Learn Romanian with Mira

27/12/2025

Crăciun fericit tuturor!

Vocabular de Crăciun
Crăciun - Chistmas
fericit - happy
brad - fir tree/ Christmas tree
coroniță - wreath
glob/uri - bauble
ren - reindeer
zăpadă - snow
om de zăpadă - snowman
Moș Crăciun - Santa Claus
cadou - present
dar - gift
elf - elf (very tough word :)) )
stea - star
sanie - sleigh

Bonus: a picture of my Christmas tree which had a tendency to "faint"

12/06/2025

Porția de română - Expresia zilei

- A da bir cu fugiții -

Mister Google very wrongly translated this one as "to give in to the fugitives", it's very far from the real meaning of it thus I have to do some storytelling. Upon research I found out that this idiom has a story behind it that goes far back in time.
As some of you might know Romania has not always been free and it was for a much longer period of time formed out of some major "regions" or "little countries", I will call them so as the terms from English to Romanian and viceversa do not really match.
Apparently this story goes way back in time, in the Middle Ages when the moving of dependent peasants from Moldavia to Țara Românească were quite frequent. In order to support their settlement the rulers would exempt them from "tributes". The part of "fugitives" is tidied to the fact that many of the peseants were running away from a region/country to another in order to not pay the "tributes" for a while.
Basically the meaning would be "to leave or run from a place to not be obliged to do a certain thing."
Upon more research one could find the English translation "to buck off".

My kids from school come in handy again for an example

Exemplu:

- Iar ai dat bir cu fugiții de la test!
- Nu, doamna, am fost bolnav.

Vocabular
iar - (here) again
a fi bolnav - to be sick

08/03/2025

Porția de română - Expresia zilei

- A freca la icre -

So I thought of this expression today in the context of being a teacher who has to deal on a daily basis, minus the weekends with the children of others. As you could probably understand from the current dynamic in classes between teachers and children, the expression is not on the positive side of things :).
But let's explain what each word means:
A freca - to rub, to scrub.
Of course the word by itself can be applied in successfully in the household while doing some cleaning chores.
Icre - caviar or fish eggs to call them so. Now let's look a bit into "icre" - Romanians have a beloved dish called "salată de icre", the process of making it means quite some "rubbing" the "icre" with oil, semolina or simply bread crumbs, some lemon juice and of course some salt.
"Rubbing" is not precisely a verb most indicated to use for cooking, at least in English ^_^, however in Romanian it could be possible. Anyway why this little story, I am trying to get the best out of the Romanian idioms and find some logic to them or a nice story to make you remember them easier. Going back to the process of making this salad the "caviar" will be mixed until it turns a pinkish-white to just give it a colour, no clue if it even exists :).
Now imagine someone "rubbing" you...and...ahem...not in the pleasant way...do not go into that positive thinking...*cough*.
In less words "a freca la icre" - means to annoy someone and if you want some word for word translation, Mr.Google said "to rub on the caviar", which sounds pretty amusing.

Eg:
Ce mă tot freci atâta la icre. Încetează! Am spus că schimb becul mai târziu.

Follow for more ^^

Also as it is Women's International Day a warm: "La mulți ani stimate doamne și domnișoare!"

26/12/2024

This carol used to be sang on 25th of December, precisely on Christmas day.

Steaua sus răsare 🎄Ca o taină mare 🎄Steaua strălucește 🎄Și lumii vestește 🎄Și lumii vestește 🎄Ca astăzi CurataPreanevinovataFecioara MariaNaște pe Mesia...

19/12/2024

E vremea de colindă. Un colind deosebit, o voce deosebită, tradițional.

Cele mai frumoase amintiri din copilărie pe care le am sunt din perioada Crăciunului.Ce bucurie aveam în suflet când mergeam la colindat,împreună cu alți cop...

17/12/2024

E vremea de colindat. Una dintre colindele mele preferate "Vine marea"

Colinde romanesti

17/10/2024

A warm welcoming to the new people following this page.

For those who do not know the story this is a one's person effort to teach Romanian as a language. The start with it was precisely at one of my darkest hours to say so. I have been teaching Romanian for quite some time and I would say my most successful and serious student who is also on this page did not reach his level without great effort besides our lessons.
It takes great effort for everything we do and unfortunately, many times, it takes time and money too.
My initial plan here was to attract more people at the classes, I failed successfully :)...too expensive, too "this and that"...that is not a reason to give up but since I am getting older, since I lost my lil buddy, since I have a very important wish, since I have a deadly health issue and being kept alive by medicine, I started valuing a bit more my time and I advise everyone to consider this: time only flows and does not return, things cannot be undone.
My aim is not to become rich but to rather live a decent cosy life and to simply be happy. Than working for nothing much with people with people who are not up for the challenge, I prefer not working at all.

14/09/2024

I want to start this with a big thank you for following this page as I have been on and off.
This year I have restarted posting much more and then my professional life took over my time. I had a heavy year, with many exams and although they were successful I am still not where I wanted or where I think I should be.
I will probably need this page as a cure as well, or better said for healing...this week my best friend has not been feeling well, on Friday I took him to the vet urgently, he is now at a pet hospital. Yes, my best friend for the past 13 years has been a cat, of course I also have real friends but somehow my cat was present in my life all the time for these years, for better and for worse, even when others deserted me, even when others criticized me, he loved this imperfect self and gave me so much healing, so much joy, he even brought a second friend in my life for which I am equally grateful. These two cats were my reason to carry on in my darkest moments, now one of them is fading away and I feel broken. I will probably find refuge in work and the other friend he brought in my life.
I will need all the work I can get most likely to numb my senses, to trick my heart.

My friend is gone...

30/07/2024

Porția de română - Expresia zilei

Not just one idiom, but 3 in 1 like the ice coffee sachets :).

Today were going to learn some fancy ways of telling somebody that they are "crazy". As you know this word has multiple uses and it is not always meant literally.

A nu fi întreg la minte
A-i lipsi o doagă
A nu avea toate țiglele pe casă

A nu fi întreg la minte, with its literal translation that in English goes something like this "to not be whole in the mind", we can say that is sounds pretty logical, the other ones don't seem like the clearest association. Interestingly enough if you would ask many Romanian people what "doagă" mean you'd be surprised that they do not know, most of them use this idiom particulary in this expression.
A-i lipsi o doagă - to miss a stave, a nu avea toate țiglele pe casă - to not have all the tiles on the house, would probably not lead you to the English "you're crazy", "bonkers" but it is what it is. Languages are creative.

Eg. - Nu ai toate țiglele pe casă, măi, bărbate!
- De ce?
- Numai prostii spui.

24/07/2024

Porția de limba română - Expresia zilei

A-și băga unghia în gât = to stick your nail in your neck.
A Romanian person is not just upset or envious, he would just stick his nail in his own neck.
So let's say you experience a bad moment that makes you upset or something that just spites you, for this you can say "mi-am băgat unghia în gât" and even attach "de ciudă", "de supărare" to it.

Eg. Când am văzut că am luat o notă mai mică decât colegul meu aproape că mi-am băgat unghia în gât.