Home from a holiday in Switzerland

I wrote it all and lost it - hours of the record of such a lovely trip Now how to avoid that loss again - hit save every once in a while?

Monday filled up fast

Sun going down and I have finished at last.  Finished so many things and yet the list grows longer!  I have gathered the apples, the quince, and a few of the last of the season's tomatoes .  I picked up some of the walnuts and some of the four o'clock seeds.  I waded into the fig tree to seek out the day's pickings which filled three trays in the dehydrator!

A Short Stay

Saturday morning at the Hotel Europa in Eforie Nord.  We booked a week and then when we got here learned that the hotel is closing until Spring.  We are among the few who only got a short bit of what we had hoped to enjoy.  This happened a while back.  We will not go at that time again!  Besides, they have ruined a perfectly lovely place by permitting too many things to be built on the seashore.
Then the next visit there was spoiled by the thief who stole my small purse containing personal items and an extra car key.  The hotel did help with securing our car from the use of that key, but the police were NO HELP at all and neither was the one at the pharmacy we used where it was lifted from my larger bag.   This stain on the community will benefit only the thieves whose targets will diminish steadily in number spoiling a place that has been a pleasant place to go for a short vacation at the seashore.

Today's ToDo List

Yesterday I cleaned out what remains of one climbing rose - the antique one that can grow like a weed if one allows it.  This one had a metal lattice that I remember putting there when Ecatarina kept pulling them up or cutting them back because she did not think I should let them grow.  Well,finally these roses graced the fence providing such joy each spring.  Whether or not to passers by I cannot say, but there is a strange phenomenon here.  Cosmos, columbine, holly hocks and these antique roses are not valued by many who are fiercely determined to get rid of them.  I have to actually fight to keep our helpers from cutting them back while allowing other plants that actually could be considered weeds to flourish!  Mallow, dandelions, mint and a few other plants that are considered possible medicinal plants grow and flourish here.  Stinging nettle (urzica) grows here and flourishes when allowed a place unhampered by the determination of those whose help does not cover the real problems that I mention, only those Eugeniu speaks of plus a few of their ideas of what should be. Also yesterday the weather was so perfect that I cleaned out the small space for my asparagus that I bought last year in Bethesda.  It has survived the mistreatment of my multiple errors and those of the one who removed my sticks marking their place so that a tractor could drive over them to do a very bad job of plowing up the field that is the place I want to put more raised beds so that I can manage to take care of the plants without an unknowing and uncommunicative person riding roughshod over what I have done with the limited energy that drives my limited activity.  I hope that Eugeniu will agree and that Costica will be willing to do what is needed to make them and to fill them with the proper soil;  maybe a good ratio between what is in the garden now and the compost that comes from the forest.

So now that I have had a healthy breakfast of my biscuits with apple butter made from the apples from our trees, I am ready to get to work on the other climbing rose that needs a lot of attention even though it is mostly gone. and taking out a few day lilies that are crowding out another rose bush.  The exciting thing is that the tulips are almost ready to bloom. The daffodils have bloomed as have the hyacinths and narcissus.  The margaritas are coming up and the violets have been spreading like they could take over the garden just as the English ivy and honeysuckle are doing.

So today's list includes cutting back what I can - it will take quite a while as last year I did not even try to stop it from taking over places where it should not be; would not help the front garden to look better!

Whew!  What a job there is left to do.  I managed to cut back and pull up a lot of runners from that vine that is more like a cannibal than a desirable vine to cover a fence. However the antique roses have a headstart on the ones that will come up from the multiple runners that I cannot pull up today because the body said to halt before you drop from exhaustion.  The pleasant part of this activity was having an occasional short chat with passers-by and the discovery of grape hyacinths along the sidewalk amid the daffodils of the walkway.

Time for Catching Up

I have written much in other places about our life.  Today we drove to Baneasa Mall where we could buy Tacos!  What a nice lunch and though it is considered fast food I think it must be the healthiest we could eat since for me it is reminiscent of South Texas and the wonderful Mexican food we can get there, so often much better than this one place here but the competition is so far away that it does not matter.  At first the lines were so long that it was discouraging, but now Taco Bell is still busy and still serving tasty treats available mo where else within my reach.

We had a wonderful celebration on Wednesday for the 84th birthday of Eugeniu who invites his colleagues each year to enjoy a day in the village of Peris a bit north of Bucharest.  Within reasonable distance for the architects who live in the city, we are blessed with the presence of these friends of many years who come to say La Multi Ani|!  Oana Pop, Eugeniu's daughter, cooked food to dream about for this huge crowd.  She prepared an enormous pot of ciorba, sarmale (with the help of Gigi and Mita), pate and vinete (with the help of Catalin), a salad of varsa (coleslaw) and then there was the meat, seasoned pork chops and sausages (grilled), also mashed potatoes with dill,  and a chocolate cake (that she especially made before she came).  A feast unparalleled!  Oh yes, the deviled eggs, too!

written long ago - "Here we go again. This has been a mild winter in comparison with those that came before. I have had a quiet day and in listening to audio books have learned how much I have missed by leaving Texas to live in Bucharest."

Interruptions, again! And now I know how much have I gained from being here!

Now Rini is older! Oops - now continued!

 Now I can say that we are well acquainted, Rini and Eugeniu and I.   Eugeniu cooks rice and other good things for Rini to eat. He buys fish and bones and gives her special food. The trip to the Vet was a relief and again a worry. We will have puppies here soon. That is why she is more particular now. Picky about what she eats, but still getting enough to nourish as she needs.

The snow is melting and I have found another story from the past to add. (Written in 2010) (Written today!)  Which one was it?  I no doubt stopped or something silly - distracted with so many things to do.  But look...

Museum Day in Bucharest

by

Nancy Clayton Rice

Copyright © 1997

I saw a little sculpture museum on the tram the other day.  I know the city well enough by now that I could find it again so we drove there after church on Sunday.  The caretaker was walking up just at that very moment.  He let us in for a delightful tour of this newly restored gem of a building.  The entry way is a delightful surprise with its rich marble and ornate design.  The newly polished oak parquet floors were shining and the sculptures were tightly packed but pleasantly arranged in several rooms with elaborate ceilings.  The smell of new paint was a sign that the interior had just been refinished.  This museum is open again after a year and a half or restoration. One room was completely white including the ornate carvings in the ceiling.  It reminded me of a church I had visited once in Disentis in Switzerland.  It was by particular design that these walls were white.  Cornel Medrea broke with tradition in this we were told.  In addition to his works,  there were two fine sculptures by his wife who had also been his student.   One of those, a bust of the sculptor himself, seemed to catch him in mid-speech, full of life.  The roughly textured busts rendered by Cornel Medrea captured the strength and force of personality, some of which were much larger than life.  I enjoyed examining the allegorical drawings and compositions of the monuments and the models for individual segments of larger works as well as seeing larger, smoother sculptures of people in more symbolic and stylistic forms.   We were glad to see this museum after all this time.

Next we went to the Central Military Museum on Stephan Furtuna.  I had thought that this would be like a drill for me as I did not want to see the ugly olive green of military objects of destruction.  What a surprise!  This complex of buildings has displays of objects from the earliest of times.  The medieval castles and fortresses were given the most delightful of displays with maps to show the ruling and warring parties and schematics and models of the fortifications.  I even recognized a favorite of mine, a small fortification at Risnov just outside of Brasov in southern Transylvania.  When we took our friend Liz to Bran Castle some time ago, we hopped off the bus in a drizzling misty rain.  With just one hour before the last bus would leave for Brasov, we climbed nearly straight up the zigzagging path to explore this small castle.  Within the walls, we found a delightful grassy green terrain undulating between the buildings, some of which had museum displays of former times.  Other buildings were being used, perhaps as in days of old, for chickens, geese, lambs and goats.  It was a scene that gives me a clue as to why some philosophers so praise the pastoral life.  I felt a sense of the security, of freedom to bask in the sun breaking through for just a moment before the rain drizzled in again.  We looked out over the walls to the village below and the plains beyond where weekend farmers were out tending to the crops.  I was pleasantly surprised to recognize it in miniature which speaks well of the faithful rendition of artistically well documented displays in this collection. 

Since there are so many displays and the history of warfare is so complex, we decided that we could not do it justice by trying to examine it all in one afternoon.  We left the main building to see the grounds filled with tanks and planes and trucks and jeeps.  We joked about the armor of the tank being useful in today's heavy traffic.   We could see how miserably uncomfortable it must have been inside those tanks for the very young soldiers who drove them.  The next building was open!  We saw the model of the Monument for the soldiers who died in World War I that we had visited at Marasesti on our way to Tecuci last October.  It is a tomb for the 6000 Romanians who died in the  Battle of Marasesti holding the line against the advancing Germans in World War I.  This battle preserved the last unoccupied region of Romania. 

Up a flight of stairs there was a most amazing collection of armor and swords and spears of every kind.   The other buildings were closed.  They have displays of the horse drawn carriages and the early airplanes.  We saw three statues.  Two were famous pilots, Traian Vuia and Aurel Vlaicu, who were early aviation innovators.  The other was Henry Coanda, who lived in the United States,  where he discovered the principles of turbo reaction.   He returned to Romania, "only to die."

This museum is so full of things.  I cannot describe enough of it.  It is an expansive view over time of how human beings destroy and torture one another as well as how they protect themselves from one another.  In those times it seemed that always the foe was the enemy without ‑ that other coming to take.  Now the ground has shifted.  It is imperceptible.  There are still major forces to contend with, international disputes and struggles against unjust governments, but it seems to me that the major battle line being drawn now is against individual terrorists.  Anonymous, erratic behavior presents a new kind of anxiety producing threat.   I think again of the exuberance of walking along inside the wall of the castle at Risnov in Transylvania and of how important it is to have a place where healthy families can grow.  Wouldn't it be nice not to need all these implements of war?  Not to have to fight amongst one another for a place to be on this earth?

The Cornel Medrea Museum no longer exists in that place.  We were fortunate to have seen it.  The lovely place we visited on that misty day has changed drastically.  Paved over and full of little shops, the charm has vanished except for the outer walls that can be seen from below and though parking space is available from the other side and though the gradual slope makes the walk up somewhat easier, it is not so magical for me and we have visited twice again. 

I found the pictures that show Risnov as it once was.

Every day is so full of things to do that I cannot imagine how I could do it all. For instance this morning, after espresso and our delicious gluten free biscuits, I have taken the sliced tomatoes out of the dehydrator and put them in olive oil, sliced more figs and three bananas to fill the dehydrator trays I emptied and sorted the laundry to finish this week's washing. Other chores, yes, one is putting the compost bin out to take to start next year's compost for the garden. Eugeniu has talked with Vicka who has spread compost all over the garden so that it can soak into the soil for next year's crop of tomatoes, corn, peppers,squash and the perennial garlic that is so amazing. The snow will come and cover it and when that melts the soil will be turned again and made ready for planting next year's garden.

The rainy day last week was a blessing indeed, but the surprize was getting to see the amazing place the flocks of birds chose to rest.  With every movement I made, they flew away only to return momentarily resting in almost measured evenly spaced places along the electricity wires above our heads.  Those are not leaves on that apple tree.

February almost gone!

Yesterday I found the way to locate this page again! so perhaps each day I can post pictures, notes etc for those who wish to see to notice daily life in the area just north of Bucharest.

Yan and Ming came last night and now Yan is helping Eugeniu to make pies - apple and visine. The visine are frozen from last year's crop and when defrosted it is easy to remove the seeds. Already Ming has tutored a young man in China who is preparing to take an exam in English so that he can qualify for a job with an export/import company. Yan and I have explored the kinds of things that are good for the eyes and for her health conditions. And I have listened to the first part of an audio recording of an interview by Nigel who has sent it from Vienna! Modern communication is fantastic.Also I have checked the email and answered some serious situations as well as those that are not so serious. Also I have listened to audio books downloaded to my computer and very much enjoyed over the past year - catching up on reading - but the easy way.

Serious concentration on political events here and there leave me both sad and encouraged. Progress in some ways is heartening, but the hate mongering does not end - here or there. And the only recourse one can take is not to encourage it on a broader scale, but most importantly to catch it in oneself. Learning the difference between letting a truck run over you and holding a firm line in accord with your values.

The snow is melting, but it is still piled high. This morning Vickah has cleared the walks so that the frozen melted snow will not cause other problems. It is still so deep that the dogs cannot walk along the grounds in their usual paths, but at least Vickah could remove snow so that the septic tank could be drained of excess water.

Grandgirls and Visine

June, 1997

Alexandra and Adela have been here a week now and they are enjoying the advantages of country life with the swing in the walnut tree and having Mihaela, our neighbor, to play with. It is nice to have girls around. They are not quite so rambunctious as boys, but then again, it has been a long time and my memory may be a bit fuzzy.

The dog trainer came today. He will teach the dog commands in English so that I can take advantage of his expertise and Eugen will know how to handle Rini, who is growing by leaps and bounds. At least she has learned not to use the front porch for her personal toilet and she does not run into the house whenever the door is opened. I think these are quite remarkable accomplishments for a dog not yet six months old who was used to indoor life before she came to us.

We have not yet taken all of the visine, sour cherries, from the trees. And I think that we never will get to the end of this task! We have taken the seeds from several liters of them and put them into jars with aspirin, hoping that this method of preserving them is as sound as it is easy. We have also put about 40 liters into bags in the freezer and today Eugeniu made jam, 9 huge jars of it and I put more bags into the freezer along with a few liter-sized bags of apricots that have fallen from the trees. Alexandra helped a lot with the visine by helping with the sorting of the good and the bad as she and Mihaela put them into freezer bags. Oana and Catalin took home a huge chest full of them and when they brought it back on Saturday, we filled it with a bucket full of visine that Costinel had picked. Fortunately Monica agreed to take it home with her. Costinel, who is Mihaela's brother, is still climbing into the trees to pick visine, but now we hope that the neighbors will take the rest. We have enough to last for quite a while and that includes the ones hanging from the nails at one end of the patio. Nicu says that we will be able to resuscitate them by soaking them in water. This will be an interesting experiment as I have long been interested in methods of drying food naturally.

Eugen is busy working on a plan for building a greenhouse plus. I like all of his plans and hope that we can follow our dream to build it.

Tecucci

12 February 2010 The fifth snow of the season ended with rain melting the huge piles of snow that are still filling the road near our house.  Yesterday the snowplow pushed some of it aside so that more cars could navigate though many choose to stay put.  The bare branches of the trees have dropped the snow so carefully held for days on end and below the snow is unmelted as yet.  the warmer predictions for the week are slowly changing to indicate that the cold freezing weather will stay with us for a while.  So we feed the soba with wood cut by Vickah who helps us ever so much!  Currently he is shoveling off the mountain of snow that has filled the patio several times this winter.  Rini is very happy that the ice has vanished and she can walk about and even romp around in the snow that covers the earth.

My husband had been ill and today he feels better though the cough is still with him.  Fortunately no high fever as yet.  A quiet day following what seems like an endless retinue of such days, but each is filled to capacity - at least to the capacity of available energy.  In spite of our varying quantity of inspiration and energy, I continue to search for healthy recipes and information about health for us and he continues to paint and take care of so many things.  Painting is one activity that is not hindered by this weather!

I have discovered that I can download whole books and again have the pleasure of reading them.  The backlight of the computer screen and the ability to enlarge the print are features that counteract to a small degree the joy of holding a book in hand - magnifiers just do not do the trick for that.  Magnifiers are great for short passages or for reading recipes, etc. But holding them at the right distance for rapid perusing of the lines of print has not been something that I have a knack for at all.

And as I think about what to write I see that our snow days are not so exciting as the days that came before, days when in warmer weather we traveled to various places and thus I introduce a story that reports another adventure at another time.

Tecuci

October 29, 1996

We started out for Tecuci on Saturday at 11:30 A. M.  Valentin had arrived ready to go at 9:30.  I was still hurriedly trying to get off the morning’s e-mail and Eugeniu was still asleep! Valentin had wanted to go for some weeks now.  Mioara is buried there.  Mioara was Valentin’s wife, sister of Eugeniu. She is buried in Tecuci beside Valentin’s parents and sister, Ilenutsa.   We hastily made preparations for the journey, packing clothes and sandwiches for lunch, and washing empty plastic bottles.  Our first stop was at the Shell station where the long lines at the pumps reached to the entrance except for one on the end with only three cars.  I pulled up fast to that line only to find that the pump did not work for benzina fara plumb (unleaded gasoline).  The attendant came, I moved the car closer to the pump and he pulled the hose from the other side.  He told Eugeniu that the red gasoline container could not be filled; it was against their rules.  Eugeniu was upset that I had taken it out of the car too soon, but he talked them into permitting us to fill it telling them that the container was considered a safe one in the U. S.  This extra gasoline was in case there was no unleaded gasoline in Tecuci.  In fact, the closest unleaded was in Focsani about 60 kilometers away, but we did not need to use it because we had enough fuel to take us as far as Buzau on our return trip with a little less than a quarter of a tank to spare.   The air pump at the Shell station near Otopeni was broken as it was two weeks ago when we last filled up with gasoline.   The traffic out of the station was as bad as on the highway where traffic was bumper to bumper.  Past Otopeni and Corbeanca we were at last on our way.  We stopped once more at a station where we found that their air pump was also broken.  Eugeniu used the hand pump we had bought in Vienna.  The route through Ploiesti to Buzau was 33 kilometers longer, but Valentin and Eugeniu were sure that the roads were better.  The traffic was heavy; there were clouds with occasional sunshine.  The fall scenery was splendid.  We had to stop or slow down to pass the carts full of corn stalks taken from the fields for fodder for cattle and kindling to start fires.  Some corn stalks are used to form walls for shelters in the fields.  We noticed a Shell station in Buzau that we remembered for our fill-up on the way back to Bucharest.  This one was not as crowded as the one in Bucharest.  Along the way we saw the vast vineyards and fields of new wheat.  Eugeniu said that the winter wheat is planted now and will hibernate through the winter snows and in the spring will be ready to continue its growth to maturity.  Wheat can be planted in the spring, but the dangers of spring rains at the wrong time can cause the loss of the entire crop.  Flower vendors displayed bouquets of huge chrysanthemums along the road side.  Other vendors displayed huge piles of onions.  A small motorized machine for wood cutting joined the line of traffic.  These are still used though there were more of them in the past.  It is one of the ways that Gypsies earned their living.

It took us four hours to travel to Adjud.  At the turn-off to Tecuci, they told me that we were to go to Adjud where Alin and his family lived, not Tecuci.  Teodorica was not feeling well and could not receive guests at his home in Tecuci.  Valentin did not know the way to their home, but planned to call from the railway station (gara).  We asked directions to the station, made a wrong turn and stopped to ask again.  The man was most helpful.  He knew the doctor and rode with us to show us where to go.  Alin, a physician, his wife Adi, a pharmacist, and their two daughters, Alina and Andrea, gave us a royal greeting.  Alin came out to greet us and took us in for a meal that was indeed a feast.  Bread, a tasty dip, cheeses, olives, slices of hard sausage, Coke and Fanta, followed by a delicious ciorba (sour soup) and then a course of mashed potatoes, meat balls and a preserved salad of grated beet with horseradish sauce.  Very delicious.  We sat around the kitchen table near the flame of the range top which was the only heat in the whole house.  Adi put the jars of beets on the radiator, making a joke about keeping them there because the radiator was so cold!  They had no hot water and no heat and did not know when the heat would be turned on.   To get hot water, it must be boiled in a pan on the stove.  Alin and Adi are making improvements in their apartment slowly.  The new door is made of a finely crafted finely grained pine, frame included.  The newly polished floor in the living room appears to be oak.  These improvements are made slowly because they are paid for out of a combined salary of $150 per month for these two professionals who are well trained medical specialists.  Adi has a pharmacy in a village of Gypsies near-by and Alin, an obstetrician, is on the staff of the local hospital.  Alin is the son of Valentin’s brother who was a forestry engineer, like his father before him.

Andrea and Alina speak English, but Alina is shyer and hesitated to say much.  Andrea told me that she is bored with school and hates Math.  She loves their dog, a Labrador retriever, very much and wants to be a veterinarian.  I told her some of my tricks of trying to make boring things more interesting and promised to send her King’s Solomon’s Ring by Konrad Lorenz.

Alin explained that the best accommodations for us for the night would be in the local hospital.  Adjud does not have a hotel.  The hospital has many empty beds because the “tax” for hospitalization is 5,000 Lei per day (at current rates less than $2).  Alin told us that the people stay at home, where they may die rather than go to the hospital because they cannot pay such a high amount.  (Today Laurentiu is here to fix the car alarm which seems to go off spontaneously much to the distraction of our neighbors.  His wife is a physician who just finished a four month fellowship in the U.S.  He said that the health care system here began to decline seriously in 1980.)

Although they have a five room apartment which Valentin had assured us was sufficient to provide a bed for us, Alin, Eugeniu and I departed for the hospital where Alin chose to stay the night also.  It was a safer place to keep the car and a more comfortable place for us to sleep.  He said that we would have a room with a private bath and that the hospital had heat.  There were three hospital type beds in our room, three bedside tables, a lavatory and one overhead light fixture.  There was no hot water and the radiator, though not warm, was at least not icy to the touch.  We giggled at the circumstances, glad that we were there only for a night’s lodging and not due to illness.  We had a safe place to stay thanks to our gracious host whose good nature must surely make him well loved by patients and staff at this hospital that is so lacking in necessities essential to good health care.  This room had no telephone, no TV, no bedside lamp.  The sheets were made of thin gauze through which the stripes on the mattress could be plainly seen.  The pillow cases were of the same material, but both mattress and pillow were solid and comfortable.  We were tired after the stress of driving where we had not traveled before on busy two lane highways full of impatient drivers threatening a head-on collision as they passed the slower trucks and buses in spaces so short that oncoming traffic had to break or swerve to avoid instant death.  It seemed that the newer cars were most often the impatient ones, but there is a whole class of Dacia drivers that speed like crazy to get in front to wait for the traffic light or to take up the small space between me and the next car that I believe is essential to safe driving.

I planned to write down the adventure of the day in our bleak hospital room, but Eugeniu began to tell me the story of Teodorica.  We took this trip on the initiative of Valentin who had wanted to visit with his family and to visit the grave of his deceased wife, Mioara, in Tecuci.  Teodorica is the widower of Valentin’s sister, Ilenutsa, who had been a well loved and most respected physician in Tecuci.  She died at the age of 82, about three years ago.   When she died, Teodorica inherited her house and belongings.  They had no children.  (As Laurentiu said just this morning, yes, we will have children, because if not there is no purpose to all of this!)

During World War II, Ilenutsa was working in a hospital where Teodorica was a patient.  He had been wounded in the Battle of Stalingrad.   The next day, when we were in his kitchen, he opened his shirt one or two buttons in the middle of his chest and showed us the indentation made by the scar of his chest wound where the bullet entered.  It went straight through his body, but he did not show the scar on his back.   At that time Ilenutsa was married, but after her husband died, they met again and married.  Though Ilenutsa was well loved in the community, Teodorica was not well thought of.  It was thought that he a cad, a dandy, a romancer of women, a man who had many affairs with all kinds of women, at the same time he was rough with Ilenutsa regarding financial and more personal matters.  Eugeniu described him as “not a true one.  You cannot believe what he says.”  So into the night Eugeniu told me of this family and their high position in the community and of their social life.  Ilenutsa was a kind and loving woman and much adored by everyone.  Eugeniu remembered a time when Teodorica visited in Bucharest at the house where Valentin still lives.  He was not happy about how Ilenutsa was treated so he took all of Teodorica’s things, bag and baggage, and threw them over the fence into a pile of snow.  This real life drama was far more interesting than the TV!

No matter that the radiator never gained an ounce of warmth, we slept well and awoke refreshed for a day of touring the area with our hosts as guides.  First Alin took us back to his house where we had coffee and a breakfast of toast and delicious jam and then to a village, Nicuresti, where his friends invited us in and served us a taste of their wine, coffee, cozonac (sort of like cinnamon bread), and slices of a custard filled roll with fresh grapes as a bonus.  They had been to a wedding the night before and had only had one hour of sleep before we came.  They had no wine to sell.  It is too new and will not keep.  The daughter in this family spoke a little to me in English.  She teaches the third grade.  They are learning to speak French in her class, not English, in addition to other subjects.  I took pictures of them and petted the puppies.  We said goodbye and I waited for directions for each turn in the road.  We passed through a throng of people and wagons gathered at the town center and people dressed in their Sunday best on the way to services.  Among the young dandies, there were “cowboys” in flat, broad brimmed hats more reminiscent of a tango dancer than of a cowboy.

We drove on to another village where we looked for the winemaker recommended by Alin’s friends.  We asked for more exact directions of a pair walking down the road who happened to be Americans looking for wine!  They could not help us, so we traveled on searching for the correct lane.  We passed an ancient wall surrounding a church, the wall being at least three hundred years old.  We finally found the man with the tractor in his yard.  We had not been able to see it because it was behind a solid fence and gate.  We got our clue down the road where a group of three was sitting by their gate husking corn.  The Winemaker was a small man with a hunch back and very dirty clothes.  His hands were stained with the juice of the grapes with which he made Merlot.  His eyes shone with the greatest of good humor and pride in his product.   These eyes announced his presence far more strongly than the mean surroundings from which this family maintained their existence.  His wife had eyes of the clearest of blue and at first was not sure of our attitude toward them, but soon relaxed. They told Eugen and Valentin about their grief over the recent loss of their 24 year old son in an accident.

In their yard they had a pen full of the loveliest of pure white geese with a tuft of feathers on their heads like little pill box hats.  The horse was harnessed to the wagon with its license plate on the rear.  Their remaining son had a towel wrapped around his wounded hand.  He had been turning the wheel to crush the grapes to make the wine and the friction of his clothes against the machine caused a wound which became infected. Under the tree in front of the porch there were huge bags of grapes waiting to be turned into wine.  The kitchen garden had ardei (peppers) still growing and eggplants that might produce again if the weather holds warm enough.  When we left, the winemaker's wife came near with a last word of parting and great sincerity which touched my heart.  The winemaker told us to go with God’s blessing.  I said, “Merci.” A week later Eugeniu told me that they had given us the huge sacks of their grapes and would take no money for them.

We returned to Adjud to a great Sunday dinner of braised beef steaks and mashed potatoes with all the trimmings and we were still full from the morning’s treats!  Conversation as the night before was full of stories and jokes.  I am beginning to understand some of the conversation, but not enough to get the jokes.  I usually get the general topic and a few specifics.   One joke translated to me was this:  A man needed to measure his TV antenna.  He climbed to the top, measured, climbed down again and then placed the antenna on the ground and measured it again.  When asked why he did that he said, “Well, that was the height and this is the length!”  (I told Eugeniu that this was what we would call an Aggie joke, Romanian style.)

Before we left for our afternoon drive to Tecuci, Adi gave me the small blue and white pitcher I had admired the night before.  I told her it was just the size my sister had asked me to find for her collection.  I had refused to take it saying that I only wanted to know where I could find one like it.  She did not know, but insisted that I take it. 

We took both cars for a short sight seeing trip on our way to Tecuci.  The first stop was a scenic viewpoint at the huge dam built to provide water for irrigation.  Next stop was the Gypsy village of Homocea where Adi has her Pharmacy.  Adi told us that this village is inhabited by the best of Gypsies.  They are prosperous and are the opposite of the usual negative stereotypes.  The homes were an Easter basket of colors and designs.  I wanted to take pictures of them all - such a contrast to the usual drab colors of the villages and cities across Romania.  Adi’s pharmacy was neat, pleasant and well ordered; it was on the street level of a medium sized three story building and was filled with plants, including several varieties of colorful begonias.  English ivy climbed the wall in one corner.  Outside the building there was large community water well and a gaggle of geese were wandering nearby.

We drove through a young forest toward a viewpoint where we could see teams of soccer players below and a horse and wagon on the dirt trail down the mountainside across a broad plain to the smallest mountain in the Carpathian chain.  Alin explained that that is the mountain that marks the turn of this chain of mountains toward the west.  A small monastery was just above us.  Adi, Alina and Andrea left us at this point to return home.  Alin went with us because he needed to be in Tecuci on Monday.  We drove to the monastery door and walked into the grounds to discover a treasure of a biserica (church) with frescoes restored in 1983.  A nun took us to the small chapel that is used most often as the biserica is too cold in winter and cannot be heated.  Then we went to see the rugs they used to make.  Lovely tightly woven rugs of bright colors with flowers woven in the unique style that I have seen in Romanian-made rugs for sale at some of the better shops.  They had only three and could not decide to sell them.  Maybe next time we come.  They tell us that they have rooms that we could rent if we wanted to come to stay for a few days.  This monastery is at the edge of a larger, older forest.  It has a splendid view and the air is clear and clean.  The dank air of the cities with its homes closed against the cold stand in stark relief to this refreshing atmosphere.  We drive on up the mountain and through the forest where the ground is covered with a golden yellow carpet of fallen leaves.  At the edge of the forest a last burst of gold hangs over the road like a lace curtain in full salute.

At Tecuci we visited Alin’s sister so he could let her know that he is in town.  Their mother is very ill with a broken hip and “sclerosa” which Eugen defines as the mental deterioration of old age.  Alin left his briefcase with his sister and then we drove to Teodorica’s house.  Alin had called him and told him that we must have a place to stay.  He agreed and thankfully we did not have to make the drive back to Bucharest (211 kilometers) after this day of village visits.  (Tecuci does have a hotel, but most hotels in Romania need much remodeling to bring them up to standards for most tourists of today.)  Teodorica greeted us and eventually was as hospitable as an old man of 82 can be.  His yard was full of grape vines and fruit trees and the kitchen garden had onions, and peppers, and parsley that was still green.  He proudly showed off his apple tree that produces four kinds of apples as well as the cherry, vishine, and pear trees.  He brought out his homemade wine and offered us a taste of it in delicate crystal goblets.  He made mamaliga to go with the brinza (sour cheese) he offered.  Eugeniu made an omelet for me since I did not want to eat the brinza.

Sitting in this kitchen listening to talk of recent politics, I could see that I was indeed in the company of old men, Eugeniu the youngest, then Valentin, and Teodorica standing opposite us in his maroon beret.  The room reminded me of my father’s house in Port Lavaca and how I used to go there and try to bring some order and cleanliness to its small kitchen.  I am relieved to see that Teodorica has a small hot water heater over the kitchen sink.  We put our coats and jackets on the coat rack in the hallway between the kitchen and the room with the TV.  Mercifully, the bathroom was inside, but that was its only redeeming feature.  Eugeniu could not even use it to shave, much less either of us having a nice hot bath!

I had on four layers of clothes and was still a little chilly.  Teodorica told us that the law permits the heating of only two rooms if there is only one person living in a house even if it has ten rooms.   We slept in the room next to the heated TV room and were kept warm by a lovely comforter in clean, white, starched linen.  Teodorica showed us all the medical books that had belonged to his wife that he displays on a table in this guest room.  The next room is locked and we were told that it is full of bookshelves double packed with books on all subjects.  We think Ilenutsa read a great deal.  Teodorica was a brush maker and is very good with his garden.  The grapes and the apples are beautiful with no pock marks left over from invasions by small creatures so often observed on the fruit in the markets here in Bucharest.

The next door neighbor, owner of an auto parts shop, was concerned that our car would be vandalized if we left it in front of the house all night.  He insisted that we put it in his back driveway inside a locked metal gate invisible from the street.  The space was too small for our car and his so he took his out and I drove my car into the small space for our long station wagon.  This act of kindness to total strangers is one of the most pleasant parts of this life in Romania.  The next morning we bought some antifreeze from them.  How do you thank the Good Samaritan?

After breakfast we walked a block to the house of the beekeeper.  His four beehive boxes were in the front garden.  This house was neatly kept and the drive was lined with flowers.  An apple tree bereft of leaves was decorated with bright red apples still hanging from its branches.   Roses and chrysanthemums and balsam and pepper plants beside the front drive.   A dog chained to his doghouse growled a warning that kept me outside the gate until the beekeeper calmed him and the unchained nearly grown puppy.  He had five jars of honey ready for sale and Valentin wanted them all for his supply for the winter.  Eugeniu told him that we wanted to buy some honey, too.  He brought out a huge milk can of honey.  He found some jars and a spoon and a stool.  This can was near empty so he brought out another can.  Thoughtfully he moved the stool and can inside where I would be warmer.  Eugeniu and I dug out gobs of honey one spoon at a time until our jars were full.  This butter yellow honey was as solid as a rock - Eugeniu did most of the work while I peeked at the back garden full of corn and chickens and fruit trees and grape vines.  The beekeeper was kind and friendly and offered the hospitality of his living room where Pro TV was advertising a Sigourney Weaver movie, the one where she is getting revenge on Ben Kingsley.  Mr. Beekeeper told me that he had been a welder for the Germans during WWII.  The beekeeper insisted that Valentin and Eugeniu taste his wine.  By now it is 11 and I am ready to get on the highway for the tedious drive back to Bucharest. 

We thanked Teodorica for his hospitality and the neighbor for his generosity in securing the car for the night and headed for the cemetery, our last stop in Tecuci.  Valentin directed us through the lanes to a place to park the car just below the memorial to World War I veterans.  We walked to Mioara’s grave resplendent with flowers and a tall tombstone with pictures and inscriptions for the dead and all but the dates for Valentin and Teodorica for it is also the grave of Ilenutsa and the parents of Valentin and Ilenutsa and places waiting for Teodorica and Valentin.  I take the last of the pictures and try to roll the film only to find that the camera did not work and all the pictures for this whole trip are gone.  I am ready to cry.  I cannot remember all the pictures in my mind’s eye.

The trip home was remarkable in that we took the shorter route home and found that the highway from Buzau was less crowded. From Urziceni we often had four lanes of newly paved road with patches of ongoing construction.  I actually drove 60 MPH for part of the way!  Four hours to drive 211 kilometers.  The first half more slowly due to the long lines in either direction slowed by the carts and horses with load after load of cornstalks - one with passengers asleep while the horse led the way!  There were roadside scenes of farmers working much as they have done for centuries.  Surely scenes and colors in the fall sunlight of just the type that inspired Van Gogh.  We stopped only to buy gasoline at the Shell station in Buzau.  We did not see a restaurant we were willing to try all along this drive so we drove straight to Bucharest and Piata Domeni, right near home, to eat at the Nicuresti at its tables with crisp white table cloths.  The Nicuresti had delicious, artfully presented food and excellent service.  It was established by people from the same village where we were received so hospitably by Alin’s friends.

We were happy to be home, ready for a nice hot bath!

:

25 January 2010

Today I begin anew with descriptions of life in Romania.  It is snowing again. My husband says that this is a real winter. The third heavy snow covers the ground and the roofs of the houses in this village north of Bucharest.   We have a lovely soba (better than a fireplace) to keep us warm and to conserve our gas supply in the huge tank in the garden on the other side of the fruit trees. The birds are happy with the grain I put out for them - refilling the tray full of grain that they had already eaten. It has been cold for a long time now and - being from South Texas - I do not plan to drive in the snow - dental work or not!

I have just written a bit of my story for the Excell Center in Cologne, and now Dusseldorf, to tell about the results of the stem cell therapy that seems at this point to have prevented further destruction of my eyesight. For that I am so grateful and now less fearful since it has been a year and no change in my eyeglass prescription has been required. Maybe they will like my story, maybe not. But being able to continue activities with no further reduction in vision is a delight.  AMD has no known cure and I wanted to preserve my vision and to continue to do the things that vision permits me to do.  So far there has been no further deterioration of my ability to see!  Hooray!  While we were in Cologne, we saw among many wonderful sights, a collection from the Mayan civilization located right in the middle of the Chocolate Museum..  After watching chocolates being made, we were surprised to see this excellent display of Mayan works of art.  We also saw a replica of the machines that Eugeniu remembers from childhood that were often found at train stations.  After you put money in, out came a soft candy.

Rini is our precious pet. She is an Akita Inu, 1st place winner in the dog show last spring. She is white and well trained to be a good companion and guard dog. She has been romping around in this snow with occasional breaks to rest in her dog house.  She is happy to play with our neighbor's dogs when they break through the barriers.  And they are running around in delight at having so much room to consider their own, if only for a short time.

Later in the day, I see that the sun is shining and the snow nearly blinds one with its brilliance, but soon the sun will vanish into the horizon and the dark will descend. It is lovely that the days grow longer now. And it is also such a delight when spring finally arrives.

My husband brought groceries when he returned from his errands among which was a packet of fresh mushrooms. I think I will make mushroom soup using fresh milk from our neighbor who has two cows. We get milk twice per week and boil it ourselves, thus pasturizing it if we are to use it as milk. Or, it is placed in a bowl and allowed to become something else. Buttermilk, yogurt? If I skim off the cream and have enough, I can make real fresh butter out of it. When my son and family were here in early December, we did make butter and it was really good - no salt added! All the better for a low salt diet. These kinds of activities are possible out here in this small village that were not usual for us when we lived in the midst of the city. There are other things that we can do here as well. I like my Romanian tomatoes the best.  Garden grown from seeds saved by nuns from a nearby monastery, we grew so many that I could make our own tomato sauce and many other things, but the best of all was the dried tomatoes, some of which I put in olive oil according to directions from someone who said that that was the method that has been used for over 100 years in Italy.  They are delicious and, for this gluten free diet I have been following, make a great snack by placing a dried tomato slice on top of a warmed bit of feta on a bed of rice cracker.  I even add a bit of sliced fresh garlic to make a thoroughly healthy delight.

This morning Vickah knocked down the icicles hanging from the roof that he did not attack yesterday. They were huge and they present dangers I do not think about when looking at the rare beauty as they grow like the stalactites they might be if located elsewhere.  The danger is most likely well known to those who live in cold climates - for instance -you would not want one to break off while you are passing by!

As the sun sinks below the rooftops across the road, the temptation is to post more pictures of this glorious sight.  The setting sun is framed between the sloping roofs of the houses while smoke billows from the chimneys where fire burns the wood so carefully prepared during the late summer and early fall.

Cherries and more

The cherry tree on the side of the house was full and I was sure that they would rot on the tree if I had no help. The little boys in the neighborhood eyed the tree with longing and one of them asked if he would be able to have some of them this year. "Yes," I said and he smiled happily. Finally the day came when the cherries were just right. I asked if they were ready to help with the harvest. "Jumatate, jumatate," I said. (Half and half.) Soon there were half a dozen boys clambering about the tree; two of whom climbed up as far as they could past the top of the ladder. Others put the fallen cherries into liter-sized plastic yogurt buckets from which developed a huge plastic tub full of delicious, but rather small, sweet cherries. Finally, we divided them, each of the boys taking home plastic bag with at least two liters of cherries in each, more than half of the pick of the day. They were very happy with the cherries but even more delighted with getting a turn on the swing Eugeniu has put on a branch of the walnut tree. I can still see the smiles of delight as they flew back and forth in the cool of the evening.

Now it is almost time for the next venture, the visine (sour cherries). We have so many trees full of visine that we could supply a market for a long while. Oana, Eugeniu's daughter, and her daughters, Alexandra and Adela, are coming on Monday when Eugeniu says that they will be ready. Alexandra was first in her class and was duly recognized on the last day of school last Friday when honors were presented.

Last week I picked strawberries morning and night while pulling and cutting weeds and other things that did not belong in the strawberry bed. Nicu promises to make proper rows of strawberries for the next crop so that we can harvest them more easily. This variety does not have a long shelf life, but it does have a flavor that is so light and delicate that I think that this is really how strawberries are supposed to taste. They are safely frozen for future enjoyment.

In the meanwhile, Nicu tamed the vines so that the grapes can grow and ripen as they should. Weeds gone and branches attached to the wires, the grapes are now the size of small peas. Last year I made the most delicious grape juice and this year I hope to put way more. That is, if most of the grapes do not get appropriated to more traditional methods of preservation like wine and moost (?).

We have not heard from Nicu today. Our prayers are with him. Without his help much of the work here could not have been done. That includes work on this house, building the carport, finishing his house and taking care of the garden. We moved the refrigerator from Bucharest for him to use and before he could finish the interior walls of his house, it burned. Completely. It was ruined. The walls and ceiling were black with soot. The neighbors told him that they saw the smoke coming out of the vent in the roof on a Sunday while we were away. The damage would have been worse if there had been more air. We were fortunate that he was not there and that this did not happen while the refrigerator was in the house in Bucharest. If that had happened there the air was plentiful and the circulation so good that the whole house would have burned to the ground. As it was, the plastic sides of the refrigerator melted, nothing was salvageable, not even the trays. After the refrigerator burned, Nicu continued to make his small efficiency into a habitable place for him to stay while he is working here. Complete with stove, new refrigerator, table, bed and TV, his small house has become comfortable.

Now Nicu has been told that he has diabetes and they are checking his heart. He has a diet to follow for the diabetes, but the results for the tests on his heart are not yet ready. Before he went into Bucharest for these most recent "controls" he cleared the weeds from the bed where we have planted blueberries, afine, and he also cleared out the most of the weeds between the rows of grapevines. A lot of work. He also replanted some tomato plants and guili, which are root plants. Amalia, his wife, has decided that she, too, will come here when she is not working at her job in Bucharest. It is much cooler here than in the city and one can enjoy the pleasant breezes that make one feel that there is a natural air conditioning when sitting in the shade.

It is living here watching the seasons that I understand more clearly the succession of harvest times for the various fruits and vegetables that grow here. That there is a "season for all things" takes on a much fuller meaning than ever before. After the visine come the pears and then the apples and tomatoes. In the fields the grains has tuned to gold and the corn is knee high.

This year the rain came too little and too late so much of the wheat and most of the corn has been lost. Irrigation was impossible for the most part as allotments for paying for the water came too late and most of the irrigation equipment was stolen long ago for the metal which was sold for a fraction of the value of what was destroyed.

The Dentist

Dr. Oltea Serbanescu is my dentist. Today I thought I had one small problem in a front tooth, but, no, there were several others. I have an appointment next Wednesday to finish what she could not do today. This brilliant and professional dentist was trained as American dentists are trained and she has American equipment. Today I noticed that her practice has grown. She has expanded to two rooms for seeing patients and she has marvelous new equipment. A flat TV was attached so that I could what was wrong and needed to be fixed.

Once we went to a dentist trained in Germany and, when she dropped my crown on the floor, she told me that I made her nervous. Being nervous she had to hurry and that is why the crown did not fit. One reason she was nervous is because I insisted that she use gloves. That is just one of the means of sanitation and protection that I expected and thought should have been standard practice, normal safe procedures. She was puppy dog friendly and she had a booming practice. I was used to a different style of dentistry. You could say that I am spoiled, but then I think that all those people who suffered through drilling without anesthesia deserve a lot of admiration for their courage. One dentist we visited did not know how to use anesthesia. They were not used to deadening before drilling and really did not know how so she asked me to sign a release, a paper excusing them if they made any errors since I was the one who insisted on the anesthesia. I said goodbye.

A friend who now lives in Canada referred me to Dr. Oltea, as I call her. I have been going to her for several years now and have referred our nieces Monica and Gabi to her. They like her a lot. And her offices are near their apartment. Compared with the cost of dental work in Texas, what happened today is a real bargain.

After the visit to the dentist, I went to Alison's book launching. Alison is a journalist who works for the Associated Press and this book tells of her experiences in Romania as a journalist. The Associated Press pays in US dollars, which used to be a very good thing. We are both in shock about the declining value of the dollar. The exchange rate has dropped considerably and steadily during the last few years. It was at the book launching that I met a woman who was very interested in having a referral to a good dentist for her daughter, who is a senor in high school. As I dashed in to the book launching and saw Andrew and Leslie on their way out. She found a place outside of Bucharest and he is looking for one.

Then a mad dash to find the pharmacy that had what I wanted. Five pharmacies later I still did not have it all! It was wonderful to have the Silver Streak, as I call my new Volvo, to drive from place to place. So much easier that I am ever so grateful! No sputtering in heavy traffic and no dying just as the light turns in my favor!

Well, tomorrow is another day and we are cool. The air conditioners have been installed and the tall grass cut. All is right with the world. Thank goodness Georgetta weeded the garden.

Noapte buna!

A Glorius Day

The referendum is over and Basescu won. The pundits are like all talking heads. What they have to say now is unimportant as they have been outvoted by a majority of the voters. Here is what I wrote to a friend in Texas who asked, "Who is the good guy?":

Basescu. He won in spite of all the tricks designed to prevent people from expressing their will. That is the problem for neo-communists as modern communication prevents lies from dominating the opinion of the "masses." The victory was said not to be glorious because of the low voter turnout, but approximately 75% of those who got to vote chose to bring back the president who was not actually impeached. They used that term, but, incorrectly, as it was a simple vote of the Parliament that turned him out of office in spite of the ruling by the Supreme Court that he had committed no infractions, that is, he had not acted outside of the Constitution.

Many voters were not allowed to vote because "it was too late." So many of those voters in Italy and Spain and other places (who traveled many miles to vote) were turned away. In this village, the voters were sent to other places where of course they could not vote and by the time they returned it was too late. Those in line were not permitted to vote after 8 o'clock. Eugeniu told me that one of the tricks was to hold the referendum on Saturday when the traditional voting day in Romania is a Sunday when people can go after church. One shopkeeper told me that PSD is finished. The people know. Under this President, there have been enormous improvements and the people - yes, even the pensioners, are tired of lies and unkept promises.

The process is the winner. The good guy is the one who understood that the Parliament can no longer control things as they did before. Another victory for the long process to bring democracy to this country. It means that people will no longer allow as much corruption as has been the norm. The very day that the country joined the EU the process to end corruption was Stopped! Much to the dismay of the EU. We will see if it is brought to life again.

This is a long answer but it is really a glorious victory in spite of what was said.

And that was written after a day of gardening. I planted the seedlings that were growing in peat pots and hope that bugs will not eat them. Parsley, cherry tomatoes, lettuce and broccoli were set out with the peppers, regular tomatoes, egg plant and dill. We also have planted blueberries and of the twelve, at least three are still alive and showing green leaves. The grape vines are full of tiny green bunches of grapes and the wild strawberries are delicious and ready to be picked on a daily basis as they have not such a long shelf life! The cherry trees are full of red ripe cherries and they, too are delicious if not as large as those we can buy at the market. The onions are not yet ready to be harvested, but those plants as well as the garlic are nearing maturity. It is all too much for me to keep up with so it is good to have help. There are so many weeds that have to be chopped or pulled. There are some that are really quite lovely. The mallow has soft lilac colored flowers and there is a vine that will choke out all other plants if allowed, but it has a tiny white blossom that is like a small morning glory. There are other plants that are to be remedies for various ailments. Urzica, stinging nettle, grows profusely, alongside the mint and wild blackberries and another vine like plant with clusters of purple blooms. OUr roses are blooming and Eugeniu reports that they have a wonderful aroma. I cannot smell them - thus it is indeed time for the visit to the allergist!

Eugeniu brought his brother here this afternoon so that he could enjoy the fresh air and the pleasant surroundings. His daughter left him here after promising to take him with her to America and he is sad because he does love her so. Our neighbors, Mita and Georgetta, came to visit with him. And now he is talking with Nicu who is finishing the storage shed for the wood to use in his "soba" which will keep his house warm next winter. The design for the greenhouse is not yet established even though Eugeniu has had many ideas and has made many sketches.

I have made appointments with the dentist, the allergist and my doctor for Homeopathy for this week. It is such a pleasure to be able to do so without worry about transportation. The Volvo is a dream car that I drove on Sunday and even washed off the mud after returning to park it in the new carport.

Tomorrow the plumbers are coming tomorrow to install the air conditioners and the next day to repair the line with the leak for the radiators. Life is busy with ordinary things. And if they do not come tomorrow, well, another day!

Our dog Rini, an Akito Inu. is growing fast and has learned to behave a bit better. She understands the meaning of "Off!" so that she does not jump all over everyone if they use that command. I learned it on a television clip from the Today show. This is an example of the miracle of modern communication. For many Americans it is hard to imagine how wonderful it is to be able to see what is happening almost everywhere in the world as well as to pick and choose the clips one wants to see and escape the rest!

The Referendum

Today, Saturday, is the referendum on whether or not Parliament has the right to dismiss the President. The voter turnout is low. Is it the rain? Are people confused? We will not know the results of the exit polls until 8 this evening.

Meanwhile, I was reluctant to drive the new Volvo in the rain, mainly because there is standing water at the corner and somehow I do not want to get mud splashed all over it. It is silver, thus the nickname of Silver Streak, which also matches my gray hair! It drives like a dream and it is a dream because when I first came here it was not possible to buy a new car at a new car dealership. It was only abroad or at the flea market or buy an ancient Dacia. Even the new ones had the same style as those that were twenty years old! This aspect of communism vanished as soon as people could choose according to their tastes and their pocketbook. Now the roads are crowded with cars of every make imaginable and every color as well. There are new roads and new office buildings and shopping centers as nice as any in the world. Recently a new IKEA opened at Baneasa. I was told that it is the largest IKEA in this part of the world. It is huge. Just walking through it is an exhausting experience.

Just looking through the pictures, I can see many things to write about. Christmas, snow, spring, this house, and people who are important to us such as Monica, Gabi, Alexandra, Adela, and many others. It is hard to know where to begin. I am blessed!