Gypsy Trip Romania & Moldova

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Post published:Wednesday September 12th, 2018
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Gypsy Trip Romania & Moldova

Let your prejudices aside and come to celebrate this exclusive feast, because to celebrate is what the gypsies do best. This trip presents the complex image of one of the most interesting and personalized ethnicity from Romania: the Gypsies.
We will discover the world of an ethnic group that strongly individualized through traditional features that had done in a small degree to integrate in Romanian society of those times and continues to experience difficulties in adjusting to new realities and requirements arising from EU membership.

Day 1: Arrival in Bucharest, the capital of Romania. If time allows a short city tour can be organized. Bucharest will be the first point where we will start to discover the Gypsy World. You may even stumble upon a Gypsy band in one of Bucharest’s beautiful city squares. If such is the case, you’d be hard pressed not to take part in the joyful dancing that always accompanies such impromptu concerts. You can get a taste for the vibrancy of Roma culture – and surely you’ll get a strong sense of how gypsy culture is rooted deep within Romania’s history. In the evening a meeting with a local personality of gypsies’ will take place and you will have the chance to discuss over dinner about their history and culture. Check-in.

Day 2: Early departure to Sighisoara, the only inhabited medieval citadel, the Rothenburg of Eastern Europe. The next stop will be in Viscri, where we will discuss about Prince Charles projects regarding the gypsy communities in Transylvania and have lunch. Arrival in Sighisoara. Dinner and check-in.

Day 3: In the morning we will enjoy the city tour of Sighisoara – the place of Dracula’s birth and the best preserved medieval citadel of Romania – part of the UNESCO patrimony. After the sightseeing we will drive to Visit the gypsies from Valeni. Here we will try a traditional gypsy lunch and Barbeque and we will enjoy the traditional gypsy life. Afternoon we continue to Reghin. Check-in.

Day 4: Today we will visit the Gypsies from Apalina, lunch with them and continue to Bacau. In the district of Apalina, situated in the suburbs of the Municipality of Reghin, live 466 gypsy families, but not at all a easy life. People from there succeed to survive from the social help delivered by the City Hall and also by collecting recyclable materials. Here we will visit a family that is involved in Horse breeding. Check-in at the hotel in Bacau.

Day 5: Lunch in the neighborhood of Bacau where we will listen the gypsy fanfare – a brass band of Gypsy heritage. Music is a very important part of their life. They attend all the important moments in the village life such as weddings, baptisms, funerals and all the other family or community celebrations. The musicians are men and their instruments have been passed on from father to son for generations. Roma being involved in performing at the weddings have always represented an important link in economic and social life of the local community. Further we continue to Botosani city. Dinner and check-in.

Day 6: Full day dedicated to the Blacksmiths, Lingurari (producers of domestic products of wood tools) and musicians at Stefanesti. Formerly also an important jewish center, Stefanesti exhibits a very interesting mix of the 2 Roma groups plus Jewish remains and influences. Return to the hotel.

Historically gypsies were divided as follows:

– “rudari” or goldsmiths, were dealing to pursuit the gold in rivers;
– “ursari”, who wandered the country with their bears;
– “lingurari” dealing with domestic products of wood tools;
– “laiesii” who were blacksmiths, builders, manufacturers of combs, were small thefts. They did not have stable housing, living in tents and wandered the country in order to get the bare necessities of life.

Day 7: Today we departure to Moldova. We are going to visit Soroca – the Gypsy “capital” of the Republic of Moldova with a sizable Gypsy minority settled here. First of all we will visit the fortress which is a unique monument of defensive architecture of Europe. Then we will continue visiting the “Gypsies’ hill” where we will get acquainted with local sightseeing -“Palaces” where the gypsies live. Here you will have a tremendous possibility to visit a gypsy family owner of a bakery, to get familiarized with the gypsies’ way of life and, certainly, to try the dishes of traditional Gypsy cuisine. In the afternoon, we start to the Chateau Vartely. Here we will have an excursion around the complex, visit the wine factory, have the wine tasting and finally have dinner in traditional Moldovan or European style. Check-in.

**Monument Thanksgiving Candle, Soroca**

Day 8: After breakfast and check-out we invite you to discover TIRASPOL (capital of Transnistria) – the old USSR is still alive and well in Transnistria. It is a breakaway territory within the internationally recognized borders of Moldova. Here we will enjoy a brandy tasting and lunch. During the city tour we will stop at different monuments in the city and if time permits visit the Football Academy. Afternoon departure to Chisinau, check-in and then we will depart by bus to have a wine tasting in the underground wine city Milestii Mici, registered in the Guinness Book of Records for being the biggest Wine Collection in the world. It contains over two million bottles of wine highly appreciated by the winemakers from all over the world. The wines lie right there, at a depth of 80 meters, in bottles covered with dust and mold, in small elegant houses which are completed every year. Return to our hotel.