On 24 January 2022 it was 163 years since the union of the two principalities, Moldavia and Wallachia, under the rule of Alexandru Ioan Cuza.
We marked the day together with the children, as it should be marked: with the Hora Unirii and a conversation pitched to them.
The Union is one of the few history lessons that explains itself well at primary-school age, because it rests on a simple picture: two neighbouring countries, with the same language and the same customs, choosing to have a single ruler. The rest — the year, the names, the map — then settles far more easily, because it has something to hold on to.
The round dance has its part too, and that part is not decorative. A child remembers far better a day spent hand in hand with classmates, walking in a circle and singing, than a date written on a board. The tune is learned in a few minutes and stays for years, and the day stays with it. Years later, most of us know what happened on 24 January precisely because we sang about it as children.
Many happy returns to all Romanians.