Last Walk-About

Thursday we did a last walk-about of Suceava. We went to places we wanted to revisit, and to places we had been meaning to go. It was a good day.

We started by finding the Bucovina Ethnografic Museum, which we had just learned about. It's located in an medieval building that's still standing.

From blog pix, Jan 09

This is the kitchen, with lots of wooden utensils and bowls and spoons. There are actually three stoves, the one center front, a smaller one behind, and a larger one to the right outside the picture.

From blog pix, Jan 09

These are examples of traditional clothing. The men still wear these heavy, felt coats. Most have gorgeous embroidery, and most have been passed down in a family. The women's skirts are like kilts, they're a simple length of cloth wrapped around and tied with a sash. It seems like every article of clothing was embroidered. The far right woman has a cloth bag at her feet; these were very common and today people here still use bgs for everything -- except the bags are plastic. :)

We've learned a lot about the traditions and history of this country. Living in a community for two years has definite advantages!

We were doing some other errands, so after the museum we, one last time, one of our favorite meals.

From blog pix, Jan 09

This is Sempre restaurant. No one knows what this word really means; it's not Romanian or Spanish, and probably not Italian. It's owned and operated by a family of Pentacostals; no alcohol, and the Sermon on the Mount on the back of the menu, in Romanian, of course. :)

From blog pix, Jan 09

Our favorite Romanian food: ciorba radauţeana: Radauţi style soup. This creamy, garlic flavored soup has chicken chunks and sometimes (not at Sempre) vegetable chunks. It's modeled after a favorite soup here: ciorbe de burta (stomach soup). We prefer the radauţeana version with chicken rather than stomach. Radauţi is a small city north of Suceava where they first starting making this soup. Whenever volunteers came to visit us, we took them to this restaurant for this soup. They ALL loved it and were disappointed when they returned to their own sites and could not find this soup.

After paying the bill, one last time, we went to our next tourist site: the church of St. John the New.

From blog pix, Jan 09

We can see this beautiful roof from our apartment balcony. Unfortunately we couldn't take pictures inside because a woman was praying at the feet of a priest, with her head covered (we heard a baby whimpering under the cloth), and beside the relics of St. John. These relics perform an annual miracle, which we were able to see last year: it is impossible to move the casket with the relics except on June 24 when the priests, after a lot of praying, can lift it and carry it through the city. The Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church comes for this miracle. Police surround the casket bearers because the crowd all wants to touch the casket. Gypsy women break through the cordon of police and run under the casket in the hopes of getting pregnant. It's a fabulous, exciting spectacle!

Next stop, the Park of Three Beards. On our first day in Suceava, my counterpart Maria took us around the city. I remember being confused, excited, overwhelmed. She pointed out landmarks that we still use, "Oh, there's the shipping company Maria told us about," or "Oh, there's the fountain Maria showed us." She said, at one point, "This is the park of three beards because it has statues of three men and they all beards. When Dennis is here, it will be the Park with Four Beards."

From blog pix, Jan 09

I finally got a picture of the Park of Four Beards. You can see Dennis standing in front of the middle statue. Can you see all three statues?

Next, a revisit to the history museum to photograph a new hero in our lives. Dennis's counterpart, Victor, took us to this museum in the first week. I've wanted to get back, especially since I've learned so much about one of Romania's greatest heroes: Ştefan cel Mare.

From blog pix, Jan 09

This wax display is of King Ştefan, far right with the red and gold boots, receiving a diplomatic delegation from the king of Poland. The figures are extremely life-like. I wanted to shake Ştefan's hand, but the museum had sent young women guides along with us, so we had to settle for being paparazzi.

Ştefan, King of Bucovina, was a cousin of Vlad ŢepeŞ, Count Dracula. Ştefan ruled for 50 years -- a remarkably long reign -- and managed to keep the Turks from invading Europe. He is said to have won all but one battle. At each place where he won a battle, he commissioned a painted monastery -- the now famous painted monasteries. People here say that at each battle site he left a church and some children. :)

Final stop, revisiting the cathedral that is being built on a hill in the middle of the city. We took pictures when we arrived because this seemed like such a major construction project!

From blog pix, Jan 09

We went back to take pictures of the changes.

From blog pix, Jan 09

You can see that the three towers have grown significantly. People tell us that this is being built through community contributions, not through the national government or the official church.

From blog pix, Jan 09

It's pretty awesome!

We ended the day as we plan to spend our last day, watching kids and pigeons in the center.

From blog pix, Jan 09

From blog pix, Jan 09

This young lady was zooming very fast around the fountain, showing her skill, no time for chatting, she had places to be right now! :)

What a lot of memories -- good and bad -- we have of this one city in far away Romania!