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Micah shows off her traditional Romanian folk costume.
Max and Micah in between scenes.
"I'm going to pick the flower..."
Micah, the wildest flower I've ever held.
Little Milla loves her corn and butter.
Alas, it appears the bowl is empty.
Undaunted, little Mills finds a way.
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Tino takes amazing photographs- a talent I never knew he had and have been fortunately discovering. It looks like the Coryell family will be getting their first official family photos soon. Just in time for the holidays. I am so excited. We've never had portraits taken before!
Preparing to go out in our Transylvanian costumes.
Patrick ended up as a Transylvanian granny, or a "Tranny". We ran out of gender-specific costumes. Tino rocked a hardcore sheperd-hora dancer costume.
The good sheperd stops at the first house- our former house on Firethorn Drive.
A spooky pumpkin display.
Micah adds the finishing touches to our own abstract expressionist pumpkin who is too modern for even a name.
Milla and I take a moment to enjoy a well-mowed lawn, a sprinkle of stars, and the perfect weather that is an Alabama autumn. I could never get away with this kind of un-harnica leisure in Romania....
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Madonna and child. Dipse's version sits comfortably within the colors and textures of Romanian village life.
Dipse's colors and lines danced through my head long after they left the immediate vicinity of my eyes. Though he studied under the famed Camil Ressu, his style brings together a love for life, a respect for local folkways, and the vivid colorings of an imagination raised on basme that is entirely his own. He mainly works in oil and acrylic, Dipse also has a few mosaics and frescoes in his closet.
The Thracian cavalier.
Currently, his work is available at the National Village Museum, where I picked up the inspiring postcards pictured below.
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We are dressing as Transylvanians for Halloween, so I took out the traditional clothing and left it in the sun to freshen it up for this evening's adventures. Max plans to be a sheperd and Milla will be a member of his flock. Micah and I will be Transylvanian ladies, while Pat will be a blacksmith. Tino will also be a Transylvanian, though he hasn't yet decided the exact nature of his identity. Looking forward to 5 p.m. and wishing I could remove my own sinuses in the meantime.
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I couldn't resist the opportunities afforded by acrylic paints. Two more drawers to go... Wonder what will inspire them.
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Our weekend work in progress- a thrifted craft dresser which I will use for all my little homeless odds and ends.
Ingredients:
The before, a lovely wood piece that needs some color for our color-hungry home.
The work-in-progress which Patrick painted yesterday.
We decided not to paint the drawers different colors and instead use words as ornaments- words we love.
So we used the lyrics to a few songs from our wedding CD and a few songs from old mixes we made for each other:
And then added excerpts from my vows and Patrick's vows, the words that made us cry with joy.
Three more drawers remain, and I think I am going to take them in an entirely different direction. I'll let you know what comes of it. A hint: acrylic paints and domesticity.
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Tino accompanied the rowdy crew of kids and sheep to the Episcopalian pumpkin patch, where we selected one large pumpkin and two little ones.
The sheep appreciated the cultural expose.
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You don't have to be a member of anything except the human species in order to register and attend this dinner, which promises to be one of the most exciting events for local nature-lovers this year. Help us to honor a local business which respects and nurtures an ecosystem in an industry where respect for ecology is often equated with a decreased profit margin. Purchase some Christmas gifts for family and friends at the art auction. Find out what we are doing next- and how you can be a part of it.
Register online at the Friends of Hurricane Creek website.
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A true lover of the cafe scene, little Mills tromped around old town waving to various Romanians and clapping for street musicians. She continues to be a bundle of joys ready to taste and try anything new, always on the lookout for a new excuse to be happy.
I think everyone needs a magnificent little Mills in their life....
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The Romanian language comes mainly from the street Latin spoken at the time when Hadrian's legions ruled the fertile provinces north of the Danube during the 2nd century A.D. By the 10th century, the modern Romanian language developed into its current form, absorbing some words from languages of nearby Slavic tribes and peoples. Dacian words, which lie close to Albanian words in language families, also pepper the Romanian language.
Romanian is a Romance language. This means that it is a part of the Italic languages family, rooted in Latin. The lexical similarity of Romanian with Italian has been estimated at 77%, followed by French at 75%, Sardinian 74%, Catalan 73%, Spanish 71%, Portuguese, and Rhaeto-Romance at 72%.
There are 47 Romance languages and dialects spoken in Europe, including three Romanian dialects:
Slavic languages tend to dominate the southeastern neighborhood of Europe. Some commonly-known Slavic languages include:
Slavic words have migrated into the Romanian language through time, trade, and association. Old Church Slavonic also made its way into the Romanian liturgy and then into the village language. Some of these words include:
Globalization has greatly increased the American and English content in the Romanian language. Just walking down the street in Bucharest, billboards advertise various consumer products and services using American words, like joburi (the Romanian plural for "jobs"), mouse (for compter mouse), internet, hamburger, blog, techno (with reference to music), cool, faine (pronouned "fine" and meaning "cool"), and so on...
When I asked Alice if she was offended by the Americanization of her language, she laughed and told me about a politician who tried to "cleanse" the language of American words. He insisted that a computer mouse be called by the Romanian word for "mouse", which sounded absurd and didn't make sense because this meaning was not conventional. I love how Romanians embrace all the change brought to their dynamic, richly-textured langauge.
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In 8 AD, the poet Ovid (a.k.a. PUBLIUS OVIDIUS NASO) was banished to Tomis (now known as Constanta), on the Black Sea, by the the Emperor Augustus. No Senate or Roman judges played a role in this decision, which leaves a little historical mystery in its wake. Why was Ovid exiled? What did he do that so offended the Roman emperor that he resorted to a personal decision to banish him?
Ovid wrote that the reason for his exile was carmen et error — "a poem and a mistake", claiming that his crime was worse than murder and more harmful than poetry. Interestingly enough, the Emperor's grandchildren, Agrippa Postumus and Julia the Younger, were banished around the same time. Julia's husband, Lucius Aemilius Paullus, was put to death for conspiracy against Augustus, a conspiracy about which Ovid might have known.
Did Ovid write something which offended the Emperor's moral sensibilities? Or perhaps his legislative preferences? In 18 BC, Augustus moved the Julian Marriage Laws through the Senate. These laws promoted monogamous marriage in the hopes of increasing the population's birth rate. Every empire needs its potential human carnage. Did Ovid's writing in the Ars Amatoria concerning what was then the serious crime of adultery appear subversive to the Emperor?
In exile, Ovid wrote two poetry collections titled Tristia and Epistulae ex Ponto, reflecting his sadness and despair. The five books of the Tristia, a series of poems expressing the poet's despair in exile and advocating his return to Rome, are dated to 9–12 AD. In the Tristia, Ovid makes a direct appeal to the Emperor but foolishly suggests that the Emperor made a mistake in exiling him- not a tactic likely to go over well with Augustus.
The Ibis, an elegiac curse poem attacking an adversary at home might also have been written during this period. The Epistulae ex Ponto, a series of letters to friends in Rome asking them to effect his return, are thought to be his last compositions, with the first three books published in 13 AD and the fourth book between 14 and 16 AD. The exile poetry is particularly emotive and personal. In the Epistulae he claims friendship with the natives of Tomis (in the Tristia they are frightening barbarians) and to have written a poem in their language. He addresses his epistles to a multitude of friends, poets, orators, politicians, and statesmen.
It seems that Ovid misses Rome and his third wife, as many of the early poems are to her. (One scholar has observed that Ovid writes less to his wife in direct proportion to his time in Tomis- maybe he realizes that she cannot bring him back and so his feelings for her grow rather chilly.)
The mysterious causes of Ovid's exile remain unexplained. Ovid died at Tomis in AD 17. It is thought that the Fasti, which he spent time revising, were published posthumously. He was allegedly buried a few kilometers away in a nearby town- a town which was renamed Ovidiu in his honor in 1930. Ovidiu is a common male first name in Romania. A statue commemorates him in the Romanian city of Tomis. The inscription on the statues is excerpted from the Tristia and reads:
Here I lie, who played with tender loves,
Naso the poet, killed by my own talent.
O passerby, if you've ever been in love,
let it not be too much for you
to say: May the bones of Naso lie gently.
To explore some excerpts from Fasti and discuss what his poems revealed, you can download the free document below. You can also explore his biography here.
OVID'S EXILE THROUGH POETRY: A LOOK AT THE TEXTS
You can access a translation of Ovid's entire poems from exile, including the works mentioned above, or you can browse his book, The Metamorphoses, in images and bookplates.
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Creative uses for ikea stools via my cousin Filip's groove-crusted apartment.
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As a result of time spent in Transylvania, Max has decided that he wants to be a shepherd when "he grows up". In fact, during our stay with the Puscariou family, Max planned how to make enough money to buy a flock of sheep with a little help from Marian. He picked apples from the orchard and took his apples to a street merchant, whom he asked to sell the apples and give him a cut of the profit. Sure enough, Max made some money- not quite enough to buy a flock of sheep, but more than I made in Romania for sure.
Since everyone and their stepmother knew about Max's desire to become a shepherd, Bunica bought a little sheep pillow for him (and a littler one for Micah) for his Romanian birthday party. The shepherd and his sheep immediately hit it off. The next day, the Puscarious dropped by for a visit with three sheep pillows for the munchkins (their kindness and love for my children was a constant rainbow). What do you know? Max's flock was complete!
"The good shepherd", as we call him, made sure that the sheep were comfy on the international flight back to the States. Upon arrival, he immediately began planning their residential quarters. And then today, Max decided that his sheep should be the happiest sheep on the planet. So he and Micah got to work.
First they created a soft, pinestraw-lined wagon caravan for the sheep, whose names include Bogdan, Miel, Oy, Crayon-Marker, and Baaa-Baaaa.
Then they decided that happiness required a slide.
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Patrick and I fondly describe it as "dirty pretty" or "pretty broken"- it suits our taste for the slightly dishevelled and worn. Most of these buildings and places have names or residents, but our brisk stroll did not present opportunities for inquiry. All the better- let the mystery be.
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Every evening on Romanian television, you can find at least one show or program dedicated to traditional folk music or dance. Music and dance, like tuica and Christianity, is woven so deep into the Romanian culture that not even communism could quash it.
Max wanted to learn more about Romanian dances, so we focused our explorations on that subject today. The hora is the starting point for all traditional Romanian dances. It gathers everyone into a big closed circle where the dancers hold each other's hands and the circle spins, usually counterclockwise, as each participant follows a sequence of three steps forward and one step back. The dance is usually accompanied by musical instruments such as the cymbalum, accordion, violin, viola, double bass, saxophone, trumpet or even the panflute.
There are many different kinds of horas to dance, depending on regions, seasons, and occasions. All you need is a few willing dancers and a good reason to celebrate life (i.e. you're alive is a good one). Max loved watching the videos and noting the differences in the steps and patterns of each hora.
The sirba (or Sârba) is a Romanian dance normally played in 2/2 or 2/4 time. It can be danced in a circle, line, or couple formations and was historically popular not only among Romanians, but also Ukrainians, Hungarians, East European Jews, and the Poles of the Tatra Mountains. It is fast-paced and triplets are usually emphasized in the melody. More sirbas and sirba-isms to explore:
If you research the roots of kletzmer, you'll discover that this vivacious and beautiful music genre shares seeds with Romanian folk dances and melodies. According to Wikipedia:
Above all the musical styles which influenced the traditional Klezmer musicians, the Romanian influence seems to be the strongest and most enduring. Traditional Romanian music was heard, adopted and adapted by Klezmer musicians. This fact is reflected in the dance forms found throughout the entire surviving Klezmer music repertoire (e.g., Horas, Doinas, Sirbas and Bulgars etc.).
Hopefully, when my mom returns from Romania, she will teach our family to dance a personal favorite, the Ciuleandra, which is diminished unless the rich voice of Maria Tanase holds it up. On a parting note, fedelesul wins the prize for the goofiest traditional folk dance, which means I need to find a circle for it very, very soon...
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A book of traditional stitch patterns and styles from the National Peasant Museum.
Traditional weaves pictures in the book.
Embroidery patterns pictured in the book.
"The artistic treasure of the Romanian is a living thing. He turns into a work of art everything he touches, actuated by a pure inner need, by a requirement of his instinct. There are no such things as a serial work, for each object is unique. Creation is continuous ; in other words, once created, a work is not separated from the source of inspiration, it never get "fixed", it is never perfect."
Mircea Eliade, beloved philosopher and historian
Eliznik explains the terms and history of Romanian embroidery and shares an excellent image chart detailing each type of stitch.
Martha took all the photos I wished I had taken the Peasant Museum and shares them with those who wish to be impressed and inspired.
Another inspiring set of images on flickr.
A pdf description of Romanian embroidery by Pauline Garblik.
A few pages from the other sketchbook. There are more available at the link in prep for her 2012 exhibition on this subject.
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Travel always brings an encounter with various textures and tastes. What remains of Romania now comes in sense-battered fragments, impressions, the stuffing of playlists and poetry.
PARCUL - Alexandru Andries (mp3)
VOYAGE - Charlotte Gainsbourg (mp3)
DON'T MOVE - Phantogram (mp3)
WALKER - Cascadeur (mp3)
DERELICT - Sundress (mp3)
YOU'VE GOT THE LOVE (Florence and the Machine Cover) - The xx (mp3)
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The communist coach treats bad oina-playing as a form of flag burning. Either you're with us or you're against us, the good old commie motto... I wonder if Bush realized that when he said it.
Oina: The Romanian national sport, which is willingly played by no man born in the 20th century. Some grandparents or grand-grandparents, when urged to be sincere, admit never seeing anyone engage in the game of Oina. Despite the rules being different, Oina is very similar in both equipment and technique to an American sport called baseball. The ancient invention of Oina (the unacknowledged precursor of basketball) is often mentioned to underline the pioneering status of the Romanian people held in fields so diverse as to include sports.
(Andreea Chirica, The Year of the Pioneer)
According to wiki, however, oina actually exists in some dimension. Allegedly, it is a Romanian sport started in 1364. Somewhat unfortunate because Andreea's version of events seems probable and I love how she writes- resonates with so much that I've heard about 1986. You can check our Andreea's awesome book, which I've been savoring like a cold Ursus on a smoky street cafe, and see more comics on her blog.
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Eminescu on the leu.
Mihai Eminescu (January 15, 1850 – June 15, 1889) was a Romantic poet, novelist and journalist. Eminescu was an active member of the Junimea literary society, which played a significant role in the intellectual underpinnings for a Romanian "national consciousness", and he worked as an editor for the newspaper Timpul ("The Time"), the official newspaper of the Conservative Party.
He published his first book of poems at the age of 16. The poet's Manuscripts, containing 46 volumes and approximately 14,000 pages, were offered by Titu Maiorescu as a gift to the Romanian Academy. In his poems he frequently used metaphysical, mythological and historical subjects. In general his work was influenced by the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer.
Considered to be Romania's national poet, Eminescu's poem of 98 rhyming verses, Luceafarul, is one of the longest love poems ever written. Given enough tuica, my Bunicu can recite the entire event by memory. The poem itself is a deeply lyrical evocation of the world of the living and the dead; it was inspired by a Romanian fairy tale.
A quick tribute to Eminescu's grave at Bellu.
Eminescu's grave is perpetually covered with fresh flowers. Romanians take their poetry and their poets quite seriously.
Chasing butterflies over tombstones:
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We didn't get the chance to explore inside on our stroll towards the old town, but the kids found the building to be quite stunning. Designed by the architect I.D. Berindei in French baroque style, the Cantacuzino Palace was built in the late 1800s.
Above the main entrance there is a giant shell-shaped porte-cochere; two friendly stone lions guard the entrance.
George Enescu - Romania's national composer - lived here for a while. The building belonged to his wife Maria Cantacuzino. Ultimately, Enescu preferred a life of simplicity and he and his wife chose to live in a smaller town house that previously housed the administrative staff of the palace; this house is located behind the main palace. Nowadays the palace houses the George Enescu Museum which displays the musicians manuscripts (scores of his compositions) and personal belongings like one of his first violins.
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The Memorial of Rebirth exemplifies the ongoing struggle by Romanians to understand, name, and claim their "revolution" against Ceausescu's communist dictatorship. Inaugurated in August 2005 in Revolution Square, where Romania's Communist-era dictator, Nicolae Ceauşescu, was publicly overthrown in December 1989, this memorial is the official attempt to commemorate the struggles and victims of the Romanian Revolution of 1989. But commemorating the chaos of a contested and still somehow mysterious revolution is no easy task.
First comes the conflict over the design and symbolism of the memorial itself. According to our dear friend Wikipedia:
The memorial, designed by Alexandru Ghilduş, features as its centrepiece a 25-metre-high marble pillar reaching up to the sky, upon which a metal "crown" is placed. The pillar is surrounded by a 600 m² plaza covered by marble and granite.The memorial cost 5.6 million lei (RON 5.6 million, ROL 56 billion, approximately €1.5 million). Its initial name was "Eternal Glory to the Heroes and the Romanian Revolution of December 1989" (Glorie Eternă Eroilor şi Revoluţiei Române din Decembrie 1989). The memorial's name alludes to Romania's rebirth as a nation after the collapse of Communism.
According to the Romanians with whom I chatted, the memorial is "meaningless" and "ugly"- too abstract to evoke the sadness and glory of those heady days. No one seemed to like the memorial, and many found it strange that the commission went to the same gentleman that designed everything else in Bucharest. The pungence of corruption stains even the "public good" in Romania. Almost anything the government touches is suspicious and shady, so it is fitting that the official memorial for those who fought to end communism leaves as a legacy the distaste and suspicion which characterizes Romanian post-communist politics.
For me, the most moving part of the memorial is the wall which lists the names of those who died in the revolution. Like the Vietnam Memorial, seeing the individual names listed makes you realize how many people lost their lives and how each inhabited this world as an individual with dreams, hopes, families, and potentials.
But this naming must have been fraught with contention as well, since the "official lists" of those who died in the revolution remain a subject of debate and discussion. Who was left off this monument? What did you have to prove to get a name on it? If you worked for the communist government, did that exclude you from the possibility of being a hero of the revolution? What if you died at home after running from the chaos? Where is the burden of proof? What is a hero in these post-post modern times anyway?
The monument was moving and beautiful- it is silly to believe that the abstract cannot convey the sorrow of the lives lost in this square. Ultimately, I don't think Romanians could be satisfied with any monument to this revolution, mostly because the Romanian post-communist transition remains, in some sense, unresolved and unofficial. Perhaps a large metal tank with the Romanian flag and the center cut out would have provided a clear symbolic value for the anti-abstract crowd. But then the state would have to deal with the stigmatization of tanks and its police and military. And states don't ever want to go that route.
The "rebirth" itself is not as clear-cut as being "born again" in the American tradition. Romania moved from the corruption and abject poverty of communism to the corruption and abject consumerism of modern mixed economies. It wasn't born into something morally superior- it just evolved into something preferable. How can a modern state decide when a legitimate (vs. and illegitimate) revolution and evolution takes place? Where force is the arbiter, power always prevails.
Chasing butterflies:
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Sanda and Milla pick raspberries in the Piscariou's orchard.
The homemade Romania journal sufficed for our homeschooling purposes during our trip to Romania. When asked to describe his experiences living with the Piscariou family in Bran, Max wrote:
The first thing I learned was how to make apple juice. Then I learned about chickens and their friendships with cats, though they aren't really very goof friends. I set the chickens loose from their pen into the fenced-in orchards and also took care of them on a snowy day.
People in Bran wear wool, fleece, and hemp. The wool and hemp are local crops. The hemp grows from the ground but the wool is taken from sheep. Bran villagers either grow their food in their backyards or they buy it at the grocery store. They eat meat, sausages with crunchy coverings because they are made from intestines, tomatoes, cucumbers, soups, eggs, and fruits. Most of the fruits come from their backyards. We picked apples, raspberries, plums, and strawberries. Where we went, villagers kept their own cows, horses, chickens, turkeys, and sheep. It was very fun.
Yesterday we walked around the town of Bran and visited the house my grandfather built. The green house had apple trees, sour cherry trees, porches, metal gutters (like most other houses here) and a cool fall-over bench.
We also went to a store and an apple orchard. There are apples everywhere in Bran. I picked a bag of apples to sell. Later, I left my apples with a trader who sold other stuff on the street. The trader said I would get my money the next day if the apples sold. I chose 3 lei for my price. I also visited the hen house to collect some eggs. One egg must have been fresh because it was very warm.
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At Romanian weddings, the bride and groom share a special jug called a "plosca" at the reception. The plosca is a gourd-shaped pottery jug with two long necks. It allows the newlyweds to "drink from the cup of life" together. I didn't find a plosca for us on this trip, which makes me sad because anything which reaffirms how much partnership requires us to get over ourselves is a good thing.
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Or, at least, this is what Alice and Remus did with Filip's blank wall in his Bucuresti apartment. Love.
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Two birds of a feather in the park. "Morcov" (via the grafitti) means carrot. Alice shared a bunch of music and movies with me yesterday. I share with the world.
Sleep Ranger (Blissed Out's Edit) - Pink Priest
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Tiny little details, mutiple situations, the way in which sunlight illuminates the dances of dust fairies. My aunt's apartment contains multitudes.
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Since Filip introduced me to Stanescu many years ago, years bound by moons and the reflections of stained glasses, I've found myself in his words again and again.
It began so simply with "A Poem":
Tell me, if I caught you one day
and kissed the sole of your foot,
wouldn't you limp a little then,
afraid to crush my kiss?...
Seeing his grave at Bellu, I stopped to sprinkle some of the dust which has passed through so many fingers and over so many graves, maybe my fistful would be dry enough to leave a footprint.
I am nothing but
a blood stain
that speaks..
Butterflies to chase into the fog:
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Dacia is the Romanian national car. And Romanians are now ready for their own version of the truck. I wish I could buy a Dacia truck in the US- love little trucks, love this little truck.
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Max celebrated his 8th birthday today at a park in Bucharest- I'll share the details of his wacky surprise party later. In the meantime, since Max is the official sweeper of the Coryell Castle, we gave him (among other things) his own personal Romanian "matura" set- a broom and dustpan decorated by my cousin Alice with lovely creatures and dust bunnies.
The all-seeing eye spots all little flecks of dust or dirt. Every boy's broom should have one.
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Old Town Bucharest is cobbled and crammed with charms. We wandered around yesterday with my mom, marveling at the streets and cafes, the little art galleries, the feel of Europe. The munchkins chased pigeons, a favorite past-time for all three.
Max takes time to enjoy juice and a croissant at a cafe.
Little Mills takes to the streets.
A neat tree at Cismigiu Gardens.
Waiting for Godot at Cismigiu.
Milla napped, nursed, and frolicked.
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The Stavropoleos Monastery originated with an inn, built in 1720, which provided income for the monastery and its surrounding buildings. The inn functioned until the end of the 19th century, when it was demolished along with the other structures. Designed by architect Ion Mincu, the building that now stands in the church precincts was erected in the early 20th century. It was absolutely beautiful.
Micah and I lit a candle for our living friends and family who are suffering. The candle is a constant prayer, and prayer is a light in the darkness.
The history of the church is painted on the walls. Churches in Romania have always been a source of local and regional history- another reason the communists found churches to be so offensive and worthy of destruction.
The stone above the main entrance to the church.
Max emerges from the beautiful wooden doors with his candle.
A lady lights a candle for someone, her lips silently mouthing a prayer.
The monastery courtyard.
The outside of the church dappled in sunlight.
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My grandmother died when I was pregnant with Max; I flew to Romania for the funeral of a woman who loved me so much she would just watch me read and smile. One life gone while another prepared to bloom. The grotesque twists still leave me speechless.
Patrick, Milla, Bunicu, and I went to pay our respects late yesterday afternoon. Bunica is buried in the most famous cemetery in Romania- a place where every grave and mausoleum evokes little fragments of the history hastily assembled into the Romanian national idea.
America has no couterpart for Bellu. Our famous cemetery, Arlington National Cemetery, revolves around thousands of identical graves for the soldiers of our many wars, our blood-laced benevolence. We don't have a cemetery for the great thinkers, writers, and artists of our country because our culture doesn't value ideas and art in any way that suggests permanence. Or maybe we haven't had enough time to acknowledge the intellectual contributions of individual Americans (though this seems strange given the number of fascinating artists and public intellectuals in the US). Anyhow, it's unfortunate in some sense.
Leaving flowers from my father for his mother.
Seeing my grandfather's photo and all but two numbers waiting to be filled on his gravestone was jarring.
We prepared the flowers and changed the water as he has done every Sunday since she died (unless he was in the US with us).
I told my grandmother that my father loved her and missed her. We Romanians speak to the dead- we don't believe they are really dead. In some sense, they are more alive.
We also speak to saints and people whom we admire as amazing human beings- those who humbled themselves and carried the burdens of the world with grace and love.
Milla watched with curiosity as I spent a little time with my grandmother.
Bunicu pays his respects to "Turica", his nickname for her.
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Let's take a ride in this wagon and see where it leads us.
The rustic gate to our house at Sohodol in Transylvania.
"Pardon me Fred-who-works-at-Home-Depot, where can I find your Romanian wooden gates section?"
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While Patrick and I dealt with an awfully mean Romanian lady at the Air France office and I cried in various public places after having forgotten the inordinate yucky aftertaste of interactions with truly mean people, the kids went with Alice and Bunica to one of my mom's favorite museums when she was a child- the National Museum of Natural History.
Max reported seeing the following (all in his unadulterated words, of course):
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Bucharest with 3 kids puts you in a minority, so we are doing our best with keeping the usual balls in the air without letting them smack us in the head.
Places we would like to hit without the kids:
Places we would like to hit maybe with the kids:
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Micah and her Grand Bunicu share crackers on a blustery day in Bucharest.
The rainy season can't hide the searing gold of a Transylvanian autumn.
Village men finish preparing the final haystacks of the season. I love the shape of Romanian haystacks...
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We didn't bring any toys with us on this trip, so we decided to buy a little wooden fishing set for the kids at Bran last week. It was time.
When Grand Bunicu visited today, the girls could not keep themselves out of his lap. Out came the fishing set, which Milla has mastered. Grand Bunicu was almost impressed by her skillful fishing.
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Today we went to the National Village Museum with Alice, Grand Bunicu, and all the munchkins. Micah got a bee in her blouse, while Rolls Royce rolled around yelling at roosters.
Since it was colder than an ice cube in your armpit, Patrick and I played at being peasants and imagined that we had some nice local firewater, namely, tuica, to keep us warm. What began as a friendly contest soon turned nasty as our imaginations got the best of us.
The kids turned out to be much sweeter peasants than their parents.
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Apparently, Kevin Costner is on location a few miles from us filming an American Western. I'm sure the snow reminds him of his cozy home in Aspen.
Patrick, Max, and Milla at Cumidava-Rasnov. Patrick is growing a beard, and we have worn the same outfit for the past five days. My packing was not perfect.
The view from Rasnov Citadel and its crazy ruins.
The ancient town of Rasnov below.
On a different note, I learned more about the ancient history of the Rasnov Citadel from a well-written wiki entry:
Cumidava (also Comidava, Komidava, Ancient Greek: Κομίδαυα) was originally a Dacian settlement, and later a Roman military camp on the site of the modern city of Râşnov (15 km from Braşov) in Romania. Early references to Cumidava are made by the geographer Ptolemy in his Geographia, in the form Komidava (Ancient Greek: Κομίδαυα).An inscription on stone dedicated to Julia Avita Mamaea, the mother of the Roman Emperor Alexander Severus (dated 222-235 AD), allows the localization of the Dacian settlement Cumidava in the area of present-day Râşnov. The archaeological research at Râșnov was initiated in 1856 by Johann Michael Ackner and continued in 1939 by Macrea Mihail who also recorded the presence of Dacian pottery during the digs at the Rasnov Roman camp. The inscription found in 1939.
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The exchange rate in Bran is scary.
Everyone seems shocked and perturbed that I am still nursing Milla. I do so appreciate their heartfelt concern. And I love how you can tell where they pluck their eyebrows when I tell them that I plan to do it as long as possible.
The cultural programming on TV last night included a goat-milking contest.
A young Romanian girl advertises Charles Stanley's latest book with the promise that Stanley will help you discover a giving God-- a God with access to the world's treasures, a God that does not want you to suffer or feel fat.
The bookstores don't have a self-help section.
Talking about homeschooling with Romanians is like talking about esoterics with a pragmatist- it does not compute.
Snow flakes as big as my fist falling right now.
The Romanian girls on the Romanian version of Top Model rival their American counterparts for stupidity.
Romanian food so fresh- every part of the animal is used for stomach soup, sausage, tongue soup, what have you. Romanians are natural recyclers. Our version of green living seems almost like an excuse for a shopping spree in comparison.
People don't smile all the time, so when someone smiles at you, it means something special.
No one is required to smile or reflect a positive "feeling" as part of their job description.
Every little moment and movement has its ritual counterpart. Fascinating.
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The town of Rasnov is medieval enough to claim its own coat of arms. And a medieval town usually boasts a medieval citadel. In this case, the Rasnov Citadel comes from a long line of fortresses.
Archaeological research revealed the existence of fortification traces on the citadel hill since prehistoric and Dacian times. History concurs that the hill near Rasnov is ideal for defense. The actual citadel was first built by the Teutonic Knights in 1215, and their legends have much to do with the three roses on the coat of arms. You can trace the various conquests, destructions, and rebuildings online.
My insightful husband pointed out that the men currently involved in restoring the citadel unearth the ancient rocks of the old citadel wall to build the new, restored, tourist-friendly version of the citadel wall. Restoring from ruins and ruins are restored. The winners create the myths and use history to vindicate their hijacking of the supernatural. And yet, there is a wonderful God to set loose the clouds which curl like tendrils across the sky that we humans would destroy if only we had purchased the right scientists to show us how.
Max drops in to help with the restoration.
The old citadel gate.
Shadows, ruins, cloudscapes, and light.
Nooks and crannies- perfect for imagining what might have been or what was.
The electric blue clouds that blew this mommy's mind.
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Next door to the little green cabana sits the hotel with the best view in Bran. Popasul Cavalerului, our sleeping quarters for the past two nights, is just plain beautiful.
A little picnic table just outside.
Owned and run by the Tatulea family, those stewards of my enchanted chilhood memories clambering through the mountains in search of edelweiss and sheep folds, every detail reveals good taste. Puiu designed most of the furniture and interior woodworking himself, and he also served as architect for the building. Because he and his wife know how to do a little bit of everything.
Thanks to dear Mom and Sanda, Patrick and I spent the last few mornings sleeping in with only the chunky Milla sharing our bed. And then there is the genius of our stone porch, which makes an excellent fridge for water, wine, Bergenbier, and peach juice. Sweet dreams indeed.
The view from our balcony at dawn today.
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