Birthday Extravaganza

Since I have been in Moldova, there have been a lot of weird birthday coincidences. The first of which is that my “host-niece” Paula and I have the same birthday, November 30. Last Friday, I came home and my host-sister asked my if I wanted to watch her prepare the pie. She says pie, but she does not mean pie like we think of it in the US, she means the yummy flaky stuffed pastry: Placenta (pronounced Plachenta). I then learned that they were preparing the Placenta for my host mom's birthday party the following night. Now my host mom's birthday just happens to be on July 10th . My actual mom's birthday is on July 9th, so with the time difference their birthdays overlapped for about 10th hours. (I later learned that my Hincesti's host mom's birthday is on July 8th. ) So I then remembered to call my real mom (actually I called her and told her to call me back because I can't afford to call the United States on my Peace Corps salary.) and wish her a happy birthday.

Now back to the pies...

So my host-sister was making the pies, which is she makes look really easy when in fact it is pretty difficult. When I started watching the pie making process, my host-sister had the dough already prepared. I asked her what was in the dough and surprisingly it has all the normal dough ingredients except one...Apple Vinegar. I guess the closet thing I have seen in the US is Apple Cider Vinegar. Anyway...she made four different types of pies, Varza (Cabbage/the best kind), Brinza de Vaca (cheese from cow's milk), Brinza de Oaie (cheese from sheep's milk) and Visine (sour cherries). Below are a few pictures and a video of the pie making process







In total my family prepared an insane amount of food. There were plates with appetizers that involved mayonnaise, cucumber and cheese; other appetizers that involved mayonnaise, eggplant and tomato; and fried cauliflower. They prepared other plates with cucumber, tomato and cheese. Here are a few pics:





They also prepared sarmale made with cabbage leaves and peppers (the closest thing I can think of to sarmale are dolmas, but they are not really that similar.) There was a salad with beets, fish and mayonnaise (sounds gross, but all you could taste was the mayonnaise.) The most interesting dish was “rachator (I am not sure exactly the name or spelling, but I think this is close)” which is chicken in jelly that is made from the chicken. I am not sure exactly how the meat-gel process works, but it basically tastes like cold chicken and salty jello. Also, there were sweet crepes with banana and apricots in the middle and cake, which was really like a giant version of those wafer cookies that have several layers of frosting. In total, there was more food than I have ever seen at a single party in my entire life!!

The party started at 7:00, or 19:00 as they would say in Moldova. From the time the party started, I understood almost nothing that happened. Everyone was drinking shots of what they told me was tequila. However, it appeared to be homemade, so I question the accuracy of this statement (mainly because I am pretty sure Agave does not grow in Moldova). I had wine. Then everyone ate about half of the food and toasted to everyone and everything. At this point my favorite member of my host-family's extended family, who I refer to as Verisoara Ana, asked me if I felt like dancing. I said, “yes” and we started dancing, then everyone started dancing. My host brother and host sister started pouring shots for and handing food to the people dancing. This went on for quite sometime. I went to bed about midnight and the party was still going strong. I had previously told my host mom she was making a ton of food, so on my way inside, my host mom pointed out to me that all the food was gone and she should have made more. I was absolutely astounded at the amount that my host mom and her sister could drink. I think they could put frat boys to shame (No Joke). On top of that my host mom was up before me the next morning to make me breakfast. Wow!!!