We passed several phases after we decided to radically change our lifestyle and the place we live: the first one was super enthusiastic, then we had the reconfirmation that we’ll move from Bucharest into the brazilian jungle, then the months when we were notifying our family and friends about our decision, answering over and over again the same questions. Of course we couldn’t miss the phase of planning and budgeting with all the hassle that comes along.
Just before the last phase we started to feel uncomfortable and in the last days before leaving we felt a mix of happiness, enthusiasm, longing, fears and frights, hesitation, uncertainty and impatience.
This cocktail had a greater effect than any “U-boat” or a “Mongolian” that we ever drank. It just anesthetized us. And I left like that with “my life in 5 suitcases”, a 10 months child and a dizzy husband from all these events, to the other hemisphere, at the end of the world, in the land of far far away.
On the way, while the lovely child slept the 12 hours we spent flying over the ocean, we were thinking on an on about how it’s going to be and we were starting to plan our life for the next five years.
Before leaving, we were telling everyone that if we find something that we don’t like, we just come back, as we are not knocked in the head and nothing keeps us tied there. This is what we were saying.
Actually we were talking about how much we’ll love it and how we’ll spend there many years. This is what we were feeling.
And, as we are used to feel more and think less, especially since we are parents, we walked on Ilheus airport with the above mentioned feelings.
At the airport, the smiles of Câmpeanu family (which we miss a lot and we kiss lots of times) reconfirmed our feelings, therefore we went further to our final destination, Piracanga eco-village from Bahia region, Brazil.
We didn’t stay there for years, as we initially thought, but only 7 weeks. But these 7 weeks spent in Piracanga were maybe the most intense seven weeks that I ever lived. Many things happened and all of them were on FFD. The feelings cocktail was stronger than even a “Long Island Ice Tea”. If we were anesthetized before leaving Romania, now we were in a physical and mental coma. We’ll probably tell more about that in a separate blog post.
During this time, at a certain moment, after a week of knocking our heads agains the walls, we came back to life and our future started to shape up.
The most beautiful thing was that the future was shaping up with a whole list of wishes that only the experience we lived could help us discover.
So we took the decision to come back to Romania. But where?
At our parents? As we didn’t have a house or even an apartment to rent.
In Bucharest? Nooo… we definitely didn’t want to live in a block of flats anymore.
In Timişoara? Hmmm… This could have been a choice, but not the desired one.
In Afumaţi? Maybe, because the very nice house that my husband saw would have been very nice for us. Too bad it was taken before the girls could see it.
In Gulia? YEEESSS, this is it, we want to live in Gulia, Dâmboviţa county, at some 15 km from Bucharest, where we rented a wonderful house 
Therefore our life in the country side goes on. As nice and beautiful as in Piracanga, because we are together, because Nadia has a lot of place to crawl, sorry walk (recently ) and where to eat grass and stones, because we already have friends coming over in week-ends, because our view from the house with the fields full of flowers or corn are beautiful, because in the morning we can smell everywhere the linden trees from the nearby forest  and because the silence makes us feel more than think.
We like it in the country side. The cities will probably be just some ocasional destinations for going out, shopping or visit friends.
We believe that we “found our place” for the moment. And yes, as strange as it might seem, we needed a trip to Brazil and back to find it. This was our road and we are so happy that we found the guts to do it, no matter what it meant. And of course this gives us the wings to always fly and find “the place” where we feed good and where all 4 of us are happy.
Like Nike is saying “JUST DO IT!”. I would say on top of that “BECAUSE LIFE IS WORTH LIVING!”.
