Lomtalanitás

Literally translated: house-junk clearance.

Last year this neighborhood event was held in the last week of March, probably because we had been having such warm weather. This past weekend was when our neighborhood had it scheduled. Removing one's house-junk is not so bad. But when the "recyclers" come around (generally Roma families, who actually camp in the neighborhood and go through everything to get anything they think is of value), the piles spread out and the wind catches any loose paper or plastic and carries it to the rest of the neighborhood.



This is the pile below our bedroom and kitchen windows. It seems we had more trash and rummaging through it last year.


This is a very common scene: Someone will find something "of value" and will sit there, all day if necssary, guarding it until a friend or relative can pick it up.





So for five days the entire neighborhood seems to be enveloped in a garbabe dump. And then on Monday morning an army of refuse trucks came through and picked up the leftovers, and in the afternoon crews of rakers and sweepers followed up and brought our surroundings back to normal.