Posts filed under ‘_New_Year’
Winter Holidays in Romania
In Romania we celebrate Saint Nicholas Day, Christmas and New Year.
Saint Nicholas Day is celebrated on the night of December 5th, when children are cleaning and polishing their boots carefully and put them by the door or on the windowsill to wait for St. Nicholas’ (Moş Nicolae) visit. He is generous to parents as well as children, putting a little present in each boot. In some areas, branches or thin twigs are left as a warning that behavior needs to improve. It is one of the most important Romanian holidays.
Christmas is known as ‘Crăciun‘ in Romania and is celebrated on December 25th. The celebrations begin with the decoration of the Christmas Tree on Ajunul Craciunului (Christmas Eve). Romanian children receive presents from Moş Crăciun (Santa Claus) in the evening of Christmas Eve and do not leave milk and cookies out for Moş Crăciun.
Carols, called ‘colinde‘ in Romanian, are a very important part of the Romanian Christmas festivities. Throughout the Christmas season, children visit every house in the neighborhood singing carols such as Steaua sus răsare (The Star) and Moş Crăciun (Santa Claus) and reciting traditional poems and legends. In return for such performances, carolers receive apples, nuts, traditional cakes (cozonaci), and sometimes even money from each house.
Traditional Romanian Christmas meals include saramale (stuffed cabbage rolls) with mămăligă (polenta), many types of pork sausages, roast pork, pickles, beef salad. The traditional Christmas dessert is called “cozonac”. It is a rich sweet bread filled with ground walnuts, raisins,dried fruits, similar to the Italian panettone. It requires a long preparation time that begins early on the morning of Christmas Eve.
Romanians welcome the New Year with the traditions that have been around for centuries. The children as well as the adults, take part in the joyous celebrations with great enthusiasm. On New Year’s Eve in Romania, children sing Sorcova and Pluguşorul. The songs wish good luck, happiness and success.
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SEE ALSO: CHRISTMAS CUSTOMS IN ROMANIA
Romanian Winter Season Traditions
Spending the winter holidays in Romania: local traditions
Sorcova
Merry Sorcova,
May your health be strong
And your life long:
As an apple tree,
As a pear stately,
As a rose bush fair,
Blossoming beyond compare.
Strong as a granite rock,
Quick as an arrow’s shock,
Hard as an iron bar,
Tougher than steel by far.
Over summer, over spring,
May your health be great.
A New Year with happiness
And in everything success.
“Sorcova” is a special bouquet used for New Year’s wishes early New Year’s morning. Children wish people a “Happy New Year!” while touching them lightly with this bouquet. After they have wished a Happy New Year to the members of their family, the children go to the neighbors and relatives. Traditionally, the “Sorcova” bouquet was made up of one or several fruit – tree twigs (apple-tree, pear-tree, cherry-tree, plum-tree); all of them are put into water, in warm place, on November 30th (St. Andrew’s Day), in order to bud and to blossom on New Year’s Eve.
Nowadays people often use an apple-tree or pear-tree twig decorated with flowers made up of colored paper. The children receive all kinds of treats such as: cakes, honeycombs, biscuits, pretzels, candies, nuts and, of course, small gifts of money. We chose Sorcova as this year’s traditional craft workshop because it is easy to do and it will come in handy on January 1st
Christmas and New Year Paganism in Roumanian Folklore 1928
This fertility ceremony is further enhanced by the fact that some of the boys hold in their right hands rods decked with paper flowers called sorcova; they approach and tap one with the greeting:
“May you live
And flourish
Like an apple tree
Or a pear tree
In time of spring;
Like a stem of rose,
Strong as iron,
Gleaming as steel,
Swift as the arrow.”
Traditional New Year’s Concert of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
The traditional New Year’s Concert of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra took place in the Musikverein, a concert hall in the centre of Vienna.
Vienna New Years Day Concert 2009 – Joseph Haydn, Symphony Nr45
BBC (UK) transmission of the live concert held every year in Vienna (Austria) on New Years Day by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.
