MOLDOVA

 

READ

The title of the book I chose for Moldova pretty well sums up the theme of the plot: The Good Life Elsewhere, written by Vladimir Lorchenkov and translated by Ross Ufberg. The book is both funny and tragic, peopled with characters who want to live almost anywhere except where they actually reside, the village of Larga in Moldova.

Their ultimate wish is to move to Italy, thanks in large part to a villager named Serafim, who has been reading about Italy and learning Italian for twenty years. The people of Larga believe that a person can earn a thousand euros a month working as a housekeeper, compared to the pittance they’re able to earn in Larga.

In the book’s opening chapter, a few dozen villagers who paid four thousand euros each to human smugglers think that they have finally reached the land of their dreams. “They’d left behind the poverty, the Moldovan devastation, the repellent earth that, no matter which way you worked it, when you planted corn you reaped just the husks.” The villagers’ elation is short-lived, however, when they discover they have not been delivered to Rome as they’d been promised.

The problem is that Italy doesn’t want them. Visa applications from citizens of Moldova are routinely denied by the Italian government. One Italian diplomat tells another as they work their way through a pile of visa applications, “Not a single Moldovan citizen gets a visa these days allowing him to stay in our country, let alone tourist or work visas. Still, we’ve got two hundred thousand Moldovans.” They won’t even grant visas to Moldovan Members of Parliament or the Moldovan President because they’re convinced that, once they get a toe-hold in Italy, they won’t leave.

Regardless of whether they’re wanted in Italy or not, the villagers of Larga continue dreaming up ways to go there, and subsequent plots become increasingly brazen and bizarre. Soon, it’s not only people from Larga but citizens throughout Moldova who are trying to flee their country for the good life in Italy. One man tries to warn people that their vision of Italy is an illusion, and that pining after it is keeping them from improving their lot in Moldova. That speech doesn’t end well for him.

The absurd plots that are hatched by the villagers are what gives the book its humor. A tractor that’s turned into an airplane, then later into a submarine, in order to infiltrate Italy by air or by sea; a crusade by tens of thousands of Moldovans trying to claim Italy for Eastern Orthodox Christians; and the effort by several people to learn the sport of curling so they can travel to Italy for a curling competition are just a few of the plans that are attempted.

After reading The Good Life Elsewhere, I can only hope that real life in Moldova isn’t as abysmal as the life portrayed in the book!

COOK

Food was barely mentioned in The Good Life Elsewhere, so I searched the Internet for a  Moldovan dish. I found a recipe for sarmale, stuffed cabbage rolls, on the Peace Corps website. I substituted ground vegan OmniPork for the ground pork in the recipe, and I used JUST Egg in place of the egg. This recipe was very labor-intensive and took a lot of time to make, so I wish I could say I really liked it. Alas, that would be a lie. You win some, you lose some.

GIVE

GlobalGiving’s website listed a project for Moldova that caught my attention: the construction of an environmental training center in an emerging Eco-village. The project’s description is like a real-life depiction of the problems facing the villagers of Larga in The Good Life Elsewhere.

“Lack of knowledge and industrial agriculture have degraded Moldova’s previously fertile black soils. Inefficiently built houses make it extremely hard for people to pay ever-rising energy bills. Trust and social cohesion in communities is crumpling and youth see no opportunities. This leaves people hopeless and drives migration, especially from rural areas. In 20 years about a quarter of [the] population moved abroad. Very few positive examples of building vibrant resilient communities are visible.”

The environmental training center proposed in this project “will serve as a regional hub for practical education in the fields of organic agriculture, energy efficiency, eco-construction and community development.” It is hoped that the project “will support the local community through job creation and educational opportunities.”

More information about this project is available at: Build an environmental training center in Moldova - GlobalGiving.

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