Maglavit: Day One

Neither of us was quite sure what to expect from our visit to Maglavit. I hoped that we would have a pleasant visit and get a taste of ordinary life in a Romanian village, something quite different from the choreographed version of Romania and the Dracula kitch that you get in touristy areas. The trip exceeded all of my expectations. The family that we stayed with could not have been more welcoming or generous, and we saw so much in the twenty-four hours that we spent in Maglavit that I’ve decided to break up the story into two posts.

We arrived in the village in the afternoon by bus, and Andreea's family picked us up. Andreea had to work in Bucharest until late, so we had several hours to tour the village and hang out with her family before she arrived. Our hosts were Ionel and Valentina, Andreea's parents, both of whom have lived in Maglavit their entire lives. Ionel works at the village's water treatment station, which was built several years ago with funding from the United States, and his wife Valentina runs the library at the village community center, in addition to teaching folk dancing classes and courses in Romanian Orthodox Christianity. We also met Andreea's sister Cristina, who attends high school in a larger village nearby and is a budding actress, and Valentina's nephew Andrei, whose mother is working in Italy.

After getting settled in and freshened up, we joined the family for a late lunch of delicious fresh fish from the Danube nearby followed by a tour of their incredible garden. The family grows all of their own food, from corn, cabbage, beans, and cherries, to chickens, rabbits, and pigs, and they preserve food from the garden by canning or freezing it, so that they can enjoy it all year round. We were amazed by the scope of the undertaking, and wondered how they had time to tend to the garden and its yield when both Ionel and Valentina have jobs. They explained that they have a lot of help from Ionel's parents who are both retired and live with the family. They also got a bit of help from us, harvesting cherries and strawberries for a delicious dessert!

Once we finished lunch and the garden tour, we piled into the car to tour the rest of the village. Our first stop was the Monastery. Maglavit Monastery has an interesting story. It was built in the 1950s in honor of Petrache Lupu, a shepherd who saw a vision of God while tending his sheep near Maglavit. At the time, the Communist Party's policy of atheism was taking its toll on the Orthodox Church, and after seeing God, Petrache Lupu began to speak out against the Communist Party's atheism and call on Romanians to return to the Church. The Monastery had fallen into disrepair, but was recently renovated with funds donated by controversial Romanian politician and football team owner, Gigi Becali.

Maglavit Monastery

The Monastery is home to a community of Romanian Orthodox nuns. Here one of them looks after the Monastery grounds.

A bell in the yard of the Monastery. After visiting the Monastery itself, we went to see the tree where Petrache Lupu saw God. The tree has become a pilgrimage site not unlike the spring at Lourdes, as its bark is reputed to have healing powers.

The next stop on our tour was the water treatment plant where Ionel works. It consisted of two of these little trailers, one for pumping and one for purification, and it was located next to the local football stadium, where Maglavit's team was practicing when we stopped by.

The pumping station

Our last stop for the day was at a fishery, which is run by Ionel and Valentina's cousins. We took a look at all of the different-sized fish in their tanks, and we got to throw them some food and watch the resulting frenzy of fins and tails.

Our hostess Valentina holding a live sturgeon.

Our host Ionel with a net full of fish trying to dive back into the water.

After a quick nap back at the house, we picked up Andreea from the bus stop around eleven, and headed back to the fishery for a late picnic dinner. Andreea's cousins picked out two huge fish from the tank and set to work killing and cleaning them.

Cleaning the fresh fish and prepping it for the grill.

We enjoyed homemade wine and plum brandy, and then the grilled fish with a delicious fresh garlic sauce. The night ended with a swim in the pool (not one of the fish tanks!) and an invigorating, multi-national game of keep-away, which ended at three in the morning!

Mike and I in the gazebo at the fishery where we had the picnic, which was decorated with traditional Romanian masks. I'm not sure which is scarier here, the mask or Mike's smile in this photo...