It's about time I did a proper blog entry. We've done a lot since coming to Romania. We've seen a lot of cool things and met some awesome and inspiring people. People who may well have a hand in changing our lives; also just really lovely local people who always have time for a young foreigner who can barely speak a word of their own language.

There's no point trying to do this chronologically though. I'll start by just talking about where we are.

Breb

Breb is a small village in the Maramures region of Romania which sits between the Transylvania region and the Ukrainian border very close to the north. While this is still a village it is a big one. Around 400 homes spread over a very wide area. It's said to be one of the last remaining strip farming villages in Europe. Strip farming is when a village has a lot of large open areas that have been divided into individual strips for different families to run. It's a wonderful thing. There is so much land lying around and there aren't many fences dividing it. You may have a fence around your house and fences dividing fields from roads but that's about it. There are orchards, potato and wheat fields, pastures, all kinds of farmland and everybody knows exactly which spots they own. And they look after them too. They are out all the time working on their land. Mainly keeping down the grass using scythes. If there's nothing else to do the grass could always do with a trim. We haven't farmed this way in the UK for a good few hundred years.

None of this is to say that this is a medieval village. It certainly feels incredibly old-school. Traditions are kept alive. There are a lot of old wooden houses. The people walk about in traditional clothing, they all go to church on a Sunday (nobody works) and most still milk their cows each morning. But modern living is here. A lot of homes have satellite dishes on the roofs for TVs and some people even have access to the internet. Tractors are slowly replacing the horse and cart, though you'll still see plenty of the latter. The unfortunate thing is that the old wooden houses are also being replaced by huge square modernised beasts that just aren't very pretty at all. It's fashionable now to keep away from the old ways as much as you can. You can understand it though. Everywhere else is progressing and when the kids go out to the towns and cities for schooling or whatever else, its seen as very uncool to be coming back to live in the village. The more old-fashioned it stays here the less young people will want to live here. Hopefully a small tourist trade can help revive people's interests in their village and while still keeping the tradition. Very few people have realised that foreign people don't come to stay in big concrete hotels with TVs and Wi-Fi.

Back to the farming. What do they produce here? Well most families own a couple of cows which they use for milk and cream (which keeps longer). They also keep pigs for meat and chickens for eggs. The big beasts are kept in barns for the most part while the chickens are left to wander wherever they can find food. They always come home to roost. The crops are mainly hay to feed the animals which is very labour intensive. The livestock is such a huge part of the people's self-sufficiency that growing and harvesting the hay is a constant task. There are also a huge amount of pumpkins being grown, also mainly to feed the livestock. Amongst all that they grow tomatoes, peppers, onions, all sorts of veggies and fields of potatoes too. There's a few walnut trees about too. As I said, the villagers here are almost entirely self-sufficient. If the world was struck by disaster, if the oil ran out and people rioted everywhere this would be the place to be. I'm sure the Breb villagers could go on with their lives with almost no interruption to normal routine.

I've deliberately left the fruit till last. There are orchards here brimming with apple and plum trees. And we've just passed the period when they've been ready for harvest. We spent several weeks working hard at the harvest ourselves. Now, while these apples and plums are absolutely awesome to eat that's not why they're grown. People work tirelessly all through the season to get up as much fruit as possible to turn into the local alcoholic drink called Horinka. Once the harvesting is finished and the barrel-loads of fruit have fermented they will be taken to a small distillery called a Cazan (of which there are many in the village) and that will run all day and night to produce barrels of this triple-distilled, 50% alcohol spirit. The Cazan owner will take a percentage and the fruit owners walk away with enough Horinka to last until the next year. Unless they drink it all first!

We've been fortunate enough to live on lots of the local produce amongst our other store bought foods. The local people are so generous with their surplus and our neighbours love to hand us bowlfuls of tomatoes and much more. Absolutely everything is 100% organic and tastes amazing. But the Horinka is something else. Its strong, but the really good stuff doesn't even burn when you drink it. It'll get you drunk fast and you won't even have a hangover the next morning. We got the opportunity to sample some straight out of the Cazan the other day. They were using our water supply across the road as a coolant and as they were filling our buckets they just had to offer us a drink. It was so fresh it was still warm. There's nothing else like it. They also have variants where they mix the fruits or add juice afterwards. I'd definitely rate the stuff over any British spirits. Maybe we'll get a chance to try the Horinka produced from our own fruits someday, but unfortunately we won't be around to see it go through the distilling process.

Weather

The weather here has been awesome. A lot of really hot days. Once in a while the storm clouds will hang overhead and we'll get a solid day of very heavy rain and thunder. Then it'll be roasting hot again the next day. In fact its apparently been one of the driest summers in a while. The streams have dried up and water has been an issue for the village which relies on the mountain streams to run well. There is water but there are so many houses using it that it can be difficult, especially when you need to water all your livestock as well as run it to cool the distilleries. So luckily as we've come further towards autumn the rain has really started to pour. We've had some really chilly days recently and we've had tubs in the camper to catch the drippage. It's not brilliant working in that rain but it's nice to see the rivers running and the fields green. We're stil getting a few hot days though. It's not quite winter yet.

Outside Breb

There's a few villages dotted around the surrounding area. We took a walk to the next one which is Hoteni. It was a gorgeous walk through huge rolling fields and Hoteni is very different from Breb. In some respects it is the same, but it has a big road going right through it and there are a lot more new houses. There seems to be a fair bit more money there too. Nice BMWs parked outside some house, that kind of thing.

The closest town is Ocna. A lot of concrete. Not incredibly pretty on the surface but it still has the old-world charm. One day we saw a bull just wandering about on the road. All the cars had to wait for that one. And of course the horse and cart combo can be seen all over still. Ocna is where they have the big market every Thursday. I got a few pictures there and Kate got herself a jumper and a traditional headscarf. I'll have to get a pic of that.

Then you got the city, Sighet. This is pretty much on the Ukrainian border. This is where we get our shopping and we've also been on a couple nights out here. There's probably a few bars but we've only been into three. Two of those close quite early but the third is excellent. It's always busy at night, the staff are friendly and it even has a dart board! There's a nice pizza place too. That's about all we've seen there.

Romanian Language

Romanian is an odd language. They say that it is Latin based but it also has Slavic influences. In some ways it is very difficult. I won't go into detail though, its complicated. But other things are quite simple. Complicated phrases can often be a simple word that is very similar in English. For example, to say that you will do something or that something is done or will be done you can just say 'rezolv'. Resolve. Easy. And the months are pretty much the same too. Days of the week are completely different though and they're far more important. While we've picked up quite a lot there are still so many simple things we don't know. Like tomorrow or yesterday. Some words just don't stick. Yow is I, Tu is you. Fak = make, Fok = fire. So I was very chuffed when I figured out 'Yow fak fok!' That got a few laughs :p

People of Breb

Living and working in Breb has been a far different experience from what we've done as the average tourist before. Tourists do pass through here quite often to stay at one of the few places built for them (including our own host's), but we were still a curiosity when we first arrived. The local people want to say hello and to show you where they live and they normally give you a drink of their own Horinka. We were fairly blown away by how friendly everybody is. But as we stayed longer and people saw us working; picking plums or walking about with scythes and as they became used to seeing us they became even friendlier. Our neighbours especially. We're still foreigners but we're not just here to look at them. I feel like we could become at least a small part of the community if only we could speak the language more and had something of our own to share. People passing by will always stop to say hello and check out what you're up to. It's the people here that have made this experience what it is and we'll remember some for their generosity or kindness and others for their very unique personalities.

One of the first locals we met and talked to properly was a guy we call the Basket Man. We were on our way to Duncan & Penny's house (our hosts, will explain) when this old guy spotted us and asked us to come along with him. All in Romanian of course and at this point we barely even knew a word. We just went by hand signals and followed him. He took us to his house where he gave us some home-made cheese and bread and a few dodgy looking apples. This was our first taste of real local food. I can't say I was too impressed. The bread was ok. Then he showed us a load of photographs of him with tourists before giving us a demonstration of what it is that he actually does. This guy's a proper basket-weaver in the traditional sense. His baskets are pretty awesome too. He showed us all this for a good while, all the time trying to communicate with us but not really succeeding. Then he asked if we wanted to buy a basket and we just had to politely say no. Unperturbed, he brought out a sheep's-wool jacket and popped it on Kate to try. And told us how much he wanted for it. We didn't want to buy anything and we had to go so he walked us back a bit, gave Kate a kiss and pretty much ignored me. We met him once more after that, we could communicate a little but he still wanted money off us and he wanted a full on mouth kiss off of Katie this time and she wasn't too happy. Apparently this guy is all about selling stuff to foreigners. He grabs anybody like this and even still tries to sell his stuff on to Duncan and Penny. I guess that in itself isn't a terrible thing (he's cashing in on people visiting his village and why not, he makes nice baskets), but he gives off a bad vibe and doesn't really have much respect for women or even the men with them. So unfortunately we've had to avoid him now and we're at the point where we can actually tell him we're busy and how so it's easier to pass, but I'm not planning to hang around him asking for photos.

Our second acquaintance was under similar circumstances but far more positive. It was evening and we were walking up the hill again when a guy said hello (in Romanian - Buna) and noticed my camera. He pulled his own out for me to see his pics and it seemed to us he was sort of the local events photographer. We had a confusing moment but a passing lady was able to translate that he wanted us to visit his house. We were still new here and even though the previous guy was a weirdo this one seemed nice. We chatted as much as we could and I got a snap of him outside his house. Then he showed us in to what I'll call his 'media room'. A room full of photos and video tapes. He'd done them all and kept everything over the years. Everything. We must have sat in that room for a good couple hours watching videos of events in Breb. He gave us some of his Horinka and we sipped while watching weddings, festivals, oil production, a sheep milking festival, loads of stuff. It got pretty late and we had to kind of sidle our way out. This guy was lovely though. A truer representation of what Breb people are really like. He saw that we were new here and he wanted to show us his hobby and he wanted nothing in return. We finished that evening with Vasilli (the guy's name) walking us home some of the way and we said good night. We'd only been in Breb about a week or so and it felt like we were getting to know people.

We haven't met Vasilli since and we've been avoiding Basket Man like the plague. But the people that we've really gotten to know are our direct neighbours. The community spirit here is amazing. If somebody needs something a neighbour will help them out and at some point that person can and most likely will help the neighbour in return. You don't feel pressure to pay people back, but its just the way things work here. People just like to help each other out. Though if you took all the time without giving I'm sure people would notice. There's probably a few people around here like that but we haven't really met any. Not in our little street anyway. We're getting on really well with our neighbours. When we stayed down the bottom we had Linutsa next door. Duncan calls her the cannonball because of her shape. She a lovely woman though. Always has a big smile on her face and likes to give us pancakes and peppers. She stopped by to talk to us today while we were working (Maria, Duncan's local manager, translated). Amongst everything else I believe she was laughing at my white body. I was convinced I'd tanned a little!

Now that we're staying in the campervan outside Duncan's house we have a whole different set of neighbours that we've come to know quite well. Across the road is where a big family stays. They have an outside tap that we used for our water supply for a good few weeks so they got pretty used to us stopping by. Even their dog doesn't bark at us anymore. Those guys own a Cazan which is used by a lot of people. When somebody needs to sort their fruit it runs 24/7 and it's basically a non-stop party in there. We were invited round for lunch a couple of Sundays ago. They had a full kitchen and the food and horinka just kept coming. We felt privileged already, being invited for lunch, but when we found out it was a wake it seemed even nicer as odd as that may seem. They wanted us to share their food at what was a fairly personal affair.

Right next to our camper we have the 'pig-murderers'. That a story I'll hopefully get to soon. They're an older couple. The wife is a bit of a tank. She's friendly enough but we don't see her about too often. Her husband has a pair of walking sticks. His legs obviously aren't too good so he gets about very slowly or not at all. We see him more often. We go round once in a while to empty our bucket of organics into their pig trough. They had three pigs. And every now and then if the guy's about he'll lean out his door to offer me a cup of the good stuff.

Our neighbours on the other side are lovely too. They have a son called Christy who still goes to school but was helping our carpenter (Gitza) to sort one of the houses while he was on holiday. They also rent a room out to Duncan's web-tech Costin. More on him later.

Lastly we have the landlords. The house we're staying at right now is actually a rental. So the landowners come by to sort out the field behind the house and to generally tend the land. They're quite entertaining. The lady is constantly laughing at our attempts to speak Romanian to her and her husband is a proper comedian. He was apparently hit by a huge electric shock when he worked down in the mines. He was incredibly lucky to survive, but they say its addled his brain a little. We just love to talk with him though cos he loves to make you laugh. He's clearly learned a lot of English off the TV too. He can say certain words and he's interested in learning from us and teaching us some words too. They're also incredibly hard workers. They know how to chill out but when they start something they'll keep at it past sundown. The same can be said for a lot of people in Breb.

So that's all the local people that we've spent the most amount of time with. We've gotten to know them and they know us too. They're the people we can attempt to speak to more because they understand that they need to try a little harder. And they're willing too as well because they know we're trying hard. Other people you pass still want to talk but our vocabulary is so limited they often give up quite quickly.

There are also people that we've worked and lived with. I'll talk about them in another update. I've been typing this up in Word and I think its good to publish now. It's a bit long, but I'll just do another two of these kind of things and that'll be our Romanian blog sorted. Here's hoping somebody out there finds this at least slightly interesting.