If you ever end up in a place where the railway ends, where a mixed community of Hungarians, Seklers, Romanians, Gipsies ruffles feathers every once in a while, where the country's majority lives as a minority - you're probably in Parajd.

I was born in the biggest city of Western Romania - Timişoara. I never much liked living there - the place I call home is Parajd, a town in the heart of Transylvania, or Erdély. I grew up there, and absorbed almost everything that made me who I am. My mother is a bánáti - a city girl - from Timişoara. My father is a Sekler (székely) to the core; he comes from a small town in Mureş county. They met in Parajd - she was teaching him English. At one point they decided that they were right for each other, got married, and settled down in Parajd where both of them had jobs. That was more than 25 years ago. They never left, despite my father's one-time attempt to move to Hungary, and my mother's constant homesickness. Due to its location in one of the highest Hungarian-populated counties in Romania, my hometown can be proud of having not one, but two names. In Hugarian it is Parajd. Officially, as it appears on the map, it is Praid.

'Where a big black hole at the bottom of a hill leads you into a 'salted world'... beyond imagination and where one doesn't necessarily have to make any body movement to be able to stay at the surface of the water'

One of Parajd's famous treasures - from Roman times - is a hill of salt, which bears in its immense womb a renowned salt mine. The mine is open to the public for health and tourism. Its emptied galleries have ice-like flooring, salted sand pits, gigantic walls which can be tasted, dim lighting, constant temperature. Though this place is deep down in the ground, it doesn't lack a sense of spirituality and faith. It hosts a unique ecumenical chapel right there, where no-one would expect one to be. One shouldn't be shy about saying prayers here, or letting go of wishful thoughts. They will certainly break through the tough surfaces and reach for the skies. And because in a salted world everything has to be of salt, there is a salted canyon on the hillside and salted lakes, which attract lots of carefree tourists and locals. From personal experience, the lakes are great for people who want to learn swimming, ruthless should you go underwater - the eyes burn unpleasantly.

'Where everybody seems to know everybody and gossip spreads like spores in air, where neighbours chatting over the fence is an everyday activity, where the building of a new home or the digging of a new well is an opportunity for relatives, friends, and neighbours to gather, where conflict of interests and pride pave the way to development'

The curse of small towns is that you can't move without somebody noticing and building up a pretty little story to chew over at coffee with the next-door neighbour. Ordinary people's lives can be remarkable: a few hours at your hairdresser can do miracles. You walk in knowing nothing; you walk out well-informed and impatient to share - the new haircut is not that important. You don't need soap-operas here. You have someone over for a drink, or find a reason to call your neighbour to the fence, go to the weekly market or any of the shops, and in no time you'll hear all the news about whoever you're most interested in - it's as simple as that. Small benches on the main road outside the fronts of houses are a common sight. They serve the noble purpose of evening chit-chat rendezvouses. Days are for work, evenings for feeding people's passion for conversation.

'Where life follows its normal cycle without too much fuss, where storks bring the spring and babies, where the fields, the hills, the mountains, the forests, the springs and streams, the harvest, the trees, the sun and the rain are sacred, where it always tolls at noon... where the rooster still proudly predicts the beginning of a new day and cows march down in front of the houses on their way to the rich meadows, where the headlines are births, deaths, and weddings, where suicidal genes take away some precious lives from time to time'

Regardless of what is going on in the big world, life here is simple - as if sheltering from storms. My memories of the 1989 Revolution are of candles placed in windows and heavy silence. What you don't talk about doesn't affect you. Or if you talk, do it behind closed doors. It's not ignorance: it's self-defence. Even having lived in England now for a year-and-a-half, I'm used to regular phone calls from my sister telling me the important events occurring back home: who's died, who's got married, who's with who, who's pregnant. At first I kept telling her that I wasn't interested, then I accepted it. Credit doesn't count: it's worth it. People need to know what is going on, however banal.

'Where a community of self-effacing intellectuals tenaciously work on nurturing new generations, where talented nestlings are born, raised, and fed with the 'food of dreams', so they can then spread their wings and take their flight one day into exploring new territories, where writers and artists found their homes and inspiration'

In the Communist years, the system of placements brought to fairly remote places like Parajd a significant number of highly-educated teachers, doctors, engineers, and priests. My parents were part of this wave. Luckily most of them found living there agreeable enough to grow roots. Thanks to that, people were educated, taken care of and spiritually guided, all to a high standard. Seeing outstanding results and achievements of the new generations is extremely rewarding for the professionals who gave up their career-dreams and stylish lives in cities to come here and work hard on educating children thirsty - or not - for knowledge.

'Where every third house is a welcoming pension and walking down the streets you can smell the spicy zests of Sekler cuisine, where every Easter Monday young girls and women are sprinkled with water or perfume, for them not to fade as flowers, where stuffed cabbage is a 'celebrity'... where for Pentecost children sing songs on the streets about peonies, where killing the pig in wintertime is an important social event, where at Christmas time the snow crunches underneath the steps heading to the traditional mass'

Parajd has got all the right ingredients for it to be an attractive tourist destination. Its picturesque location, its steadfastness towards maintaining the traditions, and last but not least the sincere hospitability of its locals, welcomes visitors throughout the whole year. All four seasons offer a memorable insight into the Sekler way of living and diverse culture. It would be a sin not to mention the fascinating flavours of Sekler cuisine. Once you have tried them, the robust, savoury, well-spiced-up, glorious specialties leave your taste buds longing. One of the most popular dishes of this region is the stuffed cabbage (töltött káposzta). As simple and profane as it may sound if made in the proper Sekler way, with sufficiently ripe sourkraut, it can cause a long-lasting eating revelation. For many years now, my home-town has hosted what's famous in the area as The Cabbage Festivities, where the main feature is the stuffed cabbage cooking competition. It draws master-creators of this dish from Romania, Moldova and Hungary.

'Where priests fight over the role of godfather to a child, where a young girl reads one book after another and dreams about making a difference in the world one day while watching over some sheep grazing the grass on the hillside'

There are three churches in Parajd: Roman Catholic, Reformed, Orthodox. Not that there are many Orthodox believers here, but in Romania every place of respectable size has to have an Orthodox church. My family is mixed in religion. My father is a proud Reformed, my mother is Catholic. They are not the very-strong-believer type, but in marriage this is one of the things which needs to be settled. The deal was: if she's a girl, she will be Catholic, after my mum; if he's a boy, he will be Reformed, after my father; and they only wanted two children. I was the elder, and baptised a Catholic. After four years, my sister was born. My father argued that, as there wouldn't be another child, the family would look better if mixed in equal amounts. My mum allowed this, so my sister is Reformed. Everything went well until, 17 years after I was born, there was the surprise of my brother - he's now ten. I've never seen my parents quarrel as hard as when they tried to decide what religion he should have - it was a domestic catastrophe. There were promises, flattery, threats and tears. Because the laws of nature prevail, the strongest wins: my brother became a Reformed. But that wasn't all. As both the Catholic and the Reformed priests were good family friends of ours, they both took their parts in the row. After the big decision was made, the two noble men didn't speak for a while. Unbelievable.

So, if you ever end up in a place where the railway ends, where a mixed community of Hungarians, Seklers, Romanians, Gipsies ruffles feathers every once in a while, where the country's majority lives as a minority - there is no doubt. You are in Parajd.

END

(c) Andrea Kiss - 22 August 2008

Andrea Kiss is a writer living in London

Photos of Parajd are here: www.praid.ro/en_foto.htm