Today’s blog about Romanians abroad is a follow-up to last Friday’s post on the protest organized by the Romanian diaspora in Bucharest on August 10th. Linguistic note: miting is the Romanian word for ‘protest,’ evidently a borrowing from English ‘meeting’. Thus mitingul diasporei translates as ‘the protest of the diaspora.’ Title image note: a CursDeGuverarne English-language […]
After Lisbon I got myself to my condo in Bucharest … and found a few clothes in my closet, so that was nice. I dove right into life here. Last Friday, August 10, the Romanian Diaspora organized a protest. The diaspora is comprised of some millions of Romanians who have left the country to live […]
When my friend, Trish, came to visit me in Romania, we went to Transylvania. On the way we stopped at the resort town of Sinaia in order to visit the fancy modern Castel Peleş. By ‘fancy’ you can see what I mean in the picture. By ‘modern’ I mean that the castle was constructed between 1873-1914 […]
Now that I’ve gotten the pop culture notion of Transylvania out of the way in Transylvania I, I can deal with the real place, which is not at all wonderfully creepy (shiver, shiver) but rather very beautiful and bucolic with a rich history. Transylvania is a geographic area more or less defined and enclosed on […]
Transylvania. The name immediately evokes weird, scary stuff. My friend, Trish, has a daughter, Caroline, who went on a talk show for kids in New York City when she was 3 years old. Somehow the subject of vampires came up, whereupon Caroline informed the host that, “Vampires comes from Pennsylvania.” Trish came to visit me […]
There are many famous Romanians, and I chose Elie Wiesel for the title image. Here’s my list: Famous Romanians: Historical 1. News of the death of Elie Wiesel (1928-2016), the writer and human rights advocate, on July 2 reminded me that he was born in Romania. His holocaust story Night (1960), a shortened version of […]
My favorite restaurant in Bucharest is Torna Fratre. The address is Strada Tunari 34, Sector 2. On the banner over the entrance in the title image, you can see the word cherhana, which is a restaurant specializing in fish. Zilnic means ‘daily.’ Food. The first criterion in judging a restaurant is, of course, the food. […]
I’ve now arrived at my major stopping place in my around-the-world trip, namely Bucharest Romania where I’ll spend the next 3 months. I’ve spent 3 – 4 months here every summer for the past 10 years, so I know the place well. Here are my immediate impressions upon returning: Romanian news. I’m a junkie. Can’t […]
Here I highlight some of the differences but mostly the similarities between Romania and Uzbekistan. Differences between Romania and Uzbekistan First, Romania is in Eastern Europe, and Uzbekistan is in Central Asia. Check out the distance. Furthermore: -Romanians speak Romanian, a Romance language. Uzbeks speak Uzbek, a Turkic language. -Romanians are 90% Eastern Orthodox. […]
This is the fifth year in a row I’ve come with my Romanian friends to Balcic, Bulgaria. It’s on the Black Sea. This year is a bit of an extravaganza. Three of us decided to reserve one of the apartments at the hotel we always stay at, The Regina Maria. It has two bedrooms, two […]