A few days ago I said I am back to blogging, since my trip is over! Well, not quite, since my long time friends called me and told me that a trip in the mountains is planned for the end of this week. Well, could I refuse my friends when it comes to a camping trip? It’s about those university friends that I’ve got drunk with so many times, spent countless hours in the mountains and partied long nights with, friends that remained my best friends through the years, so hey, I’m in, no doubt about it!!

So, Friday, since I was in holiday, I could spend my day shopping for everybody for the trip. A mad day…

Friday evening, after a long and demanding day, I took my wife, one of my friends and his wife, jumped in the car and wheee!!!

We’ve met the other 2 friends and their wives in the mountains. For me (I was driving) it was a crazy chase against time on cross mountains serpentines but at 9.15 PM we were there, found the other guys in the dark with flash lights and all we could do is install the tent at my car’s lights and drink a bottle of our local drink (think of whiskey, ouzo or vodka, to get the point) that my wife magically brought us from my father in law and fell asleep since Saturday we planned a long and demanding day!

Well, not quite, I forgot, since Friday it was my wife’s name day, my friends brought a cake with them and threw a small party for my wife while eating. I also had a bottle of champagne and some chocolate bonbons so it all ended up great!

Saturday we woke up at 6 AM, had a quick breakfast and headed for the mountains. The plan was to reach the second highest peak in Romania, called Negoiu, 2535 m high, after a 5 hours hike.

I have been there 4 years ago with the same friends, I knew the difficulty of the trip, I knew exactly what to expect, so from my point of view, because of my wife after-surgery hand condition, the target was another one: reach a lake 1.5 h away from the peak and stay there with my wife until my friends will return from the peak. I knew this from the very first moment they told me about the trip, but I wanted to go either way, even if I knew I won’t reach the peak this time.

What I can tell you about the trip UNTIL the lake (Caltun is the name) is that I totally forgot about the strong wind there. The most part of the trip was on peaks/cliffs and the wind was so strong there that we just couldn’t breath so I had to put my hand over my nose and mouth a lot of times to be able to breath properly.

The wind was so strong that was effectively blowing us off the cliff and considering the fact that on 3-4 moments we had to walk on a trail that was 30 cm wide on the very peak of the mountain, with deep falls on the left and on the right, that was quite an adventure. Also, on 3-4 moments we had to climb narrow passages on chains. Only one of the girls knew what to expect from the trail so the other 3 were just plain scared about it, but hey, once started, we needed to end the damn trip!

Until the lake we had to reach another peak, of 2390 m high that was in the way and this was quite an adventure because we had to climb it first up and then down on our way back and it was a real curse!

Once we reached the lake, me and my wife remained there, as I have planned from the very beginning, along with the wife of one of my friends who said stop, too much, I won’t risk my life further! OK, so the rest of the gang headed for the peak.

As I have previously said, I have already reached that peak 4 years ago, so it was nothing new for me to get there again, even if I felt a bit bitter for not joining my friends, but there was no way to leave my wife in the middle of nowhere at 3.5 hours away from the closest facility. The only things there were that glacial lake, a metal shelter where you can enter in case of need, a lot of heavy rocks and hikers passing. So I stayed.

What I’ve missed

To make a bit of an image of what I have missed by not going there, let me tell you a bit about my experience of 4 years ago with this peak: after climbing/hiking for another hour you get to a point called Devil’s Pass, a place that is only 2 m wide, between 2 mountains, about 40-50 m long (my personal appreciation, not measurement), made of one big rock on top of another one. In order to get on that peak you have to rely a lot on the strength of your hands and intensively use the heavy chain that is installed there.

Now, my personal experience is a bit more intense: 4 years ago I was climbing that passage with my friends, about 20 m above us there were some other guys climbing it, and suddenly somebody on top of us started to scream - Attention!!!Attention!! Falling rocks!

Fuck!I felt my blood suddenly freezing inside me seeing a rock of about 30 cm diameter falling toward us from a height of 20 m, hitting one corner of a rock, then the corner of another rock, then another rock and suddenly jumping in a totally unpredictable direction…. We didn’t know what to do, where to shelter, in what direction since the direction of the falling rock was totally unpredictable and being forced to keep the contact with the chain gave us so little options…

Above me there were one of my friends and his wife, the falling rock hit the “ground” at her feet and then flew above my head, to my right and finally somewhere down the mountain. There were only a few moments in my life when I felt my life so intense, that was one of them, when I had the impression I really faced death.

We continued our climbing, reached the peak, took pictures at a height of 2535 m and climbed down the pass fearing the event may happen again. It didn’t but we all promised to not get there again. But, well, I think that “never again” lasted for 4 years. At least for my friends…

Going back to the camp

After my friends returned from the peak totally exhausted, we started our trip back to the camp. The 2390 m peak that we had to climb down the first time, proved to be very demanding when we wanted to climb it from bottom to top on our way back. Again, the chains and the windy peaks…

I remember some girls saying that it’s more than enough, they will never get back there again risking their lives, I remember reading the text on the backpack of the buddy in front of me when climbing the passages with chains on heavy winds: “candle in the wind”! Man, what a dark and unfortunate thing to read when walking a path of 30 cm wide on chains on heavy winds!!!

The only thing we were happy about was the fact that it was sunny, because 4 years ago it was raining and we had to walk that path on fog. I remember one moment when we were on one of those passages, in the fog, we couldn’t see the valley on the left or on the right, we only saw the cloud/fog below us so we walked that 2-3 meters passage on our knees and hands, almost crawling . After the first guy passed it, he gave a long stick to the next one, in order to make a bond between us, to lead it and support it. May sound corny, but it is the truth.

The mountains where we’ve been this WE are very rocky and dry, no forest there, no tree above a certain altitude. Our water ran out on our way back so we suffered from thirst big time. That weakened us all, especially the 5 that went for the peak. One of the girls looked pretty bad, exhausted, one of the guys had to stop very often since he couldn’t walk anymore, even if he is one of the most determined guys I know and his wife walked on like a ghost, one step, then another one…

The fact is that when we reached the civilization, she got sick, she turned yellow from exhaustion and effort, she couldn’t eat or drink anything for a period of time. Well, pretty good if you consider that last time we’ve been there, 4 years ago, my wife made a crisis of gastritis because of effort and pushing herself too much, one guy and one girl suffered 2 long weeks from some stomach inflammation from drinking bad water and one guy couldn’t walk 2 weeks on one of his knee because of his knee being injured on climbing rocks.

Myself I had a pretty wild disease that was caused by some animal interaction that kept me 3 months visiting the hospitals, disease that I tend to consider as being started by the same visit in the mountains. But I can not be sure since doctors couldn’t tell what it was…

We got back to our tents late in the night after we had our dinner at a cabana where we started the trip.

Today we took it easy since everyone complained about some kind of issues: back pains, swollen feet, sun burns, stomach aches, etc. Myself I am OK, if I don’t consider the fact that my face is burning because of the sun and that I have a red stripe on my right foot between where my boot ended and where my pants started…well…

We started a barbecue (planned and long waited), had a couple of beers and headed back home since tomorrow my holiday will be over.

And I guess tomorrow I will be blogging again about guitars since I’ve got my guitar back and it works fine!!

And to make an impression about the Devil’s Pass, here’s a small movie that somebody took there. Not us, but it shows you what I am speaking about.

What do you think?

PS: By the way, the trip was in the same area I have written about here , with the same friends. In this area there are the 2 highest peaks in Romania, Moldoveanu and Negoiu, I have conquered both, plus the 3rd, Vistea Mare, plus another one called Omu (The Man) which is in another mountains but very famous.

Bookmark It

Bookmark It

Hello again, my dear online friends! I am back from my sunny holiday and back to my computer! I must admit I don’t know if I will find it easy to come back to the same rhythm as before since sun, sand, water and beer can really take you out of writing shape! I will probably need a few days to come back to the same rhythm as before. So…

I had a very relaxing holiday, a lot of days spent without doing anything else than relaxing, drinking beer on the beach, swimming and meeting friends (we’ve met 2 of my cousins who also spent their holiday there so we had company for a lot of days and a lot of beers)

At one moment we decided to cross the border and take a trip to Bulgaria, a bit fearful, to be honest since Bulgarian police has not the best reputation around. I payed extra attention to traffic signs and speed limits and it was OK. We spent one full day at their Golden Sands resort where prices were the same as in Romania. only that there were a lot of foreigners, a lot of Italians IMO, the beach was tidier and more animated.

In one word, I like it there and decided to go back for a full holiday at one moment. However, 2 observations from Bulgaria:

• They have no alcohol free beer!! What?!! 3 different bartenders looked at me lost when I asked for alcohol free beer. No, we have not such thing. And what do you drink when you drive? Well, water, juice, alcohol free cocktails. Reasonable…but where’s my beer?!! One of the girls serving cocktails on the beach told me she remembers she saw alcohol free beer in stores a couple of years ago…hmm. We have about 4-5 sorts of alcohol free beer that come to my mind this very moment!
• Their traffic signs are absolutely horrible! For ex: you get to a point where the speed limit is 20km/h because a particular situation there, a dangerous turn or something. OK, then the turn is over and I find myself in front of a clear European road where the limit would be 90km/h, but there was no sign that the 20km/h speed limit is over!! I told you I payed attention to those signs, OK?!! WTF!?!! This situation was very frequent in Bulgaria and it was very annoying since I was trying to avoid being stopped by their police! So I decided to apply a different rule there: I try to guess the reason for the speed limit (like that curve) and once the reason is gone, I drive with the theoretical speed limit for that part of the road. Pretty wild but I managed to get home safely, without breaking too many rules there, beside a few red lights…whatever…

When coming back in the evening, I had to admit that we(Romanians) should be a bit more careful with cleaning our beaches, but hey, that’s the Latin spirit I guess, compared to Slavic spirit of our neighbors. As for the rest, if I compare the wild cars I have seen in Mamaia(Romania), I have never seen them anywhere else. My brother in law was absolutely crazy when he saw some latest moment cars, like BMW X6 or latest Mercedes or Aston Martin. Well, nobody said there are no rich people in Romania, right? We could also judge by the yachts, if we think about, we visited the marina in the last day there, for fun.

At the end of this trip, I just want to make a few notes regarding my blog here:

• A big thanks to IG for his great post about seeking guitar teachers that got quite a few good page views while I was away! Thanks, man! I owe you one!
• My traffic was steady at around 550 visitors per day in the last 3 weeks and my RSS subscribers increased while I was away, so I should probably go more often in holidays, my traffic would probably increase!! I will leave again at the end of this week in the mountains for a few days so please, please subscribe to my RSS feeds!!
• Guys, comment on this post here about Willie Nelson, to enter the drawing for the free collection of 4 CDs of Willie Nelson’s career! It doesn’t hurt and it is free! Really!

That’s about it for today, a pretty long post but hey, the man is back to business!! So stay close!

Bookmark It

Bookmark It

I’ve just sent my newly purchased Variax guitar to the company that sold it to me for fixing it since I couldn’t make it start again since that single hour of playing/testing it. I  expect it to return in perfect condition, in a couple of days, ready to rock!

On the other hand tonight I will leave for one week to the seaside where I am going to stay away from everything that means work. Well, not everything since I will take my laptop with me for reading emails and maybe answering a few comments here and hopefully I will be able to post once in a while an article or two, when time (OK, my wife) will allow me get close to my computer!!!

So, I don’t know how well I will be able to keep the rhythm of posting new articles, but hey, everybody needs rest once in a while! And I hope by the end of my one week holiday my guitar will be ready and willing…

And since the weekend is here and I will not be present to entertain you, please take a bit of time to enter the competition for winning the most recent 4 CDs collection of Willie Nelson, One Hell of A Ride, read again the article that generated the highest number of visitors in one day and ever on this site, the funny top 10 list for a successful power metal band, read the article and watch the movie that generated the highest number of Diggs, over 100 diggs WITHOUT REACHING THE FIRST PAGE ON DIGG!!! By the way, why don’t you digg it, maybe a few diggs more could make it move even if so much passed since that moment!

And also, why don’t you read my reports on how my site traffic went so far. Here’s the 5th report since I couldn’t manage to write the 6th and last report (but I promise I will one of those days). This 5th report will lead you to the rest of the reports too.

By the way, the picture in this post is from Mamaia resort, here in Romania where I am heading to this very night, the most expensive resort on Romanian seaside where rich people pay up to $15.000 for a bottle of champagne at whild night parties…Don’t ask…

So without any more words, I wish myself a happy holiday and a lot of sun and good weather! Thank you!

Talk to you again from the seaside later! Bye!

Bookmark It

Bookmark It

Yesterday a Carrefour hypermarket was launched in my city and of course, my wife just needed to be there, the same way she had to be there for the other 4-5 hypermarkets when they were launched. Of course, me and a friend of mine (his wife was there with mine) were angry like hell, we didn’t have where to park, I have never seen so many cars in one single place, cars parked on the sides of the highway, in curve, on every possible exit. At one moment, my friend had to stop and turn back because his car was too large to go on one street that had cars parked on the sides…Imagine that.

Now, in the middle of this parking hell, there was that stage installed where our local Shakin’ Stevens played his nationwide hits!No kiddin’, we have our own local Shakin’ Stevens the same way we have all kind of worldwide bands adapted to our local cultural environment.

I don’t speak about impersonators, no, I speak about artists that build their image taking as a model one artist or another from the “western” culture. It is very interesting to see how a musical market that started virtually with no “new” artist develops day by day by adding new “modeled” artists.

It is interesting because there is still room. You can look around, see what is not covered in Romania and build a new artist by a template borrowed from western markets. Why not, if it works and brings money? Plus that it kind of gives you a direction, a niche, your own place on this already crowded artistic world, right? Well, it is not that frequent anymore, at artist level, but at song level, I am still amused when I realize one song or another are composed to match some western artist style or sound…

I guess this process is very common on markets that are not yet well developed. As one of my band mates and long time friend, used to say, when a company does not know what to do, copies an other one. It works well in music too.

Well, don’t get me wrong, as any other “consumer”, I fall for this too, I like this guy’s music. His name is Stefan Banica Jr. He sings, dances, plays guitar and piano, but first he is a respected actor, a very known one here, he has a huge visibility, also due to his late father who was a very respected actor long before his son came to being, plus that he is the moderator of “So you think you can dance” franchised show here!

I was amused at first when I have seen his glowing stage outfits, seemed so aged to me(the costumes, not him, since he is around 40 yo),  but after a short while I realized it is part of a bigger image. He gathered around him great musicians, one of the best guitar players in Romania, Nicu Patoi, a big band, with trumpets and stuff…Whatever. Every year he has this big Christmas concert where women go nuts for him. And yes, he makes a lot of money, he is one of the best sold artists here. And he produces hits, which is always a desirable thing.

I am actually curious, did you observe in your corner of the world this kind of “modeled” development of the local music market?

Anyway, here’s one of the hits our local rock’n'roll artist used to break the hearts of so many women here…

Bookmark It

Bookmark It

There are days when you don’t feel like writing, isn’t it? This is one of those days, or has been, I think, it’s 9:46 PM here. This was until I received a message from my StumbleUpon buddy Corey Koehler who pointed me to one his latest podcast. I must say that it was enough to start listening one of the songs there and everything changed, I think this song turned my happiness hormones on, I don’t know (I’ve heard this on the radio today and stayed in my mynd, so don’t blame me, OK?).

So, just a short post that has not that much with the guitar:

• Today I found myself driving in parallel with a brand new no-top red Ferrari! Damn! It is not like the first time I see one in Romania, just that it is the first time I see one IN MY CITY, BRAND NEW and HALF A METER AWAY from me. I could have just opened the window and touch it. The driver owns a large company here so he can afford it but he didn’t look to me to be the type to own a Ferrari. Just as an observation: Romania is not a poor country, you can see here a lot of the latest and hottest cars, but we still need to work on our roads so this car is not for our roads. Period. If you come to Romania, better take a 4×4. Damn, but it was beautiful!
• While waiting for my wife today in the car, I surprised myself lowering my car seat, with my sun glasses on and with rock music playing loud. What a great feeling! The song was Bon Jovi’s Dead or alive. Man, I love that acoustic guitar! I think it has to do with those hormones of happiness I was speaking earlier.

And to finish my short post about nothing, here’s the song that started me:Firewind, Falling to pieces! Enjoy!

Bookmark It

Bookmark It

Yesterday I was invited to a folkloric show at the main theater here. I am not a big fan of folkloric music, not at all, but because we were invited by one of the artists in the show, who has sung at my wedding, I couldn’t refuse the invitation.

I the beginning I thought it is going to be a boring show for me, since every time I see this kind of music on TV for ex, I change the channel. Man, I was wrong! I can tell you that I really enjoyed the show! And you know why? Because I have decided to make the best of it and I focused my attention on music, artists, instruments and I was amused of all the thoughts running through my head during the concert.

So, a few basic lines first: in Romanian folkloric music there are no guitars. Period. Doh! This “band” had a double bass (we call it contrabass here), 9 violins, 1 flute, 3 accordions and one cimbalom (is this the word?) plus one bandleader. Imagine the fact that the artists that are really famous here in Romania are also engaged in a collaboration with local theaters, so on stage were some very famous singers that you see on TV everyday (again, if you listen this music). Imagine Johny Cash or Dolly Parton singing in your city every month at the local theater. I don’t think it stands the comparison but you get my point.

Romanian folkloric music usually is a “returning walk”, to call it this way, you end your passages where you start them. You start the passage in C, you walk around, play, sing and, guess what, you go back to the same C! It is a round thing. Also, songs don’t always have choruses, in many cases, songs are made up by lyrics parts followed by a repetitive theme played on violins. And again, the themes are “round” and come back to the starting point.

So, because I am not a fan of this style, I only like about 2 singers, I tried to focus on something else.
And there the show became interesting:

Double bass player - because the double bass was clearly distinguishing from the rest of the instruments, I could easily follow it’s music. I was surprised to recognize in what that guy was playing some …ROCK AND ROLL FORMULAS!!! A bit altered cause Romanian folkloric music doesn’t follow the same chords progressions but it was fun to listen. Songs are mostly 4/4 in C or G major so it fits fine! The only observation was that in folkloric double bass progressions, this “rock and roll” progressions were altered by very interesting chromatic passages. I could also compare this double bass music to a jazz bass music due to the “walking bass” style, the guy never stayed on the same note and only used his bow to produce short notes, not as in cello playing (as less as I know about cello playing, I think of Apocalyptica and I have a reference point!)

Violins - very interesting, considering that I know one of the players as a VERY good player, he played at my wedding and I met him and the singer that invited us many times starting that moment and we became good acquaintances. The singer is very well seen here on this market of wedding singers. He proposed me at one time to start rehearsing with them to join them for playing at weddings, but as much as I was honored by the fact that he asked me, I politely refused, explained him I love my rock music and I love to play rock, pop and everything related to these styles but wedding music is not my “cup of tea”.

So, again about violins, I liked the way they synchronized (and they were 9!) and I loved some passages where some of the violins played the third of the rest, which I didn’t know it is used in this kind of music, but it gave a great effect!

Flute…nothing to say about him, no solo passages, no nothing, so I know he was there but I let him be, no particular interest there.

Well, the guy with the cimbalom (again, is there such word, right?!!). He is, along with the double bass player, the rhythmic section of the band and man, what rhythm he has!! I still wonder how he manages to hit those strings with his sticks. The funny part was that the women lead singers, after receiving flowers, always put them on his cimbalom, on one side. He always looked a bit intrigued: hey, WTF are you doing, hey, can’t you see I need those strings there?!! Damn, woman!! That made me think of a local expression used when you want to cover up a particular situation: “to put the handkerchief on the cimbalom”. I think I understand better now!!

Singers - here it was a very interesting situation. As in any style, there are singers and there are ENTERTAINERS! This last group were always in close contact with the public. I admired the fact that, some of them, for ex, after like 30 years in professional singing, were so sure of themselves and were practically ruling the scene! They were the master of the scene, feeling very secure and this transmitted a good feeling to the audience!

These ENTERTAINERS, of course, had the biggest success, the public kept on clapping and applauding at the end, asking for an other one. I admired them being so secure on stage, proving they know how to handle the crowd (of course, a very targeted public - beside myself).

I also watched the bandleader during the show: there were a couple of singers that were new or had not that much experience and I watched how the band leader stayed close to them, communicating to them, signaling to the band more difficult moments, as in free measures where everything must be “felt” by the band considering the performance of the singer. And then, I watched the bandleader totally relaxing when very experienced singers came on stage, the band leader started to smile, joking with them, and even left the stage for a few moments when one of those artists was singing. It was a proof of confidence and trust, because, anyway, after so much experience everything works by itself in such cases!

I have listen to the voice of the singers: there were 2 that I didn’t hear well, compared to the others. I asked myself if this is a matter of vocal technique or frequencies in their voices against the microphone frequency response. They were both males, one was with less experience, and I have immediately thought about vocal emissions, not being able to project the sound to where he should. But I also ask myself if it wasn’t about frequencies that were not distinguished from the rest of the band.

Anyway, most of the artists there, given his music style, are also wedding musicians. I remember joking with my wife about the cimbalom and double bass players going to a wedding: man, I am no taking this guy into my car?!! Hey, take the damn box out of my car, I have no room anymore!!

After the show we went to a restaurant with Romanian specific, to eat something, cause we were all hungry after the show. Me and my wife also invited my parents in law to this show and to the restaurant so we picked this Romanian specific restaurant so they feel comfortable there. What do you know!? The restaurant is owned by one of the artists in the show and she came after the show to sing in her own restaurant, as it seems she does once a week to keep it successful. So we couldn’t escape it there either!

But after a bottle of wine, everything was fine!

Looking back I consider this a very pleasant musical experience that I recommend to all of you. Listening to an other musical style was a refreshing thing, making me think more of my guitar playing and rock music!

By the way, I was telling you I only like about 2 Romanian folkloric singers. I want to point you here to the greatest Romanian folkloric singer, Maria Tanase. She does not live anymore but her musical talent, in my opinion wasn’t yet equaled by anyone. Here’s a couple of songs that are representative for her music. The first one is kind of a slow curse, “Who loves and leaves, may God give him punishment…”

See also a French version of the same song. She has a record in French, I think.

An other one here:

And also this one, in French, I don’t have anything in English but it may help a bit to catch the spirit.

Enjoy!

Bookmark It

Bookmark It

These days I have been away but now I am back to my computer, so, I will try to catch up a bit with everything that happened while I was away.

I took a short 3 days holiday with my wife and a couple of good friends and we headed for a well known resort in Romania, called Lacul Rosu (Red Lake). We managed to see in only 3 days, a lot of places and came back with a lot of photos.

I have decided to only put here a few of them, because this is not the subject of this blog, but because a few days ago I have decided to add a new category called Romania, I think it will fit just fine. So, here it is:

Red Lake was formed around 1837 where it used to be a forest and now you can see tree parts coming out of the water, kind of spooky. We rented a boat and sailed to a couple of them, to see for ourselves how they look like!

This is an area where the concentration of people of Hungarian origin is high so every sign there was AT LEAST in 2 languages: Romanian and Hungarian. Plus German, English, French sometimes… Just as an observation, there are tensions born by historical events and by the fact that Hungarian people there, even if living in Romania, don’t speak Romanian well and sometimes, with just a bit of bad will, it is told they don’t want to.

I can say that we were a bit tensioned in that area at first because you could hear Hungarian speakers all around you, in the very heart of Romania, making us feel like we were in an other country, but beside that, I can say that we haven’t had any problem and people were OK even if in some cases we found it a bit difficult to communicate in Romanian, but with a bit of effort on both sides, we went along fine!

In the above picture, my wife is on the left of the picture, the other 2 people are my friends that joined us for this trip. Of course, I was taking pictures.

We traveled to the other side of the country, crossing an invisible historical border, totally changing the accent. My mother in law is from that side of the country so I am a bit used to the accent. We have found a telecabin where we least expected, especially because we couldn’t understand why is it there. We presumed it will serve a hotel that is currently under construction, but for the moment I can’t see the point… But well, it seems to have clients, at least we took a ride…

We have visited a few historic locations.

On our way back we visited a newly launched salt mine. Newly launched(2 days ago) for tourists, cause it was old and not used, anymore, of course. However, very impressive. I felt like in Jules Verne’s Trip to the center of the Earth. People were playing a lot of games there, buying stuff, etc. We played cards waiting for our return bus.

We took a trip to an old and beautiful medieval city, one of the most famous of Romania, from this point of view, Sighisoara. And just for the fans of this kind of stories, believe it or not, historically speaking we have seen the house where Vlad Tepes’s father lived and where Vlad Tepes was born (Vlad Tepes, the historical personality that is the root of Dracula’s story, ruler of Romania’s lower grounds, which almost all the time is identified with Bram Stoker’s Dracula).

Loved the girl speaking on the phone dressed like “old time” people.

Finally, we took a trip to Sibiu, which was the Cultural Capital of Europe in 2007. Sibiu is a beautiful city that worths every minute spent there. It reminds of German cities because there are a lot of German people living there, a community that blends perfectly with Romanian spirit.

It was a demanding trip and I was very tired when I got home, but I must admit, it was a beautiful trip. I didn’t take my guitar this time cause I knew there is no time, in the evening we were all tired so the only thing we wanted to do is hit the sack!

But now I’m back and ready to blog and play the guitar! Yeah!

Bookmark It

Bookmark It

Starting today I have decided to start a new category, named Romania. The reason is that we promoted our country (we as in politicians, media people, etc) in a bad way.

You see, Romania has always been seen from outside as a poor country in need. While I don’t argue that there are areas where we still need time to reach a certain level of development, I totally disagree with those showing bad things about Romania just to get economical help of some sort from outside. There are economic programs to support infrastructure development and I totally salute this, but in a positive way, as a helping hand from a friend (country) to another friend (country), not as saviors helping the poor little country that can not save herself in any way. NO!

So, to get to the point, this girl here, Linda Teodosiu is Romanian, established in Germany. Well, her mother is German, her father Romanian. She is currently enrolled in the German show DSDS (”Germany seeks the superstar”) and SHE RULES IT!

Not related to guitars, but to music in general. Don’t you dare to miss this, OK?!

And let me hear you!

Bookmark It

Bookmark It

One of the rules of blogging says that after a good traffic spike you need to post good content so your returning visitors read something interesting and come back for more.

Well, this is the theory. In my case I could just not apply this since I needed to leave the city on a long time planned WE holiday in the mountains. So, even if I felt I could have done more to my blog on Saturday morning after the 3587 visits I had on Friday, I had to pack my clothes, take my acoustic guitar and together with my wife and best friends, we headed for the snowy mountains.

I could only say it was beautiful. A warm hotel in the middle of the mountains, cold and clean air, grill at below zero degrees (Celsius that is ) a lot of beer and best friends. What more could you ask for?

Well, in the middle of the night a blizzard suddenly started and we decided to go out for a snow fight, even if the snow stopped us from seeing clearly, while the wind was blowing us away.

(that’s me on the left)

After the snow fight we went to play some pool, drink some wine upstairs and play a bit of guitar. In one word? Fun!

Coming back was not as easy as we were expecting since the snow made the road almost unusable, as you see in the above picture (even if the hotel administration cleared it this very morning), but we made it. And it was fun cause I’ve sung and played the guitar all the way back (of course, it was not me behind the wheel). We came home with our batteries full and eager to go again. Actually, our wives have already proposed an other one 2 months from now. Well, why not?

But until then, back to blogging to reach 5000 visitors per day, right?!!

Bookmark It

Bookmark It