I've arrived!

I made it! Today was my first full day here in Romania. I arrived Saturday evening sweaty, with only an hour of sleep, and was greeted at the airport by Alan, CHF'S tourism program manager, and Gabriel (Gaby), CHF's logistics person. Both have been extremely nice and helpful; Gaby is a Bucharesti-born Romanian, and Alan, a Brit who spent 6 years in Mongolia. I was dropped off at my hotel, (www.casa-gabriela.ro, if you are interested) and crashed for about two hours. Alan came to get me for dinner, and we went to an Italian place near CHF's headquarters. It was nice, pasta and salad, until it started to pour down on us. (We were on an outdoor terrace.) But we survived and I went bac to my hotel and crashed for a little bit. Once I figured out how to use the hot water and the air conditioning, all was fine.

Today I got up at 9am, and headed down to a breafast of cold cereal, croissant with cheese, and tea. I was too tired to head out just yet for my original plan of seeing the Romanian Village Museum and par, so I watched TV (there's a lot of American tv!) until I had the energy to unpac everything and clean up. I wandered around until I found an ATM, wandered around some more until I had a late lunch, went to the Museum of the Romanian Peasant, and headed home.

I will have to wait to write more, as the computer I am on has a terrible space bar, and it's driving me batty. Also, the letter between J and L doesn't wor, if you haven't noticed. :-)

I promise to write more tomorrow, hopefully from the office. I can't wait to tell you all about my impressions of Romania!

All the best,
Lauren