Romania, Day 12

Breakfast was again served in the big open shelter plates of bread, cheese, sausage, tomato, cucumber, pork fat, and cas pane (fried cheese). In addition, there was also homemade plum jam. I ate it with my apple and it was the most delicious jam I've ever tasted. As in everything else, Maria had made it. Maria even sent home cabbage rolls for later with some of the girls in their tupperware.

Our visit to Barsana Manastirea was amazing but horribly upsetting to me. There was a mass in progress and I felt that I was being disrespectful to their religious traditions and the sanctity of their church. Barsana Manastirea is a large monastery built in 1711. It sits high up on a hill. There are so many people who attend mass on Sundays that the priest ad nuns conduct mass in a sheltered open round structure in the center, with other smaller buildings surrounding the centre building, providing shelter for those who don't want to stand outside in the elements. Many in attendance were dressed in traditional dress. The priest sang and the nuns responded in song. The interaction was stunningly beautiful. Our tour guide, Anita, spoke about the monastery and the tradition, in one of the shelters during the mass!! I felt very embarrassed that Anita spoke to us when people were trying to worship, in a sacred place. I thought to myself that if it was me, I would be offended if a tour group were intruding on my place of worship in the middle of a service. My mindset when traveling in another country is to try to understand, respect, and assimilate into the culture as much as possible. I do not feel that Anita was encouraging such a practice in our group. A nun approached the group and apparently asked how much longer Anita would be speaking. I felt mortified. I got out of the shelter and outside near the exit as quickly as I could to politely observe their practices. I really appreciated seeing the religious rituals in person, but I really feel very strongly that tourist groups should not visit sacred places when religious services are being conducted.

Maramures is the land of wooden churches and is famous for them. We visited Biserica Rozavlea, a beautiful wooden church that is in the process of being repaired after a roof leak. The architecture was stunning - the lines were not perfectly straight or centered. The roof shingles themselves reminded me of crosses. My favourite part of visiting these churches is the musky smell of incense that envelops your senses when you first enter. I have always been fascinated by historical churches and this certainly did not disappoint.

We stopped at another wooden church, Biserica Bogdan Voda, that was not fully restored. Only part of the intricate interior paintings were restored/washed. The priest's wife discussed that a group of student architects had partially restored the church. The last part left to be restored was the altar and the wall of the altar. It was amazing to see the dramatic difference between before and after restoration.

I have come to appreciate and value the western toilet and toilet paper. It is not often that toilet paper is found in restrooms. Toilet paper itself is very different here - some do not have the roll in the middle, so it's just paper rolled up around itself. Therefore, the first step of the Romanian bathroom experience is the attempt to locate the toilet paper, if it exists. You might find it on the back of the toilet, on the sink, on the floor, or even on the window sill. If found, consider yourself very lucky. If not, hopefully you have brought your own roll. One of my new slogans: toilet paper - don't leave home without it. The next puzzlement is that when using a public toilet in Romania, I rarely find the seat down. It appears that in general, women leave the seat up and squat. The first time I saw this, I thought that maybe the toilet was freshly cleaned - WRONG! The next puzzlement is that when visiting agencies, especially residential centres, the bathrooms never have a shower curtain. In fact, the shower head might be on the same wal as the toilet and the drain will be in the middle of the bathroom floor. The entire bathroom must get completely soaked.

We did not have any internet access for at least 24 hours. When we asked about the lack of functional internet, we were informed that whenever it rains heavily, the internet goes down for days. Therefore, I have temporrily been writing down my thoughts so that they are not forgotten!

Inside joke - don't ask!!