Summary

On way way down to Cluj-Napoca airport (about an hour and a half away, although we took a longer and more circuitous route) I did a quick count of the past fortnight. I had one day off, and over the remaining 13 days spoke at 24 meetings (for an average of 75 minutes each time) and had meals in numerous homes. In each case I was speaking though an interpreter, which reduces the effective teaching content by 50%, but I suggest doesn't reduce the teaching demands because every pause awaiting translation one feels like a coiled spring shaping the next set of words, ready for release once the interpreter has finished the previous sentence. Everything one says has to be considered because many figures of speech and idioms in the English language may not be understood by the interpreter, so a simpler version needs to be used, or the idiom needs to be explained as it is used.

At the end of the trip I feel that it has been enormously worthwhile, exhausting (the latter enhanced by the cold I picked up a week ago), a fascinating and enjoyable learning experience. I've been invited back and can't wait to go again.

Some things I've learned:

1. The garlic sauce is much stronger than it looks
2. Transilvania IS beautiful.
3. The people are welcoming and extremely hospitable.
4. The best way to remove the taste of garlic sauce is to eat raw onion.
5. Solid white lines in the middle of roads are purely for decorative purposes.
6. We all carry the burden of our history and culture and need to recognise that.
7. I'd like to see Transilvania again once the leaves come out.
8. The best way to remove the taste of raw onion is to eat some garlic sauce.
9. Wizz Air, the only airline flying from the UK to Cluj Napoca is a very efficient and friendly airline (but don't exceed your baggage allowance).
10. You'll spend a lot of time laughing with Transilvanians.
11. You ought to like meat.
12. Some things are extraordinarily cheap, but still expensive compared to the wages.
13. To learn Romanian, it's important to know the changes that various accents make to the sounds of letters.  For example, ș is a 'sh' sound.
14. Especially pork (see 11).
15. Some of those sounds are difficult to make because they are not in a normal Englishman's repertoire.
16. Many homes or apartments have a one or two bedrooms, but most sofas convert into a bed, and living rooms are frequently used as a bedroom.
17. Singing hymns (which process at about a quarter of the speed of normal conversation) is a great way to practice the pronunciation.
18. I want to return.

Special Thanks to:

• Mike Davis for introducing me to Mircea & Dan last Summer
• Joan and the team from the Ron Hellyer Foundation for letting me join them for the first week, and for providing really helpful advice before travelling and once on the ground.
• The Board of Maranatha Missions for their invitation.
• Mircea, Maria, Emil & Dina Peaștean who endured 3 adult guests at great inconvenience to their normal sleeping arrangements
• Mircea, who tirelessly organised, drove, interpreted and kept things organised.
• Lucien, Dina & Emil who also interpreted for us and did some translation work as well.
• Jon MacMorland of ProCopy Printing in Chichester who turned around some Romanian translation work and produced a great glossy manual at short notice.
• You, if you've read this far in the blog.
• God, who arranged the whole thing.