A Different Kind of Heaven

A day before I left Craiova, I was sitting at my desk, working on grades, when someone buzzed up from downstairs. I answered, and a voice mumbled something in Romanian. I thought maybe it was the older woman who worked for the apartment building and would sometimes ring up and then sort of snoop around, looking at leaking pipes, peeling paint, the broken sofa or whatever, and so, because I hadn't seen her in awhile, I buzzed her in. Then came a knock on my door. When I opened it, there stood 8 of my 12 acting students, the English majors who had come to me in February and asked if I would be willing to teach them off campus two evenings a week. They nearly knocked me over with their boisterous, “Surprise!”

And what a surprise it was! Some of them had brought cameras to class during the last week, and we had all gone out for dinner after the last class, and now here they were with a scrapbook they’d made for me, and beneath each image, personal notes expressing deep gratitude and friendship. Thank you, my dear friends. I will keep this notebook and the memories with me forever.

I’m now in Mamaia, on the Black Sea coast, just north of Constanta. After I left Craiova I traveled through Turkey for two weeks: Istanbul (where I got a new tattoo), Cappadocia, Izmir, Selcuk, Ephesus, Pammaluke, Bodrum, Oren, and again to Istanbul. I was amazed at the history and hospitality, delighted by the food, soothed by the Turkish civility. Someday, I would love to go back and spend a much longer time there.

But this is a blog about Romania, and so after leaving Istanbul I flew back to Bucharest, and went out in the evening with my ex-students from the National Theatre. Back in April, Mihaela Sirbu, who teaches at the National University of Theatre and Film in Bucharest, asked if I was interested in teaching a three-day rasaboxes workshop. I did, and it was a phenomenal success. The very best of the best attended: courageous, imaginative, and emotionally available, the actors and actresses gave their all, and, because of the demanding nature of the work, we quickly became a family. Mihaela asked if I would be willing to come back in May and teach a longer Practical Aesthetics workshop, and so I did, an exhausting four day, 5-hour-a-day intensive. And so seeing everybody again after coming back from Turkey, it felt a bit like coming home.

From Bucharest, I rode a bus to the Danube Delta, the area in northeast Romania that borders the Ukraine, where the Danube River empties into the Black Sea. I spent the night in the riverfront town of Tulcea, and then hopped a boat and rode four and a half hours, past forests, hills, and finally sawgrass that looked very much like The Everglades, to the village of Sfantu Gheorghe (St. George). I checked into a little pension whose gardens overflowed with roses, then hiked a mile east of town, past brightly colored reed and mud houses, to the beach. The water, brown and brackish, was warmer than I'd expected, and I swam out far away from the buzzing horseflies that had swarmed me on my walk. Later that night, I dined on locally caught fish, then strolled the dirt roads, listening to a symphony of frogs, detouring around wandering cows, all beneath a canopy of stars.

Now as my last days here wind down, I not only become more homesick, but I already begin to miss everything I am about to leave. This morning, walking along the beach, I found myself thinking of the places and people I love in America; of road trips through rural Florida, snacking on boiled peanuts, the smell of orange blossoms, and of summer rains that seem like they’ll go on forever. I thought of friends and family in places like Tampa, San Francisco, Austin, New York, Atlanta, of memories that hold us together, and of adventures we’ve yet to have. And I thought of what I’m leaving here, a different kind of heaven, one that continues to unfold with every passing day.

Last semester, I ended the American Corner Film night in Craiova by showing Into the Wild, a movie beautifully directed by Sean Penn that retells the journey of young Christopher McCandless, who discovered too late that life is best when shared with others. And as I think now of the new friendships I’ve made here, I know that some, like Florida rain, will go on what seems like forever; and that others, begun like lightning strikes, will leave only smoldering scars.

I head back to Bucharest tomorrow, and will say my goodbyes to my friends at the Fulbright office on Monday. I will also see my dear friends Petru and Ana, who launched me on this amazing voyage when I first arrived in Romania. And then on Tuesday, I leave, arriving back in Tampa at midnight, staying with my brother Horst or my great friend Steve Powell for three days, sushi and boba and Bayshore, then flying to San Francisco where I’ll eat crab legs with Marcy, drink tea with Mr. Lee, watch movies, stuff myself with popcorn, and shop for a new tattoo to even out the old TULSA one and the unbalance left by the very large new Turkish moon and star. Then it’s back to Tampa to try and find a car and new apartment, and then upstate New York, where I’ll be acting in a play at Chenango River Theatre, run by my old friend Bill Lelbach.

A few years ago, my mother asked me if I believed in heaven, and I told her that it really doesn’t matter, that for me everything here is enough. After New York, on August 10th, I’ll return to Tampa and to USF, reconnecting with friends, sharing what I’ve learned, and building new unimagined bridges. And though the roller coaster life sometimes brings with it lows as well as highs, if there is a luckier man alive, I have not met him. I thank you all, my dear friends in the states, and new friends in Romania, for being part of this amazing journey.

Opening and Closing

I was talking with my student Georgiana Popa after one of the acting classes in Craiova, and she asked if I’d ever been to a Romanian monastery. I told her that I had not, but that I would love to go. The next day, she emailed me and asked if I would like to meet some friends of hers, Marcel Radut-Seliste and his wife Diana. Marcel teaches theology at the University of Craiova, and is about to become a priest. In the Orthodox church, priests are allowed to be married. Nuns marry Jesus, and that’s the way it is.

Georgiana and I rode a tram to Marcel’s apartment. Marcel and Diana were gracious hosts, serving drinks and desserts, and for nearly three hours, Marcel and I talked about God in all its various guises. I told Marcel about my life, explained my beliefs, and he seemed not to have a problem with our differences. Marcel told me more about Tismana monastery, a five hour drive north of Craiova. He said that maybe we could drive up and spend a weekend there. I told him that sounded great.

A few days later, Marcel emailed and asked if I would ride to the monastery with him, Diana, and a priest from their parish. He also asked if I would speak to 100 teenagers about spreading Christ’s message through acts of volunteering. I replied that I’m really not much of an expert on Christ’s message, and reminded him that I do not believe that religion is necessary to know God. He replied that his beliefs and mine are not so dissimilar, it’s just that he has embraced a clearly marked path that works best for him.

A recent report stated that 50% of all Americans change their religion at least once. One of my students asked why that is, and it wasn’t until a debate in my speaking class over Religion in Schools that I understood why. According to the 2002 census, 86.7 percent of Romanians identify themselves as Orthodox. My students explained that their Religion classes, in public schools and at many universities, are taught by Orthodox priests, who inculcate students in the ways of Orthodoxy. My experience with schools in the US has been a bit more varied: there, courses in religion typically offer an overview of many faiths. And though lack of options might lead to a more homogenous society, might it not also offer a sense of community and shared experience?

Dressed in a black cassock, his blue eyes peering out from his soft brown beard, Father Claudiu Porneala ate salsa chips and blasted the Dacia’s horn. We sped past startled drivers and livestock, and listened to modern pop songs on the radio. Claudiu’s wife Ramona sat in the back with Marcel and Diana. I sat up front and drank a coke to try and settle my stomach. The topic of the day, church business, heated up the car and enhanced the wild ride. We’d loaded up on junk food, and I felt like my teeth were crumbling.

Tismana monastery is the oldest in Romania, dating back to 1375. The surrounding forested hills reminded me of West Virginia. We arrived in the late afternoon, and checked into a hotel owned by the monastery. Two busloads of polite, somewhat shy teenagers crowded the front entrance. I was given a simple, tidy 3rd floor room, no phone or TV, which opened out to a peaceful balcony. An intense priest named Gabriel asked if I wanted to go for a walk, and we headed for a narrow wooded road that led up from the valley’s stream.

The conversation soon turned to God. Gabriel looks a bit like Michael Keaton. He plays it tough, but beneath the stern demeanor is a little boy wanting to play. Filling me in on church history, Gabriel referred to “Lord Tepes” (Dracula), and lauded his iron fist rule. I questioned how he was able to praise a warring, mass murderer, wondering about Jesus’ commandment to love. “Sometimes,” said Gabriel, “we must make sacrifices for the common good.” I couldn’t be sure, but it did not seem that he was joking.

Walking back to the hotel, Gabriel asked if I wished to be baptized into the Orthodox church. I said that I’d think about it. He told me that my christened name would be Cristi, and that I was welcome to join them. It was Friday, and the next day was the big one, a day of workshops and speeches. Before dinner, a bishop arrived with an old blind monk. I was instructed to remove my hat and bow before the bishop, and to kiss his hand if he offered it. Caught up in the in the moment, but feeling a bit disingenuous, I did as I was told, and when I stood and looked at him, I was taken aback by the warmth, love and goodness that seemed to radiate from the bishop's eyes.

A communal dinner, a restful sleep, a meaty-cheesy breakfast, a morning of workshops, and after lunch I found myself sitting at a table, listening to an Italian guest speak into a microphone, translated into Romanian, about the importance of volunteering. I looked at the notes I’d made while sitting on my balcony, an outline of my life’s trajectory: the selfish, destructive 20s, being stabbed to death at 31, waking from a coma with only one vocal chord, and sincerely praying for guidance and offering my life to God. When it came time, I offered the mic to my translator, Georgiana, and stepped out from behind the table and spoke to the teenagers directly.

Referring to my journey and my prayers, I told them about volunteering in San Francisco, and, because of a lawsuit surrounding the stabbing, being in a position to help my friends and family financially. I talked about Big Brothers/Big Sisters in Austin, Texas, and about how writer’s block led me back to acting classes which led me to a couple of film roles which led back to teaching at USF. And how a chance meeting with Daniel Akau in Tampa led me to Africa which led to the founding, with Mason Wiley, of birasudan, and how teaching at the University of South Florida led me to apply for a Fulbright which led me to Craiova which led me to Tismana and to Marcel, and to this very present moment.

In closing, I told them that for me, there was no burning bush, no sea parting, no flaming chariot or giant finger pointing down from the sky, but that in retrospect, I have learned that with a clear mind, a ready body, and a sincere heart, one can be guided to do the work one is here for, even if it’s an unplanned, unsettling, startling surprise.

Afterwards, one of the teenagers came to me in tears. She’d been hit by a bus a few years before, and had died on the operating table. She said that she hadn’t met anyone else who had died and come back, and begged me to tell her what I remembered. I told her some of what I could recall, and held back some of the more personal bits. She had been instructed by her family and her priest not to share what she remembered, for fear of being thought a liar. Clearly, it upset her, and was a relief to finally find someone that she could talk with.

At the end of the weekend, after much talk of God and church doctrine, I declined Gabriel’s offer of baptism, stating that, though I long for a sense of community, I am not ready to change my beliefs or values in order to achieve that. The priests all seemed to understand. The ride home was much slower and relaxed. We stopped and ate ice cream at a sidewalk café. I didn’t talk a whole lot. I felt like I had nothing left to say.

Here

Spring is here, and all over Europe, the sun is shining and every living thing rejoices. I finished writing the first draft of the new screenplay, Snow Blossoms, and have now come to The Premio Europa Theatre Festival in Wroclaw, Poland, an awards festival with some of the top directors in Europe presenting their work. This year, there's a focus on Polish director Jerzy Grotowski; it's the centennial of his birth. Last night was an eight hour production from Polish director Krystian Lupa, based on Andy Warhol's factory people called Factory 2. I wanted so much to enjoy it, but it was a beautiful afternoon/evening and I lasted only two and a half hours and split during the first intermission. Maybe I missed something, but for some reason Lupa's "Factory People" din't ever seem to actually do any work, but merely sat around posturing, zonked out of their minds, self-absorbed, seemingly breaking boundaries for the sake of looking "different." What about methamphetamine? Perhaps it's time this production gives Sister Ray another listen.

The previous night, the Romanian gang, nine of us, arrived late and the two scheduled shows were sold out, so they got us into a local production of Macbeth, performed by Song Of The Goat Theatre. Held in a space that resembled a church alb, often lit by candles, seven actors from Poland, England, Finland, Scotland and Wales, wearing aikido hakimas and weilding wooden bokken swords, took their places in darkness and remained onstage during the entire 80 minute show. A mix of Michael Chekov, Grotowski, Aikido and Viewpoints, it was, in short, phenomenal. I am a guest of the festival, along with gazillions of international journalists, directors, actors and writers. I'll be writing a piece for a Romanian online magazine, www.artact.ro. My friend in Bucharest, the hard-working and brilliant Ioana Moldovan, put me in touch with the festival organizers a couple of months back, and I've been put up in a swell hotel and given a pass to the week's events.

It's so very strange being in Wroclaw. My father was born and raised here, before the war when it was still called Breslau, Germany. Leaving the Warhol show, I walked across town, standing and gawking at churches whose photographs hung on my family's walls when I was a kid. And today, I found the Glamsch apartment building. My father was jujitsu champion of Selesia, had an underground Louie Armstrong collection, and so, in order to escape having to join the SS when he turned 18, he enlisted with the German Navy and was in the process of having his ship bombed when the Russians invaded Breslau. My grandparents hid their valuables in a windowsill, grabbed my 13 year old Aunt Rita, and ran out into the street with their neighbors as Russian planes flew overhead, bombing and strafing.

Tonight, two shows: Killing to Eat by Rodrigo Garcia, and The Presidents, by Werner Schab. Last night, on the outskirts of the city center, I wandered into a fair's midway. Tumultuous rides evoked screams of joy and terror, and celebrants wandered past games of chance eating cotton candy; they used bumper cars to smash into each other, and tested their strength by punching things. I was hoping for strange hybrid creatures along the lines of Spidora or the Gorilla Girl. When my brother Horst and I were kids, we went to a little carnival down the block one night and there was a freak show. One of the freaks was called Bobo The Rubber Man, and there was a painting on the outside of the tent of a man tied up with his own limbs like a pretzel. Though we were never allowed to see the freak show as kids, I'm certain that it would have been miles away more freaky than last night's Warhol show, where actresses played transvestites and a testosterone-fueled actor playing Ondine at one point tossed furniture around like a drunken Polish boxer. "A Warhol fantasy?" Maybe. But my Factory fantasy involves breakable flowers and whips.

"Oh someday I know someone will look into my eyes and say, Hello-- you're my very special one. But if you close the door, I'll never have to see the day again."
--Lou Reed, 1969

With the Lights Out It's Less Dangerous, Here We Are Now Entertain Us

I have a photo of Mt. Kilimanjaro as my screen saver. Red and black caviar waits in my fridge. On my chest is the imprint of a man’s fist from the hardest punch I’ve ever taken and remembered. This morning, after four cups of coffee, I wrote dialog for the new screenplay that made me weep. Later, while sitting outside the National Theatre of Craiova, I watched an old Gypsy man with a wide-brimmed hat lumber across the stone plaza, trailed by a seven or eight year-old boy, who watched the teenage rollerbladers as if they were Death Angels from Another Planet. Days, I listen to Leonard Cohen; his music makes sense to me now. Tonight, on my way home from dinner, I gave a bite of leftover chicken to one of my neighborhood street dogs, a red one I call Rosii (Roshee) who licks my hand but will not let me pet her. Chitsu (Keetsu), the doggie in the window, was the neighborhood alpha dog whose trust I earned with pocketfuls of snacks. He used to guard Rosii, but seems now to have disappeared. Late tonight, I read about a new electric car that goes 300 miles on one charge. In Indonesia, a mini-tidal wave drowns at least 58 people. And an online Yahoo headline reads: "Judges' strange flirting; Ryan asks Simon and Paula why they can't keep their hands off each other during the show." Spring flirts with old and new wounds. Winds blow, birds chirp. The scars itch, ready for change.

What’s Wrong With This Picture?

I’ve been dreaming of dead people. People I’ve loved and lost. My father, a friend who drowned, another who died too young in a car wreck, a punk rock enchantress who one day developed throat cancer, dear ol’ Bill Sugrue…

Last night, I went to see the Filarmonica “Oltenia” Craiova perform five songs by the rock band Queen. Ms. Otilia B knows the third bassist of the symphony, and he met us outside during intermission and escorted us in. We found a couple of unoccupied seats while the symphony tuned up, and then the lights dimmed, the chorus emerged, and the guest conductor, Horst-Hans Backer, stepped onto his perch and eased the assembled into One Vision, The Show Must Go On, and a rapturous Who Wants to Live Forever. And though the music was heavenly during Bohemian Rhapsody, the chorus seemed hesitant, like they were afraid they might blow it. We Are the Champions, however, brought the house down; one of the women of the chorus belted it out so proudly it was like she was at high-octane political rally. The crowd rose to its feet, the conductor came back for an encore, and they launched into Champions again.

Some of my students, all English majors, have asked me to teach an acting class. And so Friday afternoon, ten courageous souls met me upstairs in the English Lectorate. It was mostly a How Do You Do session, but we’ve decided to meet twice a week, Monday and Wednesday evenings. One of the students is a volleyball champ and she is going to see if she can find us a gym for our classes. And this afternoon, I met Adriana Teodorescu, a local puppet theatre artist, and she is also going to try and find us a place. Almost none of the students have any theatre experience, but they all seem like the adventurous type, and I think it’s going to be great.

In fact, all of my students this semester seem especially enthusiastic. Maybe it’s because they’re undergraduates and have not yet been made cynical by overworked teachers who no longer seem to care. Maybe it’s because spring is approaching. Or maybe it’s just that they like the classes. Some students asked me to teach yoga a couple of nights a week, and others have shown interest in a nascent Wing Chun Kung Fu class that Tibi Neacsu started this afternoon. I, and Tibi’s brother Marius, are his first students. Tonight my forearms feel like some sort of undersea creatures.

Thursday night at the American Corner Film Night was the best turnout yet. About 35 people showed up to watch Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday. Film Night is held in the brick basement of the Tradem Cultural Center, and the movies are projected onto a portable screen. The room was packed, and as the movie played, black and white and still a bit grainy even though it’s on DVD, it felt like we were hiding out in a bomb shelter somewhere, trying to take our minds off the war outside.

But there is, of course, no war outside. It’s only inside, where no one can see it. Thanks to great students, rocking symphonies, martial arts and movies and yoga and theatre and snarling dogs, new music, endless coffee and the promise of spring, I’m able to enjoy a new found peace, even when ghosts come rattling their chains, even then, I sink deep into my soft red flannel sheets (thanks, Marse!) and smile at these miracles, these wonders, this beautiful dream.

PS: What is wrong with this picture? The clock is one of 7 Wonders of Caracal, a nowhere little town about 35 miles east of Craiova. Check out 4pm.

View From My Kitchen Window

Last night, I went to see La Traviata at our local opera house. This was only my second opera, and seemed very similar to the production of Aida which I saw at the Prague Opera House in 2000. Both were classical productions, set during the 18th century, with flowery sets (this one having cupids and angels painted onto an upstage scrim) and lavish costumes. And both achieved the same effect: I felt like I was watching a story unfold behind a wall of glass, in which a book opens and cutout characters float above the pages for awhile, gesturing, singing, and then the book closes, and the curtain drops.
Outside, walking home through a heavy wintry mix, an avalanche of snow fell from atop a four-storied building, booming onto the sidewalk ahead of me. Walking into my apartment courtyard, I stopped and listened to the quiet. Tree branches, their undersides like ink lines drawn against the gray sky, were slathered atop with snow. Even the laundry lines were thickly coated. The once-green benches looked like soft white cushions, circled round the lamppost, and the light from the lamp somehow burned more brightly than ever, like a lighthouse overpowering nasty weather, singing out its rescue to anyone lost enough to need it.
The street dogs were quiet all night, gone to wherever they go during such weather. I slept long and hard, and dreamed of a scene from the screenplay I'm writing: late at night, a teenage girl lies on her back in the middle of an ice rink. Trapped by circumstances beyond her control, she describes by telephone to her distant boyfriend what it's like to skate on a cloudless sunny day, that feeling you get as you glide and spin, and the sky seems to go on forever...

Back in the Saddle

I've just returned from a week in Florida visiting family and friends, and five days on the Nicaraguan Pacific coast with the preeminent Lee Warren, bodysurfing, eating seafood, hammock reading, and windy beach strolling. On my return trip to Craiova, I flew from Tampa to Washington, D.C. to Munich, and Munich to Bucharest. It was snowing in Bucharest on Monday, and I caught a taxi to the train station and bought a ticket for the three hour ride to Craiova. I had not slept in 24 hours; riding the train I kept nodding off, but the seats were designed such that each time I fell asleep my head dropped forward and I awakened to curious stares. My fellow passengers must've thought I was a junkie or a narcoleptic. As I departed, I shook the hand of the man sitting across from me. It was one of those moments where you just want to embrace everybody. I think I missed Romania.

I'd given my final exam January 20th. Grades here are not A thru F, but rather 10 thur 1, 10 being highest, everything under 5 failing. It seems the university here stresses faculty independence: I never received a class roster all semester, and still have not received an academic calendar. And so I really did not know exactly how many students I had until the end of the semester when it came time to fill out a grade sheet. Of the 36 students registered, I only met 30. Of those, 28 passed the class, most with good grades.

I met my new students Tuesday. Or at least some of them. I'd not heard from anyone at the university about when my classes were to be held, and finally Monday night one of my colleagues responded and asked if I could meet her in the faculty office Tuesday at 11am. Seems that it's the teacher's responsibility to look through a notebook there and figure out when and where classes will be held. I met with Mihaela in the office, looked through the notebook, and discovered that I am teaching four classes this semester, two Speaking and two Writing classes for English undergrad majors, about 40 students per class. The way it's been described to me, the Speaking classes are just that: urging the students to converse in English about any subject, speaking in English to them, and correcting faulty grammar. I'm all like, "Was up, y'all?" Not really. It should be fun. I'll bring in poetry, short stories, plays and newspaper clippings for discussion. The Writing class is also free-style, and I've decided to go with Screenwriting, since that's what I'm now focusing on outside of the university. My classes are jammed together Mondays and Tuesdays, starting at 8am, which means I will have long weekends to travel. I plan on giving acting workshops in Bucharest, and may do a reading of Mercury Fur or another play there. It also means, since I did not find out about my classes until Tuesday at 11am, that I'd missed three of my four classes. However, the class I did teach was great. Most of the students showed up, and they seem really excited.

The picture above is the Craiova plaza ice skating rink which was taken down just before I left. Everyone told me that the worst of winter was over, and I packed a bunch of winter clothes back to Florida intending to leave them there, but checked the weather before returning, and evidently, winter has come back with a vengence. It's snowing outside, and is supposed to continue all week. The street dogs woke me up around 4am, I tried to get back to sleep but figured maybe they woke me so I could start writing. It's good to be back.

La Multi Ani!

For New Year's Eve, I joined Oana, Aida, and five of their friends at the Estate bar. We each paid 125 lei (around $40), for which we received a couple of reserved tables, trays of snacks, bottles of whiskey, vodka and mixers, and champagne at midnight. Like most clubs/bars in Romania, Estate is located down a steep staircase and has thick brick walls and low arched ceilings. Pop music, mostly Romanian, played. Everyone was in fine spirit, dancing, singing, laughing. The camaraderie here is palpable: never have I sensed the sort of competitiveness or animosity among men that you get in The States. At midnight, we flowed upstairs and out into the street, where some guys were setting off firecrackers and fountains. Overhead, the big show started, explosions that rattled windows. We toasted "La Multi Ani!" and then everyone smashed their champagne glasses.
I need to correct myself on something I wrote in an earlier post: there are definitely people here who know of independent/underground music. Like anywhere else, the majority listen to the worst stuff available, but dig deeper and you find fans of really good music, the stuff that's not made by corporations strictly for money. Recently, I've discovered Maria Tanase, a Romanian folk singer who recorded mostly in the 1940s. She pours her soul into it, a Romanian Billie Holiday. Her voice digs into my bones, and I cannot shake it loose. Outside, big flakes are coming down, goose down, dreaming its way to earth. La multi ani.

A Very Veal Christmas

At some point, most foreigners coming to Romania start asking about the real-life Dracula, the Wallachian prince Vlad III or more dramatically known as Vlad the Impaler (Vlad Tepes). This being the holiday season, and because my friend Alan Price was on a week-long break from exhibiting his computer animation prowess at the Ares Electronica Center in Linz, Austria, I figured it would be the perfect opportunity to play American tourists and go vampire hunting in the snowy Carpathian Mountains.

Years ago, Alan played bass and I sang and honked the sax in one of Tampa’s seminal punk bands, The Veal Rifles (aka Real Vital). Alan were roommates in college, I was best man at his wedding, and we’ve attended more than one friend’s funeral together. Alan is a beautiful human being: kind and calm and chock full of information. A couple of nights ago, he told me the name for the indented knob at the bottom of a wine bottle (the punt) and why it’s there (for separating the dregs from the rest of the wine). I told him that he would’ve made a good doctor or airline pilot. I meant it as a compliment.

We met at the train station in Bucharest and ten minutes later were on an Accelerat train heading north to the Transylvanian city of Brasov. The Accelerat is only slightly slower than the newer, cleaner Intercity and Rapid trains. The slow and funky Personal trains are a post-communist adventure. For some reason, Romanians seem to have especially sensitive ears. I mean, the sidewalks can be icy and everyone’s walking around smiling, but the slightest breeze, even in not-so-freezing weather, and fur hats get pulled low, collars go up, and people lean into the wind like they’re trying to push over invisible walls. Romanian trains in the winter are like slow-roast ovens. Pity the ignorant foreigner who tries to cool things down by opening a window…

Snow began falling as the train wound its way along the Prahova valley, surrounded on both sides by the sheer cliffs of the Bucegi mountains. At tiny stations along the way, Gypsies pushed through groups of snowboarders. Arriving in Brasov, Alan and I zipped up our winter clothes, and made our way to the Pensiunea Casa Wagner. Brasov was settled by Saxons, and the Old Town is loaded with Baroque German architecture. Legend has it that after leading children underground in Hamelin, the Pied Piper and his young wards surfaced in Transylvania near the site of the town’s main square, Piata Sfatului. Our wood-beamed room at the top of the pensiunea overlooked the square and the gigantic 14th century Black Church. The Piata bustled with winter cheer: a tall lighted Christmas tree lorded over an outdoor ice-skating rink, kids sang carols, and snow fell lightly all through the night.

We rode a cable lift up the side of Mount Tampa (!) to the tall metal BRASOV sign at the summit. Snow clouds engulfed us, obliterating the views of the city below. We tromped around in the squeaky snow, then headed back down to meet up with Jeremy Hawkins, a fellow Fulbrighter and poet, for a night out on the town. Starting with warm spiced wine (vin fiert) at a mellow café, progressing through a teen dominated hip-hop club run by a guy from Boston, and ending up in an attic room of a French electronica chill bar, surrounded by plastered Romanian students, a fun night was had by all.

The next morning, we bypassed the town of Bran, billed on tourist maps as the site of Dracula’s castle. The truth is, Vlad laid siege to the castle in 1460, but nobody other than misled tourists believe he ever lived there. So instead, we rode a train to the tiny industrial town of Rupea, and attempted to find a maxitaxi that would take us to the Gypsy village of Viscri where I was told we might hear wolves at night. However, according to the locals, there was no transportation to Viscri, so we drank coffee and ate pistachios in a smoky locals bar, then caught a Personal train to Sighisoara, the birthplace of Vlad, arriving at dusk.

The old town, gobbed around the citadel, looms over the rest of the city like a jumbled, orange-roofed mesa. A wintry mix fell, and at the base of steps leading to the citadel, a shaggy dog appeared and took the lead, shepherding us up the icy stone steps. At the main square, past the clock tower, the dog sat proudly in front of a white building. We kept looking for the Casa cu Cerb (house with the deer), and as we walked around the side of the building, the dog came over and began to whine. It was then that we realized our guide had led us to the front door of our hotel, as evidenced by the stag head on the corner of the place. We entered, the dog ran in, and the owner thanked it, calling the dog “Jimmy.” After dinner, we explored the old town, walking up a steep, covered 175 wooden steps (the Scholar’s Stairs, built in 1642) that brought us to the Church on the Hill and its Saxon cemetery. Ice and rain once again turned to snow, and as we prowled the eerie quiet, the citadel’s thick stone walls and towers hemmed us in, preventing us from tumbling into the night.

In the morning, we explored the clock tower and the little wooden mechanical figures therein, the weapons museum, then talked our way into the locked-up torture museum. We were most impressed there by the replica wooden ladder, where authorities would stretch their victims taut and slowly roast them alive. From Sighisoara, we headed to Sibiu, wandered the city at night, pushed past Gypsy street teens offering sex, and had dinner at a traditional Romanian restaurant, where I got the sarmale, meat and grape leaves and spices smothered in sauerkraut.

According to Romanian folklore, vampires rise from their graves carrying their coffins on their heads, try and gain entry into their former homes, and fight one another with hemp whips at crossroads. And though believed by some to be in league with the Devil, Vlad Tepes seems to have exhibited no vampire tendencies. After his father, Vlad Dracul, was murdered, he and his brother spent five years in Turkish captivity. Vlad became ruler of Wallachia in 1456, and quickly gained infamy as an extremely harsh law enforcer. Under Vlad’s jurisdiction, all crimes, even petty theft, were punishable by death. According to my Rough Guide book, “Victims were bound spread-eagled while a stake was hammered up their rectum, and then were raised aloft and left to die in agony, for all to see.” Once, when a Turkish army invaded Wallachia, they were greeted by a forest of stakes 1km by 3km wide, upon which 20,000 Turkish and Bulgarian captives had been impaled. Needless to say, the Turkish army retreated in horror.

The ruins of Vlad’s castle perch high above the village of Arefu. Snow had fallen the night before, and at noon on Christmas Day we hiked up the 1200 snow covered stone steps and crossed the wooden footbridge and stood in the winter quiet, overlooking the Arefu River Valley. The next morning, our hotel waiter would give us a ride to a bus stop. There, we would wait in the cold for an hour, and then flag down a passing car. A man and woman would drive us back to Cartea de Arges. They would speak no English. The man would steer his car into a dreary apartment complex and flag down a young man whom he correctly guessed spoke English. The young man would tell us that the bus to Bucharest would be leaving in ten minutes. When offered 10 lei for his trouble, the driver would wave the money away with a smile. On the way to Bucharest, our bus would break down. A second bus would come and take us the rest of the way. Once in Bucharest, a man sitting beside me on the bus would offer to show us the way to the metro. A second man, overhearing our confusion in the subway, would offer to walk us to our hotel.

It's interesting to see which friends stay in touch once we go away. This has been my first Christmas spent outside the U.S., and though I have missed my friends and family dearly, I have not missed the frenzy that has come to define so much of our holiday season. On the train back to Craiova today, a young couple in love turned their laptop toward a six year-old boy sitting beside me so he could watch Kung Fu Panda with Romanian subtitles. While watching the movie, the boy offered me one of his chocolate cookies. Later, he stretched out across the seat, his head in his mother’s lap, his feet propped up on my forearm. I am forging new friendships here, and strengthening the bonds of others. It’s late now, and my eyes need rest. When I close them, I’m on the bus to Bucharest. Alan dozes, lightly snoring. A bleached blond woman sitting in front of me talks on her cellphone. Outside, the frozen gray fields flash past like a rhythmic black and white movie. At a village crossroads, late in the evening, coffin on my head, hemp whip in hand, I search for a home once lived in, a new home, home.

"Why are You Wearing that Stupid Man Suit?"

Last weekend, the twelve Fulbright grantees converged on Bucharest. On Saturday, Mihai Moroiu and Loredana Bucuroaia met the bulk of us at the Peasant Museum. A gray noon, chilly, but not too cold, we wandered the museum, gawking at the old peasant outfits and trippy outsider artwork, the transported wooden huts and handmade religious icons. Afterwards, we went around to the back of the museum and into the open market. On a grassy field, drunk men in bear costumes stumbled around and held each other up and tried to dance. Other men with dark circles under their eyes solemnly played drums and woodwinds. One very big man sat dazed in front of the reconstructed village hut.
Later, the Fulbright commission threw us a holiday feast. A fun time was had by all. Outside on the steps of the place, I met Iona Moldovan, cultural manager of Act Teatrul in Bucharest. We spoke briefly, she told me who she was, I told her what I was doing in Craiova, and she said that she knew somebody who might want to translate Mercury Fur into Romanian for me. I had brought a couple of copies of the play with me, and on the way to her rehearsals, I stopped by the Hotel Casa Victor, ran upstairs, and grabbed a script. We walked across town and she toured me through her theatre, a really hip underground place where my friend Mihaela Sirbu regularly acts.
Iona gave the script to Ionut Grama, an actor who has translated other plays into Romanian. This week, Ionut and I swapped emails and he has now agreed to translate Mercury Fur. A first step. Iona has said that if I mount the play here in Craiova, that maybe in late spring we could move it to Bucharest.
Returning to the Fulbright Commission, I ran into Cristina Bejan, a Fulbrighter who’s just finishing up her extended gig here. Cristina left for Washington, D.C. this week, where she will spend nine months completing her PhD. However, she plans on returning to Bucharest and has asked if I would be interested in helping start an English-speaking theatre company there.
I realized earlier this week that I need to buckle down and write the new screenplay I've been outlining, and learn Romanian. And so I’ve set a schedule for myself. Early to bed, early to rise. Quiet times, good meals, music and the occasional play with a friend, write in the morning, Romanian CDs in the afternoons. Since it’s dark by 5pm now, I want to experience as much daylight as possible. No drunky bear dances for me. I’ll hibernate when I’m dead.

Feathers on Egg Shells and Smoky School Hallways

Otilia Bulescu called me Friday and asked if I wanted to come out and see a local death metal band rehearse. The band, Avatar (http://www.myspace.com/avataromania), was prepping for a show in Bucharest, and were rehearsing in the dank dark basement of the student building near campus. On the way there, as I was walking across the courtyard of my apartment building, five or six dogs sprang up out of the leaves and lunged snarling and barking. Fear shot through me and turned quickly into anger, the same feeling I used to get in San Francisco when psychotic homeless people demanded money. As I backed away slowly, I wondered where I might find a baseball bat.

The nights are cold and wet now, and as I hurried across the town center, collar turned up and hands deep in my jacket pockets, I almost didn’t notice the new strings of Christmas lights that keep multiplying all over town... I’d expected a crowd of people at the Avatar rehearsal. Instead, there were seven of us: Otilia and three of her friends, and an earnest looking couple who sat glumly behind the band, nodding to the noise. The band’s been together since 1996, they’re great musicians, tight, and the lead singer has an excellent demonic roar. Later, while talking with the guitarist Cata Diaconu at the local pub “Play,” I wondered how a Romanian death metal band might find an opportunity to tour The States. I’m not a really huge metal fan, but I really liked how darkness sounds sung in Romanian. Are there metal bands that sing in Latin? Creepy-crawly!

Cata told me there used to be an underground venue in Craiova but that it closed last year. I told him my idea of directing a play with gypsy actors in the spring and that I’d like to find a decrepit, boarded up venue that we might take over for a couple of weeks. He told me about an ancient haunted house with a tree growing up through the middle of it, and said that he’ll show it to me soon. An ideal spot for death metal and theatre?

The dogs were gone by the time I came home. Other than burying themselves in leaves and crawling under cars at night, I’ve no idea where they go to escape the cold. I thought about how it would be to wander around Craiova with no place to sleep, hungry, a red tag in my ear, a skin disease, a broken leg, rotten teeth. And so rather than a baseball bat, yesterday I went to the grocery store and bought two boxes of doggie treats. I’ve filled one jacket pocket, and will carry them with me from now on, so that the next time the dogs come lunging out of the darkness, pissed off by cold and neglect, they’ll discover a little treat and kind words instead of the fear and anger. Soon, perhaps, I’ll be strolling Craiova, surrounded by sword-toting gypsies and trailed by dozens of wild dogs.

A few stray observations: students smoke in the hallways at the university. There are no overhead lights in most of the halls, and so it’s often through a dim dreamy haze I walk. Yesterday, someone told me that the reason the woman would not kill the duck (see earlier post), is that by custom it is only men who do the killing. Women here are gorgeous, though sometimes a bit too heavy with the makeup. Most men have no fashion sense at all. It’s rare to see an indie kid in Craiova; like Tampa, it’s a working-class city with a university, rather than a university city. There are almost no trash receptacles anywhere on campus, and so cigarette butts and coffee cups lie scattered everywhere. Construction goes on endlessly. Outside, gypsies beg on the street; one guy, a mentally damaged kid around 17 years-old outside the Premiere Market, can’t keep still; he copies kung fu moves, awkwardly spinning and kicking at the air. At cross-walks, people wait for the light to change. I asked a student if there were heavy fines for jaywalkers, and she told me that it’s not the fines that people are afraid of, it’s the cars that will hit you if you do not wait for a signal. There are no parking garages in Romania, and so cars fill the sidewalks and it’s like an obstacle course getting anywhere, especially in Bucharest. Theatre is still very important here, but it’s rare to meet anyone familiar with any underground music or independent film. There are only two movie theatres in all of Craiova, and, like most other cinemas in Romania, they mostly show the worst mainstream flicks America has to offer. Because Ceausescu banned Western music, until 1989 it was only the biggest names that got through. Rare to meet fans of The Velvet Underground, T.Rex or Joy Division, rarer still to find anyone familiar with today’s indie bands like Cocorosie or The Arcade Fire. Restaurants are pretty limited to traditional Romanian, Italian, and the occasional Middle-Eastern influence. I’ve heard there’s a not-so-good Chinese restaurant here, but nowhere since arriving in Romania have I seen any Vietnamese, Thai, Indian, or seafood restaurants. Quite often my dinner is rice with a side of tomatoes. The other day, while fixing eggs for breakfast, I noticed that one of the eggs still had feathers on it. I’ve also not seen an English-language newspaper in two months, and so I read my news online…

Cata Diaconu told me that for some reason, Romanians try hard to be like everyone else, that there’s shame in being Romanian. I’m not sure I get a sense of that here. And though I hear stories of the best-educated and most-talented people emmigrating, nearly everyone I’ve met in Craiova wants to stay, even those getting their PhDs. Things seem to be changing quickly. As Avatar sings on Hymn to the Ancient Ones: “Dog-faced demons will live between the fog of eternity/ The time of the entering of the Gods has begun!/ The time of breaking through the gates has begun!” As long as it comes with seaweed salad, a dragon roll and wasabi.

WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL!!!

Last night, history was made. As the sun rose, I stood in front of my Bucharest hotel room television, wiping tears, proud of my country, finally proud to be an American. I'm reminded of a quote from the play, Angels in America: "In this world, there is a kind of painful progress. Longing for what we've left behind and dreaming ahead." In one night, America is again a beacon of hope, and has stepped from shadows into brilliant light. From this day forward, I rededicate my life: to reach out to others with love and courage, to build bridges, to lift up and inspire. I ask all of my fellow Americans to do the same, to put our differences aside and to unite as one people. All eyes are upon us now. Let's get to it. Let's fulfill the dream.

Wild Dogs, Mad Monks and Smoke

The picture to your left is of a mannequin in a storefront window on a bustling
street in downtown Bucharest. Note the cat o' nine tails across the lap, the bored but sexy Eastern European body language. I am here for the National Theatre Festival, and since I cannot take pictures inside the theatres, this storefront bit of static performance art will have to do.

I got here two days ago, and, arriving at the train station, one of my dreams finally came true: two people from the festival stood on the dusty platform holding a sign with my name on it. I have The Astounding Cristina Modreanu to thank for this. She and I met at the playwriting festival in Timisoara, she told me she was in charge of the festival here, and offered to set me up. And boy did she. They have provided me with tickets to the shows, ten nights in a swank hotel, and handed me an envelope filled with a cash per diem.

The first night here, I saw an amazing production of Anton Chekov's The Black Monk, presented by Moscow New Generation Theatre. The play was in Russian, I did not understand a word of it, but it did not matter, the acting was so spectacular that I was entranced, edge of my seat. Tonight, I'm seeing a production of Electra. Yesterday, I had breakfast with Gerard Bell from Stan's Cafe Theatre Company in Birmingham, England. They're here with a production called The Cleansing of Constance Brown, and I hope to link them up somehow with the University of South Florida in Tampa. For those of you who don't know, I am on a year's leave of absence from USF. I have applied for a PhD program in Film Studies at Victoria University in Wellington, NZ, and, if Obama wins the election tomorrow night I will apply for a PhD in Theatre at Northwestern in Chicago.

This morning, I taught my first acting class in Romania. Mihaela Sirbu, the actress/teacher extraordinaire from the National University of Theatre and Film, emailed me and explained that she's been cast in a major motion picture and wondered if I could lead her class this morning in some warm-ups. I could barely sleep last night, up late planning what I would teach. It was a 9am class, and I did a bit of everything: Chekov, Viewpoints, breath work, etc. Afterwards, the students seemed really jazzed and asked if I could come back for more workshops. Mihaela and I have been trying to work out a weekend that I could come back and teach a rasaboxes workshop. I hope that it happens soon. Though I love teaching Contemporary British and American Theatre for the English Department in Craiova, when I teach and work with actors I see love, courage and divinity. Soon, I hope to meet the head of the Theatre Department in Craiova. But until then, I will do what I can where I can.
Tomorrow morning, I take the train back to Craiova, discuss August Wilson and The Piano Lesson, then return back to Bucharest at midnight and taxi over to the grand ballroom at the Howard Johnson's.

Oh, and last Friday in Craiova, Halloween night, a group of my students took me out on the town. The first stop, Pub's Pub, was down a winding brick staircase into a basement room made of red bricks and arches: a tiny place, packed with college students, soupy with smoke. Pub's Pub has occasional live music and eternal red wine from barrels. Friday, an unseen dj played an eclectic mix of just about every sort of rock music from every era you could imagine. At one point, Iggy Pop's The Passenger brought me to my feet. Then some Clash got me boppin', but soon the smoke overwhelmed me and I had to go out for some air. My gracious hosts came outside and asked if I wanted to go to another, larger club, and we moved on to a place that played a mostly 80s, mix. About half the crowd wore costumes, and Oana explained that during Ceausescu's rule nobody was allowed to celebrate Halloween. So costumes are new, daring, and everyone seemed really excited by it, the liberation that a costume sometimes brings.

After Oana and her boyfriend dropped me off, I was walking along a short alley and a savage devil dog leaped out at me, barking and snarling. I froze, and the dog harumphed back to its hedge and laid down beside it's (perhaps dead or sleeping) doggie friend. Next year for Halloween, I am going dressed as a rabid dog.

I have been making notes on the new screenplay, aching to sit down once all of these festivals are over, and start writing. Last night before drifting off to sleep, I was channel surfing and there was Petru's father Nicolae Margineanu, being interviewed for his new film. I hope to write something beautiful for him, a gift in return for all of the hospitality this incredible country and its people have blessed me with. What an journey. What a life!

The Best Invitaion Ever

The rest of the invitation reads: CNN live coverage, Live performances by the US Air Force Band, and up-to-the minute vote coverage. It's to be held at the Grand Ballroom of the Howard Johnson Hotel in downtown Bucharest, a three hour train ride from Craiova.
I am leaving for Bucharest Saturday morning, November 1st, a guest of the 12-day National Theatre Festival. They've offered me a free pass to all the plays, and a free hotel stay. Since I teach Tuesday evenings, 5-7pm, I will take a train to Craiova Tuesday morning, and then return to Bucharest at midnight and take a taxi straight to Ho-Jos.
Of the 12 Fulbrighters I met, it seems as though all but 1 of them are Obama supporters. Even the folks at the embassy seem to be rooting for him, as are all of my students and everyone I've met here. It's funny, for the past seven years when I've traveled overseas I always get the same question: "Every American we meet tells us they did not vote for Bush. Tell me, who did?" I try and explain that Bush voters usually never travel outside of The States, and if they do they don't talk to strangers. A taxi driver in Cluj asked, "Can I be honest with you?" "Of course," I answered. "If McCain is elected," he said, "America is fucked." He sounded out his curse as though he had sucked up some awful tasting phlegm and didn't know where to spit it.
My aunt Rita, one of few Republicans I know, sent out an anti-Obama email this morning, a tirade based on fear and misinformation (she listens to talk radio; go figure). One very telling part of the email was this sentence: "If you don't agree, please, don't tell me. You have nothing to gain."
And there, my friends, is the problem that America faces, and which has been exacerbated in recent years. Americans, like all people, are basically good. Unfortunately, the majority, like everyone else, are also basically lazy. What was once the "United" States, has been brought low by talk radio hosts and politicians, bought corporate mouthpieces posing as friends of the common people, who learned their skills from people like Herman Goering, President of the Nazi Party, who said, "...it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. ... Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”
The U.S. is a nation divided, and our common enemy is fear, the progenitor of darkness. Like it or not, we now live in a global market, our futures interdependent with every other country. My hope, and the hope of most of the planet, especially the younger generation, is that we are courageous enough to shine a light on darkness, and actively communicate with those with opposing views, so that we might learn to embrace love, not fear. This coming Tuesday, November 4th, 2008, will be a deciding factor in America's, and the world's, history.
"In this
moment
as smooth
as a board,
and fresh,
this hour,
this day
as clean
as an untouched glass
--not a single
spiderweb
from the past--
we touch
the moment
with our fingers,
we cut it
to size,
we direct
its blooming..."
--from Ode to the Present
By Pablo Neruda

International Experimental Theatre Festival

I am now in Cluj, a beautiful college town in Transylvania. The organizers of the fest, Cristian Nedea and Ramona Dumitrean, were kind enough to give me a week-long pass to all the plays and two square meals a day. Here's a link to the site: http://maninfest.uv.ro/festival.html. It's a little hard to navigate, but if you click on the right side flag that says "archive," and click "4th edition," you should be able to see a schedule of shows.
I'm staying with a fellow Fulbrighter, Rachel Renz, an American who's been living in Tuebingen, Germany for the past year, and has been kind enough to let me sleep on her air mattress. She's here researching the preservation of German minority culture in Transylvania. Last night, we saw a 45-minute long play called Hats and Stars and Chicken Pox, presented by the Czech Continuo Theatre, a group that incorporates dance, live music, puppets and text to create a truly remarkable experience. I have never seen anything in The States, other than perhaps some early Richard Foreman plays, that compares. Maybe it's because the performers are all so young and talented and sincere that I felt my heart-door open, and, inspired and filled with hope, wandered out into the night, past the gothic churches, the psychedelic fountains, the smoky coffee houses, feeling connected to everyone and everything, knowing that it's all unfolding perfectly.
PART II: Saw an amazing piece last night called Dancing vs. Rat Experiment by a NYC-based group called WITNESS RELOCATION. The show was done at the National Theatre of Cluj, a fat lady opera house whose make-up covers all her faded beauty, and whose insides are a haunted, broken down penny arcade. Here's a link to the Witness Relocation site: http://www.witnessrelocation.org.

Bela Lugosi's Dead

So I taught my first class at The University of Craiova on Tuesday. Contemporary American and British Theatre. Out of the 37 students signed up, only 8 attended. It’s a continuing problem at Romanian universities, and this year new rules were implemented that require students to attend at least 75% of their classes. I handed out the syllabus, and the students seemed shocked that I will be giving 8 pop quizzes with no chance for make-ups. They told me that students must work outside jobs, and one girl told me that she is also signed up for a math class at the same time our class meets!
In addition the Theatre class, I'll be holding active office hours for students and faculty who want to practice their English, re-sorting and shelving the English/American library, and in the process of developing a discussion forum/movie night at the American Corner; our first meeting is in four days. My Romanian language classes start Monday. I'm waiting to meet the head of the Theatre department here; I've offered to give acting workshops and teach a weekly yoga class (one grad student blushed recently when I mentioned yoga. She said it was “exotic”). And, besides agreeing to teach workshops in Timisoara and Bucharest, I've been asked to give a speech at a "Language, Literature and Cultural Policies" forum here in November.
So last night, I was cooking up these not-so-fine Betty Ice Bonanza frozen green beans with a side of rice, listening to Bauhaus on my laptop, hot water slowly trickling into the humongous, square, 3-foot deep bathtub that takes an hour to fill, and it finally hit me: I'm in Romania! For nine months! And I feel fine...

An amazing nine days

Perfect. That is how I would describe the nine days spent in Timisoara. I am now on a five-hour train back to Craiova, clack-a-clacking through mountains ablaze in fall foliage. And my thoughts drift back to the final show at the National Romanian Playwriting Festival, an almost holy production of Chekov’s Three Sisters, performed by the the National Theatre of Timisoara. Staged at the main Hall of the National Theatre, an ornate proscenium space with red upholstery, gilded box seats, small balconies, and a hand-painted interior dome that reminded me of the Prague Opera House, the temporary stage had been built out over the orchestra seats, so that most of the audience sat on the stage, surrounding the action. The set was simple: Oriental carpets jigsawed the floor, and dozens of tall candles helped illumine a heavy wooden table in the center. The acting and directing were both stunning, and more than once I caught myself holding my breath. It was like the movie Wings of Desire, and we were the ever-watchful angels witnessing the human parade of joy and sorrow, love and loss. In all, I saw 14 plays in Timisoara, and though it was sometimes hard to follow a lot of the action because of my (slowly changing) inability to understand Romanian, the better plays were so visually arresting with such dynamic performances, that the language wasn’t too much of a problem. Quite often, surrealist sets, the use of films (and occasional fireworks), the costumes and sound design overwhelmed the story. And even though some plays were overtly political, dealing with the legacy of communism and the aftermath of the 1989 revolution, more than one Romanian playwright shared with me that this country too often shies away from social or cultural issues. Three nights ago, I had dinner with the director Radul Apostle and the playwright Mihaela Michailov. Mihaela told me that fewer and fewer young people are coming to see live theatre, and I told her that we have the same problem in The States. Here, however, they encourage their youth by allowing free seating to any student showing up for a play, as long as there is space available.
HERE IS A LINK TO THE FESTIVAL'S MEDIA PAGE. COPY AND PASTE IT, AND ONCE YOU ARE ON THE FESTIVAL'S SITE, ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE SCREEN YOU WILL SEE THE NAMES OF SOME OF THE PLAYS. CLICK ON THE TITLE, AND YOU CAN WATCH A BRIEF VIDEO OF THE PLAY: http://www.tntimisoara.com/media.html
Once again, the generosity of the Romanian people cannot be overstated. It seems as though years of limited resources taught Romanian theatre artists how to create using whatever was available. This has also produced a tightly knit, hospitable artistic community. While at the festival, I met actors, directors and playwrights, not only from Romania, but also from France, Germany, Turkey, the Czech Republic, and the U.S. My meals and hotel were paid for, as was my train ride back to Craiova. I have been asked to teach acting workshops at the university in Timisoara, and a screenwriting workshop in Bucharest next spring, and I have been invited to the Experimental Theatre Festival in Cluj (northern Transylvania) October 19-26, and to the National Theatre Festival in Bucharest November 1-12. It all continues unfolding perfectly.

Hello Timisoara!

And so once again, Petru Marginanu worked his magic, made some calls, and set me up with a ten day pass to the Romanian Playwriting Festival in Timisoara, northwestern Romania. Because my classes have not "officially" started in Craiova, and because both the university and the Fulbright commission recognized this as a great opportunity, they gave their blessings and on Saturday morning Petru and his wife Ana picked me up in Craiova and we drove seven hours to Timisoara. As we drove north, the day became cold and dark and wet. The highway was under all sorts of construction, and my hosts chain smoked the whole way, one window always cracked. Outside, the autumn hills looked a lot like West Virginia, and for awhile we drove parallel to the Danube. Across the river, the tall brown hills of Serbia. Along the way, Petru and Ana taught me words and some phrases in Romanian. My favorite curse, and supposedly the most popular here, is "Du-te-n pizda ma-tu," or, "Go back inside your mother!"
We arrived late in Timosara, but even in the dark I could make out the changes. No more communist-era gray bloc buildings, Timosoara is a university city filled with parks, a beautiful river, Gothic churches, a wide open plaza, and progressive, vibrant people. It's fall here, the leaves are yellow and they carpet the sidewalks. The festival has put me up in in a clean hotel, provided me with the ten day pass to all plays and workshops, two meals a day, plus my train ride back to Craiova. Petru's sister Ana, a playwright who splits her time between NYC and Bucharest, has a play premiering this evening. Tomorrow, my new friends will drive back to Bucharest; I will remain here for another week.
Last night, we saw two plays. The first, Hans' Wife or What Would An Angel Look for In This City, was presented at the National Theatre, a beautifully ornate proscenium space. The set, costumes, and staging were bright, surrealist, and imaginative. Because it was performed in Romanian, I could understand very little, but from what I could discern, it was about a guy on his deathbed, traveling back over his life, exploring what he missed the first time around. A two-act play with a cast of 20, it was the only play I've ever seen with a live chicken wandering around onstage. I was given a great seat, right beside Christina Mordreanu, the artistic director for the Romanian National Theatre Festival in Bucharest that takes place November 1-10. So far, everyone in Romania has treated me like royalty; they are all so very kind and gracious. Christina invited me to come to Bucharest as her guest to the festival there, and I am going to try my best to do so. At lunch today, I met a Greek fellow getting his PhD in Cluj, northeast of here in the mountains. He told me about an experimental theatre fest happening there mid-October, and has offered to introduce me to the organizers tonight. And best of all so far, the event here, which would not have been possible without the help of Petru, and the event's organizer, Ciprian Marinescu. The second play we saw last night, Chat, took place on a boat on the river. A long narrow space so filled with cigarette smoke that it seemed like a ritualistic immersion, we sat at tables, separated by an aisle that the three actors used in addition to the end of the space where there was a tiny stage set up. It was a comedy from the town of Iasi, in the far northeastern corner of Romania. Simple props, great physical humor. Afterwards, we all moved to a late night banquet at a club on the river.
Occasionally, if I think about my future, about being so rootless, I get a slight panic, a shortness of breath, and I find myself grasping at anything that resembles permanence. This is my journey, to learn to let go, to trust that the river of life will always continue to flow, and though the scenery and water changes, the river itself will always remain. Sometimes, I am so elated that I want to sing out in the middle of a crowded park. Sometimes, it's all I can do not to put my arm around the shoulder of a stranger sitting beside me. And though I am occasionally so blue that my eyes ache with tears, I have never, ever ceased to be amazed by the exceptional beauty of life, and the indomitable human spirit. I am reborn; everything is new.

Saying Prayers the Old School Way

This morning, while walking across my apartment’s courtyard, I saw a live duck wrapped in a blue plastic bag. She was a pretty duck, soft brown, her head and neck exposed, and she made fearful cooing sounds. Someone had placed the duck in the grass at the foot of a bench. Three feet away, a scrawny black cat with a twisted-bone tail, slunk toward the duck. A weathered old woman with three craggy teeth, a kerchief, a grey dress, swollen feet and broken shoes, stood nearby with a butcher knife. She gestured to us as we passed, Mihai replied briefly, and we walked on. Later, Mihai said that the woman was waiting for someone to come along that had the heart to saw the duck's head off. When I came back from the American Corner of the library, the duck and the woman were gone.

Every day, a new adventure, and every day, something more. Yesterday morning, the buzzer buzzed, I opened the door and in trooped two men and four women in dusty work clothes. The men went to knocking a hole in my wall and installing new wiring so the clothes washer could be plugged in. The women began carting out broken chairs, victims of the hot-headed Italian former Fulbrighter. During the chaos, I excused myself to go to the opening ceremony marking the University’s new school year. As I made to leave, one of the women gestured me over and then launched into elaborate operating instructions, pushing buttons on the washer, opening the soap dish, closing it, making spin gestures with her finger, and so on until finally one of the men stopped her and gestured quite simply: open the door, throw your clothes in, fill the soap container, and push this button.

The ceremony was a somber affair, a mix of Orthodox religion and officials inculcated by communist function. It was held in the Agrinomia, a large building fifteen minutes from here. The men wore black suits, a couple of limos waited outside. Inside, dark wooden panels, red carpet and curtains. Mihai and I sat in the middle of a 300-seat auditorium. The wood panels seemed askew somehow, like wrong puzzle pieces shoved into place by impatient and clumsy hands. My red chair was broken, and I kept sliding toards the floor. We moved down two seats. Mihai explained that often in Romania, the most talented people leave the country for Italy or France or Germany where they can make better wages. “And so only the most patriotic stay?” I asked. Mihai smiled. “Yes,” he replied. “This theatre, and that chair you just left, they were built by the patriots.”

And then yesterday afternoon…Nirvana! I discovered the open air market: carrots, radishes, olives, honey, and fresh leaf lettuce! On my way home, I stopped at the supermarket for feta and balsamic vinegar. Bit by bit, I am digging deeper, and Craiova is giving up her treasures. I’ve been doing yoga in the afternoons on my living room floor, my fat and greasy sofa squatting jealously beside me. I've asked around for a gym or a fitness center; yesterday, one of my colleagues explained that there are a few, but it is mostly women who go there. “And the men?” He shrugged and answered, “We die early.” After an hour of yoga, I ventured out into the main plaza. Surrounded by fountains and rosebushes and hundreds of Craiovians: kids on roller skates, teen lovers smooching on benches, older women walking arm-in-arm, men with black berets standing in groups smiling and nodding...I sat in an outdoor café as the sun set and a beautiful girl with deep set eyes came and I asked for a Romanian beer and she brought a pint bottle called Bergenbier, with Germanic old-world writing, and a speeding, bucking ATV (all terrain vehicle) on its yellow label. Here’s a youtube ad for Bergenbier: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGodQAS7Urk. One was enough, and I strolled home slowly in cap and jacket, the cool night covering all of us under a blanket of ink and stars.

"I am your new sofa. Welcome to Craiova."

A three hour train ride west of Bucharest, everyone in Romania warned me away from Craiova, saying things like, “It’s full of gypsies and thieves and pollution and mean people.” And I’ve gotta admit, it’s not exactly a place that families on vacation would visit...sort of like Brownsville, Texas or Bakersfield, CA, but with a developing-nation-with-a-grudge-and-corrupt-political-system twist. But I'm calling it home for nine months, so what the hey.
Mihai Cosoveanu, my contact in Craiova met me at the train station this afternoon. Have I mentioned the dogs? Romania is filled with them, and everyone here cautions you not to touch them, that they bite and they are rabid. When I asked Mihai why the government doesn’t round them up, he told me that anytime there’s talk of doing so, people shout and cry. “Mostly women.” Mihai is funny, he should be in movies. On the way from the train station, he told me about the gypsies here. “They sometimes shoot each other, maybe twice a year, but not to worry. Mostly, they cannot afford the gun.” He pauses, setting up the perfect delivery. “And so they carry the samurai sword.” After setting me up in my new apartment and taking me grocery shopping, Mihai warned me about the dogs. “At night they are in packs. And then they are not scared. They come for you and bite.” Not that I’m planning many late night outings, but just to discourage me further, while eating pizza Mihai filled me in on another Craiova treat. “What is it you call the children of the wealthy?” he asked, then laughed when I told him, “Rich Kids.” “Yes! After ten p.m. the 'rich kids,' the sons of wealthy, drive fancy cars. Lamborghinis, Maseratis, BMW. They drive them through the streets of city, near where you live, up to 200 kilometers an hour. You will hear them tonight...”
The train station, like other parts of this city, is in bad need of repair. And after dragging my stuff up four flights of stairs into the new apartment, I wondered where I’d gone wrong. The apartment,however, was bigger than I expected, a one-bedroom with a kitchen and living room. There’s a TV and a washing machine just outside the bedroom door. The bathroom has one very deep, square tub. There was no hot water today, and Mihai said that “Maybe after the first of October they will turn it on.” Post-communist French doors open onto a cracked cement balcony and the buildings outside are lovely. The doors don’t close all the way, and when I asked Mihai if there was any heat, he replied, “After October 15th they will turn on the heat. Maybe.” All that aside, I am just on the edge of the old part of the city, right beside the National Theatre, which is just next to the university. I’m meeting the dean tomorrow morning, and will hopefully get a schedule of my classes then. Because the university was badly damaged in the last earthquake here a few years back (30 years to be exact, but who's counting?) and is still going through repairs, not all of the classrooms are usable. And so classes meet weekends. I’m hoping mine do not.
A few other notes: I saw pyramid shaped haystacks and oil derricks from the train window today. Nearly all of the drab gray concrete apartment buildings have their air conditioning units barnacled onto their shell...one for each unit, just beside the satellite dish. And there are almost no minorities of any sort here. I saw a black guy at the train station this morning and realized he was the first non-Caucasian I’d seen in nearly a week. No Asians, Arabs, Hispanics, nothing. Which makes for a pretty homogeneous culture. You’ve gotta love the variety America offers. The supermarket I shopped at today was huge, but there were barely any fresh vegetables, no lettuce, and when I asked Mihai if there was broccoli, he smiled and shrugged, “Frozen.”
It’s going to be a very long nine months.

A New Dawn

So after a day of touring Bucharest, the National Museum of Cotroceni (part of the presidential palace where we had to wrap our shoes with slippers so as not to disturb the centuries-old Turkish rugs), Ceaussescu's Palace of Parliment, lunch at Caru cu Bere Restaurant, and a visit to Mogosoaia Palace, I soaked in a hot bath and then met Petru and his father Nicolae Margineanu at a really nice Italian place in our neighborhood of embassies and gated older homes, just a block and a half from my hotel. We were seated in a small side room where we started with cappuccinos and then moved on to a variety of delicious treats. Nicolae, one of Romania's top filmmakers, brought me a bag of dvds as a gift. We talked about life and God and movies. I told them some harrowing personal tales, and Nicolae explained that one story in particular had stirred up a memory of a film idea he once had. He laid it out, and the three of us kicked it around while I took notes. Nicolae asked if I would be willing to write a script. A script? Oh yes indeed. We followed the dinner with the most delicious tiramisu ever, and then I walked Nicolae part way home. I feel like I am in heaven, where all I have to do is imagine something before it begins to unfold. This reminds me of the time I hitchhiked from Tampa to Vancouver, when everything was lined up perfectly and I was exactly where I needed to be and the universe responded with bounties of gifts and I was blessed and I knew it then and I know it now.
Besides, I finally slept last night. And this morning, Romanian pop music is being broadcast throughout the neighborhood. Or maybe it's a concert; soon, I'll venture to find out. It's still cold and gray out, maybe even a bit colder today. I've a feeling that winter will come fast and hard. Everyone says that other than the university and a really good theatre that there is nothing to do in Craiova, which suits me just fine. Now I have a project. A writing project. Plus, I'll be taking a class in Romanian culture and language. And traveling weekends. Petru's sister, a playwright, has a new play opening in mid-October at a theatre festival in Timisoara...
Life is good. Everything I've ever done, every place I've visited, every person I've talked with, every relationship, every love, every loss, has led me to where I am right now. Thank you.

Amsterdam to Bucharest

Hello fellow adventurers. It's Wednesday morning and I'm about to traipse out into big bad Bucharest for a day of wonder. I got here yesterday afternoon after spending two days readjusting sleep patterns and getting my land legs. It had been twenty years since I'd last wandered Amsterdam, and it's funny how my perspective has changed. This time around, I spent about an hour walking through the main tourist center with its hash bars and tired, overly made-up prostitutes (why they don't wear different themed costumes is a mystery, it's like somebody told them that men dig women who look like they're made of plastic) and dopey tourists and prowling junkies, and it was like listening to some Journey or Eagles album that you liked as a teenager and haven't heard in twenty years and suddenly you wonder what the hell you were thinking all those years ago. And so Monday I rented a yellow, upright bicycle and pedaled along canals out where the tourists don't roam, past leaning narrow houses and coffee shops and out to park lands and rose gardens and ponds and dogs and families and lovers and it's like I could breathe again, big chest fulls of air, and the wind tore water from my eyes and I ate vegetarian lasagna in an Italian joint and a big calico cat came in off the street and crawled up into my lap and nuzzled against my nascent beard and then later I saw the movie Elegy and though it was sort of New Yorker arty it rubbed very close to the bone; Penelope Cruz gets better and better and it was perhaps some of the most focused acting from Denis Hopper ever.

Flying into Bucharest from Munich, I noticed how the neat orderly landscape had slowly become a little more sloppy and unplanned, a bit like flying over parts of Texas or New Mexico. Weeds peeked out from the worn and weathered runway, and two retired jets, their nose cones amputated, sat idle in the tall grass. It's gray here, and chilly, a prelude of what's to come. But at the airport, one of my long-time fantasies was nearly fulfilled: two men waited with a sign that read "Fulbright," and they greeted me warmly and one of them, the driver, insisted on carrying my bags. Someday, my name on a sign; but this is perfect for now. Mihai Moroiu, the Fulbright rep here, sat beside me in the backseat of the dusty compact and as we inched along through five o' clock traffic he pointed out sights and filled me in on Romanian history and his erudite enthusiasm was contagious so that by the time we turned off the highway onto a tree lined boulevard dotted with foreign embassies, I was wide awake and knew I'd made the right decision in coming here. The Casa Victor Hotel is off on a little side street. My room is spacious, with wooden floors and a large bathtub. There's a large armoire that I've unloaded my suitcase into (the duffel bag, stuffed with winter clothes, squats ready at the foot of the bed), two bedside lights warmed the chill off the room last night, and the low bed, embarrassed by its lumps and springs, creaked apologies every time I moved during the night. The free breakfast was European delicious: great coffee, bread, cheese, salami. I will continue to skip the evil hard-boiled egg portion.

Before I left Tampa, Michelle Young put me in contact with a Romanian actress and teacher whom she met at Larry Silverberg's summer intensive at Eckerd College. Mihaela Sirbu teaches at the National University of Theatre and Arts here in Bucharest and evidently stays very busy. She picked me up in her blue Volvo in front of the hotel last night after a rehearsal, and drove me around town a bit before we returned to this fancy-schmancy neighborhood and we dined at a quiet and smoky place around the corner. Yep, folks in Romania still smoke in restaurants. And so much for trying to be a vegetarian. I ate delicious salmon and we talked acting and music and movies. She's invited me to watch a rehearsal today, a Viewpoints-based performance she'd directing that goes up Thursday night. It's across town, and so I'll crash-course the city metro, and then I meet Petru Margineanu, a film composer and friend of Rozalinda Borcila from USF, for a late lunch.

Thursday, tomorrow, the eight Fulbrighters walk from Hotel Casa Victor to the American embassy for an all day orientation and welcoming dinner. Friday, we're led around the city, Saturday is an off day, and then Sunday I take the three hour train ride to Craiova! I'm able to receive Skype calls (free international telephone via your computer go to www.skype.com) here, but it'll be trickier in Craiova because I will not have internet access at my apartment there, only in my office. Hope you're all doing great. More anon. Kerry