Today’s Adventure: How To Leave A Masa

After almost a year of observation I have put together a step-by-step list of how Moldovans (and those of us living with them) have to leave a masa. Reminder: A masa is a large meal / party that includes a lot of food and drink and normally goes for about 3 hours minimum, often longer. Step 1: Stop Drinking During this step potential leavers will cease to consume the wine and insist that they can’t have anymore. Well, the insisting, actually, is the important part. They’ll often still drink the wine if the host pours them another glass despite their protests. But they start complaining that they’ve drunk too much. Step 2: Sigh Deeply After every pause in the conversation the potential leaver will sigh deeply to signify that they are winding down and will be moving on to the next step of leaving etiquette shortly. This step usually goes for about a half hour. Step 3: Start Mumbling About Various Aches and Pains You are not allowed to leave a masa EVER unless you have an excuse. From what I have gathered, Moldovans believe that a masa could, in theory, go forever except that someone always has to be somewhere or has some kind of illness or has to do something tomorrow. You can never just say, “Well thanks, that was lovely,” and go. You have to have an excuse. The most common one that I have heard is ‘My head hurts,” which also doubles as an excuse to not drink anymore (see Step 1). I have also heard excuses ranging from “I have to get up early and feed my chicken tomorrow” to “My children are destroying my house so I have to get home to stop them.” The more serious the occasion, the more grave the reason needs to be in order to work as a leaving excuse. At a random little masa, you can say that you’re tired because you got up at 4am. But at a wedding no excuse is really going to cover you. Your house could be burning down and you’d still have a social responsibility to stick around. That’s why the weddings go all night. Step 4: Announce You’re Leaving #1 The potential leaver announced loudly that they are leaving. This sometimes takes the form of saying “Let’s go,” loudly to their spouse. This will illicit a hysterical reaction from the hosts, whose job it is to try and keep you at their table until Judgement Day. They will immediately insist that the potential leavers cannot go because there is still too much food and wine to be consumed and that it will be a terrible inconvenience for the hosts if it remains on the table. The potential leavers are allowed 2 retorts of something like, “No, really,” or a repeat of their excuse, such as “I really am just exhausted and I don’t feel well.” But the host wins the first round (this is standard procedure). The potential leavers will be forced to sit back down and, in an attempt to quell any rebellious ideas on behalf of their other guests, the hosts will force the attempted escapees to drink at least one more glad of hard liquor. Step 5: Repeat steps 1 – 3 for at least 45 minutes The would-be escapees then have to lay it on thick to pave the way for their next attempt. Their announcement, though quelled, as etiquette dictates, has laid the foundation of their departure and the whole table now knows that they are just biding their time until they have to leave. Also, the first person or couple to announce their intended departure, despite their inevitable failure the first time, will serve as an inspiration to the other guests and anyone who was thinking about leaving can now skip straight to step 4 without suffering any repercussions. The hosts may well have a mutiny on their hands soon and their reaction to this is, of course, to start pushing the liquor HARD, possibly in hopes that everyone will pass out and no one will ever leave the table. Step 6: Announce You’re Leaving #2 After putting in their time, the potential leavers launch phase 2 of their plan and stand up to leave, announcing loudly that they are done for the night. The hosts are forced to accept that they will likely never return the escapees to their docile place at the table, but have high hopes that they will be able to see their guests off just a little bit drunker than otherwise. The hosts usually offer some kind of bargain at this point, such as, “I’ll let you leave if you take one more shot of this whiskey,” or, “Just eat some cake, for God’s sakes and THEN you can go if you’re so busy!” Step 7: Drink More Due to the nature of the hosts’ bargaining, the escapees are usually obliged to meet them halfway and eat / drink whatever is being requested of them so that they may then go on their way within the terms of the deal offered them by their hosts. It’s beyond me why they bother, however, because the hosts immediately try to take a mile and start pushing all manner of other items on them (cookies to take home, more cake, a different kind of booze, etc). Step 8: Be Seen To The Gate It is Moldovan custom to see your guests to the gate, so at least one of the hosts will have to escort you out, all the while no doubt offering you more wine, no doubt imagining that if you just reach the right level of drunkenness, which could be at any moment, that you’ll change your mind and stay at their table forever, gorging on cake and assorted cured meats. Once the escapees get their shoes on they are home free but the hosts have a riot on their hands since their leaving the table unsupervised usually leads to a covert discussion inside the house, unsupervised, in which all other guests discuss how tired they are and how they are going to get away from the table. By the time the hosts come back inside, often half their guests have either already gotten their coats on and are, therefore, un-retainable, or have worked out master plans and genius excuses to get themselves extricated from the masa. Inevitably, after the first departure most masas fall apart within about 30 minutes, leaving the hosts drunk with a pile of dishes the size of Kilimanjaro and a strange sense of satisfaction that they managed to retain their guests for as long as they did. The ultimate goal of any Moldovan host is that their guests leave completely intoxicated, unable to eat for days, and exhausted from yelling, dancing, burping, and arguing. The Moldovans definitely know how to take care of their guests. Noapte Buna