Halloween in Dracula's HomelandRather ironic that I spent Oct 31 in Romania, the birthplace of the mystical Dracula and
Transylvania, yet did not see anyone dressed in costume. It also might have to do with the fact that I was in Bucharest at the Intercontinental ordering roomservice and coming off the 'high' I had from popping several 'Dayquils' trying to fight off a cold.
But I digress. Romania rocks. I was attending a week long regional trade conference with mostly USAID development contractors and officers networking, listening to some interesting speeches and attending different work groups. It was a very interesting, multicultural group (12 countries represented) where we seemed to work and play well together. Each evening involved an open bar reception and plenty of finger-food along with those awesome mini chocolate mouses (I averaged 3). I wish I could say these were relaxing events to personalize with all the conference attendees but I was networking my ass off. I had to come away from this event with some serious leads for my project in Kosovo and I'm proud to say of the 100 attendees, I have about 40 key contacts to hopefully make some trade linkages for my farmers back in Kosovo.
This said, we did break out of the networking mold since our last night involved a very nice outing where we were all bused to a traditional Romanian dinner extravaganza which involved flaming platters of meat, Romanian opera singers and violinists strolling among our tables of food or the absolutely stunning ballroom dancers that floated above the dance floor as we moved from Rakia (plum wine) to salad to vegetable to meat to meat to dessert. Your average 4 hour Romanian meal. But I knew it was time to head back to the hotel when many of the very old timers were trying to dance with the any of the attendees that were single (and half their age).
The highlights actually came after the conference when I ventured out of the hotel to stoll the
cold Romanian boulevard (10 lanes wide) with a steady mixture of snow and rain coming down. Eastern Europe was hit by the first winter snow storm of the season and the damp coldness alerted me to the fact that I was not prepared for winter and I now remembered why I moved to California. Anyway I was joined by some very nice attendees of the conference to visit the massive Parliament building (People's Palace) which is the 3rd largest building by volume in the world where Ceausescu was to house his entire Communist regime. This place was truly remarkable with more halls, ballrooms, conference centers, churches, offices, apartments than you can imagine. Ironically he was executed before it was finished and he was never able to rule from the empire.
For my last night in Bucharest I found a Serbian partner (Boris above) in crime that I had befriended during the meetings. After a lovely Italian dinner with my USAID officer counterparts, he and I emerging to experience the nightlife, Romanian style. As it turned out, we had to keep going from one bar to the next as a pre-party before we could go to the real club to dance the rest of the night away (they opened at 1). With beers under a dollar, each of the 'bars' filled up quite quickly where most the Romanian men seemed to act like assholes chasing the ladies into their secure, non smiling circles for protection. Finally we antied up a pricey cover charge to experience 'the office' with fantastic lounge and dance music accompanied with live bongos, stunning tall slender Romanian women wearing the latest European fashion (ok, so allot dressed like they were straight out of a Shakiro video) and men who seemed much more laid back and thankfully ranging from late 20's to grandpa in the corner. Unfortunately, I had to call it an early night since I ran out of steam around 3:30. It was a very nice change of pace from rockin Kosovo.
Although the conference had officially ended, I felt compelled to experience at least some of the Romanian countryside before leaving. So I had taken the initiative to speak with some of the locals I had met that week and had planned to train up to Brachov to see the medieval city in Transylvania and castle-hop for an afternoon (mind you is was now 5 below 0 C with 4-6 inches of snow up in the countryside). But as luck would have it my wing man from the night before was already doing the same trip with his boss and one of the local project Directors (American) who owned a mountain cabin which looked out to Dracula's castle. Perfect. I had two days of driving in the beautiful mountains with 3 great guys from the comfort of a heated SUV. Not to mention our 'guide' filled us in on all the local history and took us to the best castles, restaurants and pubs (see for yourself).
His cabin couldn't have been more perfect. Quite small but with all the comforts of home and free! Plenty of good conversation and some great 'war stories' were exchanged among these men who have been doing international development for decades, all over the Balkans and Africa. Very inspiring I must say. For my last day I was actually going to have to train it back early to catch my flight out of Bucharest but since we got off to an earlier start than expected, I was able to add one more fantastic meal in Brachov before we all returned to the city where they dropped me off directly at the terminal. I couldn't have had planned it to ever have worked out so well. And with Romania joining the EU next year, this country will continue to flourish and prove to be an inviting and hospitable place for all tourists (oh, except for the fact that the Romania has some of the worst bank and Internet fraud and therefore all of my credit cards were blocked for my entire stay) and watch out for those cab drivers...
several of my American friends (3 ladies) as their escort to the second annual Kosovo Marine Ball. It reminded me a bit of a high school prom in the sense that it was anticipated for awhile since it is one of the rare official social occasions and everyone put on their best dress, uniform, tux (or suit) in my case. Difference being that even with open bar, a majority of the men in uniform could not drink since they are technically on active duty. At least most the firearms were checked at the door at the restaurant which was located out in the countryside with well secured check-points, car bomb inspections and a security detail of about 50 men. Once inside we were still subtly reminded that we were in Kosovo as the power cut off several times momentarily and once seated at the tables we still had to make our way to the bar to get our own drinks instead of relying on the wait staff.
officers and Marines congratulating one another, paying their honor and respects, presenting the flags, singing the National Anthem and most entertaining watching the honor guards carry a huge flag sheet-cake to the end of the room where they officially called out maneuvers to cut the cake with a sword and serve a couple pieces to the highest ranking General and the guest of honor. We did get a good laugh as they introduced the young Marines that were there serving at the American Office of Pristina, all whose birthdays were in the early to mid 80's.
Finally with formalities out of the way we dove into a fairly nice dinner with plenty of gossip going around commenting on some of the outrageous make-up and dress selections from a number of the local women. Eventually, I was able to steal away and hang out with about 6 lovely ladies I know from playing ultimate Frisbee out here. Fortunately, they are all a ton of fun and love to dance. Aside from some questionable DJing, one of the Marines finally grabbed control of the mic and rapped the rest of the night away. All and all, a good night at the Prom...
