Getting Excited!

I leave for Iasi, Romania on January 12th 2017! I will spend four months volunteering in an orphanage (well, "orphanage" because Romania recognizes it as a daycare, even though it's not) and a hospital. I'm going with ILP (International Language Program), which is an organization that sends college aged kids in America and Canada around the world to mostly teach English, but the Romania program is different. There will be seven of us split between two apartments and taking care of the kiddos over there. Most of the kids are disabled, either mentally or physically, and are divided into different rooms at the orphanage by age and how disabled they are. I'm so excited to meet these kids and help them develop!

I've always loved traveling and I have a little bit of "I want to save the world" in me, so this is the perfect opportunity for me. I thought and prayed long and hard whether or not to serve an LDS mission, but discovered that that's not what I need to do right now, so here I am going to Romania. 

No, I don't speak Romanian. I speak English and some French, plus a semester of Latin, so maybe I'll be able to get around without too much help. I've been using Duo-Lingo to learn the basics and I'm planning on taking a Romanian to English dictionary. I'm starting to learn about the culture of Romania and Romanians are very superstitious. I can't sit on the ground, I can't have a window and door open in the same room, and I always have to be all bundled up or else the locals believe that I will become sick or infertile. The little ones can't learn how to crawl on the floor because they could get hypothetically sick, so they learn to crawl on a small mattress. It will definitely be an adventure.