Burying the Dead

Today we finally laid my grandmother to rest. It has taken us a year to get her here, but since this was her last request, it was well worth the trip and the enormous amount of stress that was required...

My grandmother was a pioneer during her time. Not 'pioneer' as in coming to America LOL but pioneer as in the only one of her kind, in her community. She was born in 1916 during WWI to a wealthy family, the second sibling of 5 children. Although extremly well off she felt as though she was often ignored and forgotten. This may have contributed to the development of a bitter personality that rarely warmed up to people or even her own family.

At a young age she fell in love with an Italian boy and he asked her to marry him... her mother denied this request as tradition dictated that the oldest sister be married before the others (my great aunt was not yet even engaged). My grandmother was devastated... Bruno (her fiance) was forced to leave Romania because the communists were decending upon our country and it would not go well for foreigners caught on our soil. I dont think my grandmother ever recovered from this heart break... Bruno would continue to visit her for 10yrs or so, staying for short periods of time. It was from one of his last visits that my mother was conceived. Having a child 'in flori' as we say or out of wedlock was unheard of during this period. But my grandmother could care less. She was working as an engineer (again unheard of yet), had her own house and thought that maybe my mother's birth would make Bruno stay for good. Needless to day this did not happen - whether for political reasons, or personal, Bruno never asked my grandmother to marry him again.

There is much to say about my mother's childhood (some good, many bad) but it is not my story to tell... yet :) Needless to say, my grandmother was a single mother in a hard world - the communists took everything from my greatgrandparents, including my greatgrandfather's life. My greatgrandmother died later from cancer.

As for me, I was my grandmother's everything (along with my brother of course LOL) She adored me and I was fascinated by her. She gambled, smoked and often had late parties at her home. When I was a kid I often fell asleep under her Remi table. I thought she was brilliant even if she had a mean streak and a vicious tongue. To me she was (almost) always sweet and generous.

When we were leaving for Canada we spent our last months living in her house. It is one of the few memories of my childhood that I have... I have gone to visit that house today and I was so glad that its still standing and almost exactly the same as it was 25 yrs ago. Once we settled in Canada, we sent for her to come and be with us. She spent the last 20 yrs in our house except for the yearly summer vacations back to her home.

The day she died I wasnt there, I was working. She was 92 yrs old and I guess it was bound to happen at some point. But I have always felt terrible that I did not get to say goodbye (devastated is more like it) She was hard to live with and I wish I would have had more patience, more of the love I had for her when I was a little kid... this last request was an honour for me to complete. I hope that she is now at rest... I tried not to cry at the burial as most people there (other than Ma) would not have really understood why I miss someone who was so difficult. I guess its hard to explain... Now our duty and the main purpose for being here is complete. Tomorrow Ma is taking me to more childhood places, to see if I remember any of them... I'll keep you posted ;)

XOXO

I'm such a baby

Leaving has been the hardest part. The stress if getting good seats in the plane, making it through with all our baggage, and clearing customs with my protein shakes turned out to be more than I expected LOL

But the hardest part was saying goodbye to the kids and Collin - never have I've been away this long and I could barely stand it not to cry. My son's red eyes and tears almost sent me over the edge, but I really had to pull it together so that we dont ball our eyes out by the customs agents. Bay was really brave and didnt cry... she just held on to me for a really long tiem :) - I miss those hugs already :(

Plane ride sucked, as all plane rides tend to suck, especially if they are 8 hrs long. We arrived in Paris and switched planes, which went fairly smoothly, and I have to say that the French are much friendlier than I had been led to believe :)

We arrived in Bucharest greeted by happy faces of friends and relatives I barely remembered... I met my cousin Mihaela for the first time and instantly fell in love. She is a beautiful, generous and intelligent 21 yr old with a hot temper and a sharp tongue - I was hooked line and sinker LMAO - she freed me from my relatives and proceeded to take me out and show me all the great sites of this city in which I was boen (pics are coming). It has been such a surreal experience to be a tourist in the place where I come from - taking pictures constantly and barely speaking the language, makes me stand out as foreign... My baby cousin graciously showed me all the sited and manouvered her vehicle through what I very loosely call traffic... armageddon driving would be closer to the truth but I'm not sure even that truly describes the experience of being in a car in Bucharest during rush hour.

We took a boat ride through Parcu Herastrau, then walked around to feed the swans and finally grabbed some ice cream and some mineral water and headed out to see the second largest building in all of Europe, Casa Popurului.

Honestly, I had a really great night/day/night - I thought I would be exhausted after flying 12 hrs and meeting everyone I havent seen in 25 yrs, or ever LOL - but the feeling of being 'home' and 'away' was too creepy and made me really hyper and excited... most of my mother's friends spent most of their time reminiscing about my childhood, which to be honest, I hardly remember... it's almost as if I'm hearing stories of some other kid, in a foreign land, which I barely recognize...

Now, I gotta go - hot tea and a good night's rest should be enough preparation for the phenomenon of burying my granmothers in the morning... miss you all

XOXOXO

How to carry a body, a bikini and digging tools

As some of you know, I am heading out to Europe for the next five weeks. I leave on Thursday, May 27th and come back Sunday, July 4th (if I was American my return date might be more metaphorical LOL)

With only a couple of weeks left to get ready I am trying to figure out how I am going to do all the gazillion things I plan to do in such a short period of time.

So here are some of the things I will absolutely do on this trip:

1. I will take my grandmother's remains back to her home and bury them alongside her ancestors (and her husband) - more on my grandmother later.
2. I will go see Dracula's favorite haunts including his castle and his burial place.
3. I am definitely hitting some major places in Italy: the Vatican, Verona (where my mother's father comes from) Florence, Tuscany, Pompey... and many others
4. I am then heading out to Greece - here I will go to Athens, Sparta, Delphi Myconos etc.... I can't even imagine what it will be like to stand in the footsteps of the ancient Greeks - I've dreamt about it since I was 4 yrs old and my first real reading book was one of Greek myths
5. Finally, I will take a cruise ship to Turkey where I will visit what remains of the object of my doctoral thesis, Artemis' temple - from there I will go on and visit Mary's house as well as John's... don't know how to feel about this yet, seems far away as it is the last stop of my trip.


Along the way I will post as much as I can about what its like to travel in the footsteps of vampires, Greek gods and Romans. This is my first return home (after 22 yrs) but I think it will most likely be my last. There is really no one left there since my enormous family is scattered all over the world outside of our homeland. This is what happens when people try to escape the atrocities of a dictatorship.

I am also trying to figure out how to sync my Picassa album to this blog so you can see pics as I upload them... we shall see how that endeavour goes LOL...