Winter in Moldova

When we arrived in Chisinau (pronounced Quiche-i-now), the welcome sign in the airport looked to be about 18" long.   A very small airport.   There was about 6" of snow on the ground the next morning when a fellow Fulbrighter, Rod, took us on a walking tour of the city.  It was beautiful.  For the  next week, the snow compacted and turned to ice.   Bob and I used our Yak Trax (snow tires for your shoes) and were moving pretty slowly.  The local people walked on with no problems.  The women, especially, moved around without problem while wearing high heel boots.  I have  named them, the incredible Moldovan ice walkers.   I felt fortunate that I did not fall.   Now the snow has melted and there is more on the ground.   They say March should warm up to the middle 40s.  Yay.

Restaurants

First let me say that we have not been sick once.  For me, this is unusual.  I am always the first to be sick with travelers diarrhea but hay, this is great.   The doctor here at the embassy stated the water was fine to drink and would not make you sick.  We have heard, however, that there are heavy metals in the water and so we have been drinking bottled water.

The restaurants have been excellent.  Soup is a major menu item and most restaurants have a picture of each dish and English description.  The photos are from one of our favorite restaurants, A Casa La Mama.  They have excellent Moldovan dishes including wonderful mamaliga which is thick corn meal mush similar to polenta.  Svetlana is our waitress.  She speaks Russian.  Delicious.

Also, this is a new blog.  I will also post it to Facebook.

Beth and Bob