Házad lehet bárhol, de hazád csak itt.

I mentioned earlier the lovely messages carved into the gates, here are some examples:

A béjövőnek szállás, a kimenőnek békesség.

Áldás a bémenőnek, üdv a kijövőknek.

Béke a bejövőre, áldás a kimenőre!

Békesség a bemenőknek, egészség a kimenőknek.

Ha e zajló nagyvilágban baj és bánat kerget, jó szándékú szívvel mihozzánk betérhetsz.

Ha jó szándék hoz, e kapun bejöhetsz, különben az úton fel s alá elmehetsz.

Házad lehet bárhol, de hazád csak itt.

Isten hozott. Ha mész, Isten legyen veled.

Jó szívű barát, béjöhetsz.

Őseidnek szent hitéhez, nemzetednek gyökeréhez – testvér – ne légy hűtlen soha.

Szíves vendéglátó e kapu gazdája, de a gonosz embert furkósbottal várja.

Szíves vendéglátó e kapu gazdája, de a gonoszt, álnokot végképpen kizárja.

Szíves vendéglátó e kapu gazdája, ki a fáradt utast tárt karokkal várja.

Térj be hozzánk vándor, ha erre visz az utad, ha jó a szándékod, itt szeretet fogad.

Vándor! Ez a kapu nem akar kizárni, csak azt mutatja meg, merre kell bejárni.

Vándor, ha elfáradsz az élet útján, bizalommal térj be e kapu alatt, ha jó a szándékod, itt szeretet fogad.

Székely Szerelem

Listening: Cortney Tidwell – Don’t Let Stars Keep Us Tangled Up

I’m so glad I got the opportunity to come here; I really never contemplated just how beautiful it could be, despite everyone telling me so.

Since I’ve been in Europe I’ve constantly felt like a child who’s seeing and experiencing everything for the first time. I find myself excitedly examining the architecture, the landscapes, the plants and the people everywhere I go. ..

I fall silent,

Words pass by me as I stand there quiet,

Like the helpless flame by a haystack after a storm,

The conversation dies without a say, or a word.

Racing eyes to the beat of a pumping heart,

The longing for the moment to never part.

…and I’m usually unable to hold a conversation with anyone for more than a few seconds.

Here I get this feeling tenfold.

Everything, and I mean everything, about this place fascinates me. The intricate carvings on the gates, featuring patterns and shapes telling stories of a time before. The friendly and welcoming messages of love and peace carved into the arches for visitors and passers by who take the time to read them. The horse-drawn-carts being pulled up the steep rocky roads carrying the days labour by smiling moustache-men, who wave as they pass you by. The range of different houses, the very old and weathered to those currently being built, all showing a great deal of appreciation for the aesthetics, maintain the feel of the village. The sloping surrounding landscape and the horisons of untouched forests offering shelter to the villages and towns hiding in and amongst them. The people, all full of life and jokes, smiling some of the biggest smiles I’ve ever seen, speaking a different Hungarian than I’m used to: Székely Hungarian. And perhaps most of all the fact that a Hungarian, well Székely, town still exists almost untouched and almost uninfluenced by Romania like most of Erdély. The people here are strong, and have had to be strong as their historical role was to defend Hungary from the Ottomans. They are proud of their heritage, proud to be doing things their way… and have no intention of changing.

Röad to Székelyföld

Listening: Quimby - Keresés

On the road to Székelyföld. Currently passing through the golden brown valleys and rolling countryside that is Erdély in the Autumn. It’s probably one of the most picturesque places I’ve ever been to. Following the serpentine, sloping roads was just as exciting as it was beautiful, and at the same time I felt a degree of disappointment that we couldn’t spend more times there. I guess it’s better this way because I would never leave the hidden villages that occupy this area. We stopped at the top of one of the hills and I took a few photos. The colours are just so warm that I didn’t even notice the 8 degree cold outside.

I’m spending the next week with my father’s highschool friend and his family. They have relatives deep in Romania, in Székelyföld, who apparently live in a small village. I’m really looking forward to it; I’ve heard lots of nice things about that area from everyone who’s been there.

On the way we decided to take a newly built highway, it currently spans about 50km but we saved a bit of time. Unfortunately it meant we bypassed Kolozsvár, a city I’ve heard lots of great things about and have been wanting to visit for ages. The highway ended at the foot of the most dilapidated city I’ve ever seen before, Turda. There had been a massive war in Turda in 1940 and it almost still seemed like the aftermath. Every building seemed to have a wall that was about to collapse, and I even saw a group of gypsies hacking away at a building with sledge hammers. Everything that was made or built recently looked like it was thrown together, and it was a matter of swerving from one side of the road to the other to avoid the massive pot holes that covered the face of the road.

We passed a ridiculous amount of Gypsy Castles on the way too, massive 5 story mansions with silver roofs, arched windows and statues of lions.

They were the tackiest pieces of work I’ve ever seen. Weirdest thing was that hardly any of them were finished, and you could see that they were living the normal gypsy lives they were used to on the bottom floor, or out the back in a thrown together shack. My Dads friend told me they had been in the unfinished state for years, and a big 2003 in silver letters at the top of one of them confirmed this.
This raises a lot of questions, and it would interesting to find out what exactly is going on, although I’m fairly certain I already understand…

Anyway, once we passed Turda we again entered the beautiful rolling country side, this time passing through the unique Székely villages. There was quite a difference between these villages and the ones out closer to Hungary. None of these villages had the Romanian flag displayed on every single lamp post, and every shop or building that had writing on it, had it first in Hungarian, and second in Romanian. A lot of the time things were only displayed in Hungarian, and as we got further into Székelyföld it became evident that only the official signs were written in Romanian. Even the advertisements on the side of the roads were in Hungarian. Rovás Írás was also used on a number of signs and buildings to my surprise. The interesting thing about Székelyföld was the houses. Although they were all typical looking village houses, they all had such beautiful gates. These gates, the Székely gates (Székelykapuk), were carefully hand carved with different patterns and motifs. This combined with the breathtaking hills and golden brown patterned trees had my face pressed against the window the whole way there.

We eventually arrived in the village of Oroszhegy, next to Székelyudvarhely, when the cows came home. Literally. It took about 20 minutes to drive a hundred meters down the street. It was a massive laugh though.

Once we arrived where we were staying, we were greeted with open arms and open bottles of pálinka.

Éjfél szenvedély

Listening to: PJ Harvey - To Bring You My Love

Its too late to start a blog now. Both sense of the word late. Its after 12, I need to be up at 5 because we’re leaving (currently in Tápiószecső, a village about an hour out of Budapest, Hungary) to Székelyföld (Romania). Its also late in that Im about half way through my European trip, and I wouldve had a lot of nice stuff to write about.

I’ll write about some of the things that I’ve done and experienced on my trip on this blog at some point. I’ve kept a diary up until August… But life got way too hectic and I found it hard to write down everything that I wanted to. I really enjoyed writing it while I did, and up until now (I purchase a little laptop man) I had every intention of sitting down for a good deal of time, sometime soon, and updating it to this present day.

Fortunately since Ive got this laptop, production levels are said to increase by about 80%, whilst, unfortunatley, decreasing the level of quality. Hence being able to blabber on like this for as long as I want without getting a hand cramp or the fear of running out of pages.

Basically I cant sleep right now. Too much on the mind. And now that I have this laptop I can put some thoughts down, while lying in bed, listening to music AND talking to friends back home in Aus on fb.

Im going to end this now, so goodnight dear readers. Ha!

Useless first entry,

Josh