Romanians have this strange clapping habit. Once a performance is over, there will be the usual clapping. Then, after about 10 seconds of standard clapping, somebody will always start a beat. As soon as one or two people get it going, everybody immediately joins in. Suddenly everyone is clapping in unison, faster, faster, faster, and then back to slow. This continues for a few cycles. Some of my sitemates were analyzing this behavior. Certainly it was not something we recognized from back home (though if anyone has experiences to the contrary, please pipe in here.) We decided it was a holdover from the Communist times, joking that back then there was even a proper way to clap. Although we kind of laughed it off, tonight I turn on the TV at about 1 AM and TV1, the state run TV channel, is doing a 50th anniversary special by showing old clips.

So I sit for a while watching the Brasov International Music Festival of 1968. A very classy Communist affair, funky set, long silver microphone with chord, and plenty of shots panning the crowd, most of whom appear dressed in the same suit. Glamorous because not only are the acts introduced in Romanian but also French. So, the young man singing finishes his number and low and behold, the Romanian clapping! The camera pans to the audience, the resplendent people in black and white, row upon row, hands clapping as one. And the reverberating beat from years past reaches my ears.

Every Romanian 12th grader engaged in the bilingual English program must prepare a final project/presentation before graduation. The topic can be anything relating to American/British history or culture. Today, I was invited to view the presentation aspect. Let me share some of my notes:

Popular Themes:

• Famous Sites of ________
• The Life of ________
• History of ________

Re-think Question to prevent plagiarism.

“Air of an inquisition”

Presentation Skills

• weak
• no visual aids
• taking charge > set the tone (vs. just answering questions)
• long silence in response to questions

Technology (available at school)

• laptop/projector – make available – encourage use
• PowerPoint skills

Proper source citing

• not just domains!

Authenticity

Starting with “… was born on…”

New: immersion – presentation/show/food – max 10x/day

I am glad that I went (even though I would like those two hours back at some point.) What I saw today was well intentioned teachers following the same tired old line, with lazy/robotic behaving students spewing back hastily memorized facts taken from the internet. In short, the entire exercise was a joke. What makes it a shame is that American/British culture is such an interesting topic! The written component of this project, for most of the students, consisted of a slick bound volume replete with color photographs. Of course, 95% of the information was simply copied and pasted from the internet (the other 5% brief introductions and conclusions.) What struck me was how blatant it all was. First you have this shaky, one paragraph introduction, full of odd verb tenses and a preponderance of “the” in front of any object (“I would like to talk about the Henry Ford…) and then, bang, perfectly nuanced writing. One of the teachers confided to me, during a short break, that the lowest grade they could give was a 7 (out of 10.) All in all, on display today was a massive failure of effort – both by the teachers and the students. Although I do not doubt that most students had some interest in the topic they chose, their presentation (or shall we say testimony,) did not reflect that. The teachers, depending on whether or not they liked the student, either gave them a pass with softballs or ridiculed them by pressing on with questions which they could not answer. When the students were able to talk, mostly it was a rote reading of the script they had prepared on note cards.

As part of a project I am doing with 11th graders now, we are working to produce a tangible visible presentation. To begin, I brought in my laptop to school and showed them a real PowerPoint presentation about a similar topic to the one we are studying. We talked about how this basic tool raised the attractiveness of the presentation through the use of photographs, graphs and video clips. Since students here tend to be computer literate (that is, regarding games and pirated movies,) I am sure they can figure out PowerPoint. The problem is that these skills – basic to any successful presentation – are not being integrated into the classroom. Yes, I know that most teachers can’t afford a laptop, but unfortunately technology seems to be viewed as something for computer class only. With these 11th graders, I hope to come up with a presentation that not only reflects genuine research methods, but also utilizes modern, if simple, interest generating devices.

I am considering suggesting my findings to the other English teachers, but I want to first get their reacton to today’s events… so it is.

Alas, Romania IS Eastern Europe. And what, you may ask yourself, has driven our fair author to this conclusion. One word: mullet. Yep, they are everywhere. I guess back home mullet is acceptable only in two instances. The first is in any photos from the 80’s… ya know, trends come and go and we are all susceptible to them. The second instance is in regards to anyone who did any combination of the following things: a) outfitted his/her pickup with a shotgun rack, b) voted Bush/Cheney in 2000 AND 2004, c) enjoys any type of liquor with the name Boones in it, and d) lives in a non-fixed domicile. But here in Romania you will find the mullet on a wide range of individuals. Granted, the majority are spotted on middle school aged boys too young for the advanced E. European bling-bling of pimped out 70’s Mercedes’. But the trend is not limited to such types. With an alarming frequency, mullets can be spotted on older people who really ought to know better. And so, as a public service, I feel it is my duty to design a two-class lesson plan on the mullet. We will discuss its history, adaptation and current status. This of course will lead to an emotions based paper along the line of, “what do you FEEL about the mullet?” I think it will go down well. Yes, it must.

In order to get to London from Transylvania, the best deal is to take a train to Budapest and then fly from there. My train ticket was for late on Wednesday night, Passover. Having made the proper inquiries at the local synagogue, I got an invitation to their Seder that night, beginning at 7. After a very brief service, everyone filed into the back room where there were some large tables set up with silverware and blue and white festooned cups. I was instructed to sit near the end of one of the tables. Across the way was the old man (picture previous post) and next to me was a couple about my parents’ age. Like any other Jewish gathering I’ve been to, things began in a rather subdued fashion. The community leader read some letters from the Romanian President and Prime Minister, and then did some prayers.

Now, to those of you who aren’t familiar with Jewish traditions, Passover is the holiday that commemorates the Jews’ escape from bondage in Egypt. It is rather ritualized and in fact one of the more interesting of the Jewish holidays. One of the traditions is to constantly drink and re-fill one’s glass with wine. As such, again like any other Jewish gathering I’ve been to, things began to loosen up. After a perfunctory service (I like these people, they think like we did at Hillel,) the food and wine continued flowing, some perky Jewish music was played over a boombox, and conversation picked up. The couple next to me explained that their two children were living in Canada. This was not surprising, as many Romanians seem to give Canada a try. The woman especially was quite nice, egging me a little to sing along to “Ya-a-seh-shalom,” and the man was quite courteous by always offering me more food and wine.

I was really excited, though, about the older man across from me. The first time I heard him speak was at the Holocaust commemoration service about a month ago. Of course I didn’t get the whole of it, but I got the idea and was nonetheless moved by his courage. Based on his age I figured that he knew no English, so I tried to speak to him in Romanian. He understood but was obviously not thrilled with my command of the language. In broken English he asked me if I knew Yiddish. No, I replied, I did not. But I went on to explain how Yiddish was spoken a few generations ago within my family, and that some family members had emigrated to Brooklyn, NY from Hungary. This he was interested in. Again, in broken English he said, smiling, “Brooklyn… little Israel.” Sure, it wasn’t much to go on, but we had a good laugh. Sadly in order to catch my train I had to run rather quickly after eating, and hands were shaken all around. This extension of hospitality by the community here was very touching, and I enjoyed this Seder very much.

Coming next, the London trip!