Showing posts with label europa. Show all posts

#atatsaputut: As busy as one gets, occasionally there is the old "something wrong on the internets" feeling, and that was triggered by this Deutsche Welle free documentary about Romanian Roma kids begging on the streets of Paris as well as in the Parisian Metro (subway / tube) and how the French and Romanian authorities are dealing with it. Ca de obicei, versiunea in romana a acestui articol pe FataCarte.

It's not a lot, but “atat s-a putut”.

A while back, we looked at a map that placed Romania South of Bulgaria, and Bulgaria in Romania’s place, in a kind of “castling” or “rocada” (cf Romanian) of the two countries. A relatively newer map, picked up somewhere on Facebook (fb below in Sources), makes the same “mistake”. Are the quotes around the word mistake warranted?

I’ve recently noticed a tweet that seems to indicate the Romanians are 3rd among EU countries least happy with free movement in Europe. That’s remarkable. Why would that be?

Cu exceptia introducerii, acest articol este in limba romana. As promised, I publish the answers received to the questions posed over the past few days with the deadline set on May 15. We did not specify a time for the deadline and as we write this article, it is possible that someone else may be sending us a reply. If that’s the case, comment on this article to let us know.

The elections for the European Parliament are coming up soon, and this time around, I decided to ask all candidates a few questions and post their answers. But before sending these questions, it makes sense to look at the details, the first and most important being that the voting day is May 26 between 7:00 and 21:00, local time (EST) and there’s not voting by correspondence.

This is an (Austro?-)German movie shortlisted for the Foreign Oscar and filmed in Bucharest. It’s great and rated 7.6 on IMDB, with a Metascore of 93. It is also remarkably warm and positive toward Romania.

I don’t have time for this any more than you do. It’s summer, it’s sunny, and I hardly have the time for my daily swim. But some bigwigs are counting precisely on our not paying attention to pass some really bad regulations.

I have in the past voted for the (former) President Basescu and even raised to his defence (more or less) when he was accused of slapping an impertinent child. Yet his latest display of inconsistency is more than I can bear.

Though it may be unfair to extend the failure of the Romanian National Press Agency (Agerpres) and the Romanian External Affairs Ministry to an entire nation, let us not forget that part of their job is to represent the country. The recent faux-pas, confusing the French contours with the German one in a one-print commemorative brochure is, unfortunately, indicative of the dilettantism that has taken over the Romanian government.

A recent documentary about Romanians and their come on Channel4 was left seemingly ignored on this blog (though announced more than a week ago: 1, 2), so I hereby correct this oversight. The “EAT ME” photo refers to a similar but Canadian story.

Not brown as a result of my trip to Cuba, but rather as a state of mind.

The stuff I haven't told you yet about Anaughtia (see previous and still unfinished, at this time, article) is on my mind, fighting its way into a sequel. But it will be a while. There are other stories for other blogs that also searching for a way out of my head. Until then, a somewhat easier subject, on Sweden.

I’ve hinted before on my personal struggle with answering such philosophical questions as “where are you from?” or “where were you born.” As I started answering with “Dacia,” more and more of those asking me, unsatisfied with this answer, started to look it up. One such acquaintance, a Brazilian dude, was kind enough to let me record our conversation. So I made a movie to share it more easily (like the Jens interview).

My resolve to stop speaking about the difference between Roma / Gypsies and Romanians was recently shaken by an Irish couple, one of whom had a Roma sister adopted from Romania.

I recently read a longer article on Bloomberg about Romania and its lagging infrastructure - more specifically, roads and highways. Much to my surprise, all that I was reading on other blogs (or hearing from my relatives) was described and explained as facts. (blmbrg-cows) 

I sporadically come across Dan Alexe's writings. He's a smart dude, he's courageous, and he seems to constantly be bullying "protocronists / dacologists" whom he calls "dacopaths" ("dacopati" cf Romanian original, a term most likely inspired by the derisive and pejorative “psychopaths”). I thought I deconstruct / smite him a bit.

"Little birds" is the English mot-a-mot translation of bijboace, clampacioace, fofoloance. Just the other day, a Latvian friend visited me and brought me as a gift some candy from her native country. And as she explained laughing and blushing, the candy name had a dual meaning.

Discussing the tragedy is inescapable. I had started doing this a few days ago, focusing mostly on Andrei Anghel, but didn’t have the time to say all that I wanted to say, which is why I’m continuing here.

I have been staying away from the news of the moment, but this recent tragedy hits extremely close to home, whichever way a member of the Toronto Romanian diaspora (including myself) chooses to define that notion.

Now that the European results are known and Euroscepticism discussed, after a short detour through Canadian visas for Romanians, we will finally take a look at the Romanian politics.

Today I met another European woman. Originally from Spain, she told me she worked in the Czech Republic for a while as a translator. Upon learning I'm Romanian, she also felt the need to share with me that there were "a lot of Romanians" in the Czech Republic who wanted to come to Canada but couldn't, because there is no visa treaty. When I told her that there were some problems here with Czech Roma getting visa through fraud and the visa had been suspended, her reaction was to remove her Czech work experience from her resume, out of fear that “Czechs now had a bad name.”