The momment that hooked me on wine

It was a few moments, but the very first moment was when we arrived at our first winery of the trip (look here). In the little village of Beltiug in north-eastern Romania, we first visited Nachbill, the best-known, or I should rather say, the only winery in Beltiug that has any international recognition (they are even mentioned by Decanter).
We talked with Edgar – the general manager. He was very nice even though we looked like total NPCs. Dressed like stereotypical tourists, came with our almost 15-year-old FIAT and even if we knew why we came there (Grunspitz – a local grape variety that can be found only in Beltiug) it was obvious that we knew very little about wine. He told us about wines and vineyards, and he showed us the cellars. He offered us his Blaufrankish that he had bottle opened after tasting that took place earlier that day. We loved this blaufrankish. And we loved every wine from Nachbil that we opened up to today, and we still didn’t touch the most expensive ones. But I’m thinking about Edgar and the hills around Beltiug every time I taste his wine.
The second winery was Familia Hetei. That was a strange experience. They have a little shop on Main Street in Beltiug. We were welcomed by an older lady. They didn’t speak English but suggested German. I was troubled because I hadn’t used it for a decade my German is very rusted, and I didn’t know any “wine” words. I didn’t have to. From the back store, the older gentleman came and started talking about wines in German. But all he said was “Those are red. Those are white. Those are dry. Those are sweet”. The (supposedly) Heteis started pouring from the back store. They were friendly and trying to help. But I was overwhelmed, when one man my age, who was probably more communicative came from the back store I had enough. We bought three bottles and left. We already tasted two of them. We liked them very much, that was (probably) good wine.
Even though the first experience was quite bad it was still an adventure. We will be back to buy much more next year, and with a bit of polished German, as I don’t think we could up our Romanian to “talking about wine” level.
I will probably write more about the Slovak Tokaj wine region later, but we had quite similar experiences when visiting Macik Winery and Ostrozovic. Nice people are in love with their wines. That is an experience that a supermarket or even a good wine shop will never grant you. I will forever remember when I asked Jaro Macik about their red, methode traditionele sekt. We were fascinated with this wine, but unsure if we want really buy it. He didn’t speak about this wine earlier, but when I asked You could hear in his tone, You could see in his body language that he dropped his marketing banter (even if it was a really interesting and educational one) and started to talk about this wine with love. He wanted people to try it. Of course, we had to buy it. It was a very interesting wine.
Wine is people, and wine is an adventure. Many of you may live within a full-day drive of a vineyard. Visit it, talk to the people, and buy some wine. It’s a great way to start.