Luminita E. (Cojocaru) Velicanu

Luminita Elena Velicanu passed away on Friday January 23rd at the age of 59. She was born in the village of Telega in Romania in 1966, the only child of her parents Elisabeta and Ion Cojocaru who loved her and supported her education. She graduated with a degree in Aerospace Engineering from the Politehnica University of Bucharest.  She got married and had a son, Dragos Velicanu, and together with her family moved to the Boston area in 1995. In the US she built a career in software engineering for over two decades before pursuing other passions in the last decade of her life.

Luminita had a short but adventurous life. She had a great love for the outdoors and spent her time traveling, hiking, camping and skiing. Even as her health started failing she would still go on shorter hikes in the nearby mountains and take walks in the Fells.

Luminita was also very passionate about eastern traditions, meditation and spirituality. She spent many years studying and practicing yoga. She pursued these teachings by studying and living at the Blue Cliff Monastery in New York as well as the Green Gulch Zen Center in California where she found both peace and community.

Gardening and growing fruits and vegetables has been a lifelong love of hers, from seeing it first hand growing up in the village, to planting her own garden wherever she was living. She cared deeply about the environment and animals and lived her life by minimizing her impact on the environment and wellbeing of other living creatures.

The funeral service for Luminita will be held at the Weir-MacCuish Funeral Home, 144 Salem St Malden, MA, on Friday, January 30th. Visitation from 10-12 followed by a service. Interment will be after the funeral at Oak Grove Cemetery.

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