Я еду в Бeлць!

In other words (well same words, different language...), "I am going to Balti!" (Transliteration: Ya edu v Beltz).  Now that is a hard word in general seeing that even though I 'spelled' it correctly, it's actually pronounced "Beltz".  

And so it is!  We got our site announcements yesterday.  I will be working with an organization called Pro Business Nord in the city of Balti.  I am very excited!  I think that being in an urban center will provide more opportunity to teach yoga than I might get in a village.  I will also get to meet many people and of course practice my Russian.

I can honestly say that it is times like these that the flexibility of yoga comes in handy.  I certainly never imagined that when I joined the Peace Corps I would find myself in an Eastern European city speaking Russian.  My nomination had been for the Caribbean.  I imagined myself on a warm island helping growers find better markets and prices for their produce and products.  I would sleep under a palm tree and eat mangoes for lunch.  But it was only an imagination and NOT an expectation.  And so I was never too let down.  The less we "expect" out of life, the less we suffer.  

I heard a swami say something very interesting shortly before I left for Moldova, "It is important to be 100% invested in all we do, and yet 0% dependant on the outcome".  This is a VERY difficult concept, espeically when applied to businesses, outcomes and financial "security".  But in LIFE, when we give up the need to be in control (an illusion anyway), and simply do our duty, whatever that may be (in the Carribean, in Balti, scrubbing floors, fixing things, starting businesses, ect.) without a dependence on the outcome of these activities to define who we are and what we are worth as humans, we suffer less.  When our worth comes from within, we are always whole.

Om tat sat.