May 28 - Symbolic Immortality

Breakfast

Merry Cemetery

"compliments or scolds, praises or deplores characters or existences, virtues or vices, heroic burnings or discouraging cowardice, profane or arrogant attitudes. The touch of humor is minimal in the rich treasury of thoughts and feelings expressed through the epitaphs and paintings on the monuments of the cemetery in Săpânța.

These thoughts and feelings are deep and painful, clean and bitter, sorrowful and solemn, tormenting or consoling, sober and sad.

The characteristic feature is not cheerful, but that life here is above death. Here we have an idea that we can also see in Roman antiquity. Romans, when announcing the death of someone, did not say that he died, but they were making the announcement through the word "VIXIT = He Lived!"

"Sheep speaking, stars falling, flying, Suns grieving, people walking, trees burning, mountains sparkling, birds giving light, water laughing, fir trees trumpeting."

Life is beautiful, very beautiful! But here, even death seems to be just as beautiful and this thanks to you, master! Thank you for this moment of Truth!"

Priest Iustin Lutai

This excerpt is from a passage which is translated to eight languages and posted four times across the exterior wall of the monastery in Merry Cemetery. I chose to post just these parts of the passage because they stood out to me. I have had the opportunity to visit a large number of cemeteries so far along my adventure. I've begun to get a strangely familiar feeling as I have taken a moment to practice mindfulness while looking around. It's almost like feeling humbly serene. It makes me think about what would be said of my life so far. Could I have done better? Could I have done worse? What about after considering the circumstances of my life? Then thinking about how little I could possibly know about the circumstances of the lives of those illustrated on each gravestone by their epitaphs. This extended to anyone around me as well, just considering how little I could possibly know about any one individual. I do my best to not judge others too quickly nor on just a few instances with them because I have been on the other side of that exchange.

The idea is similar to the Fundamental Attribution Error. In general, individuals tend to judge others more harshly than they do themselves. For instance, when I get cut off by someone speeding down the freeway I tend to think, "How rude!" Whereas when I cut someone off I tend to think more along the lines of, "Whoops, but it's okay because I'm in a hurry!" I've started catching myself doing this and rephrasing my thinking to something like, "Woah! His wife must be in labor! Good luck!" I find myself enraged by others' driving significantly less often when on the road; that is, after attempting to excuse their behavior before casting my own judgement on them. Similar to the idea of Mental Alchemy.

Victims of Communism Museum

This was a prison turned into a museum with the phrase, "Break the silence!" I really enjoyed the idea of dispelling ignorance to push for peace and understanding rather than shy away from a potential error. I think it's much easier, like I stated earlier, to scapegoat others and tell ourselves, "I would never!" I think it's extremely difficult to put yourself in someone else's mindset since it's near impossible to replicate their circumstances in such a way that they would feel real to ourselves. Not to excuse the idea of inflicting suffering just for the sake of suffering. That being said, I think forgiveness and genuinely seeking understanding before solidifying judgement can be, in a way, mentally healthy. I'm all about vicarious learning, why not take the opportunity to learn from another if at all possible? All of the reward with little to none of the risk inherent in experience. However, action made in ignorance, or a lack of understanding, requires a judgement call. And judging before understanding, or pre-judgement, is simply prejudice. Given that, action taken based on prejudice would be discrimination. Seems like a slippery slope to me...

Wooden church and village

We went to a preserved village in which anything constructed was made almost entirely of wood. The reason for this was that in Romania one of the most abundant, and always available, resources was wood. They had shingles made of wood, fences around gardens or paths that was made from tree limbs woven together then around wooden pegs in the ground, and even a large arch with a gate at the entrance made entirely of wood. It was remarkable to see how ingenious they had become with the utilization of wood.

Dinner then visiting

Sleep