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Romania is a country with a long and complicated history. It also has a variety of customs, traditions and holidays. Some of the holidays are celebrated throughout the whole country; others are designated for specific regions of the country.
Situated in the southeastern part of central Europe, Romania can trace its origins to the Thracian Dacian period. The Romanian traditions have retained myths and rites from that age, thus drawing Romania close to the cradle of the European culture. In particular, the Romanian culture resembles that of eastern Mediterranean regions.
The Romanian holidays have preserved the foundations of family structure and organizations, as well as the patterns defining social groups. The holidays reflect rules of behavior that originated in the Roman and Byzantine civilization.
The Romanian folklore developed within the borders of the two great regions of European civilization--the west and the southeast. Over the centuries, the Romanian people crystallized their own popular culture. This culture expresses the need for communication between man and nature, between man and man, and among different human groups.
The Romanian customs have also been an instrument in the exchange of goods, services and information. Matrimonial ceremonies exemplify the customs in a specific way.
The Romanian practice of faith and spirituality have been in synchrony and in harmony with aspects of popular trades and facets of Romanian geography.
The Romanian holidays, while diversified by regional traditions, have common threads running through them. The same unity can be found in the traditions and customs throughout the country. They include the Christian holidays. Since Romania is mainly and Eastern Orthodox country, this form of Christianity permeates the spirit of the holidays, with other themes such as the seasons or common trades being blended within religious themes.
Two main groups of people appear in the expression of Romanian customs: those who are living and the ancestors who receded them. Romanian culture carefully preserves the memory of ancestral peoples.
The focus of most Romanian spirituality is found in each village. The trades of the villages were mainly agricultural. Romanians traditionally were farmers who worked the land, kept vineyards, raised cattle or lived as shepherds.
Spring and summer were known as the time to work the land. Autumn represented the harvest and winter was dedicated to the formation of artistic creativity or spiritual growth.
Delicate, graceful and sober--the popular art of Romania was preserved by the village. Village leaders assumed the tasks of guarding the originality, individuality and permanency of artisans' work.
The nature of the village was driven to be in strict harmony with the natural environment of the entire country. Today, traveling throughout Romania, one can be pleasantly surprised when observing the extent to which one village differs from another village in terms of their general outlook. These differences underscore not only the cultural influences of a location, but also the specific details of the land surrounding a village.
Villages existed with a life of their own. The life of the village expressed an intense thirst for life by the inhabitants of Romania. Peasants possessed a deep knowledge of the way to tend the earth. They had the ability to enjoy life and to dream into the future. They were regular observers of the feasts for the earth, their cattle, the flowers and crops, and the overall beauty of living.
The Romanian customs can be divided into family customs, calendar-based customs and religious customs. They represent a "triptych" marked by the three major life changes: birth, marriage and death.
I posted this for you in order to better understand Romanian people spirit and soul, two very important components of our life. These are things very seldom present in newspapers or any kind of "senzational"
For all of you with lots of friendship and simpathy.
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