The World without Romania

 The World without Romania

        There are some countries without which the world would have a completely different face from what we know.
We can easily imagine a world without the U.S., Britain, Italy, a world without hamburgers, corporations, White House, Big Ben, pasta, pizza, Tibetan rituals and we can enumerate many other examples indefinitely.
But one question remains: how many of you have tried to think of a world without Romania? For those of you who have not imagined, I will describe how it would be shown.
First try to think that the only writing instrument is a pencil. Not so convenient, isn’t it? In case you did not know, the fountain pen was invented by Romanian Professor named Petrache Poenaru. His invention was patented by the French Government in May 1827.
Dr. Stephen Odobleja, another illustrious Romanian scientist is renowned as the “father of cybernetics“. Practically, he is the inventor of the modern cybernetics.
The inventor of insulin is Nicolae Paulescu. Initially the invention was very controversial and merits were awarded Canadians Banting and Macleod. At the award of the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine in 1923, Sjoquist, a member of the Nobel Committee has recognized that the real discoverer of the antidiabetic hormone produced by the pancreas, called after insulin was academician Nicolae Constantin Paulescu.
One of the most revolutionary inventions of the twentieth century, a century when the time was solving all problems was the jet plane, invented by Henri Coanda, in 1910. Without him, the plane would probably have been invented much later.
turism-intern--romaniaA Romanian gymnast has provided computers the possibility to “learn” how to display a perfect 10. Nadia Comaneci won a gold medal at the 1976 Montreal Olympics.
Probably a long time would have past until someone may have thought of writing a complete history of religions, if Mircea Eliade had not done it.
All around the world nobody had the courage to laugh in the face of death as we did, because we are the first nation to have a happy graveyard at Sapanta, in Maramures County.
Nobody came to performance to defended four consecutive penalties like goalkeeper Helmuth Duckadam, in 1986, when Steaua Bucharest won the Champions Cup.
Hey, Mr. Bill Gates! We want to congratulate you for being among the richest people in the world, but if we think more you owe as a lot. The second language spoken in your company Microsoft is Romanian. Repeat after us: “Multumesc = Thank you”.
But let’s proceed with the presentation of the gates from Maramures, which are unique in the world for their architecture.
Pages of art books would have been fewer, if there was not Constantin Brancusi. His sculptures are considered the work of a great artist, because of the materials of which worked.
In Romania there is the most beautiful color in the world. Although Voronet blue is a worldwide renowned, nobody has been able to find the combining elements of the painting from Voronet Monastery.
Another thing for which Americans should thank the Romanians is their national sport, baseball. This is because the Romanians are the ones who invented the sport, calling it Oina, and being practiced for the first time in 1364.
Watch the movie below and make an idea of what the Romanians should be recognized for. As for the Romanians, this video will make you feel proud that you are Romanians, the descendants of Dacians!

Culture - 2 -

Gopo – A Romanian Walt Disney

 

   In 1957, a short animated film, about a strange little man, created by an unknown Romanian artist named Ioan Popescu-Gopo (1923-1989), won the greatest prize for this section at the Cannes Festival.

 

Ioan Popescu was born in Bucharest in 1923 and he got his nickname “Gopo” from the abbreviation of his parents’ last names – Gorenco (his mother) and Popescu (his father). He made his artistic debut in 1939 by drawing caricatures in different newspapers. He attended the courses of the Art Academy from Bucharest, but never graduated; what he succeeded in graduating was an animation course he followed in Moscow.
There are early proofs of his talent – his friends used to draw three dots on a sheet of paper, told him that those were the nose or a leg and challenged him to create a naked woman, starting from them. Needless to say, he always succeeded, no matter how far or strange the dots were placed.
Ioan Popescu-Gopo made his debut in animation movies in 1949 together with his father and another pioneer in this field, Matty Aslan, by creating a short animated film, “Punguta cu doi bani” (“The Bag with Two Coins”), a free adaptation of a popular story by Ion Creanga. In 1950, he started working for the Movie Studio from Bucharest and realized some educational animated films.
As he activated in the same field as the legendary Walt Disney, Popescu-Gopo was one of his great admirers, but he also strived to produce equally masterful animations. As he himself confessed, understanding that he could never match the American’s technical achievements, he decided to make anti-Disney movies, ones that didn’t distinguish themselves by color, grace or beauty, but by subject.
This is how Gopo’s Little Man appeared. This character is a schematized human, with a long head and with no facial features than two dots as the eyes, a circle as the nose and a line as the mouth. His first story was named Scurta Istorie (Short History) and it presents a strange and unique perspective upon the cosmogony and upon the evolution of life on Earth.
In the beginning, there was the sun, which had curlers and the planets were hanged to them. One day, the sun sneezed and the planets were thrown away into their present orbits in the solar system. The Earth, a wet blue planet that served the Sun as its nose, shared their fate. In time, animals appeared on our planet and, because of the earthquakes a dinosaur produced, a monkey fell from a tree and broke its tail. When it recovered, it noticed it had the shape of a man. Gopo’s Little Man. This silent, curious, round bellied character went through several adventures that were quite premonitory for those times – he flew in a spaceship, walked on the Moon and travelled under water. All this time, he never gave up his most precious treasure – a flower.
“Scurta Istorie” captivated both audience and specialists. The renowned movie critic Georges Sadoul praised its originality and Gopo’s creation was rewarded with the Golden Palm for Best Short Film at the Cannes festival, in 1957. The story about how the animation entered the contest is equally spectacular. The authorities initially decided that a short movie called “Delta Dunarii” (“Danube Delta”) would represent Romania’s proposal for the competition. When the delegates arrived in France, one of them realized that there was a possibility that their selected film would be too long and it would be rejected, so he rushed back to Romania that very evening, took a copy of “Scurta Istorie” and returned to Cannes. Gopo, the composer Dumitru Caloianu and the Sound Director Dan Ionescu – together called the Golden Triangle – didn’t even knew, until after the festival was over, that their creation had actually entered the contest.
After this success, Ioan Popescu-Gopo continued the adventures of his Little Man in “7 Arte” (“Seven Arts” – 1958), who won him the Best Prize for An Animated Film at the Film Festival in Tours, and in Ecce Homo! (1977), a creation that, unfortunately, didn’t have the success it was expected.
The Romanian artist also tried to write, direct and produce long movies and, although he didn’t feel too comfortable working with live actors, his creations are characterized by the same innovative animation techniques.

Author: Iulian Fira 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

George Emil Palade – The Romanian Nobel Prize 

   

 

      The 2009 Nobel Prize for Literature, won by Herta Huller, a German writer who was born and spent a part of her life in Romania, reopened the debate whether a winner of this prestigious prize should also be claimed by his or her native country, not just by the adoptive one.

 

 

 

In the case of Emil Palade (1912 – 2008), although he lived and worked in the USA, his Romanian origins are no longer neglected, as he himself admitted in his acceptance speech. He was born in Iasi in a family that valued education above all else: his father was a Philosophy professor and his mother was a teacher. He started his studies in his native city and graduated through a baccalaureate at the Al. Hasdeu highschool in Buzau.

Although his father would have wanted him to study Philosophy, he was more inclined towards tangible and material issues, so he decided to enter the School of Medicine of the University of Bucharest in 1930 and he got his M.D in 1940, with a rather unusual topic – the nephron of the Cetaceean Delphinus Delphi. However, human beings became his main object of study, as he served in the Romanian medical corps, during the Second World War. In 1946 he married Irina Malaxa, daughter of a wealthy businessman, Nicolae Malaxa, and, in 1946, he decided to move to the USA to continue his research.

For a few months, he worked in the Biology Laboratory at New York University and, while there, he attended a seminar about electron microscopy, held by Albert Claude (1899 – 1983), who invited him to come to the Rockfeller Institute for Medical Research. Palade activated in the Pathology laboratory and initially worked on cell fractionation procedures. The scientific enviroment was extremely favourable – he had capable collaborators, the research institution didn’t lack funds, the field he was activating in was newly found, the competition between the scientist was fierce (in a positive way, of course) – so he had his contribution in several important results: the defining of the mithocondria’s structure and its role in energetic production, the description of the small particulate component of the cytoplasm (later called ribosomes), the investigation of the local differentiations of the endoplasmatic reticulum and the analysis of the chemical synapses.

Since his highschool he had been very interested in history, especially in Roman history, and, as a result, the Latin language proved to be very useful in providing him with names for his newly found corpuscles.

In 1961 he was awarded membership of the United States National Academy of Sciences and he won a couple of prestigious prizes, during the ‘60s – the Lasker Award (1966), the Gairdner Special Award (1967) and the Hurwitz Prize – shared with Albert Claude and Keith Porter (1970).
In 1974, George Emil Palade, Albert Claude and Christian de Duve were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for “their discoveries concerning the structural and functional organization of the cell”. Palade’s Nobel Lecture, having as topic “Intracellular Aspects of the Process of Protein Secretion” was published by the Nobel Prize Foundation in 1992.

Besides working at the Rockfeller Institute for Medical Research, he also activated at the Yale University Medical School (where he was the first chairman of the Deparment of Cell Biology) and at the University of California, San Diego.

The day he was born, the 19th of November was declared the Romanian Researchers’ Day and it has been celebrated since 1944 by Romanian scientists, who present their latest discoveries in the fields they activate in.
A less known fact is that there is another Romanian scientist was supposed to be awarded the Nobel Prize, but who was prevented in receiving the international recognition because of the restrictions of the Communist regime. Ioan Moraru (1927 – 1989) was an important Romanian physician, specialised in Pathophysiology, Pathology and Forensics and vicepresident of the World Health Organization’s Executive Committee. He was also one of the members and founders of the organization named International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), which, ever since its foundation in 1980 has used research, education and advocacy to help prevent nuclear war and encourage the abolition of all nuclear weapons.

Author: Iulian Fira

Culture

Eugen Ionesco – Fighting The Absurd With Its Own Weapons 

 

        When the horrors brought upon humankind by humans themselves in the XXth century transformed reality into an unbearable enviroment, many sought comfort in the realm of the absurd. Eugen Ionesco (1909 – 1994) was one of its masters.

“Explanation separates us from astonishment, which is the only gateway to the incomprehensible”. – Eugen Ionesco

 

 

Eugen Ionesco was born in Slatina (Olt County) in 1909, although he often claimed that he was born in 1912, as he wanted to make a connection to the year of Ion Luca Caragiale’s death (1912), whose great admirer he was. Others consider that he made himself younger because he wanted to really fit a critic’s favorable opinion about some young writers, who included him and Samuel Beckett.

His mother had French citizenship and, when he was four, he was taken by his parents to Paris, where his father attended the Law University. When the First World War began, his father returned to Romania, while he, his mother and his younger sister, Marilina, remained in France. Those were happy times for young Ionesco, who even wrote a “heroic” play and a comic scenario, while he was in the countryside.

Unfortunately, his father was not very fond of his family. He was supposed to have died on the front, but he actually never fought, but, instead, he developed an ability to side with those who held the power, no matter the political regime. Through his influence, he got a divorce, remarried without his family in France not even knowing and obtained his children’s custody, Eugen and Marilina, who returned to Romania in 1922.

The relationship with his father and his new family were very bad and he moved from their house in 1926. Some say that this troubled period of his life decisively influenced his literary personality.

Ionesco attended the college Sfantul Sava in Bucharest, passed the graduation exam at the Secondary School in Craiova in 1928 and followed the courses of the Faculty of Letters from Bucharest, where he studied French Literature.  That year also witnessed his literary debut, in Bilete de Papagal (Parrot Notes), a magazine famous for its tiny format. In 1934, his collection of articles entitled “Nu!” (“No!”), although very controversial through their iconoclast ideas and criticism of the established Romanian writers, gained him a prize from the Royal Foundations Publishing House. In 1935, he dared mocking Victor Hugo, in Hugoliade, a satirical biography of the great French writer.  In 1936, he married Rodica Burileanu, who he had made acquaintance with in the early ‘30s, and worked as a French teacher in Cernavoda. In 1938, he earned a scholarship in France, but he was forced to return to Romania when the Second World War began.

Watch this interview with Eugen Ionesco in which he talks about his childhood, studies and personality among other facts:

      The situation in his native country (the abdication of King Charles II, the crimes committed by the fascist movement of the Legionnaires) made him deeply regret not having stayed in France and, with the help of some influential friends, he was appointed cultural attaché of the Romanian embassy at Vichy in 1942. From that moment on, France became his adoptive country.

He had to face some financial problems in the beginning, but he joyfully received a new member in his family, as his daughter Marie-France, was born in 1944, and the situation improved as the war ended.

In 1948, he started writing on a play that would later be named “The Bald Prima Donna”, his first great absurd work, who was performed from the first time in 1950, at the Theatre des Noctambules, under the direction of Nicolas Bataille. The play wasn’t very successful, as many contemporaries didn’t understand it, provided there is something to understand in it, but, in time, the public ended up in enjoying this new kind of literature and, until today, it has remained one of those plays that can be performed over and over again and still preserve the fascination they exercise upon the audience.

To describe its action or to explain its meaning is an impossible task. It’s enough to say that, using subtle twists of language and situations, “The Bald Prima Donna” plays with the reader’s or viewer’s mind, revealing to him the degradation of human relationships, at an unconscious level.

Other famous absurd plays written by Eugen Ionesco are: “The Lesson”, “The Chairs”, “The Leader”, “Victims of Duty”, “The Future Is in Eggs ”,“ The Rhinoceros”,” Exit the King ”,“ Hunger and Thirst”.

In 1970, Eugen Ionesco was elected member of the French Academy and, the same year, he received the Great Austrian prize of European Literature; in 1985, he received the Monte-Carlo International Prize of Contemporary Art. Many other distinctions and awards followed throughout his life.

Author: Iulian Fira

Traditional Romanian Recipes

Vegetable ghivetch 

Ingredients

4 clusters garlic
3 parsley roots
4 or 5 onions
2 celery roots
1/2 cups olive oil
1 turnip
2 cups soup stock or bouillon
1 small head cabbage
1 small head cauliflower
salt and pepper
    Those who have seen a vegetable ghivetch as made in Romania will never forget it. First there is the baking dish as big as a wheel and filled with the white, yellow, green, purple and orange colored vegetables in a riot of color. This is then placed in the great earthen bread oven, and as the changing aromas force themselves out into the kitchen and reach your nostrils, a wonder¬ful feeling of anticipation comes over you.
In the cities they prepare their ghivetch in the largest glazed earthenware dish that they have and send it out to the neighborhood baker to be baked in his oven.
Prepare the following vegetables: One bunch of carrots sliced crosswise, 4 large potatoes diced, one eggplant which has been washed, left unpeeled and cubed, one cup of green peas, one cup of green beans sliced lengthwise, one meaty green pepper sliced lengthwise, one cup of green lima beans, 3 parsley roots, 2 celery roots, one turnip, all of these cubed, one small head of cabbage and one small head of cauliflower both cut into thick pieces, I few chopped leeks, one summer or winter squash diced, one handful of okra, 8 to 10 tomatoes sliced thick, one bunch of mixed herbs chopped, one bunch of grapes and 4 clusters of garlic separated into cloves. Mix together all the vegetables gently and place in a large earthenware baking dish.
Fry 4 or 5 sliced onions in 1/2 cup of olive oil or butter to a nice golden brown, add 2 cups of soup stock or bouillon ami bring to a boil. Now pour over the vegetables in the casserole one cup of boiling olive oil, add about 2 teaspoonfuls of salt and some pepper to taste, and finally pour on the hot bouillon with the fried onions.
Cover and bake in a moderate oven, until the juice has been absorbed. Serve hot or cold.

Spring Chicken Stew Peasant Style

Ingredients

2 or 3 spring chickens
salt
5 or 6 onions, chopped
4 or 5 tbs. sour cream
3 tbs. lard
beef soup or water
dried tabasco
peppers
fennel, parsley and dill



 Clean 2 or 3 spring chicken and cut into pieces. Fry 5 or 6 onions, chopped into small pieces, to a golden brown in a casserole with 3 tablespoonfuls of lard. Add the cut up chicken in the casserole. Add a pinch of crushed dried tabasco pepper, salt, cover the casserole and cook until the liquid is absorbed, stirring from time to time. When no liquid remains, add 4 or 5 tablespoonfuls of sour cream, simmer for 5 minutes, then ad. I enough beef soup or water to just cover the chicken, one table spoonful of finely chopped fennel, one tablespoonful of finely chopped parsley and a little dill. Cover and cook for 1/2 hour, dien serve hot with butter dumplings, noodles or potatoes fried in butter.

Tripe Sour Soup

Ingredients

honeycomb tripe
laurel leaf
lovage and thyme
veal knuckle
1 potato and 1 onion
1 egg yolk
2tomatoes
green hot pepper
salt and pepper
butter
                                                                                    1 bunch assorted herbs
                                                                                    4 to 6 tsp. lemon juice

    Wash well a nice piece of honeycomb tripe, let stand in salt water for 1/2 hour, then wash again.
Now put it into a pot with 2 quarts of water and add one onion sliced, one laurel leaf, a bunch of assorted herbs, salt and pepper to taste, 2 sliced tomatoes, a veal knuckle, one potato and a little thyme and lovage. Cook slowly for 4 hours or until the tripe is tender.
Lift out the tripe and place it on a board. With a sharp knife cut it into thin strips. Let stand Vi hour, then remove the vege¬tables from the liquid.
Place the strips of tripe back into the pot and continue the boiling in the clear liquid a little longer. Put into a large serving soup bowl one egg yolk and one teaspoonful of lemon juice or vinegar for each person you expect to serve. Beat with a fork until light. Now pour the boiling ciorba with the tripe slowly into the egg mixture and stir constantly.
Serve very hot with a green sharp pepper. If you like a sharpei flavor in the ciorba, add to it a few pepper seeds. Dab with butter.

Romanian Culinary Art - 2 -

Cuisine of Oltenia 

   

    Oltenia is a region in the south – western part of Romania. It is bordered by the Banat region to the north – west, by Transylvania to the north and by Muntenia to the east.

 

 

     Common history and geographical proximity made Oltenia and Muntenia part of the same kingdom of Wallachia (known as Tara Romanesca in Romanian) – foreigners called the inhabitants of these two regions “vlahi” (Romanian word) or “Wallachians” and the truth is those people had and still have many common features. From a gastronomical point of view they both suffered some Turkish, French and Italian influences which have been more and more adapted to local taste and customs in time.
People eat many more soups in Oltenia than in any other part of the country. They enjoy their soups sour and generally speaking food is lighter than in regions like Transylvania, Banat or Moldavia and it preserves a bit of Mediterranean touch. Black pepper and salt are most commonly used to spice the meat. If you go today in some Oltenian villages (especially in the southern ones) you are amazed to see that farmers still cook their food in crockery and use a sort of ancient oven made of clay which they call “?est”. This procedure gives a particular enjoyable taste to their food.
Oltenians use a lot of fresh vegetables, chicken, beef and pork meat and of course they eat a lot of dairy products as all Romanians are great producers of milk, cheese and other dairy by – products. No wonder that Romanian cheese is renowned in the Balkans and central Europe. Romanian cheese, especially a salty type which is called “telemea” in our language, has reached Hungarian, Slovakian and Slovenian borders centuries ago – for example Slovakian people called it “brinza” (from the Romanian general word for cheese – “brânza”) and they know it was brought to their country by Wallachian merchants.
      As I said before Oltenian people enjoy eating fresh vegetables but these people like their green stuff so much that in time they have developed a lot of vegetable soups – weeds such as leek, dock, orach, nettles, all kinds of beans, amaranth, green onion and many others  – used separately or mixed up – make delicious local broths an soups. Oltenians like their soups to be sour – so lemon juice, borsch, vinegar, yogurt, tomato juice, sauerkraut juice or some green spices are used to get this flavor; among Oltenian spicy herbs parsley and lovage are the most appreciated. Vegetables are used a lot even when soups are cooked with meat. For those who like Romanian tripe soup or borsch (usually served with garlic, sour cream and a hot chili pepper) it is important to say that here tripe soup is cooked with vinegar and horse radish and with no garlic at all!
Oltenian sausages are famous – this dish is a symbol of Oltenia,  the motherland of Constantin Brancusi – an internationally famous sculptor. These sausages are made from equal amounts of beef and pork chopped finely and mixed with garlic, pepper and salt; then the paste is stuffed into sheep guts. In the end the sausages have to be smoked – dry for two hours.
Oltenians also enjoy polenta and all kind of pies made of “malai” (a sort of corn flour, used also to cook polenta) which are still backed in the “?est” in the countryside. Traditional Oltenian dishes are "ghiveci calugaresc" (Monk’s hotchpotch), "tochitura olteneasca", mici (they seem to be a kind of sausages with no gut cover which are grilled on a barbecue) and "carnati oltenesti" (Oltenian sausages), "ciulama de pui cu mamaliga" (veloute with chicken and polenta), "saramura de peste" (a kind of fish soup), "mancare de praz" (a leek dish), "gutui cu piept de pui" (chicken breast with quince), "rosii umplute cu carne si orez/doar orez" ( tomatoes filled with minced meat and rice or with rice only) and many others.

Author: Irina Petre 

Transylvanian Cuisine 

 

   Transylvanian cuisine is full of flavours and fattening and I guess Eskimos would be envious of these meals if they knew them. But there is a logical explanation for these rich meals and we should think this region is a mountain and hill area, with cold winters.

 

      The well known bacon, onion and bread (slanina cu ceapa si paine) is only a scrap of the barrel and the local recipes book has many pages with very diverse recipes, mixing up influences from Austro-Hungarians and various German populations who settled there during centuries. That was how entered the recipes book the Austrian snitzel, the German (actually “sasesc” – "sasii" are a German population who migrated to Transylvania between the 12th and 13th centuries) kaiser ( a sort of fat bacon) or the “secuiesc” (apparently people known as “secui” have Hungarian origins)  papricas (a kind of dumplings made of flour, eggs, butter and optionally cheese served with boiled veal meat and paprika).
The widespread “Borsch” from Moldova is not very much used in Transylvania. People around here prefer pork, beef or lamb soups seasoned with vinegar and spiced with all kind of herbs and roots but tarragon is by far the most frequently used herb. It is also traditional in this area to put sour cream in soups – so, if it happens to you to see somewhere “ciorba/ supa ardeleneasca” (which translates “Transylvanian soup” ) on a Romanian restaurant menu then you should expect to find sour cream in it.
An interesting feature of the Transylvanian cuisine is represented by its… fruit soups: next to the well – known tomatoes soup or kohlrabi & fennel (gulii & chimen) you might be surprised to find apple soup, quince soup, raisins soup or morello cherry soup seasoned with sour cream. Transylvanian housewives give them a sour taste by using a large variety of herbs and spices. Pork is very much eaten at the main meals, especially during the cold season. Transylvanians do not usually eat fish, since the region is crossed by quick rivers where fishing is not possible or very difficult.

bacon, onion and bread

Lard and roux (“rantas” in Romanian) are also largely used for preparing main meals. “Rantas” is obtained from stewed onion which is then fried with some flour in a sauce pan. Transylvanians cooks would use traditionally white dressing but sometimes they are not afraid to make use of red ones, with lots of paprika! You should not be surprised if you taste a salad and it is a bit sweet – it is common in this region to add some sugar to salads and dressings.
Cabbage à la Cluj is a dish as famous as the sarmale or the Oltenian sausages. Chopped cabbage (actually it has to be sauerkraut) is mixed up with minced meat and rice in a pan and baked in the oven, when ready it is served with sour cream and it is indeed very tasty. If you go to a local restaurant and want to order a portion of sarmale you should be careful how many of them you order: Transylvanian sarmale are giant and it can easily happen that 2 or 3 of them weigh the same as 8 – 9 Moldavian ones! But Transylvanian meals would always end with a cake or something sweet picked up from an impressive list of desserts.
There are many types of fruit and cheese pies, cozonaci (panettone), langosi and gogosi (different kinds of doughnuts), pancakes and the delicious “gomboti cu prune ” ( a kind of dumplings made of potatoes, eggs and flour, filled with plums and sprinkled with cinnamon, sugar and “pesmet” – a kind of crushed dried bread).

Author: Irina Petre 

Romanian Culinary Art

Romanian Cuisine – Expression of Diversity

   

     When visiting a new place I tend to think that each of us is pretty much curious about the local cuisine: in fact, apart from the basic need of feeding yourself one might like to taste something traditional in the area. This can be for cultural reasons or because of simply curiosity. Anyway, eating habits and local cuisine say a lot about a country or a region inhabitants and their culture.

     Like everywhere else in the world Romanian gastronomy is an expression of the geography and history of the country too: the landscape diversity provides Romanian housewives with a large variety of fruits, vegetables and spices while the historical neighborhood of other ethnic groups has left a colourful and tasty mark. So, Romanian cuisine is extremely diverse. In fact it is a mix up of different dishes from several cultures it has come across during its stormy past, but it has managed to maintain its own character and adapt the foreign recipes to local taste. It has been greatly influenced by Balkan cuisine but it has retained some influences from other neighbours’ culinary traditions, such as Germans, Serbians, and Hungarians too.
Traditional Romanian spirits are very… strong and we can include here the famous palinca and tuica. Palinca is a traditional Transylvanian drink and it is a type of brandy, usually made from plums, apples, pears or apricots and its alcohol content is at least 40% but home made drinks can even reach 60% – 70% although their fruit flavour is still strong. Tuica is another type of local brandy in Wallahia.
But Romania is also a great wine producer. In fact arheological findings and historical documents place the beginning of wine culture on these lands some 4000 years ago. High quality wines produced in this region were object of trade ever since ancient times. Some of the most important vineyard centres are Dealu Mare, Pietroasa, Dragasani, Murfatlar, Cotnari, Odobesti and some of the best Romanian wine varieties include Tamaioasa Romaneasca, Feteasca Alba, Feteasca Neagra, Galbena de Odobesti, Babeasca, Busuioaca and many others.

A few characteristics of the Romanian cuisine
Although each region has its own specific specialties, there are a few characteristics of Romanian traditional cuisine.

     A lot of bread – Once I have heard some skinny western ladies complaining about the awful Romanian meals which come always along a big and fattening loaf of bread…well, this has a very simple explanation: since ancient times, Romanians have always been an agrarian society and to worship agrarian and earth gods came natural to them. That is why cereals like wheat have always played an important role in their life…and in their cuisine too. Wheat and bread are symbols of fertility and abundance, according to folk beliefs and this superstition is also connected to the Orthodox religion where bread represents Jesus’ body and that is why one should never waste or throw away the “holy bread”.
In the past baking bread was almost a solemn ritual and bread – under different shapes and compositions – was part of all major ceremonies like a child’s birth, a wedding feast, Christmas and a lot of other both religious and profane festivals over the year.
People used to bake bread in different beautiful shapes – they could be round, twined and criss-crossed according to the baker’s imagination and had various names like colaci, turte, turtite, impletite etc; usually women were the cooks in the family so they were the authors of all these incredible models. Bread could also make good sweets – if the “colaci” or “turte” were cooked with sugar, honey, eggs or other spices and/or taped with walnuts, sugar, honey or syrup.
An old custom – which is still valid in some villages today – was to welcome your guests or visitors with bread and salt, as a symbol of hospitality – home backed bread had a special flavour and it was both tasty and healthy.
A lot of soups – you can find a lot of soup recipes in Romanian cuisine; some of them are clear soups but some of them are thicker brods which are usually prepared with lots of vegetables and these ones are called “ciorbe” in Romanian.
Some of the most widely spread and appreciated clear soups are “supa cu galuste” (this is a clear chicken soup served with a kind of semolina dumplings inside it) and “supa cu taitei” – a chicken soup with noodles which were traditionally home made from flour (most of the times wheat flour), eggs, salt and water. These soups may contain some vegetables like carrots, celery, onions, potatoes and parsley or they can be very simple with only chicken meat, semolina dumplings/noodles and spices – especially parsley and black pepper.

 “Ciorbe” are extremely diverse – one can prepare a “ciorba” almost from everything. Meat used for “ciorbe” can be of any kind – pork, beef, chicken, lamb – and they usually contain a mix up of vegetables. “Ciorbe” are usually served with sour cream (“smantana”) in Transylvania but there are several recipes of brods whichfor almost every restaurant or pub in the country would let the client choose the way he wants to have the “ciorba” served: with or without sour cream.
The famous “ciorba de perisoare” is such an example: this kind of meatball soup cooked traditionally with vegetables like carrots, celery, tomatoes, onion, rice and parsley, dill, black pepper has been brought by Turks centuries ago and it was adapted to local taste.
There is also a large variety of vegetable soups which can be especially for fast days or not – if they are cooked with sour cream and/or eggs. There can be “ciorbe” based on lentil, beans, nettles, potatoes or orach but there are tens of recipes of vegetables soups in Romania.
Another very appreciated soup is “ciorba de fasole cu ciolan afumat” (bean soup with bone smoked meat) which in some parts of Transylvania is served inside a bread pot (a round thick well baked loaf of bread which was carved inside and had the soup poured down inside it) instead of a classical soup plate – this might sound like a wacky thing for some people but I can assure you the dish is extremely tasty and do not worry – the soup will not leak off the table.
In Dobrogea (especially in the Danube Delta area) fish soup is at high esteem.
A lot of fast days – our country main religion is Orthodox Christianity and because countrymen were very religious people they used to keep a lot of fast days over the year. The longest fast period is before Easter – 40 days of meals without any kind of meat, eggs or dairy products, by sympathy with Jesus’ 40 days of so called black fast (no food at all) in desert – but there are a lot of other shorter fast periods plus every Wednesday and Friday during the week.
As you can imagine there are a lot of dishes for fast periods and some of them are really delicious.
Rich, heavy meals – yes, indeed one might think Romanians eat like medieval people but there are reasons for these substantial dishes. Like in most other upland regions people had fat heavy meals in order to provide them with energy for cold weather and hard work. Farmers all over the country needed rich meals after long hours of sweaty labour on the field. Boyars and noblemen threw large feasts and it was always important to have as many and varied dishes on the table as possible.
Christmas and New Year banquets – this is the biggest religious festival over the year and in winter times pigs and their meat are the stars in the Romanian cuisine. Why? Because of something that might seem cruel to a lot of foreigners – it still seems cruel to some native city people – but it is part of our folk traditions.
On the 20th of December – day called “Ignat” – pigs in the farmers households are being sacrificed (they are slaughtered having their throat cut) so their organs and meat can be used for various Christmas dishes. Despite some EU rules calling for any pig slaughtered on the farm to be stunned before its throat is cut it is not clear to me that backyard throat slitting – even without stunning – is less humane than sending the pigs packed in trucks to big slaughterhouses, something one can see on roads across other EU states.

Here are some special Christmas dishes, which can be easily found all over the country:

• Carnati – pork based sausages
• Caltabosi – a special type of sausages made from heart, liver, lungs and meat
• Piftie – pork based jelly (aspic) made of pork and leftover organs (such as ears or snouts), garlic and sometimes vegetables like carrots, string beans
• Toba – various cuttings of pork, liver boiled, diced and "packed" in pork stomach like a salami
• Sarmale – rolls of cabbage pickled in brine and filled with minced meat, rice and various spices and herbs. They can be served with sour cream and/or polenta. These are probably the most well known Romanian dish, although similar things can be found in Bulgarian, Greek, Hungarian, Serbian, Slovenian, Turkish or Syrian cuisine.

• Cozonac – a special type of pannetone filled with a walnut squash and/or cocoa, raisins, Turkish delight or with poppy squash (poppy seeds dried, smashed and boiled with sugar and milk).

 March specialties – Mucenicii – these kind of sweets are baked only once a year – on the 9th of March – when Romanians feast the 40 (or 44) Martyrs from Sevasta who were said to had been Christian soldiers in the army of Roman emperor Licinius, who were imprisoned and convicted to die in a cold lake – Sevasta – but God strengthened their will and their bodies too so they would not die.
All “Mucenici” have the shape of figure “8” – a symbol of human body – and in the southern part of Romania (Oltenia, Dobrogea) they are small pieces of pastry boiled in water with sugar or honey, chopped walnuts and cinnamon. They are served as a sweet cold soup – the liquid stands for Sevasta Lake… ingenious dish! In the northern parts of the country, Moldavians had not been that precise because they only bake 8 shaped pieces of dough – simple or twined – honey them and sprinkle walnuts on top. Absolutely delicious!
Easter feast – there is always going to be lamb on the table for Easter! Lamb means purity and a new life and it is also a symbol of Jesus Christ and his sacrifice for humans’ sins. Lamb roast and sometimes lamb soup is eaten on the Easter day.

But for Easter there are also “sarmale” and “cozonac” on the table alongside of other specialties as:

• Drob – a cooked mix of intestines, meat (traditionally lamb), eggs and fresh vegetables, mainly green onion and dill
• Oua rosii (red painted eggs) – for Easter Romanians use to knock symbolically red eggs (hard boiled eggs painted traditionally in red – but today people use different colours) – red as Jesus’ blood – saying “Jesus has resurrected” and the answer is “Yes, indeed He is resurrected”.
• Pasca – a nutty kind of cheesecake made only at Easter time – it is yummy but only once a year!

Coliva – dead people’s cake
Coliva is a special “cake – salad” which is offered at funerals and when people give alms for their passed away relatives. Traditionally Orthodox people celebrate (actually is more like a memorial and a day of mourning) their close relatives’ death by going to the church and giving alms to poor people or to neighbours, relatives or friends. Romanians celebrate 7 days, 3 weeks, 40 days, 6 months, 9 months, 1 year, 2 years and so on since their relatives have left this world.
Alms consist of different dishes which have been previously blessed by a priest and “coliva” is the single dish which is cooked only in such occasion. It is made of boiled wheat, chopped walnuts, sugar/honey and various spices, such as lemon and orange peel, vanilla sugar, rum extract/essence; finally, the cake is beautifully decorated with caster sugar, cocoa, bon-bons and walnuts.
As the wheat grain is a symbol of Jesus, “coliva” is also a holy dish although it is a pagan times heritage. “Coliva” is a symbol of the after-death life and of revival, rebirth: according to folk tradition the dead body will resurrect the same way the wheat grain is first buried and then it germinates a new plant.

Author: Irina Petre 

Romanian Traditions

Dream and Sign Interpretation in Romania 

 

It is a well known fact that Romanians are a superstitious people, so it's time to have a look at the way they interpret dreams and certain signs they find in the everyday life. Passed on from the elders, these traditions are kept even nowadays even in the greatest of cities.

Dreams and interpretations

Here's a list with the most common interpretations of different symbols that might appear in your dreams: 

• clear water – great worries
• dirty water – disease
• falling in unclear water – disease
• fire – argument, worry, good weather
• infant – danger
• going to a wedding – argument
• having a tooth fall off and hurting teeth – a member of your family will die
• somebody dies – changing weather
• visitors – news
• somebody's house crumbles – death of someone living in that house
• a bull or a pig chases you – illness
• receiving news – having guests
• plane, soldier – getting news
• gipsies – good luck
• attending church – loss of money
• playing, dancing, laughing – upset
• flying – growing
• getting dirty – shame
• if a pregnant woman dreams of a boy's hat or a ring – she'll give birth to baby boy
• if she dreams of a scarf or woman's ring – she'll give birth to a baby girl
• wolves – problems with the law
• crossing a bridge – winning in front of the law, achieving something
• going uphill – progress, health improvement
• descending a hill – money loss
• priest – religious holiday
• white clothing – joy, success
• widow man/woman – danger 

Tradition also says that Monday night dreams, as well as those on Thursday and Saturday night come true, while those on Sunday (towards morning) usually don't come true. Some use special books for interpreting dreams, while others consider that dreams are sent either by your guardian angel or by the evil spirits.

Foretelling the future

Gipsies usually foretell the future by looking in the palm of your hand or by using cards. Others have a look at an older calendar, throw a grain of wheat towards it and if it falls on one of the 70 numbers on the page, this has a certain meaning. There's also a zodiac that gets checked out by foretellers, as well as calendars spanning over 150 years.
In the zodiac, each month has a certain sign associated to it, lasting from the 12th of a month to the 12th of the next one. Foretellers also search the sky and stars for signs regarding the future of a certain person. For example, a falling star points the direction of the place where your future will change.
Some women even practice the guessing of the future by using a coffee mug. There's also the "bobdi" guessing, done with the aid of 41 corn grains, that are placed on a table. Afterwards a woman makes the cross sign above them and they're mixed, while the woman chants an old song. Then the grains are split into 3 groups, each group with grains counted four by four. The remaining grains are placed on the table in a straight line, separately on 3 columns.
The process is repeated, while mixing the grains and choosing only some of them, till you get 3 horizontal and 3 vertical columns, so that any way you count them, there are 9 groups. If a grain falls in the middle, it's a bad sign. When 3 grains are in the middle, it's a good sign. If on top, the first line sums up to 9 grains, it's a bad sign. “Bobdii” are tossed while thinking the same thought, three times. If you want to have another thought, you must switch one of the 41 grains.

Signs that foretell events

As every culture has pretty strange signs that "foretell" events, here are a few from Romania:

• If you find an old horse shoe and keep it in the attic, behind the main pillar, it'll bring good luck to your house.
• A hanged man's rope is good for spells.
• If a cat comes by your house, it'll bring good luck.
• In order to be lucky when buying and selling stuff, before going to the market, you'll need to throw some coins to the children you meet on the way.
• If someone sews your clothes easily and they come out well, it means you're a lucky man, but if they fail to sew them once or twice, you must be an evil man.
• In order to preserve your luck, it's not a good idea to share your salt, when the cow gives birth, because it'll lose its milk.
• If you eat out of your lap, you'll be "eating your luck".
• Before going to a party, you should eat on the door step of your house, in order to keep spells away from you.
• Little children shouldn't look in the mirror when they start speaking, in order not to remain mute.
• When the walls, windows or corner of the house cracks, these are death signs.
• If the lamp of the house gets broken by itself, the people living in the house will split up.
• If a girl breaks a mirror, she won't be married for 7 years.
• When an icon falls off the wall and breaks apart, it's a bad sign, foretelling somebody's death.

Author: Alex Stanescu

The Girl Fair of Mount Gaina 

 

   Near Mount Gaina you’ll witness one of the most interesting traditions of Romania: the Gaina Girl Fair, taking place each year in the Sunday closest to July 20. Known as "targul de fete", this is the greatest outdoor holiday of the country and it hosts the greatest traditional song and dance groups from Romania.

 

      The history of this celebration was lost in the mist of time, but Mount Gaina was mentioned by Strabon, "the father of geography", who claimed that Dacians had a "cogaiom" mountain near their capital, Sarmisegetuza, where they made their sacrifices. Gaina is probably the peak where Dacians invoked their Gods and offered them such sacrifices. 
The girl fair is first mentioned officially in 1816 with people from all over Romania taking part in it, specially those from the Bihor, Aries and dwelling near the river Crisul Alb. They’ll exchange traditional products, like food or clothing and have a good time singing old songs and taking part in dances. This place is not only a symbol of Dacian traditions, but also one of the landmarks of the local "gold rush", as the precious metal seemed to have been widespread in this area.
Christian tradition placed this holiday in the second decade of July, so it'll be close to the celebration of Saint Ilie. The girl fair of Mount Gaina also has economical reasons, like the need of buying or selling various products, including girls, but only symbolically. The festivities of the girl fair take place in a beautiful local forest, surrounded by fir trees and situated at 1467 metres altitude.
There's also a romantic and ethnic motivation of the fair, as young people who live in very remote regions get together in this celebration, meet each other and sometimes fall in love and get married. In the past, girls would arrive at the fair with their dowry on their horses and the marriage was done on the spot by priests who came to mount Gaina for this purpose alone.
Today, the Mount Gaina fair is just a great local celebration, which takes a couple of days of preparation. It starts with the "tulnicarese" group of Avram Iancu, followed by various artistic programmes, which last till night kicks in. Among the dances on Mount Gaina there are the passionate "tropotite" played by mocani or "tarina", a dance for pairs and the most famous of locals, also known as "moti". There are variations of this dance, as, for example, the Abrud tarina is played elegantly and slowly with wide arm movements, lots of walking around and spinning the girl underneath the man's hand.
For tourists, the fair is the perfect place to buy unique local products, like musical instruments, wooden vases, ceramic ornaments, wooden tools or clothing items and culinary products.
Regarding the name of Mount Gaina (which means chicken in Romanian), there’s  a legend that says that on this mountain lived a chicken that laid golden eggs. Locals tried to steal her eggs, but the creature moved its nest all the way to the Rosia Montana area, where gold is extracted now. A smaller version of the girl fair of Mount Gaina is held in October (26th) and this is called the Fall fair.
The origins of the Mount Gaina celebration lie in the pagan celebrations of the summer solstice when people gathered on the peak of the mountain and worshipped the sun, praying for better crops and wealth. As Christianity became popular, Mount Gaina turned into a gathering place for shepherds and local folks, looking to dance or get married. A couple of traditions still remain from the ancient times, like the girls kissing the morning dew on the ritual plants or the early morning singing of the tulnicarese group, which point their musical instruments toward the sun.
The girl fair was most of the time a series of planned weddings between people who didn't want their young ones to marry their own relatives from small communities, so they travelled to Mount Gaina in order to find matches. It's  nice to see that a romantic tradition is still alive in the era of digital matchmaking, but that's one of the advantages of a rural/agricultural country with a rich tradition of legends.
Author: Alex Stanescu