When I read this:
Veniti cu toti eompreuna Sa va dau tuica de pruna Sa bet din acest pahar Sa va treaca de amar Va dau tuica din Butoi Si din unu ii videa doi Pin-am trait in vecie Am avut si palincie Toate acestea le lasai La 54 de ani.
Come ye all together, I’ll give you plum brandy, Drink this glass To forget your sorrows I’ll give you brandy from the barrel, Instead of one, you’ll see double. When I was alive I used to make strong brandy I left all this When I was 54.
(Translated into English by Anca Mihailescu)
or this:
“Eu aici ma odihnesc Moldovan Gheorghe ma numesc Cit in lume mi-am trait Cu caii mult am muncit Si-acum vin pe cal calare Aduc lemne de vanzare La omul care nu are Iar drumu mi-sa umbrit Ca iute eu l-am parasit Am venit la hodinit As fi vrut sa mai traiesc Nu sa vin sa putrezesc Lumea asta o lasai La 59 de ai Mr. 1986.”
“This is were I rest Moldovan Gheorghe is my name. I worked a lot with horses As long as I lived And now I come on a horse back To bring firewood for sale To those that have none. But I have come to the end of the road And have come to rest I would have liked to live longer And not come here to rot. I left this world at age of 59. Died in 1986.”
(Translated into English by Anca Mihailescu)
” I was smiling. There is nothing wrong with smiling, is there? But what about if you’re in a cemetery & these are written on the cross of the people who passed away? This is how it is at Merry Cemetery a totally unique place situated in Sapanta, county Maramures, NW of Romania.
People’s short stories like short fables, tragic stories are told with humor. This is what this place is about & what makes it unique is making fun-smiling about the end, our end & adding humor where usually there is only tears, pain & black.
I visited this place in the fall of 2004 & I had the opportunity to interview the artist who’s creating the crosses & the short poems. He is the second generation of folk artists, the woodcarver responsible for creating Sapantza’s Merry Cemetery.
download (19 MB) The Merry Cemetary Part 1
Born in 1908, the creator of Sapantza, Stan Ioan Patras (pronounced PA-trash) went to school for four years. At the age of fourteen, he started to wood carving for a little bit of extra income. Around 1934-35 he conceived the style of crosses painted with a short epitaph. For the colors of the crosses he used natural color dyes used in the local folk weaving.
Dumitru Pop, the folk artist who continues the Merry Cemetery tradition started to work with his master at age of nine. After Stan Ioan Patras died, Dumitru POP moved in his house and continued to work creating crosses until the present.
I asked Dumitru Pop if in creating the cross he is involving the family of the deceased. He told me that all the time he is creating a proposal for how the cross will look and the family approves it before he’s begin to make the cross.
download (62 MB) The Merry Cemetary Part 2
Walking between crosses & graves, reading & smiling, met the person who is buried there, connected through the text from the cross for him/her & his/her family transformed the cemetery walking into a peripatetic walk & deep transformative experience. Death is part of our lives. How we relate to it is part of our life journey.
Notes:
Book: Sapanta Le Cimetiere Joyeux/ The Merry Cemetery Editions Hesse, 1991
Location: Sapanta (pronounced Sa-pan-tza) is a little village in Maramures (pronounced Ma-ra-mu-resh), an incredible well conserved ethnographic region situated in North West of Romania.
If you want to travel to Maramures, I recommend Nord Nord Vest Travel Agency: http://www.nnv.ro I found it on the net & contacted Dan Comanescu who was very kind & really helpful in finding what we really were looking for. Our experiences there was WONDERFUL.