Kinetic Edge Performance: November 2007

Back from Romania. In one word: Perspective. Perspective on another culture. Perspective on life. This is my first experience abroad so those of you who have traveled already know some of this.

Thanksgiving was given an entirely different meaning than any of my previous references towards it after this trip. It changed a lot of lives including my own in the process.

This post will be radically different from most of my other posts on here based on what I just experienced for 7 days in Romania. I was there on a mission trip with my girlfriend's family and Starkey Hearing Foundation based in Eden Prairie, MN. If you haven't heard of them or of the Founder Bill Austin, I will do my best to describe what took place throughout the entire week.

The trip began with a 7.5 hour flight to Amsterdam on Saturday night Nov 17th. 2 hour layover. 2 more hours of flight time into Bucharest, Romania. Thank God for Z-Health! We were graciously greeted at the airport by Mihai (Romanian Starkey Rep) and Emi (Turkish Starkey rep) eagerly ready for the 'Americans.' TA was about 8:00am their time on Sunday.

We were greeted outside the airport by sleet and a wet cold that cuts through us. Made Minnesota weather look balmy! The drive from the airport to our hotel was interesting. At first, it looked somewhat the same as the U.S. Billboards, some stores like IKEA, and then it definitely was different. Traffic. insane. 99% of the cars are the size of Honda hybrids here and people drive so close to each other in traffic lanes that it's amazing at least 50% of the cars don't have side-swipes. Pedestrians. They just decide to walk across the street...and there is no 'pedestrian right-of-way'...the cars just honk! I can't tell you how many times I thought our bus driver was going to nail pedestrians...and he was 'courteous' compared to most of the other cars we saw. Drivers just honk when they want to get in and start moving over without looking hardly ever. This scenario in the U.S. would result in road rage beatdown approximately every 1000 feet ;) Definitely a different way of driving communication, yet universally understood in this country.

Traffic is also 'special' in another way: Round-a-bouts (RABs). RABs that go both directions and multiple lanes of traffic. For you Twin Cities' natives, picture Spaghetti Junction (I-94/I-35E/Hwy 52/Downtown St. Paul) having 2-3 lanes going each direction on EVERY ramp with no regard for stoplights. This just begins to explain the mess they have in Bucharest.

On to the mission...
Starkey Hearing Foundation
'So The World May Hear'

Day 1 Monday
We arrived at this huge gov't building later to find out that it is the currently the 2nd largest building in the world (next to our own Pentagon) called the Palace of the Parliament. This is where all gov't meetings are held for the Romanian people. Later we would come to the conclusion that this is a HUGE deal for us to be in this building utilizing one of the great halls for installing hearing aids and an even BIGGER deal for the kids and their teachers to enter this building at all ...think more dictatorship-type country even though Romania become a 'democracy' in 1989 after a major revolt. So this they are relatively young when it comes to rights and all of the political goings-on that comes with it.

We entered the Great Hall just after 9am to witness one of the most structured things surrounding kids that I had ever seen: 150+ of them sitting in chairs and you could hear a pin drop (short-term memory reminded they were borderline deaf and could not hear any pitches we can :) The Romania/Germany Starkey team also greeted us and were anxiously waiting to get started.

The Hansen family broke into 5 'teams' ...the rookies (I was included in the rookie category) were paired with their significant others to learn the ropes. Let the fun begin.

The first 4 or 5 that I personally got to work on was where the SIGNIFICANCE of this trip began to set in. Even though there was more than a language barrier (not only do I not speak Romanian, I have yet to learn sign language as well) but thank goodness for the Romanian interpreters. Yet a worldwide universal language was the default:
1 smiles
2 high-fives
3 thumbs-ups
4 hugs
5 and sometimes secret handshakes (some they would show me and some they would show me)

The first crew of kids ages ranged approx. 4-10. 99% of the kids could read lips very, very well which is a huge props to their teachers. 75% of them have never had hearing aids and have never heard any sound whatsoever. So to be the first person to witness a huge smile when they heard the first sound ever in their life cannot be described without witnessing it live. Incrible doesn't even begin to explain it. The facial expression and the excitement in their mannerisms was nothing like I have ever seen and definitely formed an impression in me of something that I doubt will be duplicated in my lifetime until another mission like this one. Most of them were very excited to receive something from 'the Americans' even if it was a piece of candy. We also handed out a medal on a lanyard that was the color of the Romanian flag to EVERY kid we saw. We were celebrities in their eyes in more than just 'Americans'.

After the first crew of about 100 we went to lunch as we were waiting for other schools to arrive. Then it happened. I walked in to the 'toaleta' where recently graduated deaf kids could now hear running water and automatic hand dryers for the first time in their lives. Something that we take for granted more than once a day for sure. What a sight to see the delight on their faces...high-fiving, thumbs up and smiling from ear to ear!

Day 1 Total kids fitted with hearing aids: 262
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Day 2 Tuesday
More of the same. This day was the first 'performance' we were given: their way of thanking us for what we were doing. Most of the these '5-10 minute thanking sessions' were traditional Romanian dance. Pretty cool to see 5-10 year old kids who formerly had to watch their teachers and go off vibration for steps finally be able to hear the music somewhat...they were not in sync :) because it was the first time they had actually heard the music!

Towards the end of the day we fitted some older adults in their 60s/70s/80s. Most of them have had hearing aids but cannot afford them. They were more than grateful.

Day 2 Total: 260

Today we finished early so we went on a walk around a 10 block radius of our hotel. We continued to be amazed by how poor the city was...run down row-houses (like Boston and New York) and were introduced to 'street dogs'...dog after dog after dog that were wild scavengers looking for food, filled with fleas. They told us that Bucharest has thousands of them due the lack of money of the people which does two things: no spaying or neutering and no family pets. This makes for one canine multiplying mess. Really sad that all of these dogs were skin and bones and mangy with no home. Just one more humbling experience to add to the trip and appreciating what we have in the U.S.
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Day 3 Wednesday
Today was the first day that we had some extremely deaf kids who could not hear anything on the highest powered hearing aids that we had. This was frustrating for us, yet at the same time the kids were happy to receive their medal and candy as if it was no big deal for them.

Day 3 Total: 270

Leaving the Palace today was interesting. Apparently the President had a meeting some type of gov't meeting scheduled. So when we left the room where we had been all morning, we were greeted by men in uniform holding swords (their version of our marines). When we walked out the building there were about 30 Secret Service in full on SWAT type gear standing at the front of the building with a helicoptor parked in the lawn and about 10 black BMWs parked strategically around a couple of vans. The difference between their Secret Service and ours was drastic. Ours wear suits, ear pieces and conceal weapons under their coats. Theirs wear everything visibly to everyone...vests outside their clothes, guns strapped to their legs...everything was visible and much more powerful and intimidating. Not sure if this was the purpose or they just do it different. You knew they meant business and nothing was discreet. They would not allow us to stay in our van to watch him leave which we would have had front row seats all to ourselves watching him right out the front doors.
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Day 4 Thursday...the final day
Today was the most frustrating day of all...Jordan and I had 14 kids who we had to turn away because they could not hear any sound whatsoever on the highest hearing aid available. This was hard and I really felt for them as they wanted to hear so badly yet it wasn't going to happen.

Day 4 Total: 270
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Overall, this was the most humbling experience of my life. I would do it again in a heart beat and look forward to a similar trip next year.

Final thought: The Romanians we befriended as translators had some interesting comments on Americans: "You all look so 'fit' (the Hansen family)." They thought this was very out of place based on what they see on TV...severely overweight and obese people. Sad that is the perception of Americans to foreigners, yet exactly why I do what I do.

Now that you've read this far...my blog will be back on track with regular scheduled rants!