The Name Game

It began at the train station.

Upon our arrival, Griffin held out his hand and introduced himself to Silviu. "Hi, I'm Griffin."

"Huh?" Silviu looked confused.

"I'm Griffin." 

"Oh, ok. Buna Grippon." 

Observing this interaction, I dismissed the mistake. After all, it was 3 a.m in a cold, noisy train station, who could be faulted for mishearing the name of a foreigner?

However, the following day when Silvia gave it a try, she looked like we were asking her to confess that her parents were never married. "Grepen? Griccil? Ce?"

When Măru came over for cards later, he didn't even try, he just laughed and shook his head. 

At the meeting, one brother looked at Griffin, took a step back, tilted his head sideways and made the crazy sign.

At this point we began to wonder why it was so effortless for the Romanians to grasp the name Logan and not Griffin. Neither name is Romanian, why did one roll so effortlessly off the tongue and the other leave them dumbfounded? 

"That's easy," Silvia and Măru agreed, "Logan is a car, we all know that one."

"If your name was Mercedes," Silvia said, "we'd all remember it."

And so Griffin has been Mercedes ever since.

For my children, this is a refreshing change of pace. Their lives spent in the States have been a series of fruitless explanations regarding the correct pronunciation of their names (both first and last) resulting in Mircea being renamed "Mitch" and for the hard of hearing, Lucian at times becomes "John". However, Mitch and John are reasonable substitutes (even if Mitch makes me shudder) whereas if Chris and Karen ever come to Romania, folks here will have serious questions for them. Is it any wonder why people keep asking the Rummel boys, "Does your father work in a car factory?" 

Other than getting renamed, we've been buying suits, going to the meetings, entertaining many visitors (we're not really that popular, it's just that it's the holiday season and people are making the rounds) and seeing gorgeous sunrises.

What follows are snapshots I've been taking with my phone since the Rummel boys both seem to be uninspired to carry their cameras around. I understand their reluctance since we've been doing far more socializing than sight-seeing so until we head to Sibiu, it looks like you're all stuck with me and my view of Romania for a little while longer.

Modeling their new suits just prior to leaving for the mid-week meeting (instead of hemming the pants, we played pinocle-choices were made that day folks)

A post-meeting snack from Vivienne

Cousins

Outside of the hairdressers where Mircea was getting a much-needed haircut

Pizza and beer in the city

Afternoon walk through Craiova to meet up with Andra who was finishing her service time at a cart. Then we went through the open market (still looking for Communist style toilet paper for Anna)

Sunrises (because I'm still just a couple of hours off from being completely converted to Obedin time)

First Impressions

"It's just so different from what I'm used to." - Logan Rummel

I vividly recall the first time I came to Romania. We arrived in Bucharest in the middle of a muggy summer night, our suitcases filled with diapers, toilet paper, deodorant, and other random items like a set of silverware, a can of compound cement, and a cheese grater.  Unless we could squeeze it in our luggage, we had to live without it because so few things were available in Romania in those days. Amenities were virtually nonexistent and whatever you could find in the way of necessities was usually such poor quality that you often didn't bother to buy it.
The infrastructure was a mess: during most hours of the day the water was shut off and electricity was spotty. The highways were nothing more than two lane roads filled with Dacias and Trabants. (To appease the newly arrived, safety-conscious American, Silviu installed seat belts in his Dacia but at some point I realized that none of the seats were bolted into the floor of the car.)
No one spoke English, there was no internet, and the only way to contact the States was to make a long-distance call at a cost of 15 cents per minute.
It was really entering another world.
So I wondered, now, in 2017, at Villa Ionescu with its high speed internet, WhatsApp, and shopping malls filled with stores like Zara and KFC, what would it be like for a first-time visitor to Romania? Would it feel like they had traveled to another country or would it merely feel like they were in a colder version of Santa Cruz?
I sat down with Griffin and Logan and asked them about their impressions of Romania so far. The answer at the beginning of this post is what I got from Logan. In addition, they had the following observations:

-The village looked like what I thought an Eastern European town would look like. If it had snowed it would look better.*

-The village is kind of run down, there are a lot of unfinished buildings.  

-It's weird to walk around and speak English and have people stare at us.

-It's strange to smell diesel and cigarette smoke everywhere. 

-The milk is creamier, the meat is better, there are a lot of sour things and everything is homemade.

So, internet and KFC aside, Romania still makes an impression on the American traveler.

Although we're focusing these first few days on relaxing so we can get over our sleep debt and jet-lag, we still took the boys out for a walk through the village and into Craiova to visit friends and do some shopping.
Below are a few photos I took with my phone to document some of the new things they've been exposed to:

Everyone in Romania wears papuci in the house. Silvia bought all of us brand new papuci so we feel like bona fide Romanians

Mititei and sausages at Kaufland

Tanti Lenuţa's beci, and filling up bottles with her zeamă de varză 

Garbage pick up in Obedin

We've spent a lot of time playing games which Logan says he's really enjoying because he's not used to doing nothing while on vacation.  (I include the top photo since, to date, it's the only one I have of Silvia's face)

Logan looking as if he's posing for a Christmas ad with Silviu's cats

Early morning fire with Tibb

Below are Griffin and Logan's photos from one of our walks through the village. I love seeing what they feel is worthy of photographing

*for photos of our village under snow, search for "winter" in the search box, upper right at the top of the page

Planes, trains and automobiles

A post in which I load numerous unattractive photos, describe our utter and profound exhaustion and dissuade anyone from ever wanting to come visit us.

People tell us all the time that they'll come see us in Romania but I can count on one hand the number of folks who have followed through on that promise.
Generally it's less by design and more by accident when we get visitors, e.g. people who are already on holiday in Italy and they figure it's not too big of a deal to meet up with us in Romania.
But to start from California and make the 24+ hour trip, that's a feat reserved for the intrepid few and by that I mean my parents who really only undertake such an exhausting journey in order to see their grandchildren.
I get why people would hesitate to do it. I really do. For one thing, I complain about the arduousness of the trip all.the.time. When I get going on the subject I'm a broken record.
But I'd like to point out that my complaining has much to do with the fact that I'm just plain burned out. After nearly 20 years, I'm sick of traveling the Santa Cruz-Obedin corridor.
However, at long last we've found friends foolish crazy adventurous enough to join us on the journey. Fortunately both Griffin and Logan are excellent and enthusiastic photographers and not only will I get a break from carrying my camera around but you all will get to view our adventures through their fresh, unjaded eyes.
At the moment, profoundly jet-lagged as we are, not much has been photographed but since some of you non-travel weary readers are already clamoring for a post, I am trying to oblige.
These uninspiring photos represent the sum of our adventures so far. They mainly consist of us dozing on various means of transportation. The highlight of the 13 hour SF to Istanbul flight was Mircea ordering beer with his meal.
The highlight of the 50 minute flight from Istanbul to Bucharest was Mihai and I accidentally getting put in business class, the result of which created such confusion that the flight was delayed 20 minutes until they figured out the haggard passengers lounging in row 7 were actually supposed to be in economy class row 16.
Other than the joy of seeing Vali when he drove us from the airport to the train station, there were no other highlights. There was just exhaustion until we got home and found a kitchen full of food and warm beds with clean sheets.
Never fear, it won't all be so mundane, there's more and better to come, the Rummel boys promise.

At last a meal at a table! Things are looking up already.