<\/p>\n
Part two of my drunken, gushy travel journal entry about the time I visited Dracula and he made me eat cherries.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Before Snagov, the race across a quarter of the country from For brunch, we pulled off at \u00a0a dust-blown roadside It’s thanks to Gabriel and the blow job waitresses that our Getting to the rotten lake in the center of Snagov wasn’t as The “lake resort town” begins as a tumble down industrial In the countryside, the white trees are far more prevalent The practicality of this custom was unintended, Snagov is, technically, a suburb of Bucharest. When we caught our first glimpse of water between the houses The lake “shore” was actually a bog, ringing the lake. We caught site of a small jetty on the island where three Gabriel asked to read the section in my Lonely Planet once again “She says,” Gabriel translated, “That there are no more Parinte – it means parent, and a common name given to “Well armed?” I asked.<\/p>\n Gabriel nodded, looking a little unsure. \u00a0He looked We were all shocked that the woman meant we had to literally “He is sleeping,” Gabriel translated.\u00a0 Then he began After each taking turns, we decided to call it a wash. “Oh!” Gabriel put an arm on my shoulder, “He has heard!”<\/p>\n The ancient lady left with smiles and waves and we stayed, “Oh,” Gabriel muttered.<\/p>\n “What?” I asked.<\/p>\n “He is…how do you say…taking water…”<\/p>\n “He’s bailing out the goddamned boat.” Sherban muttered.<\/p>\n The monk finished bailing it out, leapt in and motored “Many snakes!” Gabriel was shouting, one white knuckled hand At the island’s docks, we all scrabbled out, nearly hugging He raised six fingers and started talking.<\/p>\n Gabriel translated, “Six Euros each.”<\/p>\n “What?” Antony “Six Euros or we go back on the water,” Gabriel shrugged.<\/p>\n We all paid, including Gabriel, more out of fear of the The island was self-sufficient and, for most of the last few Locals brought in what they could – toaster ovens, With only one person to defend the island, the monk was He led us to the well, blessed by Dracula, and asked us each Of course, nothing happened.<\/p>\n From the well to the chapel, we all squeezed into the foyer “Ten euros,” Gabriel said, “For each of us.”<\/p>\n “To take pictures?” I asked.<\/p>\n Gabriel nodded, then said, “Go over and read signs in We read about the history of the chapel while Gabriel Gabriel returned,\u00a0 “No good.\u00a0 He will not lower price.” I nodded, “Yeah, that’ll still be good.”<\/p>\n “He is very upset.\u00a0 He says he has not seen a whole ten “I have a ten dollar bill.” I replied.<\/p>\n Gabriel’s eyes widened as if I had just smacked him. “Sure.”\u00a0 I handed a crisp, new bill to the monk and The monk looked at the bill, then smiled largely and swept “He says all is okay now.”<\/p>\n “What is?”<\/p>\n “Pictures.\u00a0 They are now paid for.”\u00a0 Gabriel The chapel is, literally, held together with tape and The chapel records the saga of Dracula’s family up to the Dracula is buried in the middle of the second room, The Romanians all get a laugh out of the western image of In fact, the blood-sucking, vampire, cursing God routine is Leaving the chapel, surrounded by wild dogs, the monk led us “Blessed by Dracula!” Gabriel said, laughing.<\/p>\n The cherries were collected and put to good use.\u00a0 The So a drunken hermit, armed to the teeth, machine-gunning From that forested island of orchards and gardens and a tiny
\nBrasov to Bucharest,
\nour final destination for the day, had us all unhinged.\u00a0 Gabriel’s
\npre-revolution Dacia had the feel
\nof a car that wanted <\/em>to catch on fire and was constantly thinking about
\nit.\u00a0 The air conditioning was a dashboard wide vent, which Gabriel popped
\nopen to allow a wall of road dust to wash in, the small of burning oil and
\nrubber fast on its tracks.\u00a0 Once out of Brasov,
\nthe main roads became blistered byways of the sort you’d expect to find in the
\ndeserts of the Southwest, the closed-off sections of Route 66.\u00a0 Life with
\na Dacia was obviously
\na labor of love.\u00a0 Gabriel was ready for every stumble.\u00a0 When the car
\nblew out a tire, he had it repaired in pit-stop time.<\/p>\n
\nstop.\u00a0 At night, the place was a strip bar.\u00a0 By day, it was open-pit
\nbarbecue serving breakfast and lunch.\u00a0 The strippers – who all appeared to
\nbe 15 years old and enslaved by cruel, violent masters – doubled as
\nwaitresses.\u00a0\u00a0 These polluted girls seemed terminally confused by
\ntheir daytime roles – should they bring the dessert menu or should they offer a
\nblow job?<\/p>\n
\neyes were opened to Fanta’s regional flavor “Shokata.”\u00a0 The much debated
\nShokata gained worldwide renown for the “make your own commercial” campaign
\nlaunched by Fanta’s owner, Coke, around the same time.\u00a0 Where Gabriel
\nargued Shokata was only Romanian, and based on a secret Romanian recipe, careful
\nresearch reveals it to be of Asian origin… Or is it Scandinavian?\u00a0 Or
\nIsraeli?\u00a0 Coke’s not really talking.\u00a0 Probably because the “Shokata”
\nflowers, pictured on the can, don’t really exist.\u00a0 Here’s the truth – It’s
\nlemon Fanta.<\/p>\n
\neasy as it should have been.<\/p>\n
\ndistrict, then gives way to single family housing that’s oddly reminiscent of Albuquerque’s
\nolder, poor neighborhoods.\u00a0 No one in Romania
\nis capable of providing clear instructions, either.\u00a0 You’d think they
\ncould tell you the way to the huge lake in the middle of their community, but
\nit seemed that was too much to ask.\u00a0 Gabriel said the locals were just
\ngiving us a hard time out of spite.\u00a0 The roads were dirt tracks, seemingly
\nbuilt at random, and impossible to navigate.<\/p>\n
\nthan in the city.\u00a0 Trees and posts are, traditionally, painted white in
\nthe style you often see here in the US
\nto combat parasites\u00a0 — from the ground to chest high.\u00a0 In Romania’s
\ncase, it’s not a question of pest control but decoration.\u00a0 Ceausescu’s
\nwife thought it was pretty to paint all the trees white.\u00a0 During
\nCeausescu’s reign, the white doubled as street lighting.\u00a0 Driving at
\nnight, the only lights were the reflection of your headlights, and on
\nbreakneck, unpredictable, unpainted roads, those trees must have saved many
\nlives.<\/p>\n
\nthough.\u00a0 The true reason was to please the lord and master, and everyone
\nin Romania
\nwas issued a number.\u00a0 Every weekend, the odds and evens would trade off
\nand paint the trees in their community to keep the white spotless and
\nfresh.\u00a0 It’s good to be dictator.<\/p>\n
\nIt’s about 15-20 miles from the city.\u00a0 But suburban sprawl is American
\nthinking, Snagov is a country getaway at its heart.\u00a0 The houses are barely
\nkept up, yet the trees are carefully painted.<\/p>\n
\nand the trees, Gabriel slammed the car to a skidding halt, parked illegally,
\nand then ran down to the lakeshore.<\/p>\n
\nA little hike along each side showed nothing but private and government
\nproperty, the largest of which was Ceausescu’s vacant and still
\nprivately-guarded summer home, a sprawling estate that would put western
\nmonarchs to shame.\u00a0 Until the government decided how to divvy up
\nCeausescu’s property, it all remained abandoned.\u00a0 There was no rental
\nagency for boats.<\/p>\n
\nmotorboats huddled, then waded through the reeds to find the companion dock on
\nthe shore – termite-ridden wood, sinking slowly into the mud.\u00a0 The dock
\nhad two wooden canoes tethered to it, one that had turned into driftwood and
\nsunk into the mud and the other full of water and breeding mosquitoes.<\/p>\n
\nand, armed with the guidebook, knocked on a door and hauled out the ancient
\nwoman who answered, summing up our current situation.\u00a0 She laughed, and
\nthen we learned the truth.<\/p>\n
\nrental boats.\u00a0 Sometimes the locals will do it, but the parinte may
\nshoot.”<\/p>\n
\npriests or monks.\u00a0 But the way she phrased it seemed to catch
\nGabriel.\u00a0 He cocked his head and asked for clarification.\u00a0 After the
\nreply, he turned to us, “There is only one monk.\u00a0 All the others – they
\nare dead.\u00a0 We must call across and ask permission to visit the
\nisland.\u00a0 He is well armed.”<\/p>\n
\ndown at the Lonely Planet in his hands as if it were a book written by the
\ndevil, then he handed it back to me.\u00a0 I had put my hand out, fearing that
\nhe was about to toss it into the lake.<\/p>\n
\ncall the monk. She walked us back down to the dock and began shouting:
\n“Parinte!”\u00a0 Her voice echoed around the lake, but there was no
\nreply.\u00a0 She took a breath and shouted again. After five minutes of
\nscreaming, her voice cracked and she turned to Gabriel.<\/p>\n
\nshouting.<\/p>\n
\nJust as we were leaving, the monk shouted from somewhere on the island.<\/p>\n
\nGabriel’s little flock of sheep, watching the dock on the island.\u00a0 A
\nportly man in black, surrounded by feral dogs, waddled out to his dock and
\nbegan working with one of the boats.<\/p>\n
\nacross the lake.\u00a0 He invited us to climb in and, taking water the entire
\ntime, he hurried back to the island’s docks, worriedly looking back as the lake
\nwater washed in.<\/p>\n
\nholding onto the seat and the other pointing at the lake water, which was
\nteeming with water moccasins.<\/p>\n
\neach other, and followed the monk to dry land.<\/p>\n
\nbarked, “How come he didn’t tell us that back at the docks.<\/p>\n
\nblack lake than anything else.\u00a0 The monk warmed to us as soon as collected
\nthe cash and showed us around the island.<\/p>\n
\nhundred years, supported twenty to thirty monks.\u00a0 It was large enough for
\nlivestock, orchards, gardens and had it’s own water source – a thousand foot well,
\njust wide enough for a man to slip down, dug by a slave Vlad Tepes had captured
\nas a boy.\u00a0 It took the slave 25 years to dig the well, working dawn to
\ndusk every day.\u00a0 The parinte now lives alone, leaving the island once
\nevery six months or so to get some mod-cons from the local store.\u00a0 In the
\nmid-90’s, the government took away all funding, which left the monastery
\ndependent on tourist money and donations.\u00a0 With tourists arriving every
\nsix months, maybe four or five people a year, there wasn’t much hope there.<\/p>\n
\nbreadmakers, TV’s and the like.\u00a0 All hand-me-down gifts, and a few items
\nliberated from Ceausescu’s empty palace which, we learned, is something like a
\nscene from Great Expectations – everything inside the sealed palace is frozen
\nin mid step from the days of the revolution.<\/p>\n
\nplagued by gypsy raiders.\u00a0 They came to deface Dracula’s tomb – a small,
\ntwo room chapel – and steal food from the orchards and gardens.\u00a0 The
\nlatter they sold by the roadside.\u00a0 Once, the monk ran out to throw stones
\nat them and was attacked.\u00a0 Beating him, the gypsies sunk his motorboats
\nfor good measure and took off.\u00a0 Perhaps guilty about cutting the funding,
\nand knowing that this last defender of Dracula was a marked man, the Romanian
\ngovernment supplied him with two pistols and a military grade assault
\nrifle.\u00a0 Then they gave him a full license to kill.\u00a0 Gypsies, locals,
\nill-mannered tourists.\u00a0 No questions asked.<\/p>\n
\nto drink.\u00a0 My English friends demurred, but I took a long drink of the
\ncool water.\u00a0 In my travels, I’ve taken to drinking all blessed water,
\nchildishly hoping it’ll cure my neuralgia.\u00a0 The last batch I drank was
\nfrom Glastonbury, so here
\nwas the test – Jesus versus Dracula.<\/p>\n
\nas the monk situated himself behind a desk of postcards and knick-knacks,
\nfussing with his clothes and the chair and doing everything but changing hats
\nlike in some old comedy routine.\u00a0 Then he announced the price for picture
\ntaking.<\/p>\n
\ncorner.\u00a0 I am going to make this better.”<\/p>\n
\nembarked on a 15 minute shouting match with the monk.<\/p>\n
\nThen, to me, Gabriel presented a ten dollar bill with one third missing. “He
\nwant to know – is this still good?”<\/p>\n
\ndollar bill.”<\/p>\n
\nHe grabbed me and hauled me over to the monk, babbling in Romanian.\u00a0 Then
\nhe turned, “You will trade ten dollar bills.\u00a0 Yours for his broken one?”<\/p>\n
\nstuffed the torn bill in my pocket.\u00a0 It was destined for a bribe in Budapest
\nthough, now, I wish I had kept it.<\/p>\n
\nhis hands to take in the chapel.<\/p>\n
\nsmiled sweetly at the monk and shoved me away, “Go, go, hurry!”<\/p>\n
\nbubblegum.\u00a0 Butterfly bandages and electrical tape keep the murals
\ncovering the walls and ceiling from caving in.\u00a0 All of this comes from the
\nmeager funds that gawkers like ourselves brought in.\u00a0 Our six euros per
\nperson and, to the less fortunate, 16 euros, helped do what little repair was
\npossible. \u00a0Even the scaffolding, erected so the monk could repair the
\nceiling, was in need of repair.\u00a0 Upon close infection, it looked like he
\nhad hauled it out of the lake.<\/p>\n
\nmodern day.\u00a0 The family is now dead or forgotten, but they were careful to
\nmaintain and update the history of the chapel until about 1800 or so.
\nIt’s like walking around inside one of those large family bibles.<\/p>\n
\nsurrounded by everything you need to hold a full mass for a small family – pews
\nand an altar.<\/p>\n
\nDracula. The Dracula that we know and love is Bram Stoker’s Dracula.\u00a0 You
\ncan go visit the rooms Stoker took, a castle right along the main train
\nline.\u00a0 He never left those rooms, cobbling together the Dracula legend
\nbased on the stories from the hotel staff.<\/p>\n
\nabsent from the Dracula legend.\u00a0 He was a devout man, and one of the only
\nleaders in the last thousand years to bring peace and prosperity to Romania.
\nThe type of peace where you left your doors unlocked and valuables in plain
\nview without any worries. Dracula is a national hero, equivalent to George
\nWashington.\u00a0 The Romanians have begun to cash in on the Vampire legend,
\nbut, to them, it’s about as ridiculous as it would be for us to discover a 150
\nyear old fiction novel claiming Washington was a killer werewolf.<\/p>\n
\nto his wild cherry trees.\u00a0 He did nothing to tend to them, their branches
\nexploding and weighed down by cherries, and they were the best I’ve ever
\ntasted.<\/p>\n
\nonly English word the monk knew – “Hooch!”<\/p>\n
\ngypsy raiders and watching over the body of Dracula.\u00a0 That right there is
\nthe beauty and the eccentricity of Romania,
\nthis holy man in black with his cherry wine and machine gun.<\/p>\n
\nchapel built by a horror movie icon to the diesel-choked insanity of Bucharest,
\nwe left RomaniaSlovenia.
\nbehind, slow train to<\/p>\n
\n<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[352],"tags":[361,353,161],"class_list":["post-2512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gsarchive","tag-brasov","tag-gs-archive-2004-2008","tag-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2512"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2512\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2733,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2512\/revisions\/2733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}