Tripping With Toby: Maramures Tour

Horowitz Travel- May 16, 2017- Maramures Tour

I thought we'd wake up with designs on faces and bodies. The bedding, including the pillow case, was textured, rough seersucker. At least I could scratch my back when I turned over. And we tossed and turned a lot. Even with earplugs I heard the village dogs barking late into the night. Their inner nocturnal wolf DNA kicked in and turned them into hounds of darkness.

Speaking of the dark side, today could be called the day of the dead. I'll fill you in. There have been references to Jews in this area since 1062 CE. We did get in to see the remaining synagogue. It is in Sighet, and the only one of the six that were here in 1885. It is still in use by the 130 remaining Jews and is in the process of being repaired. Fifty percent of the population was Jewish. Of the 25,000 in the area, 12,000 were deported to concentration and labor camps. We were shocked to see that Auschwitz was only 600 miles away. Jews who returned to Romania after WWII and wanted to emigrate to Israel were traded for a bounty based on their education and how much the Communists thought they were worth. Conversion to Judaism was prohibited at the time for obvious reasons. Christians who were determined to escape by reason of becoming Jewish had to go to Hungary. From 40,000 Jews in all of Romania before WWII, there are now 6-7,000.

Elie Wiesel was born and lived with his family in Sighet until they were deported. He is a favorite son of the town and his house is now a museum of Jewish history of his time. The curator was an extremely knowledgeable woman whose mission was to educate locals, especially school children, about Jewish history and the Holocaust. On a hopeful note, right next to the Holocaust Memorial is being built a second synagogue.

The visit to the farmer's market held more excitement than usual. The place was crawling with police looking for smugglers. Evidently, Romanians cross into the Ukraine, some 200 meters away at some points and separated by a river, to buy cigarettes and drugs. They then try to sell them "under the table" at the market. Of course, I got a welcome to the Ukraine from Verizon.

We walked over to the Communist Memorial, which is to Romanians as our Holocaust memorials are to us. Our ignorance soon became apparent. A former prison for political, religious, and intellectual "criminals," it tells the story of the 250 prisons throughout the country where 600,000 were jailed between 1944 and 1989. Pictures of the bunks where prisoners slept couldn't be distinguished from Nazi camps. Photos of faces lined the walls commemorating those who died through torture, neglect, illness, or execution. There's a black memorial wall with names engraved of those lost. An interesting feature is that large blank areas have been left where more names can be added. Not all archives of the period have been released. Radu said that there are old Communists still living who don't want to be named as oppressors. When they die out, the remaining files will be opened and names added to the wall. A heart-wrenching bronze sculpture depicts naked men and women in varied states of grief, pain, and desperation as they face the barbed wired impenetrable wall of the prison yard.

We drove to Sapinta to see the Merry Cemetery. Towering over it is a colorfully tiled church with mosaic exterior. But that's not why people flock there. Headstones are ornately colored and illustrated with carvings depicting the life of the deceased. The epitaph tells a funny anecdote about the person's life.

Next was the Jewish Cemetery back in Sighet. Fortunately, the lady with the key was home, and we entered through barbed wire fencing and under a guard tower (not occupied) to see a somewhat maintained facility. Graves of important rabbis and their wives were in a "chapel" while the rest had to make do with lesser accommodations. Some stones were tipped, but many were new. You could tell that the grave was old, but someone had recently replaced the headstone.

Onward we went to a display of today's living illustration of old traditions. A woodworking shop still made fences and gazebos. Women washed heavy rugs in the stream using an ingenious method of placing them in a large tub and letting the power of the naturally flowing water do the work (better than scrubbing on a rock), and, the ultimate in optimistic advertising, a dowry tree. A leafless tree is set in the yard. Pots are hung from it depending on the wealth of the family. If the pot on top is red, there's a young woman who's available for marriage. The one we saw had a green pot on top. I guess the family is fresh out of virgins.

So, from death we arrived at life and hope for the future.

Dinner was a repeat of last night only with beef soup, chicken and risotto. There were an additional 21 guests from the U.S. who are Eastern Orthodox, plus the gang of seven from last night. We continue tomorrow with the New Zealanders while the New York couple head to Bulgaria. A distraction during the entertainment was Alicia, the three-year old little girl who wears all the shoes I spoke about. She stood to the side during the entertainment singing along and dancing. She stole the show.

Tomorrow we go to the North of Moldavia and the town of Gura Humorului in Bucovina.

Toby