DAVID

The last weekend we went to Moldavia, Bucovina, the North-Eastern region of Romania where my friend Anca and her husband live. It was at the same time a trip for pleasure but also to partcicipate at the baptismal ceremony of their newly-first born child DAVID. Altogether we had a special role in the ceremony, namely we were the god-father and god-mother of David.

We travelled for aprox. 5 hous by car through beutiful places and breath-taking landscapes, but horrible road (under construction). Fortunately we took some friend with us (Ana and George) who were heading for the same big event and were godfathers of the child as well.

As I was saying Bucovina, especially, is that part of Romania with plenty of Monasteries and where you feel like inwardness and peace is at home. The nature and the landscape is just perfect for meditation and rest. Here is just a piece of what we experienced during our trip, and are just some fugitive photos taken on the road. You can see the colour of Autum through the camera lens, but in fact they where more splendid.

We left Cluj on Friday afternoon and reached Manastirea Humorului (our destination) at 10 pm. After cathching up with Anca and Steven (her husband) as we haven't seen each other from New Year's Eve 2006/2007 and after a good sleep in their guest house, we woke up on Saturday in the baptism rush. Everybody was saying and doing something, not necessarily having a clue about it. I don' t know how time passed but we realize we were at the church listening to the priest about what we have to do as godparents. Obviously we were excited about our "status" and we relly hope not to miss smth or doing smth wrog as it was our first time in this position.

It's not a philosophy to attend and to be a godparent but it'a a nice feeling. The tradition says you remain the mentor and a spiritual parent of the child for the rest of your life and you are responsible for his evolution in that respect. Ouch! Responsible? Oh my Gosh! Now I realize. But the kid is a sweety and I think we will get along very well. He's so cute and small and funny.

Our main responsabilities as godparents during the ceremony were:

1. Carring a burning candle through the ceremony:

2. Holding the child in turn with the others godparents while the religious ceremony continued:

3. Dress-up the child with new clothes brought by us (poor baby was terrified with so many "giants" around):

4. Pay for the ceremony...one of teh most unpleasant moments!:)

I must say that the child, in order to be baptized, it is submerged in water, three times, in a big bucket. Fortunately our priest was inspired and boiled some water and then mixed that hot water (it was a funny scene to see the boiled water prepared for the little one, it was like a horror movie scene:) with cold one to make a pleasant bath to David. He cried like crazy when submerged...but we all have our good and our bad moments in life. I think this was the first David's bad moment;)
Here we gathered for the ceremony. The parents of David (our friends) in the middle, both looking left!

Touchin moments. Generations meeting under the church roof (grandmother and grandson):

Afterward everybody went home for the party. We gave the presents for the little one (usually money but also all kinds of baby stuff). Looking for a perfect present I was susrprised to see how diverse and quite expensive can be these things. But they worth every penny.

Well as I was saying after eating like a viking (they eat like crazy in Bucovina, but they have all the reasons to do that...the food is great!) we started the party. As usual me, Peter and Anca (David's mother) started dancing. We started to dance about 6 o'clock (the three of us) and in almost 1 hour the party heated up. At 1 pm we had to take a walk under the moonlight. The village is so quite and the air is so fresh that you have the feeling you could stay there forever.

When we came back the people were still rocking and the noise kept awake half of the village. It was our time to leave the premises. We were knocked out! Of course as we started dancing at 6 pm not at 8 pm as the rest of the people. It was a mega party anyway and we felt like in the College: young and fit! Hahahahah.

More pictures (but not all) at www.flickr.com/photos/ancu_bm. We didn't take too many pictures this time, but David's parents did so we're waiting!