I think you should visit Romania. It is a country quite unlike any other.

I guess it is like an
awkward teenager - who after 20 years of freedom does not quite know what to do with
itself.

It is trying to desperately combine more Western ideas such as a far more liberated sex scene,
with hundreds of year old traditional customs of waiting until after marriage.

It is keen to have a booming tourist trade and attract the tourists away from the more tempting
Bulgarian shores, where food is cheaper and the services better. The hotels like to charge
increasingly Western prices for a never changing Eastern European hotel experience. The
good news is there is always a price crash mid-season to try to get people to come -
especially along the coast.

Even our European membership creates tension. It is great as I can see a massive
improvement in the general infrastructure, but chaos as the government tries to do away
with unpasterised cheese and allows in super-cheap Polish apples.

However, despite all these troubles, you will still be made to feel you are the only foreigner in
the country and everyone will be keen to put on the best face of Romania. The further
away from Bucharest (where we are two a penny) you are, the better the impact.

If you can visit Romania with a Romanian, then you are certain to be in for a special treat, a
suddenly a whole closed network of friends and relatives in the countryside opens up and
you see the real, extra-special part of Romania culture, probably along some dusty
Romanian road towards some forgotten Romanian village.

If you are coming alone - to visit Romania and see it at its fullest, take the time to read your
lonely planet or rough guide to Romania, or you will miss so much as Romanians - tired
of being invaded from every side - seem to have come up with the strategy of using
minimal road signs, using the logic if you don't know where it is, then clearly it is not for
you.

If you are coming to visit friends in Romania, you should come weighed down with coffee
(from poundland is fine!) and quality items, as this is the one thing you will not find here.

I am confident that if you visit Romania, you will want to come again and again, and
experience this fabulous country in all four seasons, as the beauty of Romania is it is so
different in each season. It gets so cold; the sea freezes over to a distance of 200 meters
out. It gets so hot in other seasons and the sand reaches 45C.

The Romanians you meet in Romania are completely different to Romanians back home. The
ones you meet abroad are unhappy, as they need intense levels of heat and sunshine to
thrive - rather like tropical orchids. If you return them to their native soil - watch them
bloom.

Likewise the Brits and Americans abroad seem to really disappoint and can be skirted past if
you want to see real Romania. If you just want copious drinking buddies - then they are a
perfect reason to visit Romania.
Throughout this site, I have added lots of cool places to visit and things to see. My new photo
gallery section seems to have become an instant hit - a perfect way to prepare for you to
prepare for your trip.

Tell me more about your experiences of visiting Romania. What information have I missed?
Romanian Art

Let me tell you about Romanian Art. If you are not a poet, then you have to become an artist.
It is a small blessing if you actually have any talent.

I am lucky that both my Romanian Godparents are gifted artists. While my father was alive -
he never considered getting himself painted. After he died, a couple of photos and computer
printouts later, I have a picture to keep of him, to add to my growing collection of the dead I
have met. It’s horrible to think that this Romanian art is the best impression of my deceased
father.

My Godfather joked if my wife ever married and made him her marriage Godfather, he would
make a beautiful painting of her. A few years later and lots of secrecy, and a few heavy hints
as to the promise and the birthday gift I needed to find, the day of delivery arrived.

My father in-law organised it so that his daughter would meet her Godfather in his artistic
studio and instantly be bowled over by her gift of her own Romanian art.

Sadly it did not work out anything like any of us in the know had planned. We arrived and she
was guided past endless fabulously colorful Romania student's examination artwork - to the
moment of truth.

She looked at his latest masterpiece. He asked if she recognised who it was. She said no - not
the foggiest. He then went on to tell her it was her. Nothing like me was the curt reply which
cut the poor man, who many had told him for months that this was one of his best ever work -
further more (to kick a man when he is down) - she continued - she did not like it in the
slightest.

I had to agree that painting my wife in gray, surrounded by colorful flowers did not do credit
to her wonderful Romanian tan but to avoid further upset, we would take it home and see what
would happen.

Weird things always happen to his portrait paintings as one week later, we really loved it and
admired how he had caught both the looks and essence of Irina and so it now remains pride of
place on top of a corner cupboard, looking down at us in our sleep.

When baby Victor arrived - he too instantly fell in love with the painting and sleeps his best
when he can look up and examine it in all its glory.

My godmother, not to be outdone has also given me some of her best works. When my
grandfather died, another able painter, I took in all the paintings I could of his, to fill the walls
of my Romanian country homes - sadly as life proceeds with its twists and curls, I have yet to
actually complete this task and give my a change from Romanian for Swiss mountain views
and relaxing lakes.
Romanian baby names

Choosing Romanian baby names is a very serious thing. Most Romanians will choose
traditional Christian names. The chances are, if you did pretty well in battle, beat back the
Turks or Hungarians, built a few monasteries, you could be recognized as a saint and
Romanians will call their babies after you.

Lots of popular modern names in England, especially with 4 letters or less, and with no clear
religious connotations, generally caused me problems when it came to naming baby Victor.
Romanians love to use short English sounding names for their dogs and cows - so obviously
cannot name their precious child in the same way.

As we need to keep in mind two nationalities and their cultural sensitivities, it was even
harder as a word in one language could mean something completely different in the other. So I
threw in the gauntlet that the name had to be the same in both languages.

Little Victor came out top as much because there was so little to choose from. I only have
`Adrian` left in the t for baby 2 - and I am not keen on it, so I hope we have a little girl called
Victoria!

There is a tradition in Romania of calling the child after parents. The child is always known -
until well into adulthood as 'Little such and such' - I use to think it was a real name rather than
a spoilt name. When they asked why he is not called Peter - I replied because I did not know
the plumber's name (my joke) - oddly as jokes go, I have seen lead balloons rise faster than
my slur on the family name. I think each child should have his r her own destiny and so have a
unique name in the family - the way little Victor giggles and smiles constantly, I think he
agrees.

The British are equally rubbish at naming their children - every year the most popular names
seem to come from soap operas. Where is the thought or imagination in that?

I did look into naming Victor after his two grandfather's but because the spellings in
Romanian and English are different, we decided it would make his international heritage stand
out at school and as you know no one wants to especially stand out at school!

We looked in baby books and it was only when Uncle Victor called that everything dropped
into place. The fact his name day is one day before my wife's birthday helped.

His second name Ioan (John) was because he was born on St John's name day and my wife
did a mental agreement with him that if the birth went well, he would be named after this
good saint.
Romanian Boys Names

The Romanian boys names list is a long list, heavily weighted by bible characters.

The starting place for a boy's name is that of his father. His goes against my better feelings as
what if you fall out and he comes to hate you, therefore your name? I have friends like that
after long and messy divorce disputes. It also requires you to name him after the postman or
plumber in 10% of cases in the UK. I like being the only one with my name - and letting him
forge his own way with his own unique name.

The next choice for a Romanian boys name is seeing which Romanian saint is nearby -
Romania is famous for its saint's days and days you should not eat dairy products, clean, have
sex or work. I guess this explains the nose diving population rates and terrible economy here!

We did follow this tradition and so his middle name is Ioan, for John. Mine was Dennys -
mispelt for years as the female version, Denys, and as my godfather whom I was named after
never sent presents or visited me, an all round bad choice of name.

The leading name Romanian boys names seems to be Andrei - for Andrew. The old saying is
ay Andrei and half of Romania will stop and ask you what you want. The female version
Andreea is equally popular.

Bogdan - again a solid Romanian boys name. The problem being if we wanted to bring our
child back to the UK, Bog means toilet and having your son called Bogdan, the toilet man
would be simply too much for my wife's sensitive nerves!

Mihai - again a popular choice. I know some nice people called Mihai and some complete
basket cases - sadly my family is related to the basket case end of this line.

Cristian - the missing h- is very important. A friend of mine had a kid in his British class,
whose parents despite being from Romania and having a long, long line of ancestors clearly
from Romania, decided being a Romanian was not good enough for their kid. Sadly they
didn't survive the British dream and had to for some reason return to Romania, with a son who
could not speak a word of the lingo. He got in trouble for writing out his name in the
Romanian style, so they put him down as a very bad influence on the boy.

Alexandru or Alex - There are lots of Alex's in Romania and all the ones I have met have been
really great, generous and helpful people - a great omen for a name.

There are a few such as Dragos and Valentine, which I don't so warm to. Then again the terms
of affection duck, love etc from North England always would me up. I guess you can name
him like this if he was born in February.

Horia is another common Romanian name, which seems to go only well with horrible, so you
end up with Horrible Horia or horrible Horror and again it does not suit my ideas for a name
for my son.

Victor -an all round excellent name. It is short, easy to spell, not too common and when we
move back to England is also a great English name so no one need know he is Romanian - as
the English look down on the Romanians - as they do with any other nation.
Romanian Blouses

Are you looking for a Romanian blouse? I love Romanian shirts for men and women - they
are works art in their own rights.

If you know any old Romanian - ask them to show you their traditional blouses and out of
plastic bags will appear hundred-year-old clothes - with the most exquisite embroidery. Each
item would have taken a whole winter to sew and the clothes in each part of the country has
different styles and the colours and symbols in the patterns have may different - sadly
forgotten - meanings.

I was surprised to find a small museum at the back of the Bucharest people’s palace dedicated
to Romanian clothes and blouses from all across the country - there are no signs to it - the
authorities rely on you being telepathic and know where to go.

Another great place to buy Romanian blouses is at the Bucharest Village museum near
Herestrau Park. If you are lucky or go on a major celebration day, the place with be full of
stalls selling great Romanian handicrafts - if you are unlucky - the shop there is still well
stocked in them.

The alternative is any artisan shop or tourist market - I saw the nicest examples in the north of
the country - in Moldova.

They also sell nice 100% cotton (Bumbac - is Romanian for cotton) for men. My wife is
paranoid about my English skin and the crazy Romanian sun so I bought a loose fitting
peasant shirt to wear while walking or driving to the country. I also learnt never to trust them
to send you a shirt in a larger side than they have in stock - I got one - it looked like a sack
with long arms.

I love my shirt and my Romanian wife loves to wear to wear blouses, as they are light to wear,
very airy, with beautiful attention to detail.
Romanian Dance

Every Romanian celebration needs a Romanian dance. My wife was simply appalled in the
UK at our sense of dance and our general dancing abilities as at British weddings it is
incredibly popular to hire a traditional country music band and a caller to tell you what to do.
In Romania it is apparently drilled into you at an early age.

Don't worry however as the dance you see at Romanian weddings require nothing more than a
good few beers to loosen up the muscles as you grab hands with everyone else in the circle
and dance around and around and around....

The real Romanian dance is of course more complicated than this and so it becomes part of
any decent floorshow as it is beyond the audience to recall these steps.

Generally the Romanian dancing women are dressed in white with colorful embroidery and
little aprons and most of the gear will be over 100 years old when great grandma had to do
something with her time in the deepest, darkest, coldest Romanian winters. The daughters
never seem to have followed suit. On their heads is a scarf. Most Romanian peasant women
still wear these. My granny has a wonderfully creased and wrinkled up face from being out in
all season - where her age-old scarf has protected her head, she looks so much younger, the
skin is still smooth and white.

The men wear snazzy little waistcoats - even I own one of these, which I dust off now and
again for Romanian costume days at school. The also wear white loose fitting trousers and a
hat. The hat comes generally in one of four ways. There is the ridiculously small straw hat - I
am sure someone put one on as he could not be bothered to make a larger one and then
convinced the world that was the way forward with hats. The next is a rather snazzy black felt
hat with a brim - a bit like a cowboys hat - this is the hat I wear for my costume. You can find
some people wearing a sheepskin hat -which signifies you are a shepherd with now, I
presume, one less sheep. The final hat - very beautiful and ornate is a hat with an outlandishly
large semi-circle of peacock feathers - which makes me wonder about its origins on two
fronts. The first being when and why did they add the peacock feathers? These birds cannot be
described as native and so the tradition must be less strong than the other hats. Also the other
hats are robust in wind and rain - I can't see a peacock feather hat offering much protection -
indeed you would feel you need to carefully put your coat over it - to protect it - so get even
more wet!

The Romanian dances are fun to watch - in very small doses. We had an international day at
school - and I was too slow to grab the decent school camera. However I saw a Romanian
holding it and thought I was safe... Sadly not. A few days after the event I got hold of the
camera and found the woman had only filmed the Romanian dances done by her class - so
only with almost-adults and the wealth of the fabulous dances done by the children such as
from Turkey etc were all completely ignored.

The really annoying part was my friend came dressed up as a Morris dancer and because I was
searching for a camera to film the event, the other teacher only filmed anything Romanian, it
was lost to the world apart from a few photos - it did however look cracking.

If you go to Romanian theme restaurants, you can see and often join in the dancing. Check
out the restaurant in Lipscani for the best places to eat. Can you imagine a traditional English
theme pub? Whatever happened top Morris dancers? I joined a Morris dancing club - noticed
a complete lack of decent looking women and left again - complete with my white hankie,
beard and stick!
Romanian Exports

What Romanian exports can you find in your local town? This is an interesting question,
especially when you compare now to Romania's recent past.

During the communist era, Romania exported food. It was a major wheat exporter to be
precise. All the fields on the Bucharest plains were full of wheat crops. All over the rest of the
country were carefully orchestrated crops such as cabbages, potatoes and watermelons. It was
the Communists austerity plan. While the Romanians themselves lived on very little, all its
food was sold off to pay off the national debt. This is a system quite a few modern counties
should follow - America could improve its budget and wipe out its obesity problem all in one
go.

The Romanians got bored of being hungry and low paid, so they had a pre-arranged
Revolution to overthrow power and give it to a new Government which has left Romania
poorly paid, hungry and on the perpetual verge of bankruptcy. As for the fields - they become
in general abandoned scrubland with lots of 'For sale' signs gently rusting in the wind and rain.

The legacy is Romanian farmer do still produce millions of cabbages, potatoes and water
melons, all at the same time and in the same places, so prices are stupidly low for these
products and the seller needs to live, eat and sleep next to his dusty crop on a roadside full of
equally dusty trucks looking for a buyer. They oddly are no longer considered great Romanian
exports.

With the arrival of our EU entry, things have got no easier, as from personal experience, I can
tell you that the Polish apple farmers have started importing their apples at unbelievably low
prices, wiping out what profits we do make in a year.

If the newspapers are anything to go by we are responsible for a thriving supply of sex
workers to London. They get 1500 euros to pass between their handlers, and can service up to
20 men a night - serious sloppy seconds if you arrive at the wrong time! The majority of the
whores in London are Eastern European, though as they don't pay their taxes, they probably
do not appear high on the Romanian embassy’s promotional Romanian exports materials.

However one thing Romanians do export well are themselves - more Romanians work abroad
than those from any other nation. They do all the jobs no one else wants and send the money
home to their parents. The Romanian president thanked them for not being a burden on the
Romanian welfare service - upsetting his European partners in the process, who promptly
clamped down on the rights of Romanians to work in their countries!

Another successful export is the Dacia Logan cars. They are very cheap, until you start adding
on all the extras. Apparently Russia is a major market for these cars. While in France, I did
see one - but as Romanians are like breadcrumbs in a bed i.e. they get everywhere, there is no
guarantee it wasn't a Romanian on his holidays. This is another odd thing about Romanians -
no matter how short a time they have or how far they need to travel, the car is always their
choice of transport over a plane.

The final real export of Romania is clothes and shoes -check out your labels and you will see a
lot come from the sweatshops of Romania. There are lots of factories here, but fewer than 10
years ago. For a country that exports clothes, you would be surprised how expensive the local
clothes are. A PriMark in Romania would certainly make a complete killing here! We could
also do with some nice charity shops - on second thoughts, perhaps not as Romanians have
great fears of second hand clothing -they are convinced it could be diseased or cursed!

What Romanian exports have you seen? The Romanian wine that is exported is far rougher
than the stuff we drink - so try it here!
Romanian Fashion

Romanian fashion in Bucharest rotates all around colours - never the same colour and never a
colour that will coordinate with any previous seasons colours. For example last year the
colour was orange - a really bright, lost at sea, emergency life belt orange. The year before
that it was bright red. This year it is purple - so of course is completely different to orange.

For the first few years I was lulled in my belief that if I let my new wife build her clothes
collection up - using the finest fabric and best makes - they would last her for years to come.
This dream was followed by the following years announcement that she was missing a certain
colored bag - so needed one .. A time goes on - she looked back through her collection ad
offered away clothes - including jewellery I had bought her - she reclaimed this when I
complained to make space for the new seasons colours. So Romanian fashion shopping for
women involves lots of shopping. Fortunately she loves shopping so is happy.

Romanian fashion could be the same for men and I am not seeing it but I doubt it. Irina also
does all my shopping - so I have cupboards stacked full of new shirts and t-shirts and by
watching my weight, I still fit into the trousers I bought 8 years ago.

If you live in Romania you will find super cheap tailors everywhere. On your arrival you
could drop off all the clothes which need adapting - have a nice two weeks here and then pick
them up on the way to the airport. My sister had all her medical work clothes made like this.
This means as my clothes wear out - they get repaired.

Dry cleaning here is also super cheap - so at the end of the season - they all get cleaned and
packed away into the cellar.

Romanian fashion in the countryside is much more my thing. Granny still uses an anorak I
was given 20 years ago by a good friend. Her change in dress may, if you are lucky, extend as
far as a new headscarf in the Spring, Grandpa, my ultimate swearing and cursing, fashion role
model does not change a thing - apart from 1 new shirt each Christmas and birthday by his
daughter.

There is a clothes chain in our family - I get a nice jumper. I am tall with long arms so this in
itself is a challenge. It is washed and shrinks down to my father-in-laws dimensions. After a
while it becomes worn out and unsuitable for Bucharest society and so moves to the
countryside.

I love my fashionable countryside attire. I have peasant shirts - which no one else would wear.
I have tracksuits so I can walk the dogs (dog hair is another unspoken fear in the family and so
I need special clothes for going out with the dog). I have so many almost new t-shirts,
consigned to the countryside for almost invisible (unless you are Romanian) food spots.

My countryside footwear is a beaten up pair of sandals - which of course saw better their
better days in Bucharest and the biggest, fluffiest sheep skin slippers for when I am in the
house and typing in the generally unheated backroom of the little countryside home.
There are very few Romanian films about. If you go to any other Latin country, you will find
mainly the local language being used. Apart from news channels here, very little is seen of the
modern Romanian cinema industry.

I do have a friend who tried to make films here and gave up and first went off for more
training in Prague followed by going to London.

I did see a funny film made in Romania last Christmas about a bunch of Robbers dressed as
Santa ready to do a major heist in a mall and were naturally foiled by a clever 9 year old.
While it was all set in winter, it was filmed in the middle of an extra hot summer - so they
must have all boiled in their suits!

Most of the Romanian screenplays you see on TV will be scratchy old ones from the pre-
revolution era - with terrible sound tracks to match. Modern film cartoons are dubbed while
the rest have subtitles that don't always match the spoken word.

I do enjoy watching these movies however as it does give my Romanian a well needed
workout.
I read if you want to hear original Romanian gypsy music, choose on of the gypsy
encampments on the South side of Bucharest and simply ask. I cannot honestly think of worse
advice if I tried. I can imagine what would happen - a fresh faced Englishman, carrying all his
worldly goods in a fancy new rucksack wanders into a poverty stricken camp and asks in his
best English for some music please.

He would be taken down some even grimmer part of the camp, the normal chat would be 'you
want Romanian girl? I get you Romanian girl!' - by which time four of these gentlemen have
surrounded him and held him tight as they skillfully get busy with their razor sharp knives,
checking out each and every pocket, slicing off the straps to his rucksack and vanishing back
into the grime whence they came. So looking in a gypsy camp for anything other than good
robbery story to text your mates is not the way to go about it.

The simplest way is to switch on Romanian cable TV - there are channels dedicated to 24/7
Romanian music. I still can’t quite imagine who it is who is watching these folks gently
wobbling from side to side in a fake pub setting at 3.00am in the morning, I guess Romania is
secretly a national of insomniacs. Then again I can’t imagine who would watch these channels
full stop – I have never been a fan of traditional Romanian music.

I did explore the idea of having a Romanian gypsy music band at my wedding, though having
anyone of the Roma fraternity would have been strongly resisted by everyone else. I stopped
when I asked the price of a few pub players and they quoted a price of 2000 euros for the
night. Romanians never cease to amaze me, for their lack of business skills. When that is like
6 months wages for many Romanians, to expect them to pay that for a night won’t work, so
we stuck with the traditional DJ, who as it happened had a wonderful stock of traditional
Romanian music dances. An old friend of mine, went the other way, and decided that he could
do away with the DJ and rely entirely on these folks to make the music – their repertoire was
limited and he got bored, so I am certain I made the right choice in the end.

There are also a few other places you can hear Gypsy musicians for free. If you hang about
the local town hall on the Saturday, every 15 minutes, a man with a battered all accordion will
come and play for the passing weddings. Of course you will only ever hear the Romanian
equivalent to the British ‘Happy Birthday Song’ – but they use this for pretty much any happy
occasion. The second place is on the underground – this is a lot less common. Most of the
time, you will just see people on their knees, praying to God, complaining about their lot, and
then wandering up and down with their hands out, everyone else, who also have a lot of on
their own plates, avoiding their eyes. The only winner, which I would love to do, is if you
complain about your lot and then send a sweet looking child down the train to do the begging,
then all the purses magically open.

The other places you are certain to hear Romanian gypsy music is from Romanians booming
car radios or if you are unlucky enough to have young folk with big speakers living near by,
then you can hear it across the valley. We have a Doctor who lives below us and treats all the
young women of the area, and so their men folk just sit in the car, and provide the street with
their choice of music. Sadly their tastes are not universal and there seems to be precious few
Tom Jones fans out there!

If you do go to a traditional Romanian folk concert, to hear some Romanian gypsy music, then
you had better brace yourself for a long night. They offer the very best in terms of value of
money, and often my wife comes home about 1 or 2 in the morning. I don’t like the music,
and so I am spared this, as I can’t appreciate it for more than oh – a few songs, before I curl up
and have a snooze – so it is completely wasted on me.
Romanian icons make fabulous gifts - simply because it is considered a sin in Romania to
throw them away! Which made it curious to see icons on items such as air fresheners, which
by their very nature, should be thrown away.

I have some really beautiful icons ate home, which have been in the family for ever and will
be passed on down to little Victor. I also have a beautiful Romanian icon painted on a stone. I
do however have my share of truly hideous icons. The worst one is a huge one, in a silver
frame that weighs a ton so it is tough to put on the wall.

My wife every night prays in front of the Romanian icons. I refused to have an icon on top of
my bed, as I am terrified that in an earthquake it will fall down and kill me in the process.

Another surprise is how Romanians feel obliged to kiss the icons, even ones that have been
covered in white paint after the church was redecorated. All around the churches you will find
beautiful icons. I was wandering around a distant nunnery (their underwear hanging on the
washing line were long and black and very formal, but apparently hanging a few racy black
G-strings up for fun would be a deadly sin!) and I was admiring their icons when an angry nun
(I blame on their uncomfortable, itchy underwear), came up and demanded to know what I
was doing as I had turned my back to the alter! I tried to point out that I wanted to see the
icons on the back wall but to no avail and returned to looking I the only permissible direction.

The churches in Moldavia have the best example of religious icons. The blue church is an
extraordinary example as no one has ever been able to recreate the blue paint from natural
products.

You can buy religious icons almost anywhere - from the supermarkets to the little artisan
shops to the handicraft fairs. I would recommend the last of these simply because you can
often to get to meet the original artist. The love it when foreigners take a genuine interest in
what they are doing. You can find icons made in all sorts of materials. Once a Romanian cut
down a tree and saw a religious icon - such as an image of Mary buried in the centre. The tree
was immediately declared as blest - ad if you believe the story, they succeeded in building a
whole church out of a single tree. If you know, like I do, how poorly Romanians estimate how
much materials it would take to do a job, the first tree would have been used up about half
way and another tree would have needed to be delivered in the dead of night to complete this
amazing miracle.

My favourite icon story however comes from a man in America, who saw the face of Christ
appear on to of his toasted cheese sandwich, so he placed it in a sealed glass box and sold it to
a hungry religious believer for 15,000 euros. Another icon appeared in Mexico, when water
seeped down a wall on an underpass -making an image of Mary - the underpass became
impassable a believers flocked to pray there. I think in the end, a glass plaque was placed on
top of it, to protect it.
Romanians are very proud of Romanian literature. Mihai Eminescu is their version of
Shakespeare.

My wife could not believe I was not highly conversant with his work, after all she knows all
the famous English authors such as Dickens and Hardy.

The funny thing being as soon as you leave school, you never seem to need to open another
serious book. They seem to switch immediately over to trashy Romantic magazines,
newspapers full of topless women - even the weather forecast seems to need a topless or
scantily dressed woman to show what is happening. I guess when you have the moral high
ground, you can relax a little.

Publishers are forever keen to get Romanians reading more serious books - so they give them
away free with newspapers - and let you buy the top one hundred classic reads. However
when they relaunch these in beautiful boxed sets from what I presume are all the millions of
unsold copies, they are phenomenally expensive - pushing the completely out of the reach of
all but the highest earning Romanians, who are probably there mainly because they have
already powered their way through the classics.

I have frequently tried to improve my own Romanian literature skills. I started modestly and
for a while, with a serious amount of concentration, could follow a trashy Romantic story.
They follow similar patterns - boy meets girl - boy makes another girl pregnant - boy marries
second girl, so first girl, now a shamed woman, marries violent drunkard - violent drunkard
gets wild smashes up house - dies in fatal car crash - Woman two equally unsuitable and
paranoid about fascination her husband has for girl 1 - so gets violent - leaves - boy 1 and girl
1 get it together and are happy. All is forgiven until Boy gets bored - has sex with her other
and becomes her step dad. Repeat that story a few times, pop in a few adverts advertising
witches - all problems solved in 24 hours or your money back! - and you have a winning
Romanian magazine.

I did own a translated version of Mihai Eminescu's poems - in Romanian and English - they
were poorly translated as the poet used English rhyming words, and for a year it was my
staple toilet fodder - each poem was about the right length.

Now most foreign books are translated into Romanian and if it was as poor as my poetry
book, I would explain why Romanians look down on foreign authors - little realizing that t
was in fact the poor Romanian translator who was to blame!

What Romanian literature could you recommend I read or study to gain a deeper
understanding of Romanians?
Romanian music - love it or hate it, it will boom at you from all sides, and like any other
country, their tastes are distinctly broad.

The first music that you are likely to come across is Romanian folk music. If you go to a
Romanian theme restaurant, you will see some super sexy woman - probably in her mid-
twenties - who make even the traditional Romanian dress look hot, belting out Romania
classics. You will enjoy it over a beer, mentally ticking it off as an experience you have now
seen and done and got the photo. Alas, this music will follow you everywhere you go. Your
wife, having enjoyed the show will buy a couple of innocent looking, incredibly cheap
traditional music CDs as you next refuel - so the rest of your journey around Romania is
accompanied by the only sound tracks you need to see Romania.

You switch on the TV, skillfully avoiding showing your wife she can now also watch
traditional Romanian TV 24/7 on at least three different dedicated TV channels - and settle
down to watch some incredibly slim, beautiful women jiggle their bits in some incredibly
skimpy clothes... The same woman you were admiring in the restaurant - plus 20 years and
rather more stocky - will then take centre stage and sing all the same songs - and you have the
terrible dilemma - do you sit through it for more skimpily clad women - or switch over to one
of the many re-run channels or if you are really brave - the Romania news? You know if you
switch over - you will get lost and never find the show again so you sit it out, watching
forgotten Romanian actors, wives of famous people, and more terrible Romanian comedy,
with the only 2 comedians Romania TV has, for the skimpy dances.

My wife takes it to the next level and goes to the theatre to watch them. As you know, most
music concerts are over as soon as the musician can - so an hour or hour and half, all is
wrapped up and I am back in pizza hut eating a nice pizza and washing it down with
Romanian beers. Not Romanian traditional music - the performer is so thrilled to have
someone actually come to see it live, that she rolls in completely buzzing, at about 2.00 am. I
guess it only a thing Romanians understand.

There is also a strong heavy metal and heavy rock scene here. I have a theory about this. I
think this is a side effect of Romanian traditional music. It is the only music strong enough
and loud enough to drown out the sounds of traditional music booming out in the living room.
When you add the Romanian dance and language teachers are such a fierce race of women
that they put Amazonian female warriors to shame and suddenly the rejection of Romanian
music comes to be completely understandable. Come in summer and you can go to Rock
concerts or hear them from miles away - that it is enough for me.

Classical Romanian music is nice - indeed it s almost at the level of perfection. This causes
problems for the modern artists, so they bring in the punters with the promise of famous
traditional classical music, the see if adding Chinese drums or a few electric guitars can
improve on perfection. Sadly, from my friend who goes to experimental music concerts to
show his girlfriend he has a deeper side assures me it does not work at all.

At least Romanian children's music is still fun. I love it and keep the CD player on a loop, as it
seems to keep baby Victor happy and I understand all the words. Curiously, it is much nicer
and gentle than English children’s songs that invariably require some level of injury and death
to ensure it becomes a British traditional song.
I have become rather an expert at Romanian names. Recently I had to find a name for my son.
Coming from two different nations - and needing to fit into both countries name systems
without appearing to be a foreigner in either was a challenge. I needed to find a name with the
same spelling in both English and Romanian. Fortunately - my Romanian uncle Victor called
one day and everything clicked into place and the name Victor was chosen.

We first bought a book on Romanian names and I slowly went through it - my first choice was
Phillias - as in Phillias Fogg - the character who traveled the world in eighty days. This was
immediately rejected, along with Nicolae Ceaucescu, Jesus and other historical figures.

We ruled out names such as Andrei and Roxanna (before we knew it was a boy!) as my
father-in-law said tat if he was called that, each time you called him - half of Romania would
come.

Romanian like to call their children after the father - but I did not like this on a lot of different
levels. I like being the only Peter in the family (though I did set up a Peter Fogarty club on
facebook - anyone called Peter Fogarty can join). Also the name has different spellings in
each country - and I don't want a teacher to have to learn more names than they need to -
Fogarty causes enough problems on its own. The family liked the name - but I wanted him to
have his own destiny - not mine.

I looked into naming after his two grandfathers - but as one was dead and he had never met
him - how could he aspire to have his best qualities? The other grandfather - is very much
alive - so we took this name and ran with it for a while.

I then found the name George - patron saint of England and played with different
combinations of the name there. Again the Romanian and English spellings were too difficult
and so despite it being a really strong name, like a character in all my favourite childhood
books, it was not the name for my little one.

A long favourite of mine was Edward - because you can call the kid Edward -- if he is a
formal looking child of a high class, Eddie if he looks like he could be a cool dude - or Ted if
you saw the warmth in him. I did think about this one for a long time - as the pronunciation I
the same in both languages and it took me a while to discover you wrote Edward as Eduard in
Romanian - not nearly such a pretty spelling.

The weirdest name considered was Jack. Before my wife was pregnant with Victor - one day I
was touching her tummy and heard the voice in my head say - "I am a boy and my name is
Jack" which freaked us both out. For me it was the voice, and for my wife because I was
hearing voices from beyond, she did not think she was pregnant and mot importantly - did not
actually like the name Jack. Perhaps Mary was in the same situation with Jesus.

Fortunately in our case - a period came and Jack was no more and little Victor - top name for
any child - rules the roost.
Are you looking for Romanian poetry? You need to come to Romania - where rumor has it
that everyone is a poet, something I can well believe.

Romanians are very proud of Romanian literature. Mihai Eminescu is their version of
Shakespeare. He is a fabulous Romanian poet, who wrote about love, suffering and living in
the countryside - he wrote a huge number of poems before tragically dying at a very young
age.

From what I gather from my wife, learning any sorts of poems is considered distinctly girly
and not encouraged in little boys. I discovered this by two different ways - first of all my
father-in-law only seems to know one child's sleeping song and what is sweet on first listening
starts to distinctly grate the nerves after 9 months of constant repetition. The second clue,
rather more directly, comes from my wife who was surprised I spend all my time reciting
traditional English nursery rhymes to him - she had to get a book to learn hers. This makes me
suspect the difference between the nationalities is that the British have their poems ingrained
from childhood, the Romanians, with all their pomp about their great poetry, learn them at
school and then promptly forget them.

My wife, Irina, did study poetry from an early age and apparently enjoyed reciting famous
poems from the age of two. If I get a simple sentence out of Victor in the same time period, I
will be very happy.

At the other end of the scale, I have a very old friend in both how long I have known him and
his advancing years who loves Romanian poetry like no other literature. We meet rarely, but
when we do, he loves to spout poetry at me - and this man only bothers, it seems with very
long poems, with very advanced language. As you can guess, as he only ever says his poems
in German or old Romanian, I am always at a distinct disadvantage when it comes to actually
understanding what the hell he is talking about - but at least the thought is there! So I stand,
admiring the rhythm, slurping on my Romanian brandy and everyone is happy.

All around Romania, you will find old houses that have been converted into museums, which
were once the home of a famous poet. Many of these do appear to be incredibly small houses,
and so you can easily wax lyrically about how tough your life is from such a place - the low
doorways which I would have certainly regularly banged my head on, would also have
promoted my anger and passion to new heights!

As for modern Romanian poets - I am sorry, I cannot name any. I am sure they must be there -
but they have so much competing against them, such as making enough to keeping a family
ticking over, traditional Romanian music, all based around the words la-de-la-de-la - you
would be amazed how many songs do have this refrain somewhere in it - so if you do happen
to know f some modern Romanian poets, I would really appreciate learning about them!
You will love Romanian point lace - it is some of the finest lace to be found anywhere in
Europe.

If you go into any old person's home, you will find lace everywhere - lace tablecloths, lace
place mats and lace bedding.

It is a common addition to any single Romanian girls bottom drawer - ready to furnish her
new home with yet more antique lace.

If you travel to any major tourist spot in Romania, you will find a stall selling Romanian point
lace. The little old ladies will show you their stock - though as I come from a Romanian home,
sadly I cannot buy as we have spare lace in all sorts of cupboards.

I recently found a plastic bag at my grandmother's house - and yes it to contained exquisite
Romanian lace. It turns out that in her youth she and her mother both loved making lace items
that they would add to their traditional costumes.

Sadly the need and demand for lace is on a severe decline - it is a highly time consuming
operation and lace from China is far cheaper to make than Romanian lace - a very important
fact in these harsh economic times. In addition to this, Romanian houses are full of lace and
modern Romanian homes are like something out of an Ikea catalogue, so not really a place to
find Romanian lace.
The Romanian Royalty, despite the fact they actually live in Switzerland, rather than roughing
it in Romania, are still held in surprisingly high regard here. One of the reasons for them
living abroad, apart from the better quality of life, after the revolution of 1989, they were
turned away from the Romanian borders on passport irregularities. Can you imagine the
Queen being returned to her yacht or train on passport issues?

The Romanian royalty has however left a wonderful, lasting legacy, on their country. There
has been Romanian Royal here for about 1000 years, and they do have close relations with the
British with Queen Victoria being involved in their heritage.

The castles Romanian Royalty have left behind are well worth a visit. Several have work by
Queen Maria's own hand. She was particularly fond of little Bran Castle. This is an
exceptionally pretty castle. It has little rooms, and an all in all feeling of homeliness. It also
has secret passages from the Queens room to the library.

Sinaia castle is something out of a fairy tale and despite having seen it on many occasions; it
still takes y breath away. It looks like the castle on the Walt Disney logo. It is built on a hill
and can be seen a long time before you reach it on the gently curving road. I have seen it in all
seasons and it is certainly a jewel, despite the season. When you get up close, and enter the
courtyard, the paintings on the wall remind you of a more Shakespearian time.

In Bucharest, there are new and old palaces that once belonged to the Royal family. There is
the old Court, which is now a complete ruin in Piatia Unirii. If you stand with your back to
McDonalds, on the right hand side of the square, behind the shops is the ruins.

There are more Royal ancient ruins ear by in Lipscani, which have been uncovered such as
old walls to cellars etc. The problem I have with Lipscani was the Government had a
wonderful idea of restoring the area. It went, guns ablazing, so to speak, into the project,
busily ripping up the roads and pavements in a very chaotic, typically Romanian manner,
made some raised, temporary pavements ad then ran out of money and stopped.

A word of warning about the Lipscani area. When you take out a camera, you will probably
be approached by a 'lost tourist' - probably sounding a little Austrian - who will ask you for a
tiny amount of money, say a dollar or pound, to help him. In all circumstances, look sad,
mutter something about having left all your money at home, and don't open your wallet. I
could be wrong, and perhaps he was a tourist, but I think the scam goes like this - you give
him a little, he then sees two things - a - where you keep your money and b - how much
money you have on you. Then his more shadowy accomplice will help himself to the rest a
short while later.

However, saying that while you wander around Lipscani, you will also see lots of little old
ladies begging - please give them 1 Ron (The green note) as they are legitimately poor.

The palace to see in Bucharest is the Cotroceni palace. It is also the home to the president, so
obviously security is incredibly tight. You need to book in advance of arriving and then all
your bags are checked with an x-ray. This palace was the main home of the Romanian
Royalty and has hundreds of pictures and painting of the different characters. It is well worth
the visit and you will join the masses in feeling like you have got to know and understand the
Romanian Royalty, see how artistically talented they were and enjoy their home - especially
the wooden chapel.
The last thing that the Romanian Royal family can be thanked for was the setting of different
public parks across Bucharest.

In the chaos of Bucharest street life, hides tranquil spaces of green. King Ferdinand, a German
who became king of Romania, and King Carol, where both keen to add green spaces. If you
go to Cismigu Park in winter, you can find an outside ice rink. I love this park as like all
Bucharest parks, it contains well maintained children’s play areas - where the bubbling sound
of Romanian children laughing and having fun will float on the air. There are two restaurants
around the little lake, which have excellent, well-priced menus.

The downfall of the Romanian Royal family came when due to its mix of English and German
blood in the family, it could not decide which side to fight on so like an indulgent parent it
decided to be fair and fight on both sides - and lost twice.
Romanian soccer’s a major national pastime. We have three major football clubs in Bucharest
alone, FC Steaua Bucureşti, Real and Dinamo.

<P>
There is always a lot of excitement when Romania plays other football teams - as they seem to
win quite frequently. As you are well aware, being seen as a tourist in Bucharest is equivalent
to just emptying all your pockets on some dusty street corner and walking away - removing
the fun of robbing you n a hundred different ways' from directly stealing your wallet on a
crowded bus, to massively overcharging you for your water, flowers or taxis.

So it always comes as rather a surprise to discover tourists, dressed in their UK football club
colours wandering around Bucharest. It makes life easier for the rest of us, as obviously if
your given the choice of a complete idiot, wandering around drunk on cheap Romanian beer,
or a slightly lanky almost Romanian dressed looking foreigner, for one day in y life I am free
from suspicion. The poor chap will wander home; convinced Bucharest is even more like the
Wild, Wild West than he previously thought.

I am now, as it happens, related through marriage to one of the sexiest Romanian sports
reporters you will ever see - sadly she mainly writes for newspapers -a complete waste of such
beauty if you ask me! However she is a FC Steaua Bucure&#351;ti fan - whose colours are
blue and red.

Her entirely new bathroom is kitted out in the exact same shade of blue and red so I hope she
remains a life long fan! The only thing missing is a toilet seat. This intrigued me, as I must
admit sitting n the toilet, reading my love poem book, would not be quite the same experience
without a seat. Apparently this is because she has yet to source the exact shade of blue or red
she needs and a cheap white or wooden one just would not be the same.

I am pleased they are in the European championships. I was surprised to see that the
Romanian soccer team did not make it to the world cup - seeing they seem to play so well in
Europe. They are constantly on with my father-in-law intermittently watching between his
amazingly loud snores.

The only time to keep away from the stadiums is entering or turning out time as between all
the fans and police, transport goes at a crawl, the trams are full and even on foot it is difficult
to pass easily. However it does give you plenty to talk about and it does appear to take up a
considerable amount of time on the Metro (Underground) advertising TV programs - between
terrible American 'You've been framed or Just for Gags shows' - a show not really improved
by having no soundtrack.
The nice thing about Romanian songs for children are their lyrics are actually suitable for
children to listen to and understand. In contrast, the leading characters in English songs for
children require lots of pain and death. Here are a few of my top examples I sing to baby
Victor.

<ul>
<li>Humpty Dumpty - Egg gets killed in fall. Describes a tragic tunnel failure in England,
killing lots of workers.</li>
<p>
<li>Ring, ring, o' roses - About the black death and the plague killing 1/3 of the population
and looking for the first symptoms - a ring of spots which looked like roses.</li>
<p>
<li>Rock a bye baby - putting your baby in a cradle high up and being surprised when a storm
whips up and it falls to the ground, smashing baby cradle and all on its fall.</li>
<p>
</ul>

In comparison my favourite Romania song goes like this. There is a slug complaining about
his bad day after being bitten by a red ant, so off her goes sadly down the path, where he
meets a beetle coming the other way. The beetle complains how slow the slug is moving and
if he does not move a damn sight faster he should pull over and let him past or he will pull
him by his horns and throw him off the road, making sure he lands on his head in the process.

This poem is directly preparing a Romanian child about how to drive like a Romanian. Here is
my take on the story.

Despite having no food, money, job prospects or a decent girlfriend (all and any being the ant
sting), don't expect any sympathy from anyone else.

The Beetle clearly represents the new rich class, which travels about incessantly at high speed
in streamlined - almost black beetle shaped cars.

If you are depressed and so driving slowly, the new fast class are likely to complain, try to
force you to the side of the road and if this fails pull up directly in front of you, grab some
heavy instrument or fire arm and promise to do you damage.

No-one else appreciates this as it is suitably coded as simply a slug, an ant and a beetle. But
now you know, you will look at the song ion a whole new light!

There is however a close similarity between English and Romanian songs for children - there
are a tremendous number of cross species relationships - such as a Froggy went a courting, he
did ride, to take miss Mouse to be his bride. She needed to ask her Uncle Rat's permission,
showing this was common practice in her family. The same stories are found time and again
in Romanian stories.

Oddly if you chat to adult Romanians, they can't recall any songs to sing to baby and need to
learn them again from istening to CDs or only singing the one song left from those days. In
comparison, an English parent will buy the Cd with the list of songs the know in their heads.
If it is any comfort, Australians also have the same problem and so I found a site especially
for them to learn classic Australian songs again.
A Romanian wedding is an amazing spectacle - not to be missed by anyone.

If you are getting married here and come from overseas I recommend leaving the locals to
organise everything. After I tried to organise the menu by listing all the Romanian foods I
really like, I was told to just look smart (after a closely supervised shopping trip!) and turn up.

If you are a guest, you can expect to have to give between 100 - 200 euros to attend the day -
if you are foreign or closely related to the family you can see the price rise. It is not a set
amount - more an unspoken suggestion... Which makes guessing how much to give that much
trickier.

The day starts with the groom (in my case hung over and almost no sleep) going to the bride’s
house to collect her where she hides... Then you head off to church together. The church
service is anything but normal as you wear a golden crown and are led around the alter three
times.

Here I made a classic mistake - a part of the ceremony has you wearing the wedding ring on
the right hand... so I started crossing myself with the left one... oddly this is a major religious
crime here so the priest was not at all impressed!

In a Romanian wedding you will see quite a few things missing from a traditional wedding
such as no best man or any speeches. As mine was an Anglo-Romanian combination my
father delivered his stunning speech in Romanian. There are lots o dances followed by
kidnapping the bride for some whiskey... you need to give lots to show their value.

There are lots of tours around the room and lots of kisses. All night the couple tour the room
to make sure all are well.

At the end of the night when everyone has left the father in law collects in all the envelopes,
counts and mutters to himself when families have not been as generous as expected and goes
off to pay the bills - anything left over is you and your partners. We had enough to buy a new
car with ours!

Don't forget to say Casa de Piatra ... I did this once in a castle I was visiting - I got very odd
looks from the couple until I realized they were simply on a photo shoot and not getting
married at all!
Would you like some Romanian wine glasses? I bought a complete set of wine glasses for my
sister's wedding. It was rather a miracle that I managed to fly the whole lot these intact in both
hand luggage and the main luggage of me and my wife on separate flights - as she flew in
early to help.

My sister was so touched that she redesigned her kitchen - bought a lit display cabinet so that
she could show the world her beautiful Romanian wine glasses.

We bought the wine glasses in Lipscani in Bucharest - they were very tall and elegant. I have
also seen them in artisan shops across Bucharest and in Unirii shopping center in the center of
Bucharest.

We don't have such pretty and rather delicate wine glasses - we use more robust short stocky
lead crystal glasses. These are available in Ober. As this is Romania however, I have seen
them for sale at traffic lights... this is always something I find amusing as when I a driving
along, I don't normally think of buying glasses, dirty over sized carpets or stolen mobile
phones while waiting for the light to go green - but I guess some must.

While buying your Romanian glasses - don't forget to buy some Romanian wine. There is
even a great Romanian wine route that, for once, is well labeled.

Romanian wine is cheap but good - try to find their local natural wines as these have fewer
additives. You can find wine shops - where you bring a bottle and get them for barrels.

Tell me more about your experiences of buying and using Romanian wine glasses. Where did
you buy them and did you get them home completely intact?
A Romanian wedding is a really fabulous day. I have often thought how much fun it would be
to regularly gate crash them - after all a party is a party is a party. But this one has a nasty
sting in its tail - before you leave - you need to present an envelope covering the cost of the
meal, day and a gift. Which makes going to a normal restaurant a far more appealing option.

A weird thing about marrying in Romania is you need to announce the Banns via the British
embassy and also in the local town hall. This means anyone can make a complaint if they
wished. I can understand this in the olden days, where everyone lived in small communities
and knew each other. The chances however that I would go on a daily basis to check the latest
batch of foreigners weddings is slim - added to touring all the town halls. So I doubt anyone
sees a problem wedding at this stage! (Apart of course the future parent - in laws - who like
predicting disasters!)

The venue itself is really important to a Romanian wedding as it shows the world just how
high up your contacts are. We have been to little bars and went to an incredibly cool place in
the centre of town that contained a huge park, a small waterfall and a luxurious restaurant with
a chocolate fountain machine. Only the highest members of the Romanian National Bank
could hire this elite, police guarded area, so we were naturally impressed. We eat at a
restaurant owned by the Science Academy so again used inside contacts to hire it. You first
find the venue, then you announce the wedding, then you find a church that has a slot. There
is none of this 'You must attend at least 6 weeks beforehand to wed here' malarkey. You just
need to provide cash and choose somewhere that will look nice in your photo collection!

The Romanian wedding invitations were a nightmare to organise it took them three print runs
to get them right. The first time they got my name wrong, the second was the wrong date and
by the third attempt, still with minor errors, I just gave up all together!

The problem with weddings is that no Romanian wedding is better than your own, and we still
consider we had the best one ever - if modesty can allow me to say such things.

The worst Romanian wedding I have been to was probably the one with belly dancers - men
were enthusiastically shoving dollars down their bras and pants. My wife perplexed me as I
was cringing in embarrassment as to why I was not following suit. I pointed out that she was
next to me and also why would I waste our limited resources on such women.

In the same Romanian wedding, they had the belief that the louder the music, the better it was.
I guess they are the sorts who also drive their cars and share their taste in music with the
world up to half a mile away. So we couldn't even dance.

A top Romanian folk singer led another Romanian wedding - it was one of the most lavish
weddings we went to - I had never met them before or since.

The wedding reception is long, a mix of long meals with lots of alcohol. I love it as it is one of
the only times I can drink gin and tonics freely. There seems to be remarkably little beer
served at these venues. It is mainly spirits, wine and coke. The last one of these is always
consumed in vast quantities. For a nation where eating well and naturally is still very much
part of the culture, this comes as a big surprise to me. There is of course also a constant supply
of sparkling and flat water. The amazing thing being that despite there always being a free bar,
I don't ever recall seeing anyone blind drunk, as you would at a British wedding.
The bride gets kidnapped and the groom must pay a pre-determined amount. I was curious to
know if the groom ever was having too much fun and didn't pay for ages. I know my wife did
not enjoy being kidnapped, as with a top party going on downstairs, she didn't actually want to
miss a second of it as I tried to rescue her. It is the chance of showing everyone how much
you appreciate her.

There are no speeches - not that it stopped dad saying one in Romanian. His speeches were
always unpredictable so others had prepared follow speeches! Fortunately it was really nice -
so all the other speeches went unsaid.

Last piece of advice - pay to keep the camera and video people to the end. My British friends
got the dJ stupidly drunk and he, along with the English sang a serenade to the new Mrs.
Fogarty before driving off home. Sadly a moment missed by the film crew.
There are so many ways of describing time in Romania. The most simple is to say we are two
hours ahead of British time. This is great as then I can do a full days work, go home and still
catch the Brits mid-afternoon. Of course the side effect is I can’t call for a chat in the morning
without causing them to get out of bed!

If you come here, you will discover a whole new concept of time. Do you recall times when
your mother or your partner used those magic words 'maybe later' - which translates into 'not
on your nelly' or simply a polite way of saying no? These terms, I am convinced, have their
deep dark roots in Romania.

When a party or meal starts at 7.30, the Brits will be there, ready for a pre-meal beer at 7.15.
The Romanians on the other hand see this as the time they should really be thinking of getting
into a taxi - from wherever else they happen to be in the city.

If you are building a house in Romania, the timeframes make the British builder look the
model of efficiency rather than a man who needs long tea breaks. Here, every weather
condition is used as a perfect excuse. Rain and damp will warp the most resilient of wood,
(ruling out Spring and Autumn) and it must not be cold (goodbye working in Winter), while it
is impossible to work in the Romanian heat - not to mention the secret deadly radiation rays
which oddly only target Romanian skin.

When I first came here, I was impressed at the proposed timeframe for knocking down a little
shack and reusing the bricks for a bigger, better designed home for two families. After saving
up the tiny amount needed, and waited with bated breath. 7 years on, every cold winter sees
more fabulous house designs roll out. Every summer sees reasons why this is not the time to
do it. You get use to it - perhaps little Victor will build my dream house...

The killer Romanian phrase is 'Septamaine vitoire' which should mean 'next week' but is up
there with the British 'maybe'. It means everyone agrees something should get done - but not
now. I use to believe it was going to be the following week - it took a few intervening months
and a miserable father-in-law to stop asking!

If you come to visit, your time in Romania will feel like endlessly long sunny days, yet your
day to fly out will come around so quickly that you will wonder where your 2 weeks really
went.

The final odd belief, started by Romanian scientists, was time in Romania, like everywhere
has suddenly increased. This is why you get less done in each day - each day is in fact much
shorter than it was in our childhood days. My pointing out that for this to be true everything
from distant stars moving across the sky to super accurate atomic clocks would all need to
speed up at exactly the same rate, despite the vast differences in time (light from stars we see
our thousands to millions of years old) and space. Romanians hate such logic; time is so short
here as everyone has to work ever harder to stay in one place.
Romania TV is fun to watch.

When I first got here, granny only had one channel called TVR1 and seemed to be perfectly
happy. There is one state channel broadcast strongly enough that anyone can pick it up. This is
very much like the BBC in the fact that it has news, variety shows and films.

I then invested in an antenna to boost the signal to two channels, which she greatly
appreciated. As we started to send a lot more time there, I bought a top package for satellite
TV and granny now has never looked back - or come to that anywhere else apart from the TV.

She loves the political shows and all the Romania TV news. One channel, which I personally
avoid like the plague, is OTV, which is full of scare stories that never seem to actually
happen. Bucharest sits on a fault line and we are all waiting for 'The Big One' - so OTV
regularly has folks on the show who have been prewarned in dreams about the coming of this
huge earthquake - which will, when it comes, kill thousands of Romanians, so is a point of
concern. They predict a vague date - which Romanians then believe. Many left Bucharest for
Easter purely because 'The Big One' was suppose to happen around then on a big religious
event on Saturday and had been announced on Romania TV.

Another classic on Romania TV I watched and all my family believed was a suggestion we
were all being secretly micro chipped and only those with a microchip in the future could eat.

On top of scandalous stories, I was surprised to see a news story about naked little children
running around on a baking hot day on a beach. In the UK, even placing a naked picture
yourself as a baby on a birthday cake is forbidden by most supermarkets, while photoing your
own children in swimming pools or parks is also forbidden - so as you can imagine films of
naked children on national TV is a bit shocking to most of us.

I noticed it is only recently that they have started to frost out images of dead people. Until
recently, you would see the dead bodies in all their glory at any story of car crashes etc.

When I first got here, all the cartoons were in English - which suited me perfectly. Then
overnight they were dubbed into Romanian and it took me a few more years to understand
again what the dialogue was.

The variety shows here are certainly very varied. The key features of any show are lots of
incredibly beautiful, dressed to a minimum, skinny woman who will randomly go into a dance
routine. As there only seem to be 2 comedians in the hole of Romania -I have even gone to see
them live - you also need a slot for them. Then you throw in some aging actors who have not
done a movie in years, some others who are famous for having famous husbands.

Romania news is very much locally based - and very confusing. I watch Realitiate as it has a
convenient tick tape along the bottom for international news. It is fun to watch though I still
don't get much of it - my family explains it simply as he is a thief, she is a liar, they are
fermenting a revolution etc.. So the family is more fun to watch than the TV.

At least all the movies are in English (the soap operas are in Japanese or Latin America
Spanish) so I can chill out and still see old reruns of British shows.
LEARN ROMANIAN

There are times when you need an English to Romanian translation of things. My wife
complains I don't use all the words other people use. This is because overtime your stock of
words declines, purely because you are not exposed yourself to them. In addition, without
consciously thinking about it, you simplify your words purely so that you are better
understood.

I do often find myself being given instructions for objects, such an ingenious folding baby
bed, and needing to provide an English to Romanian translation so the rest of the family can
actually use it!

A more annoying part of reading a Romanian translation of Western goods is seeing how they
describe ingredients in different languages. A super sweet baby biscuit become, purely from
apparently crossing the Romanian border, a sugar free biscuit, as they didn't mention sugar in
Romanian anywhere on the packaging. This is especially annoying to us, as we are trying to
provide him, at least for a short while, a sugar-free life style.

Then comes the tricky part of translating jokes and proverbs into Romanian. They say that
when you can do this proficiently, you are well on the way to using the language correctly. I
think my favourite Romanian phrase is describing a man made of mammaliga (boiled, ground
maize - a Romanian staple food) in the rain. I occasionally throw in English proverbs, but they
take rather a while to explain and then I always have a nagging doubt that I have said them or
explained them correctly.

Everything in our school has an English to Romanian translation and an English to Turkish
translation. While I host my parent evenings, people sit in and get a Romanian translation of
everything I say. So it is odd that when the parents get the final end of year report, it is only
ever in English. To make matters worse it is a very educationally technical language - even
normal teachers wander away looking confused about some of the targets - the parents have
no chance.

However there was an interesting experiment. Three reports re issued and the parents were
questioned afterwards, in the first, no grades were given only comments for improvement. The
second only got a list of grades. The third got a full report, combining both the reports from
the other two. Guess which group got the most from their reports? I think it will surprise you.
Those that just got grades were happy enough, those that got just comments read them and put
them into action. Those that had both' completely ignored the teacher comments and just
focused on the grades for achievement and effort. This is why I suggested translating all the
reports using Google translate - which turns everything into tourist-speak, i.e. a mix of local
lingo and English words popped in if the computer can't find a replacement, but it still is a
much better alternative to giving English school reports to people who have no understanding
of the language - why these folks send their children to learn and read stuff they can't help
with was always a mystery to me but there you go!
Do you want a free Romanian translation? You must remember that you always get what you
pay for - and a Romanian translation is no different.

I always use Google translate for my Romanian translations. As I am still learning Romanian
they look great - I pass them onto Romanians with complete flops. Indeed I cannot think of a
single email I have written using Romanian from Google translate which was answered. They
cause my wife physical pain to see her language so profoundly messed up by a computer. The
other firms think that if this is his level of learning - we will never communicate at a decent
level and prefer to lose trade than make the effort - this is something you quickly learn about
Romanian companies - if they can find a way to lose business - they will. To provide a decent
customer service to the jolly foreigner won't happen - Romanians don't expect a decent service
- so don't count in this discussion.

So when does a free Romanian translation bode well? Thank you cards and Get well soon
cards to Romanian friends - they like the touch and it is great way for them to jump on their
foreigner husband and say - "Joe was here two weeks - and has better Romanian than you (as
they expect foreigners Romanian to be bad)" - this fatal card with then travel around all the
extended family - providing endless joy to every Aunt and granny to point out the local
husband should write more in Romanian... and make you a welcome guest the following time
you come to call.

I recently heard a funny story about a company who wanted Welsh signs - they sent their
message to be translated - and posted the Welsh response in huge letters next to their
supermarket - alas no one in central office knew Welsh - not really needed in Central London
- so did not discover until it was too late when they read what the sign said... The error
message - 'No one is in the office at the moment - please try again later...

What mishaps have you had when you have used a free Romanian translation service? My
wife - while dating - offered me a massage (meant message) from Romania!
Are you looking for a free Romanian translator? I would personally recommend Google
Translate. It lets you type in English and automatically makes a Romanian sentence.

My mother and stepfather love this system as then they can write thank you messages to my
wife's mother.

Oddly enough my Romanian wife is completely at odds with me over using this free translator
of Romanian as she fairly points out that the translation is very poor and only used in an
emergency.

To test it, one drunken night in my youth I used it to pass myself off as Italian - the Italian girl
was not impressed - even less so when I told her I was an Italian teacher - she pitied my
students and ignored me - so these translators are better than nothing but not for affairs of the
heart.
You want to know how to speak Romanian? I am afraid to say it is a really tricky language to
learn. I have tried to do it in so many different ways...

My first attempt was while I was still in the UK. I bought a book and a tape to learn how to
speak Romanian and as I walked to and from work in a town where I was regularly told all
foreigners were 'nig -nogs' and not worth talking to, I got some very odd looks. Also, as a tape
cannot correct you - and the Romanian language is so precise - I mastered reading and a little
understanding but speaking eluded me.

While in Romania, after a few lessons with my Romanian girlfriend - she decided I needed a
real teacher and so I went twice a week for lessons - at first I made solid progress - until she
decided that I should learn about the dark side of my new family.

Paying money to hear stuff you know is not true annoyed me and I had to find a different way
to master this language.

This was followed by a quick succession of more Romanian books, CDs and tapes - each
having the downside of not correcting me...

I married and thought 'Now here is my chance to learn how to speak Romanian' - alas no.
They would let me witter away in my Romanian and work out the gist of what I wanted -
normally due to my wild hand expressions that matched and never correct my terrible
grammar.

Even when my wife did try she was first charmed at my 'Sweet Romanian' so didn't like to
correct me until my mistakes had taken such root as to be impossible to eradicate - at which
point she would just get annoyed and walk off...

People suggested she only ever spoke to me in Romanian - a sentiment I completely agree
with but again alas no as she thinks it would be quicker to do it herself than this solution.

I do make great progress however during my immersion sessions as my Romanian granny and
mother-in-law cannot speak English and so it forces me to think and work on my Romanian.

My Romanian great aunt loves to complain to me about my lack of Romanian - in guess what
- Romanian. This means I have conservations about my not speaking Romanian in Romanian
with someone who never took the time to learn a second language.

My mother in law told me to learn the language by watching the news - but you know how
fast newsreaders speak and Romanian politics is tricky enough to follow. I do however
understand the president - who speak slowly and clearly - perfect for foreigners and the dim
witted.

I did find that the software BYKI did help and I did use it a lot to build up my skills - though
the rest of the train on a daily basis had to hear me go 'blue, blue, red, yellow...' as I learnt my
colours.
What should you do to learn Romanian? The first solution is the simplest yet the most
extreme. Move here - and live somewhere other than Bucharest.

If you live in Bucharest, there are enough ex-pat people and places that will stop you ever
needing to fully engage with your local environment.

Choosing a preferably small, rather run down village, in a house which requires lots of
renovations - hence lots of interaction with the locals and the local shops is a far more
effective way of mastering Romanian - learn the lingo or starve. My building projects all lie in
differing levels of disrepair. The problem being that in one, my granny, who is quite correct to
be perfectly happy with her little home, does not want experimental improvements from her
rather-building-inept great-son-in-law. In the other, which no one lives in, as soon as I get
magnetically attracted to one of our large, whirring, noisy, wood cutting machines, my father
in law distracts me like a kid with sweets, as he immediately recognizes that my hands and the
complete lack of any safety equipment is not an ideal combination - so it is more efficient, and
more gets done, when I don't work there either.

Why do I need to learn the Romanian language? I still want to become a Romanian citizen,
but they don't just accept anyone - you need to apparently prove you love Romania by reciting
a 90 verse poem about its merits rather than write a 130 page website on the same love of the
place.

If you want to learn Romanian from afar, a much better idea, click on the advert from
Transparent as you can really get a great piece of software for free. It does have lots of
flashcards to learn Romanian as well as 69 other languages - many which are put there for fun.
You can even the go to their community page and download more free lists - building up a
comprehensive library for free.

The third way, which also contains a link from here, is to marry a Romanian. This failed
miserably for me - don't get me wrong - you cannot find a happier husband than me - but
English dominated and you will learn a relationship can really only support one main
language. The advantage being as Irina is so fluent in both languages now; it has removed all
my needs for further study.

However - saying all this, there is still a part me that is determined to master this impossible
language. When I find a moment, I will again, like the language junkie I am, employ yet
another Romanian (I have a rapidly growing staff!) and this time learn Romanian so I can
become the Romanian citizen I know I can be!
I often use the Google Chrome online Romanian translation when I am browsing the web.

I find there is lots of interesting news in Romanian that I change into English before reading.
This is especially useful for when I am browsing for items for the baby.

More frequently however I do it the opposite way and I use an online translation service to
share information with the family. My parent in laws tell me to learn Romanian (an
impossibly tricky language!) so this is my way around it.

Oddly enough I often find pages in English about Romanian traditions such as how to give a
child their first bath or hair cut (big ceremonies here) and I translate it back into Romanian for
the family to follow.

As always be very aware that while these translations are understandable (a bit like
instructions on how to build something made in China and only a basic set of English
instructions are included), they should only be used as an informal way of getting the gist.
Anything more formal requires a real Romanian translator.
The Romania language dates back to the Roman times. The Dacians (original Romanians)
were not easy to beat - but they had access to all sorts of things the Romans desired - such as
Gold and Salt.

Amazingly but true Romans were paid in both money and salt. Romanian for salt is sare -
from there you can easily see where the term salary comes. So Romania and Italy became
close trading partners. As the Roman Empire went into decline and collapse, Romania became
an island of the Romantic languages, surrounded by a sea of Slavic languages.

It in turn over time evolved into its own special language - spoken no where else - letting it
become a really pedantic language which is only spoken by one nation - and hard for anyone
else to confidently master.

There are lots of side effects to this. The young people know how to speak the Romania
language and also English - making me even lazier in the process as I can try even less to
communicate. The fact I work in a British school and mix all day with British teachers, my
wife speaks to me in English and my in-laws understand my Romanian so never correct it
does not help me at all!

I did investigate a machine to help me speak - but it is ten times as expensive (200 pound) as
any other multi-European language translator so I resisted the urge so far. My wife insists out
my only hope is now to learn it with Victor when he learns to speak. I am sure he will quickly
outstrip his old dad’s rate of progress! He also needs to master English so he too is bilingual
and he can translate my desires into intelligible Romanian!

Don’t get me wrong - I speak poor Romanian all the time but I can read it really well. I read
my wife’s trashy Romantic magazines, where people describe their miserable lives and where
I can hire a real Romanian witch to cure all my ills in 24 hours. It apparently costs about 100
euros per problem followed by a few more thousand to get them to leave you alone again.

The only time my Romania language skills improve is when I left alone with my Romanian
grandparents - where you must speak Peasant Romanian or no one can understand you.
Saying that, the fact I walk my dog on a lead (or she runs away at the sign of any trouble)
confuses Romanians quite enough for now.
I wanted a Romanian to English translation so I went to an official translator.

Every legal document must be translated for it to be valid so you know what you are getting.
If you saw my wedding photos you would think I was marrying my translator as we read the
A4 translation together.

In my early married days in Romania, I had a stunning confidence in my Romanian skills - 8

years on, my Romanian is much better though I have far less confidence in it .. partly due to
my early experiences. My father in law each day would drive with me to work. This was for
several reasons. The first was to teach me how to drive like a Romanian. Te second was so he
could use the family car in the day. I used these happy times to perfect my English to
Romanian translation skills. I would come home to Irina, my wife, reporting truly amazing
tales where Nae, my father in law would do as I asked. He would go home and report to his
wife and daughter stories of my amazing change of heart on ideas.... it turns out in the car we
would have 2 completely different conversations - each babbling away and no-one really
minding.

There are frequently funny mistakes in Romanian menus such as fried crap (Crap is Romanian
for carp). There is another in Otopeni airport warning you not to export more than 10 litres of
bear in your luggage - they meant beer - but only after succeeding to liquidize a bear into easy
to transport plastic bottles!
I love trying to convert Romanian to English for my students at school. In my class, no one
has English as their first language, and so while I need to teach them the entire English
National Curriculum, they do tend to help each other to convert their fluent Romanian into
English.

It is curious to see where the common languages lie. Sometimes it is a Turkish - Romanian
line, other times English - Romanian. So even children speaking a second language may not
always choose it to be English.

Today we had a lot of fun at school as we decided to make our own Rosetta stone. In Ancient
Egypt, a single stone, holding three different translations of the same text were found. Using
one language, you can find similar words in other languages. So now my class has translated
Romanian into English, as well as Turkish into English and even between Romanian and
Turkish. The children loved expressing themselves in their own languages and then translating
these into different languages.

At school I often find I need to translate parent's Romanian into English, especially at parents
evenings. The funniest are those done by the children into Chinese as there is no way of either
party knowing if the child has reported what the other said accurately or what they think both
sides would like to hear. As always it is a matter of faith.

Everything in our school is translated into English, Romanian and Turkish - with the
exception of the school reports. So the most crucial, teacher-speak documents arrive in the
hands of parents who have no idea about what to do with them.
You can now find Romanian translations online really easily. If you download the Google
Chrome browser, it is super fast - and more importantly it will change all your web pages into
your own language. Sadly it does not translate humor very well so I am hiding behind the fact
if what I write does not make you smile in a second language - then blame Google.

Romanian subtitles on TV really simplify the English language and often use less offensive
words. Swearing is especially watered down so my wife gets super - annoyed a she is keen to
master English swear words - to use against me when she decides it is about time to explode
again.

As Romanian TV translations are so dire, I can only wonder at how well foreign books get
translated into Romanian - and it is understandable that Romanians think foreign authors are
not a patch on their own writers. In reality it is the Romanian translation that is at fault - rather
than the highly entertaining and incredibly witty original author.

Everywhere I go, I need Romanian translations of all I do. The children need a Romanian
translator at parents’ evenings, which is great. I understand what is asked in Romanian but
anything more detailed than well-behaved and hard worker and I need a little help. There was
an experiment to see if we could run a school without making any translations - under the
theory we are an International school. It resulted in our school secretaries being inundated
with confused parents, who wanted to know what to do with a piece of paper in a foreign
language. Ever since we have sent out letters in English, Romanian and Turkish. I would like
to see translations of the school reports into their local language.

If you open a firm, get married (or I guess divorced) or buy land, you will need to employ a
legal translator to do the work for you as this is a safeguard the state has in place so you
understand exactly what you are doing and you don't end up getting married rather than buy
an apartment (a big party with a woman in white is a bit of give away at any house warming!)

Fortunately, for me, I seem to have reached the end of my legal requirements - all land and
property goes directly to baby Victor, no plans to divorce or remarry here, and buying a home
in Romania was so tough the first time around, so no chance of making any changes there!
I have recently found more uses for a Romanian translator. It can't be much fun being
translating Romanian for British teachers looking for their work visas as the process takes so
long.

In Bucharest, there is only one place they make visas. I was there recently to get my
permanent visa here. There I met a really sweet looking Romanian translator, and so having
nothing better to do, I watched her in action - or more precisely, inaction. The problem is there
are 10 windows, and a queuing ticket machine which Romanians ignore by hovering near the
booth and sliding right in there for a 'quick question' - which always seems to need a long and
complicated answer. There were 2 windows open when I went there - a long queue for
foreigners and a window with nothing much doing, for Romanians - both armed with cameras,
which took photos that never actually seem to appear on your visa.

The poor Romanian woman who acted as the translator, with white stitching on her bag to
keep it all together, has to do this queuing daily - one for each new teacher that needs help. I
did it once and was bored silly - I had mastered remembering all the anti-corruption rhetoric,
which in fairness does seem to be trickling down as I did not need to pay any gifts to get
things done.

One teacher forgot his passport - so you can imagine how annoyed the smiling Romanian
female translator must have really felt.

Fortunately for me, as I own a house here and plan to work for ISB until they extract that
piece of chalk from my dead, cold hands - preferably not dropping dead in front of the
children, I never need to go back in that long queue again.

Which gives me time to explore other uses of a Romanian translator. Recently I bought a
super cool inflatable double mattress for my father in-law to sleep on rather than the floor or a
hard, narrow sofa. We have two of the world most uncomfortable sofas - one for each of my
in-laws to sleep on while helping to look after baby Victor. My wife, being my wife, decided
that a double tall mattress was fine - though my father in law refused to sleep on it, perhaps a
tall single would be better - so for once Google translator did its job and I could find one in
Romania - and when it arrived, my wife found it so well packed that she decided it was best
left where it was after all.

Here is a funny thing - shopping online in Romania never uses a credit card. Most Romanians
don't have credit cards - those that do - never need to worry as no one ever looks at who
signature it is anyway - but I digress - in Romania, you have three options. The first is to pay
at the door - so you give cash directly to the courier. The second being you have to give cash
at the post office - the third being to pay at the bank before the order is released.

The next job I will be giving a Romanian translator who, also works as a teacher, will be to
teach my son English. I am a part of the 'lost generation' - where for about 10 years they
decided that teaching children English grammar was left off the curriculum as they pick it up
as they go along - and so I am forever unable to put into words why we use much or many -
and it frustrates me terribly. So I guess I will never really become free of beautiful and rather
patient Romanian translators after all!

When do you use a Romanian translator? What for? What is the oddest job you have required
a Romanian translator for?
Romanians like to tell you how simple Romanian words are to read, speak and understand.
Romanian is a wonderfully phonic language where how it is written is how it sounds... but try
to speak Romanian from a phrase book and not a sole person will understand you. I once tried
it - the helpful Romanian just looked at me and said I am sorry I don't speak German and
walked off.

My lack of Romanian vocabulary naturally annoys my wife but for the first 5 years no one
ever corrected me so bad words were permanently locked into my brain.

If you are even remarkably close to the right word but not 100% - then they simply will not
understand and for a long time I was confused by this when I compared how easy it was to
understand all the different English dialects - then the theory struck me.

The British explorers traveled everywhere and so took their language everywhere and so
slowly it mutated into all sorts of words with a common heritage, In contrast Romanians
stayed at home as they were busy constantly protecting themselves from invasion from all
sides... so as a result their language remained pure (the only Romantic language in this part of
Europe) and far less flexible than English.

Saying that Romanian words have some beautiful sounds - my favourite is DobbyTock that is
not a polite word but just feels great around the mouth.

Here is a challenge for any Romanian reading this - I like to describe classes positively and as
each class in my school has a letter such as mine is 4F - which I call 4 - Frumos. My friend's
class is 4L and try as we might we can't think of one.
Speak Romanian! His is a cry I often here directed at me, and perhaps one day I will pay some
attention to it - some day. I live in a world where England is king. Almost everything I need to
do can be done with my average level of Romanian, and as I work in an entirely English
environment, where I only need to know basic words in Romanian so that I can explain ideas
to children, the websites I need and make are in English - and the ones which are not, Google
Chrome has a magic little button which changes Romanian into intelligible English.

There are a whole host of reason I will not perfect my ability to speak Romanian however
long I will live here - after 8 years I have reached a major plateau, which will take a lot of
work to further climb off. My wife speaks to me in English rather than teach me and speak to
me only in Romanian - so my English skills are now going to shot as well as you tend to
subconsciously use easier words and well known proverbs. My in-laws live us and don't speak
English. This should force me to speak Romanian - I do but no one ever corrects me until a
word is so well ingrained that nothing will shift it from my vocabulary. Victor needs me to
speak English to him sop he picks up an English accent and can communicate with both sides
of the family.

Romanians will tell you their language is so simple as it is all phonetic, what you read, you
say - what you want to say, you can write down without needing to think about silent letters
and magic e. What they won't tell you is if you are a fraction of a syllable out - like a
computer that only understands 0's and 1's, then the world stops and no one will understand
you. They will say it and it will sound so close, in English you would immediately understand
each other.

I have a theory on this (not surprisingly!). At our peak of Empire building, we owned 25% of
the Earth's land mass, so obviously our language got seriously corrupted on the way as
Africans chatted to Indians in a version of English quite unlike English in the Queen's parlor.
It was already a tricky language - Shakespeare could not spell his own name and even on the
same page managed to spell it three different ways before, rumor has it, deciding to call his
own sons Bob, Jo and Al for simplicity, so we always had a wonderfully flexible language
from each conquest.

In contrast Romanians have never had colonies anywhere else as the number of handkerchiefs
and undershirts needed for a years expedition proved prohibitively large for the number of
ships they had, so they all remained at home, defending their shores, and sticking any jolly
foreigners on sharpened poles for not speaking Romanian properly. With such an efficient
method of teaching their young - and poor students being deemed Turkish invaders posing as
young Romanians and popped on a pole, the Romanian language became decidedly precise.

In their enthusiasm for an exact language, you will discover that to speak Romanian
effectively, you must never ever use the words please, thank-you or sorry. Use those words
and they will instantly know you are not Romanian. I had to train my family that if I took
them out to some fancy theatre production, costing me an arm and leg, I had better hear a
thank-you in the evening and it is only when they feel the British fury slowly rising - which
gives them more of a chance to correct things than a Romanian fury which is instantly on -
then instantly off again in agreement of their crazy Romanian language - that they remember
and thank me, leaving them perplexed as to why they need to say it, as surely I should know
they enjoyed it without saying anything, and me happy to hear it.

Little Victor needs to learn to speak English with all its formalities and social niceties and
Romanian. To speak Romania and English will see his brain grow larger - as he needs to
know Romanian social rules and English ones and realize women from both countries will
slap him if he uses the wrong set of social graces in the wrong country. The bright side being
at least the Romanians have put away their sharpened poles!
Do you want to study Romanian? As you can see at the top of this page, we have provided
you will lots of free tools for helping you study the Romanian language for free.

As anyone can tell you, the best way to learn Romanian is via a Romanian friend or lover.
Especially a lover - as then you feel more inclined to make a serious study.

I have just launched my own Romanians friends agency, where you can meet, date and get to
know Romanians. They will spend the time teaching you the basics, while you help improve
their English. The more you study Romanian, the happier the both of you are, as the chances
are that through much better communication, your bonds will get much deeper.

DOf course, you could already have a partner who won't thank me or you if you are caught
cruising a Romanians singles site. Especially for you, I added a second link so you can learn
Romanian without a Romanian lover. This is naturally less fun but a wonderful alternative.

This completely free software can be boosted up by their additional courses - again for free.
You can get quite fluent, without ever using a teacher - or paying anything. In my extensive
library of teach yourself Romanian courses, it is my most used one and the only one I share
with and recommend to others.

The basic model is good. It has flashcards - you are given the English and must give the
Romanian, and then it does the opposite, and you must give the English. You will also be able
to play their multiple-choice games.

Then, when you tire of this program, you will be ready to move onto the deluxe version -
which is worth every penny. It adds lots of great features, such as lots of fun thinking games, a
chance to compare you pronunciation with a native Romanian, lots of extra cards containing
more useful words and phrases, the ability to listen to the lessons in mp3 - so ideal for a
modern phone or MP3 player, and the micro-version, so you can learn Romanian on your
pocket PC.

While I was enthusiastic about this, my poor fellow commuters also got basic Romanian
lessons, as I constantly repeated my colours, numbers and simple phrases until the computer
thought I knew what I was doing - and everyone else thought I was some care in the
community mental patient, who had slipped his two care assistants.

The downside of the computer is that your Romanian lover won't accept your terrible
Romanian, and they will constantly correct you - normally however only when the word is so
ingrained that it is engraved in your brain incorrectly. The upside of the computer is you can
do it while drinking one or two too many beers, or you can not talk with it in weeks, your
mates can even share the computer and there is no one reminding you of this fact!
Do you want translate Romanian into English? I use to sit down with a dictionary and try to
do it while reading my wife Romantic magazines. These Romanian stories are full of wild
husbands who often seem to lose the plot and destroy the home. This is interspersed with lots
of adverts about recruiting witches to do your bidding - all guaranteed to take place within 24
hours... it costs a few hundred euros ... then they blackmail you for all you are worth to
remove the curses.

I have to really concentrate when I listen and translate all the Romanian I hear into English. I
switch off and tend to dream - at which point every seems to ask for my input...

Even worse is how rapidly they jump conversations so when I get my head around one topic
and make my question - and all has changed and I return back to my stupor and drinking beer.

I have even investigated about how to use a mini computer but it was 200 pound - as if I
would spend so much...ironically if you by a translator without Romanian is only 30 pound.

It is much easier to translate Romanian into English as lots of words have similar roots - or
roots from French - from my dusty French days. Slowly I am doing it without thinking -
indeed my English is slowly gaining Romanian rules - though it could be worse as my brother
live for while in Japan and his English plummeted altogether after learning Japanese grammar.

Your best move is to find a friendly local in one of the bigger international schools or
companies to help you out and let them guide you rather trying to do it all on your own.
LIFE IN ROMANIA

If you are looking for a Bucharest Weather forecast, you will get a little confused - as there
are two issued - one for the North Bucharest and one for South Bucharest. The odd thing
being Bucharest really is not very big to begin with!

So on the temperature map you will see both weather stations submit their own predictions.

I have yet to find any online services that are any good at predicting the weather in Romania. I
have and still occasionally use the BBC weather centre, at www.bbc.co.uk - but the problem is
they are very British and so are naturally very pessimistic about the weather. Some small spots
of rain and the rest of the day clear blue skies - it will tell you that rain is on the way. I once
went to Istanbul, completely ready for rain and cold, only to find sun and heat.

The local weather on the news is held in great reverence. The whole family goes silent for the
weather, and will happily sit through mind-numbing sports reports to see it. I usually make the
terrible mistake of grabbing the remote control and clicking the wrong button, missing the
weather for yet another hour.

I like the Bucharest weather forecast on Euronews, as their screens track up and down Europe
and Russia is overlapping diagonals -letting me see England and Romania in the same show.
In winter we are much colder, in the summer Romania is much hotter, especially this year,
when they predict a longer, harder winter than normal - and the typical winter is already tough
enough!

The Romanian weather forecast comes from the Bucharest meteorological office in Banasa
and they love visitors. When there, you can see how artificial the weather predictions are. If
you are looking for a prediction of a temperature in a shady box, surrounded by a field of
grass - this is the place! Sadly if you want the real Bucharest temperature predictions, add
another 10C in the summer to take into account the roads and concrete blocks radiating heat
back - not to mention the air conditioners pumping super heated air back into the air.

We use to have a digital thermometer on the town hall - I t ink I must have been the only one
to like it because it was quickly removed as it interrupted wedding photos. Most are wildly
inaccurate anyway.

Basically, if it is summer - it will be hot with rain at 4.00pm. Spring is nice and autumn is wet
and miserable. Winters are very cold and expect lots of snow and dangerous icicles dropping
on you from 10 floors up!
Christmas in Romania in the ultimate get away and should be sampled at least once in your
life.

The children, Christmas starts on the 6th of December - Mos Nicolae comes (St Nick) and if a
child has been good, and the shoes are properly polished, will find chocolate in them. Naughty
children (and wives) find only a stick in theirs. For marital bliss, I recommend sticking to the
chocolate route.

The towns celebrating Christmas in Romania are ablaze with colourful lights and there is a
sense of good cheer everywhere. Unlike in Britain, which is terrified of celebrating any
traditions in the fear it may offend visitors (oddly none of the countries we seem to worry
offending change an iota of their traditions to stop the British getting offended), Romania
takes Christmas full on.

There is a lot of religious activity here - and for about 5 Ron slipped to the right priest, your
sins (those you can name in Romania without making anyone blush) are forgiven. The church
service is really nice - and a great way to contemplate your life as you will certainly not be
able to follow a word of it. If you go to a countryside church, you will become as much a
point of discussion with the locals as anything else is.

My uncle starts the Christmas in Romania with the announcement that the pig is ready for the
chop. I always have arrived late as I don't want to see the pig actually being killed in the
backyard (by the local butcher) and so the dead pig is laid out when I get there. Lots of
drinking ensues as we prepare a huge barbeque. The skin is eaten after cooking it with a
blowtorch. The rest of the meat is prepared as we find the local vet to check the animal does
not have tricoloma - a deadly worm parasite which can and does get into the human liver,
causing all sorts of problems. Then we eat meat to the point we can eat no more. The rest is
put into freezer bags and shared out. Almost all of a pig can be eaten.

Romanian Christmas food is a nightmare to prepare for the Romanian wives, as the men are
deemed useless, well I am at least - and so guided out the kitchen on child minding duties. The
salata de Burfe is a regular favourite - it is a highly refined version of potato salad. Everything
must be super finely chopped. My wife does it all by hand as there is no machines which does
it as well. Believe me - I am an expert on this point - we have all the failed super cutting
devices in our kitchen cupboard!

The gifts for Christmas in Romania are often well thought out but nothing too elaborate. I did
try to buy my wife some jewellery but I never see it again so she goes off and gets what she
likes and I then give it to her. This is the time my bulging clothes cupboard gets an extra red
jumper, a new tie to spot with food or a shirt. My father in law gets the same. A few weeks
later, when my new jumper has been washed and shrunk to his size, he also gets my jumper.

The weather, particularly in the mountains and the countryside is magical for Christmas in
Romania. The snow normally falls just on cue, giving the land that chocolate box experience.
We love to go for our long romantic walks in the snow and I am looking forward to pulling
the little one on the sledge, but you do have to be very careful. The bears can wake up and be
hungry and a small child makes a perfect snack.

Last year we were walking along and came across bear prints and fresh bear poo - still
steaming gently in the freezing air.
There was a completely different reaction from my Romanian friends and me. I saw it as a
perfect game of tracking a bear. They saw it more as a game of running as quickly as possible
back to the car.

A few months later I did meet a bear and its cub and it is not an experience I would like to
repeat in a cold and lonely wood with only a snowball for protection. I have moved into the
running away camp.

Another fact of Romania Christmas is this is the time everyone tries to go away - so make sure
you book up very early. I would recommend September at the latest.
There is a little English poem I could use to describe the Climate Romania has 4 seasons of
very different lengths.
<p>
<i>There was a little country,<br>
Who had a little curl,<br>
Right across her body,<br>
When she was cold,<br>
She was very, very cold,<br>
When she has hot,<br>
She was horrid.<br></i>
<p>
For about 1 month in September and 1 month in April, the weather is perfect for anyone flying
from Britain. In the Summer, the sand can reach 46 C and in Winter the sea freezes to 200
meters out and Bucharest reaches about -20C - fun for a few days - if you are not homeless, a
street dog or street child. In these low temperatures - just when your boiler needs to remain
above freezing or freeze up, the gas supply drops right down. I was forced to keep my one and
only electric heater going at full blast on the balcony to keep it working.
<p>
Summer in Romania is hot especially on the vast, flat planes around Bucharest. As you get
further into the mountains, Climate Romania cools and becomes more bearable.
<p>
This year - in Bucharest - I invested in a mobile air-conditioning unit. A complete waste of
money as you needed to open a window to put the pipe out - allowing super heated air in. I
discovered I could only use it in the evenings, night and in the rooms without direct sunlight.
However as it is only used a few days a year - we suffered and survived it!
<p>
For the most part Romania is dry which is lucky a whenever there is a decent sized storm, one
part of Romania or another seems to regularly go under water - and the TV is full of crying,
uninsured Romanians and numerous appeals for money. The best singles ad I saw was a 70-
year-old man looking for a 25-year-old partner - he focused on the newly homeless.
<p>
When it does rain here - it is really impressive. The rain really does pour down making filling
the water barrels a lot of fun! We live high on a hill so flooding is not a major worry for me.
<p>
What is your favourite Climate Romania? Please send us you most impressive or craziest
Romanian weather shots.
<p>
Here are some curious facts about Romania. These are hard won facts and not commonly
known outside the country - but Romanians seem to believe them - so what more can I ask
for?

<b>Amazing fact 1:</b> There is no word in Romanian describing something in a positive

way, which begin with the letter L. I wanted to make list of nice words starting with each
letter of the alphabet to describe my class - no Romanian has yet found a nice, positive word
starting with the letter L.

<b>Amazing Facts about Romania 2:</b> Roma in Romania can never win. You seem them
in the street - poor and begging and everyone tightens their coats, holds tight on their
handbags and keep their wallets out of sight. You then see some really fancy houses with
turrets and obviously some new doors, doing well - with nice Mercedes an BMWs parked
outside. You comment you like the color or design of the house and are told it is all from
stolen gods. This is absurd but no one ever is any gladder to see a rich Roma than a poor one.

<b>Amazing Facts about Romania 3:</b> Planting out your Christmas tree in the garden will
kill you. The Romanian peasants have this crazy belief that planting a conifer on your land
will produce a death in the family within 12 months. This is actually quite sensible, as most
Romanian families are full of old and frail people - so the chances one of them will pop their
clogs in the following year is quite high. And of course it will then all be linked back to my
derision of this tradition, and so I will have blood on my hands - best to keep the tree plastic
and save a lot of problems down the line.

<b>Amazing Facts about Romania 4:</b> Sweating makes you ill. I am unfortunately one of
life's sweaters - a gene passed on from my father. Romanians above a certain class never
sweat and will inform you that if you remain wet - then you will get chest problems. Alas they
also tell me to wrap up warm on each day I go walking so I come home drenched and in an
urgent need to change.

<b>Amazing fact number 5:</b> Romanians alone know how to conduct medical research.
Anything which goes against their traditions can be put down as a multinational undercover
plot to wipe out huge chunks of the population - vaccines - despite having clearly saved
thousands of children - are a perfect example of this.

<b>Amazing Facts about Romania 6:</b> Romanians don't like black cats crossing their path.
Sadly the British think that a black cat crossing your path is good luck. Se we often sit in the
car together. Both of us mentally or often verbally encouraging or scaring it away.

<b>Amazing fact number 7:</b> Romanian cars have no need for brakes. If you travel down
the motorway - Romanians trust entirely in their car's headlights to blind and dazzle each
other. Likewise no-one - especially babies -should use car seats or seat belts as in the event of
frequent crashes, a seat belt hinders your ability to be thrown through a window at great force
and so avoiding danger - unless you happen to stop flying and hit a hard surface.

<b>Amazing Facts about Romania 8:</b> Opening two windows simultaneously or even
worse - hanging your elbow out of a moving car's window will give you bone problems as you
arm is cooler on one side than the other. I you have 2 windows open - you are sure to suffer
from ear problems - mainly from the terrified screams of the Romanians to close the windows
at which point only you in the car will suffer from intense feeling of heat exhaustion. Even
outside - placing a baby in the wind without a hat on is certain to cause permanent injury.
<b>Amazing fact number 9:</b> - Romanians have a fear of getting ill from sitting on a toilet
seat. Science has shown - if used properly, a toilet seat is not a dangerous place - indeed fewer
bacteria live on it than anywhere else in the house. However, you can be sure that as soon as
you have left your friend's house, out comes the blue medical alcohol and everything is wiped
down - the logic being if you had a nasty disease down there you probably would not want to
talk about it. What do they do in pubic toilets? They either hover over it - or get up on the rim
- shoes and all and squat and do their business. A local church has had to put up a sign
requesting people to sit on the seat, as they were obviously tired of cleaning muddy footprints
from the rim.

<b>Amazing Facts about Romania 10:</b> The most corrupt place you can go to in Romania
is the Romanian Orthodox Church. They have ripped me off so many times, I don't bother to
keep track. If you live in the countryside - one priest will be stretched between two or three
churches. Come into any major city and you can find three priests in one church. If you have a
wedding, baptism or funeral - all three will expect to take the service and be paid for it. All
three will demand you provide them with a brand new soap and towel set to wash their hands
with - think how many sets of soap and towels they must get in a year as they keep them!
When you have a baptism - you also need to provide the church with 1 liter of olive oil.

When I was organizing a friends wedding - I was told the hire of the church was 20 pounds -
so my wife made sure I had the money ready in my suit to pay at the end of the service - The
priest realizes I am foreign and so demands 100 pounds - 20 pounds for the service and 80
pounds church donation. In the end, we needed a wedding whip around - so we could pay the
bill.

When it comes to baptisms - things get more annoying - the same couple as before now has a
beautiful child and we have the honor of being Godparents. The church refused to let me
touch or carry the baby in the church, as I was Catholic rather than Orthodox - likewise
refused to add my name to the baptism certificate - but had no problem asking me to pay r it
all.

The final annoyances I have with this church is if you make a confession - you must pay the
priest to forgive you. If you have a sick friend - and you would like the priest to pray for you
every day for a month - they actually in some churches have a printed list - so you know how
much to pay for divine intervention. Like any good business model - the longer you want - the
cheaper it is per prayer.
Let me tell you about Matrimonial Romania. In most societies you stand up by your future
wife and say I will support you for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health. Very noble
speech - which in the UK extends as far as your own new family, with a shiny ring around,
which limits your responsibilities to only these few people.

In Romania, marriage takes on a much deeper meaning - hence why I call it Matrimonial
Romania. When you marry in a Romanian family, you promise to accept in richer and poorer
the entire family and all their struggles, you will share all their joys, and plug all their
financial holes - something which as probably the highest earner in the family will come thick
and fast. Don't for a moment think that demands for money will be made directly for you to
weigh up, family debts from other times will haunt you as when the person they originally
borrowed from wants it back, then you will find out about the financial messes.

When it comes to sickness and health, nothing in the Romanian health service is free -
everyone from the doctors and nurses to the emergency ambulance man wants a little extra
something. Romanians also have great faith in completely untested and sometimes incredibly
expensive medicines - and you are made to feel a complete git if you look at what it claims to
do, points out the complete lack of any decent medical trials to read up on and so need to pay
in blind faith so you know you have explored every avenue.

There are however big advantages of marrying an entire family - and no that does not mean
you can sleep also with her sister - in the fact that as a foreigner your strange ways are more
readily forgiven and the family protects you from your furious wife. As when you get into
trouble, the family say 'He is a foreigner and does not know our ways'... which is a wonderful
get out of jail free card. The problem is getting them to realize there is a point in the
relationship where you do now know your way and could they take the training wheels off
your marriage and leave it to roll on its own.

The Matrimonial Romania traditions are great. If you treat your wife well, you will be fine.
You have to accept that while you may feel like you should be head of the family, as you have
married an entire family, the chances are very strong that an older Romanian man will feel he
is the head of the family and so you need to sit it out and wait until that vacancy opens up and
you are left to steer the course of your ever aging family in the right route.

The problem for a man is likewise, he will never feel like the head of the family as her mother
will also be putting in lots of silly, ancient untested ideas, which she expects to be followed,
along with supporting the idea that the man - most probably her husband's views are also
respected.

Eight years down the line and I am breaking out and cutting away ties in the family so that
when it comes to little Victor, he does not have so many ideas floating about him - it is a
tough job in this jungle of British and Romanian ideas - it is stunning to see how often they
come at a problem is directly opposite ways. An example is how much exercise to give a child
- the Romanians have great fears of the child's back an neck - the British more robust view is
children always survive as my mother proudly informed my wife - every child lands on its
head at least once!

The matrimonial Romania ways of life do get a little confusing, but at the same time, having a
Romanian wife and of course her Romania family around you mean you will never be alone,
or short of things to do or places to stay. Just sit back, close your eyes and enjoy the ride!
I have more Romania clothes than I ever had English clothes. Romanians have this passion for
constantly changing their clothes around.

My mother was shocked when she heard my wife organises my wardrobe but this is simply
because each shelf is for clothes for different occasions and I tend to mix and match.

There are about 6 catergories to consider.

1) Super formal clothes for weddings, funerals and baptisms - you get invited to lots of these
as you need to give the host 200 euro gift a time.

2) Work clothes - These last ages - as long as there are no greasy spots on them from the car,
tram and metro.

3) Town clothes - when you leave the house to shop with the peasants you wear smart clothes
to distinguish yourself from them!

4) Home clothes - As soon as you get home you need to get out of any of the above and
change - a bit like a school kid on a school night...

5) Country clothes - When your clothes have passes through all the above stages you then take
them to wear in your countryside retreat - most Romanians seem loathed to have to stay any
length off time there but I dream of the day I will only wear country clothes.

6) Your father in law clothes - having a washing machine in the house is still something of a
luxuary in Romania and so you still end up doing your extended family washing - hence this
error!

In general Romania clothes are much smarter than the British equivalent so make sure you are
wearing your best party frock when coming to call.
Are you looking for a Romania education? Perhaps you are moving to Romania and are
looking for somewhere to put your children?

If you are coming from overseas, I would strongly recommend going to the best International
School you can afford, and avoid the free Romanian option for lots of reasons. Let us assume
your child is 11. By 11 a Romanian child will know far more academic detail than your child -
so your child will either struggle or be placed in a more junior class, doing terrible things to
their self-esteem.

Romanian schools are terrifically under funded. The buildings are in terrible disrepair, making
British schools look like hotels. The teachers are woefully under-paid and the whole system is
viewed as low quality on the global stage.

However - despite all this, baby Victor will be heading through the Romanian system because
he is Romanian and so he will get the intensive Romanian cramming from day one, along with
th army of tutors who provide the child's real education.

If a child seriously messes up on a subject, he does the year again. If the child seriously
misbehaves - he does the year again. It is designed to focus a child's attention on their learning
and behaviour.

The school system is to split into three parts. The elementary school is where you find the
least qualified teachers. I use to tell people I was a primary school teacher - followed by a
sharp kick in th shins under the table as Irina told everyone I don't know the right Romanian
and I am a maths teacher in secondary (a much more respectable post).

Then there are a few years in the Gymnasium school (like the UK middle school), followed by
finishing off in High school until 18. After this they go to university, where most seem to sign
up for 2 degrees - making me question hoe vigorous they are - as in the UK I only had time to
complete one degree at a time.

The children I meet are polite, well educated and hard working, so I am sure despite
everything, the Romanian education system does seem to do its job - as long as the parents
have enough money to cover the shortfalls. When they finish their baccalaureate, many are
snapped up by overseas universities or further trained in International companies such as
Google and Microsoft.
Are you looking for Romania facts? I thought it would be fun to ask a group of 3 20-
something year old Romanian women for 10 facts about Romania. I doubt how accurate it is -
and they were constantly uncertain of how much was true - but loved trying to think of
anything. Here are their 10 random facts about Romania.

1) Did you now Romania had the largest carpet in Europe? This is apparently in the People's
palace and needed to be made insitu.

2) Bucharest has second largest building after Pentagon - this is again certain - over 20% of
Bucharest suburbs were flattened for the building and its huge park. It is built on a small hill -
apparently for protection against earthquakes.

3) Romanian invented the fountain pen. As they lost more men in the Second World War than
ay other country - I hope for their sake that the pen is mightier than the sword or we will all be
in trouble!

4) Romanians invented the first aeroplane. This is an interesting debate since Leonardo Da
Vinci invented on paper the first machine that has been shown able to fly, the Wright brothers
were the first pilots -and certainly not Romanian - so I don't quite know where they fit in!

5) Here is an odd Romania fact - Did you know they use more plastic table clothes than
anyone else. This is almost certainly true - though perhaps matched by the Hungarians, who
also apparently are into wipe down table clothes - certainly a very Eastern Europe trend.

6) Another Romania fact is Bucharest had the biggest vegetable market in Europe when the
Obor market was constructed. Built by nephew of Ion Cranga. I have never heard this fact
before. Ion Cranga was a story writer, his house is tiny, with low doors, so after living there, I
can see the logic of someone saying, "Right - now to build something really big!"...

7) We have most of the length of the Danube. I am sure - knowing Romanians that we would
also probably be the heaviest - they believe water dilutes away problems. Go to any stream in
Romania and you should be amazed if you don't to see it full of plastic bottles and rubbish.
Add pollution from the heavy industries and the Danube has lots of trouble.

8)Secret tunnels under Bucharest - There is apparently a huge lake, complete with sailing
boats directly below the center of Bucharest -if - and this is a big if - it was shown to be true,
then it would make a wonderful tourist attraction - showing surprising communist
developments during the communist era - I would especially like to know the truth on it!

9) People work more hours in the office than any other Europeans. They also get paid less -
though what II see is yes they are in the office more - do they do more work than anyone else?
Sadly not. Are thy more than productive than others? Sadly not so they work longer - but only
produce the same amount of work as every other European.

10) Romanians apparently have a sense of humor. A Romanian was born as a poet I am told.
Their humor relies on simple puns. Mr. Bean and Benny Hill are still very big on TV.
Romanian humor is an acquired taste - like any nations - and what person or nation would not
consider itself as having a sense of humor? Any one who is breathing likes to think they have
a unique sense of humor. Oddly my other thinks I have ore of a simple Romanian humor than
a traditional British sense of humor - I don't personally know. My Romanian sense of humor
limits my jokes to very simple levels.
Romania the country is a true gem of a place which to the fact it is shaped like a fish is going
to be completely spared in the 2012 troubles if you believe the local tabloids here. Then again
it is going to become the next place to for a Messiah to come from so got a lot going for it.

Romania has it all - beaches, mountains, huge lakes and green forests. It would take a lifetime
to really see and appreciate it all as it all looks completely different in each season.

Out of Bucharest, you will see a completely different view of things from the horses and carts
carrying huge loads to grinding poverty down long dusty tracks - where few tourists tread.

Romania the is ironically hard to see as they have so few road signs to guide you around.
There is many a time I have missed seeing some Romanian treasure because it was afew
hundred metres off the road. Trying to find the world famous salt mine was something beyond
many tourists with a Romanian in the car!

Romania is changing fast - too fast for many - as the land gets abandoned, old cars traded in
for fast new cars and farm machinery replaces local labour. Now is the time to see this
fabulous country, before its gems are lost forever - not just because of poor road signs.
After a long hot spell, the Romania weather has started to turn its attention to finally preparing
for winter. The weather here changes rapidly and dramatically. It never does anything by half,
so while a week or so ago we were still at around 20C in the day, every day now it is getting
markedly colder, and colder and colder. The skis have become a permanent dull gray, ad each
morning an ever-thicker fog is surrounding us.

Romania weather has this nasty tendency to bring a lot of surprises with it. So the predictions
now are for snow. This is rather a nightmare for teachers as the children go ever more wild in
the snow and I am always amazed to see how few accidents we have. The floor becomes an
ice rink - made worse by the children actively making long stretches as slippery as possible.

The snow is a constant source of worry and argument as the children collect the stuff up to
make snowmen and igloos - with both camps of children convinced the other group is stealing
their snow.

The snowball fights - something I have never really personally enjoyed as getting cold and
wet is ever been high on y priorities, also tend to slip rapidly in chaotic fighting using ice. The
fact the Romanian weather warms just enough to melt the snow into water, before rapidly
refreezing again, does not help me at all!

The Romanian streets themselves are equal deathtraps in winter. The Romania weather in
December produces astonishingly long icicles which when the weather warms a fraction, turn
into lethal missiles dropping from 10 floors up. The residents of that block underfoot should in
theory clear the pavement. More frequently the snow is trampled down into a solid sheet of
ice - and in the worst winter I had here, I could easily expect to have at least one nasty fall
every time I went outside.

There is however a remedy to the Romanian winter - the first is to buy some YakTrax - these
are wonderful devices that fit directly on the bottom of your shoes. They making walking
incredibly solid again and since buying them, I have yet to fall over. The good thing being you
don't need to take them off while changing trains etc. My mother sent my wife some while we
were but dating -she promptly gave them to her granny to stop her falling over and breaking
her hips - who in turn gave it to a neighbour who after another month she decided she did not
like so I lost access to these amazing shoes for my wife. She really wanted them a few years
later so I did buy them from England for her, but sadly the Romanian post failed me and they
were of course, stolen in transit, so she will have to wait for another time.

The good thing about the Romania weather is en it has decided it has had enough of winter,
overnight it will warm up and become Spring and in about a fortnight, having done its
traditional nod to Spring, we will be racing again back into the incredible heat of summer!
The Romanian bank system is a bit of a joke, as anything you need requires you to pay for it!

From the moment you open a bank account here costs start to build up. My friend last month
spent an hour opening a Euro account for her school wages. After an hour she had to pay to
open it. In addition there is a monthly fee to keep it open! Ironically the interest rates are not
so great so they make money from both you and your money.

Sadly it does not stop there - if you want to put any money into your Romanian bank account,
or take some out or even just check your balance - you have guessed it - you need to pay more
commission. A few years ago I opened a bank account with Citibank Romania, and needed to
pay 15 euros a year to keep it open - a month later I got a letter saying that as I did not have
the new minimum of 10,000 US$ in my account, I would need to close it - again requiring a
commission to be given back my money.

Romanians seem to spend a lot of time living on credit. This is reflected in the fact every time
a business goes bust; a bank replaces its place on the street. When the times were good, the
100 euro a month was fine to pay off the car - perhaps more because Romanians are never
seen in the sort of car I would buy! However with the economic downturn, salaries cut by
25% and food and the general cost of living all rising, these loans are getting harder to repay.

The other thing you will notice in a Romanian bank is the complete lack of service. It gets
worse if you are a foreigner as the Romanian balances up their own level of English, how
important you are to the bank and if they feel like working that day. This makes cashing n
foreign checks a nightmare for me.

I make an incredibly modest amount for running this website - and dream of the day it will
cover its own costs. But it does make the occasional check - spread over the year. This means
I need to go on to a bank to fill in a form so that they can process it and get Google to put
money into my slender account. On a good day, I will meet a smiling young thing, with just
enough English to understand my terrible Romanian and the job is done. I can go into the
same bank on a different day and get told that this only a small branch and they don't handle
foreign currencies - find a different branch. Despite pointing out I know they have the forms I
need, you are onto a loser as she either is not in the mood or does not know which form to
complete but does not want to tell you or come to that, her boss, that she cannot do it so
stonewalling you is her best option.

The newest innovation in Romanian banks is online banking. To use it, I was given a
handheld console (hefty deposit in return) to bank online. The fees are less but everyone
knows how incredibly insecure Romanian computer networks are. My wife agreed to let her
modest savings for little Victor go online - and now is regularly bullied by the bank
demanding to know why she has not accessed her account to see what she has in it from
home.

Romanian banks are not secure places for long term banking - they come and go and fold
without, as far as I know, anything like the protection given to a UK customer. This puts us
into a great dilemma as how to invest in Victor's future - which he is more than likely to blow
on a black car with tinted windows than on his planned Cambridge University education -
however neither is the keeping money under the bed or in the cupboard a solution. We have
avoided the higher interest but tied until his is 20 option - and went for a bog-standard
account, where we can put his weekly pocket money - a lot more than the 20p a week I earned
- and gifts from Christmas and birthdays - but we can pull them out again at the first sign of
trouble.

The final thing to note is your credit card is accepted in Romania but view it like a National
Lottery. Some banks will accept foreign cards, others will not. Even in the same bank I found
the older looking machine accepted my credit card, while the newer flasher ones declined it.
You should however inform your bank you are coming or they are likely to view your
transactions a out of the usual and so freeze your account. The annoying thing being you won't
know this until you next use the card - having filled your trolley with shopping, your tummy
with food or your car with petrol -and it is rejected.
Are you interested in who drives Romanian cars? When I first came here - you could have any
Romanian car you liked - as long as all you dreamed of is a basic white Dacia. I bought such a
car from my wedding money and it is going strong. Despite the fact I own an apartment in
Bucharest, the UK and work in a decent International School, the local village gossip is I am
bankrupt - the evidence of this being the mark of shame - I still drive a little white Dacia - and
have not upgraded it at least twice in the last 4 years. There is of course a very good reason for
this - it works well and every time a crap Romanian driver crashes into me, it is incredibly
cheap to fix!

Okay - here are the run down of Romanian cars you can expect to see in Romania.

The dilapidated wreck - these are found on most Bucharest streets, the windows green with
algae and the wheels broken with flat tires. They just sit, slowly decaying away - effectively
ownerless - with the exception of the lone street dog that lives under it, who will take the
occasional snap at your heels if it feels so inclined.

The most popular car is the whore-mobile. You will see these all over Bucharest and less so
outside the city. There will be some blonde woman in a huge jeep - who runs on the theory
that the wider she spreads her legs, the bigger the car she gets in return. The women are
ridiculously young and so are quite incapable of driving anything more than a bicycle - only
by letting their legs doing the walking, can then afford the throbbing monster of a massive
black car.

Then there are the boy racers. These need to tint all their windows black. It is quite funny -
some have such rubbish cars, and it is clear all their money is going to the bank. My evidence
of this is I I’ve n a really area with a rubbish car. They live in areas even the street dogs look
as if they are trying to work a way of escaping it, yet in the morning are huge queues of luxury
cars coming from these suburbs. I always wonder why if they can raise this sort of capital,
why they didn’t move to a nicer area rather than waste their money on cars which - due to
Bucharest being packed full of nice cars and aggressive drivers, fail to impress anyone.

There are then the Roma cars, these are always beat up Mercedes or BMWs, again which have
seen better days and not impressing anyone.

The funny thing is my little Dacia just bounces at high speed over the terrible Romanian roads
- one set of roads I saw was really bad but with a single excellent road passing through it as
this was the route the local mayor took every day - the worst roads being n the richest areas.
The big powerful four by fours in contrast, which adverts have powering over mountains,
crawl carefully at a snail pace over Romanian bumpy roads! I have to laugh at them!

However hit what Romanians jokingly call the autostrada, and my distinct advantage vanishes
- suddenly I find my little white Dacia the plaything off 4 x 4s with huge cattle bars strapped
to the front. When you are busy trying to overtake, these monster Romanian cars whizz up
behind you lights blazing demanding you pull over and you have to wonder where they think I
can go to move out thee way - into the side of a speeding truck I guess.

Which brings me to Romanians fascination with the big. As we live in a city with very few car
parking spaces, we should be moving ore to Fiats and Smart cars - not monster trucks.
Apparently they are safer - but this is only because Romanians don't wear seatbelts and taxi
drivers take great umbrage if you put one on. So we live in an ever increasingly polluted city,
with ever-bigger cars, with ever more powerful systems, which clean and cool the air inside
the black tinted windows.

When Romanian Christmas carols come onto the radio, then you switch into a completely
different frame of mind. If you search on Google, you can find radio stations dedicated to
Christmas carols sung in Romanian. If it is December, Magic FM is the radio station to listen
to -it has a perfect mix of traditional English and Romanian songs.

If you use WinAmp and find their radio stations, you can find online Christmas carols in
Romanian. This great service is likely to get you out of a lot of trouble with your relatives.
You just put on quietly when you eat your big meal. We cook a few at this time and so I am
always looking for ways of creating a festive atmosphere.

You will also get lots of children knocking upon your door, most with their parents so make
sure you are well stocked up with chocolates and small notes. They will start well but it is
soon obvious that they know very few songs and so asking for a particular song is on a road to
nowhere.

At the same time you will get a bunch of gypsies dressed as a bear coming down your road. In
the countryside it is nice and traditional and you are likely to know them so you give money.
In Bucharest, it is strangers looking for a fast buck so you can safely ignore them or pretend
not to be in.

I love to hear School children Christmas songs though in my school, due to a high percentage
of Muslim children, you need to be incredibly careful of the songs you sing. The choir
however does a great job and does add a festive cheer to everything.

I do miss the Christmas carols in the Romanian Orthodox church - there are no songs or hippy
guitar-playing priests in this establishment, so even the Christmas services are rather a severe
time. I did go once for a Christmas confession and discovered for 5 Ron, (1 pound), all my
years foibles and indiscretions were forgiven. For a few more pounds the priest will even
spend a month praying for your soul.
Who wants a Romanian citizenship? There are so many different rumours about what it takes
to be given this honour.

Some say it is really tough to get - and that you need to recite perfectly by heart a 90 verse
poem - but I cannot see how this Romanian would integrate you into Romanian society (You
must show sufficient Romanian to speak and socially interact). I do plan to take this exam
when I have a moment, then again I also have great plans to learn my dead father's mandolin
and that too has yet to happen!

If you have any living or dead Romanian relatives, then you can claim Romanian citizenship
through them. My Russian friend had a Romanian Moldavian grandma so she got it easily.
Then again she is the sort of woman who probably could easily recite that super long poem!

Another rumor is if you have a wife and family here that naturally preclude you from having
the time, space or patience to learn a 90-verse poem, they are more lenient. Some people go
into the interview and almost immediately out again. If you are an Arab, apparently they make
it much tougher for you.

When everyone else would happily quit their nationality if they could be given a new, shiny,
better one, do I want to go against the flow? The first is to avoid having to always apply for a
Romanian visa - these things are a nightmare to get and you need to be really careful you do
not lose your card or there is hell to pay in getting a new one. The system lost mine, so I could
not leave Romania until it was found - neatly filed under my first rather than second name. It
also allows me to own land which when I don't need or want more land just yet, could be
useful in the future.
Every weekend I tell my friends at school that I am off into the Romanian country. They all
remain in Bucharest - I race out of Bucharest on a Friday night - and only come back on a
Sunday night.
<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/hay-meadows.jpg" style="float:left;"
width="240" height="140" alt="Romanian hay meadows" border="0" ALIGN="left"
vspace="5" hspace="5">

<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/hidden-valley.jpg" style="float:left;"

width="240" height="140" alt="Lintesti valley" border="0" ALIGN="left" vspace="5"
hspace="5">

These are the two places I love to explore. The one on the right is a field next to my father-in-
laws home. Recently a professional botantist from England told me it was a really special, rare
meadow... I knew this from all the bees buzzing and wild colours all summer.

<p>
The second one, is where I go for long walks with the dogs. Everytime I go out, I see at least
one buzzard, and often some deer racing off into the distance - with two farm dogs in hot
pursuit.
<p>
In both places, despite frequently visiting them, I still have so much to see.

Each of my Romanian country homes are in ideal places for visiting valleys and mountains.
As you can see, I can head off into the mountains. In a few hours I can be in the depths of a
cloudy, misty mountain ranges or I can be wandering about in open woodlands.
<p>
In each case, you need to watch out for the bears. In the left picture, this is a major area for
apples and plums - so bears come down from the mountains to feed.
<p>
The Romanian countryside is a wonderful place as the landscape is constantly changing. If
you get off the main roads, and onto the smaller, winding roads, then you see even more of
this spectacular country!
<p>
As well as the stunning land, rivers such as the famous Dumbovita river, weave their way
along the bottom of valleys.
If you take the time to follow a Romanian river, such as the Olt river, you will see a wide
variety of landscapes, and have to marvel at what the communist engineers achieved.
<p>
The lake was created be communist engineers. It is used to provide hydroelectric power to one
of my Romanian country homes. The water apparently flows for miles, and miles under the
mountains.
<p>
Romanian customs do still, even after 8 years, still drive me to distraction, as they are so alien
to modern British customs.

When you meet a girl you know you should kiss them on both cheeks. When you leave them
again you should kiss them on both cheeks. I have learnt not to kiss a girl goodnight while she
is in a lift and you are not - as the doors close and you get a frighteningly large whack on the
head. They also seem uncertain if you want to kiss them or not. Then there is the embarrassed
kiss - when I kiss someone I should not such as a neighbour who turns out to be of the worker
class.

The same confusions lies with Romanian customs and Romanian men. When do you shake
hands, who should make the opening move and when do you shake hands and kiss on the
cheeks. My confusion is translated into Romanian as unfriendly, but they always seem to be
shaking hands.

The next confusing Romanian custom is about where you should be in relation to women.
You should allow your wife onto the bus before you - which contravenes the logic of dashing
on first to secure her a seat. Likewise, no matter how busy a bus is, you should always get off
first and guide her down the stairs.

When it comes to doors, never enter before a woman. The original reason for this was no one
knew what lay behind a door, so it was best to sacrifice your woman folk first if there was
anything bad behind the door! Romanian custom dictates always open a door for a woman
unless it is a British woman who will simply call you an inconsiderate sexist pig for your
efforts. She likes to be your equal. Romanian women despair, as they need to undo years of
equality to feel like a woman again.

The restaurant becomes a nightmare as you slide in and out her chair for her and never eat
faster than her. Likewise always make sure everything is equally shared - they say not
anything until it is too late! There is no Romanian custom of 'Going Dutch', it is quite simply
unheard of - it is a point of honour to pay. You will need to be damn fast with your wallet if
you want to win. Don’t leave your wallet in your coat pocket - even on the back of your chair
or you will lose it.

The Romanian customs around driving are trickier. Everyone on the road thinks they are
better at driving than you. Even the non-drivers will tell you so. Stopping at a zebra crossing
is asking for trouble and I have twice been crashed into while waiting. Also Romanians like to
stand and wait for friends on a Zebra crossing so when you slam your brake on to stop they do
nothing. Not stopping will get you a hefty fine. However using a zebra crossing - do so with
caution - most Romanian cars won't stop unless they have to.

This behaviour brings me to Romanian customs and car lights. Always have them on. A car
will flash its lights when you are turning left to tell you not to think of going yet. In contrast, a
car in the UK flashing its lights means go. Romanians in general only use lights - not brakes
to drive. Go down a motorway - they whizz up behind you as all motorways here are just dual
carriageways and flash their lights. Use the right indicator to say you are letting them pass -
the left indicator to say you are going to ignore them and both just to terrify them as they think
you will stop.

Inside the car, things get no better. Romanians believe an open window or even worse two
open windows will make you sick. You will boil as in addition to this you must wrap up
against the suns rays. You may meet a rich Romanian - they love to show how good their air
conditioner is and will freeze you instead. And don't even think of putting an arm out of the
window when you are moving, to cool it. Romanian medical science (bless its cotton socks)
have shown that because the front of your arm gets cooler faster in the wind than your under
arm which is more protected from the wind, the difference is heat causes rheumatism. It is a
slow process so it will take time to see - I once was doing this in town and a crazy old drunk
came and told me the same story.

In the home, things are no different. Everything Romans do is packed full of meaning. Again
there is all the shaking of hands whenever you enter the room and who should be kissed or
not. Then they say Sari - maine (I kiss your hand) that is only said to the old, priests and
women, and so does not go down well when you parrot the greeting you just heard him say to
your wife.

Romanians love to cook and eat and anything offered should be eaten or they get mega-
offended. I one read a fabulous website for Christians visiting homes in Romania. It stated
that you should eat a tiny amount of the food and when full simply refuse any more courses...
as it is your right as a guest. I would be hung, drawn and quartered if I did that! If you refuse
you food, then you are sick - a sick guest is considered the greatest worry known to a
Romanian.

The site then continued to state that when you arrive - walk around the apartment and throw
open all the windows and let some fresh air in - as a guest, it is your right to breathe and be
comfortable. I think at this point, most of my Romanian friends would go - "Is this
Wednesday the 23rd of October (Or whatever day you happened to be visiting) - this is the
day my old aunt who has a thing against foreigners (to stop you tagging along) needs her
bath." They would quite rightly then ask you to leave.

A Romanian will tell you that moving fresh air is their equivalent of water on the Witch in the
Wizard of Oz - they must avoid it at all costs as it is the quickest way to get sick, have a flu or
any other condition they feel in the following days. They keep their windows closed - you are
allowed one window open if you close the door and the lights to stop the new deadly variety
of mosquitoes to enter the house and kill you.

There are so many more crazy Romanian customs that I could build a whole site purely on
this one topic. What customs from Romania do you follow? Which seem to make no sense
apart from for their amusement values? Please share them today!
Are you looking for a Romanian house? House - hunting here is a sport of the brave, rich and
stupid in Bucharest.

When I moved to Romania, I sold my UK home for a decent profit, and decided to buy here. I
gave myself a 2-week timeframe to locate a nice home... and learnt that house buying here is
not to be taken so lightly.

The first thing Romania lacks are estate agent shops with photos and details of the house -
complete with a price. Here you need to visit each and every possible house before buying.

This is where the first problem lies -if you are a foreigner, the price of homes rises incredibly -
so in the end, to get a good deal, I left home hunting to my wife and family and only saw my
new home after all the contracts were in place - and how the seller wiggled to escape them
when she found out the buyer was a happy-go-lucky British man - the money appeared
minutes before the deadline - then she insisted we gave it to her in cash so she could count it
her self... a huge commission charge from the bank for me... before being asked to be driven
across Bucharest so she could put it back into the bank!

When Romania was under communist rule, families who escaped have their homes illegally
repossessed and used by other families. Here lies the problem - if you buy from the current
family, at any time you could find the real owner knocking on your door and asking you to
leave. To make it harder - some owned the house but not the land.. very complicated for me!

Then there are the Earthquakes to consider... the first thing to check for are red metal signs
attached to the bottom of it telling you not to be in or near this house in the next big quake -
due any time... and often one of the apartments above it are for sale. One woman said in the
newspaper - "I hope this won't affect the property price".

When you go into Romanian houses you will find almost all houses use plastic table clothes.
It is a weird feature of life here.

In the countryside the houses are normally in terrible states of repair with lots of low doors
and ceilings. When a ceiling is higher - they feel obliged to include a low-slung metal light
just where you are likely to stand up quickly.. I have many a bump to prove it.

The final odd thing about Romanian homes is how hot they are - they rarely if ever dip below
23 - 24C - even in deep winter. In the coldest parts of winter the gas supply cannot cope and
huge sections of the city gets cut off for a bit. In the summer the power supply fails as the
huge numbers of air con systems causes the system to close down.

Final point - you can't buy land as a foreigner - so you can only buy an apartment - so you
can't dream of a house here in your own name - sorry but ce la vie!
The Romanian houses in the countryside are rarely visit by tourists - who only ever really see
the Bucharest tower blocks followed by nice hotels in the mountains or by the sea.

You need to build up very warm relationships - or I my case, get engaged to the family's only
daughter, to enter the countryside homes.

Their outsides look worn and rundown - and there is a good reason for this. Every year I am
promised the houses will be completely renovated the following summer - so why spend
money now? Every summer it seems the weather s too hot or wet or the workers cannot be
found, so we reluctantly leave it another year.

My country home has sloping floors due to subsidence - cracks in the walls which leave the
new comer nervous and spiders in every shape, colour and hue racing about at night - making
it essential to check our bedding daily.

However - everyone doe try their best to make it a home. There is a little connecting window
between the two rooms ad from the main room comes the sounds of laughter and arguments
that would rip an English family apart for months - followed 10 minutes later by more
laughter.

It took a while to persuade my new family to collect rainwater from their roofs at the
Romanian houses - but now we have barrels everywhere. The rain in Romania pours down -
making it essential to go outside - with my battered old umbrella - to empty barrels and make
sure every barrel is filled to its limit. This water goes for the cow.

Running water is still a luxury in many peasant Romanian houses - we have to wait about
another 10 years before water - funded by the EU - reaches us. We could make our own well
- and lots of people do - but from other neighbors’ experiences - you could spend a fortune
digging - and discover nothing - up to 50m down - to show for it!

I have always associated life in the country with relaxation. So I am particularly fond of our
little old, rather ramshackled, bench outside our gate. In the past the whole village would sit
out and gossip by the gatepost - now no one does - even our old, wildly bearded, beggar seems
to have found a better haunt. The problem being that our road I more of a dust track - so with
each passing - speeding - car, you are enveloped in a cloud of dust. This dust gets everywhere
- into the house and beds.

Our kitchen is a building on its own. I guess it is to reduce the fire risk. Here the top cat and
Grandfather live. And the million odd flies - which I am sure were put on this earth to give
grandfather something to do.

Only recently did we work out how to add a sink and a tank of water there -so we can wash up
inside - a luxury in winter!

The final touch of the house is its numerous wood burning stoves. I had one installed in my
room - when it is on - you boil, as Grandma is very generous with the wood. When it is off -
my wife frets I will get sick from the cold - despite the numerous blankets and super thick
woolen duvet - made by my grandma in her youth.
Romanian real estate prices is currently in free fall - don't however expect to come here
anytime soon for a real bargain - the crazily cheap prices are long gone - I was lucky, I got the
tail-end of it as it took me so log to actually find anywhere I would actually like to live in
Bucharest.

Romanians will try to sell you a house at twice what I think its current value is. I did see a
nice piece of Romanian real estate near me, and on my calculations, we should have been able
to buy it by selling different properties we own. However as the man wanted 400,000 euros
(about 300,000 pounds or 600,000 USD) - it will be for sale for a long time as a decent home
in England costs less than that and has the additional benefit of not being in an earthquake
zone - the big one is expected in two years.

Then there is the problem of the estate agents here. In the UK and around the rest of the world
you find them on most high streets and you simply wander in and look at all the houses, their
photos and the asking for price. You quickly filter out those that are in crap areas, look about
to fall down, are too expensive or otherwise unsuitable. Here you lack such a luxury - they
may have a poorly, rarely updated website - but certainly no prices are mentioned as the price
depends on which country you are from.

I use to come and look and well-priced Romanian real estate would magically double in price
when I opened my mouth. I only found my nice apartment because I did not see it until all the
contracts as been signed. A rather risky moves - when you think of how much money is
involved - but it is worth it.

Our structural survey was done by my father in law and a friend of his from the construction
university. Avoid anything with a big red metal plaque screwed to the front of it, as it is
predicted not to be there after the next big shake in two years time.

The other thing to know is that you cannot actually own any land as a foreigner, so you need
to only buy an apartment or get married to a Romanian who will keep it in their name or open
an expensive Romanian company, and own it that way. A bitter and twisted woman (yes -
even here you meet them!) told me that I should go for the Romanian company option as
when I divorce or get divorced, I still walk away with everything. I am going for the keeping
married option - as going into marriage with your divorce plans in place - are not such a hot
idea.

Every year you will need to pay tax and insurance on your new Romanian real estate - both
are now obligatory - and so you will need to find a friendly Romanian to guide you through
this process. I am quite sure that my home will withstand pretty much anything with its 50 cm
thick walls and perpendicular beams but who knows!

As I said before - house-buying process in Romania is a very slow process -so even with
money ready to burn, you will struggle to find anything you like. My favourite no-chance
homes included one where the main bedroom had no windows - apparently 'perfect kids
Rome', one next to a power station - so close to the cooling stacks that 'we don't use any
heating’.

Even when all the contracts have been signed, it is still a nerve-wracking time to the finish. I
needed to transfer all the money from England and it arrived with minutes of the deal to spare.
Then the woman insisted we took all the money out - I hate to think o the commission I paid
for this folly, just so she could see touch and count such a massive amount of money, before
wanting to be driven across town, still with this huge amount of cash and depositing in her
own bank account!

After buying the place -be prepared top have to spend the same amount again doing the place
up. I naively thought a splash of paint and we are done - sadly nothing of the sort! We stripped
the walls back to brick, the floor was uprooted, new pipes put in and finally it is a home - the
problem being none of us ever want to go through it again, so this particular home will not be
on the market for quite some time!
If you can find yourself a good Romanian woman, all your Romanian troubles are completely
over.

I once took my dog for a walk on a chain with a pack of street dogs. To this day I don’t know
why I let go of the chain, but my fabulously well-behaved dog became a vagabond and ran off
into the woods - chain and all! After checking he had not come home, (unknown I had been
spotted by granny), I headed off after him - midway around, it rained so not only did I lose the
dog, I came home soaking wet - who do you think got the blame? Me for being with the dogs
with no umbrella or my wife in bed, watching TV? She did on 2 counts - if she had come for a
walk, I would not have taken the dogs and lost them. Likewise, she would have brought an
umbrella so we would have kept dry. `He is a foreigner and doesn’t know our ways, you have
no excuse! ` - I got it in the neck from my good Romanian woman in turn, more laid on as she
never saw the end of her movie!

You need a different Romanian woman to keep your ironing under control and your apartment
neat and tidy. This is tricky, as you need to leave them to come while you are working. I have
found only a few good cleaning women. One ran up huge phone bills in my house - she had
the phone repaired as she noticed it did not work - she was also my landlady so she had a key
anyway.

Another stole a cheap black comb - why is this a problem? Romanians are crazy about witches
and witchcraft - go to any Romance magazine - all clutching a cross and promising to put you
world to rights within 24 hours. The rare white hair of an Englishman goes a long way to
solving a wide range of ills.

The third type just plain scares the child into submission! I need to say he `Our Father`
between 3,9 or 27 times to remove their negative impact on the home, along with lots of Holy
Water - the odd thing I use to scoff at this - now I get regularly hit by these same negative
impacts, and wish I was back to immune and able to scoff! Perhaps I have been here too long!

You need to develop a close relationship with a Romanian woman in the market, as then she
will put aside the best fruit for you around the back. She does expect you however to be 100%
faithful to her bananas or it is back to dry or unripe fruit! I even use to have a little old
Romanian woman who would help me with my chaotic bread buying skills. Oddly these little
old ladies only help lost foreign men - lost foreign women shoppers obviously did not listen to
their mothers, so deserve to be lost now!

Every Romanian woman expects to be remembered, even if you speak on the phone. Helpful
hints like, `I was at your wedding, and your son's baptism` - along with another 150 briefly
introduced people you did not try to remember as you checked you still had the rings and the
camera batteries for the hundredth time! It gets very embarrassing as they all have double -
barreled names - all which seem to blend into each other or work both ways round like Marie -
Anna and Anna - Maria!

The final odd thing is the older generation lose their first names altogether and are simply
known as Doamne .... Or Domnule .... - even my Romanian family is not quite sure! However
you still need to know this info somehow so you can call them up on their name days - and as
they all have two names, you must call them on that elusive second name’s day.

Finally always treat a Romanian woman well - find her a chair, coat and don’t go anywhere in
front of her - unless getting off a bus. Never meet her in her home with an empty hand, and
kiss hers on entering. This hand and cheek is a nightmare as you can only kiss certain types of
women, though it is safe to say the use of tongues is always frowned upon and never kiss a
girl on the cheek next to a lift - I tried and the lift door bashed into it as it shut suddenly. In
retrospect, perhaps it was just God’s way of reminding what I should and shouldn't do with
her best friend! I hasten to add - It was only a kiss on the cheek!
The vremea in Romania or the weather in Romania is changing - and changing fast.

The weather forecast is one of the most watched parts of the news, and my mother-in-law will
sit quietly through endless sports reports - at which point I want to get up and watch the BBC
news, but we all wait quietly for the weather forecast.

They have all sorts of ways of showing the weather, such as like you are flying over Europe or
Romania, and the symbol and temperature pops up to the more normal man standing in front
of different parts of Romania.

The temperatures the report in the Vremea in Romania will be nothing like you experience. I
have visited the high tech weather station in the North of Bucharest, which is incidentally
surrounded by stolen land full of non-functional antennae. I asked why they didn't return the
land to their rightful owners. The man just looked at me as if I was some land grabbing
radical. Anyway, I digress, the temperatures they measure are inside cool boxes, in a grassy
field. You will more than likely be sweating away in Bucharest - which combined with the
smallest amount of green space per person in Europe, everyone driving four wheel drives they
don't need and a city full of air conditioners working at full pelt, pumping ore hot air into the
atmosphere and so any concrete blocks storing up all the suns heat - you can safely add on
another 10C to their prediction.

They also like to terrify my wife by saying the sun is now producing a unique radiation ray,
sitting under trees, or in the dark shade of the side of your house is not enough - you must not
venture outside at all... So we sit inside from 10 - 5 in the summer to avoid this special ray
without a name.

Weirdly - lots of Romanians ignore the Vremea in Romania advice and head to the beach
where the sand reaches 47C. What is stranger for me, coming from the UK where pedophile
scare stories are permanently in the public consciousness, national TV here film and broadcast
completely naked children racing about, having fun on the beach - you can even by these
naked Romanian children as postcards to play practical jokes on sending them back to the UK
and counting how long it is before your mother's house is raided in glaring publicity by the
local porn squad.

In winter, vremea in Romania este greu (The weather is very bad) - ad this particular year we
are expecting a really tough winter. Last year we got so much snow in our garden - up to
50cm and all the neighbours who don't have gardens use my garden as a great dumping
ground for the snow so I end up with a little mountain of snow.

Romania becomes super dangerous - there is ice everywhere and you cannot walk near the
side of the many blocks as falling icicles from 10 floors up can do you massive damage - you
are legally required to remove them. The snow will come thick and fast - making driving even
more dangerous than normal. Snow falling off the roofs is also heavy enough to damage your
car so you need to watch where you park your car.

The thing I hate most about Romanian winters is that every morning and every night I have to
get up and start my little Dacia's engine and leave it running for a few minutes to warm up - or
the cold completely wipes out the battery an I can't start it.. Which then involves my father in
law coming with all his technical gear to get me moving again. I did suggest I got my own
gear - he looked puzzled -why when he has it already!
Do you want to know the weather in Romania?
<p>
The weather, until recently, was very easy to predict. Now the weather seems to be getting
rather confused at time, with snow falling in June and wonderfully warm days in the middle of
Winter.
<p>
This year, the weather in Romania became very cold in May. This made the life in Romania a
little harder, as it also killed off all the new buds and flowers. Our apple and plum harvests
this year have been much smaller than normal.
<p>
Winter

I love Winter. It can be very cold here. We can expect snow from November to March in
Bucharest. It is a very variable season. The first year I was here, I could not go far without
falling over.
<p>
Last Winter, the weather in Romania was warmer than normal. We hardly had any snow at all
- only 2 showers.
<p>
If you are in Bucharest, an excellent tip is to walk down the middle of the smaller roads and
take care of tower blocks, as every year a few people get severely injured or killed by falling
icicles.
<p>
I missed a small avalanche in Bucharest, as all the snow on the roof of my small apartment
block fell into the street - straight on top of my friends new car!
<p>
The snow in the mountains is far more reliable - there is lots of snow every year - making
Romania a top place for skiiing.
<p>
Spring

When Spring arrives in Romania, the whole mood of the place lightens up. Bucharest's
towering blocks seem to sparkle in the sun and we enjoy lots of blue skies.
<p>
The weather in Romania is then generally good, with light rains. We start to think about
heading off into the countryside. There is a small period in the countryside where the rain and
mud keep us in Bucharest.
<p>
It is a tricky time in the countryside, as you think that the weather is great for planting out the
new seeds - next week a big frost can strike.
<p>
However if you leave it too late, then Summer kicks in before you have time to add more
seeds - and your plants suffer from too much heat and too little water!
<p>

Summer
Summer in Romania is very dry and very, very hot. If you come in Summer, you will soon
want to escape the hot streets of Bucharest, and head into the cooler mountains.
<p>
If you are planning to live in Bucharest, over the summer, you will need to air conditioning.
This of course annoys Romanians, who are convinced every illness is linked to draughts, air
conditioners and wind in general.
<p>
The sea is warm in the summer, and great for children, as many of the beaches gently slope
into the sea. The problem is that in recent years, the Summer is also the time of the great
yearly Algal blooms. This makes swimming no fun at all.
<p>
Escape into the mountains in the Summer, and experience the cooler mountain climate.
<p>
However, particularly in recent years, you get hot weather in Romania, followed by amazing
storms in the afternoon. After this, the weather is cool for a day or two, before the heat kicks
in, followed by another storm.

Autumn

Romanian Autumns are wonderful. The landscape needs to be admired. It is full of glorious
reds, bright yellows and orange leaves, which no camera which can really catch.
<p>
The weather in Romania at this time, is warm, sunny, and the skies are blue. This a great time
to visit Romania, when the weather is not too hot.
<p>
Whatever the weather, Romania is a wonderful place to visit. There are things to do in every
season.
<p>
LOVE AND SEX

Bucharest girls were clearly placed purely on this planet to make everyone else's lives a little
brighter. In general they are incredibly well dressed, with exact makeup and looking good -
very rarely do you wonder whatever made them wear that particular choice of clothes - unlike
me with odd socks, ties and shirts which clearly don't match - all because I dress in the dark so
as not to wake up baby.

They do have expensive tastes - and the number of young women in new fast black cars
makes you wonder whom they are keeping happy at home as clearly they can't afford the hire
payments on their own. I once had the audacity to beep and flash my lights at such a car as it
cut me up in the traffic. It was only then I saw the CD (diplomatic plates) and heavy-duty
security van with a man in dark shades pull up and block my car in at the lights - a very
nervous moment indeed!

Bucharest girls love the best in everything - something impossible in Romania due to any top
label is almost certain either a fake or made especially for the Romanian market - so crap. As
their wealthy foreigner partner it will be your job to provide these things on a seasonal basis.
The Bucharest girls from the countryside are the worst as they realize that they are way behind
the rest and so have a lot of catching up to do.

In general, asking a Bucharest girl about her life in the countryside is asking for trouble. They
remember the bad parts such as no running water and working hard all summer in the fields
picking grapes or apples for the family. They lack my passionate love of the Romanian
outdoors.

Bucharest women seem to remain naturally slim until they marry, then they develop a fuller
figure. It is due to their minimal diet due to low pay and peer pressure. They rarely go to the
gym s sweating is viewed very unladylike.

Where do you meet Bucharest women? Any international based company is a good hunting
ground as then they speak decent English and are often single but looking for a way to get
their legs around a ticket out of Romania. Alternatively try by signing up online - your inbox
will be immediately full of stunning young women looking to meet you for a coffee and more!
I have met many a happy man who has met his future partner this way - along with a few who
considered this the route to meeting crazy Romanian women.

Bucharest women are very passionate about everything and liable to blow into a storm at a
flick of a switch - let off all their steam in one foul go - enough to destroy a typical Western
European relationship - before switching back to that soft and gentle woman you thought you
knew.

The last part is a warning of a saying - Bucharest girls are well known to need 3 men in their
lives - one for love (probably a Romanian from their country home village), one for sex
(occasionally requiring marriage first!) and one for money - to help fund the other two! If you
are lucky, you can fill all three roles - though consider 2 out of 3 as not a bad thing. Ironically
if you tried the same with 3 Bucharest women - make sure that your medical insurance is up to
date and you live on a street with a hospital - you will rapidly need both!
All around you will be lots of hot Romanian women looking for a rather cool and
sophisticated English man - or I guess at a stretch an American will do! The fascination with
the English are due to thousands of classic English titles such as Wandering Heights, which
the women read at a very impressionable age. After this time it is laid in their memory that the
English are a real catch. My cousin is moving from France to England and her mother is so
excited because finally her daughter may meet and marry an Englishman. As I don't drink lots
(the balcony is too cold a place to spend the night in quiet contemplation as your wife refuses
you in the house), I don't smoke (even though Romanian cigarettes claim that they may or
may not kill you) and I work hard -I further extend the English myth.

So hot women are on he look out for this life and a ticket out of here. Your job is to steer her
clear of other expats - or the illusion is shattered when she discovers we have moved on or
rather downhill since Dickens days - I can say from personal experience that my wife would
never have dated me if she had really known how ex-pats behave.

There is a real danger of dating hot Romanians - their friends seem to always be ever hotter.
They are all curious to meet you and find out how their friend snagged an ex-pat. The more
beautiful they are, it seems, the less English they have at their command, forcing you often
into a compromise between stunning beauty and actually having anything to say to each other
- not a problem for a quick fling - but certainly needed for anything more meaningful. Don't
forget - she will be your direct translator between you and the rest of her family, if she can’t
speak English, don't expect anyone else to either.

An odd thing about dating Romanians is their fixation with your salary. I use to say it, until I
discovered it was shared by my dear great aunt with every market stall holder in her part of
Bucharest -so obviously when I wandered about prices would magically rise to new levels of
fiction. So you get into the habit of telling them a number bigger than they would expect to
earn - but much lower than your real salary and you would just hope it was around the same
mark as your wife or partner quotes.

There is another major problem of dating a hot Romanian and taking her back to your own
country - frequently her long term plan - is while she is stunningly exotic and beautiful - the
chances are you are not. So unless you are lucky and date a seriously traditional girl - no
nooky before the wedding day, she will be off like a shot sampling the true pleasures of being
stunningly beautiful in the UK. This is a country where stunning beauty is still very rare and
sop a girl can have her pick. I don't know what the rates of unfaithfulness are in the US but in
the UK 10% of children are not born the father who thinks it is his, rising to 25% for certain
parts of some rundown Northern towns. Biologically this makes sense as then the best genes
are inserted into families that seriously need a lift.

I also however suspect Hot Romanian women look best in their Eastern European situation -
and lose their glamour when you remove the backdrop of drab communist blocks and tiny
crammed studio apartments. I think settling out here is an excellent way to not put this to the
test. Also Romanian women miss their family and countryside life - so will constantly want to
be here.
Are you coming to Romania to meet Romanian women? It is not as easy as it looks - as
despite their complete lack of money, they easily outdress British women and expect their
men to do the same...
<p>
Women look for someone fresh out of the Romanian army because they are much more
ordered, follow instructions with out question and their spirit is broken - saving the future wife
years of intensive training on how to be a practical man... or is that only in my relationships,
who knows?
<p>
When I arrived, my best friend took one look at me and realizing I was doomed if I wanted to
meet Romanian women - took me on a wonderful - very drunken shopping trip (the drinking
was at the end - pure miracle we got home with all the clothes intact!). The UK clothes were
dumped and for a brief shining moment I looked hip - the plan being I would look respectable
enough for long enough for a Romanian woman to take me under her wings and continue my
progress in fashion. I worked for me - if you overlook I was still wearing the same summer
short-sleeved shirts in a bitterly cold winter, as I still hated shopping.

Eight years ago the Romanian women online looked like Russian shot putters and not a smile
between them. Several of my female friends since then have met and married nice men.
Ironically my male friends who have wanted to meet Romanian women online complain how
crazy they are - Romanian women are crazy at the best of times - the stress of finding or
keeping a romance on course up the church isle must push most over the edge!

So online is one option. There are lots of other alternatives. Get a job here in a decent sized
company and you will be surrounded by super skinny women on the look out for a foreign Mr.
Right to whisk them away from Bucharest. Yearly I see big romances between foreign men
and local Romanian women - most often braking off when the men head onto new climes and
conquests.

If you head down to the local ex-pat bars (somewhere you will never see me as British
football, expensive beer and failed 40 - something business men go there)... You will find a
certain kind of woman looking for a rich ex-pat hubby.

The downside of Bucharest is the lack of any real social clubs here - in the UK I always found
clubs like Rotoact worked well for meeting women... and there does not seem to be a
newspaper which lists these kinds of places.

Of course if you are looking top meet Romanian women and pay buy the hour - you will have
lots of opportunities in many of the central Bucharest hot spots. My friends paretook a kiss
from one such woman - one lost his fancy mobile phone, the other lost his empty wallet (I
made him leave it all behind to cover for such things!).

If you do have sex in Romania - you should take full precautions as Romania has one of the
highest HIV rates in Europe and they have just stopped the needle exchange scheme here so
expect another major jump in the coming years.

Saying all of this - if you do meet a nice Romanian girl here, hold onto her with all your might
and you will be adopted by the family (which takes another huge mind leap which many
British men would struggle with) and have a life quite unlike any you would find back at
home.
Do you read Playboy Romania? This is just one of the many erotic magazines. Oddly
whenever I ask for a magazine - and when the seller does not understand - I always seem to
get offered pornographic magazines. My wife would kill me if I ever did this!

Playboy Romania is one of the more gentle erotic magazines - a very artistically arranged. For
such a conservative country - the playboy logo is everywhere - my wife had a t-shirt made by
them and a hat - as they were yellow and made of high quality cotton. She was torn between
liking the clothes and knowing what they really meant.

Before coming to Romania, I read that taking pornographic magazines into Romania via
planes. I expected to see a country free of pornography. I am so wrong - pornography is
everywhere here.

The cable TV is particularly hard-core - you buy a package with discovery channel and
National Geographic and in-between these are the hard-core channels - the logic being a man
can watch dodgy movies and click over when he hears the door. Likewise it means the man in
the dirty raincoat arrives - he can pretend to have a burning passion for science and buying
Kleenex Tissue paper boxes.

Children here have far more access to these magazines and TV - I know this because of the
comments children say to me in my Primary school classroom. When a 7-year plans to have
sex with one of his little girls on your residential field trip - you know things have gone to far.

On top of all these methods along with online access in children's bedrooms is the fact down
any major street in Bucharest is a sex shop (along with a bank, pharmacy and casino). Oddly
despite all this sex and sexual interest - with the youngest part of this population - is
Romania's population is going to decline by 25% over the next 50 years - mainly by
emigration and because having a child here is so expensive so people rarely have more than
one or two...

Perhaps this explains Romanians fascination with pornography - as a stress relieving process!
Even the happiest married man peruses Romania personals, while browsing his wife's
favourite, if somewhat trashy magazine.

The vast majority of them are men looking for women, which my friend pointed out was
normal when you consider it is a woman's magazine - which begs the question as to which
single men read this. I read my wife's. The number of mentally okay men still living with their
mother must be small.

The first thing being there is no privacy in Romania personals. In England, you would stick
your letter into newspaper or reply via a newspaper into an anonymous box, so the stalkers out
there had a tougher time in finding or harassing you. In Romania, they make it much easier for
the average stalker to have his fun. You need to give out your mobile phone number or
landline number and all beeps will be ignored - you must actually talk to the girl. Some also
give out their mailing address so they are particularly at risk, as the world then knows they are
single and desperate.

If I look in the categories I could express an interest, the women seem to mainly come from
small villages, are divorced or prematurely widowed. They are looking for faithful, non-
drinking partners for their futures. The problem of course being each and every one of these is
missing a photo - so you get quite far down the track before you see them. In England, I use to
do this, in my quest to find the perfect woman - I met a lot of sweet nutters, but no-one who I
could go wow over and thinking about it, this could be because only the real computer phobic
die-hards are still using this method for meeting new people.

Which is where putting your personal ad online becomes much more interesting. We tried an
experiment once using online dating adverts. We put up our own profiles - and go no answers.
My friend then made a profile using all the fearsome collection of the characteristics of the
disasters I called my girlfriends, and wham! We were flooded with replies! Which shows a
woman, even one who has a husband who ignores her, six children and a mental disorder
enquiring daily doses of Prozac are better dating online.

I have heard of no success stories in using Romania personals using a newspaper but I have
been to quite a few weddings for people who met online. The joy being anyone can sign up
and be online - you are no longer limited by which newspaper your wife, current girlfriend or
mother happens to buy.

The only thing that makes the Romania personals so good for me to still read and no I am not
looking, is they are written simply and I learnt all the features and descriptions of the body
from them.

There is now a new service I explored out of curiosity. You can now send your Romania
personal ad via blue tooth to every other blue tooth mobile phone user in your metro train.

I was really bored on a training day - and thought of trying this - sadly the risk is, as my boss
comes in on the metro, the same as all my ultimate in senior board members were at the
training session, and none would have enjoyed my Romantic advances! I guess this is
something to leave to holidays in London!
My wife was told never to marry someone who had never been in the Romanian army. An odd
thing but based on her perfect logic.

Every local man needs to spend some time serving in the army. My godson was in the tank
division and had a great time. The army teaches you how to clean, tidy and be highly
practical.

My wife has taken 7 years to get me into a position it would have apparently taken only 6
months with the pros! Evidence of this can be seen when you leave the men to make a BBQ -
firewood is collected, chopped and laid in a very organised manner and all seem to like to start
the fire with a good lashing of diesel.

As pay is terrible in Romania, the soldiers like to go overseas such as in Iraq to fight but quite
a few were so shocked by what they saw they came back changed men.

Those carrying out their duties in Romania seem to have very boring jobs to do such as
standing in little huts just a little way from Sinia castle. I never really understood what they
were guarding as the castles are empty of royalty and every tourist is guided. I guess however
if you need to provide a 6-month job to every young male, this is as good a spot to let one and
any other.
Romanian sex must be some of the quietest, constrained sex in Europe. Most of the population
in Bucharest live I small, high-rise blocks with at least 2-3 generations living together.

My mother-in-law stayed at our house and so one day I wandered out the room to go to the
bathroom - I was rather hot and very unclothed but as I thought she was in the front room
asleep not a problem, as I would pick up a dressing gown for the return journey. Alas she was
not where she had been previously, but was sitting having a cup of tea in the kitchen - the poor
woman saw more than a mother-in-law should!

The cost of living in Bucharest is high and rising. The Romanian salaries are low and falling -
making escaping the family home evermore tricky. As the population is still producing little
Romanians - in very expensive pushchairs - sex must be happening somewhere.

Young Romanians are now starting to discover sex as the Church has less and less impact in
their lives. Sex before marriage is becoming normal. Even boyfriends moving into the family
home well before the big day causes no scandal. My mother at least expected some sort of
ring before people could sleep together - she got her idea completely muddled later when my
wife and I were kicked out of a double bed and made to sleep separately so her single friend
could have a double bed. But then again her requests that we were welcome to have sex under
her roof was one I hope I don't hear again.

Along with a rise in their newfound Romanian sexual prowess, comes an increase in sexually
transmitted diseases, and my wife’s growing paranoia that she can catch them from toilet
seats. As they get the diseases, I guess there is a lot of unprotected sex going on. Romania is
not a country I would ever recommend that - apart with a life partner - as the levels of HIV
and AIDs here is huge, growing and with the removal of the needle exchange scheme (The
government decided it was too costly), it will only get worse.

Finding Romanian sex is not difficult, as many of the Roads into and out of the capital have
ladies of the night on them. My local truck stop shuts the natural spring water supply is shut
off every night to discourage their post-coital washes in the local car-park. One Romanian
whore robbed both my friends after she asked a final goodnight kiss and made off with their
mobile phone and wallet.

There other strange thing is how many sex shops are here. The size of some of the sex toys
made my eyes water just to look at - let alone experience them. This is combined with some of
the hardest core pornographic material around. My friend was waiting for her haircut and one
of these magazines was left on the table. She was torn between shock and gruesome
fascination about it all.

While Romanian sex is great -the women willing, you can't cross certain, clearly laid down
lines. Once I had a fully clothed friend of my wife's jump on top of me, a squeeze of her slim
strong thighs let me know all a man needs to know - she kissed me on the cheek and that was
it, but I knew she must be dynamite in the sack. Think Irina just looked on and laughed at the
funny scene. However on a staff do I got a phone call at midnight to invite me to 'see her
spider' - after me she called another teacher and all he said was what goes on in Pedal, stays
there. If I had taken up her obvious advancement, the family would have come down hard -
you learn here that a one-night stand is never worth losing all you have built up here. No to
mention the two other facts that you could never relax knowing she could find out any time -
and that everyone woman doing wrong with you will dial your wife to tell what a bastard she
has married - and that is before her mother gets you!
What are your experiences of Romanian sex? How do Romanians compare to other
nationalities. Don't forget that the French have the lowest sexual happiness and the Brits
prefer hot water bottles and shopping to sex.
Romanian singles I meet are incredibly beautiful women with no money to rub together. They
are young, renting something in the city, so have little left over to have much fun.

They are always dressed incredibly well - better than their British equivalents - but remain
single far longer. I guess the men are in a similar, penniless, condition - every last penny
paying for that black windowed mega stereo car they bought during the booming days.

It does not help that young women are getting more Western and freer with their sexual favors
- I was once offered to see a spider at 1.00 am - I declined and the following man refused to
say more that 'What went on last night in Predeal, stays in Predeal' making me suspect he saw
more than just a spider with the girl with a tight fitting t-shirt with FCUK written across her
breasts.

In addition, Romanians are made to work ever harder - staff is dismissed due to the economic
crisis - yet productivity of the firm cannot drop, neither can salaries rise apparently. This
makes it ever harder to meet new people.

Some Romanians take to online chatting and dating. This seems to be the best way forward -
as at least everyone you meet is actively seeking. It is an incredibly fun way to meet new
people - and I have been to several weddings from this method.

Other single Romanian women seem to head for places where richer foreigners hang out. In
theory this is a winning idea - a constant flow of foreigners, who are rich, looking for fun and
will move onto ever-higher positions in ever more exotic places. The problem is most
Romanian women are viewed as part of the Romanian experience and not a destination in
itself. Very few women find themselves sitting next to their foreign chap as the plane takes off
at the end of his contract. The best they can hope for is to meet in his holidays and hope he is
behaving himself in the long weeks between as they save furiously for another plane ticket for
2 more weeks of sun, sea and sex.

Romanian singles can advertise in trashy Romantic magazines - they do however need to give
out their phone number to the world - no nice PO boxes here - so every nutter can stalk to his
heart's delight! Some of the adverts included a 70 year old looking for a 20-year-old flood
victim etc.

If you get as far as meeting a nice Romanian girl - this is only the preliminary. Winning over
the family torn between their daughter dating a rich foreigner and knowing they will never
have in-depth conversations with him and possibly lose their only daughter abroad creates life
long rifts and problems which require massive diplomatic tact on all sides. It is also likely to
be an accelerated romance - expect to meet the parents very early - the chances are she still
lives with them. Don't expect to see the grandparents until she has an engagement ring to
show! If she is 100% Bucharest girl, the chances are they to live with her; try to have sex
without 2 generations hearing!

Romanian singles have single friends with no morals about tempting away the new friend - I
have yet to meet anyone where such a liaison ended well. Romanian girlfriends who are
cheated on respond like a British girl in the same situation who in addition was suffering PMT
with a chili up her arse - so don't even think about it.

The weird thing is if a single Romanian moves aboard in the search of love - she always
seems to end up with another Romanian - especially in Canada - as his mother looks down in
shame at the local girls and indoctrinates him from the cradle that only a Romanian woman
will do - even after the family has long left Romania in search of riches, adventure and a
medical system not in crisis.
Sex in Romania is as common as anywhere else - and if you count the number of sex shops
along any main road - especially in the capital, Bucharest, they should all be at it like rabbits
in the kinkiest possible ways... Until you remember most young folk here live with their
parents until they marry... And after marriage sex slumps.

A few years ago, before marriage, I was a keen cyclist - sadly with no sense of direction!
After a night at a friend's home, I got lost on the way home... a few hours later, hot, sweaty
and certainly not thinking about sex in Romania (cycling does that to you!) and on the home
straight - I stopped at a roundabout.

A young girl - no more than 12 - came up to me and asked if I would like a blow job - which I
of course declined ... It was only later when I thought about it - the smeared lipstick etc - that I
realized how busy she must have been.

Romanian women go through different stages when it comes to sex in Romania. The first is
not to want to sleep with anyone before marriage - a truly noble aspiration.

Then some get this idea that if you want to keep an Englishman, you really ought to have
regular sex with him - these I heard about but my Romania girlfriend kept me well away from.

As Romanian women get older and marriage seems so far away, many seem to relent and their
partner moves into the small block apartment where they start with their parents in the next
room singing loudly to avoid hearing the noise.

Romanian men on the other hand do not have any of these problems and seem happy to take
what they can get.

In Romania - there is a saying - how true it is I do not know. A Bucharest woman needs three
partners for her needs... one for love, one for money and one for sex. The lucky few find all of
these in one man.

Another man I heard about was caught having an affair - and got away with it as he explained
the woman had cast a magic spell over him making his unable to resist her advances... And his
wife accepted this fact.

In contrast my mother-in-law on my wedding day did some pretty graphic hand signals as to
what she would do to me if I upset her daughter on this front... Which is kind of funny when I
know that there would be little off me to do anything with if I did the dirty.. So I think keeping
on the straight and narrow is a much better idea.

My final funny story took place on a lonely dark rainy night in the woods outside Bucharest...

My uncle was in this storm and saw a young beautiful woman - very wet - by the side of the
road. He stops - offers her a lift - and in she gets - within 100 meters - she is listing her
services and prices... alas he had collected a woman of the night who was dropped off again
200 meters further on – very quickly – before anyone could misunderstand his gentlemanly
intentions! (With lots off expletives!).
FLAG AND MAP OF ROMANIA

The flag of Romania is very much like the flag of Chad. The Romanian flag flies high
everywhere I go.

The curious thing being that the British flag does appear far more frequently in Romania on
clothes than doe the Romanian flag. You can buy here headscarves showing the British flag
though I cannot recall seeing the American flag recently.

The Romanian colours are seen on ribbons and gift boxes but not on clothes. Ironically you
don't see the British flag flying very much - not even in Britain as it was taken on as the
symbol of a far right group, the National front, which wants to send all non-natives back
where they or their ancestors if they were born in the UK came from. As people distance
themselves from the far right, the instinctively move away from the far right symbols and so
the Union Jack has become shunned by the locals and only worn as a fashion item by the
tourists.

The Turkish are far prouder of their flag. I discovered this by accident during my brief hippy
phase. I bought an earring of a moon and star at a little folk festival in the UK, never thinking
for a moment it was anything more than a delightful trinket.

I then decided to tour Europe for a month and ended up in Turkey. I hated it, as the shoeshine
boys would pounce on your feet and start cleaning them. The local men would stare and point
at my ear and to this day I don't know if having the Turkish national flag in your ear is
acceptable or not.

I think it would be great to have a wider range of Flag of Romania fashion ideas. I did indeed
once own some shoes that were red, yellow and blue. I thought I was hip - the rest of the
world, apart from one shoe seller failed to agree with me.

How about 'Love Romania - love life' scrawled over a Romanian flag on a t-shirt or would this
contravene the strict laws about the flag of Romania. Please tell me your views of flags of the
world. Which, if any, look good on a t-shirt. I tend to find the beer belly under it does tend to
distract from any fashionable flag.
I wish someone would map Romania accurately and provide the world with detailed maps of
every square centimeter, complete with all Romania's attractions.

If you go into any decent bookshop in Britain, you can find a wonderfully detailed map of any
part of the UK, complete with where all the footpaths are, where the hills and slopes are and
what to look out for on each of your walks down to simple humps in the ground which some
archeologist will swear blind is some ancient holy burial ground.

In Romania, we have none of these luxuries and it really does bother me. We do have road
maps of Romania, which is understandable as Romanians are getting more and more like the
Americans and never walk anywhere. The reason for this is simple, in Bucharest, especially in
the summertime, when you can walk, the air pollution is so bad that you are actually doing
yourself irreparable damage to your lungs each time you step outside.

In the countryside, things are no easier as my granny does not have the luxury of a few hours
wandering about her fabulously green, untouched valley. That pleasure is left entirely to her
English grandson and his wild dog. In the evenings, when peasants do have the time to go for
a walk, all the neighbours release their terrifically savage dogs onto the street, preventing my
nightly wanderings. The only dog not to be released is my sweet dog, who because she has
never been out at night, would go crazy in protecting her territory from marauding dogs, and
so to prevent a nightly scandal with our drunken neighbours and costly vet bills on all sides,
my dog is kept in her kennel.

So in a nation of increasingly fat, non-walkers, why should someone map Romania? Simple -
for the pleasure of one odd, often rather lost, Englishman! I would love to be able to create
circular walks around my farm. I would love to know where all the different paths went
without following them, as Romanian footpaths tend to peter out into nothingness. I would
love to know where all the ancient lumps of soil, which pretend to be ancient burial grounds,
are.

Ironically they have taken the time to map Romania in the key tourist spots, such as in the
mountains. However as the area they mapped also contain huge, brown, volatile bears, who
kill tens of people a year, my curiosity of what lies down some deserted mountain track is
somewhat diminished.

What I would really like - and I still think has a huge marketing potential for someone, would
be to take a decent GPS system, and pop in the Google maps software into it. This means I
could see where I am and scroll forward, left and right and see what beautiful things I appear
to be missing behind a hilltop or where a great place to have a picnic could be.

The annoying thing is someone has already mapped Romania to a super-fine level as I can buy
maps of my own land, where the underwater streams on my land lie (essential if you plan to
dig a well) etc but nothing on a easy to buy in a shop sort of format.
The Romania flag is a source of great pride in Romania, and it can be seen flying all over the
place - and defacing a Romanian flag will land you in prison.

While writing this page, I leant a lot about the flag - for example the flag of Chad is virtually
identical - the only difference being the description of the colour blue. One calls it navy blue,
the other indigo blue - it would however take an expert to separate out the slightest difference
in shades. So as long as we never go to war with the African state of Chad, we should be
okay.

Romania does however occasionally ask Chad during diplomatic discussions if they could
change their flag to another colour. I think this is more because Romania and Chad have little
to do with each other and in a state of sheer boredom, while the Romanian ambassador is out
for a stroll, he pops into the Chad Government offices to chat and the identical flags are as
good a topic as any other.

When I wrote this page, I did get into a little discussion at school as a child from reception
showed me the following morning a flag he had made at home... it is upside - down I pointed
out which is technically a criminal offense. His proud mother was oddly not pleased at my
steering her child back onto a lawful path - I guess you can't please everyone!

There is a major problem with the Romanian flag, which I am certain, you have never
previously considered. We all know it is made up of 3 colours, red, yellow and blue. However
ask any Romanian child to paint you the flag and you will discover none of them will be
100% certain in which order to place the flag or if the colours need to go vertically or
horizontally. Which is a great shame as any British child can draw a reasonable copy of the
British flag and the Turkish children are so obsessed with their flag that they draw as
frequently as they are able.

The Romanian flag flies at school, next to the EU flag. In the lecture theatre there are more
from the ceiling to the floor. The managers have different allegiances and so each Turkish
office in the school has the founding father of Turkey on the wall.

The National days are great as long flags fly everywhere. Did you know the only place that
does not actively celebrate its national day is England? This is because the multinational
community there apparently feels threatened by the sight of the British flag and what it stands
for. In Romania, you are free to fly a Romania flag on your land as long as it is presented
correctly and not in a defamatory way but you need permission to fly other countries flags. In
Britain, flying your own flag requires planning permission and you are obliged to remove
them if anyone feels threatened by them - even during the Fifa World Cup, when a British
woman covered her house in them, she discovered them neatly removed, folded and placed on
her door step by her local council. Then the British Government wonders why people don't
have any National pride.

Here is a final question for you - if Romania Flag and the Chad Flag are the same, how do you
know where to enter the Romanian embassy there?
Where does one find Romania maps? The latest place I have been exploring in my quest for a
decent map of Romania is buying a GPS system. The sad fact is I really don't need one' but I
do find th arrow which sways across the screen while driving to be pleasantly hypnotic and
that is my only motive for buying one. As I only travel to my grandma’s house and back and I
am sure I could do it with my eyes closed and no one, in the world of Romanian crazy drivers,
would probably notice! So I have to make do with watching them in taxis instead. I did
however discover that my yet to arrive Kindle has a GPS feature on it. It triangulates where
you are from three different mobile phone masts an gives you an idea of where you are -but
the technology only applies to American users at the moment, using their new beta-version of
their web browser, so I have a while more to wait! Another point a good friend made was
anything 'mildly hypnotic' and y driving skills are almost certain not to mix anyway.

The Romania map is shaped like a fish - this is suppose to bode well to us in the coming years
as an ancient yogi who was passing through Romania and keen to make a good impression
informed his followers. This has got me wondering - what do other countries look like and
what could this mean? Take Italy for example - it could be an incredibly sexy woman's boot or
it could equally mean a long leg in mid-kick. The first can only be taken as a good sign, such
as Italy will always be a major attraction of sexy women looking for high quality foot wear -
while a kicking leg foretells doom and gloom, as the Euro fails and Italy suffers a good
proverbial kicking by the financial markets and everyone else connected to the EU. As we are
a fish, this is a sign of Christianity, and so naturally, the place of the new Messiah, who will
make himself known in Bucharest in 2012. Bucharest will gain the joy of becoming known as
the second Jerusalem. Th downside is the Yogi predicted its size to be about double of what
he saw cut to half of its current size - so I hope according to this Romania map, I am on the
right side of that firewall!

My theory is he never guessed Bucharest would more than double in size as I can imagine
anything wiping out the suburbs, leaving the centre intact - especially when last time it was
the giant Earthquake which knocked down the city - and there are more red circles telling you
that you really don't want to stand just there in an earthquake or visit your friends living on its
upper floors. Sadly no one knows when it will happen so you are best advised to call via
phone but never actually visit.

This all leads to another question about Romania maps - if we were to regain all Moldova, and
the shape of the country did change - does this also mean our destiny and ability to survive
2012 change? What would the Romanian Messiah do? Look for a more fishlike country or
make do with a sexy Italian boot and a pre-made St Peter's Cathedral in Rome? What do you
think the answer could be?
The Romanian map sparks major controversy in my circle of international friends.

The Romanians are unhappy with their lot as after the Second World War - as a punishment
for being on the losing side (they were actually on both sides but changed sides too late), they
lost lots of land - and the map of Romania changed forever.

There now is an eternal battle with Russia - as half of Moldova is still Russian and half is
Romanian. Recently - as I am sure previously - the Romanian president asked for it back. So
far without luck.

Then there is the Bulgarian issue. Romania lost more its territory to the Bulgarians after the
same war. There was an artists' village where the Queen of Romania declared she wanted her
heart buried there. When Bulgaria took over the land, her heart was returned to the Romanians
who placed it as a curio in the Bucharest National History museum (so I was told by a tour
guide in Bran) - I hope it now has a more fitting place,

Then there is the controversial debate over the Hungarian community in Romania. The
Hungarians are still sore over Romania taking a large part of its lands, complete with its
resident Hungarian population. My wife tells me the original land was a part of Romania and
the Hungarians took it and they simply took it back. Either way, both populations still have
issues with each other. The best example of this was my Hungarian - English phrase book that
remains fairly unread. They list all the European countries and the Hungarian name for them...
with the glaring omission of Romania, which is odd seeing they are neighbors and I guess
serious trading partners.

The love of Hungarians is no less intense on the Romanian side. The Romanian - Hungarians
want to set up their own school, where their children are taught in Hungarian. The Romanian
government talks of integrating the population - which means 'Stop asking for the impossible
and learn to live like every other Romanian and learn the language'. The compromise they
were allowed was placing all the road signs in both languages. This annoyed the hell out of
my fiercely nationalistic wife who resents seeing other languages being shown in Romania -
especially cursed Hungarian! I just looked at the surrounding beautiful scenery - and
remembered in Britain we are full of multilingual signs from Welsh to Polish and it does not
seem to cause nearly as much distress as it does to the sensitive Romanian feelings.

There are those nations that change the Romanian map for centuries - I am of course talking
about the Turkish. My wife had a thing about the Turks - which is surprising as the Turks
stopped ruling here about the two hundred years ago. I guess it is the same as the British - may
of whom still dislike the French despite us not fighting them in centuries. She still loves to
remind them that the Romanian leader, Vlad Tepes, beat them and stuck them on poles -
hence his charming nickname - 'Vlad the Impaler' and so was a little taken back when I started
working for a Turkish company - and even more so when we were invited to Istanbul on a
yearly cultural visit. She and her mother, who I also had arranged to come, did not look
forward with pleasure at being in the heart of this fierce enemy. However, like normal, the
reality was something else. They were surrounded by charming Turks who spoke Romanian
like a native and called the most flattering of names that they left the country, complete with 2
small carpets and lots of colorful glass lamps, convinced this a great place to visit and that the
Turkish were now our friends.

The Romanian map only changes because Romanians defend their borders - apparently they
have never been the first to attack - then again as they never had any colonies or seemed to
explore anywhere (Even humble Wales has a Welsh speaking community in Patagonia of all
places!)... there must be a good reason for it all - perhaps it was the paperwork was too tough
or there was a wind blowing (any Romanian can tell you this is the quickest way to get the flu
and should be avoided at all costs!

Did you know that because the Romanian map is shaped like a fish we will not be affected by
2012 predictions? What amazing facts can you tell me about the map of Romania? I would
love to know more!
Are you looking for a Romanian maps? In England you can find maps of pretty much any
scale of all of the UK in your local bookshop.

Here you can only find maps of the main tourist areas such as the mountains. This is fine for
most people as most people in Romania either never leave their cars to go for a wander due to
their healthy fear of bears or go only where lots of other people go - complete with toilets, ice
creams (from ice-cream vans nothing like British ones, here you can buy family boxes of ice
lollies with 6 or 12 lollies in each box) and for once clear markers directing you at least half
way to what you came to see.

However I live in an area that is completely tourist free - though they are now building an
ecological park here to bring in the tourists. So there are no maps of the area that I can use to
help me find and explore around here.

Before my baby was born, I use to have a step counter attached to my belt as I took my daily
10,000 steps exploring. I got really fit - but was always worried that I would get lost on my
wanderings - indeed I often did!

There are no Romanian maps or signs in y forest and only a few dust tracks to follow that
peter mysteriously out from time to time. There is apparently a wonderful forest walk to Curte
Arges from here. The village use to walk there for the county fair and then back again -a
round trip of some 30 miles. But there is no map for me to use to find out how and the local
villagers now rarely walk the 200m past the local lake - so the ways of the past have been
hidden again in brambles and forest plants.

There is a partial solution for the really technical - you can map out your own route using
Google satellite maps - which while laborious does make you look more carefully to see what
was hidden on the other side of the hills which form the long, silent valleys.

I did think of going as far as getting a Romanian GPS system but as I travel only between
grandmas and Bucharest - a straight road with no turning offs until I reach the village, it was
kind of pointless. I think it was more that moving arrow which fascinated me than where it
was leading me.

I did once try to use my Romanian road map to guide my wife through Romania via simple
short cuts. The roads on the maps would become ever tougher to drive over - my little old
dacia (with aspirations to be a four by four but sadly not) struggled with the rocks and stones.
My wife has a bad back so struggled with the driving and the navigator. I just struggled.

I even tried to use maps of Romania in the classroom - confident that Romanian children
would now where all the key cities of Romania were placed. As not a single child cold label
any city more than 100km from Bucharest, about as far as a child could be expected to go -
they too obviously never use maps and rely on their fancy GPS systems and general
knowledge to move about. I am sure children in Britain would be better at labeling cities than
these children as we do still use maps and children from their earliest ages have maps made
into puzzles - or perhaps I am being overly optimistic - who knows!
PEOPLE OF ROMANIA

Would you like to meet Romanian people? This society is open and mixed as any.

If you take a translator with you, and you tour Bucharest, you will find poor people
everywhere. If you chat to the old, you will find they lived good, perfectly respectable lives,
until they reached pension age and were forced to beg for money and bread on windy streets.
They have stories that will make you cry. The families should take care of them - for those
with no family, life in Romania is incredibly tough.

Chat to the youth of this nation and you will find a nation of highly qualified professionals
with their bags packed by the door, just waiting for the right foreign opportunity to present
itself. Already 10% of the Romanian medical staff has left with another 60% wanting to
follow. I have chatted to Romanian workers abroad that found French workers so lazy and so
found well-paid manual jobs. Now only barriers to non-skilled workers prevent another mass
loss of people.

There is a prediction that there will be a 25% drop in the population over the next 50 years
due to emigration. Romanians abroad are odd. There is a large Canadian - Romanian
population - supposedly a little snobbish of their Romanian folk back home who never made
the leap, yet they try their best to marry other Romanians.

Those Romanian people that move abroad go into two camps - they either never adapt and
nothing is as good as Romania and within a year are back, but now with ex-pat experience,
making it easier to find a better job. These are my kind of Romanians.

The second also hate being abroad - Romanians all hate living abroad, hence their complete
lack of colonies. These will do down Romania as often as possible as a means to justify not
living in Romania. These become the super rich, but lose their soul and the feeling they
belong anywhere. Any books written by these folks will paint such a black negative image of
Romania that you would never come and check it out for yourself. These are the only books
about Romania I ever have burnt.

This leaves the bulk of the nation. They have no plans of leaving, as their roots have grown
too deep into Romania’s past, yet they know the future is not too bright. Those that can will be
supported by their overseas relatives, the less lucky by generous passing strangers. The
original logic of 1 child, educated super well, is coming back to haunt them. In addition, the
dutiful child is now finding the responsibility of caring for 2 aging generations a heavy load to
bear. The more that leave, the bigger the burden on those that remain.

Romanians take there loads better than most nations and old age care homes are still a rare
luxury here rather a state provided norm. The old still have their place in society and the
grandparents are still main care providers for grandchildren.

The low wages are accepted as normal. Companies use the crisis as a reason to cut staff,
freeze wages and still expect improved productivity. The state workers understood the whole
state was on point of collapse - and they had to make sacrifices to pay for it. Cutting money to
their crumbling health service has just increased its demise.

Oddly corruption payments to doctors and general food price increases have not followed the
trends of cuts. Likewise transport costs continue to rise.
Despite all these troubles, you will still be made to feel by your Romanian friends that these
are the boom years - no expense will be spared for your comfort, the huge sacrifices they will
make will come from a less public part of their lives - and you will be the last to know about
it.

So please kindly refrain from telling them `Romania is so cheap! ` as the chances are most of
your real costs are being borne by the family’s finances and not by you.

How do you find the Romanian people? Do you find them warm or more of a fiery nature? Do
you know any that have left? Why did they go?
Romania Brides is of the most frequently searched topics on my website. This is not
particularly surprising, as a man would need to be a complete fool not to see the merits of a
Romanian wife.
<p>
This works on such a lot of different levels, that I am not really sure where to begin. If you go
down this route however, be prepared to be much more flexible than you have ever been -
putting your Romanian family permanently in first place is key. They will put you in their first
place - it is very easy to abuse this new adoration, but trust me, controlling your demands does
pay dividends.

A Romanian bride on her wedding day will look like a complete superstar. She was however
being so busy making sure that everyone else is having a good time (I just sat back and trusted
the restaurant would do its job - which it did to perfection!).

A Romania brides will bring out the best in her man - though again this is a rather emotionally
painful process as she chips and sculptures away at your long held beliefs, as you try to
remove her completely irrational ideas as to what is healthy - such as pig fat in large quantities
as it is natural.

As you can see from the top of this page, we have entered into the world of meeting, dating
and marrying Romanians. It is a great way of seeing a country, meeting Romanians online,
becoming good friends and letting them guide you on your trip.

If in the 2 weeks you are here, the true potential of your growing relationship, you can start
the process of making her the happiest Romania bride there is!

You will find that being a foreigner gives you a huge lead over your more local competitors,
simply because you are exotic and so offer a lot of new dreams, potential and chances.

To further boost your chances, I have added a brilliant 'Teach yourself Romanian course' - it is
amazing what you can find now a days for free on the Internet. Even learning a few basic
phrases goes down so amazingly well here - I get it in the neck each time a newcomer visits us
- I teach them a few basic phrases in secret, they recite them to Romanians and the Romanians
look at me and ask 'Why can't you speak like that?'.

Your Romanian bride will coordinate everything - you just need to turn up on time (in the suit
she has picked out for you!) - actually you need 2-3 suits. One for the civil wedding, one for
the church occasion, and a third for the reception.

When going to a Romanian wedding always wear suit and tie. The Romanians will be in much
more casual wear, but will look to you to bring some more foreigner style to the proceedings
which of course you will be at a complete loss to understand! Incidentally, the money is also
expected to be larger.

There are a few games that Romania brides like to play. Before the wedding, you pick her up
from home. She will hide and you must seek your love - armed with some nice gifts of course!
(Silk went down well but was really hard to find in the UK!). The second game is her friends
will kidnap her at the wedding - pay the ransom quickly, do not make a pass at a bridesmaid -
they too will look especially attractive - and do the requested forfeit and all are happy.
Romania girls just shine in all they do. From the momwt they wake up to the mome they go to
bed - hopefully with you, they look immaculate. My wife is just such a woman. She can
walkwith me along super muddy tracks and come out the other side as clean as if she had
loted a few feet off the ground. Me on he other hand will have got mud all over my shoes and
lower trousers and if there is a dog turd around, you can restassured my foot will have foud
this!

You will find Romania girls are distinctly in the high maintence catergory. They point out
they need to be, and will encourage you to up your game in the process. A friend of mine is
dating a Romania girl- he is tryin to get her fit, which is always a losing battl with Romanian
as any Romanian female will tell you - sweating to much, regardless of the temperature, will
give you the flu. Sheis busy trying to get her long distance running boyfriend to go to allthe
clasical concerts she can - I don't know who will win the battle but I can make a fair guess.

Romania girl's hair colour does seem to change with remarkable regularity. There is a strong
demand for Henna here to add a touch to complete overhall of red to women's hair. Oddly
evenin Romania the cost of cutting a woman's hair is much highwer than cutting a man hair.

Romanian women have a passion for handbags. My wife has lots of them in the cupboard but
never seems to have just the right e for most occasions. These are regulary supplemented with
bags which are given away free with women magazines.

Romanian girl's do seem to work much harder in the home than their British counterparts. My
wife is always scrubbing and cleaning our apartment - even when she is not there, she sends in
a cleaner twice a week o check on me -which is rather silly as I a either dashig in toeat a quick
sandwich or attached by an invisible cord to this website, trying to fnd more exciting things to
tell you about life in Romania.

Romanian girls do not like the cold, damp or odd smells in the house. Unfortunately these
seem to exist in all the UK houses we visit and so we only go to the UK in Summer. In winter
the houses do not run at the tropical temperatures only sensitive orchids and Romanian
women survive in. We did try but our friend's boiler could not cope with the demand. My
mother doesnot even try, as putting on an extra jumper is fine by her... though not for my wife
- who just silently freezes.

A Romanan girl is far more closely attached to her mother - who will, at any given chance
come and stay with you. They do need a little house training on arrival like remembering to
say please and thank-you. The downside is when you pop out from the bedroom in a state of
undress, you will find her looking rather shocked and making a cup of tea.

Most young Romanians, boys and girls alike, want to escae Romania. So when you meet the
right one, the chances are she will want to goback to your country with you - assuming it is
more civilised and better run than Romania. I am sure that we probably would have gone if it
wasn't for her relatives and her having such close bonds and my having a wonderful dog in the
countryside. People refuse to believe that I could possibly be happy enough to willingly stay.
They don't realise how much the family protects me from the harsher parts of lie and
bureauocracy.

If you do meet a Romanian girl - remember she needs 3 men in her life, one forlove, one for
money and one for sex. You on the otherhand are only allowed 1 woman or a broken net and
that is before her mother launches her own attack on you.
A Romania woman keeps every great Romanian family together. This can be your wife or
your mother-in-law or even your little old granny.

In times of crisis, you will discover just how strong and essential a Romania woman really is.
As I work ever harder to keep the family finances rolling in, I do really appreciate the work
my wife has to put in to keep the family together. There is the food from the market to be
collected, not to mention a whole hoard of little old ladies, all in desperate need of feeling
someone still considers them important. The funny thing being, despite rushing about all day,
when one of these old dears decides it is time to drop dead, my wife still feels tremendously
guilty about not spending even more time with them.

Every Romania woman seem to set it as her life goal to keep my life ticking over as smoothly
as she can, and to protect me from the complaints of her fellow Romania women. You also
need to, however develop a skin like a rhino, as every small mistake you make n life is blown
up into something significant, before floating away again into nothing.

In Romania, as far as I can see and understand, as it is still a very traditional family, women
are still judged on the way their man behaves. This is a bit of a bugger, as I still, after 8 years,
frequently make social mistakes. For example, I never know when to shake hands or kiss or
whom I should or should not be kissing, so I revert back to my roots, which requires infinitely
less shaking of the hands! Romanian men seem to always be shaking hands - and Irina has
tried to teach me, but it will never come naturally to me so Romanian men and me just wave
and say hello. Little Victor, under the constant guidance of his mother on the other hand will
be a champion hand shaker and cheek kisser.

A Romania woman, when not looking after her husband and home, needs to turn her attention
to the growing family. Raising little Victor in Romanian customs will really boost his dating
chances in England. The reason being while women fought the battle of equality, they lost the
little pleasures bestowed on them, such as doors opening for them, checking they always enter
a room first and have a seat pulled out for them at the table. I had so many encounters in
England where women didn't want any help - a pregnant friend had to find her own seat in a
restaurant etc - that you just give up and the ways of a polite Englishman vanish into the
realms of Dickens and Hardy. Oddly British women coming to Romania really enjoy the little
extra pieces of attention they receive in Romania, and commented how much my own
manners had improved in the hands of a Romanian woman.

A Romanian woman, however, is not a saint, and there are some features you just have to live
with in return for married bliss. The fierce temper is one. Latin women seem to be able to
explode once in a while - and really let rip. This sort of behaviour in England would see you
dropped off Christmas card lists for years at a time. Here, 30 minutes to an hour later, the sun
will come back out and everyone will be smiling and happy as if nothing had ever happened.
Ironically this is probably a much better way to deal with pent up emotions than the British
slow boil approach that ends with you simply snapping for some completely absurd reason.

Romanian women, particularly an old Romanian woman, will still be seen wandering around
in very elegant clothes. Quite where a Romanian woman, with all the load that would snap a
British woman like a twig, finds the time to still look great while out and about and find th
nice clothes she wears, is one of life's little mysteries for me!
The only problem any Romania woman will tell you about in Romania is the lack of high
quality items. The perfumes, even from high quality shops, rather than the man selling Chanel
5 from a box in the street, seem to be a pale shadow of their Western counterparts. Finding
quality perfume, make-up or come to that anything else, is a perpetual challenge here. The
only solution is to only ever buy things new on the market - as e chances are they are still
imported from abroad. As the business grows, it seems to develop a purely Romanian sideline,
where taste, durability and quality seem to get reduced to their minimum.

If you have a Romania woman - give her a squeeze and a bunch of flowers today. You are
living with a little gold mine and ironically, you have probably not thought how much she
does for you in a long, long time. It is time to say a big thank you. She will love you even
more for it! (If that was possible!).
Romania women are the glue that keeps every Romanian family together. The men provide
the muscle and money; women take on the childcare, home and shopping. It would be
considered very 1950s in a modern Europeans eyes, but it does work well. It is nice to know
your role in the home.

I kind of upset things as swinging an axe brings out men, Romania women and children, and a
first aid box. In the UK, the only people handy with an axe are the hitchhikers you now never
pick up. So it is a skill I needed to learn - Romanians take a lot of convincing. I am great at
childcare, apart from when I battle with their irrational ideas such as his ears still needing to
be covered in mid-July.

Recently two disasters hit us. Irina`s mother got seriously ill and the powerhouse of the family
did his back in, leaving us, the next generation, to take care of everyone.

Luckily money talks, and so this little 1-bed flat now has a maid and a cook to do all the work
for me. Baby Victor stays on the bed all day so he is delighted whenever he sees me, as he
knows his little feet will not touch the floor again.

My granny is amazing - Our favourite Romania women runs the family farm, I just potter
about and pick the highest beans. She keeps a close eye on my weight, as soon as I lose any -
not easy in Romania where fat is considered essential, she accuses my poor wife of clear
husband neglect, even when I am in Bucharest on my own! It took a long time to be allowed
to help. I can bring in the hay but have yet to master digging as apparently an Englishman
should not be seen digging - we have workers for that.

Romania women are the local moral police - today I was told off for building a website on a
Sunday. Oddly the same women seem to work hard cooking, collecting water, or preparing
the house but apparently God overlooks these indiscretions - but only when a Romanian
woman tells you to do it.

The women love to shop - my cupboard is full of plastic wrapped t-shirts. I have more than I
could possibly be expected to wear in one season, especially as school insists on shirts and
ties, and when I am not there I am wearing old clothes. The bad news is autumn has started so
this set of clothes get boxed away and I get my next set out. I just hope my season’s colours
are still in vogue.

My son suffers the same problems except he is only 8 months old so he cannot wait for next
summer. We are getting him thick winter wear - he will wear it while boiling in the apartment,
looking out the window.

Saying this, we both do look a lot better than our UK equivalents so I won’t complain too
much. A man wanting to do well on the British dating scene would do better with a Romanian
woman dressing him, but that is the irony, if you have a Romanian beside you, you can forget
the dating game... or you will find all the nice new clothes sliced up.

The other thing they excel at is cooking - no one will cook better than you wife’s mother,
apart from her mother. Logically as each ancestor was a better cook, the first Romanian
female was literally a cooking goddess, and it’s all gone slowly downhill since then. They can
take days to prepare a meal.
If you eat too much - you get told off for eating too much and getting fat. Eat less and you risk
the complaint that you do not appreciate how long and much it took and she will sulk for a
few more days. Ironically as you probably paid for the ingredients and will have certainly
noticed the unslept bed.

So love your Romanian woman like no one else - and she will do everything possible to make
you feel king of all you survey... generally the pile of washing-up at the end of the meal!
Romania is packed to the gills with Romanian babes -walk down the street and in the summer
skinny, well-dressed beautiful women will surround you. Walking to the market or going to
buy a newspaper becomes a wonderful time of idle fancies.

If you are planning to get a little action here - being well dressed, generous to the little old
ladies begging in the street and having a wonderful BBC style accent will all hold you in good
stead.

Check out the malls (there are so many these days!) and you can sit and have a coffee while
watching them drift by.

The best time for Romanian babe watching is in the summer - evenings in the parks are
particularly delightful as they whizz past you on roller skates.

When it starts to get cold - they vanish for the season into little wrapped up Eskimos -
Romanian women don't appreciate the cold and only go out in an emergency or with 20 layers
on - so hiding their delightful shapes - with the exception of their dark, beautiful eyes.

You may be tempted to date marry and take home a stunningly beautiful Romanian back to
the UK. I suspect this does not often work out well as for a starter the chances are she will
discover that you were not the cream of the crop after all - and promptly vanish home.

In England - as budgets ever tighten - and for environmental reasons the Brits like their houses
at 19 - 20C. If they are cold they are trained from childhood to put on an extra jumper.
Romanian women will complain it is too cold at anything less than 24C - and when the baby
(and entire extended family) arrive - your heating system is unlikely to be sufficient - I know
this from visiting the UK with my Romanian family in the Spring - as we know their is no
chance UK house will be warm enough in Winter.

Another thing to be aware of is Romanian babes - especially in Bucharest - are generally high
maintenance - and need at least 3 men to maintain their happiness - one for love (a nice
Romanian boy from their home town), one for money (this is where you come in!) and one for
sex (her Romanian Bucharest boy) - who will always out dress you!

Saying that - you could be lucky and be all three - so don't give up home. After marriage - is
the tricky part as then you become a magnet for other Romanian babes - don't be tempted as
they all seem to have each other’s mobile numbers and are not afraid to use them.

Another thing to notice about Romanian babes is they love to be treated well - and expect
much more from their man than their British women counterparts. For example she must
always be the first to get on a bus - but you must lead her off the bus. She must always have a
chair - but never on the corner of a table as any single woman sitting on a table corner will
never marry - and she will love flowers - so will that innocent looking Flower seller who will
charge you 10 times the real value - unless you buy it from a shop with price labels - which
are still surprisingly rare.

Another great place to see Romanian babes is on the beach. Don't expect them to swim - most
Romanians can't swim for two good reasons - the first is their health - if you want some nasty
skin disease or eye disease - go for a swim here - even in the sea - where the salt should kill
things off - you will get sick. The second is cost - most pools in Bucharest are in expensive
fitness suites - at over 1000 euros a year to join or tiny pools in hotels costing 10 pound a day.
The bright side being that should a Romanian babe be out of her depth you can rescue her -
only to find yourself out of your own depth and struggling hard in every other meaning of the
word.

One man on the Internet offered me 100 euros a day to find him a Romanian woman to show
him around Bucharest. I offered to give him a male guide with better English but it wasn't the
English he was looking for. After my wife's rather to the point email him, he decide that we
were not his ideal first port of call!

My advice is to buy a coffee - dream for a few hours - wander about town and window shop
the women and take your dreams home to the UK or US - to be pulled out in Winter - and
wonder what could have been. If you disagree with me - sign today for an online dating
agency - so you have a head start in meeting Romanian women and let the most amazing
roller-coaster ride of you life begin today!
Romanian beggars are just a fact of life in Romania - as in any other major city. The
difference being that begs here and why.

You of course have lots of the firm of flesh, who could easily get a proper job somewhere,
wandering around the metro stations, complete with a piece of card around their necks - they
always look surprisingly well fed to me - but the sign always assures me they are dying of
hunger - if somewhat remarkably slowly and old age will get to them before hunger ever does.

You have the cripples. These Romanian beggars have the most amazing injuries, such as no
arms or legs from I guess some horrendous industrial accidents, dot the Bucharest landscape
in all weathers. You again find lots of people with no legs dragging themselves around on the
buses and metro. I guess they have a legitimate reason, as the social support for the
handicapped here is almost nothing.

The highest earning Romanian beggars combo must be the mother with the baby or very
young child. This team brings in the most money, as some sweet kid puts put their hand out as
they wander down the train. However the problem here is this is such a lucrative trade that
parents take their children out of school to beg at traffic lights etc, preventing them getting the
solid Romanian education they could, sending them into a life of illiterate poverty - leaving t
for their children - again - to bail them out.

The saddest cases and the one my mother ways makes sure she has a bundle of 20p / 40c notes
for are the elderly. These really are a very deserving group. They have generally worked hard,
had super respectable lives and then discovered that the pension, which on a good day would
cover one weeks shopping for me, has to last them an entire month. The lucky ones have a
family who is earning enough to keep them ticking over - the less lucky pick a decent spot
near a bakery or other food place, put away their pride and beg.

The scariest group is also the group in greatest decline - the famous Bucharest street children.
These 10 year olds still have the power to terrify me. This is because they tend to hang out in
places like bank automats - with their perpetual glue-sniffing bag in one hand. I went into on
bank to complain - what did the bank do? It sent out a cleaner with a mop to chase hi away -
no beefy security guard so I put it on my list of places worth robbing - if the top security
offered is a lady with a mop. The kid remained outside for 20 minutes before giving up. He
was cheeky enough to barge in when I was half way through my transaction and press random
buttons to se if he could empty my account. Another just tried to see my pin code - he was the
one I was more worried over, so I took care not to meet his big brother further down the
street!

The hairy drunk is another key member of this group. He will wander up to you spouting
English football teams - so as a gesture of goodwill - I use to tip him a little or buy him a beer
- the problem being he started to seek me out for money and then there was no pleasure in
giving - as he came to expect it. So I returned to that essential Romanian phrase - Nu Am Bani
- I have no money - before scooting off into the market and returning laden with food - and
guilt.

Even in the countryside you get beggars -but these are fuelled by alcohol and are harmless.
My wild dog keeps them at the gate - where they sit - drink a beer on a good day - before
ambling off back down the dusty road in their eternal quest for beer.

What are your experiences of Romanian beggars? Do you give to them or ignore them?
What are Romanian girls like? They have high expectations – read here how to win with the
ladies of Romania!
<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/Romanian-girl.jpg" style="float:left;"
width="250" height="230" alt="Romanian girl sitting on a wall" border="0" ALIGN="left"
vspace="5" hspace="5">

Young Romanian women are skinny, fashionable and have very high standards! My friend,
Simon came to Romania with me, when I arrived, to make sure that I was set up properly in
Bucharest.
<p>
He took one look at me, and shook his head sadly and pointed out that I had a lot of learning
to do to meet any Romanian females here. All my old clothes were bagged up in a black bin
liner, and dumped, as you need to be sharp dresser in Bucharest, to get anywhere.
<p>
We spent an entire day shopping. In those days, everything was incredibly cheap, before the
rest of Europe found out about Romania’s charms. Even the department stores were made up
of small individual shopkeepers. His cunning plan was this – as long as I looked Romanian
long enough for a local girl to take me under her wing, I would be fine. It paid off well. Only
by looking at part, did I get my first date – though turning up in blue jeans at the ballet on my
first date proved I have far to go!
<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/Romanian-model.jpg"
style="float:right;" width="90" height="130" alt="Romanian model" border="0"
ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">

Romanian ladies have high expectations of foreigners. Sadly lots of foreigners have come here
and muddied up the British reputation (created from the myths of classical literature such as
Dickens and Agatha Christie and programmes from National Geographic) – but many still
expect perfect manners. Their parents will have even higher expectations. Never turn up at a
date not armed with flowers. Anyone who arrives at a Romanian girl’s home empty handed
will be looked down on.
<p>
Girls in Romania still expect to be treated as a woman. They expect the door to be opened for
them, for you to carry everything, and know when to be in front of them, such as when they
get off the bus, or when to be behind them – when getting on a bus or tram.
<p>
They also expect to be greeted properly. This is a really tricky area. I never really have
worked when to kiss a girl’s cheek (you need to kiss both cheeks). When you first meet a
Romanian female, make sure you kiss her hand – like in days of old. When you get to know
her better, you can kiss both cheeks. However, if you are introduced to a peasant, you don’t
kiss outside the family… I am still learning!

Romanian daughters are very close to their family, and it will be a major decision if a
Romanian woman decides to follow you to another country. I decided I couldn’t do this – as
in many families – my wife was the only child of an only child. However many Romanian
girls do have wishful thoughts about what it is like to live abroad, and surely it is better than
here. Romanian girls who decide to remain in Romania have a tough time, as their friends
wonder why they don’t go West when they can. In reality, I think Romanian girls are happiest
in Romania – where traditions still matter.
<p>
If you ask a Romanian - all their problems are due to the Romanian gypsies (Roma). Oddly
after a time here you get sucked into this terrible, prejudiced mindset.

If someone has stolen the drainage cover (hence the reason no-one jumps into puddles here in
gay abandon) - is certain your Romanian friends will blame it all on the gypsies. The cost of
iron is high - but apparently any true Romanian can't steal.

When Madonna came here - she tried to explain to Romanians that gypsies were nice - if
rather misunderstood - people. She was almost booed of the stage for her efforts. It was like
going into a vegan convention and arguing that a piece f sausage was as valid a food as
anything else!

Gypsies do have a lot of uses. They buy all the old iron cluttering up Romania in exchange for
cash. We dispose of all our old clothes by going into the depths of the mountains loaded down
with bags of stuff. It is whisked away and sorted.

Romanian gypsies - indeed any Romanian flower seller - should be avoided at all costs as you
will get ripped off on their true price by about 10 times - or be given the worst flowers in their
selection. My wife has got use to rare plants coming home - all shop bought where I can see a
price.

Gypsies are being helped by the EU - large shanty villages, complete with tents are making
way to large concrete houses - which once built - almost certainly in a location you would not
freely consider moving to - seems to go on sale -and remain that way for a long, long time.

The Romanian gypsies are great fortunetellers and hang out near posh hotels, dressed in
distinctive bright colours. They seem to terrify normal Romanians who fear some ghastly
magic trick will be placed on them if they listen to their futures.

If you are a poor Roma, then the locals are convinced you have come to the area to commit a
crime. If you are successful - but of Roma origin - people worry you are a better class thief -
but still a thief all the same. They are certain to keep their children indoor - certain a blue
eyed, fair skinned little boy is certain to be kidnapped or some evil spell placed on him -
shattering his well being.

There are no cures or solutions to this European caste system - Roma are hated everywhere
they go though it must be admitted they do few favors to their image by setting up amp on a
Dublin roundabout - which costed lots to remove, moving in to a British family home while
the family were on holiday or constantly invading France and setting up illegal camps. They
did this once in my valley - and while my wife did consult them on lifting a curse - would
worry and she was pleased when good will ran out and they moved on.

Romanian gypsies treasures can be found in Romania by following the blue flames burning in
the grass. The fact it is all cursed gold takes the fun out of finding it - indeed my metal
detector has not been used as I know that sod's law I will come across a treasure box while
looking for my mother-in-laws lost wedding ring (lost by my wife in early childhood) - and
promptly one f my rather ancient grandparents would die and I would get the blame.

What do you think of Romanian gypsies - are they misunderstood musical virtuosos or the
bane of every Romanians life - I would love to know your opinion.
<p>
Romanian ladies are very traditional. Click here to learn about Romanian Etiquette.

<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/group-of-romanian-ladies.jpg"
style="float:left;" width="300" height="200" alt="Group of Romanian Ladies" border="0"
ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">

Romanian women have very high expectations of their friends, relatives and visitors. You will
find Romanian women will take you quickly to their heart, and expect you to behave as a
gentleman or fellow lady. You will see them fly into the most incredible rages with other
Romanians and occasionally, if you are in the wrong place, with you! If happened in England,
there would be a good few months or years of sullen silence… in Romania if will last about
10 minutes, and then everything is back to normal.

<p>

<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/Romanian-female-workers.jpg"
style="float:right;" width="250" height="240" alt="Group of Romanian Ladies working"
border="0" ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">

Romanian women work incredibly hard. You will be amazed at how much they can fit into a
day. When I visit older Romanian female hosts, they will be busy in the kitchen. When I first
met Granny, my wife’s grandmother, I was asked if I wanted beans or soup. I tried to be
polite, so I answered ‘Both please’ – poor granny had to cook two meals as she too did not
want to appear rude! I often don’t see the Romanian female hosts when they cook as while
everyone is eating one course, they are in the kitchen making sure that everything is as
expected.
<p>

<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/romanian-grandma.jpg"
style="float:left;" width="250" height="190" alt="Grandma" border="0" ALIGN="left"
vspace="5" hspace="5">

There are solid expectations of a Romanian lady. They are brought up with a strong sense of
morals and expect you to know all the Romanian customs. When a woman comes into the
room, make sure she has a place to sit – even if it is your own chair. I always get too excited
and immediately ask if they would like a tea – a common question in England – don’t ask in
Romania, as Romanians only drink tea when they feel poorly.
<p>
The Romanian women will be the toughest judges of your character if you start dating a
Romanian daughter. They love it if you take time to learn some basic Romanian phrases, and
try to speak a little Romanian before you meet. This causes such a huge amount of joy. Don’t
forget that many Romanian ladies only have one child, and they have such great aspirations
for their future. Also remember that you will be expected to become an active part of the
family and support everyone’s dreams.
<p>

<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/Romanian-ladies.jpg"
style="float:right;" width="200" height="300" alt="Grandma" border="0" ALIGN="left"
vspace="5" hspace="5">
Both your future Romanian mother-in-law and the girl you are dating love gifts. Whenever
you visit a Romanian lady, a winning idea is to bring some gifts from your home country –
such as sweets or biscuits, when you first meet. You will then be immediately offered them,
and the whole family will share them with great delight.
<p>
Romanian women love to buzz around gold and silver jewellery stores. Irina, my wife, often
asks me if she should buy a friend of mine some gold or silver jewellery. Sadly I am not
skilled in looking and remembering at what a woman likes to wear – so she now has to meet
them, then the next time they meet, even a year later, Irina is armed with a perfect piece of
jewellery.
<p>

In summary, Romanian ladies are the keepers of the family – find an elegant, polite, open and
happy Romanian woman, and you can be sure that your future happiness as part of the family
is certain. They will love you dearly, and make you an adopted son of the family.
What are Romanian men like? How do you know if you have found the man of your dreams?

Romanian men take my breath away. They are incredibly practical at fixing things – even
when they not, you will only find out further down the road, when your car gives up.
Fortunately I drive an old Dacia, so everyone’s dad has had one, and so they keep it on the
road for me!
<p>
Irina, my wife, gets exasperated about me, as I am not practical. I have had to learn how to
swing an axe and how to chop the wood into the right size. There is still a sudden rush of help
when I turn my eyes to the more powerful machinery, such as the wood saw, the chain-saw or
other machines designed at loping off an Englishman’s finger in an moment. Every step has
been a painful step – I stopped at trying to milk a cow as the normally placid cow got so
annoyed it kicked over my milk bucket – which had only a cup of milk in it!
<p>

Romanian men are very polite and know how to treat a woman well. I have met only a few
Romanians that did not know how to behave in public. They know when to open a door and
before you have even thought of it, they will be returning to the table, complete with more
wine, another chair or an extra spoon.
<p>

When it comes to drinking, there are two distinct classes of drinkers. I could not, I hasten to
add, compete with either. The peasant workers drink considerable amounts of alcohol, and can
easily drink a litre of clear plum brandy over a day. They would be most upset and not come
back if you ran a dry farm! The problem is that as they drink so much, you need to have a
trusty Romanian looking after them and making sure they are still working hard in the
afternoon and not vanished to sleep under a tree. The more educated male though will never
be seen drunk – as sleeping on a balcony or in the hall is not a great option (Romanian women
rule the roost in most Romanian houses!).
<p>
Now we are in the European Union, the best workers have also hightailed it to other countries,
where they can get better-paid jobs. So we are left with the drunk, old or too young to travel.
Their wages have gone up – but for $30 you can still employ a skilled man to cut your grass
for the day, or about $10 for an unskilled youth to mix your cement.
<p>

The Romanian male do most of the driving, unless they have had a beer or two, at which point
their wives or daughter drives. As an Englishman, with a careful driving style and despite
never crashing once, I worry them all and so I just sit back and read maps.
<p>
The Romanian men I know take marriage seriously – the young men have lots of girlfriends.
They are all very committed to their families and work exceptionally hard to provide all that
their families need. I must admit, I do enjoy having Romanian men around – as then I can
pretend that I am as practical as they are, (my friends are very diplomatic on this subject),
while trying to help them.
<p>
When you come to Romania, build up a friendship network of Romanian men – they will
know more about British football than you. They will make you feel part of the group. The
only skill you will need to master is being able to pay the bill sometimes when you are eating
out!
A Romanian preteen is a wonderful child. Each child is only sent to school at the age of 7.
Romanians are very strong believers in giving every child the best Romanian childhood that
they can.

<p>

Children have a very special place in Romanian society. You will often see a mother standing
up so that her child has a seat on the bus or the underground (called the metro here).
<p>
As most families can only afford to raise one or at the most 2 children (more than 2 children
are very rare here), their children get the best of everything. The children look much better
cared for than British children, with a huge range of smart clothes. The children learn early on
that they have at least 3 different sets of clothes – this is something which has been really
troublesome to me – the children have home clothes, street clothes, and country clothes and
instinctively know which are which. I must admit, I still stand in front of my wardrobe and get
confused which are which.
<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/Bus-trip-into-mountains.jpg"
style="float:right;" width="250" height="140" alt="Romanian preteen school trip" border="0"
ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">

The teachers love to take their Romanian preteen children on cultural tours of Romania. My
wife was often took her class to see Romania at the weekend. The children were always
respectful and polite. I travelled with them once and they were so pleased to test out their
English on me.
<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/Romanian-preteen.jpg"
style="float:left;" width="200" height="200" alt="Romanian preteen mountain walk"
border="0" ALIGN="left" vspace="10" hspace="10">

My wife, as a Romanian preteen, was sent to live out in the country with her Granny. This is a
wonderful idea in Romania, as Bucharest is such a busy, polluted capital. Irina lived near the
woods. She had to look after the cow and make sure it was well behaved. She of course had
the help of the village boys. Sadly the valley, where the village use to meet, is now an empty,
silent place, where only one or two cow men live. I use it for walking the dogs and dreaming.
<p>

My Romanian preteen children in my class at one of the top Bucharest International Schools
are exceptionally hard working. They take learning seriously and often their parents come to
visit and ask what they can do to help their children even more. It has taken a long time for
computers and technology to arrive here – so until recently, the children were incredibly fit,
well and active.
<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/mountain-boy.jpg"
style="float:right;" width="250" height="130" alt="Romanian preteen mountain walk"
border="0" ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">
Children in Romania learn early on that they are a part of an extended family, and while they
may only be a single child, in reality, as they spend a lot of time with cousins, aunts and
uncles, all who discipline the children, the number of spoilt children here are still low.
<p>
The only children to watch out for are the Romanian preteen children who are begging on the
underground or at traffic lights. Their parents are normally genuinely poor, but the money you
give will end up with a criminal syndicate rather than directly with the parents. Also the
problem of giving money to these children is while they earn well while small and sweet, they
are missing a lot of school – which means they will never be able to escape from poverty. I
prefer to give these children some food to eat as at least they will directly benefit from it.
<p>
My life is surrounded by Romanian teachers of different sorts - each has a special role to play
in my life.

Romanian professors are incredibly organised and hard working and yet seem to complete all
their tasks in a fraction of the time it takes me. I am frequently reminded by these teachers that
as no one is ever likely to build a statue to me - why bother? The amazing thing being that my
websites produce more money from Google advertising than they get paid per day.

The Romanian teachers at school are great - but need to put up with abuse not accepted
anywhere else in the world such as 'My child must not be taught by a Romanian' - can you
imagine the anger if this was tried on any other section of society - the weird thing being they
are so passionate about teaching - I would prefer a Romanian teacher to teach my kid over a
young ex-pat.

My wife was a state teacher - great hours - lousy pay and here is the real killer - you need to
do an exam every year with very few getting the permanent contracts - often with a bundle of
dirty money to smooth it through. So many are left going from year to year in desperate hope.
It is sad to see so much dedication being undervalued. Most of these teachers need to keep
tutoring to keep the income coming in.

The third type of teachers working in Romania are those working in universities... the pay is
uniformly low - a top professor earns much less than an ex-pat teacher working in an
International school. Again they do this for the love of teaching. They have long holidays but
need to write a lot of their papers from home. They do have a lot of free time - but lots is
taken up by private lessons and keeping their every growing family in order. He loves to help
me out on building - and most of my apartment was a labour of his love - in-between teaching
and writing maths books.

We battled hard to convert my wife's teaching certificate into a UK one - ready for any return
to the UK. Ironically teachers who qualified in Romania can bypass the induction year and
become permanent teachers in the UK without a problem.
What are Romanian teenagers like? The first word that comes to mind is thin - and I have
never really worked out if this is really a choice thing or a lack of money and food thing.

Don't misunderstand me - they are healthy and thin. When you go into the parks they are
whizzing around at high speed on roller-skates or bicycles and never break into a sweat. The
reason for this is simple - in Romania, sweating is universally regarded as a bad sign - you
sweat - you get your clothes wet - you get cold - you get sick. I would come home from long
walks in the middle of summer dripping with sweat ad the chaos it would cause before I got
changed is something else.

This is the first generation to really get into sex in a big way. The amount of sexually
transmitted diseases is on the rise and Romania has one of the highest HIV rates in Europe - as
children were given blood to boost their immune systems and some was infected - causing
major damage. However as Romanian teenagers live with their parents well into early
adulthood ad beyond - it is hard for them to express these feelings and so on walks in the
countryside you do often see old condom wrappers blowing in the wind.

It has become a harder job to teach children at Romanian schools as not only do you get a
ridiculously small wage, and a complete lack of resources and even less respect as a teacher -
but also the children are less keen to learn. The good thing here is that if they misbehave or
get a low grade in key subjects - they repeat the year or attend summer school. The Roma at
this point start to vanish and so get low grades - which will have an impact on their life
choices later.

However, Romanian teenagers become very studious in their late teens and often will
complete 2 degrees at the same time in two different subjects at two different universities
which could mean Romanian degrees are not very good or Romanian students work
exceptionally hard - I know in the UK that completing one degree took all my time and effort.

Romanian teenagers - the girls at least - dress well whenever they are on the street. The
Romanian boys are less well dressed and always cause my wife to despair and hope little
Victor does not follow the same path.

The great thing about young Romanians is how little they drink. Beer here is incredibly cheap
- but the social pressures of not being seen drunk are huge. So the city centers are not
dangerously overrun by drunken yobs - I took my wife for an evening stroll in Bournemouth
in the UK one Friday night - never again - there you did not feel safe or proud to be British.
Here you can sit out until late and watch the world go by without a worry. If Romanians think
you have reached beyond an acceptable limit, they simply stop filling your glass until you
look sober again.

I look forward to little Victor reaching this stage in life - a long as he doesn't blow his cash on
a black, tinted windows fast car and drive like a real Romanian on speed - he should get past
this stage, the poor chap is surrounded by teachers of every subject so I guess we will just
keep him too busy to think about anything else!
What do Romanian teens do? In Romania, young people love to hang out in the mall. They
are some of the most fashionable people I know.

When you arrive in Romania, you will be stunned at how beautiful the young Romanians are.
They are very keen on the latest fashions and often can be found strutting their stuff in the
Mall on a Friday or Saturday evening. However, unlike in Britain, you will rarely, if ever, see
any Romanian youth who is drinking excessive amounts.
<p>
<p>
Romanian students often work exceptionally hard at school. It is not unusual to discover they
will have four or five tutors, for their different school subjects, outside of school, along with
extra studies with their parents. My young cousin managed to get 94% in her final exams –
and is off to study for a degree in French.
<p>

<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/Romanian-teens.jpg"
style="float:left;" width="300" height="250" alt="Romanian Teenager" border="0"
ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">

In Romania, young adults like to study more than one degree at a time at university. Often you
will hear they are studying two degrees, at two different Bucharest universities, at the same
time. So they have little time for getting into too much mischief. You will be amazed on how
many are studying for a law or business degree. Major companies such as Microsoft come
here to recruit these exceptionally hard working students.
<p>
Young adults from the more traditional families will still believe in following a fairly religious
life until they get married. Young Romanians do still spend a lot of time with their families
and relatives as they grow up, and so continue to develop a high standard behaviour. As yoing
Romanians are now aspiring to become more ‘Western’ in their ideas, lots of problems are
following them.
<p>
There are still strict sexual divides between the Romanian youth. The males are still expected
to be incredibly practical – having gained all their practical skills such as being handy with an
axe and able to repair the old family Dacia. The Romanian teenage girls are still expected to
be able to run a home, and have a wide range of different Romanian recipes, able to run a
household and shop – and believe me – Romanian teens are experts at shopping!
<p>

In addition to practical lessons with your father and uncles, if you are a male Romanian
teenager, then you had to, until recently, join the army. If you were a school leaver – you
would spend 2 years in the army, while graduates got 6 months in the officer class. Many a
Romanian girl still looks for a Romanian male teen who has attended the army course, as then
he is far more practical and organised than before.
My poor wife had to teach me the skills a Romanian man should have known on his own.
<p>
Bucharest is getting into a more dangerous place for young Romanians, which is why I guess
they are so well protected by their family and friends. I often see a sad looking poster on the
underground with pictures of missing Romanian teenage boys and girls, who have been
kidnapped and made to work abroad in the sex trade.
<p>
The joy of Romanian teenagers is their knowledge of English. As a lost tourist, I have often
been taken by the hand and shown where exactly I should be going. As the young Romanian
get older, you see them less and less, as either they are busy with their university studies or
have moved abroad, where they can find better jobs as builders in Spain or Italy.
<p>
Looking for Romanian women for marriage? What is a Romanian wife like?
<P>
<b>Why Romanian women like foreign men.</b>
<p>
Finding a woman to marry in Romania is as easy as falling off a log. I had all sorts of offers
when I arrived here. Most of the women at the time were looking for what comes with a
British man. This includes a chance to escape Romania and live in the golden streets of
London. Most Romanian women would like to marry a man with a decent earning potential
and even now, women hear about the high British standards.
<p>
I met Irina at an International School – so we met for a coffee, and due to different mistakes
and misunderstandings, I managed to keep the dating going long enough to marry her. Her
mother was so worried I would take Irina back to England, but as I fell in love with the whole
family, their way of life, and Romania in general, that I could never leave here.
<p>
I know of quite a few women at work who want to marry one of the passing through
foreigners. I watch them. The problem is that one of the benefits of being single in Romania is
the number of offers you get as a British male here – so most women at schools are
disappointed.
<p>
<p>
<b>Get introduced via a friend</b>
<p>
Irina tried to introduce friends of friends of British men looking for Romanian women for
marriage. We had no success here either, as the amount of distance between England and
Romania was too far for Romances to bloom, especially if they both speak different
languages.
<p>
<b>Meeting a Romanian woman online</b>
<p>
The only really successful way I have found for meeting Romanian women for marriage is via
the Internet. Quite a few of my Romanian female friends have found success this way. It is
much more acceptable these days, than when I checked out woman on the Internet before
moving here. Then the women online all looked like German shot putters. Now the photos are
much more attractive.
<p>
The advantage of meeting women online is that you have already filtered out those who don’t
speak a word of English, don’t have enough money for a computer and who do not actually
want your romantic attentions. The only problem is that you will miss out on some fabulous
women, like my wife, who never go online, go dancing, or the bars.
<p>
<center>

<a href="http://www.affbot3.com/link-
0b02035f0b030355500306510c0b5d065200400e0a5f11400e015e5d550502060009070842584
45f?plan=179" ><img src="http://www.affbot3.com/image-936-11197.jpg"
border="0"></a><img src="http://www.affbot8.com/impression-
0b02035f0b030355500306510c0b5d065200400e0a5f11400e015e5d550502060009070842584
45f.jpg" width="1" height="1">

</center>
<p>
<b>Search the woman magazines</b>
<p>
The final place to find Romanian women is in the weekly women magazines, such as Povestea
Mea (My Story), which has a large section on dating. You will then need to either speak
decent Romanian, hope she does, or cheat by using an online Romanian-English Translation
service – such as ‘<b>Google Translate</b>’ to explain your emotions and hope they translate
your ideas correctly.

<p>
<b>Problems of marrying a stunningly attractive Romanian woman</b>
<p>
My friend, Simon, loves to remind me that Romanian women are the most stunning women in
the world. When you find a Romanian woman for marriage, he pointed out that when you
bring her back to your home country, unless she is completely in love with you, she will look
around and compare you to others and vanish in a flash… The other problem to think about is
that when a Romanian woman moves to another country, the culture shock of Britain or
America soon makes her wish you would move back to Romania, where she can find her
favourite cheeses and everyone knows how to treat her well.
<p>
If you are blessed with a Romanian wife, consider yourself a very lucky man. She will
organise you to distraction - you friends will assume it is just marriage which has brought the
best out in you. Even more funny, they then go to her and tell her she is the lucky one, as they
can clearly see that an English husband is much smarter and neater than his Romanian
counterpart - they never seem to think why this may be.

My wife is very close to all her family and the first point of call for a lot of elderly old
women, who are looking for an adopted daughter to gossip to. This does of course result in the
phone constantly ringing as they go off and cook for us and then proudly tell us to pick up the
offerings!

When the baby was due to be born - we wondered how we would cope with an extra little
body in the house, where would he sleep and how would our lives change. Oddly, possibly
naively, I never added to this conversations, where would her parents stay as they naturally
assumed they would move in to be nearer to us and the little one, not to mention the cook and
cleaner - for a single international teacher, I do seem to be doing very well at creating all sorts
of jobs for people around me. This is apparently so I have time to relax more - in-between of
course needing to work ever harder and longer to pay for all the people who are reducing my
workload.

Another mistake I made was thinking that marrying a woman who had experienced extremely
low incomes would mean she would happily live on almost nothing after marriage, so we
could save... She just looked at me as if I had completely lost the plot - it wasn't going to
happen! Oddly everything she buys - with the exception of anything she buys from the TV - I
can see has a use and I am just as bad at shopping when we go o the supermarket - we always
seem to acquire another few useful pots to fill the countryside home with.

Another great piece of advice is to marry a Romanian who has land and a home outside
Bucharest - preferably in the mountains or by a woodland so you always can escape and
dream of escaping Bucharest.

A Romanian wife is a very loyal woman - her family will distant themselves from her if they
know she has been playing around. They will simply kill you if you tried to do such a thing,
which is really ironical as the foxiest Romanian ladies will suddenly have a devastating
attraction for you, when they know you are married and worth having. They will also more
than likely have your wife's number on speed dial to tell her before you get home again - and
chopped off balls hurts as much in any language!

A Romanian wife fury is legendary as it is short. In the morning, you can have your ear
chewed off - my sins generally rotate around where I leave my shoes in the hall but must not
go as far as the kitchen and my brief case - never to be left in the hall and woe be tide me if it
ever touches the kitchen table! There are constant bumps like this - yet by evening, she is back
to chilled and happy as if we never argued at all.
 PICTURES OF BUCHAREST

Bucharest photos are easy to find on the Internet, but much harder to take yourself.

The big problem in Bucharest I for a completely trouble free existence in Bucharest, you must
not look out of place. As you can guess, the typical Romanan does not carry a camera around
with him in Bucharest, unless he has recently mugged some stupid tourist and is now selling
his stuff at one of the many traffic light junctions. If you are lucky, you may even be able to
buy your own stuff back at a knock down price! This means no cameras. As soon as you take
out your camera - and I would recommend a cheap disposable camera from your local
pharmacy or supermarket so it s not stolen en route, you will attract attention. There will be
the direct beggars with a gammy leg, the old person (always a soft spot for me) and the
common 'lost tourist' who lets his accomplice in the shadows do the dirty work.

All around Bucharest there are no-photo signs such as when you pass the runways near the
airports, some bridges and abandoned looking military posts. With the advent of detailed
Google maps now freely online, surely these signs are outdated. However they are
rigourously enforced in the airports - especially if you try to photo a friend coming out of
customs in arrivals. I do suspect los is to do with sheer boredom of the security guards - at last
a job to do!

However away from security forces and thieves and there are endless things to photo. If you
wander around the parks early morning or evening (and are not attacked by the packs of wild
dogs), you will love the light and picturesque views around you. The parks after snow or in
autumn are particularly magnificent.

The homes and buildings which survived communism are full of architectural surprises, again
worth photographing. These buildings play hide and seek with tourists and developers, hence
the reason they survived. My own home was built for rail managers and looks great from the
outside. It was really pokey inside until I modernised it.

Please share your Bucharest photos here so that you can inspire others to also come and visit
this truly fabulous city. Most websites and guide books really do this city down and I am keen
for its other side to also be seen such as the turtles in the river in the center of Bucharest to the
stunning colours in the park.
Any Bucharest Romania guide seems to be really down on the country, putting people off
coming. The number of ex-pats - especially those with big book or magazine deals really let it
rip about Romania. The weird thing being they never seem to leave - they complain and are
generally negative about the place but don't seem to go anywhere which is clearly better.

I find Bucharest a really odd little capital - the longer I am here, the more I really love it.
Behind any small alley way door, can lie an entire new world - a bit like Alice in Wonderland
-and the only thing stopping anyone knowing about them is the complete lack of signs. This is
why I decided it really does need an online Bucharest Romania Guide.

I recently discovered an entire university campus on my doorstep - complete with its own
large botanical garden, vineyards and little wooden church. Amazingly, around the church are
lots of children's communal toys - never stolen or broken. This could be due of course to the
complete lack of other people who have discovered this university - just a few mums pushing
prams, a few dad's wobbling dangerously on their roller skates, who are trying to teach a
miniature version of themselves to skate and lots of students - who are loaded down every
weekend with produce from the countryside.

The university opens its doors once a week to the public to buy organic produce at very high
prices. There are people coming -but not many as in Romania only a trusting fool buys milk or
cheese off someone they don't know - so it is a group of rich daring risk takers shopping at the
market - the rest of us make do with our local sellers in the market.

The huge amount of security scattered around the universities tend to put off the casual
explorer, but the guards never leave their booths - unless you happen to be in a car.

Any Bucharest Romania guide worth it's salt will almost certainly guide you towards
Herastrau Park - the premier park, in my opinion, in the whole of Bucharest. It is always
packed full of people but if you go for a walk around the lake, and away from main eating
centers, the crowds dwindle down to an irregular trickle and you are left to enjoy the park n
your own. It is a perfectly designed walk as you get to Children's island half way around,
where in the summer children can spend hours going down giant inflatables - again this place
is often almost empty apart from when I occasionally take my entire year group of 50 children
for an outing! Then further around in a clockwise manner, is the children's park with a huge
big wheel.

Then it is a long string of drinking holes - selling coke and surprisingly cheap beer to keep
you ticking over. Before you know it, you will have crossed the weir and be heading back to
little shacks selling ever more sweet Romanian food, leaving your child confused as to if he
should be sleeping from so much walking or running around on a major sugar rush!

If you have extremely good luck, you will find the arch de triumph open - it happens about
twice a year and it is worth going - no matter what your plans were - as the view from the top
is really, really special. You can see for miles and will be surprised at what a beautiful city
you live in or are visiting!
In Bucharest time moves slowly. Ever since Christmas, I have been pretty much trapped in
Bucharest. There are many reasons for this - such as my baby only can visit the country in
warm and dry weather and my mother-in-law needs to feel strong enough for the journey.
Combine baby and mother - in - law needs and you find remarkably few windows of escaping
Bucharest.

My time in Bucharest is mixed. When friends are here, I am motivated to go out for long
walks around the parkas Herastrau Park is a jewel not to be missed by anyone! It has a
beautiful walk which takes you all around the lake. Somewhere in the park, yet to be
discovered by me, is a free bicycle hire place if you want to cycle in there. There is also a
scenic tour of the lake by boat for ridiculously cheap prices.

There is so much to see all around Romania that I would recommend only a short time in
Bucharest. If you come around about Christmas, there are the wonderful Christmas lights
throughout the center of the city, which will warm the cockles of your heart - grab some hot
mulled wine for a complete feel good factor - a perfect way to spend your Bucharest time!

The museums are again cheap but interesting. I find it odd that they are generally empty but
come a white night -a Romanian all is free to enter - night and there are long queues to get
into places which only cost 2 lei (40p) at any other time! They are however fun to wander
around - wander around them in anything other than the set direction really is asking for
trouble.

The Romanian Technology museum is a fun half an hour. My father - never before in
Romania - made a complete beeline for it and thought it was one of the greatest Romanian
museums going. I really should have checked t out prior to talking 3 classes of Year 3s who
got a bit lost on the only Romanian descriptions and so much preferred the good romp in the
park afterwards. I liked the museum and it did show lots of Romania's odder forms of
transport. It is however an acquired taste.

If you go to the People's Palace in the center of town and lie glibly about being a student, they
apparently let you in free. You have a guided tour of huge empty conference rooms - the
president never wanted to live there as he felt at risk from a poisonous gas attack - clearly the
every day air quality was much better then than now in Bucharest or he would have never
noticed it. The building is surrounded in rumors such as there are another 10 floors going into
the ground and that the total building is at least twice as large as what you see - not to mention
a secret metro lie linking it to the rest of the network.

Your Bucharest Time should include lots of time in the Bucharest parks. These are -
particularly in sector 1 - really well kept. Some of the parks in the city do require you take a
jolly big stick to swipe at the frequently dangerous dogs here. My friends go running every
night - not something I would recommend - purely as the Roma element frighten me - and
they need to brave the dogs on a nightly basis.

Your Bucharest time out will almost certainly involve drinking and bars. Pick up a copy of
Bucharest in your pocket, a free guide to what is happening in Bucharest and their mobile
phone app, and let them guide between the p and coming and down and out sorts of clubs. I
must admit I have not been drinking in town for more than 5 years as being drunk is frowned
on, ex-pat beer places are expensive with crap beer and I know that when I stop in a place like
that, it will be the day some crazy militant works out Bucharest has been overlooked, its levels
of security are dire unless you announce all you movements on a blog like the anti-nato
protestors, and ex-pats being hurt are really the only way anyone would even mention it on
more than a local channel.

A Bucharest time out should include a tour of the malls as Romanians dress up to the nines
before going to the cinema and are often more worth watching than the films themselves. We
have got more modern and so do now include 3D theatres - I now just have to wait for little
Victor to grow big enough for his dad to have a regular excuse to take him to see movies
there.

The best cinema is in the Crangasi mall, the cheapest is a few stops south of Unirii in Eroi
Revolutionei - but the mall itself leaves a lot to be desired!

My Bucharest time does involve lots of impromptu BBQs - sadly not something you are likely
to experience as few Romanians thought about getting a garden when buying their apartment.
The only other ways is to own a large balcony or have wealthy friends in nice villas in the
suburbs. All unlikely to be found quickly by the typical backpacker.
<p>
My Bucharest vacation was actually far nicer than I was expecting. I had a week off from
school for the half term break and many of my fellow teachers were hightailing it to distant
places - I did think about a trip to England, but decided that deserting the family at this precise
time was not really fair or ideal.

So I had a staycation or vacation in Bucharest. My wife loved this as all the jobs she had
wanted to do, with her newfound freedom from Baby Victor, meant I really was left holding
the rather large baby! We had great fun - as he loves staying in people's arms. My parent in
laws still worry about him somehow breaking his neck or back - I pointed out as far as we
knew, no child ever achieved this without actually being dropped on a hard surface. The best
they could come up with was some fully-grown gymnasts neck snapped - I didn't take it
particularly seriously.

As my parent in laws have moved from sometime soon leaving into very permanent fixtures -
the living room has now been converted into a second bedroom. There is a huge inflatable bed
on the floor - then there are two pull out bed sofas - one for each in-law - the second was to
give my mother in law change. I am glad we only got it from the cellar, as we humped it up
the stairs and rebuilt it, she decided its too hard and she preferred the softer sofa. So lucky I
did not buy a new sofa - as recommended by my wife.

They have kind of forgotten they are guests in the home, so while I flat out on my bed, in
comes father in law, drops baby on bed, switches on all the lights, and looks surprised when I
seem to be rather annoyed at his behaviour. Throughout my Bucharest vacation, the thought of
sneaking off, getting a nice hotel room and some sleep was never far off!

It was nice however to leave the little one with his grandparents
(who never can decide if they want to spoil or be strict to the child - so generally calls him
names and then hug him – for maximum confusion!) and go shopping with just my wife. This
is a real holiday treat for us! This is only followed by taking little Victor without a full
Romanian escort to the park. He loved sliding down the slide, going on the cool Romanian
communist swings - which come complete with a comfy back and being slowly spun around
on the roundabout. The in-laws were convinced his spine would shatter like glass - again
without actually being able to name a single child this has ever happened to.

The odd thing about my Bucharest vacation was it was more tiring to constantly correct
amazingly stupid Romanian ideas than teaching 15 second language students. I actually came
back to school more tired than when I left it!

The only other jobs needing to get done as to tour doddery old ladies who cook food for us -
then call to inform us of the fact and can we pick it up.

After this, I ended up having to politely chat to some ex-pat Romanians who come back to the
country, uncertain why anyone still lives here to visit the family. They chatted to me in very
slow, very clear English, like you would to someone not quite all there - confirming my belief
that I could get a more fun conversation from a funny eight year old than a 28 year old
Romanian!

So don't despair if you have a week in Bucharest - it could be worse - you could share them
with my in-laws for company!
The capital of Romania is of course the beautiful city of Bucharest. Despite all you see, hear
and read, Bucharest is a city full of surprises and the longer you are here, the more you will
come to love it.

If you are in a built up area, try to find some small back streets and you will get an idea of
what Bucharest was like in its heyday, described as the Little Paris of the East. The days
before tower block building gripped the city with its pile 'em high solution to everything.

I read the capital of Romania had less green space than almost any other city when you
divided parks by population. However there are parks everywhere - lots are a decent size and
keep my running friends happy - though they have had to learn about how to deal with the
rogue street dogs. I always found these were top places to go on dates, escape the in-laws and
just a place to de-stress from work. There are lots of people in the centre of the park, but also
lots of empty spaces to escape the crowds.

In the old days, the number of cars was strongly controlled so each family could have one car.
Car spaces in the city were planned on this. Come the Revolution, free choice for everyone -
everyone immediately goes for monster 4x4 cars and then they express surprise when they
can't park the car anywhere. As most these folks already live in Romania, you would have
thought they would have noticed this before getting yet another set of wheels!

The public transport system in the capital of Romania is simply amazing - and to make it more
exciting, it is constantly being upgraded, further reducing the need of a car here.

I love the metro as it whisks me past traffic. It is prone to occasional strikes but these are well
warned about and rarely happen. The trains, even during the rush hour are not as full in other
capital cities and so you often quickly find a seat. It has limited cover, as it was designed to
move workers from working class areas to industrial complexes - so the centre of the capital
of Romania, Bucharest, is not very well served.

When I can't jump on a metro, I recommend the trams, as these too are surprisingly underused
by the locals. I pretty much always find a seat and play at finding wireless networks on the
way - though I am never close long enough to pick up a connection.

If I am forced between the bus and using my legs in the capital of Romania, you often see me
walking along. Everyone seems to use the bus - at rush hour be prepared for the fight to
squeeze on - the rest of the day it seems to fill with obscure loads like 30 brooms, half a
market stall etc. This is the place most pickpockets are at their busiest - the tight squeeze
prevents you noticing much.

The taxis are another pet hate - I never take one on my own and Romanians also regularly get
ripped off. My wife loves them - and has a list of good taxis on her mobile phone - an
excellent idea for everyone else to follow! If you ripped off there is little you can do - possibly
renegotiate - or just save the trouble and walk.

Accommodation here is in a semi freefall - you will pay double compared to a Romanian.
They then complain they cannot find tenants! Saying that foreigners seem to have higher
starting expectations - more seems to get broken or damaged in the process and they are more
likely to unexpectedly vanish than locals, so I guess they have a point!
Herastrau Park is my favourite place in Bucharest.
<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/ferries_Herastrau_Park.jpg"
style="float:left;" width="500" height="300" alt="ferries_Herastrau_Park" border="0"
ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">
<p>
If you visit on a warm, sunny afternoon in the Summer, you really must try and catch a ferry
here. It only costs about 2 Ron - and takes you all around the lake.
<p>
If you are feeling more energetic, there is a fabulous walk you can take, which takes about 2-3
hours, and should be done in the day light, where you can walk all the way around the lake.
<p>
The only dangerous park is where you need to walk along the train tracks across a bridge, to
then restart the walk on the other side.
<p>
I have known people however who actually love running this route and use to run two or three
times around the lake.
<p>

<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/Herastrau_intrarea_din_nord-
vest.jpg" style="float:left;" width="200" height="240" alt="Herastrau_intrarea_din_nord-
vest" border="0" ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">
<p>
As you wander around the park, you will see some very odd looking sculptures, which once
had a great meaning to the city. However as you will discover in Romania, there are very few
labels to tell you what anything means any more.
<p>
However, there are also some classical statues. The weirdest set of statues are surprisingly
modern. To celebrate Romania's entrace into the European Union, all the heads of the original
countries were made looking up at a European Union flag.
<p>
<p>
<img src="http://www.pictures-of-romania.com/images/FantanaModura_Herastrau_Park.jpg"
style="float:left;" width="500" height="300" alt="FantanaModura_Herastrau_Park"
border="0" ALIGN="left" vspace="5" hspace="5">

<p>
The nicest time to visit is in the evenings, when all the young people are out and about,
whizzing along on their roller skates and having lots of fun.
<p>
The old folk will be sitting on the benches chatting.
<p>
There are lots of stalls, and bars in Herastrau Park. You can buy candy floss - though I would
recommend staying with the white candy floss rather than the pink, as the pink has stawberry
flavourings in it.
<p>
The walk in the rose gardens are nice.
<p>
If you cross the lake, and walk towards the Children's island, where you can find huge
inflatable slides for children, you will also find a wonderful big wheel, which will give you an
excellent view over Bucharest.
<p>

This is another of my favourite places, which is found on the South side of Herastrau Park.
<p>
Once or twice a year, you are allowed to climb to the top of the roof, and see the whole of
Bucharest from the top. This is a fabulous experience, and one I really wish they would share
more often.
<p>
This arch was made between the two world wars, when Bucharest was known as the Little
Paris of the East. The arch was originally built out of wood, so the victorious soldiers could
march through it.
<p>
If you time your visit correctly, and visit the arch on the hour, then you will be greeted with a
little musical show, where a new set of bells ring out pop songs and traditional tunes. It is well
worth the visit.
<p>
Are you looking for a map of Bucharest? The best place to find one for free is in the back of
the what’s on guide, Bucharest in my pocket (in most ex-pat pubs, restaurants and hotels, as it
is small and easy to carry around with you.

If you go to any metal booth selling bus tickets and abonoments (if they can be bothered -
often they decide that foreigners take took long to explain to so lie glibly about not selling
anything!), you can find a rather large, unwieldy map of Bucharest, which is very useful
despite its size as it has all the bus and tram lines and numbers printed on it.

The place you most need a map of Bucharest is in the underground metro stations - a place
famed for their complete absence! In London there are tube maps scattered all over the station
so you can plan how to get from A to B.

In Romania, the first underground map you will see is on the modern trains. This means you
have in theory navigated the almost nameless stations and worked out in which way you
should now be traveling.

The good news is the modern trains have a map and changing sign on board and a clear
intercom. The bad news comes if you need to go on a side line - the trains are old, covered in
graffiti, the intercom is not clear and they have hard to use maps stuck on them.

If you jump onto a modern Bucharest bus, you will see it has a big screen showing your bus
on a SAT Nav - which looks really cool and must have cost a fortune to install but is
completely useless. The roads on it are tiny and as the computer is desperate to include as
many side roads as possible, the name of the road keeps changing. I can't work out whom this
is for - it is a crap system for tourists as it is not clear and the locals know where they are
going already - or they use a taxi. To make a rubbish map system worse, every so often it
switches over to showing you pictures of tropical islands and wonderful places in the sun -
always with the label of the next stop on top of it!

I must admit to having got into finding and collecting maps of Bucharest - I found one from
the turn of the century and shared it with my pupils. They have moved the river, and
Bucharest continues to expand. To keep you on your toes and buying newer road maps, they
keep adding and building more and more one-way systems. The theory being if you live on
that street and drive up it the wrong way the police will not prosecute you - I hasten to add I
am not convinced about this.

I once used my map to find an amazing and little used short cut between two major roads on
the outskirts of town. My little car likes to think itself as a rugged 4 x 4, my wife, despite her
bad back thinks she is a rally driver and I the generally confused navigator. I found a little
road and the road just got worse and worse -it took us much longer to drive along this little
white road on the map - locals looking in disbelief - than it would have to have kept on the
major roads. So don't always believe there is a drivable road - even if you Romanian map tells
you there is!

Where did you find you map of Bucharest? Was it useful? Did it help you?
The Romania capital, Bucharest, has so many negative reports about it that you will probably
be tempted to follow the Romania guide book's advice and fly into Bucharest, grab a train or
hire a car and go somewhere else. However just like London is a magnet for the British,
Bucharest is the place Romanians aspire to end up, so it must have some good features to!

If you work on the per capita level - the Romania capital Bucharest has the least green space
of any European capital. However, there are well-kept parks everywhere and you are certain
to have at least one large green space within a comfortable walking distance and at least 5
playgrounds for the children to choose from. Anyone can enter them, they are not vandalized
and there is no 'people without children may not sit here' signs in the Romania capital to
prevent pedophiles or come to that anyone stopping on a bench to sit in the sun and bathe in
the warm feelings generated only by children playing and laughing.

There are three places (fortunately near each other) that are well worth the trip. Go to Piatia
Romana on either the 300 bus or the metro. If you can find the 300 bus-stop going towards
piatia Victoria in the Romania capital, and facing the little newspaper shop you walk right,
towards town and go just around the corner, you will come across, in my opinion the best
Covrige (Bread Bagel) shop in Bucharest.

The second place that no foreigner knows about is Romania capital's most amazing teashop.
From the same 300 stop, again walk towards town, this time following the main road all the
way, keep on the left hand side with your eyes peeled for a wicker sculpture of Noah’s ark in
front of a large building with no windows or signs on it which is a little way back from the
street. This building too is covered in Wicker.

Go inside and you will find the most amazing bookshop in Bucharest. It is a maze in there.
There is also a upstairs which is obvious, and a basement that is easy to miss. It has fine books
in English and Romanian. It also sells all a English man needs for a great cup of tea... and
speaking of tea, you would be forgiven if you missed the tea shop hidden inside.

In the backroom, there is a little tea shop where every chair is different and the paintings on
the wall are regularly changed. However the real treat is the menu. You get given a decent
sized novel of a menu - about 100 pages long, detailing all the teas and tea combinations they
sell. The pots are easily big enough for two people to share. Add a couple of Romanian cakes
on the side and you have a perfect place for a romantic date or simply a place to to unwind.

The sad thing about the place is how hard it is to find. I left my father unattended for a
morning and he wandered up and down, desperate for a tea - and would have loved it in there.
Sadly he never went inside but was stunned when I pointed out this completely hidden,
unlabelled building was a thriving tea-shop. we could not quite understand how it makes its
money - it has normally more staff than customers. Make sure you don't leave Bucharest with
going in - they love tourists coming in as it happens so rarely!

It is incidentally also a great place to pick up a diary - admittedly a very expensive - diary at
any time of the year. Which is great to know when my wife gets one of her little whims, she
sends me out to resolve her desire.

The third and final place is the big Diverta bookshop on the opposite side to the hidden tea
house. The fun in this place - which is packed with people is to find the ex-pat book store
below it - as the roof is very low and it really isn't ideal for tall English people to wander in.
As it is always empty, you have a little Romanian chap at the door desperate to guide you to
your shelves as he really does not have much to do in the little rabbit warren.
What is the Romania climate like? If God hated cyclists he would send them to Romania. This
is not because we are a country full of feral dogs, happy to take a chunk out of anyone's leg. It
is due to the climate.

Bucharest has engaged itself in building many kilometres of cycle paths across the city - the
pot holes have been smoothed down and the traffic police swiftly remove - with great glee at
earning another 200 Euros in fines - any obstructing car - but still they remain almost unused.
Why? Simply because we don't have a good climate for cycling.

In winter the temperatures drop to -20C - and more many more months traveling on foot, let
alone 2 skinny wheels, is dangerous enough. It is also the season the Romanian criminal class
removes drainage covers to sell as scrap so that harmless looking puddle could actually whisk
you and your bike into the Romanian sewers system.

Then comes Spring - for 2 weeks - in-between the rain and more mud and puddles - cycling is
possible - so you can drag it down the 10 flights of stairs of your block for some exercise -
avoiding the snarling dog on floor 3 - who instinctively hates bikes and deserves to be shot -
and you will feel good - until you breathe in Bucharest air - some of the most polluted in
Europe...

Within 2 weeks Romanian summer comes - it does not hang about - and the temperatures
rocket - rain is replaced by more pollution and a very fine dust - and as Romanians won't o
anything to break into a sweat - your local friends will steer you away from this form of slow
suicide to roller-blading - where you can twist your ankle surrounded by stunning women -
perfect for taking you mind off the pain.

There is then another brief - glorious 2-3 weeks in Autumn - a time many new comers are
fooled into buying a bike they will use to hang washing on - and dream of getting fit without
getting squashed by a taxi.

Then the rains kick in - this is a truly miserable time of year as the drains back up and your
route becomes puddle ridden - hiding again those missing drain covers - even those still
covered every so often give way, swallowing a child or cyclist in its wake.

Then before you know it ice - snow (up to 50cm in town) and frost sets in and you go back to
hanging your socks on the handle bars and dreaming of those magic 2 weeks in Spring when
confidence and everything again feels possible - even cycling in Bucharest!
Romanian cities are quite unlike anywhere else - they take a long time to get to really know
and love and the faces of the cities are growing ever nicer and more affluent.

On Friday I was desperate for a beer after an exceptionally long day at the mill and so, as both
wife and child were out of town, I popped into town for a quick beer and gossip in Lipscani.
Whenever I went on my own, I always seemed to end wandering up some mud track - which
is not an experience one would expect in a booming capital city like Bucharest. However,
with my Romanian friend, he took me one street along and suddenly all was paved with great
pubs bristling with life.

The beer was cold and good and as the weather here is still exceptionally warm, we sat outside
- rather a novelty for late November, and while sipping our precious beers, watched the world
go by. The only annoyance being the constant stream of beggars and leaflet handouts going
along the street, but this is the same in all the Romanian cities I have visited.

Bucharest's changing face also has seen the disappearance of lots of fabulous little shops. I am
actively supporting as many little shops as I can as they are suffering from competition from
the massive out of town places that have popped up here. There use to be a really nice shop I
town, very cheap, where each little area had its own little seller. I got kitted out there during
my first weeks here and then again, due to my obvious dating successes, my wedding suit
afterwards. It has sadly gone - been replaced by a never finished super deluxe mammoth
boutique.

The problem in all the Romanian cities, though it must be added, is particularly acute in
Bucharest, is the absurd amount of traffic. If you throw in a little rain or even worse, a little
snow, the whole of Bucharest is reduced to a very slow, massive tailback crawl. The funny
thing being, it really is not needed. The taxis - if you trust them - are incredibly cheap - only
about 30p (60 US c) a km. The metro, which I use every day so I have time to get all my ideas
into this blog, is smooth and fairly empty. The buses - something most local foreigners avoid
quite right like the plague - are incredibly frequent. You rarely wait more than 5 minutes for a
bus. So why all these cars? There are few parking spaces and illegal parking frequently results
is a big orange lorry whisking your pride and joy away, with a 200 euro price tag to get it back
- the extra scratches and bumps many Romanians have reported on their prides and joy can be
considered a free gift. Th reason is simple - if you have a monster in the garage, probably
eating up half your monthly income - you feel obliged to show it and use it as much as
possible.

The other thing to watch out for in Romanian cities is the terrible state of the pavements.
There are lots of holes and missing man hole covers to maneuver with the pram - not to
mention the terribly parked cars which are leisurely parked across cycle lanes etc and then
when the drive out, they follow the pavement looking for an exit, but the real problem is they
have never thought to link drops in the curb with where someone might actually need one. So
you will cross a zebra crossing, with a huge rise on either side - dodging the crap Romanian
drivers in their flash black cars who will not stop at the sight of a red pram trying to cross,
only to discover on the other side, that you can't easily pull the baby back onto the relative
safety of the pavement.

For a while in Bucharest, there were automatic air quality notice boards. Whenever I saw one,
it always seemed to be telling me that the air at the moment was so bad that it was gradually
damaging my health. Not surprisingly, these were quietly phased back out - as to fix the
problem would require extracting Romanians from their shiny cars.
A really positive aspect of Romanian cities is the number of parks there are here - especially
tiny play parks for children, which contain a wide range of functional exercise machines. They
are everywhere - from along the busy main roads, where you really don't want your child
taking huge lungfuls of air, to the quiet back streets, were it is a much nicer place to play with
your little ones. The other places to explore for their new play areas are all of Bucharest's
main parks - where due to an unexpected amount of investment - you will find great things for
your kids to do. This is in complete contrast to the UK who has progressively removed them
or stopped building them - very sad indeed.
Travel Bucharest at your own peril. I can't think of any real safe way to cross Bucharest. I
guess the Metro is the safest. The problems with the metro are a few fold. The first are the
complete lack of signs at the stations - so when you are sitting on the metro, the chances are
that unless you are on one of the latest trains (funded by the EU - presumably after getting lost
themselves in Bucharest), there will be no indication of which station you are in.

Also all the metros stop at 11.00 pm - so just as the evening is warming up to its amazing
crescendo, it is time to depart and run like billio and hope you are not too late - not an ideal
way to travel Bucharest in safety.

Getting a bus is a nightmare at all times and really not recommended to travel Bucharest in
safety. You will be amazed at exactly how many Romanians fit into a bus during rush hour -
why they don't lay on more buses than their already frequent timetable is beyond me.
Anything fragile will get broken - anything not deep inside your inside coat pocket will get
stolen and it is generally not an experience you want with a large foreigner rucksack declaring
you are an easy target. In addition, no matter what, you must get you ticket stamped - there is
likely to be only one functional ticket machine and it won't be at you end of the bus! Being a
foreigner makes you the prime target for ticket inspectors looking for a fast buck.

Taking your car here to travel Bucharest in safety is in realiity all the more of a white-knuckle
ride. After 8 years, I am oblivious to which side they pass. The Romanians will pass on the
most empty looking side - then do a sharp left 10 meters down the road, forcing you to slow or
slam into them.

Zebra crossings are a particular problem, as Romanians like to stand next to them for a chat.
There is a motorist rule - I have no idea if it is a law or not - that if the pedestrian is not on
your side of the street, you do not need to stop. Twice I have been crashed into while waiting
at a zebra crossing - once because I stopped, the second time I stopped, the woman's mobile
phone on the back seat was ringing and she was looking for it while driving... Romanians are
without doubt the worst drivers going but then again, a little brown envelope stashed with
cash to the right person still gets you a license - even under the noses of the police here.

Walking has its own perils, not a way to travel Bucharest in safety. The Romanians love
removing drainage covers. Instead of replacing them, they then put bunches of trees, plastic
bags and anything else they happen to find in the hole. So be careful as any innocent looking
puddle could be an open hole into the sewers. Even those with a lid are not safe as
occasionally your extra weight can cause them to cave in.

Because Romanians have an insane belief that bigger is better, my little old Dacia is laughed
on and as many people as possible have bought a four by four. Not ideal for the city, so the
Bucharest parking problem just gets worse as they park all over the pavements. We did this
once and another car blocked us in - we needed to get the police to remove it, as Irina was 8
months pregnant at the time! All these big cars create huge amounts of pollution, so when you
are walking, you breathe in ridiculously high amounts of pollutants. I did try to walk more
often until I decided it would be the dong of my health.

I use to cycle my bicycle everywhere. Cars park on the hundreds of kilometers of cycle track,
the pollution and open man hole covers - not to mention the insane reaction of every street
dog to bark and bite you - I quickly recovered from this desire. This is before you add into the
equation the dangerous Romania drivers who will happily try to kill you, the permanently
adverse weather (too hot, too cold or raining) and the belief of Romanians that getting the
slightest wet due to sweating or the rain brings on immediate chest problems and death.

This leaves the taxis - the worst option of all! I need to be very desperate and in the company
of Romanians before I enter one. There are honest taxis, such as Speed Taxis and Chris taxis -
it is the independents you need to watch out for. They happily rob anyone. They have
extremely high prices written in such a way to look smaller. They will switch off their meter
half way through a journey and make up a number. The list is endless. The independent taxi
driver will most often be found outside malls, Gara de Nord and Banasa airport. To avoid
them, simply check the side of every door and check the amount on the inside window of the
passenger side to check they all match. If you get caught out, unless you are exceptionally
strong and well built, you need to pay ad remember it as another tale to tell friends back home.

These are my experiences of how I travel Bucharest - oddly the same stories are repeated
again and again in every travel guide, so we have all been repeatedly stung by the transport
networks of Bucharest.
Whatever the weather in Bucharest, Romanians, like the Brits, are sure to complain about it.
Unlike the Brits, the Romanians are ironically a warm sunshine based people - so do not do
well when it rains (6 months of the year) or snows (3 months of the year). If any nation had
more fear of water, in all its forms, you would have found the country where the wicked witch
of the West from over the rainbow lives.

When it rains, they worry about the slightest amounts of rain reaching them - and will always
have an umbrella to hand. There are regular radioactive cloud which only local authorities and
the news will report - none of this will be mentioned on the BBC or any English-speaking
news channel. The amount of fear the volcanic, dust clouds from Iceland generated was
amazing. My wife didn't want me outside, I pointed out that in Bucharest the volcanic dust,
even radioactive dust, would do less harm to me than general Bucharest pollution.

When the weather in Bucharest gets cold -beware of the ice. It is each blocks legal
responsibility to remove snow and ice from the pavements. Some will - most won't. The same
goes for icicles hanging from the roofs - they grow extraordinarily long - and would hurt if
they happen to hit you from 10 stories up. A few people every year do go into a coma or die
from them.

The snow will fall thick and fast and Bucharest will look really beautiful for a few days until
the snow mixes with the dust, dirt and general pollution in Bucharest and return to brown. The
parking spaces at this point are fiercely protected as digging 50 cm of snow out for your car
means you expect the space t still be there later - as obviously you don't want to clear the
whole street. In my case it is easy - when it gets cold, immediately m car battery loses all
power and so can't be moved - even if I wanted to!

Then comes the spring warming. This is another terrible time in Romania, as the snow
becomes slush for months but this is not a Romanians real worry - the real worry is what
happens to all the snow and icicles on the roofs of the city blocks. The icicles become mini
missiles as they fly randomly towards the earth. The snow comes down as a thundering
avalanche and does terrible damage to your car underneath. Friends of mine drive around in
dented cars from the snow falling on them - think what it would do if it hit you!

After the snows comes the rain. The rain here is not exceptional, but then again the drainage
system of Bucharest is even less exceptional - so there are always huge floods and puddles in
the city in spring.

For as long as Spring lasts here - normally 2 weeks - you could not ask for better Bucharest
weather. There will be blue skies and a perfect temperature day and night. To prove this I
have gone home in winter and 2 weeks later come back to a baking summer and completely
missed spring all together.

Romanians complain about the weather in Bucharest and their summers. They are really hot -
too hot for Romanians and the news is full of dire warnings of being in the sun - even the
shady nooks under apple trees are deemed hidden type of radiation which apparently passes
into the shade Plus of course the heat makes fruit drop early, and no one in Romania seems to
be able to survive baby apples dropping on them - so constant fear abounds our house!

The nice thing about summer is that every day, at 4.00 it rains an amazingly violent storm for
about 15 - 30 minutes. Enough to catch you off guard and wet. Not enough to really water the
garden.
However, despite all this, the weather in Bucharest won't stop your fu here as in the sun there
are the parks, in the rain there are malls and museums and the locals will make you feel
welcome, whatever the weather.
PLACES TO VISIT

What are the attractions in Romania? The first attraction is the country itself. Everything is
within 4 hours drive from Bucharest. You have the mountains, the sea and endless forests.

The Romanians believe that nature can cure pretty much anyone. If you go near Rumnea
Vultuea, you will find quite a few unexpected surprises in this area of Romania.

There is an amazing salt-water swimming pool. It is 300m deep as it is built directly over an
old salt mine. The water is supersaturated with salt, making it impossible to sink. My mother
hated this place as her legs kept on floating to the surface. The sad thing about this attraction
in Romania is its complete lack of security, so you can't go on your own as you need someone
to stay with your clothes, money and of course the car keys. You will also need to ask around
in town or here it is as there are very few signposts guiding you here. It is of course
completely tourist free (due to the lack of advertising and signs) and incredibly cheap - 5 Ron
(1 pound) will give you a day pass. If you have forgotten your swimming costume etc - no
worries - there is a little shop which sells them all just outside the gate. Apparently they now
even have a masseur - so they are certainly going up class!

Further along the road from these attractions in Romania is the old salt mine. I have not been
in this particular one, but the ones I have visited are truly awe-inspiring. The one in Salnic is
like a huge cathedral and the salt makes beautiful patterns across the walls. The Romanians
use the salt mines to improve their breathing. Apparently if you have breathing difficulties,
you can sit in the mine for a few hours a day and feel a lot better after 1 week.

There are also more attractions in Romania, the medical sulphur springs in this area. There is a
huge hotel complex built up around the medical springs. You have doctors prescribing 1 litre
of water from Spring 21, followed by 1/2 litre from Spring 32. You are given a map to fid
them all. Each apparently has a different set of properties and most apparently during the
week, have a guard n the door to make sure only paying customers get the water. The whole
valley is so fresh, clean and verdant and the springs are all so far apart, that I suspect that the
physical act of walking is more of a cure than the water itself. My wife told me of their great
properties and how they can cure anything. Her mother got sick and so, being ever helpful, I
suggested the medicinal springs - she just gave me a withering look and said 'She has a real
disease - no water will cure her', which surprised me as drinking tea apparently is a major
cure... Works well for the Brits I guess!

I can only say come to Romania and let the attraction of Romania cure your troubled mind
and soul - no where else is quite like it!
<p>
Are you looking for a Romania adventure travel? Then Romania has all you are looking for!
As soon as you get out of Bucharest (which contains adventures of a different kind -such as
keeping your wallet intact!), you will discover a world full of adventure.
<p>
There are so many ways to experience an adventure here. If you go to Predeal or Sinaia, in the
mountains, you can hire a couple of quad bikes and a guide. The guide is more there to make
sure you don't run off with his bikes or completely trash them in your wild enthusiasm. My
friend, Wayne, bought his own quad bike so he could live in Bucharest, but go for his own
Romania adventure travel - a beautiful idea but not recommended for most people as he found
out. I am lucky, I have a wonderfully rare thing called a garden and a garage - so if I wanted, I
would be able to buy one and park it. He parked his in the street. Two weeks later, some
enterprising Romanians, who learnt his predictable routine, arrived in the night, ad simply
lifted it and drove away with it on a truck!

My own Romania adventure travel always rotates around our rather beaten up little white
dacia cars. My wife, who dreams of owning a jeep, takes our car up the most impossible
tracks. I use it for taking short cuts between my two country homes. Romanian back roads are
terrible - most get washed out and are full of unbelievably large holes. This is why the Brits
always make me smile. When you compare the British country side roads deemed needing
massive repairs to my daily Romanian country roads, you would happily drive on the British
roads for another 50 years or so before they reached Romanian road standards.

A more exciting way of creating a Romanian travel adventure is to go for walks in the
Romanian wilderness. If you are not very careful and don't respect the paths and when a path
is open or closed (they have good reasons to close them!), you could have more of an
adventure than you planned for. The bears are the biggest problem, and in the past have even
ripped apart a sleeping beggar in the center of Brasov during the night. Never attempt night
walks - accept whatever place a hotel offers you, as it is better than coming down a mountain,
even along a road at night. Similarly, if you hear the scuffles and oinks of a wild boar, don't
follow your first thought of 'Wow, I have never seen a wild boar before!' - as it could be the
last time you see one or anything else. They are really dangerous and are best appreciated on a
dinner plate in a Romanian themed restaurant. Incidentally, bear meat tastes terrible and to
save you from disappointment, pick a different meat from the menu - I have yet to meet
anyone who said bear meat was good for anything else than going into dog food.

There are lots of companies that offer land rover tours of Romania - which do look jolly
exciting. However, if you go to the north of Romania, to Moldova, you can travel between
each of the monasteries - sleeping in them if you want the compete Romania experience. The
roads are passable but very exciting to drive. I found all sorts of forgotten valleys that have an
isolated monastery. It is odd - God always seems to pick the most stunning Romanian
countryside to place his churches. He also seems to insist on the church being fabulous but the
dusty road to it, a challenge, to prove any pilgrims metal.

I would love to know more about your Romania adventure travels. Where did you go and
which company did you use? I would really love to see the photos of the trip!
Romania castles are great. My favourite little castle is in Bran - it is high up ad overlooks a
road coming into the town. Recently the 'real owners' turned up and offered to sell it to the
state for a huge amount of money.

The good thing about the new owners is that they have placed lots of information about the
castle and Romanian history.

My first trip there will always be my most memorable. I was wandering around the place
when I saw a sweet little old lady beckon me to cross the security barrier and follow her... Not
one to miss a chance of seeing unexhibited parts of the castle, I followed... down a corridor
and into a little room with a table and chair and tens of hand knitted jumpers - which took be
back.

After pointing out I didn't need a thick woollen jumper I was escorted back to the tourist side
of the Romania Castles and she vanished.

A game my father liked to play there was taking illegal photos of the place - and so I have a
nice photo of us all squashed into a corner under a stairs.

The problem with Romania castles is that they are often very hard to get to. There is one such
castle on the Transfgershan road on the curte de Arges side. When you are driving along you
will on top of one of the mountains a large ruin but not work how to get there.... Unless you
see the one small sign... to help you on the left will be a restaurant (with hopeless service),
still on your left a small electric substation labelled a castle and then a car park with a little
Romanian souvenir shop (mainly plastic goods from China.

Next to the car park on the left hand path (the right hand path leads to a freestyle open air
Romanian toilet area so watch where you step!)... I digress.. On the left is a set of steps.
Hidden in the forest and about 50 steps up is the sign most people would have put in the car
park to tell you about this Romania castle.

To reach the top takes 1480 steps. It was built as a punishment to the local villagers for
attacking and injuring Vlad Tepe's brother. They were made to work until their clothes were
rags.

It is a well-made castle that combines brick and stone and was never beaten.

When you get to the top - a lovely walk - you find a little shop with postcards by the door. I
assumed that the real shop was inside - but it turns out - as an angry Romanian explained - it is
his house.

The view from the top is great. It is not somewhere to take small children as the guardrails
have huge child sized gaps in them - and mammoth drops on each side.

The walk down is much faster and it is fun to see the hopeful folk who have yet to reach half
way - carrying children as they go...
Romania cities are exciting places to visit. The first problem will be getting around them.
There are no signs anywhere. Even in Bucharest, the Romanian capital, road signs only went
up when they held a NATO conference. Any sign not put up was left - so even now you can
get hopelessly lost and locals won’t know the names of local restaurants.

One beauty of getting out of Bucharest is that the other Romania cities still have wonderful
squares, where in the evening you can wander about, drink a beer or a coffee and relax in a
car-free location. The nearest to this in Bucharest is Lipscani, in the old part, but of course,
after ripping up all the streets to mud, they did no more, leaving the restaurants to finish the
job themselves. It is better to go to Herastrau Park by the lake.

Romanians, due to the fact they live in tiny apartments with three generations on top of each
other, do have wonderful parks. This is a perfect place to chill out in an evening. My father
use to comment how nice it was seeing youngsters who were out for an evening, dressed in
style, without drinking excessively, were still able to enjoy the balmy summer evenings in the
park. Try to find o the Internet 'The never-ending tower' which is a tall, spiral tower with
gravel all around it. Only by standing on the gravel can you really admire the beauty of the
tower - ironically by standing on the said gravel, you are infringing a local by-law and the
policeman stationed there for just such as event will chase you off it again!

In Romania cities finding accommodation is easiest found by going there, or via a travel
agent. You will find very little online, and those you do find will have crazy prices. We just
amble about until we find a nice little place. We love wandering from place to place, without a
plan, so this suits us perfectly.

Romanian cities are really car unfriendly - in Bucharest, it cost us 200 euros to get our car
back - ironically it was even in a car park. The car clampers took it with a police escort.
Romanians have bought so many new cars, that in even crap areas, the spaces are full of nice
cars. The good news is taxis are really cheap - just keep an eye on the tariffs, there are a few
bad apples in every city.

My favourite, out of all the Romania cities must either be Brasov or Timisoira.

Brasov, when you get into the very center of town is like a little German town transported into
Romania. It has bars - even a Scottish bar. It has places to sit outside and the whole ambience
of the place makes you feel really good. Take the time to catch the cable car to the top of the
hill and you get an amazing view of the town. The walk back down is also very pleasant. If
you are lucky, you will find yourself at the big Hollywood style sign overlooking the town.

Timisoria is a completely different kind of town. It is where the revolution started - there are
still bullet marks in the walls to prove it. It is made up of lots of interconnecting squares' so
you can wander about with your beloved from place to place, stopping for a coffee as you go.
The downside is it is so far from Bucharest that your driver, in my case my God-son, will be
so tired that their hotel bed will have far greater attractions than any plaza and beer session.

The final thing to see in Romania cities is the relics of communism. They are easier to find
outside Bucharest. The blocks of flats are sometimes, such as in Iasi, painted with heroic
workers, who are suppose to inspire you to greater things. In Bucharest, go to the Peasant
museum, near Piatia Victoria for an example of this style of art.
Do you want to learn about Romania Geography? The Geography of Romania is fairly
straight forward, designed so that everything is convenient to get to.

In the middle of the country, curled up across it like a big, lazy C, are the Carpathian
Mountains. On one side of the mountains the super-rich visit - where you find the mountain
towns, Predeal and Sinaia. These houses cost almost to exactly the same as a home in
Bucharest. Lots of my pupils have a second home there. Recently there was a huge storm
there, and some of the homes were washed away in the river. I was in the same storm -but far
away from Sinaia, and it was amazing. The rain fell off the roof with such a force that it
completely missed the water buckets!

These mountains are amazing and if you look in my 7 natural wonders of Romania, you can
see more pictures of them.

I have one of my farms on the other side of these mountains and yes, you've guessed it, this is
where much poorer people live.

To continue on our tour of Romania Geography, we have to travel to the east of the country
and to the North of the mountains, these are really simple, untouched parts of Romania, where
life seems to go one as it has for centuries. It is also sadly the places that on a yearly basis get
deluged by the most severe flooding. Every year you see footage of peasant homes being
completely washed away. These guys don't spend any money on home insurance, so the loss
of their home s a huge crisis. Every year, there are urgent appeals for aid, but Romania is a
poor country, so people have little to spare, and everyone are aware on how corrupt charities
here are. If you meet the head of a charity here, you can be confident that they have a few nice
homes and decent four by four car parked outside and that no one asks where did this money
come from?

The next stop on our Romania Geography tour is the South of the country. This leads you to
the border with Bulgaria and Europe’s longest river, the Danube. This is a wonderful river to
see. You can by fresh fish off the fishermen, and relax by the water. I was once taken to see it
with my family - it was a very long drive to get there, passing through ever-poorer villages.
We got out by the Danube and I felt like a decent walk to stretch my legs. The family - who
are not natural walkers - looked on perplexed as they correctly pointed out that it was a long
drive home again. So we just drove about the country, buying up as much carp (In Romanian
it is pronounced Crap - giving tourists endless fun with Romanian menus!).

The final major area to visit on our Romania Geography tour is the West is the sea. The Black
Sea is one of the most industrially polluted seas in the world after the communist era but
looking at it, you would never guess. The news is always reporting on how dangerous the sun
in at midday - but again if you go to a Romanian beach, they are so full that you would never
guess.

In summer the water is warm - though the profuse growth of seaweed can detract from the
fun. Mamaia is a popular beach as there is a gradual drop into the sea and the beaches are
covered in sand. My favourite beach is Doi Mai - a quiet, almost forgotten beach, where you
can find some of the best fish restaurants going.

The Danube ends in the Danube delta -check out the photos from my 7 natural wonder pages.
This is a great trip to take. You whizz around on a motorboat as the faster he travels - the
quicker he finishes! You will see lots of birds up close and this really is Carp central. My
amazing tip is to tell restaurants you are a small advance party of a much bigger party of
tourists - and it is your job to sample their food... and if by magic, a table will be found for
you.

Before you get to the cool of the mountains, or the fun of the beach - you need to cross the
hot, flat plains. Too hot in summer and too cold n winter. Not a place worth stopping in or
talking about!
Romania Moldova is in the north of the country, a world away from Bucharest - and a very
long drive! It took us 8 hours of solid driving - only stopping for fuel to get there. As I was
traveling in an old Romanian car, with the Romanian family, at least a ton of sandwiches and
20 gallons of coffee had been prepared for the trip.

I have been to this end of the country twice. The first time I went, I went to see an amazing
doctor. The amazing thing about this doctor is she is completely blind and has no medical
training. She was simply a country peasant who got run over by a combine harvester in a field
and while she survived, she could no longer see. She did however then gain a new incredible
power - she could see and recognise all the energy fields around the body and knows which
energy fields to worry about - she can even do it down a phone if she is holding a photo of the
person. The odd thing is the British family end of things are skeptical, as was I, but when I
suggested sending her their photos, they didn't want that either.

The old, blind peasant from Iasi (a town in Romania Moldova) speaks, the doctor converts it
into real medical diagnosis, and recommends exceptionally expensive, untested medicines to
cure it.

The second trip to Romania Moldova was on a much lighter, more enjoyable note - I went on
a tour with my wife around lots of the Moldavian monasteries - many were built to thank God
for helping Romania win some battle or another. You can sleep overnight in them, though
some insisted men and women sleep apart, even married ones.

The skill was to find the smallest, loneliest places in Romania Moldova - and sure enough a
monastery would have popped up. They are all covered n beautiful paintings from the bible
and if you want the priests to pay for your soul, there is a set rate in each monastery - and like
in any good business deal, the longer you pay for, the cheaper each individual prayer is.

We went out of season - and so enjoyed the amazing roads and scenery on our own.

There are lots of nice places to stay and we did not find it a problem to find accommodation -
and it was all of a high standard.

If you look carefully as you drive along, you will also see signs to very small churches with
only one or two priests in them. The annoying thing about the signs is they direct you to these
holy places, but do not tell you exactly how far into the wooded mountainside you need to
wander to find it.

Th reason that there is a Romanian Moldova and a Russian Moldova, with a passport control
between the two is that during the Second World War, Romania, who likes being the fair
father of the East, decided to fight on both sides - so it was deemed it had not fought for long
enough to keep all its territory. There are constant diplomatic initiatives to brig them back
together.

Romanians will be crazy in their insistence for you to see the north of their country and like
me, you will look at your short time here, the monster drive and think better of it. Believe me,
it really I worth the sore bottom, crazy coffee induced buzz and limp sandwiches to see this
world!
Are you planning a Romania tour? When I did this - I discovered that all you need to do is get
in your car, choose an ultimate destination and then let the roads take you where they please
before you get there. We didn't book any hotels in advance, as we were traveling in autumn,
and so we were not limited as to how far or short a trip we needed to take.

At present, I am building up a collection of all the places I have seen during my Romania
tours and I will place these as photo galleries around my site - this will give you a great
insight into where I and my friends, have been and what is well worth visiting. You will need
to bring your camera with you as it is safe to say that the photos of Romania are certainly
amongst the most spectacular that you are likely to see in quite some time!

The roads you find on your Romania tour are normally fully of unexpected sights. Keep your
headlights on at all times to avoid being pulled over by some corrupt cop and demanding a
super huge fine in return for your license.

The only problem with doing like I did it, is while I had a fabulous time and loved spending
every moment of it in a wonderfully carefree way, but I am sure with a little more preplanning
could have squeezed in even more.

We would see a ruined castle on a hill and after lots of stomping about find it was amazingly
open and complete with a guide who must have been bored out his mind. His main job was to
make sure it wasn't dismantled by certain Romanian ethnic groups and carted away by horse
and cart.

The well there was guaranteed to bind a man and woman together in perpetual romantic bliss -
which it seems to have done very well.

I had the huge advantage of having a native guide who knew a lot of what there was to see
during my Romania tour. Anything not sign-posted we missed or came across by sheer good
fortune. A tour guidebook would have been nice, we always seem to read them after the event,
which does not really help us!

I think if I had to tour Romania, I would recommend splitting the country into 4 equal pieces
and explore intensively in one of the areas. You won't want to rush Romania - as nothing in
Romania rushes - except the tourists and ex-pats determined to do and see everything before
their contracts expire and they are off to another exciting location. My friend taught me a long
time ago - Romania was here before I was born - it will still be confusing and perplexing
tourists long after I have died, so seeing a particular part of Romania this year or next year
won't make much difference in the long term, so relax and enjoy your ambles here.

I know a guide you can trust - he has a wide range of different vehicles for different numbers
of people. I have used him to show me the delta and I can strongly recommend him to
everyone. If you leave me a message, I will dig out his contact details for you. I am pleased to
Romania's tourist industry has taken off in the last 10 years - when I first came here, you
could only come here on a dual center holiday - 1 week in Romania and 1 week in Bulgaria.
For these reason - to keep everyone happy, I took both sides of the family on our honeymoon -
everyone really enjoyed it!

If you tour Romania - pick up a hire car from the airport. The good thing being the major
brands are featured here, such as Hertz, so you are less likely to get ripped off than if you use
a local tin-pot car hire shop.
I have found a new wonderful device to take on your Romania tour - I am so excited as I have
ordered one from America. It is an Amazon Kindle and lets you download millions of book
for free onto your machine. It means I finally have a way to search for and identify a huge
number of plants, mushrooms and animals I see - especially Romanian insects, which
certainly don't appear in any books - unless my wife happens to squish one using her latest
Romantic novel.

It also has the additional feature of providing you will a free phrase book in about 25
languages. Unfortunately, like normal, Romanian is not one of the chosen languages - though
if you are traveling west - you may find the Hungarian words useful.

When you make your Romanian tour, collect up your photos and drop a few on the site to
share with everyone else! I really hope you enjoy wandering about - it is fun - just take your
time, and relax!
Romanian castles

Of all the Romanian castles I know, without a doubt, the most Romantic must be Sinaia castle
- Peles Castle hidden in the Carpathian Mountains - this time you can't even see if from the
main road.

It was a royal residence - the king was a gadget freak so it was the first castle in Romania to
electric lighting and a cleaning system pop a pipe into the wall and the machinery in the
basement came on.

There are two tours - a long one and a short one - go for the long one - you will thank me as
all the best stuff is kept out of reach of the cheap - skates.

The outside of the inner court of this Romanian castle reminds me of Tudor or Elizabethan
artwork - Shakespeare would have felt at home here. Large statues dominate the gardens - and
if you wander down to the lower patio, you will be standing on the spot my brother-in-law to
be asked my sister to marry him. She of course accepted - any man asking such a question in
such romantic spot is almost certainly, in my opinion, going to be rapidly accepted.

From the vantage point of this Romanian castle you can see the mountains towering above
you and Romanian forests all around.

The road sweeps down the hill in a gentle curve. The road is cobbled and half way around lies
a fabulous looking hotel - compete with cannons.

There is a second castle is Pelishor castle near by - which was given back to the original
family - the state kept the original furniture - like some evil bailiffs - to put into a villa ... sorry
... museum in some undisclosed location.

From these Romanian castles - if it is winter - take one of the horse drawn sleighs back down
the hill.

You will see all sort of very Romanian items on you walk from town to the top - past all the
market stalls. You can buy simple foldable boomerangs that will constantly whizz over your
head.

There will be old peasant women selling delicate lace and an assortment of ever more exotic
animals to be photoed with. As these poor animals don't get fed properly and end up being
given to Romanian zoos as stunted mutants, don't be surprised, like one of my pupils were,
when the lion cub bites you - its the first truly fresh meat he has seen all day!

You will take a while to wander past all the market stalls. There will be a lot of plastic,
colorful wigs you will never wear again, jumpers which still smell of sheep - which will
shrink on the first wash and eternally itch you and vampire plates. The cheese in pine skins
taste nice but officially can't be taken home and lots of sleeping dogs. The toilets are two
thirds of the way up the hill and in a circular building.

Take care when you are walking in the nearby mountains - do not wander about at night or far
from others as there are bears - which are amazing to see - if you are in a car - but do kill and
maim a few people a year. Likewise avoid bush camping unless you have a terminal disease
and want to get it over with, as bears can come into the tent and you will be no match for a
hungry brown bear. Likewise - you will see them only in tourist restaurants on the menu -
there is a reason for this. They are incredibly tough to eat, eat anything that comes their way
and no self-respecting Romanian will willingly eat them!

While in Sinaia take the time to visit the Monastery. Ignore the beggars outside but be
prepared to pay to go in at the little booth.

I do love this castle - I would recommend catching the train from Bucharest as they leave
about every half hour and the road is really busy at weekends - don't bother to try on a Friday
night! I would then continue onto Brasov - you need to catch a bus into town to see it - Brasov
is in an industrial wasteland on the outskirts.

I am really looking forward to how you found these Romanian castles and see your photos. It
is certainly one of the most photogenic castles you will ever see - a lot like the Walt Disney
castle in its films logo.
To fully appreciate you Romanian holidays, you need to go on holiday with Romanians.

The first car will be full of clothes for every conceivable occurrence. You will need to fill one
bag with simply underwear - a fresh t-shirt, undershirt, handkerchief and pants for every day
you are going.

Add in a baby and you may as well stay at home as they say that the baby can’t remained
strapped in for a 2 hour journey on Romanian holidays but having it as a human projectile
whizzing out at 70 km/ hour - not a problem.

The second car full of family will have its windows firmly shut - the heat will be stifling, the
baby will be crying in distress, and the Romanian logic dictates this is because someone less
off than us are having negative thoughts about our family. If I open the window more than a
crack, there is uproar in the family! There is a child on board! The cooling wind will
permanently damage its ears and give it flu. So you and baby get heat stroke while the
Romanian argue over which of the driver around them - all with headlights blazing and horns
honking are terrible drivers, as we personally swerve from lane to lane.

To overcome this problem, I drive the empty backup car during our Romanian holidays -
windows fully down, terrible music such as the Sound of Music or such like blazing - but
feeling cool and happy.

The Romanian family, no matter how far or grueling the drive, they will insist on taking this
convoy of cars to wherever they are going - taking all their ingrained prejudices with them
like never stop in Bulgaria or you will be robbed and the car stolen etc. Fierce arguments will
brew during Romanian holidays - enough to force a British couple to head in opposite
directions, but a Romanian family loves these - it is, I have discovered the Romanian
equivalent of a jolly English sing song to simply pass the time - any deeply hurtful comments
must not be recalled after the journey has ended.

At no point will a Romanian be left on their own. The father will be up early, buying in
supplies from cheap vegetable stores to reduce costs. Coffees need to be made and put into
thermos flasks, as shop bought coffee is way too costly. Everything will rotate around saving
money - or making you feel bad about spending your own money.

At no point in the holiday will the Romanians feel truly happy outside a town situation - go
into the mountains - bears will eat you, go to the sea - everyone knows sea air causes and
aggravates cancer - not to mention the solar rays themselves - going skiing and everyone will
wait for you to break something - so you give it up as too stressful for the family. Go for a
walk on an isolated country track - and they will be ready for meeting rapists and robbers
around every turn.

Go somewhere more exotic and the food will come in for close scrutiny, and don't bother with
places like the UK where houses are not 100% at or above 24C. My Aberdeen energy saving
thermometer has to remain in the 'too hot - put your heating down' for a Romanian to be
happy.

After all this - everything is done in reverse - even more bags and shopping are miraculously
packed into the car - along with half a ton of coffee for gifts to everyone else (Poundland in
the UK is especially good for this!) and we trek back half way across Europe - traveling as
fast as we can - to minimize hotel bills - again more tempers flare as people actually believe
their SAT NAVs ideas of a great route over some forlorn mountain track, until we get back
into Romanian territory.

As you know, Romanians are very proud of their country. The exception to this is when they
cross another countries border and see what the rest of the world takes for granted, such as
good roads, decent service and clean toilets - then a certain depression slowly descends upon
the Romanians, as they realize their 2 weeks break is over and it is back to work.

The depression lifts two weeks later as the photos come back, the coffee is shared out and
suddenly that dirty, expensive city called Paris re-develops a new sheen as the describe it all
to their friends and show the photos and dream of going again next year!
The Romanian rhapsody about the Danube being blue is obviously of a long lost era. These
days the Danube is a sluggish, lazy brown river, packed full to the gills with pollutants - so
much so, than a group of European countries is trying to clean it up. It is possible that the
latest Hungarian toxic waste spill will simply add to this to toxic cocktail.

The best place to see the Danube is at the Delta. It is a place full of excitement - if you see
how Romanians drive, imagine them on a boat. In England, there are speed limits to restrict
damage to the riverbanks. No such luck here - they go fast! It is a great place to see birds, as
they have no chance of escape before you arrive, and then flutter into the trees until you have
passed.

The fish is great, though these days, who knows what different chemicals you are eating along
with your carp flesh. The restaurants there are great for fish related meals, and should be
sampled as frequently as possible. You will have a fish soup, after which the same fish is
recycled into the main meal. The prices are great and the portions generous.

Which brings me to my next question, as the Danube is polluted brown and not quite as
attractive as it once was, where does my heart now sing a Romanian rhapsody?

Without a doubt, getting out of Bucharest and going anywhere else in Romania has to be
deemed an excellent start to this. Getting into the mountains is also an excellent start, as the
air is fresh, the scenery is stunning and the adrenaline you feel while scaling or walking along
the very tops of some of these mountains is something else.

As you leave the major tourist centers and ski slopes alone, you rapidly find yourself
completely alone. As I have often said, Romanian see no value in walking for walking sake -
especially if you have a farm, cow, a few chickens and a few senile relatives to look after.
This means there are completely untouched valleys and quiet woods, just waiting to be
discovered -indeed you may find such an abundance of silence unnerving - which is why I got
myself a dog. You could always wear your MP3 player and listen to the appropriate classical
music tracks to complete your scene.

So what do I think a Romanian rhapsody would be? Romanians don't seem to feel the same
love of their country as I do - going on how much trash and pollution they always leave
behind. I think their male Rhapsody would require a BBQ, beers and a rather large fence
around them to deter wandering wildlife. A woman’s would just be a shop selling quality
clothes at affordable prices, followed by a warm cab home - Romanians don't like the cold -
despite living in -21C in winter!
If you want to travel in Romania, I heartily recommend you update and bring your own SAT-
nav along with you. The thing to remember is to not leave any trace of it whatsoever in the
car, such as the SAT- nav cradle while you are sightseeing or you may have difficulty fining
your way back (minus one SAT-nav of course!).

Romania is a land full of hidden treasures, and as far as I can make out, despite them being
amazingly nice or interesting tourist locations, the authorities seem to be determined not to
place any road signs to let you know they are there.

Take the wonderful town of Slanic for example, complete with 2 salt mines - one which is
working an active, on which is a wonderful relic of a mine, where people with asthma hang
out for hours at a time breathing in the healthy salt aerosols. There are no signs telling you this
place exists, locals guide you to the modern mine, s it requires more persistence than most
tourists have.

You will also find that catching buses can be a challenge when you travel in Romania - they
will happily take you from Bucharest to some God-forsaken little village, which is really great
if you don't have a car. However getting back could prove tricky as the bus companies will tell
you 'we don't normally stop in your village' - so you need to find your own way into a larger
town to carry on your way.

If you do travel Romania, avoid the little minibuses - they often appear as crash stories on the
news. They tend to get very over crowded and the drivers - who want to keep to a timetable -
drive like a crazy man - and as I notice this in a country of possibly the worst drivers in
Europe - that is saying something!

Romania is also poorly equipped if you want to travel in Romania on a bicycle. My earlier
girlfriend bought a bicycle to keep up with me and on our first grand cycle out - hit a pothole
and when straight down a huge drainage ditch, writing off her wheel. Getting bikes repaired is
getting easier if you live near Bucharest but not if anything happens out in the sticks - also a
bike offers remarkably little protection if you do happen to bump into a bear during an off
road mountain escapade.

Saying this - you can get free bike hire for cycling around the lake which looks a lot of fun!
The problem is there are only a few free bikes - you need to hand over your passport to get
them and for a small amount of money you can get one from a much shorter queue.

Romanian trains are basic but fine. If you plan to get anywhere, ignore the personal trains -
rickety old blue trains that go slowly everywhere and stop at every stop on the way. The prices
are constantly rising, so while they are still great value for money -and after a few weeks in
Bucharest you will probably be happy to pay any price to escape it for a weekend - they are
not the bargains they once were. The trains I used seemed to always play Romanian folk
music when it was moving and Western 80s pop in the station. The sellers on th trains have a
funny habit of leaving items in each carriage and then coming back to collect them or the
money afterwards. Everyone seems to be terribly honest about it - I really could not see the
same system being a rip roaring success in England.

Finally, if you do travel in Romania out of season, don't book anything online as there are lots
of rooms available most of the time - those advertised online seem to be ridiculously
expensive in comparison.
Western Romania is an area of mixed blessings. It is without a wonderful part of the country
and it does show strong Hungarian influences - such as incredibly high gates and fences so
you can't peep into the yard as you pass.

Every year, it is this part of Romania which gets hardest hit by the yearly floods. As the air
passes over the mountains in the middle of the country, all the autumn rain are dumped here -
then in Winter there is a pause as all the water is frozen into snow, building up the Spring
problem as then - due to the odd Romanian climate where all weather is abrupt and extreme,
freezing winter temperatures are followed by almost UK summer like conditions - very little
in-between, releasing all this water back down the mountains, flooding susceptible villages
again.

It is amazing to watch on TV as traditional Romanian houses are made of mud and wattle so
simple collapse in the floods. My wife tells me it is a modern phenomenon and did not happen
in her childhood.

It could have been less reported under a Communist government - who knows. Rumor has it
that in those glorious days there were properly maintained drainage systems that prevented
these problems occurring. Since then they have been vandalized, stolen or neglected. Who
knows the real story?

However, as a tourist, I love going there to the home of the 1989 Revolution in Timisoara.
There are still bullet holes in the walls. Pass through the endless gray tower blocks into the
centre of town where you will find a beautiful park and lots of squares interconnected
together. A great place to chill out with a coffee or cold beer. My school has just opened a
school there so perhaps one day I will be able to work there.

I visited it during the Summer- I was probably just lucky, as I saw a wonderful procession of
young Romanians from all over Romania dressed in their specific regions traditional dress.
We really don’t have anything to compare to this in England - we have lost any really
traditional dress apart from a few examples in London such as the Beefeaters. We certainly
have lost recognizable regional dress - I wonder why some places succeed in maintaining a
sense of tradition and others lose it and is this linked to how much you embrace
multiculturism?

Ironically it is easier to get to Western Romania from Budapest than Bucharest. The
Romanian roads are terrible and so it is a very long, slow drive. The route from Budapest is
mainly on well-made, fairly empty motorways - a joy in comparison.

All around this area are sleepy towns, they are less busy and have a distinctly less rushed
atmosphere than in Bucharest - making them a nice change for the Bucharest folk who are
tired of the baking, over populated, polluted sea and bear filled mountains.
ROMANIAN FOOD

Are you looking for a really nice Bucharest restaurant? For years I followed this same trail -
you would find a place, and enthuse about it to all your friends, so eventually you would go
with some dear friends to a rather bland, disappointing meal - nothing like the first time.

My favourite Bucharest restaurant is ironically Pizza Hut in Piatia Romana. It is the only place
that time after time I have left happy - the pizza is good about 90% of the time.

As we are so busy keeping it all together, we are becoming limited to weddings and baptisms
and mercifully few funerals to experiment with Bucharest cooking. This does have a major
side effect, we have to go to places other people have chosen, and of course eat the
preselected menu.

Our school simply stopped doing staff does in any Bucharest restaurant - if we need to eat
together, we eat in the school canteen. The Turkish are so proud of their food that even things
like water, coke and fizzy drinks are sourced from their own country!

Occasionally the need to eat out does overwhelm us - and then we go to one of two places.
IKEA in Banasea may seem an odd choice but their meatballs are great! It is always cheap
and simple - but always nice. We even have been known to drive there with empty plastic
boxes to eat at home.

We still use Ca Mamma (like mothers) if we get a burning desire for tripe soup. Which I
hasten to add is a remarkably rare event!

I am amazed at how costly one of the meals is in a local hotel. He does a clever dance,
catching things in his hat. At around 100 a meal, he must be good - there was a long line of
rich folk waiting to eat. I think they are desperate to spend their often ill-gotten riches
somehow before it burns a hole in their pocket.

Romanian restaurants are still way behind on the no smoking front - this again is why I like
pizza hut - they split restaurant into two with a glass sheet completely sealing the smokers
inside. We loved eating in pubs in the UK for this reason.

In Romania, There would often be non-smoking tables near normal tables so the whole time
smoke would drift lazily across your plate.

When you eat, add 10% to your bill as a tip. I have heard but fortunately never experienced
the waitress who came back and demanded more.
Everyone looking for a cheap rough red wine chooses a Romania wine. Everyone assumes
that we export the best of what we have so what is left t be drunk in Romania must be nearly
undrinkable.

This is completely opposite to thhhe truth. There is a great tourist wine called 'Vampire wine' -
perfect for giving to friends back home as a gift which then will never be drunk as no-one
wants to empty the bottle. The wine inside is remarkably good and should be savoured along
with the endless photos of Romania you will no doubt be wanting to share with them.

Sec wine is also another favourite of mine. Sec in Romanian means dry and these are fine dry
wines.

If you look carefully in the outskirts of town, you will find small wine shops which sell wine
directly from large barrels into plastic bottles. Go fo the most natural wines you can find - as
these contain the least chemicals and are the least likely to give you a rash.

If you have time, and a non-drinking driver (because at least in theory Romania has a 0%
tolerance of alcohol in a drivers blood stream - more so if you are a wealthy foreigner as then
you are rich pickings) - take a ride along the famous Romania wine road - which links
together lots of famous little Romanian vineyards. The scenery is fabulous and it is a chance
to see the best of Romania and sample its best wines.

Another area rich in vineyards is the East of the country as you head towards to Danube Delta.
Again you will see hillsides covered in vines.

For a country where every ountry home seems to have at least some vines growing in the
courtyard, there is no culture of making your own wine. All the pieces I needed such as the
airlocks etc, I needed to buy from England and take here with me. The same is incidentally
true for beer production. Saying that, even in the UK, I struggled to find them.

You will find Romamians have weird cocktails for wine - which will permanently mark you
out as a local. When you drink red wine, try it in a 50:50 mix with coke (the drink - not the
drug I hasten to add!). For a white wine, mix it with sparkling mineral water to make a 'Spritz'.

There are three types of wine here, sec (dry), demi-sec (medium dry) an dulce (a sweet dessert
wine). I go for sec, my wife drinks dulce. For nice sweet wine go for 'Ovidio's tears' - a
wonderfully sweet, yet drinkable wine.

As there is no culture of home mde wine here, any attempt at using any other ingrediants will
be frowned on though I must admit my apple wine was appreciated, I can't imagine nettle or
turnip wine going down for quite the same applause.

Final word of warning is that while Romanian wines are incredibly cheap and tasty, it is not
sociablly acceptable to be seen drunk in Romania and your actions will be severely frowned
upon. Drink in moderation and your generous Romanian hosts will breathe a little easier in
your company.

Please tell me where you have found the best Romania wine and what was it called? Does
your skin go red when you drink the stuff or is it just me and my rotten luck? I should add this
rash doesnot always come and so for me, drinking Romania wine remains a fun game of
Russian roulette - shared by my wife.
Romanian beer is seen everywhere. You constantly see beer adverts on TV followed by
drinking too much alcohol is bad for your health.

I have been heartily disappointed with the beer here. It pretty much all comes out as a light
larger and I am more into thicker British real ales.

The black beers here are nice - I personally go for Silva Bruna when I can.

This disappointment with the beer seems universal as given a choice most Romanians choose
foreign brands and it is only in the poorest, off the beaten track villages will you find your
beer range is limited to local brews.

Curiously Romania does hold one big surprise in the fact the shops do stock a much wider
range of non-alcoholic beers than we find in the UK. I would recommend you try Bavaria
non-alcoholic beer as the best tasting of the beers. This range could be due to the fact that
there is a zero alcohol limit for driving - which I use as a perfect excuse for getting out of
doing work - such as collecting tons of water... One beer and you can't drive for a few hours...
I love it!

The other odd thing about Romanian beer is the complete lack of home brew kits here. There
are no convenient tins you can buy to brew beer at home and getting your own ingredients
such as hops has proved to be a constant challenge.

The good thing about Romanian beer is it is incredibly cheap - so if you want a holiday filled
with drinking on a budget, then Romania is the place for you.

This neatly leads me on where to drink. The most popular places seem to be the worker bars -
rather seedy looking places with an open front and drunken men at all the tables. Then you
can move up in price to hotel bars that are distinctly nicer... Up again in price and you will
find yourself in an expat bar (I avoid these like the plague) where you are more than likely to
meet a 40 something British failure who has succeeded as a pub bore - remember the simple
fact, just because you are both Brits in a far away place does not mean you need to drink
together.

Where do I drink? As much as possible next to a BBQ or while watching Romanian friends do
incredibly practical work with tools which would take off one of my fingers in an instant!

When you drink - always say Noroc (Good luck) (this is frowned on by the Orthodox church
apparently) or Sanatate (Good health) and make sure all the glasses remain full. I did read if a
Romanian fills up your half filled glass it means he wishes to kill you. I asked Romanians this
and no one had heard of it so I guess the travel writer who wrote it just had a rather bad night
out!

Final word of warning - In Romanian culture being seen drunk is one of the worst social
crimes you can commit and so you are not likely to see your Romanian host drunk very often.
It is great - and the Brits could learn a lot by following this example.
Romanian cuisine is certain to add a few inches around your waist - this is not helped by their
apparent complete lack of exercise for anyone over 20. Those under 20 can be seen whizzing
around on roller skates - before the fear of getting sweaty and hence sick switches on. I did
finally find the source of the Romanian obsession - you are ten times more likely to get sick
with tuberculosis here than on average in any other country - and being a distinctly primitive
culture, this is still explained away by being in the wind and getting wet (which - while I am
on a roll - probably explains the complete lack of cheap swimming pools here!).

Romanian cuisine is not for the faint hearted on so many different levels.
<ul>

<li>The first is due to the huge fat content in all their food - full fat milk, oil and fat is added
to pretty much everything, which explains why Bucharest does have a world class heart
hospital in Bucharest - at least the equipment for one - rumor has it that it is not unknown to
have to share your bed with other people. </li>
<p>

<li>Secondly - to get the full flavor demanded by Romanians, ideally you need to use freshly
killed animals - so all my chickens when I visit grandma. As you obviously can't kill a pig
each time you need pork, the traditional way of storing meat is in a barrel of fat. </li>
<p>
<li>The third level of not being weak hearted is that it will take you days to cook a typical
Romanian meal - everyone will complain about some aspect of it - and it will be gone in about
1/2 hour - followed by a huge pile of washing up. And no machine is good enough for slicing
or dicing - believe me, I have a cupboard of failed chopping, dicing and slicing machines my
wife has seen on TV or demonstrated in a store by a woman who has spent the last 10 years
skillfully slicing and dicing one or two types of vegetables.</li>
<p>
</ul>

Oddly every woman is convinced her family has found the secret way of cooking - any other
family's cooking efforts and ingredients are thoroughly looked down on - to be a true
Romanian requires nifty work with a knife - proverbially as well as literally.

Saying all this - I do really enjoy Romanian cuisine and look forward to the different festivals.
I find I eat too much and too fast because I switch off from what is being said in rapid
Romanian, mainly about people I don't know about, so just eat - and all there is left to do is
sample each dish.

The females Romanian cuisine skills will produce a large number of courses is a rigorous
order - with coffee in between to keep it all ticking over.

The men need much less to feed you - after the pretence of choosing the correct type of wood,
dried the previous year, cut to perfect dimensions - all to give the meat a certain flavor - out
comes the battered old bottle of diesel and this is liberally poured on top and ignited, ruining
the whole effect, followed normally by taking out meat from the cheaper end of the freezer
section - and this is cooked - until the outside is done. The insides are often well cooked, but it
is often hard to tell. This delight is eaten with pigskin that is cooked with a blow-torch (to
burn off the outside hairs) - and served up with a pinch of salt.
You will love Romanian cuisine - my dad was a delight here, he ate like it was nothing special
causing great envy of the other foreigners who clearly were feeling distinctly less
adventurous!
The Romanian dessert is probably the only place on the Romanian menu where Romanians
don't use large amounts of pig fat, (apparently good for you because it is natural), salt (good
for you if you find some with iodine added) and garlic (the more you eat - the less the chance
of the flu... which is probably due to how many people who choose to sit next to you!).

Papanashi is my number 1 choice in this area. It can be great - or dire - depending on your
luck. This is a deep fried doughnut with fresh cream and jam in the middle. I always make a
beeline for these when I am eating out.

Pancakes (Romanian for this is caltite) are another favourite here - my wife likes them with
sweet cheese and sultanas while I go more for a nutella experience. You can find pancake
shops on the top floor of most malls here.

I must admit that the quality of ice cream here ha gone through a steady and disappointing
decline over here. It once was one of my highlights of one of my dates - to have a coffee an
ice cream while going for a romantic walk. These days the ice creams are full of chemicals
and I need to politely decline - something I rarely do with any other food on the menu.

On the ice cream front -in my desperation to have decent ice cream, I bought an ice cream
maker - do you know how much space one of these takes up in the fridge? As most Romanian
houses seem to have their freezers packed with dead pigs and chickens which were killed
because they were not looking too well, there is little to no extra space for such a luxury -
even though I do have a cow giving me organic cream and a garden packed full of fruit.

Another great Romanian dessert has to be Gris - it is very like semolina - but it is made a lot
more solid so that when it is cold, you can take a thick slice and eat it with your hands.

Which leads us to the cake section of this page. Try to find and shop only at Claus in Titolescu
in Bucharest, as this is the number one cake place. It really does beat the socks off anywhere
else in the city and almost impossible to find. If you walk from the old town hall towards the
post office and keep walking - it is 100mon your left in a tiny side street.

The final Romanian dessert to try is Cozonac from a bakers. It is a cake with walnuts mixed
in. An old lady once taught me how to make one - but I must confess I would get it from
Claus anytime. They are particularly popular at Christmas and Easter - when everyone puts in
their bulk orders. The supermarket versions are cheap but relatively inedible.
Love it or hate it, you will need to get use to eating Romanian food and having blind faith in
the fact the water trickling out of a pipe in the mountains or down some unwashed peasant's
well is actually clean. There is actually a UV pen you can buy in Bucharest for sterilizing the
cup of water - though knowing Romanian paranoia, I would not be surprised to hear that UV
in someway changes water from a natural drink into some lethal, cancer filled drink.

The most popular food is the pork. You find it everywhere. This of course makes it tricky if
you eat out with Jews, Muslims or vegetarians - it is safe to ay Romanians love their pork. We
once ordered a traditional platter - the Jew asks if it was pork free - of course, the waiter, keen
for a sale promised it was - one smell proved him wrong.

There has been a poor uptake of Soya meat alternative here as it simply is not pork.
Romanians have a fear of anything genetically modified, so Soya bans are viewed with great
suspicion, and all those meaty though chemical flavorings do not help its cause. Saying that,
they’d love adding extra dried flavors to the soups so it makes little sense in the long run.

Very few Romanians seem to be into eating a daily dose of breakfast cereal. I go to the
countryside and I am always genuinely surprised to see my muesli supplies running low -
grandpa eats nothing, grandma has no teeth so cannot easily eat muesli, so where does it go?
All the more of a mystery when you think I am only allowed to buy sugar free organic muesli.
This summer I found out the truth - every morning grandma takes this ridiculously expensive
cereal and throws it to the two cockerels. Apparently muesli is only fit for pigs in Romania -
and a rather die-hard Englishman!

A Romanian country breakfast is fabulous - it will probably include a decent amount of

freshly brewed plum brandy, some coffee, cheese from the farm, boiled eggs, scrambled eggs,
bread and grilled meat.

At the precise moment you think 'I could get use to this' everyone vanishes and you will be
told to wash the dishes and put them all away - and that there is no hot water and the cold
water we do have comes directly from a well so both needs to be used sparingly and replaces
afterwards.

Grandpa will then retreat to his customary place by the stove or on a sunny day, by his little
table, grandma will be off with the cow, and the buzz of a rather powerful chain saw will tell
the world your father n law is having fun!

Don't complain however as out of that kitchen will come amazing amounts of food,
beautifully prepared - all with your name written on the underside of the plates reminding you
to get ready again to wash up.

And if you don't like Romanian food - you can get British food sent to you. I just miss real
British beer! So perhaps I will investigate it one day! What do you think of Romanian food?
Romanian recipes invariably involve a lot of meat. Romania was never set up to make life
easy for a vegetarian.

My friend is a vegetarian and needs to eat the freshest, most organic foods going. He has
found that if he buys organic produce in Romania for his Romanian recipes, there are several
problems.

The first is supply. It is really hit and miss if you happen to find organic free-range eggs in the
shops. When you do, prepare to pay a steep premium on them.

Organic foodstuffs are also pretty hit and miss in the supermarkets as they are so much more
expensive, the local can't afford them. So whole lines of organic food can be there one week
but not the next. The problems of finding organic foods is getting worse as the peasants rely
more and more on chemicals.

The other important reason for not finding lots of organic food in Bucharest is that most of the
population still have relatives in the countryside, so organic chicken and pigs and fruit is easy
to find within the family for local Romanians.

There are purely organic and bio shops in Bucharest, but their prices are higher than in a
central London bio shop I visited. The shop I am thinking of is in the Baneasa shopping mall,
where an organic coconut cost around 10 pounds - compared to one pound for a normal one.
Which of course leads to the problem - how would you know if I bought a local chemical
grown coconut and sold it on as organic?

There are however some nice little health food shops in Bucharest that sell organic fruit juice.
There is still a desperate need for someone to directly sell 100% organic fruit juice without
any preserving treatments - such as apple juice. The problem being such juice must be sold on
the day it is made or the apples ferment at a terrific rate!

There are also some bio- restaurants in Bucharest. They are again very expensive and always
seem to be rather empty.

The solution is to get to know a few Romanian families and buy from them. There is also an
organic food in a box service in Bucharest I wanted to try but they never return my emails or
say what and how it costs for what is in a box. Nice idea though!
Romanian wine is excellent. It also has the advantage of being incredibly cheap. I am on a
constant quest to find more wine producers near my home.

As I have said a hundred times before in this blog, an will probably say it a hundred times
again, Romania is packed full of wonderful surprises and shops and places of interest they
really should not be.

Yesterday, as the weather was warm and sunny, I spent the time with my son, as my school is
celebrating an Islamic holiday. Near us, is another of Bucharest’s best-kept secrets - the
university of Agronomy and science. From the front, it looks an imposing place, full of grand
buildings looking out onto a major road. However behind these impressive buildings is land -
and lots of it, as they have to teaching farming skills in the middle of Bucharest.

As I was walking along, like many times before, I was admiring the huge vineyard, full of
different varieties of vines from different parts of the world. Next to it is the Vinery, the
department dedicated to making wine - I cannot think of a better way to spend my time other
than signing up! My wife however pointed out I already had the full set of degrees up to PhD!
As luck would have it, a professor was coming out the building armed with ten liters of wine,
in two old 5 liter water bottles. He told us that while he had just that moment bought the last
of the university stocks of wine, normally it was for sale and was of a cheaper and better
quality than many of the local wine sellers. I will certainly be watching that building more
carefully in the future!

Romanian wine is however rather a lottery for me. I stick mainly to the natural wines - which
come in an odd assortment of recycled bottles, but must admit to having gained a sensitivity to
a certain, unknown, Romanian chemical they add to some of the wine. This means I can enjoy
a glass of wine, or with a sip turn bright red in the face - even before doing anything stupid
requiring this level of embarrassment. This goes take a little of the fun out of slurping
unknown wines here.

The other odd thing, which I have also noticed more of a decline in the UK last summer, is
that I cannot easily buy wine or beer making equipment here. I had to buy all my airlocks and
corks in the UK and cannot start my beer making experiments due to a lack of malt, but I have
started to experiment.

As I own an apple farm - with about 10 - 13 tons of apples collected a year - most going into
our Romanian brandy production, I did successfully make some rather rough apple wine. I
also experimented with the much easier to make cider - al I did was juice a few apples and if
you don't drink them fast enough, you have lots of fizzy cider on your hands.

The joy of cheap, natural, Romanian wine is that at my wedding, I bought in 80 liters of wine,
so the whole place flowed in the stuff, with enough left over to lubricate the honeymoon and it
even went into smoothing the earliest days of marriage. A each major celebration, we get
another large stock of wine, which lasts us forever these day as I drink less and the Romanian
ladies in our home do not touch it at all.

The final joy of Romanian wine is now it is getting cold, they heat it into mulled wine - even
the roughest red tastes nice after a day out in the cold! They sometimes add spices - which I
buy from the supermarket especially for hot wine, but in the main like to make it completely
naturally.
ROMANIAN MONEY

The currency in Romania is called the Lei or the Ron. It is a curious currency in the fact
however much I seem to earn, such as by working online or tutoring, it is never quite enough
for all I need. Then you see other Romanians who earn far less than I do, go out buy cars, buy
apartments etc and seem to have a great time of it.

The currency is closely related to the Euro and dollar, and recently each time the value of the
Euro dropped, he local currency dropped even further. This was fine for me, as I get paid in a
complicated mix of dollars, Euros and pounds - depending on who is doing the paying.

I think that much of this apparent wealth is linked to the credit industry. Bucharest is in many
ways a dying city as every time a little business goes under, its place on the high street as
pretty much replaced by a bank. And banks here charge you for absolutely everything -
putting money in, taking money out or even asking how much money you have in there at any
time.

The local currency gets less and less valuable, the local wages are n freefall, but the prices of
utilities and food continue to progressively rise. Even the public transport system - admittedly
remarkably cheap for the serve they provide, is getting more costly.

The locals just grin and bear it the best they can. We are going into food production in a huge
way next year. I plan to dig over my countryside land, and plant it up with Spring and
Summer crops - with seeds sent from the UK to reduce our food bills and help us stretch our
finances a little further.

The currency is so confusing that any tourist is well advised to only shop in places with clear
signs as the locals still refer to the local currency in Romania in both its pre- and post-
devaluation terms (It was devalued 10,000 times) and so when they ask for o suta - it could
mean 100 Ron or 100,000 lei -two very different values.

Someone had the cunning plan that all currencies in Europe should be known as the beer. So
all you did would be related to how many beers you owed him. We could extend the idea for
higher denominations to bottles of wine, champagne and whiskey. What do you think of this
cunning idea? Buy me a beer and I will explain how it works.
When you come to Romania, you will need Romania currency. The currency here is the Lei.

You will also need to work out how to change your money. Bucharest and the major cities are
full of currency exchange houses. I have never understood why. If you think about it, most
people working in Romania are working for the Romanian state or a local firm. All these
people get paid in the local currency. The wages here are pitifully low and so the chances of
any major saving is also fairly unlikely - so even the idea that Romanians convert their money
into Euros is pretty far fetched.

The major reason we have so much money is that it is a perfect money laundering operation.
You may think THIS is a far-fetched idea. But it is not. When the authorities in the UK
investigated the financial dealings of UK money exchange houses, most were found to be
fronts for money washing schemes and so they were all pretty much closed down as you
needed to show a clean, transparent set of dealings to remain open. I am sure the same is here.

The worst place to go to is Brasov for money transactions. It looks like a sleepy German town,
with beautiful squares and even a Scottish pub! However the exchange houses - if you are
unlucky enough to arrive at night without a credit card, offer ridiculously low rates of
exchange if you need Romania currency - all of them - so there is an obvious cartel going on.
They go advertise both a good and a poor rate - most tourists only see the good rate stuck on
the window. To get this rate, you need to exchange 50,000 Euros in one transaction - as if you
were going to do that! When you have been robbed by them - put it down to bad luck and use
as an after dinner story as the local police can do nothing about it.

The best way of getting Romania currency is via a credit card from a bank machine. There are
however two pitfalls here to watch out for. The first is really annoying - lots of banks,
especially Raiffiesein bank, simply will not accept your card. The best bank to try is BRD or
BCR. If you use a BCR cash machine try them all as some will and some won't - even in the
same branch.

The second problem is that your home bank - ever keen to stop fraudulent withdrawals may
let you remove some money or buy some item from a shop on the card - then seeing it is in
Romania - far form you local spending patterns -will freeze your card. The problem is they
won't actually tell you they have done this - so the next time you need Romania currency,
such as when you have just filled the car with petrol or done the weekly shopping, the card
will fail to work and you will look like an idiot. You must always carry the number you need
to de-freeze the card. I have it on speed dial on my mobile phone and as a friend on Skype as
it s so well used!

So lets assume you decide not to follow the cash card route - then you change money via an
automatic exchange house in the side of a bank. I use to love them - now I am terrified of
them. I saw a woman with screaming kids in the car late at night trying to get someone to
come and get her money from the machine because she put her money into be changed and
nothing came back out! The other problem is sometimes you need to remove the notes in
small denominations - so when you pull out one, a second lot of money follows. I almost lost
the second one, as I did not realize. Fortunately the honest Romanian (yes - they do exist) -
kept the money for me when did his transaction.

The places not to change money are in the train station where apparently Mafiosi operate or
the airport, where the exchange rate is terrible.
Romanian coins will become the bane of your life. They build up so quickly in your wallet
that you feel you want to just put them in a big bottle somewhere but the moment you do, you
will find that you have just too little money for a newspaper, book or when you go shopping
they will ask for these coins.

It is the social norm to not worry to much about these coins. When you fill up with petrol, and
you fractionally over or undershot the amount - then you just pay to the nearest note, unless of
course you pay by credit card.

Here is a quick breakdown of the coins and their uses.

The smallest coin, a little brown coin, is the bani coin. It is super rare and so I get terribly
excited when I get one in my change. You only ever find it in super pendantic shops as its
value is so low as o make it almost completely worthless. I think iot was only ever made to
make the range of coins complete.

The next in the collection is the 5 ban coin - worth about 1p or 2c. I use this coin remarkably
rarely so it does tend to build up in my pocket. Most people leave at the till as they are still so
small and worthless.

Now we get into the Romanian silver coin collection. It is the 10 ban - a well used coin and so
again will tend to fill up your wallet. At least this one has a real use and no one minds if in an
emergency you count them out to buy a newspaper.

The big dady of the collection is the 50 ban coin. This is a great coin and has many a time
saved me. Two of these coins is worth the same as the smallest note. It has the added
advantage of being the one companies use to let you use their shopping trollies. If you are
lucky and not a miser like me, when you come out of some central supermarkets such as
Kaufland, a gang of street urchins will offer to retu you trolley for you in retun for the 50 ban
piece.

You may not always get coins in your change - some shops find themso annoying that they
will give you a sweet or some gum instead. Just smile and accept them.

The final note on coins is don't worry if the coins confuse you - I still get confused with how
many notes and coins are needed - and as I am the ultimate bumbling Englishman, the often
need to write down and show me!
The Romanian currency is really great. I discovered that you can take one of thier plastic
notes and put it through the wash and it is still as good as new after this time.

You need to made sure you have some 50 bani coins on you at all times you need them for
trollies. The great thing about this low value coin is unlike in the UK where people will
regularly steal the pound from yourtrolley while your back is turned - it is not worth stealing -
if your trolley is empty - or only got a few things in it - they will steal that instead. One
heavily pregnant friend found her shopping in a neat pile and thetrolley gone - she just burst
into tears - and walked out the store. I am just paranoid about the trolley - so never leave it
despite the width of each isle.

The beggars are happy to accept 1 ron notes - as are perol attendents, while a hairdresser
needs a bigger tip - as they are best kept happy.

There is a lot of confusion about the 100 ron note. When someone says o suta (one hundred) -
they could mean 100 ron (20 pound) or 100,000 lei - 2 pound. Depending on who they are -
they might keep the difference.

However Romanian shop keepers are more likely to add a few extra lei (1 or 2 ron) to you if
they they think you won't notice - oddly enough I boycott suchshops afterwards and derive
reat pleasure when they hit troubled times and go out of business.

You do need lots of small Romanian currency - but only notes - for taxis. After the church -
they are my biggest ripoff merchants I know. They never - despite driving around all day on
short trips - ever have change. I was also told never to say 'Thank-you' when you pass over the
money as Romanin taxi drivers understand this to mean - keep the change. You also need to
examine the taxi cab doors in minute detail a there are lots of tricks they use to extract money
from you.

Anold one was to write 7.35 so it looks like 1.35. Only when you are inside and seeing the
partially obscured meter will you know you are in trouble. Anothr trick is to write tariff 1;3.5 -
so you pay 3.5 ron per km rather than 1.35. You zre certain to loose the argument thogh you
can try to negotiate a he calls in a non-paying customer to the local community police. Once
my wallet dropped out my pocket - another teacher saw it after I had left and told her he
would give it back to me the next time we met. She thought this ws so sweet of him (as far as
I can gather, he is still waiting for our paths to cross - as I hae never seen either the taxi or
wallet again!)... I just thogt how stpi can somene really be and still be allowd to teach?

The coins will quickly accumulate in your wallet - especially the 10 bani piece - bu as soon as
you remove them, you see the magazine your wife is desperate you collect -from frequent
personal experience - will be those few bani more than you have.
Romanian money is the strangest currency you will ever come across. The main cause of this
confusion is that a few years ago it was devalued by 10,000 times.

Some people still talk in old money - such as in millions and thousands while others such as
tourists and newbies to the country talk in tens and hundreds.

To make it more confusing some say 500 to mean 500 Ron (about 100 uk pounds) while
others take about it to mean 500,000 lei that was worth 10 UK pounds.

My father in law recently went to buy my uncle a fence.

"It will cost you 120" said my father in law.

"That's great!" said Uncle...

Nae goes off and buys the Uncle the fence...

Nae goes off to get money from Uncle...

Nae asks for 120 Ron (25 uk pound)...

Uncle understood 120,000 lei (about 3 UK pounds) and was rather upset and surprised at the
difference...

So if Romanians make these mistakes together, what is the chance for the rest of us?
ROMANIAN POLITICS

The Romania economy makes absolutely no sense to me. In theory this could and should be a
wonderfully wealthy country. There is gold in the mountains - one US firm had the crazy idea
that Romanians would agree to the literally grinding down a whole mountain to get it out.
When you drive through the countryside you see gas and petrol wells pumping up gas and oil,
and as this country has mountains, forests, the sea - all perfect for tourists - you would expect
a great life and lots of wealth. In reality, the wealth stays with the few and there is no real
trickle down of money to the masses.

Romanians make terrible business folk who cannot make a deal o sell anything - this does
help explain the failing Romania economy. I have lots of examples - here are just a few. In the
UK at the end of the day lots of food stock is sold off at amazingly cheap prices - like a couple
of dollars per box of fruit. Here they will sell it day after day at high prices and complain how
little custom they are getting. As I happen to also grow and sell apples - not a business that
will make my fortune, I know how little I get for my apples and how much profit the people in
the market make.

The same goes for property. If you are a foreigner, they will rent you an apartment at inflated
rates - so often lose custom in the process. Even foreign landlords who should know better do
the same.

As you can see making deals in Romania are hard - particularly when you also need to smooth
your way constantly with little brown envelopes full of cash. Yes - corruption is a major issue
here - the odd thing being it is so ingrained that Romanians give the money to people without
being asked - indeed insist they take the money. But woe betide you if it is too small and you
need the doctor! I have heard all sorts of problems involving no painkillers for the poor. This
makes making a stand a dangerous and pointless activity.

The Romania economy is also suffering from a complete lack of infrastructure. Where else in
Europe can you still find mud tracks in the suburbs of your capital city? Where else in Europe
is it common not to have running water, gas or rubbish collection? We only have 2 motorways
- each with only 2 lanes each way - making driving here precarious as you try to pass slow
trucks with fast Romanians flashing their lights for you to clear their paths.

The economy now punishes the poor - 25% cut in state salaries. They wanted to also cut state
pensions (which are already tiny) but the constitution (for now!) stopped them. Oddly there
has been no equal obvious drive for cost cutting from the rich - the number of new flash cars
in Bucharest is clear evidence of this.

The solution? Nothing can be done as pretty much all the problems are so endemic to the
country. For example if you spent millions on improving the roads - most would end up in
some Swiss bank account and the Romanians get the cheapest road possible - which will fall
to pieces again in the following cold winter.

Another problem for the Romania economy is the complete lack of collecting taxes - what
many people earn and what they declare are completely different things. This of course further
promotes the idea that Romanians are low paid - as the Government etc only have the official
figures to work from.
Many have found a good solution - move to a well-run country such as ironically the UK -
take the crap jobs there - and send home money for the rest of the family. The president
recently thanked Romanians who did leave the country for not being a burden on the state. As
for me - you will see me live here forever and follow the slow decline of Romania to its bitter
and tragic end!
What are Romania jobs like? What do Romanians do for a living?

Romanians are a very confusing bunch of people - I gave up trying to work them out a long
time ago.

They will happily tell you that they are the lowest paid workers in Europe and that their lives
are super - tough. Even living on an ex-pat salary and earning as much as a normal Scottish
teacher only gets and my family from one month to the next. So it comes ass a frequent
surprise to me when I am out shopping, just how opulent Romanians are?

You can't easily find a parking space in the IKEA car park. All the cars there are new, glossy
four by fours - over half with tinted windows. So where does this money come from? I have
no idea.

Romania jobs also have fewer hours than their British counterparts - so most people have at
least two different jobs. A Romanian teacher can get a friend or a member of the family to
cover a lesson. My boss would have kittens if I even thought about trying such a thing.

There are a wide range off jobs here -but if you are thinking that a foreigner you are coming
into a land of plenty -think again. Most of the teachers’ partners have never found work here.
When you have a choice of a local, Romanian speaking low paid worker with all their
documents or a non-speaking, expensive worker who needs lots of papers to prove he can
work, it becomes obvious.

If you are looking for work, the International schools in Bucharest are a great start. There
were 14 at my last count - so plenty to consider. There is even an international missionary
school where singing and dancing s forbidden as it is a great sin in the eyes of God. They do
however expect you to be self funded - though the teachers there do seem to expect much
more money than anyone else in the job.

I found that it was best to work online from Romania. It means you can find all sorts of online
jobs to complete - from building websites (such as this one!), building computer games to
online tutoring. It gets tricky when paying taxes but with a little effort - not impossible.

If you are Romanian, then life is still tough between jobs. In the UK you can life the life of
Larry on benefits - though I am the only person I know who actively saved on benefits! In
Romania you have 6 months of benefits - they you are your family's responsibility. The
money stops and you need to go out and find a job. The benefits are pathetically small to
begin with - but money is money.

The Romanian president caused a row recently by thanking all those Romanians who have left
Romania to take the jobs of the benefit wasters in other EU countries, mainly Spain and Italy
(where it is hot and sunny and they have a similar language), though some do make it as far as
Britain. An amazing fact is a larger number of Romanians work abroad than any other group
of nationals in the EU.

The departure of health Romania jobs is crippling the local National Health Service. The
stories of how poorly paid Romanian doctors and nurses are paid is completely false. On
paper it is true - but when you add the hundreds of brown envelopes placed into their hands -
and you see the cars they drive, I have yet to see a poor Romanian doctor.. They complain
about the lack of respect they have here.. I can’t imagine why! An example of this was a nurse
was prepared to pay a doctor friend of mine 6,000 euros to be able to work his hospital...
Obviously expecting to recoup this money in bribes over the next year.
All around you are permanent reminders of Romanian communism. It was time of great hope,
fear and despair.

Once I commented to a fellow teacher that life under communism seemed to be (from the tales
I have been told) a much better life than now. She went an odd sort of purple and told me only
a fool would think this. But I am still thinking life was easier on most non-political regime
following Romanians.

For a start, the level of poverty is now much higher than it was pre-revolution and the costs of
living much lower. There were not so many super-rich here who suddenly gained wealth after
the revolution but buying up state industries for a fraction of their real value.

The number of almost finished communist developments is amazing. These include the
extension to the underground system - it has taken another 20 years to finish one line left
undone.

The National Library was ready to roll - it even had its iconic 1989 date on the front. Over the
last 20 years it has stood as an empty shell - stripped of anything of value.

The grand Bucharest canal - linking Bucharest to the Danube to make us an important port -
got within about 10 km of its destination - the neglected and stripped of its value post 1989.

Out in the countryside - between Pitesti and R.Vulcea lies the neglected remains of a rail line -
a fabulous bridge stretches over a green valley - sadly never completed and so after 20 years is
now just another silent monument to what have could have been.

The downside of Romanian communism was the destruction of entire communities of

Bucharest to build ugly tower blocks. The weird thing being that the Romanian developers are
still wanting to build these same sort of blocks - but in prettier colours. Even now there are
plans for the demolition of one of the nicest middle class areas of Bucharest homes to be
replaced by tower blocks as they make more money.

The leader did get rather carried away when he built the peoples house - he would fly about in
a helicopter and order the destruction of any houses in his way. You would get about a 30
minutes warning to move - hardly enough time to go and buy a set of 'Change of address'
cards for your family and friends.

Another downside was the lack of food - as they exported food to pay off the national debt.
We were the breadbasket of Europe - now we have become simply the basket case of Europe
with many acres of prime agricultural land lying barren and fallow.

The final problem which when they left the country was the seizing of land. Our family
avoided this by placing a little house on the land and sharing it very early between the
children.

Others are coming back and reclaiming their land - even a Bucharest park (beautifully
refurbished and maintained) was reclaimed by a family - they wanted millions of Euros or it
would become a building site. Some land is still in governmental control - lots of forest
became state owned and does so to this day.
A Romanian dictator, Nicolae Caucescu, ran this country for 20 years. He did a huge number
of good and very diabolical things in his time. He ended his days by being shot after a very
short secret trial. Oddly no one else is his regime seems to have been punished - indeed many
went on to become incredibly rich and powerful.

The population as a whole still seems split as to if he was a good or bad thing. Under his
control the general level of wealth was higher than it is now, there were more jobs, less
corruption and a more equal playing field and no national debt.

The downsides were foreigners were excluded, if you had too much land it was shared out,
everything was monitored with 1 in 3 Romanians reporting on the activities of their families
and neighbours, prisons full of anyone who disagreed with him - so many intellectuals were
left to dig the glorious canal near the Danube. So rather a tough place to live.

My family did well under these conditions - going out to eat in nice places about once a
fortnight and my wife getting a solid education. They did sometimes host foreign students but
were very careful not to speak against the system.

They would spend hours queuing for lots of bread to take out to the county. They had already
split their land into small parcels so the could keep it all in the family.

The odd thing is when you try to study Romanian history of this time you get onto decidedly
shaky ground as the state rewrote the history of Romania - so when I find a Romanian gem of
History -my wife rolls he eyes back and points out this is not true so I gave up trying to find
out the real story.

One curious side effect of not being able to leave the country during the Romanian dictators
rule is now they can leave - they are. Romania has the largest number of workers working
outside their own National borders. Many of those who have not left - want to leave. Many
come back (unless forced to do so by the French) willingly after a bit - when they discover
that there is no-where quite like home. Most blamed my wife for us staying - in fact I fully
admit it is me who does not want to return to the UK - where even playgrounds are being cut
on a grand cost cutting spree... Here they are constantly popping up like mushrooms.

So in summary life under a Romanian dictator was better or worse - depending on your luck
and social position.
<p>
The Romanian economy continues to slump. This week saw the increase of the minimum
wage from 110 UK pounds a month to 180 pounds a month. There was great celebration at
this rise. To be honest however, if you are on these pathetic salaries, you will be fighting for
your survival on a day-to-day basis. Let us think where 6 pound a day would get you.

The food in Bucharest is getting more and ore expensive on a weekly basis. There is a
growing number of times where I bring 60 pound on a small food shop and still find myself
having to put things back on the shelf. This is more than a week’s total income for these poor
souls, not helped by the failing Romanian economy. It is not uncommon for my weekend shop
bill for a few things from the market, some baby milk and other essentials to set me back 100
pound a week -and this with us living modestly.

The utility bills are distinctly odd here. The electric and gas, instead of being a fairly regular
amount, fluctuates wildly from a few pound one month to a hundred pounds the following
month as apparently the bills and the receipt of the money internally is hopelessly out of sync.

It is not even as if you can simply not pay - you get enough non-payers in your block and the
utility company simply switches off the supplied to your whole block - the ultimate peer
pressure! They also seem to do this when it is still incredibly cold, just to keep you on your
toes.

Sending your child to school is another major expense here. Everything you need in school,
you need to buy, as the Romanian economy does not provide real free schooling. There are no
useful pen pots, rubbers, rulers or notepads provided. This means it costs another 300 pounds
a year on average, to send your little one to school.

This is where more trouble lies. If you were in an economy such as the Romanian economy,
where life was so tough, wouldn't you be tempted to ease things a little with some child labor?
If you were to remove your child from school and place at a busy traffic junctions cleaning car
windows or straight begging with a sweet little puppy (always a puppy - who knows what
happens to the dog later!), you can make for a short while a great income. Sadly it does mean
missing school and so the circle of poverty is again sown young.

Public transport is still cheap, though it is also on a steep rise with the prices on the
underground doubling overnight. This mans the poor can still move around, and as the buses I
rarely use are so packed, they can swipe your wallet in the process.

There is incredibly little state help. You do get an additional mount of money to help pay for
bringing up a baby. You get tiny income if you become unemployed which lasts you 6 months
- being long term unemployed here is really tough on everyone else who needs to support you.

The economy has slumped to such a level that the easiest target -medicine - has been pretty
much exhausted in the process. You can now find two heart patients in the same bed -
unofficially of course - and it is pretty hit and miss what basic first aid materials you will find.
I heard some junior doctors recently had to do an operation without gloves - only to discover
later that the patient had HIV. If you need painkillers etc, you need to buy them yourself in
frequent situations.

How did the economy get so bad? The old friend corruption is certain to have had a major part
to play, exceptionally easy credit also did not help as people could get themselves into
impossible situations, where all their income is paying the interest on a shiny car. Also the
nations interest in completely avoiding paying any taxes - if you declare your true salary, no
one could afford to keep you is the general feeling in the nation - it was this final feeling
which use to really upset me' being from England, a serious tax paying country.

Thee thing which keeps Romania going is people are leaving and getting decent jobs in more
stable economies and sending money back home.
There have been many Romanian leaders over time. Many have been brutal in their
approaches but are still kept in high esteem.

The current president, Trian Basescu, seems like a nice chap. He speaks slowly and clearly -
making it easy for me to follow his speeches on why Romanian - already one of the lowest
paid in Europe - need to accept a 25% pay cut and a 5% tax increase - and weirdly enough
Romanians seem happy to follow this logic. He has been forced to have a referendum on did
he sell off the Romanian navy to the Greeks via his brother and was even accused of making
magic spells so his opponents lost the recent election - but as this is Romania, nothing is
surprising.

Another famous Romanian leaders was Nicolae Causecu. Depending on who you are he was a
hero or villain. He was shot after a kangaroo court after the revolution. He did a lot of good
for the country - reduced national debt to zero -at horrendous costs to the population (he sold
all their food abroad and brought in collective farming).

He built huge housing blocks and sold each apartment for $100 so everyone could afford a
home - plus they were easier for the security forces to watch. He did flatten huge areas of the
city and after the major earthquake in 1977 he increased this spree. Villages were destroyed
and peasants moved into the city.

He kept Romanian like prisoners - no one could leave as a family -only one at a time. If you
did manage to escape - your house was given to someone else.

This Romanian leader did however love big projects. He built the underground and rumors
have it that below Bucharest there is a huge lake with boats on it and that the ground is riddled
with secret tunnels. Apparently there could even be a metro line to his People's palace - put in
if things go bad and he needed to escape quickly.

Despite his cruelty and misplaced ideas, there are still lots of people who would happily return
to those days where poverty was not so rife and food prices were still affordable.

The most famous leader was Vlad Tepes - loved by Romanians -hated by the Turks. Even
when he died - his head was sent to Turkey as proof and the rest of his body mysteriously
vanished from his grave in a monastery on an island near Bucharest.

He would dress up as a peasant and do his shopping in the local markets and if he was cheated
(as a foreigner you will be certainly repeatedly cheated), he would bring n the seller the next
day and lop off a hand etc as a punishment. The story is that you could leave a Gold cup by a
well and no-one would touch it - as counting to ten on one hand is a tad tricky.

He was known as Vlad the impaler as he once caught lots of Turkish soldiers and impaled
each on a spike along the road he knew the Turkish would come to attack him - by the time
they arrived they were not really in a fighting mood.

Oddly - for such a vicious man - he also was responsible for building some of the nicest
monasteries - you must come and visit them sometime!
Romanian oil is both a blessing and a curse for this poor country. In theory, with flowing oil,
Romania should be a wonderfully wealthy country - a bit like an Arab state, or the taxes from
its production and sale should at least provide a solid infrastructure - sadly none of this
actually happens.

There are gas and oil wells dotted all over Romania, in various states of disrepair. They can
been seen pumping away for all their worth, or large deserted concrete platforms may be all
that is left of them. They did protect us from last years Russian - Ukraine gas dispute as our
own gas reserves would have seen us through the winter at a push - even with the crazy
temperature levels maintained in Romanian homes.

So where does the money go from Romanian oil? I simply have no idea - but it is certainly not
shared evenly. You also need to be really careful where you shop as I have bought the most
expensive water - pretending to be fuel as the little garage owner knows you will be hundreds
of kilometers away before you find out - something to do with petrol and the water separating
out in the tank or such like.

So why is it such a curse for Romania? Whenever there is a war in our neck of the woods,
everyone wants the oil, gas and fuel. The Germans used to drive their tanks, the Brits
responded by going on suicidal raids where they bombed the refineries flat. They also bombed
Bucharest to stop the rail system shifting oil around. Then Romania switched sides - and
you've guessed it, the Germans bombed Romania to oblivion to stop the Allies from accessing
these resources. And when all the smoke cleared - the Russians rolled, introduced communism
and declared all the oil facilities and resources legitimate spoils of war and started - despite
British protests, to dismantle everything and ship it back to Russia.

There are some tourist upsides to oil and gas production in Romania. Take the time to go and
see the Romanian mud volcanoes - gas from the oil reserves is trapped tens of kilometers
underground and through processes I don't fully understand, it bubbles up through cracks,
mixes with sticky clay deposits on the way up and forms wonderfully active, bubbling, cold
(really cold - even in Summer!) mud volcanoes - which apparently have great medical
properties.

Near my country home it is said you can sometimes see blue flickering flames, which I think
are methane deposits seeming up and self igniting. However as only the state has the rights to
any mineral deposits underground and I don't fancy losing my pasture fields to money
grabbing developers - I agree to think no more about it. My wife thinks that they are places
where gypsies have buried cursed gold and treasures - leading to the death of anyone who
finds them - so again I always think it is remarkably prudent not to explore too deeply this
site.

What are your opinions about Romanian oil? Have you also experienced its complete lack of
quality? Have you seen the impressive oil refineries here and can you explain why they still
need to burn off the gas in wonderfully long yellow - orange plumes of flame?
Even 20 years on, talking about the Romanian revolution can drop you into a whole heap of
trouble.

For our family, who stayed out of politics, on paper each owned a mall patch of land and a
little shack, so could keep it all intact and seemed to like the big social plans of the
communists, as long as our own house was not squashed with less than half an hour warning -
not enough time to print and post you change of address cards, let alone a Romanian woman
being able to comfortably walk on the street, so I thought most Romanians enjoyed those
days.

At present 49% wouldn't mind returning to those days - this will slowly increase as nostalgic
memories surface, painful one diminish and Romania’s economic downturn continues to bite.

So in a lull moment, to make conversation, I pointed out life pre-revolution seemed much
nicer. Possibly her house was flattened, her relatives spent time as political prisoners or were
forced to help dig a huge canal in appalling conditions - who knows.

What is certain is that Romania went through a traumatic time in the revolution - my mother-
in-law lived most of under a table, terrified of random, whizzing bullets coming into the
home.

My wife was 14 and was in the countryside with granny and no phone. The TV was full of
stories of terrorist plots to blow the dams and poison the drinking water. She still recalls the
terror of not knowing what was true and who to trust.

Ceaucescu - the dictator - was making a speech when the troubles began. I have read his
government already had decided what each persons role would be before the miners kicked
off the troubles.

Even now, 21 years after being summarily shot rather than exiled, his bones were dug up, his
DNA tested and he was confirmed dead and buried - when will the same be done on other
mysterious deaths like Elvis and Michael Jackson?
<p>