Dear friends, I hope all is well with you!

Since this year has been so strange and unusual so far, changing everyone’s life, forcing us to reconsider what we took for granted…I’ve realized more than ever how lucky I was, being able to welcome guests to my city and country, shake their hands, share a conversation and a meal together, and a hug at the end…
So now that I miss you, I felt the need to get in touch with you, and tell you how grateful I feel to have met each and everyone of you. Thank you!

As the Orthodox Easter is near, I would like to do something I don’t normally do -share with you a few of my cherished Easter memories.

Easter is a big thing in Romania that involves a lot of preparation, and families reunite for the occasion. In my family, the tradition is to take a little holiday somewhere beautiful in the mountains, where we do walks in the nature, prepare our food and have picnics, eat lamb (traditional Easter food in Romania), catch up and just enjoy the time together.

Sometimes on Easter we revisit the birth place of my mom or my father, occasion to meet up with the extended family members we don’t get to see very often.

It all gets very special when the young ones who live abroad return home in Romania to spend Easter with the family.

Here are a few special, personal family pics from different Easters:

Family trip memory photo, Bran Village area, Easter 2012

Emotional return -my mom in front of her childhood house, now abandoned, in her native village in Oltenia region, Easter 2013

At the village cemetery where my grandparents rest, Easter 2013

In the garden, catching up  -Easter 2013

My mom and daughter in Cismigiu Garden, Bucharest, Easter 2016 -my daughter who lives abroad came home to Romania for Easter

Memory photo -me with my mom during our family trip in Apuseni Mountains, Easter 2018

Our Easter Sunday breakfast table, Easter 2018

With my close family during trip in the beautiful Varghis Gorges Nature Reserve,  Transylvania, Easter 2019

I would very much like to hear from you how you spend the Easter/Passover.

Wishing you a Happy and Peaceful Easter!