October 9, 2008: Cluj, Day Two – Posters and Banners

Dear Friend,

We’re staying at the Retro Youth Hostel in Cluj. We arrived in the afternoon yesterday, found our beds, and pretty much had the rest of the night to ourselves. We did have a meeting before bed (at least, it was before bed for me,) but otherwise we were left alone. Those of us present were Iris, Paolo, Ana and Adi, Ana (from Viaţa,) Andreea (whom I met a couple days ago,) Tudor, Eugen, Marius, Cristina, Maria, Diana, and Viaţa friends George, Claudius, and Ilie. The rest would join us later. During the meeting, I was assigned to help put up posters and paint banners for the tents at our festival this Saturday.

Unlike Bucureşti, you need to ask permission in order to hang posters in Cluj. If you hang them up without first asking permission, there’s a really huge fine of an amount I can’t even remember. It’s a large amount, an unnecessary amount. So, most of our time hanging posters was taken up by asking permission. Ana and Andreea, who I hung posters with, spent a good twenty minutes explaining to a school principal (who reminded me of Frank Langella) what we were doing and getting permission from him.

As we were hanging up posters, I got to see quite a bit of our corner of the city. Cluj is essentially a cleaner, quieter, and less crowded Bucureşti. That being said, I was able to enjoy it much more. The architecture was still a kind of patchwork mosaic of previous decades mashed together, but the mashing seemed much more aesthetically pleasing, as if there was thought put into whether or not the new, glass paneled building should be built next to the decaying stone wall. Also, it seemed “modern” Cluj was on the main streets and the antiquity was found in the labyrinths of back streets, where our hostel was located. There were cobblestone streets, too, which always make me happy.

I took on my next assignment of painting banners in the recess area of a nearby school. The school was painted orange. Everywhere. The entire building was a very loud orange. We laid out the pieces of cloth we were going to paint on and set to designing and making the banners. I helped design two of them – the New Horizons IMPACT banner and the A.R.T. Fusion banner. They turned out really well. Some others in the group worked on banners for a street animation tent, an arts/crafts tent, and an administration tent.

The painting took up most of the afternoon. I discovered that students get out of school as late as six o’clock in the afternoon here. Some of them came over to see what we were up to. One little girl in particular, wearing a red sweater, reminded me of my youngest sister Talya. She didn’t say anything, but stood contentedly off to the side and watched as we did our work. It was amazing how much she reminded me of Talya, though not necessarily from how quiet she was. Talya is definitely more engaging.

Back at the hostel, Paolo was busy at making supper. He had been assigned by the group to whip up some Italian cuisine, in this case pasta. He was very intent on his work, his art if you will. He did well, the pasta was great. It was a sort of alfredo, much cheesier and with chunks of ham. My first helping wasn’t as cheesy as I would’ve preferred, so I dug deeper into the pot for my second helping, where the cheesy goodness was located. I made a cheesy comment about digging deeper in order to find what you’re truly looking for.

I ran into somewhat of a culinary faux pas concerning Paolo later on in the evening, though. It was with Iris, too. While Paolo and I were talking, Iris very kindly handed each of us a chocolate covered cherry. I popped it into my mouth, took a bite, and experienced a flood of something I couldn’t identify. I did identify the slight burning sensation, which became the focus of my senses instead of the taste of chocolate or cherry. Before my mind reached the inevitable conclusion, I asked Paolo what was in what I had just put in my mouth. It was as I swallowed that Paolo told me there was chocolate, cherry, and a little bit of rum. “There’s alcohol in it?!” I was trying to stay calm, but Paolo goofily communicated to me through the silly smile on his face that I probably wasn’t doing a good job. I followed him as he backed into the other room, where Iris was. I asked her if there was alcohol in what I had eaten. The look on her face was “oops.”

Now, generally, I’m not against alcohol. I am, however, against my personal consumption of alcohol. What made this situation worse was that I had consumed it, though in a tiny amount, without my knowing. Communion wine and medications don’t fall in this discrimination (though for awhile I hadn’t realized that what I was drinking during Anglican communion services in London was indeed wine.) So, while remaining calm and trying to not proselytize, I attempted to explain my position, that I wasn’t pointing fingers, and that I was just trying to make sense of everything. Everyone joked that I wasn’t going to be drunk, which made me feel as if I had failed at what I was trying to say. Eugen also mentioned that what happened was a good thing because they now got to see me open up more to them. This didn’t help the situation, because now I felt I hadn’t been doing a good job at opening up and that I was freaking out about alcohol.

As I went to bed, I had quite a time trying to quiet my mind. I really wanted to do an address to the group, a sort of ice-breaker where I would explain my position, not on alcohol, but on what I really desire my experience here to be. I’ve been told I’m an introvert, which I’m beginning to believe is quite true. I don’t want that, or anything else, as I’ve said before, to keep me from investing in the people I meet. However, I feel as if I’m missing the mark. I’m trying, but maybe I’m not trying hard enough. In all honesty, I don’t know how to invest and part of me tonight wanted to explain that to my colleagues. I feel I need their help to invest in them. I don’t know who they are. How can I invest?

Noapte buna.
Kailen