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Hi everyone,
Well by the time you read this Christmas Day will be over, you might be reading it Boxing Day, but there is no such holiday here in Romania. I am sorry but there aren't any pictures of the Christmas lights this week due to the weather conditions. The weather messed up quite a few plans, Ninge was supposed to go to slaughter this week, but he is still in the pig house, we can't get him out. This meant that we did not have the pork to take out to our families this year, they will have it later in the new year. We learnt early on in our time in Romania, not to promise anything; so the families were not expecting the pork, therefore they were not disappointed, and will be thrilled to have meat in January when the weather is bad. But back to the beginning of the week.
Monday, you remember last week, when I left you, it had been snowing all day on the Sunday and was still snowing. It snowed all night and this morning when we woke we were snowed in. Snow or no, I had to feed. I went through to the bathroom to fill the kettle, no water!!! The pipes in the bathroom were frozen. Lew puts the electric fire in the bathroom to thaw the pipes, but we don't know how long that is going to take. Next step, thaw snow, then boil the water from the snow to use to feed and water the animals. But, I need a coffee and there is no water. Perhaps, there is some water in one of the containers in the animal house. I don my wellingtons and pushed my way through to the animal house and open everyone up. There is a quarter of a container of water, great coffee. The snow thawing for the feed, the water pipes being warmed in the bathroom, we make coffee. Feeding takes even longer today, I use more than the usual amount of hot water to make up the feeds. The animal's water containers need thawing before they can be filled with warm water, which the animals drink straight away, they need refilling again. Then I put extra straw into each house to keep the animals warm. It was -10C last night and even though the sun is shinning the temperature does not go above -1C all day. The sun shinning on the snow makes it sparkle just like the glitter on a Christmas card. The snow looks very pretty but it isn't very practical. There is no way we are going to be able to move the car or van for a couple of days, which plays havoc with the plans for the week. We were supposed to be going to stock up with animal food, pet food, stock up on the protein feed, collect potatoes and vegetables, collect the paperwork for the pig to go to slaughter and then take him down to the slaughter house and do some Christmas shopping. Oh, well no good worrying about what can't be done. As the sun is out and we haven't any major drifts up the field, I walk up to cut some maize stalks, I want to keep the cut ones for when I can't get up the field. Lew organised porridge for breakfast which was very late today, more like lunch. The pipes in the bathroom had thawed and when we have finished brunch, it was back to feeding again. Another two bales of straw were shared amongst the animals. The fire in the animal house was lit and stacked up with maize cobs to burn during the evening, I can't keep it in during the night but as it is still burning when I close the house down for the night the heat keeps the house warmer than outside. Lew decides to leave the electric fire on low in the bathroom to keep the pipes warm.
Tuesday and the water is flowing into the bathroom, but it isn't flowing out. It was -13C last night and now the waste pipe from the sink is frozen. I hear on Solent Radio that they are forecasting a night of -4 for the South of England next week. When you experience that temperature try and imagine it a few degrees colder, then imagine that your heating goes off about two o'clock in the morning, the engineer can't fix the problem till late afternoon. You get the picture; this is what it is like for every family in our village. They have fires like the one we have just installed but they can't be kept in all night, the logs are too expensive to waste and maize cobs don't burn long enough to keep a fire in for a length of time. The kitchen fire is lit in the morning, if it is bread baking day, and that is the only warm room in the house until the sun starts going down when the bedroom fire is lit, if you are lucky enough to have a fire in the bedroom. Often there is just one bedroom with a fire in it and when the weather gets cold everyone sleeps in that room. The people in our village do not have a room like our 'lounge' in England. There is no 'family room', only the small kitchen and bedrooms. All of the kitchens are very basic, a cupboard, a table, a sink, the fire cooker and if you are lucky an old gas cooker. Most kitchens do not have running water, the water is collected from the tap in the yard (which at the moment is frozen so it is back to well water) and stands in the kitchen in a bucket. The water from the sink runs into a bucket to be emptied. The gas cooker is run on bottled gas, and you may remember last year the trouble we had getting gas at one stage; mains gas has just arrived in the towns but I suspect it will be a few years before it gets to the villages. The 'better off' people of the village do have a fridge, but at this time of the year it is switched off, can't waste the electric, it is cold enough in an outside cupboard for anything to be kept, not that there is food to be kept at this time of the year. It was another beautiful day but the sun wasn't strong enough to melt the snow.
Wednesday and no water again. The pipes in the bathroom weren't frozen, but the pipes coming into the building were. I started melting snow again and Lew set about thawing the pipes, luckily it didn't take so long today. The outside pipes are covered with four bales of straw but it hadn't been enough last night. Chip arrived about two o'clock school had been closed for the rest of the week because of some heating problem. He cleared some snow and chopped some wood for us. The post lady arrived today with notification of a parcel to be collected from 'vama' and a couple of Christmas cards.
Thursday and we have to move the van, I have only enough feed for this morning. I spend the morning collecting the ingredients together. Lew and Chip tried to get the van out, it took them about half an hour to get it to Tica's road which has a base of stones and has had cars over it and there is a track down the middle. This afternoon Chip and Lew take the feed to the mill, he texts to say they will be sometime, there is a large queue. Lew doesn't bring the van back up when they get back, he leaves it in Tica's road. I have the water on ready to feed by the time they get back. I had thought we could go and do some shopping and take some photographs after I had fed but Lew said they had problems getting back up the hill to the village because the surface of the road was freezing. We had had several flurries of snow during the day, nothing to speak about but it had gone slushy and now was freezing hard. This evening the first of our carol singers arrived and sung a song in Romanian but they usually finish with 'We wish you a merry Christmas'. We have some loose change saved for the occasion and duly pay for their singing, this year though I pay each child in the group. Last year I gave the money to one person in a group, I later found out they had run off with all the money refusing to share saying it had been given to her. This year I have learnt my lesson.
Friday and we decided to go into Constanta as soon as I had fed this morning. First stop the bank machine to pick up some money, but Lew can't find a place to park, so he drops me off. The first bank machine says it can't complete the transaction, the second machine tells me to contact the bank. Next stop 'vama' to collect the parcel from Sian, the queue is horrendous, I text Lew to warn him I'm going to be ages. Lew comes to see what's up and goes off to take money out of his account so that we can pick up the logs for the fire. Two hours later I am at the front of the queue and hand in my ticket, the post lady goes to find my parcel, then takes me and the parcel to the inspector. The parcel is opened and the contents checked, he is even considering opening the thirty or so Christmas cards that are in the parcel. So I explain that English people send a great many Christmas cards and these were from my daughter to her friends in the village and he accepts that. The gentleman after me has four parcels weighing a total of 70 kilos that is going to take some time to go through. The postlady does not collect the next parcel until the first is cleared through the system; that is why it takes so long. I have had enough for one day, so we decide just to collect the logs on the way home. The first logs place is charging 250 new lei (£50) for a ton of logs, the second 225 new lei (£45). I won't pay that much and we head for home. On our way home we decide to check our wood merchant, his price is 200 new lei (£40) a ton, I don't think we will find a better price and as the logs are being delivered they won't be wet; we buy a ton. The scales weigh up to 500kilos, half a ton, so Lew, Chip and I have to fill the crate with logs twice, then unload them into the van. When we get home Chip wants to unload straight away but we persuade him to wait till tomorrow. The road was beginning to ice again as we came up the hill and Lew thinks we would be silly to go and take the photographs tonight. More carol singers tonight, it is mostly the children that say hello to us all year. Then the church group arrive to sing carols, Sian is on line and enjoys listening to her friends, then she says a quick hello to everyone before they all go back into the cold to another house. All the jobs done I rang the bank to find out what was going on. I had to go through two departments, evidently the first machine registered that it had given me £200 that being my limit for the day the second machine was saying you have had your limit - 'on your bike'. I explained to the nice young man called John on the end of the line that I had not received any money from the first machine. He said not to worry the machine would realise its' mistake and not take the money from my account, but just in case keep an eye on the statement. Ah! Well!
Saturday and Chip arrives to start unloading the van, he wants to chop the logs before they are stacked but I have to much to do today. I need enough straw brought down to last me a couple of days I don't want to be carrying straw about on Christmas day, I do want a bit of a break. Lew and I leave Chip carrying logs (they have to be carried from Tica's road up to the animal housing where they are to be stored till needed). Lew and I go and open up the straw stack, I want eight bedding bales and four feed bales taken down for my use and a bedding bale taken down to John's Granddad, he has a new pig which he wants to keep warm. He came up this morning, he wanted one of my old bales that protect the car from the worst of the weather, but they were wet and frozen and I persuaded him to wait till I could give him a dry one. Lunchtime, it is back into Constanta to do the shopping I hadn't had time to do yesterday. On our way in we spotted the colourful gypsy group making a great deal of noise and singing carols for Christmas. In Constanta we wanted to get a book for Chris for Christmas and I knew just where I could get an English novel, but the shop has closed down - no book for Chris. Lew wanted to get back before the temperature started dropping, so dog and cat supplies bought we headed for home. I swallowed a coffee and left Lew to unload and rushed down to the carol service at the church, I knew I had missed the start but knew I would be able to creep in. But when I got there the church was empty and cold, the fires hadn't been on, so there had been no service here today. I turned and rushed home, feeding was going to be late and the sooner I got started the easier it would be. We had several groups of carol singers while I was feeding and I was fast running out of change. A group of four boys arrived and as I had no change they would have to 'be good' and share, but as I was giving the money out I was told by the boys one of them was the cashier, that was lucky, I gave him the money. I thought I would check the bank statement this evening ... and ... yes, the £200 has been taken from my account. I ring the bank again, they say contact the branch on Wednesday. I do hope I get this sorted out, I'll keep you posted.
Sunday - Christmas Day. This year is more of a low key Christmas than last year when Sian was with us. Of course I have more animals to deal with and they need to be fed and watered whatever day it is. I fed warm food, gave them warm water, gave them their treats (maize stalks with maize cobs attached), swallowed a coffee, grabbed Sian's bundle of Christmas cards and headed for church leaving Lew cooking Christmas dinner. The church was hot, both fires were going full blast and the church was full, I think word had got round that there were Christmas presents again this year. At the end of the service the children were given their presents, they had come from Ireland. I found out that the service yesterday had been in the community centre not in the church, that's why the church was empty and cold. I said 'hello' to all my friends and gave out Sian's cards, then walked home with Laura and Florri, they are expecting John home in the next couple of days. We were asked to go to Madi's for dinner today but 'toast and roast' the Radio Solent Sunday morning program had asked us to say 'Happy Christmas' on air. When I arrived home Lew had the computer already tuned in to Radio Solent, we had a coffee and waited for the telephone to ring, Lew is used to talking on the radio, he has been interviewed many times but if I spoke today it would be my first time on radio ... scary. The telephone rang and Lew spoke to Lee and George (Georgina). I said a quick hello to family at the end, but if you were listening you will know that it was a good thing I didn't have to say any more ... We had dinner then I took our presents down to Anisoara's family, I came back with brawn made specially for Lew, salata made by Florri for us, 'samali' because we didn't get our pig put down for Christmas, and two slices of cake. A quick coffee then off to feed again. I did write most of the diary this evening but as I had drunk a glass of wine, I decided it would be better finished Boxing Day.
What's been happening in the village this week? Well as you can guess it has been all preparation for Christmas. The children didn't officially finish school until Saturday morning but I did notice increasing numbers of children about during the week, so I guess school was empty Saturday morning.
Well I think that's all the news from a snowy Siminoc ...
So I'll say cheerio for now ...
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