Jobs and Conferences - things I have been up to

I just wanted everyone to see what a nice fall day we are having for Halloween in Cluj!

Now, it is finally time for some updates on what I have been up to. It looks like I might finally get to meet up with some of the museum people in Cluj next week. That will be nice to do although I am starting to think that there really isn’t that much to do with my research question on the 20th anniversary of communism. I might need to go back to one of my original project ideas involving the educational-art packets. Of course, it is getting tricky to do something like that because I am in each place for only one semester. It is all so complicated to think about.

Other than the museum project, I also am about to get started in the advising office. I am meeting with someone about this on Monday, and I plan to offer a series of six workshops on preparing applications for the United States. These will be similar to what I did in Cambodia, and it worked pretty well there – topics like developing a cv, looking for funding, and a three part session on writing the personal statement/essay. I am glad that I am getting a chance to do this kind of work, both here and in Cambodia, as it is something that interests me – and an area where I actually have some experience. I would love to be able to do this kind of thing back in Texas, especially in my hometown. Just encourage students to look at schools, especially places like liberal arts colleges. These are schools that so many students in small towns know nothing about and often the price tag scares them away before they can realize that those places can offer really great financial aid. I know that not everyone would be going to those places, but I believe that even in a place like Eastland there are 2-3 students every year who have the ability to succeed at those schools. However, because those schools only recruit in big cities or at elite secondary schools, students in small towns rarely (aka never) get the chance to learn about these places. I am not sure I will be able to do this kind of thing (although I did a little in September before I left when I did presentations to a few classes and clubs at EHS!), but I think it would fit in well with my tea shop-bakery :)

Last weekend I went to an opera here in Cluj.  I got to see Aida for approximately $6 - how incredible is that?  It certainly was a simple set, but it was quite a good cast and a wonderful setting!  It was so fun because while I saw Aida in Cluj last Sunday, my mom saw the movie theater telecast performance of the Met's Aidia - the first time for both of us to see that opera.  What are the odds that halfway across the country from each other that we would end up seeing the same opera on the same weekend?

The opera house opened in 1920, naturally enough with Aidia :)  As you can tell, it is quite lovely from the outside, and there is quite a crowd for the opera.  Each opera only shows once, but the crowd is always packed and sold out.

This picture does not do the interior of the National Theater justice, but it was the best I could do on the spur of the moment with my camera:

This past week has been pretty busy. I am trying to finish all of my job applications and just got the 4 mailed out to the places that require hard copies, and today I am finishing up the 5 for places that are accepting electronic submissions. It will be very, very nice when this is all complete. My fingers are crossed that something will work out for next year, but I have no idea what it might be. These are all academic positions at universities and colleges – in US and public history mostly.

In addition to all of that application work, I have been conference hopping. On Tuesday and Wednesday there was a conference (sort of) with the Department of Scandinavian Literature and Language at BBU and the Norwegian Embassy celebrating the 150th anniversary of the birth of Knut Hamsum. He is a well known Norwegian poet (mostly in the 1920s-30s) who won the Nobel prize in literature. A lot of his books have been turned into movies. I went to the first morning of talks about Hamsun. Wednesday afternoon and Thursday had screenings of the movies. I had intended to go to one or two, but didn’t have time because I was trying to combine that with another conference, preparing for and teaching class, and working on the job applications. In addition, the movies were all pretty depressing, and I wasn’t sure I was up for that….

Here is a picture of my with the organizer of the event from BBU and two of the people who came from Norway. The Norwegian ambassador to Romania was there as well, but didn’t make it into the picture.

Then, on Wednesday and Thursday there was a Jewish Studies conference, also by and at BBU. I attended two of the sessions, one of Jewish acculturation/assimilation in Hungary and the other on the some other kind of acculturation but in Romania. It was a very interesting mix of people – presenters from Romania, the US, Israel, Germany, England, and France. It is so interesting to see conferences like that here in Europe because in the US that rarely happens, but here the countries are so much closer. Anyway, the conference was interesting, but did not really hold my attention. It is not a topic I am particularly interested in, and it was held in very much the traditional paper presentation way. One neat aspect of the conference was that some papers were in English and others were in Romanian, and there was a translator who translated it all into the other language. We were able to listen using these headsets. How neat?!

Here is a picture of Lauren and I with our headsets on to get the English translation: