Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Hello all,

I have returned from the Holy Land aka. Israel! This has been my second trip from Moldova and was amazing! In this post I am going to be posting a few of my favorite pictures along with some commentary.

First things first though I need to throw a special thank you out to Ohad Benjamin Sternberg. This man busted his ass for 12 of his bestest of friends to plan the best vacation that any of us have ever had. So thank you very much sir.

First Picture!


Katie McNabb!!! In all her glory. There is talk going around that there may in fact be a whole album dedicated to pictures such as these catching her in all of her glory. I have many more pictures just like this which captures the beauty of this wonderful ginger.

In this picture I stand where Jesus, yes Jesus, was baptized! Only the Jordan River is all. While we were here there were roughly 100 Japanese people in white taking their turn to pay and be baptized. It is really sad how touristy of a place this has become. You walk into a gift shop upon entrance to the site after which you walk onto a patio with a restaurant, area to buy your white robe to be baptized in, and a changing area. I assume that if Jesus were being baptized today he might not choose this location to be baptized in.

Not much to say here except that I had never picked an orange from an orange tree until now! Although, the oranges in Israel were very sour. It may had just been the time of year.

In my opinion most Moldovan girls have the exact same pictures in their facebook pages. This is one of a whole series that I took on a nature walk. I want to be perfectly clear that if you are a girl from Moldova and have one of these pictures don’t be sad! I still think your beautiful!

In this picture you can see a huge white building. Although, it’s not a building at all! It’s a tent. Throughout the country they had greenhouses that would make my partners drool! This particular green house contains banana trees.

The Moldovan roll! I had to take advantage of the warm weather to practice my Moldovan roll. The roll is perfected by the Moldovan people in the summer however one must have a larger belly to keep ones shirt up allowing the sun’s rays to bronze ones belly. I will be sporting this roll in the upcoming summer regardless if I don’t have a manly belly. I can do one better a sport all of my manly belly hair.

This picture was taken in a city called Acco. It was probably my favorite city that I went to. We arrived here just before sunset and were able to eat and then head to the sea side to watch the sun set. The weather was perfect; people were outside having a good time, and made me really look forward to watching the sun set over Romania this summer.

This picture is of some really cool crosses that were carved in the stone walls of Jerusalem. The crusaders apparently carved them. There were areas of the city where whole walls were covered in them.

The valley of death: The dead travel down this valley to reach hell…

Katie McNabb drank 10 diet sprites a day

Everyone has got a little captain in them. This is not only a great picture because we are doing the captain, but as you can see there was something down below us sparking an interest. Notice Nkosi and Sam’s lack of interest in the picture.

This is us covered in mud! If you take time to really look at this picture you can see how ridiculous we were all acting. If you look closely you can see that I am sporting a 6 pack of mud. If the world only knew that one bath in the Dead Sea and you instantly become swole!

If you look closely you can see Saudi Arabia in the distance. This was the first trip across the Red Sea for the captain of our sea bearing vessel and he didn’t quite know where to dock. Therefore we went just a little too far and ended up in Saudi Arabia and were headed off by a Jordanian military boat that proceeded to escort us to our correct port in Jordan.

Funny story: Our captain was in the dock for a total of 15min after we left and threw a used cigarette in the water and was therefore fined $700. So in one morning our captain went in Saudi Arabia water and was fined $700 for something very small! It is safe to say he had a no good terribly bad day.

This picture was taken at Petra. It’s cool because it shows how the people living here carved gutters to collect rain water that flowed off the cliffs. The water would run down hill to the main area of the city.


Indiana Jones anyone? Our tour guide made us line up against a side of the cliff in a single file line to see some cliff formations of spiders and alligators, but when he tried to point them only one of us could see them. He then proceeded to tell us to turn around revealing the “treasury”. This is the most famous building in Petra and I’m sure all of you have seen it in Indiana Jones. Funny thing is it’s not really a treasury at all, but a tomb.

All the holes in the rocks are homes of citizens. Fun fact they were also tombs. That’s right the people lived with their dead. I’m sure they were sealed up, but still… I don’t know that I would want my dead relatives rolling out of their graves and falling on me in the middle of the night.

This is me in my awesome garb at the royal tomb over looking all of my subjects. “One day Simba…. All this will be yours.”

Doing my best Moldovan squat. My knees don’t bend all the way so it makes this move a little more uncomfortable looking than the Moldovan people make it look.

Well there you have it. A taste of Israel and all the fun we have had. Just another shout out to all the people who helped plan this trip. And look at me go! 2 posts in 2 days!!!! Word!

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Change? Shit is guess change is good for any of us.

Hello all,

I have decided to write down a few things that I find interesting about myself now that I live in a far far away land. This morning I was sitting on my bed drinking my 2 cups of coffee and watching my one episode of Dexter before I get out of bed and get swollen working out with my tension bands in my room and it occurred to me that my daily behaviors have changed a lot now that I am here.

1- In the States I would eat because I was bored or lazy. Now I don’t eat because I am too lazy to walk my lazy ass down the road two blocks to buy food. As you might imagine this new behavior has lost me 20labs (lbs. but more fun to say labs). My snacks in the State included waking up at 11 PM and driving to a gas station for a Dr. Pepper and a bag of Nibs. Now my snacks include me rooting through my packages sent from home hoping with all my might that I missed a sucker, candy cane, or better yet a 1lab bag of skittles. Most of the time this activity ends up in disappointment, other times I find a stale yet satisfying Sees’ sucker.

So I have made a decision! From now on I need to start eating all day everyday if I am going to gain any of my weight back. I am going to become the most ghastly, repulsive, disgusting pig a Moldovan has ever seen and with time I will gain my 20labs back and arrive at my glorious, handsome, bigger self.

2- Sharing. I love to share now. I do it all the time! Back home I hated it! I always thought to myself… go get your own bag of Nibs! Now with a little behavioral conditioning from the very generous Moldovan people I find myself leaving work to get something to eat to get me through the gap between lunch and dinner, which can sometimes be 8 hours, and returning with 50 lei worth of Snickers bars for everyone that works in my office. It actually brings me joy because when I share with people they will actually pretend to understand my Romanian. Most of the time I can see exactly what they are thinking when I am rattling off long strings of non-comprehendible Romanian, “What?” “Who is this kid?” “He can’t be Moldovan” “If I just smile and nod he will stop” “Why did I engage him?” “How does he not understand the difference between dative and accusative?” just to name a few thoughts that go through people’s heads.

So! The moral of this story is, if you share in another country people want to talk to you.

3- I have learned that regardless of how long, cold, or how much snow there is in a winter I always hate it! I constantly have to remind myself that it’s not Moldova’s fault. I don’t hate my life in Moldova I hate my life in winter in any country. Spring is on its way here (that’s what I’m told anyway) and when it does come I will revert back to sickeningly positive self. As of now though I keep my winter face, coat, boots, and scarf on, close my eyes and hope that when I open them the ice, mud, freezing temperatures, grey, and snow will be gone!

Finally I would just like to mention that I just returned from Israel and will be posting pictures/links to pictures on here along with some explanation….. Maybe…