moldova and how different or similar it is to America. So once I was back here, I really reflected on how I would describe Moldova in a nutshell.

The best way to describe Moldova is that it’s like the 80s with internet. Many of their practices and beliefs are similar those of the USA in the 80s, but you can see everyone with mostly current technology. The people are not particularly outgoingly friendly; however, once you have befriended them, they are very loyal to you and proud of you. Also, beauty and appearance is stressed, often to the expense of quality. And this is probably due to the fact that they don’t have the money to spend on quality items, so they make everything look as good as possible.

A Snow-Covered Cruileni

I woke up this morning to a beautiful white Criuleni. There has been a little snow here and there the last month, but nothing that was really sticking. This week though, the ground was frozen, and I had hoped that this meant snow would stick, which it did. It’s the perfect kind of snow, the kind that crunches underneath my feet. There is enough that it covers everything, but the trees aren’t hanging low because of how heavy it is.

The atmosphere seemed to change overnight. Criuleni was so happy today. December was a lot of rain and cold, so it was kind of dreary. But the snow brought lots of smiles and happiness. On my walk to school this morning, I saw lots of children playing together as they walked to school. As I passed the bus station, I heard a man singing loud for all to hear. During school, every boy spent every minute of every break outside playing in the snow. And on my way home, the students all ran and slid to see how far they could slide across the packed snow. I even saw an adult man trying to slide across the snow.

This snow was a perfect pick-me-up for all of Cruileni.

Beautiful Hearts

When you are in Moldova, you will, without a doubt, hear the word “frumos” every day. “Frumos” means beautiful, and Moldova expects all things to be beautiful. One must dress beautifully, one must speak beautifully, one’s house must be kept beautiful, the table should be set beautifully, the students must write beautifully. Beautiful appearance is a high priority of most Moldovans.

When I first came here, I was bombarded with this word “frumos”. With such a strong stress on beauty, I was beginning to think that this is a very shallow element to prioritize, and I was not sure I would like a place where so much stress is put on appearance. The importance of outer appearance is present in the States as well, but I guess it didn’t bother me as much because there is also a huge push for not caring about what is on the outside.

I soon came to learn that acting and being beautiful is not due to vanity, but rather out of respect for others. One should dress beautifully because you respect those you work with so much that you take time to look well for them. Students must speak beautiful to show respect for the teacher’s work. Learning this made it easier to tolerate frumosness.

Since then, I have come to more than tolerate frumosness, but appreciate it. Moldovans are not stressing outer beauty, but rather complete beauty. Ever since I have been here, Moldovans have wanted to help me be comfortable. They are very friendly and kind to me, and they don’t judge me harshly for my foreign understanding of things.

And this week, many of my acquaintances complimented me unnecessarily. A student randomly told me she liked me, and a couple staff members at school randomly told me the other day that the school staff likes and respects me. And then today when I was explaining the word “foreigner” to the students, I said that I was a foreigner. My partner teacher said that, to them, I was not a foreigner, I was a friend. Moldovans are constantly showing me kindness, and I’m falling in love with their beautiful hearts.