27 Luni

On a last-minute whim, thanks largely again to the insistence of PCV Aran, I hopped a train North to Miercurea Ciuc, Romania for a hockey match.  Now, understandably, it may seem strange to travel ten hours round trip for a hockey game, especially when I am not even a sports fan and you would be right to question my sanity for making such a commitment.  But, somehow the pace of life in Romania is simply different from that of the United States.  I can remember a time when I would turn down the opportunity to see a music concert in Washington, DC simply because it was a forty-five minute drive to the venue.  Here, though, our suburban excursion equivalent usually involves packing a roll of toilet paper.  Travel time alone was not about to keep me from exploring a new city and a new, interesting aspect to Romanian society and culture; the enigma that is Hungarian-Romanians.

In my defense, this hockey game turned out to be, as promised, a very memorable experience, largely because of the teams that were playing.  As history tells us, the boarders of Romania have changed about as often as a US politician’s views.  Over the centuries, the size of Romania has ebbed and flowed considerably before settling into its current form.  Once upon a time, a large part of northern Romania belonged to Hungary and it was not until after World War II that this swath of territory was gained/regained by the Romanians.  In the meantime, a large number of ethnic Hungarians had settled the borderlands, many of which still live there today.  Herein lies my compelling excuse for making the last-minute trip.  As a result of the historical changes in territory, there is a significant rivalry between the ethnic Hungarians in this region and non-Hungarian Romanians.  There are many cities in this area where upwards of ninety-percent of the population speak Hungarian as their primary language; street signs, café menus, let alone spoken word on the street stand as proof.  To this day, there continues a movement for the northwestern region of Transylvania to secede from the Romanian republic altogether, though it lacks wide enough support to likely come to fruition.

Regardless of the greater political ramifications of this discourse, we saw an example of this rivalry in the microcosm of the Miercurea Ciuc hockey rink.  Our gladiators for the evening were the Romanian national team, Steaua Rangers, Bucharest and the Székely team from the north, Hoki Sport Club, Csíkszereda.  Joining a Peace Corps Volunteer stationed in this region, who has subjected himself to the water-boarding torture that is the experience of learning Hungarian, we naturally had to root for the home team.  If not out of loyalty to our comrade, than for our safety in this Hungarian dominated venue.  To our initial chagrin and later nervous elation, no beer was served at this event; a management decision that became clearly understandable as the game progressed.

Picture this extreme embodiment of Hungarian hockey fan exuberance:  A forty-something man wearing a shiny, light purple mechanic’s jump suit.  Sporting an eighty’s inspired crew cut, straight shaved sides and back with two inches of jet-black hair on top.  Running along the length of the rink, bouncing back and forth on the railing like a temper-tantrum inflicted child on a jungle gym.  Passionately yelling expletives in Hungarian while clutching a baseball card style representation of an Eastern Orthodox Saint, pausing only intermittently from his raucous illustration of dedication to pray for victory.  Clearly mentally unstable or perhaps just intensely passionate about his hockey team; most likely both.

Though not all Hungarians get as fired up as the cheerleader portrayed above, those in attendance clearly showed their love for Sport Club and their disdain for the Romanian capital’s team.  Although Sport Club served an embarrassing victory over Steaua a few days early in Bucharest, eight to zero, this game was much closer.  As fun as a blowout would have been, this fight for every goal was more interesting.  In the end, Sport Club came from behind to win, four to three.  Once the game was over, the Székely anthem, emotionally led by the Sport Club Team Captain, blasted over the loud speakers to the crowd’s delight, as captured on video by another Volunteer.

At the risk of sounding a bit cliché, this was another one of those Peace Corps moments that make the sacrifice worth it.  Even though I was exhausted by the journey and my extremities were numb from the bitter cold in this, on average, “coldest Romanian city,” I couldn’t help but feel that this was one of those moments where I had witnessed something truly unique to the Peace Corps Romania experience.  Sappy stuff aside, I found a Washington Capitals puck from the nearby hockey store to bring home as a souvenir for only 12 RON. Score!

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