Festivus for the Rest-of-us

There is a feeling of constant movement in the air. The feeling where, although you sit perfectly still and nothing is moving around you, something stirs inside. And no, it's not your bowels. The humdrum of life beats in your ears and brain.

The reason for this feeling in Sighisoara is that a huge festival has begun. It lasts the entire weekend and I'm sure that thousands of people will come through the city before it's over. There are people constantly around our house, out back on the path outside of our gate, in front looking at historical towers, taking pictures of our stairwell (because apparently it's photogenic). The citadel (center of town) is hardly recognizable. There are stands lining everything that even remotely resembles a wall loaded with gobs of stuff that nobody really needs. Many times you pass a stand that you thought you saw "back there" (a lot of them have the same stuff). Stages are set up all over the place with traditional music and dance. As you walk through the stands your stomach will most likely begin to growl because of the permeating smells of food stands. You would expect life to feel cheery and uplifting at an event like this and most of the time...it does. Then you take a few steps forward and run smack into someone wearing all black with black makeup and long black hair. Freaky? Yeah just a bit. You see, this is a "midieval festival". Therefore it's entertaining and somewhat frightening. =]

Anyway, that is what's going on this weekend. We spent this past week trying to get our house up and running. We're still having a few technical difficulties and the time it takes to straighten them out is much longer in Romania. But, while running errands all over town I managed to take a few photos. (Those are posted at the top of this one.)