Well yesterday was Easter for Hungarians, Germans and pretty much all the foreigners here in Romania but for the Orthodox church that won’t happen until next Sunday. A useful word to know here in Romania at this time of year is denie (denny-eh) which refers specifically and only to the Orthodox masses held each day during the week before Easter (aka this week right now). … Continue reading Word of the Day: Denie
You know sometimes I forget that some of my readers are at the very first rung of the ladder in terms of understanding Romania and the Romanian language. I had someone ask me the other day about an extremely common phrase. Time to cover the basics! When saying “thank you” the common way to say it (which applies to most situations) in Romanian is multumesc … Continue reading Word of the Day: Thank Ya Very Much
One of the more fun things you can do in the Romanian language is spontaneously create adjectives from acronyms. One of my favorite is “otevist”, which you won’t find in any dictionary but means “of or relating to OTV” based on the way those letters are pronounced in Romanian (o te vi + st). OTV is short for Oglinda TV or “Mirror” television. It is … Continue reading Word of the Day: Otevist
Today I happened to be passing by Piata Unirii here in beautiful but frozen Unicorn City and I briefly stopped and watched the circa 50 protesters do their thing, surrounded on all sides by bored but ever vigilant security officers. My brain working the inexplicable way it does, all of this got me to thinking about one of the rare compound words in Romanian that … Continue reading Word of the Day: Girofar
Well today (Thursday) is probably the greatest of all American holidays, translated into Romanian as Ziua Reconstintei but known in English as Thanksgiving. There’s a lengthy explanation of the origin of the holiday at the link (goes to Wikipedia) but there are some details missing, some of which I’ll elaborate on in a moment. Putting it very succinctly, a group of Europeans who had emigrated … Continue reading Word of the Day: Slava
All Things Romania 