Dear Friends and Family,
In Moldova it is easy to remember when seasons change, vacations happen and school begins and ends; it’s the same every year for everyone. School starts September first, the first day of fall, and school ends June first, the first day of summer. On March first we celebrated the coming of spring, and I can already feel
its arrival. A fun thing about welcoming spring in Moldova is the mărțișor, which is this cute trinket you see to the right. The word mărțișor translates literally as “little March.” It has a rich history with the two colors representing different things: white stands for purity and red for love. It is also believed that the one who wears it will be healthy in the coming year. Although the meaning might be different for different people, what you should know is that it is an offering from one friend to another to show love, appreciation and respect, and it always marks the coming of spring. I love walking around Chişinău seeing them pinned on women’s coats knowing they were given by a friend, out of love and to welcome spring.
That was your Moldovan cultural lesson for the month. Now for some updates. A servant team of four women from the US and Canada arrived on March first for their 3-month stay with us, moved into their apartment and has hit the ground running. They’ve been busy with orientation, culture and history lessons and getting to know the kids. This team arrived striving to speak Romanian since the second they landed. Pray blessings on their efforts and faith as they learn, as not being able to communicate is definitely one of the biggest challenges. They have also been a huge help in managing our space at the school. These women have been so willing to serve since they arrived; it’s incredibly humbling and extremely helpful.
In other news, we bought a sewing machine! We were recently given several more rooms in which to run our after-school program, and one of them, outfitted in cute pink damask wall paper, was fittingly called The Pink Room. It’s for girls only. And we’re going to sew in it! I have begun working with three girls on learning how to use the machine. They are antsy to make bags, but we’re trying to slow down, learn how to use the machine, make different stitches, draw and cut patterns… You remember being a teenager and wanting what you want, now. Pray for patience for me and the girls as we stumble our way thorough learning how to sew.
John’s work with the Pinocchio group continues to go well. A few weeks ago, the group created hand-made greeting cards to be sold at a private high school with whom our organization has a good collaborative relationship. On March first the kids from Pinocchio stood in the hallway of this school in downtown Chisinau and sold their cards, making in the end over 100 dollars! The children were then paid for their work, and the other profits were put towards materials for sewing which we hope to be able to turn into some sort of a profitable project here in Moldova.
Also this month, we hosted a celebration welcoming spring for the school staff. The children spent several weeks learning poems and songs, and to our delight, there was a great staff turnout to see the fruit of the students’ hard work. It was fun for us to put on something for the teachers expressing our appreciation for them by handing out hand-made cards and candies as they left. We’re feeling really hopeful about our relationship with the school. Please pray that it will continue to grow and strengthen as we move forward.
David Chronic, the Africa/Europe Regional Coordinator for Word Made Flesh, visited us this month from our sister community in Romania and facilitated the preparation of a 12-month tactical plan for our organization. This time together created space for us to name our accomplishments as well as our disappointments over the last year. We were also able to identify the false paradigms we have been living under and to create a new one, one we can live by and which I would like to share with you: “We choose to seek our true identity in God, to appreciate the value of each member of our team, to trust each other, to follow our vision and to act upon established priorities, while also being open to taking risks.”
We also narrowed down our overarching goal of developing our organizational capacity over the next year. This came from our desire to hire Moldovan staff, better evaluate our programs and obtain security over our space at the school. While we have permission to use this space from the school, it could be taken from us at anytime. We are so grateful for the space and need to trust that God will provide us with the ability to stay or provide us with something else that can be ours. We covet your prayers!
We send you our love from Moldova,
Rachel & John