Yesterday a major Orthodox celebration took place: Saint Mary or Grand (sic!) Mary as popular it is called in this country. Lots of celebration throughout Mazemania and of course also in South Moldavia were I am right now.
Many Marias and Marians celebrated yesterday their name day in a local manner. They took out after they came from work (so after 3 PM) the barbeques. But they didn’t go to the nearby forest or on a field but as they do it here they place them right in front of the famous Romanian „blocks” (apartment buildings). And there were hundreds of open fires and smell of meat throughout the city…an European City. For an outsider as myself this was a shock. Of course I’ve seen it before but only here. Actually I see this events in front of the apartment building on the sidewalk every Saturday and Sunday. They fry all sorts of meet that they later eat inside their apartment leaving the fire to die by itself outside.
Yesterday I was counting the open fires within the city, some high as 1 metter. Of course I couldn’t count them all as they were hundreds. Seems that it is sort of a local tradition that some might explain that this people moved in the city with the traditions from the country side were they lived before. That might be an explanation but not necessary the only one. Anyway the funny thing is that near the Fire Department there were lots of open fires/ barbeques like this…and it seemed to me that some smell of cokking came also from within the Fire Dept too. But I might be wrong. There is no worry within the autorithies here that all these opened fores might once destroy the city through a major fire. Probably the peopel are more relaxed in this area as it is known to be the most severe seismic area of Romania, plus every year seem to have lots of flooding in the are too. So…what wrong can happend with a barbeque around the block?…..