The Magician

This is the story of a village hidden between the rolling peaks of Istrita hill and the magician who turned it into one of Romania’s most beautiful destinations of yesteryear. It is a story of inspiration, of growth and decay, but above all of inspiration and creative force.
It is said that the magician, a young man from the lineage of Greek travellers, arrived on these lands by chance. He loved them and read their treasures. He was a modern magician. An industrialist who, with the wand of technology, made the oil from the 1000 wells on the hill of the Great Pasture flow downhill to the small refinery he had built. Tankers loaded with gas left Monteoru station for the port of Braila and from there to ports in the Mediterranean.
So the enchanted wand turned black gold into a chest of money! What could the Magician do with all that money? First he built a church in the middle of the village. The town hall was needed and he did it! The little hamlet was transformed overnight into a famous town! Where could the children learn? He immediately built a school for boys and girls! Every year he rewarded the good pupils, then guided them and supported them with money to continue their studies at top schools in European university centres. As the small village of Sărata Monteoru was also rich in healing waters, the magician, whose name was Grigore C. Monteoru, decided to turn to the magic wand.
Immediately, an army of builders from Italy, Greece, Turkey, Hungary, led by a famous German architect, Eduard Honzik, built a proud spa resort, with modern hotels, with a treatment centre, marble baths, shower cabins and all the comforts of a European resort. The power plant, cinema, turbine mill, mineral water storage tanks, pharmacy and renowned doctors completed the resort’s famous buildings. Sick people with modest incomes received free treatment in the spa hospital, built and maintained at our magician’s expense.
In the “English” park, lit up in an enchanting way, the military music played the songs of the time: Viennese waltzes, polkas, mazurkas and Romanian folk songs, to the delight of Romanian and foreign visitors who came to seek their health at Sărata Monteoru. And they found it in a few days of spa treatment. Not for nothing the resort was also known as Bastonul. Those who came with a cane left happily with miraculously healed feet!
On the day of the official opening of the spa that would bear the name of its founder, the cream of Romanian society was invited: The Royal Family, the great noble families, the surrounding landowners and the family of the young and beautiful wife of the magician. Alexandru Candiano Popescu, the great hero of Grivița, the Minister of Education, Spiru Haret, with his wife, Ana, the consul in Constantinople, Dumitru Petrescu, the families of Hariton, Carp, Tissescu, Cătuneanu and many others were not absent.
Guests arriving in luxurious carriages and coaches, led by the pompfully poised surrogates, were taken to the park of the Monteoru mansion, where they were refreshed with sweets, fresh fruit and refreshing drinks, in the shade of exotic trees brought from all continents. The water of the fountains gushed coolly from the fabulous mouths of mythological characters or gentle cherubs. Here and there, beyond the orange groves and greenhouses of flowers and vegetables, deer and shy stags grazed the silky grass, and above, in the terraces exposed to the benign sun, the most fabulous fruits of the Monteoru family’s golden orchard were dangling.
Below the church, the water of the artificial lake carried light boats, in which elegant ladies in long dresses, with coquettish hats and fringed umbrellas, laughed happily alongside gentlemen with moustaches, slim waists and courtly gestures. The pond was populated with exotic fish and graceful swans with their unfailing ballet numbers.
As in all fairy tales, where Prince Charming is put to the test, so it was with our Magician. For him and his children the magic wand didn’t work. Weakened by the loss of his two sons, Gogu, who died at 14, and Gheorghe, a young student in Paris, Grigore Monteoru leaves this world to meet his children. His sons-in-law, Lascăr L. Catargiu and Dr. C. Angelescu continued the work he had begun.
The salt-water swimming pool was in demand all summer long, and the old Casino, which no longer exists, met the most demanding and refined tastes. It was here that the elite of the time came: politicians, ministers, businessmen and landowners. While the ladies chilled out on the restaurant’s terrace, showing off their dresses and hats brought back from their trips to Paris, sprinkling their conversations with small talk, the gentlemen, between two games of billiards or roulette, patriotically put the “country to rights”, smoking cigars brought from overseas.
That’s how it was once …. The shadow of war has also twice passed over the beautiful valley of the Sahara.
Grigore C. Monteoru’s dreamland was becoming a blur. A harsh wind, a gale blowing from the East was the straw that broke the camel’s back. A new order had also come to the valley of Salt. The people of the new power, uninvolved in their souls, wondered: – What do we need these buildings with thick stone walls and copper roofs for? What are we to do with the gilt-framed paintings, 30-40 cm wide, with the three-foot-high oriental vases and huge stuccoes adorning the walls, with the heavy furniture and the “English” and “French” parks reminding us of a world of the rich?
But above all, what should we do with the marble bust of Grigore C. Monteoru, placed in the middle of the resort by his descendants, in gratitude for the magician who had raised a hamlet to the rank of a European resort? Down, however, we are stronger than these walls! And they set to work demolishing them!
Nothing seems more fitting for the end of our story than the fairy tale “Youth without old age and life without death”, in which Prince Charming, returning home from the land of happiness, finds nothing left of what he once left behind. But as hope dies last, better days are now dawning for this corner of the country too. People from other parts of the country, who love this corner of paradise, are giving hope that together they will be able to revive the small town from its ashes, like the Phoenix bird.

Source: www.tinutulbuzaului.ro