Financiarul

The World Records Academy (WRA) informed on Sunday, on its official site, of the homologation of the record set by the village of Pericei, Salaj County (western Romania), for the biggest monument to onion.

The onion bulb is 4.5 metres tall, is made of glass fibre and synthetic resins and is covered with beaten copper plate. The socle the bulb rests on is two metres tall and is made of travertine plated concrete.
The monument was created by dean of the Visual Arts Faculty in Oradea (western Romania) Cornel Durgheu. Being estimated at more than 200 million lei, it is 6.5 metres tall and is the natural colour of the above-mentioned vegetable, it is unique the world over.

“Thanks to this monument the onion has turned into an act of culture. And not any act of culture, it is one that is unique the world over,” said Durgheu when the building was unveiled.
The monument to the onion was commissioned and paid for by a businessman who was born at Pericei and settled in Oradea, where he goes under the name of Sandu of Pericei. He started to do business trying to “export” onion to Austria and Germany.

It is the fame of the onion that gave him the nickname, which subsequently became a registered trademark: Sandu of Pericei. “Truth is that we grow the finest onion. It could be an early vegetable on the most pretentious tables, exactly as caviar is a gem among these fish products. The Pericei onion is a gem in the world of vegetables,” he says.
There are documents attesting the use of the Pericei onion by the imperial cuisine in Vienna.

Onion growing is a tradition in the village of Pericei and very many local people live by this activity, many of them thinking that the onion grown in this Salaj place is the tastiest in Romania as it has some of the most favourable soil and temperature conditions.
Mayor of the village Csaba Boncidai says that onion has become a brand they are proud of and want to make known all over the world. In his opinion, in every place there should be a symbol that is supposed to prove the past, the present and the future of that place.

Here are some of the Romanian records registered by the World Records Academy:

- the biggest administrative building: the Parliament Palace
- the biggest painted egg: Suceava
- the biggest beer glass: Timisoara
- the largest pavement drawing: Cluj-Napoca
- the biggest wicker basket: Cluj-Napoca.

Other homologated Romanian records include: the records of Nadia Comaneci (the most numerous marks of 10 at the Olympic Games), the ones of coaches Octavian Bellu and Mariana Bitang (the most successful coach in the world) and of Governor of the National Bank of Romania Mugur Isarescu (the governor of a central bank holding this position for the longest time).