Pilgrims' Progress

Brasov, Romania

“What’ve you learnt over this past year?” I asked last week.
Jboy13 managed to reply, “How to empty a portapotti.”

Left alone for a few minutes, he then produced another answer (although I must say I remain grateful that he was such a competent loo-emptier, and saved me from ever having to complete the task).
”I now have a better understanding of money.”

Maybe it started here:

On a train in China, a man boarded with this little clipboard, and proceeded to give a long spiel about counterfeit money. Unfortunately for Joe Chinaman, it is impossible to tell whether a note is counterfeit or not – he even had samples for you to check. But fortunately for the passengers on the train, he also had a special little UV torch, which, if purchased on the spot, could be used to show you the authenticity of your notes. Another gadget is not what we needed, so we made a point of only using authorised money-changers and not using enormous denominations.
Jboy13, meanwhile, enjoyed inspecting the samples!

A few weeks later he was up near the top of Hong Kong’s tallest building, this time inspecting a display of the counterfeit measures taken in Hong Kong to protect their monetary system. Actually, make that systems plural – three different banks and the government all produce money there, each designing their own notes.

Added to these experiences, was the opportunity to *use* money. At home I don’t even carry five cents on me; I use a card for all purchases and so the children had rarely seen real money being used. Some smaller ones even thought if you produced your card you could buy whatever you wanted.
One of the things we wanted to do on the trip was to allow the kids to make money-decisions with us. And using *actual* money has made this very easy. Flashing a few baht in front of them in Thailand and asking them to decide whether it should be spent on a truck ride home or that we walk the three kilometres and buy ice-creams on the way started the process.
Comparing prices in different countries for the same products – a loaf of bread, a kilo of rice or the cheapest local fruit – enhanced their money-savviness, not to mention improved their mental arithmetic!
Today the older kids were sent out to do the day’s food shopping. They were given the freedom to walk further to a particular supermarket to buy the pasta at well under half the cost of getting it at the market and also buy themselves something with a portion of the savings – or to just get everything at the market and a closer supermarket. They came home with chocolate! WIN-WIN Actually, they really won; the man, who they bought a cauliflower from, would not accept any payment at all!!!
They have also had money of their own to spend. The six-year-old has struggled most with this; he could determine to save it all and precisely twenty-seven seconds later be tempted to the point of wanting to spend by a bag of lollies. More Than Once. Jboy13 limited his purchases to significant items: a watch, an electronic game and a crossbow. He still has money in the bank too. And now understands better what the numbers stand for (the children had always had virtual bank accounts kept in a notebook at home, and Jboy’s in particular had seen a lot of activity with his flower press business – but now it means so much more).

Being a boy, who pays an inordinate amount of attention to detail, he has noticed a lot more about money than any of the rest of us. In fact, it sparked an interest to compile a bunch of pictures of coins and notes every country we have visited for more than a day.….which then grew into a mind-numbing comprehensive array of details about other aspects of those countries, too – flag, capital city, official languages, population, average rainfall and temperature, and time zones (Russia is fascinating!)
Having produced this *stuff*, we thought it might as well have a broader purpose and should be displayed on the blog….if you would like to have a squiz, you can go to the pretty interesting stuff page. Sadly, to our DetailsMan, the computer will not support the non-latin scripts he so painstakingly gathered – each country written in its local script….so you’ll just have to imagine squiggles and dots and dashes and all sorts of interesting writing!

Brasov, Romania

December first always signifies the beginning of our Christmas preparations.
A year ago we were in Laos, the most non-Christian country we have visited.
This year, it’s Romania, and we have six months of frequent church-visiting behind us.
One of the kids commented this morning, “It even feels like Christmas here.”
Singing our first carols, did not feel foreign. Reading Isaiah 7:14 was not out of place.
“The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.”
Talking about who gave this promise and whether it was fulfilled and how signs give us information and what signs we have seen that point to God and how Immanuel means “God with us” and how we have witnessed this, and how the people living here are so much more aware of this truth than the people we were living with a year ago….all this *felt* Christmassy.

But that is not the celebration Romanians have at the forefront of their minds on the first of December. This date signifies for them National Independence Day. Actually it signifies the union of Transylvania (and a few other regions) with the Romanian Kingdom in 1918, a fact disputed by many to this day, but certainly celebrated. The actual holiday has been shifted over the years – in Communist Romania it was set to mark the 1944 overthrow of the pro-fascist government. Prior to 1918, the national holiday of Romania had been on May 10, which had a double meaning: it was the day on which Carol I set foot on Romanian soil (in 1866), and it was the day on which the prince ratified the Declaration of Independence from the Ottoman Empire eleven years later.

So we celebrated Romanian-style. With our friends we headed out of town to the mountains again. WOW. Just half an hour from Brasov is a humming tourist town, full to overflowing with upmarket hotels and restaurants, gondolas and ropes courses and not much else. We spent a very pleasant hour wandering around. (I’ve tried hard for thirteen months, three weeks and five days to avoid that sentence, but it really describes perfectly what we did today!)
We popped into a distinctive church,

we lingered in a restaurant made in the style of the people who lived in the region two thousand years ago (oh, the handmade linens attached to the ceiling – and the hand painted ceramics and wild boar, bear and wolf skins, and corn cobs and candles, and sheepskin covered treestumps to sit on – the whole place oozed character),

we listened to history from that time (fascinating stuff we had NO idea about – like only the rich wore particular hats made from sheepskin, and that they carried flags made from the head of a wolf and the body of a snake and when the wind filled them it made a loud noise),

we tripped along paths, spotted a squirrel and happened upon the exact materials for a secret project, the idea for which had just hatched as we left the apartment in the morning.

We were approached by a young couple with microphone and camera….and later this evening Rob found himself on television.

No, it wasn’t snowing – the only snow round here is our fuzzy television screen.  Unfortunately for us, but thankfully for those who live here and still have a few months of real winter to survive, it is uncharacteristically warm this year. Previous years there has ALWAYS been snow in November. Ah well. At least it meant our afternoon activities were not to be too freezing. We drove to a camp-in-the-process-of-being-established, where one of the group works. While a soccer game was played on a mole-hill-infested field, we roasted mackerel and potatoes over the fire, and then feasted on that accompanied, of course, by mamaliga and spicy garlic sauce, and followed by a range of homemade cakes. In a moment of appropriate patriotism, we sang our respective national anthems (actually the Romanian one was R…E…A…L…L…Y long – we just stuck to the first verse in English and Maori!), and then prayed for each other’s countries. By the time the dishes were done the sun was setting – another glorious sunset impossible to capture in words, or even by a camera.

Returning home, I contemplated how God infiltrated possessed every part of our day. From the beginning as we remembered how He came-to-earth in the form of a man, to the awesome creation we admired and enjoyed, to the heritage of history both here in Romania and more briefly in New Zealand (Samuel Marsden preached his first sermon on Christmas Day 1814), to the hospitality we were again shown – God’s love heaped upon us, to the prayers for our countries, spontaneously offered – there will be no peace or harmony or true freedom for either country – for any country – without the hope, solutions and love offered by the God, who made us all, and knows how best we should live. What a lot we have to celebrate.

Brasov, Romania
Please note this post is written by the Crazy-Mama of the family.
The Sensible-Father does not necessarily share all the sentiments!

Here’s a little girl and her great-grandmother. Mother and grandmother were there too, but we didn’t get a picture of them all together.

We did, however, get some funny stories about the oldest living generation……let’s call the main character Great-Grandpa. He came to visit from his little farmhouse in a nearby village. There were crumbs on the table, which he swept up into his hand and promptly deposited on the floor. He had forgotten he was now in town and there would be no chickens running into the kitchen to demolish them!
On another occasion, Great-Grandpa came to the grandparents’ place, where, as a special treat, they ran him a bath. As per his life-old custom, he filled a cup with water and splashed it over himself!

These smile-inducing stories punctuated a discussion about how we care for the aged. A kiwi example was cited (not by us) – individual homes in a little community with sports facilities, garden etc. But even there, as nice as it was (and much nicer than the more usual apartment block complexes), something was missing – people under the age of sixty! We couldn’t follow the conversation fully, but we did pick up and agree that old folks’ homes on the whole are not quite right. A community loses wisdom and experience when the aged are “kept” away from society in general. Children miss out, young people miss out, middle-agers miss out and the elderly themselves miss out too.

Something we have noticed over and over on this trip is old folks contributing meaningfully to their families and to their communities. There have been countless examples – right from the very first place we stayed in (Singapore, where the 80+ year old Grandmother went out each day with her barrow to collect cardboard for recycling)….to the ladies at the market here in Brasov, bringing their home-grown produce or homemade cheese or hand-carved wooden spoons in to town from the villages to sell. All throughout Asia and eastern Europe we have seen old ladies and old men still working. This is such a contrast to New Zealand where (excuse the generalising) there is an expectation that at age 65 you will stop working and embrace leisure.

Even if this were a desirable model, it would not work, not with the demographics we have these days. It will soon be impossible for the ever-enlarging “oldies” group to be supported by an ever-diminishing younger workforce. (Rob does not disagree with this bit).

And as hinted at already, I do not think putting my feet up permanently in twenty years’ time (not even to knit all day – wink) is going to cut it for me. Just this week I have realised that there is no urgency to bring to fruition my visions within the next ten years. Assuming I might live to be eighty or ninety or so, I still have more than half my life left! While I would like to move to a farm as soon as we return and start the process of city-girl-turns-country, I can see that staying in the suburbs for another decade does not relegate me to a whole lifetime there. Starting a farm at fifty might seem crazy, but since when have we walked the sensible route? At least it would give time for some theoretical learning to occur while we wait – maybe we’d make fewer mistakes than if we jumped in the deep end right now! And even starting at fifty, gives perhaps thirty years of regular (although undoubtedly slow) work. In that time we could improve whatever ground we have, get the vege garden not just established, but in a seasonal rhythm, we could grow trees (even walnuts would be producing fruit before we died and we could have harvested a pine forest), raise piggies for curing our own bacon, raise chookies to have eggs to eat with the bacon, and even learn to spin wool from our own sheep’s backs in our spare time.
For the next few years while Rob makes his contribution at his chosen place of employment, when I’m not edumacating our children or weeding our garden or preserving our harvest or baking our bread or brewing our vinegar or petitioning the council to allow the keeping of chickens on our section (as could be done in the rest of the world without stringent regulatory red-tape) or knitting our socks and sewing our quilts or doing Pilates or practising hospitality or reading the classics or or or….I’ll be dreaming. Rob asked what I’d like to be doing in twenty years’ time and I answered without stopping to think, “To be a hippy.” There just might be time for that yet! When you reach retirement age and do not equate that milestone with reaching a use-by date, you can dream big. You can even dream for your great-grandchildren.

PS The two litres of honey brought home from the Grandpa’s house at the weekend, made by his own bees in his own backyard, just might have gone a long way to convincing SensibleMan that hippy is not so bad!

PPS If you’d like to see some of our intergenerational stories, please CLICK HERE.

Brasov, Romania

It was so easy to get out of the habit of going to church on a Sunday. Here it has been easy to slip back into the habit. But it’s a habit with a difference. The church “family” we have become part of is not a Sunday-only deal. This was the group we met our first weekend here, then hiked with last weekend, and also had Slideshow Sunday with, it was the group, who came away for this weekend trip (minus just a few with other commitments). They belong to a church in Brasov, but instead of attending the services every weekend, they meet together as a small group to share their lives deeply, to make disciples. They maintain ties with the “big church”, but also have the freedom to take us away for the weekend, to spend time together seeing God revealed in creation, to open his revealed Word, to practise amazing hospitality, to share a yummy breakfast, to sing and pray together…..and then to wander through the streets of Pitesti, stopping to look in churches along the way, and the spot where a church stood before the communists decreed it be destroyed in 1962. We walked and talked. We found St George killing his dragon on two different churches, and wondered about the widespread-ness of this legend. We enjoyed this style of *church*.

Then we hopped in vehicles and zipped off towards home, stopping on the way to visit the remains of a Roman fort. At this point Rob thought it an appropriate time to stop for lunch <wink> (being two o’clock-n-all). But this was not to be until we covered A Lot More miles and made it to a World War I memorial, where we climbed the hill and ate smoked ham sandwiches as the sun disappeared, leaving us shivering with the sudden drop in temperature. The setting sun cast a deep red glow across the bare trees; it lasted only a matter of minutes, and then darkness settled.

Back into the cars, we drove homewards. But not directly. Along the way, there was a detour through a steep-walled canyon. The sides rose up, towering above us so high that we could barely see the stars. The road winding along beside the stream, was not the best, but the view captured in our headlights was simply spectacular.

And there was one more treat in store. Climbing one of the last hills, rounding a corner, we caught sight of a fox. All through England we had hoped to see a fox, but it hadn’t happened. Here frozen in front of us was the foxiest-looking fox you’ve ever seen (OK, so it was the *only* fox we’ve ever seen). Its bushy tail stretched out behind its poised body, front paw raised off the ground. For a few seconds it stood there, long enough to think you’ve seen a fox and take a second look to really make sure. Then off it trotted into the darkness. And we drove home. 507km covered, a 2l bottle full of honey from our hosts’ backyard beehives tucked in our bag, wonderful memories tucked inside our minds.

Pitesti, Romania

Before arriving in Romania, we spoke to countless Romanians, all of whom were most disparaging about their capital city, Bucharest, and most of whom were unimpressed with the rest of the country as well. Once we arrived here, we discovered the Romanians left behind agree with the capital verdict, but they have a special place in their hearts for the rest of the country.
We cannot comment on the biggest city, having not been there, but just a few short trips from Brasov have shown us amazing countryside. Mountains as spectacular as any of the other alps in Europe. Canyons rivalling all others we have been through. Hairpin bends as tight, even if not as frequent, as Italy. Tunnels chiselled out of rock. Bridges to impress. A dam, so still it revealed a reflection of trees and mountains, so perfect, it looked unreal. Quaint villages with intricate woodwork, colourful paint, benches inviting conversation, decorated window frames, delightful rooflines. Monasteries, churches, and even a castle (popularly known as Dracula’s, even if this detail is historically inaccurate).

7am Saturday, before the sun rises, while the night’s coldness still grips Brasov, we set out. Two cars and a van. Most of the group we went hiking with last weekend.
First stop Bran, for Dracula’s Castle. We don’t actually visit – we, in the first vehicle, just stop to let the others catch up. Kids bounce out of the van to play on the playground while we wait. It does not take long for them to return to the van to don thermal underwear and knitted vests, gloves and hats. On we drive over the hills, looking down on shepherd’s huts and people’s houses, buried far in the valley we leave behind, shrouded in mist.

Second stop, a rock. But this is not any old rock. It’s a rock with a path beckoning us to clamber up and over. And down the other side. To a chapel, first mentioned in literature in 1512, but most probably dating back to the 1300s. Various scenes  painted directly on the cave ceiling are peeling off, but still awe-inspiring. Religious icons are simultaneously rich and simplistic. For sale in the adjoining room, are not only beads and pamphlets, but knitted slippers and vests. Do you have trouble imagining monks sitting around knitting? I did, too! I know men can and do knit, but it turns out this particular monastery is actually a “nunnery”, the very first “women’s monastery” in Romania.

Third stop, a dam, lake and lunch.

By the time we set off again it’s 2:30pm. The moon has just risen and it looks like the sun is about to set. That’s because it is! In just two hours it will be gone. But that still leaves us time to wind our way up the mountain to the beginning of the snow, engage in snowball fights, make a teeny-tiny snowman, slide down the slope, get wet and cold, and watch the sunset in awe.

Rob thinks we’re driving directly to our accommodation for the night, a fair assumption, given that it’s two and a half hours away, it’s already 5pm and when we arrive we need to cook for 25 people. But he’s wrong.

On the way is another monastery. Even under cover of darkness it is impressive. The huge wrought iron gates are firmly shut, a sign notifying us of opening hours and cost. One of our party has a word with the guard, and we find ourselves being admitted, free of charge as it is outside visiting hours! “This is Romania,” our host explains. With the sun now a distant memory, it is cold; chattering teeth cold. We stay only long enough to take note of the distinctive orthodox Romanian architecture.
Rob’s tummy might be rumbling, but it was a stop well worth making!

On to Pitesti (pronounced pi as in pip, tesh, t……you need to imagine a little dot under the s for it to be authentic). The last few kilometres are driven on Romania’s  motorway. The speed limit might be 130km/hr, but with no street lighting, we avoid that kind of speed. The road, however, is much better than others we have driven on over the course of the day.
We had been warned about Romanian roads when we were contemplating driving here in the motorhomes – atrocious, we were told. “Italian,” we would now reply! If you’ve driven in Italy, you are prepared for Romania – it’s really not so bad. Yes, it’s bumpy, but it’s not *that* bad, not for long stretches at a time anyway! Actually the two worst menaces are stray dogs, which appear out of nowhere, and real live humans in dark clothing, who materialise on the road – not on the verge, because there often isn’t one, but right on the road where you are driving in darkness. At dusk you are also likely to meet cows returning home for the night, but they are big enough to see easily.

We get to Pitesti, where we are welcomed by the parents of one of our group. They have kindly opened their home to us for the night. Great-Grandma of our group’s baby is also there. Four generations.
We take over the kitchen. I am under strict instructions that I am a guest and not permitted to do anything, but no-one objects when I peel the garlic for the ubiquitous garlic sauce. I am, however, severely reprimanded for considering to hep with dishes after dinner <wink> But that’s a while away. Cooking for twenty-five takes some time! Rob pokes his head in to the kitchen periodically in hopeful anticipation, but he has to wait for the dozen children to eat before the adults are permitted to. Again, it’s well worth the wait. Every time we have mamaliga it gets better and better – this time is the best. Probably due to the accompanying sausages (by the way, you know how everyone talks about German sausages being so amazing – well, we much prefer Polish or Romanian ones – they are in a class of their own – no offense intended to our German friends)….yes, sausages and garlic sauce and eggs and cheeses (yes, two different sorts of cheese, piled on in quantities we would never consider using at home! Another “by the way”….by the way, Romanians don’t use “spreads” on their bread – they use “piles”….jam, honey, nutella, cheese, pickles – all are piled on at least a centimetre thick. This is one tradition our children would like to take home with them!!) And while we’re talking about the cheeses. One is a name we were told was too difficult for us to pronounce or remember; it’s a creamy white ball of cheese contained in a sheep’s stomach (or something similar), with a hint of “blue” about it. Delicious. The other was a very light yellow cheese, which in a few days’ time I will try to discover how to make, so that we can use handfuls of it, Romanian-style. But tonight, we just enjoy.

10pm and we finish eating. Kids are sent to bed under strict instructions not to make a peep before 8am, and all the adults follow suite immediately. We wonder, did the Romanians we met in the rest of Europe not visit this part of their country?

Brasov, Romania

In my role as parent (or perhaps tour guide), I’ve posed a few questions to the children over the past couple of days. Questions like “What did you think of the trip?” and “What have you learnt this past year?” and “How will this experience affect your future life, both the immediate future and perhaps longterm – if you can imagine beyond your childhood, that is?” and “What’s the worst thing that happened?” and “What was your favourite thing/place/food/experience” and “Why?”
We know that when we get back, we will need to slot into “normal daily life” (whatever that is), and that most people we come across will have no interest in our goings-on (not you, who is reading, of course – we feel your lurve!), but *some* people will pose a question or two. A number of times the children have already been faced with the impossible, “What’s your favourite so far?” or even more vaguely, “What do you think of the trip?” (Actually, it’s fascinating how people are more interested in what the kids think than the adults!! And I LIKE that they are treated as *people* and not some of our baggage). Context usually limits the answer to a twenty second one, but where do you start in under a minute? How can you compare riding an elephant with a roller coaster? Slurping a bowl of spicy noodle soup with biting into a thick custardy cream cake or chomping on the most flavour-filled crispy apple you have ever tasted, that you just picked off the tree? Come to think of it, how do you compare a slice of watermelon with a slice of buffalo mozzarella, a pot of Mongolian sheep’s tail with a bag of freshly fried crickets? How do you choose between scaling a mountain in Thailand and clambering over four thousand year old ruins? How do you choose between floating down the Mekong river for a couple of days and the fastest scariest zippy-dippy tuktuk ride across town? Oh, and what about the time we crammed fourteen people into one tuktuk?
How do you choose between experiences and relationships? Seeing the marvel of Angkor Wat was absolutely amazing, but so was seeing the look on the face of a child who had just received their first ever book. Climbing castles inspired, but so did visiting an orphanage. Cycling anywhere (whether in China or Holland or Greece or…) was always a favourite…and so was realising that Grandpa would be rejoining us earlier than planned.
Discovering a new beetle or bones at an archaeological site or a new word or a spectacular sunset was always exciting….as was discovering your journal entries becoming more interestingly written and longer and longer and longer.

So I’ve been grooming the children…. “Listen up kids, it’s better to answer, “Oooh that’s a tricky question; I’ll try to answer it” than to stare dumbly saying, “Ummmm I dunno.”” 
How to teach them to discern whether someone is asking out of politeness or because they are genuinely interested, though, is tricky – you see, we work on a philosophy of “take people at their word” – we don’t go looking for hidden agendas or unspoken intentions. And so that means the lady who told our young lad she really was interested in rugby, got much more than she bargained for. All she could stammer as I pulled him on to the next pillar at Philippi was, “My, he is articulate, isn’t he? It’s homeschooling that does that.” Which was a really funny comment for her to make when she’d just expressed real concern to me that homeschooled children can’t interact socially <wink> He was certainly *interacting*, even if inappropriately by adult standards!! But he was six and she had asked him a question….so he had answered. Hopefully we’ll have got Body Language 101 and Clues About Whether Someone Is Listening Interestedly Or Merely Politely down pat by the time we get back (eg they look engaged versus distant, they ask more questions versus grunting, they share their own experiences – must remind the kids to pick up on those stories and take on the role of Good Listener, asking further questions of the speaker…)

If you haven’t read enough yet today, there’s a bit more on the now-updated Parenting Page, and quite a few pictures too.

Brasov, Romania

So some of the kids think it’s gonna be a real boring post….just updating info about toilets-n-stuff. Let’s see if I can convince them it’s a blog-worthy topic. 

Well, they read the toilet page, and laughed. They remembered and laughed. They also groaned and exclaimed and sighed and questioned. If you, the reader, has even half the response, it will be classed as a successful post!

Let’s see if I can do the same with transport.
No. I didn’t expect so, but there are lots of good memories and interesting observations all the same. Hopping in our van will never be the same again. When you are walking along the road and you’re overtaken by a horse or ox or donkey, you notice a few things. Firstly, they create very little audible pollution – you hear nothing until they are almost upon you and then there is just a gentle plodding or clip-clopping. Secondly, they have a nice earthy smell – no petrol fumes. Of course, if you are comparing horses with cars from a speedy persepctive, the animal does not fare so well (although there is something special about galloping across a plain), but if your alternative is walking, they are a desirable option. When you are walking along the street and a donkey overtakes you, you realise it actually trots along quite quickly. Besides, animals respond to you in a way a metal carriage doesn’t!

If you’re a crafter, you’ll be fascinated with the traditional crafts page…and I noticed when compiling the pictures, that recreation in many parts of the world can hardly be separated from creative arts, and in particular, to *being creative* as opposed to merely entertained. By the way, crafting is not a girly domain – you’ll find a Mongolian bowmaker (one of only two left in the country) and an old Thai man fashioning himself a new gun.

Brasov, Romania

Our clothes are wearing out a bit. We’ve been living in the same two long-sleeved tops, two short-sleeved tops, two long pants and two short pants for over a year now. Handwashing gets things really clean, but it is also much harder on clothes than a fancy-schmancy washing machine (which I have missed far less than I anticipated – probably due in large part to the fact that the older five children wash all of their own clothes and Rob seems to squish the rest around the sink. He’s my hero!)
Romania is full of second-hand clothes stores, which in turn are full of reasonable clothes at more-than-reasonable prices. And so I’ve picked up a few pieces. If we had more time to sift through and try things on, we could get even more, but I’ve spent almost the whole day in front of the computer screen, tidying up the blog.
I realised I was waaaay behind on our Room With A View pictures. Not any more. If you really have nothing better to do and want to have a look at the 153 different places we have slept in so far, you can do so RIGHT HERE. Or if you’d like to see just a small selection from a hilltribe hut to a beachside spot, you can CLICK HERE.
While I was at it, I updated the DRESSED TRADITIONALLY page. It is about as sparse as our own wardrobes. We had a vision of taking lots of traditional dress pictures, but it just didn’t happen. I think we got a bit caught up with food pics! If you don’t mind slobber all over your keyboard, I’ve added lots and lots and lots of pictures to the NOURISHMENT TRADITIONS page. Warning: if you are on dialup, you’ll need to go and bake your bread for a whole week and pickle some gherkins while the page loads.

Exciting note for the sock-knitters, who follow this blog.
We brought along a few pairs of shop-socks and a pile of handknit socks.
Guess which ones have worn the best – by a looooong way. We don’t have one pair of shop socks without a hole (the last pair surrendered on our walk on Saturday). Only one pair of handknit socks has got a hole – and that was not made with proper sock wool. So there ya go. Keep on knitting.

PS It’s one month ’til Christmas!

Brasov, Romania

Brasov, Romania

You’ve got to know what questions to ask.

On both Saturday and Sunday I asked different people how Romania has changed over the past hundred years. You could ask that question in New Zealand and likely receive a response about the introduction of automobiles and electricity, and the disappearance of outhouses and suburban vegetable gardens.
Here people threw their hands up and claimed, “That’s much too long!” (never mind that they have a much much much longer history than kiwi-land!)
In each instance, they then turned to talking about post-89.
When I pressed for a longer timeframe (what about the fifty years before that?), it turned out that fifty was an inconvenient number. Time had to be counted in terms of pre-communism versus during-communism. It occurred to me that life is very politically driven here. I had expected answers to do with the availability of commodities, but I was fed worldview. What sort of apples or apartment you can buy pales in significance when freedom is at stake.

One younger lady commented that it was easier during communism as *everyone*  could get an apartment, whereas now it is virtually impossible for the likes of her. Those not even a decade older than her felt differently – instead of being just eight years old at the time of the revolution (89), they were double that, and while they are also unable to buy an apartment, they would choose freedom any day.
An even older man, one who has seen pre-communism, communism and post-revolution commented wryly, “During communism we were not allowed to talk, now we are allowed, but we don’t.” He also observed, “During communism we were not allowed to think. Now we have to learn to think again, individually and as a nation.” I would have loved to ask more questions on this – did you actually stop thinking? how did you raise your children? did you view people with suspicion? do you today?
But the conversation moved on to other matters. Patriotism, as I recall. Are Romanians patriotic? Apparently one in ten is leaving the country, so this made the answerer think NO. But we see far more Romanian flags flying here than we would see kiwi ones in New Zealand. There are hints of patriotism that are completely missing in New Zealand. I wonder if this is because we have more-or-less had our country given to us. We have not been overrun by marauding hordes, we have not had kings fighting over us, dividing up our land, we have not lived under and fought to get out of the control of a dictator. (And perhaps that explains, if simplistically, why the Maori have a stronger sense of identity – they may well feel overrun and subjected to live under a different value system.)

In such a politically-driven country you’d expect to see crowds thronging to the voting booths. Yes? No. Yesterday was presidential election day. Twenty years ago about 95% of the population cast their vote. But twenty years on, not enough has changed, corruption is still rife (no-one seems to know where the bulk of the EU money disappears to, and neither do they expect to be able to find out), and politicians are not to be trusted. Just a quarter of the population turns out to have their say. The vote is close – 31.17% to 32.42%. It will go to a second round, but the average man on the street feels unaffected by the result.
As for *who* they wanted to win, this was a taboo topic!