1. St. Vasile’s Day.

    I am a bit behind on the blog front - my apologies to my adoring fans.

    So a lot has happened this past week.  Let’s start with a new beginning, quite literally - St. Vasile’s Day, or the Orthodox New Year.

    St. Vasile’s Day, like most Moldovan holidays, is not just a one day affair.  On the eve of St. Vasile, people go around from house to house chanting, yelling, reciting poems, performing skits, and basically doing the adult version of Orthodox Christmas children’s caroling - except this time, money or wine is expected in place of candy.

    I was nervous that half the village would be coming to the Americanka’s house after bani, as everyone seems to believe all Americans are rich.  But I just had a few kids coming throughout the day, satisfied with cookies.  As I was about to go to bed, however, I did have one group of Vasile Eve visitors - my 11th B form class.

    About half of my class and half of the other class arrived late at night with a very elaborate poetry recital/skit of sorts.  After each verse, as is customary for St. Vasile Eve, everyone yells out, ‘Heyyyyyyy HEY.’  It was really impressive and warmed my heart.  Even if they came for money, they still trekked through the glod to get to me.  In return, we inundated them with food, candy, and even a little bit of wine (this is customary, expected, and apparently is not looked upon strangely.  Well.  Okay). 

    I was told that the next day we’d probably have more visitors, who would this time be singing or saying poetry about the new harvest.  However, everyone left out one small detail.

    When I opened the door to our first set of St. Vasile wellwishers, they began to throw seeds in my face, over and over, while telling me to have many years full of good harvests of pears and apples.  Colita came rushing to the door and yelled, ‘Miss Kerry, what are you doing?  You have to catch them!’  Oh, right, excuse me.  OBVIOUSLY.  At least I was ready to catch the seeds for the next few visitors, but nonetheless, our entry way was full of sunflower seeds and corn all day.

    Holidays in Moldova.  There’s nothing more I can say.





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