Keep on walking

Minibus customer service at it's best

2012-02-24T00:29:00.004+04:00

I spent four days in Bucharest on some career related business and today I was going back home. Woke up early in the morning, rushed to the subway, ran my way to the bus terminal and there I was, 5 minutes before departure, almost on time for the trip.

Inside, there were four passengers in total and another lady showed up just one minute before the scheduled departure time. All good until the dispatcher, a young girl, who probably hated her job, announced us that we had to wait another hour because there were too many empty seats and they cannot make their business quota. No "I am sorry", no regret, no nothing, just the feeling that what they were doing was pretty normal.

I was like "mmm, I could wait, but I don't really like the idea". One girl beside me politely bursted with anger.She asked to talk with someone from the "management" if there was something like that existed in that company. I appreciated her for what she did, reminding me what a friend told me a few days before "don't let anyone, treat you disrespectfully no matter what". After complaining for while she convinced the supposedly "boss"to leave at the scheduled time with a minibus used for emergencies.

That took about 30 minutes with us inside wondering around and going from one vehicle to another.

On our way home, the driver was clearly uncomfortable with the situation and so disrespectful with the passengers, pretending not to hear what we were asking him, talking on the phone with no hands free while driving at 130 km/h.

When we stopped for a break, I decided to eat something and I was rushed to finish fast so we can continue out road. No "please", no "thank you", no nothing.

After another hour and a half I arrived in Galati I was like so close into bursting and yelling at the mother****er. But I thought "is he going to learn something ?". Seeing his red neck behaviour my answer was no and I don't think I would've made a difference.

What would make a difference, small or big it's gonna be a complain call and an e-mail to the company.

Overall I just felt so not respcted and felt like them taking us home on time was a loss of money instead of seeing it as an opportunity to have a good image and keeping their clients close.

Some things in Romania will change soooo slow.

Rosia Montana - the story of a national rip off

2012-02-19T22:43:00.002+04:00

It's amazing how some people inside and outside Romania can make a lot of money by calling themselves business men. In reality, here in Romania, we called them the "smart guys", taking advantage of a certain situation through any kind of means at any possible level to get themselves filthy rich.

I've been watching and getting informed about a place called Rosia Montana is a place in Western part of Romania where there are vast resources of gold, silver and many other rare and valuable metals. It's also provides a huge cultural heritage since Romans were there between 106 and 275 AD, not to mention the natural landscape which is very unique. A few days back I got this really nice article in Romanian and thought of translating it and share it in English.

To go back a bit 50 years back, Romania lost between 1952-1960 from the Soviet-Romanian company, the largest reserves of Uranium of our country, exactly 17,288 tons.Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej, the Communist leader back them, was really upset because the Soviets didn't give us the tools to extract the metal.

Today politicians want to give to a Canadian-Romanian company with U.S. shareholders, rare and precious metal deposits in Rosia Montana in exchange for jobs - a good pretence since people in that area are pretty poor. Not enough for someone who is smart enough to realize a rip off since Romania's participation in this company is about 20% and risks to reach down to 0.6% if a capital increase happens. The Government is to bear the costs of maintenance, of the dams and catchment systems, monitoring hydrocyanic acid emissions, water pumping and treatment for an undetermined period, all of this estimated at 12 million euros annually.

Romanian state would receive 4% of the gold and silver extracted at the site. The press is talking about increasing this percentage up to 6% and it's presented as a successful negotiation, without being told that in countries like South Africa precious metals royalties/dues are up to 20%.

In the 200 million tons of ore that would be extracted in Rosia Montana with cyanides is estimated to be 1.5 grams of gold per ton of ore and 11, 7 grams of silver per ton. You might think: "Well it's not really profitable", you are right! The motivation for this project is in the rare metals that accompany gold deposits. Vanadium - 2500 grams per ton, arsenic - 5000 grams per ton, titanium - 1000 grams per tonne, molybdenum - 10 grams per tonne, nickel - 30 grams per ton, chrome - 50 grams per tonne, cobalt - 30 grams per ton, gallium - 300 grams per tonne, germanium - 20 grams per ton, tungsten, molybdenum, etc..

Not to mention that in the contract, it is stipulated if other metals besides gold and silver, we get 0%.

If we put these resources in global context, depletion of energy and the need for the development of renewable energy, photovoltaic panels and wind turbines, we find that the first crisis that will face the world will not be oil but rare and precious metals. A smart Government with smart people will take advantage of the situation.

Gallium, for example, found in Rosia Montana in quantities of 300 times higher than gold, is used to make photovoltaic panels and current price is $ 900 per Kg. Usage of this metal will increase as technologies are improved and efficiency of solar energy will increase with rise in oil prices.

26% of extractable copper resources of the Earth's crust were already lost in landfills. Closing the copper mine in Rosia Montana to make way RMGC(Rosia Montanta Gold Corporation) led to the dismissal of hundreds of workers, of which Gold Corporation officials not remember when calculating the number of jobs.

Overall I think there are a few things that I am concerned and I against:

The ecological disaster that threatens the area. Usage of cyanides in gold extraction as the scale of it's intended to be it's gonna be destructive to all life in area: human, animal and plant life.
Cultural heritage disaster and destruction. Rosia Montana is one of the areas richest in Romania's cultural heritage, including a large territory on approx. 650 ha. 50 classified historical monuments, of which 7 designated as monuments of national and universal value.
The national rip off. I am totally against the Romanian Government would get only 0.6% out of the extracted gold on the pretence that there's need of jobs over there. This is not an excuse to destroy all the things mentioned above. If you have the natural and cultural wonders you can invest in tourism for people to enjoy them. A really great idea would be make some kind of tourist mining where people come and do some amateur gold mining.
The media promoting the extraction over there through different kind of commercials where normal people appear saying that they want and they need the extraction to begin. I thought that was a sinister way of emotional blackmail to change the opinion of the site. I even sent an email to the manager of one the biggest TV station in Romania asking them why they agree to show these commercial on TV. Everyone could answer that question money.

I think we should be aware of what is going on and not take part in what many think the biggest heist in the history of the Romanian people.

If you think this post is true and you want other people to know it (inside or outside Romania. Share !

Iran is not the problem

2012-02-12T14:14:00.003+04:00

I was asked these days by my friend: "What's up with you, you love politics so much ?". Actually I hate how people who rule the world are making politics. It's not about that anyway. It's about knowing the reality in this world we live in. If I cannot be an actor, I can be a spectator and even having this role I can change something. I am not going think that a movie or theatre piece is going to be as shown in the poster or the trailer. Even a spectator can "booooo" at a theatre piece if he doesn't like what he sees. This is the only world we have here and we cannot just move to the Moon or Mars if we stop like it here. I know that my only power right now is to write speak my mind, share and hopefully other people will see what I am seeing.

My talks about Iran in this post will be as short as possible. I also talked about his topic in a previous post. As a human being I don't want to see human suffering because of war. Thinking only in Iraq half a million people died. Most of them civilians. Imagine that. Imagine that all of your family, neighbours, friends were lost in the name of "democracy", on the pretence that my country supposedly had weapons of mass destruction, half of million people died because some smart guys sought their own economical interest. Wouldn't that make you question some things, make you feel a bit angry, resentful about the world you live in ?

How is a war started in the first place ? There are few steps to follow:

Demonize the enemy. In 2002 George W. Bush named Iran as being part of an "Axis of Evil" and preaching that the country is supporting terrorism and other illegal activities. Even when you think about it: "Axis of Evil" it sounds false, unrespectful for the inhabitants of that country and unjustified.
Exaggerate a threat. The threat here is the idea that the country is arming itself with a nuclear weapon. You need the technology, you need the information and you need the people. Since the country has been isolated from the international community how can you do that ? When US helped weaponize Israel, India and Pakistan with nuclear weapons, aren't those countries a threat ?
Fake a diplomatic effort. What I saw in the media the last years were only ultimatums and sanctions given but not really negotiations. This is not a diplomatic effort.
Establish a pretext. Every pretext is lie. For example the Vietnam war pretext was a lie. Go into it and find out( http://www.mindfully.org/). It was a war that lasted 19 years and two million people died. If there's anything Governments are good at is lying.

There's a documentary below that I think is straight down to the point about the policies of US and Iran. It's long but I think it will open your eyes a bit about the world we live in.

Iran has a beautiful history and heritage. It's one of the greatest nations in the world (aka Persians). I think it's the people's choice to change something over there. Not by force, not by war, not by any kind of intervention.

A night out

2012-02-05T14:10:00.002+04:00

It's Saturday night and for someone to come back just before midnight it's pretty lame isn't it ? Some are just partying like hell about now. I didn't have any plans for tonight so I just thought of auto-inviting myself for a meeting that some pretty likable girls that I knew had in an Irish pub. Awesome atmosphere. When you get to drink, alcohol has three reactions to your behaviour: euphoria, depression or violence. Well I am now at the second beer.

I'm starting to feel a bit strange. Start to think that it has been 7 months since I've returned from Azerbaijan and I worked in only 2 of them. It's messed up. I've applied to over 40 jobs and positions to get rejection after rejection. I mean I know I am a pretty capable person. There's a voice saying: "am I?".

The girl next to me is pretty' nice. I wonder what she likes. Fuck the music is loud you really have to shout to get heard. The thing is that I have to say must be either cool, funny or something interesting. Pfff...me and the girls. I met my last girlfriends last month, one didn't even bother to say hello and the other one we met accidentally at a presentation. We talked, but only via Facebook while we were in the same room. None of us had the guts or the will to invite each other for a drink. At least just to know what was keeping us busy. The last one I disappointed by not crossing the ocean for her because the circumstances just didn't allow me to. Now she hates. There is something that I miss in all of them. I cannot just forget them all. That's who I am.

Ough yeah the girl next to me. Better say some stupid shit or nothing.

I see my best buddy for almost 20 years standing at another table with other guys. I am not staying with them. I get the feeling that one or two of them hate me. That's probably the reason I am not there. What can I do ? Go to them from time to time say hello, joke and go the fuck back to my place.

The pretty girl next to me says something. There are high chances I didn't get what she said. I smile say something back to her.

I start to think that in this whole job seeking, career orientation I've become so much down and in the same time so much selfish and alone. I started to get really irritable especially with my parents and with my sister I feel indebted to her like for years and feeling like hell for that because I can't pay her back.

The girls next to me started to dance. I have an attempt of dancing. I know that after the second beer I do get the courage to move a bit. I guess not enough beer so I just sit back into my seat.

I am thinking that I need to get out of the country. Somehow you have a different connection with the people that are away from home.

Fuck it. I just need a good night sleep. Leaving the place. This is not my night out.

Meet Bradley Manning a hero of conscience

2011-12-24T14:30:00.002+04:00

Meet up Bradley Manning, ex-soldier of the US Army in Iraq. He was arrested in 2010 for leaking classified information to Julian Assange, Editor-chief and spokesman for the famous Wikileaks foundation.
Because of him we know how the US Army operates in Iraq and Afghanistan having no value for human life and for the people they occupy in those countries.

A hacker turned him to the FBI after a chat conversation and it seems that he had more conscience than all the other soldiers revealing what was really happening.

May 22, 11:49:02 AM Manning: im in the desert, with a bunch of hyper-masculine trigger happy ignorant rednecks as neighbors… and the only safe place i seem to have is this satellite internet connection ...11:49:51 AM Manning: and i already got myself into minor trouble, revealing my uncertainty over my gender identity ... which is causing me to lose this job ... and putting me in an awkward limbo ...
11:58:33 AM Manning: and little does anyone know, but among this “visible” mess, theres the mess i created that no-one knows about yet
12:15:11 PM Manning: hypothetical question: if you had free reign over classified networks for long periods of time ... say, 8-9 months ... and you saw incredible things, awful things ... things that belonged in the public domain, and not on some server stored in a dark room in Washington DC ... what would you do?
12:26:09 PM Manning: lets just say *someone* i know intimately well, has been penetrating US classified networks, mining data like the ones described … and been transferring that data from the classified networks over the “air gap” onto a commercial network computer … sorting the data, compressing it, encrypting it, and uploading it to a crazy white haired aussie who can’t seem to stay in one country very long.
12:31:43 PM Manning: crazy white haired dude = Julian Assange ...

Because of him we know how two reporters of Reuters were killed by the US Army after the their killing was vehemently denied .

What he did, was it really illegal, taking in consideration if the war was illegal ?

Another set of lies. Are we going to believe them again ?

2011-12-05T15:35:00.001+04:00

Ten years ago 9/11 happened and world was put into 7 years psychosis of war against terrorism. A false pretence of "stabilizing" and brining democracy to the countries of Afghanistan and two years later in Iraq. The invasion came with thousands and hundred of thousands of lost lives. Most of them civilians caught in the rain of fire between the Coalition army and people trying do defend their country. Without any doubt the majority of the victims were brutally murdered. Innocent children, men and women killed. One example can be seen in the footage released by Wikileaks in 2007 below. The footage is very shocking but it clearly demonstrated how the US Army just doesn't care about the lives of others.

But let's back up a bit. So the invasion of Afghanistan was on the basis the Taliban regime holds responsible for the attacks of 9/11 which in my opinion was just a big, biiiiig bul***it. In 2010 I got to know why the invasion is keeping so long and why the zone needs to be "stabilized". Recently, they say, a large quantity of minerals was discovered in the Afghani mountains thus a big opporunity for foreign companies to make a lot of money there: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/14/world/asia/14minerals.html?pagewanted=all.
Before the invasion of Iraq Mr. Bush was telling everyone about biological, nuclear and mass destruction weapons, making everyone really afraid of the threat that Saddam Husein and his regime is to the world. The guy I think has the highest percentage of lies per minute. Have a look at this video:

Later on, no nuclear weapons were found, no biological weapons, no weapons of mass destruction were found and everyone concluded that the war was all about oil. BP and other oil companies, they started to drill and profit from Iraqi resources.

Another campaign is launched by US and the allies against another country which stand between Afghanistan and Iraq. Let me help you with that. It's Iran. You might say: "Ough but Iran has no oil or natural gas resources". And I will say: "Ough YES it does". Iran holds 8% of the world's oil and natural gas resources. So it's all about the oil and about brining control the countries in the area. Take a look:

We have:

Iraq - under control
Afghanistan - under control
Turkmenistan - opening to the West due to high resources of gas.
Armenia - under the Russian Influence but has a strong diaspora in Western Countries
Azerbaijan and Turkey, I think will play a key role in the eventuality of an invasion. Azerbaijan has a conflict with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh. Giving access to US Army from Azerbaijan to Iran it will be the closest way to Teheran. In exchange Azerbaijan might get help taking back the occupied territory.

So the last years we have seen a lot of news telling and manipulating the public opinion about the threat of Iran. This is just a satellite photo and the TV and newspapers are telling us: "Look this where they make the nuclear weapons", we think: "if they say it, they have to be right". Please don't. They can also say that's where they make chocolate. I won't believe and neither should you.

This is a nuclear weapon:

We have absolutely no reason to believe what the press is telling us until it is proven otherwise. This is just pure manipulation and propaganda to impose someone's or a group of people agenda. Wake up !

Never stop running, a story of a first 21 km run

2011-10-11T01:58:00.001+05:00

9th of October 2011. Woke up from a restless night like every time I have something important to do the next day. It was a cloudy morning with the prospect of heavy raining.

My friend's place ( Ovidius Vasilievsky ) where I was staying was pretty close to the event's location and starting line so I started to walk. The rain was falling heavy on me and I said to myself that is gonna be a messy run. When I got there it just stopped. Just my luck. Starting to look over the people that were running for the same cause, chit chatted a bit and went for the the warm-up in front of a big stage.

After 20 minutes of warm-up, everyone gathered at the starting line. I hopped there will be someone that I knew that will want to be there for me. I just started to be a bit realistic and thought about who the fuck will stay under the clouds, cold and with the prospect of raining over their heads. You can always find something to chat with other unknown people about different kind of things: about the equipment, about the time they will make for the run, about the skinny African athletes, thinking how they can run like the antelopes with just a small piece of muscle on their legs.

BANG ! and this was the starting signal everyone were moving to the starting line and after that slowly running. First 5 kilometres is where you start passing over the large amount the participants that have a slow pace. Just hopping in front of the slower participants getting around them did the trick. And then the rain came. It was not enough that I had to go around the different size of pool waters as much as I could but the rain. Too bad i didn't bring something over my head. My thoughts were "Keep on running".

It was a nice feeling to run under the rain. To flush some of my disappointments of this year. Not making to Ecuador, not reconnecting with some of my friends, not finding an internship until now. All that needed to be flushed away....I overcame old men who were running and old men overcame me. I saw the men stranded on the wheel chair who had the power to get over their handicap and participate. I thought of congratulating each and everyone of them for their initiative. I did for one man who was on the wheel chair. I told him: "Congratulations sir" he nodded appreciating my gest and I kept on running.

I finished my first 10 km pretty easy. At the end of the first lap I always saw relatives or friends cheering or encouraging some of the runners. I thought: "Damn....they are so freaking lucky".

Next 5 km were pretty hard. It felt that each km was longer than before. I had one guy with a pink t-shirt who overcame me and got him as a reference point. Never lose him out of my sight. This was my goal. I got through him because I think he got tired at km no. 15 or 16. There were participants who were faster. If the first 10 km I got overcame runners the next 10 km I was overcame by others. It was a bit frustrating but I kept running.

Last 5 km were the hardest. The longest distance that I had ran was 16 km the next 5 km were to be quite hard. I kept thinking of positive things like: energy, love, courage, friendship. Kept thinking why the hell I was here and the answers kept coming: "for the cause, to overcome myself, to achieve my goals, to demonstrate myself that I can keep going". Last 3, last 2, last km. I could hear friends cheering for their loved ones "Come on !!!!", "You can do it!!!!!!", "Bravoooooo" or "Just a few metres left". I kept running. I could see the finish line and in the end it was over. It was an amazing feeling, tired, exhausted and feeling that I could cry, a feeling of fulfilment. I gave my tracking chip away, someone handed me the medal and I had to take the Finish picture.

Flushed, tired but happy.

I got to the organisation tent, thanked them for inviting me, went for my massage and for the changing tent. I heard the winners getting awarded. Half-marathon winner 1h 3'....damn and I got 1h 48'.

Wondered around the square and went back home for well deserved rest.

What next ? Might be Florence, Pisa or Lisbon. We'll see.

For all those you read this post know that I ran for an non-governmental organization called "Viitor Plus" (Future Plus) and their cause "Adopt a tree". You can still donate money for projects of foresting degraded lands in Romania. You can contact me on my email (mihai.negru@gmail.com) for further details.

Adopt a tree now

2011-09-29T21:51:00.003+05:00

I've been running a lot lately and exercising for one of my goals for this year, of being able to run 21 km and I was thinking of actually participating at the half-marathon competition of the Bucharest International Marathon.I expressed my wish to participate on of the alumni groups I am subscribed but I wasn't quite sure.

Eventually I was pleased to accept the invitation from "Future Plus - Sustainable Development Association" whose president is Teia Gavrilescu (Alumnus AIESEC Romania) to attend the Bucharest International Marathon and run for the cause "Adopt a Tree" for the project "Forest of the Children". Thus on October 9 will participate in the race for half-marathon (21,097 km). YUHUUUU !

"Forest of the Children" is a project of forestation of degraded lands through fundraising. 24.5 hectares have been forested in three years in villages across Romania.

You can become one of the adoptive parents by providing funds for tree planting and care of the forest until it reaches mature.

Who wants to support the cause and become an adoptive parent to a tree, two, three or more you can contact me personally or my phone number (0040 729 323 723) or my e-mail (mihai.negru@gmail.com) until October 5th.

For bank transfers here are my accounts:

RO30INGB0000999900873274 - EURO
RO75INGB0000999900780799 - RON
Swift Code: INGBROBU
If you are abroad you can also fund the cause through Western Union.

We some some people doing something for someone or something and we always wish to do the same but sometimes we lack something. Now you have the opportunity. Doesn't matter how much. You know you did something.

An old Chinese proverb is saying:

The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago.
The second best time, is today.

Coming back home

2011-09-28T13:52:00.000+05:00

Three months ago as I was saying I came back home after a 10 months experience in Azerbaijan "The Land of Fire". I went though different feelings from June and until now. It was a feeling of excitement that I am gonna be home and sadness that I am going to leave some people behind. It made me feel numb together with the stress of the never ending tasks and responsibilities. The stress was all gone when I finally passed the border with Georgia and when I got the plane to Romania.

I was looking forward for coming back home with a real thirst of sharing and meeting my friends and family, telling them about my experience, reconnecting with them. Any long time away from home has it's own consequences.

I was not expecting from my parents not to ask so many questions because frankly they don't know what questions to ask and even from my close relatives I the only question that I got was "And how was it Mihai over there?" and moved on really quickly to the next topic. I found myself in the same place, same people but different. People don't have the time or the will to spend more time when you really need it. Even the best people that you know won't care until you tell them to (although that doesn't really work).

Few key learning points during and after a long time away from home:

- communication is important with the people you know;

- people/pals come and go;

- doesn't matter who you were and what happened in that past, what matters is the present (that's the harsh truth);

- your friends won't stop changing for you, they will move on get into relationships, jobs and their time will be precious;

- never ever have high expectations or at least have right ones;

- you will find so few people that know what you are going through, know what to talk about and have the genuine interest about what have you been through ; if you have them your are lucky.

I remember that several times I spent hours with a people talking about their experience in another country with a true genuine interest (something that I learned from Dale Carnegie). It was a fine pleasure to listen and discover what they discovered over there. In these three months I wished there was someone to do the same for me.

A short story of my experience in Azerbaijan

2011-09-24T13:45:00.000+05:00

It has been three months since I arrived from my experience in Azerbaijan. Last year in September I was in Baku in the BOA chair's apartment, planning things, talking to the few members that we had and beginning a new stage in AIESEC Azerbaijan history.

It was hard, we had to adapt and to manage things with limited amount of resources, dealing with promises from companies or Governmental institutions. For example I got my living permit after three months from applying because there was a letter missing from a Ministry or money that came from partners after three or four months. Sometimes it felt like a survival experience over there and God knows there were moments when the fridge was almost empty. I even made it with 25 euros a week which included food, drinks and transportation around the city.

The cultural differences were something that I had to adapt to like the inequality between men and women, the lack of freedom that most girls have there. The first shock was in my first week when we had a movie night at 5 PM and all the girls left at 8 PM or a disco party that started and ended at the same hours. Going to a club from 5 PM was something that never happened to me. The dark colors people wore on the street or in the metro was a bit depressing for me. The ongoing fight with the car drivers to stop at the pedestrian crossing. I hated the war and the way it clouds people thinking. Some of them thought of Armenians all evil people which was not true.

I loved the food, the city centre of Baku, the Old Karavan Saray from Sheki, some of their traditions, their desire to grow the country, their hospitality, the Qəlyan, the tea and none the less the hard working people that we manage to have in our organization. I always say people are more important than the places you are in. These are the people that we formed and all of you hard working people know that you made my experience fulfilling and continue to be passionate about what you like:

People that helped in all this experience was my sister which came to visit and I wanted so much more of my friends to do the same, Kent (I owe you big my friend), Farid, Alex, Zazu (I owe you too my Tanzanian friend), Ioana and Ceci for a nice Easter together, Danu, Ramona, Andreea, Abbas for the great qəlyan we had together and Myron for being such cool roomie. I have to appreciate all the really hardworking people with whom I worked with: Zara(one of the best LCPs ever, in her application form she drew me on a rainbow - unforgettable), Nurana, Aynur Alyieva,, Lamyia, Ulker, Baba, Tahmina & Nigar (they come in pair:P), Piri, Ragim (the apartment hunter) and Rahim.

In the end I have to thank a special person from Ecuador that I didn't manage to visit because of timing/money issues. She made my morning and evenings so much easy to bare. She made me believe again and that's important. I will keep my promise like I always do.

...and now we are starting a new chapter. More on next post.

10 things to learn from Japan

2011-05-27T23:26:00.003+05:00

I got this message from the AIESEC Romania alumni group. I was really impressed and I think we all need to learn something from them. I'm afraid of how things are going to happen in case of a big earthquake in Romania.

1. Calm - No images with great pain. The pain itself was lifted away.

2. Dignity -Queues for water and food were so disciplined. No pushing around, just calm.

3. Knowhow - Architects did an incredible job. The buildings were trembling but did not fall.

4. Grace - People were just buying the necessary things, so everyone was getting something to eat or drink.

5. Order - No robberies in stores. Without horns and traffic jams. Just mutual understanding.

6. Sacrifice - Fifty workers stayed to pump water into the reactors. How much will they ever be rewarded?

7. Tenderness- restaurants reduced their prices, non-functional ATMs were not robbed, the healthy ones were taking care of their weak.

8. Training - Elders and children, everyone knew exactly what to do. And they did exactly the right thing.

9. Media - they showed a magnificent restraint in the news. Nothing sensational. Just calm reports.

10. Consciousness - If the electricity goes down in a shop, people put things back on the shelves and leave quietly.

Stay Hungry Stay Foolish by Steve jobs

2011-05-14T22:21:00.004+05:00

I've seen this movie about four years ago and still has an impact on me. I discussed it today with my conversation clubs. I think it did had an impact on them but when it comes to do something different in their lives they came with the same conclusions: people, it's not possible to do that, other people's opinion is more important than ours and so on...

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:
Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.
Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.
My second story is about love and loss.
I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.
I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.
I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.
During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.
I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.
My third story is about death.
When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.
Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.
This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:
No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.
Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.
Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
Thank you all very much.

How to meet Shrek and donkey in Baku

2011-05-04T15:47:00.001+05:00

Meeting these two fictional characters takes an evening with a lot fun and the most amazing and cheap beer that you can find in Baku, NZS and flavored with some good Azeri dishes.

It all happened on a Friday evening when one friend from Canada, Kent calls me to ask me if I wanna go out with him and other friends to drink a beer. Of course I accepted because I didn't have so much time for myself. We started the evening totally different. We didn't go where all the foreigners go but the old Azeri/Russian places where is cheap and you can eat some really, really good food. I guess the ex-pats places don't have the same charm.

Imagine a place where they don't even have a toilette, you had to go out, across the street and go to a public one. Beer was 0.6$ and it was the unfiltered/unpasteurized one. Even for locals was kind strange to see foreigners in these bars, enjoying and have fun. It was one of the rarest times I saw people staring at me. We finished quite early and I didn't know that my friend, Kent, had a plan to visit other two places.

Didn't really matter people were looking at us or the fact that the places were filthy/unclean. We really had fun.

We went out on a quest to search for a karaoke place as a last thing to do. After some time of searching we finally found a place that didn't have the loud music. It was the first time when you could've order the songs and then sing it at your one TV. It was also showing the score of how good you did. I sang Smooth Criminal, Serenata (Italian singer Toto Cotugno) and an incredible duet with my friend Kent: Last Christmas.

I scored 96/97 out of 100 so that was pretty impressive :D.

So where the hell was Shrek. You can find it on this place we sang karaoke. All you need is some good beer to get you in the mood. Found him when we arrived, a bit scary at the beginning but his a good dude. Donkey is fun to ride. :)

You can find Shrek and Donkey, Sahil area, near McDonalds.

Czech President Vaclav Klaus stealing a pen

2011-04-13T12:43:00.002+05:00

I think as a president you can ask after the press conference for the pen. Maybe it's the excitement of not getting caught.

One day in Baku

2011-04-11T20:04:00.001+05:00

Another nicely done video about Baku.

Baku at "Build it Bigger" on Discovery Channel

2011-04-06T21:01:00.003+05:00

"Build it Bigger" is one of the shows Discovery Channel broadcasts in Europe and in US. The program features futuristic and ongoing engineering projects. I did watch it while I was in Romania and it was no surprise to see that they have an episode about Baku, talking about Heydar Aliyev Cultural Center and the Flame Towers.

Thoughts about Quba

2011-04-05T09:27:00.003+05:00

It's sometimes challenging to understand AIESEC and the way the organization works and the people that are part of it. Everything goes so smoothly if you go for an AIESEC conference from the beginning.

In AIESEC Azerbaijan this was the second conference of my term. Being in the Land of Fire we called this local/national conference "Flame 2011". We decided to make this event in Quba another important touristic resort of Azerbaijan. One interesting fact about this city is that one it's suburb, Qırmızı Qəsəbə, also known as Krasnaya Sloboda in Russian, is the home of Azerbaijan's largest community of Mountain Jews and considered as one of the largest community of Jews in the former-Soviet Union. This is one thing and as a local legend I heard that the place hosts one of the President's resting houses or complex for him and his guests. Didn't see it. Might be a rumor or just reality.

Looking back at my list of conferences that I attended this was my 35th and don't think there's one that I forgot. Looking at list I have so many memories, the fun, the trainings, even the nights that I spent partying, enjoying them with the other participants, were just amazing. Even the bad experiences stick out as helpful ones and things to talk about.

The memory that I am going to get from this conference is actually making the conference happen. I think not so many knew why were we going to Quba, girls started to quit because of parents, others because of money or just total lack of responsibility. Working with people it's the most challenging thing in the world. In the two weeks I was organizing it together with an old member, Baba, I remembered one of my friend's saying: "The more I know people, the more I love dogs". That was the feeling that I got before the conference, when talking to 44 different people, by e-mail, phone and text messaging. What an experience.

In total we were 18 which was great because in a smaller group people tend to know and bound to each other better. In the end people felt great and that's what's important, they learned new skills and information, they got to be more opened with each other, we celebrated earth hour which so freaking cool, we relaxed, we gossiped, we wished and we got or wishes and expectations fulfilled.

I am grateful for the people that attended the conference and made it happen, for Baba which kept the relation with the hotel and I think was going crazy every time I was saying that the number of participants is getting lower by the day. Grateful for Ramona one of the Romanian interns who helped us during the conference and I am most grateful for a Canadian dude, Kent, who's been helping me and the team a lot since the beginning.

I think one of the things that I enjoyed was playing with Kent ping pong during the breaks and the excitement of getting my ass kicked 80% of the time.

This conference gave me other memories that for sure will stick to me and will last for a lifetime. The only thing that I wish is that members here will act responsible and dedicate themselves to make this organization better, stronger and bigger. It's so easy to receive things for granted but so hard to build things. I wish they will make AIESEC here the organization that is so known abroad and that it's creating such amazing experiences for so many people every year.

A world without Romania

2011-04-04T19:43:00.004+05:00

Romanians who are watching this movie might say "yeah I've seen this, it's pretty old dude". Yeah...sure but it's a reminder of the things people might know about Romania or don't know and have a big "woooow" moment. Non-Romanians you will be surprised so just enjoy. :)

Alcohol and Yoga almost the same benefits

2011-04-03T18:10:00.005+05:00

One good friend of mine send an e-mail with these funny pictures and I wanted to share them with you.

Dolphin - this position is recommended for the shoulders, thorax, legs and arms.

Ananda Balasana - this position is good for massaging the thighs.

Malasana - a good exercise for the back and ankles.

Pigeon - Tone the body, increases flexibility and helps to relax

Balasana - a position that gives a sensation of peace and relaxation

Marjayasana - Strengthen the position of the diaphragm and spine.

Setu Bandha Sarvangasana - this position relaxes the brain and calms down the tired legs.

Halasana - excellent for treating lower back pain and insomnia.

Salambhasana - A very good exercise for strengthening the lower back, legs and arms.

A question of morality

2011-04-01T21:16:00.009+05:00

I talked earlier with my sister for a few hours and she was asking me to give her an advice about a situation she is facing with. I put myself in her situation and kinda sucks.

So we have 5 people. Some of them I know, one of those people is my sis' and other I don't care. I will just use letters to identify them and the whole thing is going to be like an equation.

So:

A & B - is a couple that she knows. They are in serious relationship. "A" being a devoted man and B the woman. B is going to leave for France to have a PhD and they are committed to have a long distance relationship. Or at least this is what A told my sister.

C - is a man, a common friend of my sister. He, by the first appearance is a kind and polite man.

D - is a good friend of B. They sometimes talk about their latest accomplishments in terms of men they slept with.

E - is my sister. She knows A(the man) from her work, he is really devoted to his relationship with B really wants to make things work although B is going to France. My sister know all about his relationship from the talks with him and from Facebook.

So my sister is at this official reception with A, B, C and D. They all have some drinks, some cookies or whatever they do at official receptions. A, B and C leave the event while D and E stay for more and enjoy the reception.

After a few hours B calls D telling her that she slept with C and it was amazing.

My sisters when she found out she was totally bothered by the whole situation. She doesn't like or love A but she cares about A as a person who doesn't deserve to be in a relationship with B. She never thought that C can do these kinda stuff.

She asked me what she can do in this situation. If she tells B she will ruin her friendship with C and most probably with D also. If she tells A he will be heartbroken. Some people will lose stuff.

What do you think can be done in this kind of a situation ?

Some people or facts might be just fiction. I just want to task what would you do in this kind of situation.

Amazing technology from Google

2011-04-01T18:07:00.004+05:00

I've tried and it really works. First watch this movie and then click on the link below. Simply amazing these guys. I don't know what I would have done without Gmail

Try Gmail Motion now: http://mail.google.com/mail/help/motion.html

Believing again

2011-03-30T00:19:00.007+05:00

I have seen so many people in my life breaking up and being disappointed of having a relationship it was hard to think about my life with someone. In one of my post first feeling of freedom I was hoping of finding someone here in Azerbaijan. I was hoping that I will find someone that will share my passions, that will focus on the meaningful things in life, that believes in self evolution and in changing herself for the other half, a person that will have the four s: simple, sensitive, sexy and smart. I hoped she was here. She wasn't. After 3 months of work and living in this country I knew that my chances were really low. I even was a bit frustrated about the past and wanted just to ditch my values and principles aside and just play the game(hook up, sleep with them and never call back). Started to do it 'til one point, worked pretty well, having all the lines and tricks in place but it was not for me. Even the one night stands that I could've have, didn't feel right. I knew it was not me doing these kind a stuff so I just stopped it.

In January one way or another I did find her, 10 000 km away from Azerbaijan, across the Atlantic Ocean, somewhere in Central America in Guatemala. Or she found me :). Her name is Heidy. It all started just for fun, it continued as fun and desire to know each other more and it got to be so much more. Sometimes I do lose track of how it all happened. I guess we saw that we have so much in common and that we care about each other, which makes all the difference in the world.

After two months and a half I made the decision that after my experience in Azerbaijan I will go to Ecuador, Guayaquil and spend two months with her. The magical date is 19th of August 2011 and the clock never ticked slower than this. Maybe some people might say that it's the craziest, unconscious and most immature decision that someone can take. At this moment I don't regret it and I don't think I will. When you see in the morning that someone is writing to you and tells that cares about you, that makes all the difference in the world.

I met Heidy a few years back in Brazil, first time at airport in Sao Paolo. All the delegations from each AIESEC country were meeting there to go for YouCan! International conference. We stayed one night in Sao Paolo with a nice group that we formed. Meanwhile we visited some parts of Sao Paolo, she once send me a video where we were on top of a sky scrapper and I was telling her she was great. Had no recollection of that video until I saw it.

Nothing happened during or after the conference, I was in a relationship back then, but we did make some nice photos. Here's one of those photos in Sao Paolo.

For now it's a long distance relationship. I didn't really believe in this kind of relationship if someone would ask me four months before. To be sincere I want to wake up early in the morning to make up for the 11 hour difference between us, to listen to her, to see her, to empathize, to appreciate the way she is, to to say that I love her it's what keeps me going and what makes me living.

I have my fears but for now I wanna think just in present time and the months that I am going to spend in South America with her. That's all.

So I am just going to end my post with something that my sister said once: "It takes a lot of love, sense of humor and optimism to make any serious relationship to go. Much much respect and devotion."

Chuck Norris facts read by Chuck Norris

2011-03-29T13:15:00.001+05:00

You thought Chuck Norris didn't know about the things are being told about him ? Well...you were wrong. Here is the proof:

How not get your ass kicked by the police

2011-03-23T22:35:00.002+04:00

Really nice gig from the Chris Rock Show from a few years ago. I think the advices can be applied to so many countries. Learn from this and you won't get your ass kicked by the police.

Best Indian movie scenes ever

2011-03-21T10:51:00.002+04:00

A piece of advice about computers....

2011-03-20T17:56:00.004+04:00

A small conversation that reminds me of the time (10years ago) when I was explaining my colleagues in the high school how they can download stuff from the Internet or many, many other advices to improve their experience with their computer. Enjoy !

Operator: "Company X, customer assistance, how may I help you?"

Caller: "Yeah, well, I'm having trouble with WordPerfect."

Operator: "What kind of problems?"

Caller: "Well, while I was writing, suddenly the words ran away "

Operator: "Ran away?"

Caller: "Yes, ran away"

Operator: "Now what does your screen show at this moment?

Customer: "Nothing"

Operator: "Nothing?"

Customer: "It is empty, does not accept anything I write"

Operator: "Are you still in WordPerfect, or did quit the program ?"

Customer: "How can I tell?"

Operator: "You see the program window on the screen?"

Customer: "What is that a window?"

Operator: "Never mind. You can move the cursor on the screen?

Customer: "There is not any cursor: I told you I doesn’t accept anything I type"

Operator: "The monitor has a power light that will indicate if it’s opened or not"

Customer: "What is that a monitor?"

Operator: "It's the the screen like a TV that will show what you write. Does it have a little light that tells you whether is open or not ?"

Customer: "I do not know"

Operator: "Well, look behind the monitor and see where it leads the cord. Can you see it ?"

Customer: "Yes, yes, I think yes

Operator: "Perfect .. Watch and see if the cable is plugged in"

Customer: "Yes,"

Operator: "When you were behind the monitor, did you notice that there were two cables in the back, not just one?"

Customer: "No."

Operator: "Well, there are two. Please look back there again and find the second cable

Customer: "I found it"

Operator: "Follow it and see if the other end is inserted in the back of the computer"

Customer: "I can’t reach it"

Operator: "Okay. But can you see if it’s there??"

Customer: "No."

Operator: "Even if you try to lean more you still do not see it?"

Customer: "I can’t see, not because I can’t lean to it, but because it's dark in the office."

Operator: "Dark?"

Customer: "Yes, the office light is off, and the only light I have is coming from the window but it's not enough"

Operator: "Well, please open the light for several minutes"

Customer: "I can’t"

Operator: "You can’t ? Why?"

Customer: "Because it's a power blackout "

Operator: "So .......... blackout?? Oh, yeah, okay, I now understand the problem. Do you still have the box and manuals the computer came with?

Customer: "Yes, I keep them in the closet"

Operator: "Very good. Go get them, unplug your system, wrap it in the box as it was when you bought it. Then take it to the store where you bought it"

Customer: "Really? Is it that serious?"

Operator: "Yes, I'm afraid it is.

Customer: "Okay, then. What do I tell them ?"

Operator: "Tell them you're too stupid to have a computer !"

True friendship last for a lifetime

2011-03-17T10:21:00.005+04:00

Two years ago I found this video of a true story (from "christian, the lion who thought he was people"). I reviewed this video so many times until now, still gives me the goose bumps and touches me every time. Soundtrack isn't so good, first time I saw it, was Whitney Houston - "I will always love you". Now you have Aeroshmith. Enjoy !

True friendship lasts for a lifetime. Get in touch with someone today. He/She will be glad you did it.

Celebrating 10th of March

2011-03-15T23:44:00.005+04:00

You probably read my post about my not so good day of 9th of March. Well the next day was, of course, 10th of March which is from this year The International Day of Awesomeness.

The International Day of Awesomeness is a celebration of awesomeness. People are awesome every day, frequently don't realize it, and their feats of awesomeness are rarely recognized. This day was aiming to fix that, with a special day to both perform and celebrate feats of awesomeness!

The way to celebrate The International Day of Awesomeness was pretty simple: just be awesome the whole day.

The International Day of Awesomness occurs every year on March 10th. Why? Because that's Chuck Norris' birthday.

Here's a picture of me after a long day of awesomeness. :)

The President's speech

2011-03-15T23:26:00.001+04:00

If that would've happen....

Not a good day for Men Day

2011-03-09T19:11:00.004+04:00

March 9. In Romania 9th of March is Men Day. Romanian dudes just go and get smashed today with 44 shots of alcohol. For me was suppose to be a normal day in my life where I had interviews with candidates for AIESEC. It turned out to be one of those days where you just wash it off with some good hours of sleep.

Morning. I wake up early in the morning like I usually do in the last period to read some nice messages. No problem I have Internet I read the messages I get a smile on my face like always and go back to sleep. After a few hours I woke up, no Internet.

No problem, I just have to go to the provider pay it, problem solved. I find the address and with the clients name I went to pay. It seems that the lady at the provider didn't need the name but just the subscription number. NO problem I saw, I go back home check that number out.

My colleague calls me on my way back home: "dude there's no electricity in the building, we will have to take the interviews to a coffee place nearby". NO problem I say. On my way to the coffee place, have the unfortunate image of a dead homeless man laying on the grass and being picked up by the police. From what it seemed he died from the intense cold. "God forgive his soul" I say in my mind and I move on". Finish a few round of interview: 6 cups of tea, 8 manats(euro). No problem. Lunch comes up where to go ?

We found this really "lovely" place in which I think it had so many clients lately that we were the ones that were keeping the place in business. One soup, one coffee and four small pieces of meat: 10 manats(euro). No problem we were hungry.

We went back for the coffee place and continue our interviews. Ordered some gem and tea that are usually cheap in Azerbaijan. We did it for the candidates to feel OK and for us to at least have a clean image. Two rounds of tea and gem: 13 manats. Meanwhile electricity went up but was too late to pay the Internet.

No problem, tomorrow is a better day. Tomorrow will be just awesome!

A kid doing magic at Norway Got Talent

2011-03-04T23:26:00.003+04:00

I just saw this movie on facebook and I said it should really go on my blog. It's the first time I see something from Norway Got Talent, below you will see a kid that performs a nice magic number and even for his age(six years old) he is just great. You don't need to know Norwegian to understand what is happening.

Life simply explained

2011-03-02T13:46:00.002+04:00

On the first day, God created the dog and said to him:

"Every day you will sit at the door of the house and bark at anyone entering or passing by. For this, I'll give you 20 years of life."

The dog said: "It's too much time to sit and bark. Would it be OK if you would give me only ten years and keep the other ten?" And God agreed.

The next day, God created the monkey and said to her:

"Cheer the humans with your monkey skils and make them laugh. For that I give you a lifetime of 20 years."

Monkey said: "To be mocked for 20 years? That's pretty much! Would it be OK if you would give me only ten years and keep the other ten as you did with the dog ?" God agreed.

The third day, God created the cow and said to her:

"You will go all day on the field with the peasant, you suffer the heat of the sun and give milk to support the family of your peasant. For that I give you 60 years of life."

The cow said: "That's a pretty hard life, and you want me to live for 60 years. Would it be ok to to keep 20 and return 40?"

And God has also accepted this time.

On the fourth day, God created man and said:

"Eat, sleep, marry and enjoy life. For this, I'll give you 20 years."

But man said: "Only 20 years? It is possible to give me my 20 years, the 40 that you took from the cow, the 10 and 10 from monkey and dog, to have a life 80 years? "

"Sure!" God said, "you asked for it"

So that is why in the first 20 years we eat, sleep, play and have fun. Next 40 years working as slaves in the sun that we support our families. After you 10 years cheer your grandchildren. And the last 10 years we spend at our house porch barking at everyone.

Now life has been explained to you!

How to play a freakin' Sudoku

2011-03-02T12:11:00.005+04:00

While I am in the subway I have the habit of either listening to an audio book or play a game called Sudoku. Everytime that I try to explain how you play it just confuses people more and just don't want to play. It really works for your brain and keep the cognitive areas functioning.

The objective is to fill a 9×9 grid with digits so that each column, each row, and each of the nine 3×3 sub-grids that compose the grid (also called "boxes", "blocks", "regions", or "sub-squares") contains all of the digits from 1 to 9.

Here is a movie that can explain how the game works:

You can start playing the game here: http://www.websudoku.com/

What the....Mărţişor is this ?

2011-03-01T08:53:00.000+04:00

It's first of 1st March I am 4000 km away from Romania now and I miss going on the streets and see vendors selling spring flowers and Mărţişoare. Small kids buying these things for their teachers, moms, friends or sisters. Grown men buying for their wives or female work colleagues. Here I've been promoting AIESEC and trying to attract the right people in the organization. I must say I had some high expectations from these students but that's another topic.

So what the....Mărţişor am I all talking about here. Mărțișor is a traditional celebration of the beginning of Spring, on 1 March. The name Mărțișor is the diminutive of marț, the old folk name for March (Martie, in modern Romanian), and thus literally means "little" or "dear March".Mărțișor, marţ and mărțiguș are all names for the red and white (or black and white, also blue and white in other regions within the Balkans) string, from which usually a small decoration is tied, and which is offered by people on the 1st day of March.

Giving this Talisman to other people is an old custom, and it is believed that the one who wears the red and white string will be powerful and healthy for the year to come. It is also a symbol of the coming spring. Usually, women wear it pinned to their blouses for the first 12 days of this month, until other certain spring celebrations, or until the bloom of certain fruit-trees. In some regions, a gold or silver coin is hanged from the string, which they wear it around the neck. After wearing it for a certain period of time, they buy red wine and sweet cheese with the coin, according to the belief that their faces would remain beautiful and white as cheese, and rubicund as the red wine, for the entire year.

A happy 1st of March for all the girls that are reading this post and a beautiful and warm Spring.

The Khojaly Massacre

2011-02-26T18:44:00.000+04:00

Today was an important for the Azeri people and a day that is marked forever in Azerbaijani history and heart of its people. It is a sensitive post and I am just going to refer in terms of official data and not make any kind of personal opinion over this topic. I know everyone in Romania is keen to approach for example Moldavia or other parts taken by USSR after second world war.

The Khojaly Massacre was the killing of hundreds of ethnic Azerbaijani civilians from the town of Khojaly on 25–26 February 1992 by the Armenian and Russian armed forces during the Nagorno-Karabakh War. According to the Azerbaijani side, as well as Memorial Human Rights Center, Human Rights Watch and other international observers, the massacre was committed by the ethnic Armenian armed forces, reportedly with help of the Russian 366th Motor Rifle Regiment, apparently not acting on orders from the command. The official death toll provided by Azerbaijani authorities is 613 civilians, including 106 women and 83 children.The event became the largest massacre in the course of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

I checked it on the Internet and this is what the other side is saying. Armenian side officially claims that the killings occurred as a result of wartime military operations, and were in part caused by the prevention of the evacuation of town inhabitants by Azerbaijani forces. Armenian government officials asserted that the casualty count, though high, was due to the fact the fleeing civilians in Khojaly had mingled with the retreating defenders and when the Azeri troops shot back, Armenian forces fired upon them, killing both soldier and civilian alike. Helsinki Watch itself concluded "that the militia, still in uniform, and some still carrying their guns, were interspersed with the masses of civilians." However, Human Rights Watch and Memorial, found this explanation of Armenian officials unconvincing, stating that the killing of civilians could not be justified under any circumstances. Human Rights Watch noted that “the attacking party [i.e., Karabakh Armenian forces] is still obliged to take precautionary measures to avoid or minimize civilian casualties. In particular, the party must suspend an attack if it becomes apparent that the attack may be expected to cause civilian casualties that are excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated."

Monument to the victims of the massacre in Baku. Passing by the it mostly each day.

What an artist does...while a baby sleeps

2011-02-26T00:14:00.000+04:00

You will probbaly going to have some "awww" and sooo cute when you are going to see these pictures so enjoy...

Xaş, hamam, lunch, free hugs and movies in one Sunday.

2011-02-23T22:48:00.000+04:00

I was looking forward for the Sunday that just passed two weeks ago. Kent, a Canadian guy, who's one of the closest persons here in Azerbaijan set up a day where we can experience some of the things that Azerbaijani men do: eat Khash, drink vodka, go to a Hamam and after it have a well deserved lunch. It's not they do it one day. I guess we just wanted to try them all in one day.

So we wake up early in the morning, meet close to the city center at 8 o'clock, with Kent and with other two American friends of him Kyle and Nick. We head down to this, mmm let's say rustic place. I was amazed a few days prior to that Sunday that in some bars you can bring your own drinks. We sat down in a private room in the bar and Kent brought two bottles of vodka: a small one and a big one and ordered one bottle of beer for everyone.

Me and Kyle

Appetizers arrived and then the Khash or Xaş arrived. Four big bowls of Khash. So you might ask what hell is Khash ? Well the main ingredient in khash is cow's feet, although other cow parts, such as the head and stomach (tripe) may also be used. The feet are depilated, cleaned, kept in cold water in order to get rid of bad smell, and boiled in water all night long, until the water has become a thick broth and the meat has separated from the bones. No salt or spices are added during the boiling process. The dish is served hot. How does it sound ? Not that appealing huh ? You can add salt, garlic, lemon juice, or vinegar according to your own tastes. I put some garlic and salt to it.

So that's when the early party started. We talked about Baku wanted to host the Olympic Games and the projects that they needed to implement in order to be a competitive city candidate for the Games. We also talked about someone in our group getting married to an Azeri girl and how that worked until now. One year and half without doing "something" that's a real commitment for sure. Talked about our jobs and our relations with colleagues at work. In between we had the occasional shot of vodka until we finished the two bottles and also the beers that came along. I couldn't finish the Khash neither did nick but Kent and Kyle did passed the test. We left the pub somewhere around 10 and headed for Hamam.

This is us around 10 in the morning a bit tipsy: I, Kyle, Kent and Nick

Hamam was just amazing. Last time when I was in a Turkish bath was 3 years ago when I went to a five star hotel for a conference in Turket. God I missed it. We went to this place where you had two saunas, a dry one and a wet one. Gosh it was relaxing I could go there everyday and relax in a sauna or in the cold pool.

That's just not my belly. The wind was blowing inside.

We headed afterwards to have brunch...weeeell it was planned to be brunch but it wasn't. Arrived somewhere in one bazar close to the center around 1 or 2 PM to this really old place. We ordered the a few omelettes. Usually I wouldn't like to go these old places. But I think it's part of the experience that I have here that makes me experiment. The omelettes were just excellent in my opinion. Either was the alcohol was talking or the cook was good I did really enjoyed it.

Next stop after the guys went up for a event that I wanted to o for a really long time: "Free hugs day". I had a T-Shirt with free hugs but I never went for the actual event. So I headed down to the city center where I knew that some youngsters were gathering up. Now, my initial excitement went down immediately because in Azerbaijan not everyone is going to hug if you go and ask. I am not good with speaking Azeri myself. Only the guys who had a Free Hugs sign written on a cardboard had luck. So I just settled hugging the agents to give an example for the passing citizens.

Next stop was Flex Alumni office. Flex that stands for Future Leaders Exchange which is a scholarship student exchange program administered by the U.S.A. The program provides opportunities for high school students (ages 15-17) from former Soviet Union (including Russia, countries from Caucasus, Moldavia and Russia) to spend a year in the United States, living with a host family and attending an American high school. I had a good collaboration with Leyla the Flex Alumni Coordinator and I've been invited to their Valentine's day movie event. Although I've seen the movie twice (Valentine's day) I do like to visit their office because it really reminds me of the AIESEC office back home: full of pictures, signs, drawings, testimonials of people that had the exchange experience. Also the people remind me of the people that I have here in AIESEC and that I always meet at conferences.

Full day. Either the small hangover, the sauna or the desire to have a nap after a good lunch I felt that I needed a good night sleep. Came back home at 8 PM and slept 12 well deserved hours. Had a full 13th of February.

What do people do on the internet at night

2011-02-21T01:26:00.001+04:00

My roomie just found this really cool website with funny pics and I just wanted to share on of them :)).

Source: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/state_web_winter

Who said Baku is not a touristic place

2011-02-17T00:35:00.000+04:00

I've been in Romania for the holidays and I was kinda indirectly proposing to my friends to come in Baku and visit. I got the reaction that either they don't have the money or it's not a cool place to visit.

I am gonna break down some heavy information so bear with me. Baku is one of Caucasus most important tourist destinations. I mean the hotels in city earned 7 million euros in 2009. Baku boasts many popular tourist and entertainment spots, such as the downtown Fountains Square. Baku's attraction also feature something that I didn't visit yet such as Yanar Dag, an ever-blazing spot of natural gas.

Also on 2 September 2010, with the innauguration of National Flag Square, Baku became home to world's tallest flagpole, included to the Guinness Book of Records. Something expensive but to be proud of as Azerbaijani.

....And for the girls Baku has several shopping malls, including Park Bulvar and the closest to my apartment is Amay Shopping Center, Azerbaijan's largest inner city shopping mall. To be sincere they didn't finish it yet and I don't know when they will. I got lost once in Amay trying to find an office.

I enjoyed a great deal of time inside the inner Old city or the Maiden Tower or the long walks on the nice pedestrian zone that they did along the Caspian Sea.

Talking about having a walk along the Caspian Sea this a a really big project that it will be finalized in 2014:

As I said in the previous posts Baku is now heavily under construction. These are some really nice projects that some companies are investing their money on:

There are many things out there about Baku but if I caught your attention you can find out more on the web.

Valentine's day on a happy note

2011-02-14T17:39:00.000+04:00

Some say I give to much attention to this holiday, some might say that I am not sensitive enough and I don't give the attention that it deserves. This is what I think if you love someone you don't need one day in one year to have a reason to love someone. You give everyday something: time, affection, you sacrifice for him/her.

I remember one story from Stephen Covey's book "7 habits of highly effective people" and it sounded like this:

"Stephen, I like what you're saying. But every situation is so different. Look at my marriage. I'm really worried. My wife and I just don't have the same feelings for each other we used to have. I guess I just don't love her anymore and she doesn't love me. What can I do?"

"The feeling isn't there anymore?" he asked.

"That's right," he reaffirmed.

"And we have three children we're really concerned about. What do you suggest?"

"Love her," he replied.

"I told you, the feeling just isn't there anymore."

"Love her."

"You don't understand. The feeling of love just isn't there."

"Then love her. If the feeling isn't there, that's a good reason to love her."

"But how do you love when you don't love?"

"My friend, love is a verb. Love -- the feeling -- is a fruit of love the verb. So love her. Sacrifice. Listen to her. Empathize. Appreciate. Affirm her. Are you willing to do that?"

...and this goes both ways.

Now finishing this post on a happy note, I have two jokes for you

1.Love is Blind?

Phil, a smart and handsome young man, dressed in the latest fashion, walked into this local pub. He noticed a woman gazing at him without blinking her big eyes. Phil felt flattered so he walked up to the woman and said in his deepest voice, 'I'll do anything you wish, beautiful lady, for just £10 but on one condition.'

The woman appeared to be trapped in the moment and asked as if in a trance, 'What's your condition?'

Phil answered, 'Tell me your wish in just three words.'

There was a long pause, the woman opened her purse, counted out the money and handed it to the man along with her address. She then looked deeply into his eyes and whispered, 'Clean my house.'

2. Don't Make a Fuss About Valentine's Day

My dearest wife is always going on and on and ON about NOT making a fuss over her on Valentine's Day. She repeats that it's the thought that counts.

Well, I put a lot of thought into the gifts from previous February 14ths but she didn't quite take to any of them like I assumed she would. Here's my list - see what you think:

Brand new mop and bucket.I was thinking it would be fun to see what colour the floor was because I couldn't remember.
Romantic dinner at fast food restaurant.I was thinking that she might like to go inside for a change instead of fetching dinner at the drive through.
Chocolates left-over from last year's candy box.I was thinking of how proud she'd be of me for not wasting food. She's been nagging me for years to recycle.
Midnight moped ride through the park.I was thinking that I'm getting too old to be peddling on the bike.
Dozen roses printed on high quality photo paper. One of my favorites this -I was thinking these would last a lifetime instead of just a week.
45 second back massage. I was thinking any longer and she might think I was interested in something else.
Windows 7 - I was thinking how proud she would be to be a part of the technology crowd.

Azerbaijani bad boys night out

2011-01-31T15:44:00.000+04:00

One night while I was playing the protective boy(more or less of bodyguard) on a girls night out in Baku, I decided that the boys from AIESEC Azerbaijan didn't have the evening of their own.

One message in our internal group and the boys were on.

One of the guys, Baba, which you can find him as our hero in the post "Another Christmas story to tell my kids". His brother recommended a reaaally good place for us. So we met in a rainy evening and went straight to the location. It was somewhere underground with separate kind of rooms where someone with their bros could stay in quiet, drink their tea and smoke their qalian.

It was not that fancy as we thought of, really old wood, used couches, the walls were imprinted with fingers shapes, the chair that I sited on was not that stable. Since we were there didn't really matter if it was that bad, the only thing that matter was that we were their together.

Usually when you go this kind of places in Azerbaijan you get tea, sweets, gem and the Qəlyan. We started talking, talking and talking like boys: a little bit about relationships, good movies, history, politics and tea was not there. Again we started talking and every time we asked when we got the same reply: "It's coming". We finally got the tea in I think one hour and the Qəlyan in half an hour after the tea.

This is how a typical table look like with the tea and it can be more, like different kind of nuts or more gem:

I really like this kind of atmosphere when people are relaxed and can talk about different kind of stuff. This is how you know them better, this is how you connect. This time it was not that relaxing because it took forever for everything to come but still. It was pretty awesome.

One thing that people do is if you are a guest the bill. This will not happen again. I know it's something that proves hospitality and politeness. I appreciate it a lot and I respect it taking into consideration some of the financial challenges that I am facing.

This happened once with us, but it will not happen the second time or let's say if it happens again, definitely not the third time.

On our way home after a delightful kebab/shaorma, our friend Baba is telling us: "You know on our way to kebab I spotted the place that we were suppose to be the first time".

Another opportunity to go there next time!

More photos can be found here:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=266333&id=679152521&l=64c62b3919

Handsome Men's Club

2011-01-26T23:02:00.000+04:00

This a really funny gig performed by Jimmy Kennel and it's somehow related to the festivals in USA like Golden Globe or the Academy Awards(Oscar) where every magazine analyses which "celebrity" was sexy or not, which one dressed cool or not. The handsome Men's Club, although there's a small gay scene in the end it's still funny.

Lifehouse - Blind

2011-01-26T00:27:00.000+04:00

I am not such a big fan alternative rock or post-grunge but this band has some really good songs. Their last album Smoke and Mirrors just rocks, BIG TIME! They have some really good lyrics.

I was young but I wasn't naive

I watched helpless as he turned around to leave

and still I have the pain I have to carry

a past so deep that even you could not bury if you tried

after all this time

I never thought we'd be here

never thought we'd be here

when my love for you was blind

but I couldn't make you see it

couldn't make you see it

that I loved you more than you'll ever know

a part of me died when I let you go

I would fall asleep

only in hopes of dreaming

that everything would be like is was before

but nights like this it seems are slowly fleeting

they disappear as reality is crashing to the floor

after all this time

I never thought we'd be here

never thought we'd be here

when my love for you was blind

but I couldn't make you see it

couldn't make you see it

that I loved you more than you'll ever know

a part of me died when I let you go

after all this time

would you ever wanna leave it

maybe you could not believe it

that my love for you was blind

but I couldn't make you see it

couldn't make you see it

that I loved you more than you will ever know

a part of me died when I let you go

and I loved you more than you'll ever know

a part of me dies when I let you go

Some facts about barefoot running

2011-01-25T11:13:00.000+04:00

Barefoot running might be a new concept for us in a so called modern civilization. But think about it. Our ancestors did it thousand of years. They didn't wear Nike, Addidas, Puma or any other brand. Take a look at this video:

Can't wait to buy these shoes:

A few thoughts of HappyThankYouMorePlease

2011-01-24T12:36:00.000+04:00

Josh Radnor ( How I Met Your Mother) made his screen writing and directorial start at a film festival called Sundance with his movie HappyThankYouMorePlease.

The movie is all about six New Yorkers/three couples dealing with the problems of love, friendship and identity. This may sound familiar like any other movies but its charm is refreshing and its character keeps the film from becoming just a romantic comedy.

The first and main story focuses on Sam Wexler, a struggling writer (Radnor) during a a pretty bad day he encounters a young boy who’s been separated from his family in the subway. When the boy reveals that he is unhappy in foster care, Sam decides to bring the boy back to his apartment. The friendship that develops between the two of them, initiates and complicates Sam’s romance with a beautiful singer named Mississippi (Kate Mara).

The second story involves Sam’s best friend, Annie. Annie has alopecia, which is a condition that prevents her body from growing hair. Radnor has portrayed Annie as a strong, intelligent woman who is coming to terms with her baldness in a very endearing way. Basing the character on a real-life friend living with alopecia, Radnor has developed a character who is genuine and Akerman embraces that notion with an equally sincere performance. It's also the story of how she meets Sam #2 who's a co-worker and develops from being an annoying colleague, that is always coming int he bad moments to a caring and beautiful man. There's great scene when Annie tries to ditch him and he wins her back just by closing her eyes and making her listen. Unforgettable moment.

The third story involves Sam’s friends Charlie and Mary Katherine. Feeling their relationship is being tested as life pulls them in separate directions, they agonize over the idea of moving to Los Angeles. The chemistry and performances between Schreiber and Kazan is natural and exposed, lending to some of the best scenes in the film.

Radnor did a great movie where each character displays moments of vulnerability and exposure that give a sense of history and moments that have defined them. It is a film about gratitude, the acceptance of love, and the absence of cynicism.

My New Year Resolution

2011-01-20T20:34:00.000+04:00

My way back to Baku gave me some time to think about what I want to do this year, things that I want to achieve and live. I got to 25 main points that are randomly shown below.

Visit at least two new countries.
Be debt free this year and pay back 10% to sis'.
Get a job after the MC experience!
Go and visit Teona (Georgian friend that I have to fulfill a promise to)
Get into a relationship(been single for a really freakin' long time)
Get laid.
Smile more :)
Run 21 km.
Visit one of the most 100 beautiful places in the world.
Try to get to South America.
Donate money to charity.
Talk more with friends.
Read more books. (at least 12).
Learn Azerbaijani.
Get my most wanted running shoes (http://www.kayakshed.com/vibram-five-fingers/mens-five-finger-kso#)
Since I am in Azerbaijan I thought of meeting the Romanian coach Mircea Rednic and have a beer with him. :)
Learn to play chess in a good way not randomly as I am doing now.
Most importantly I need to repeat number 6 lots of times.
Surprise people around me.
Be nice !
Get drunk when it's appropriate.
Work on those six packs.
Believe more in myself.
Appreciate more !
Get closer to people.

The 23rd year of my life

2011-01-11T23:22:00.000+04:00

The age of 23. When you look at it's just a simple number. Or even the year 2010. Still a number. For me it was definitely an year of accomplishments, of failures, of dreams and hopes that some of them realized and others didn't. Sometimes I think of the road not taken but life has its own way of showing you that the road you are now on is the good one.

So let's make a recap of my year:

I started the year by being a little bit hated by some people for asking a question that was considered a personal attack at the local elections in AIESEC Galati. Thing that I somehow regret doing but only by the fact that I bursted in that moment for the shit that happened to me before. Chapter finished moving on.
I had the freaking plan of going in exchange with one person that I shared my life with for more than one year and a half. It was a plan or a dream that was just broken as I was afterwards and it all happened by having different expectations, lack of maturity, not being able to communicate enough and making a plan reality. I still think there's more to it.... Chapter finished, 95% over it.
I finished my term as coach for one local chapter in AIESEC in Romania, LC Constanta with whom I had the privilege to work with between June 2009 and April 2010. A team that was united, extraordinary joyful(sometimes too much), hardworking, passionate and it was definitely the place for me in that period.
It was also the year when I worked with an amazing team of AIESEC Romania with which I have a great respect for each and everyone of them for making history in 09/10. Working as LC coach was definitely an accomplishment for me. I felt great when two people from the EB team of AIESEC Constanta (Ana and Andrei) decided to run as coach and got elected, it felt even greater when I felt that my involvement and work was appreciated. I remember that I was not present for the elections of the new generations of coaches and after the whole process happened one president of AIESEC Bucharest approached me(I had her on my chat list but we never talked). She told me: "Mihai, I don't know what you did in Constanta but I saw everybody was talking about you, were asking the candidates how are they going to do better than you. My respect for you!". What a feeling that was. I have a tear in my eye every time I think about it. Chapter over and a pleasure to remember it.
I graduated my faculty which is an accomplishment although I don't feel it that much. For my thesis which I did worked a lot, I got an 8(out of 10). I could've received a better grade for if I would've chosen a better moment to present it. Still, what happened, happened. I didn't even connect that much with my colleagues over the four years of college. None of them were part of AIESEC. That was a downside because I couldn't really share all my cool experiences with them. Chapter over, ended a beautiful part of my life: college days.
I wanted to go in exchange although that plan broke. I applied for some internships. Got short listed but didn't get accepted or didn't get accepted at all. Chapter over, I'll try to rewrite it.
I saw Balchik, a beautiful resort in Bulgaria.
I traveled to Italy and Croatia with my sister and made a Romanian tour (http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=194163&id=679152521&l=2f8b7f7699)
I traveled with two good friends of mine to Turkey where we fulfilled a promise to our three Turkish friends(http://mihainegru.blogspot.com/2010/09/memories-from-turkey.html)
It was a year in which I had the opportunity to see other faces of my friends and get to know them better and with some of them to be more opened with each other. There's more to be done here. It's a working progress. Always going to be this way.
It was a year when my friends were moving on in their professional career. They started to work for companies, get salaries, started to buy cars or even get apartments. I really felt low not because I envied them (I was happy for them). I felt low just because I was feeling that I am not keeping the pace with them.
It was a year when I felt alone. I was kinda broken during the summer I didn't feel so much support or openness from some friends. The best advice I got was in October from someone that I recently met.
I took the decision of applying in AIESEC Azerbaijan. It was a decision that I don't regret it. It was an experience so far, the most challenging. Working with people that I know, living in the same apartment, dealing with a different culture and different people. I had bad moments and good ones. We had accomplishment and failures. From all of them we learn and move on. These are some of the people that I had and I will have the pleasure to work with: Chapter under construction :)
I sacrificed 6 days of travel(round trip) by bus to travel to Romania from Azerbaijan to surprise my family, show to one friend that some Christmas wishes do come true and to see my other friends in my home city. I just hope it meant something for them.

It was a year of endings and new beginnings. Some endings carried with them some baggage that would have been more easy if someone helped me to carry. It was OK. I guess I also had to ask for help. Some of them brought joy and fulfillment and I was happy to share it with the world.

Like all chapters, in books and in real life they're all forever written. Either if you like some of them or not, you learn from them and you make sure the next ones will be better.

Turning 24

2011-01-05T01:07:00.000+04:00

I am just about to turn 24 in a few minutes. Time to think about what I did in the last year: accomplishments, failures, disappointments, deceptions, happy, sad or meaningful moments, the adventures that I had until now with my friends. The plans that succeeded and the ones that didn't. The people that left my life, the ones that joined and that ones that stayed close. The good and bad advices. The fights and reconciliations. The places that I've seen. The future goals and the thoughts if it matters if it's good to set goals or not.

I will have more time to think about these things on my three days trip to Baku and make a 2011 resolution for myself.

But what does 24 mean ? I was just curios to find some facts about this number and here it is:

The number of bits a computer needs to represent truecolour images.
The number of Carats representing 100% pure gold.
The number of cycles in the Chinese solar year.
The number of frames per second at which motion picture film is usually projected.
The number of hours in a day.
The number of letters in both the modern and classical Greek alphabet. For the latter reason, also the number of chapters or "books" into which Homer's Odyssey and Iliad came to be divided.
24, television series. Each episode covers one hour, with 24 episodes making up one entire "day".
The number of points on a backgammon board.
When pronounced "two-four", a 24-pack of beer (Canadianism).
The maximum number of Knight Companions in the Order of the Garter
24 is considered an unlucky number in Cantonese culture because its pronunciation is similar to that of "easy to die".[citation needed] For this reason, many buildings skip this floor number. The same goes for 13, 34, 44, etc.
A Straight Edge symbol, for X is the 24th letter of the alphabet.

One week after my great return

2010-12-30T23:52:00.000+04:00

[Present] It has been almost one week since I came back to Romania. It took me and Crina 51 hours of bus ride and 14 hours of sleeping and walking around Istanbul to finally get back home. After the whole Istanbul experience I came up with a new motto for the city: "Buy now ! Regret later".

I surprised my family and friends in the first two days of my stay. When I got home I knocked on the door and said that I was caroling which was a kind of surprise for my mom because nobody is caroling at 6 o'clock in the morning.

I surprised a friend on Friday evening by making my sister to meet with her and give her a package with some presents and while she was unpacking I was talking with her on the phone. She had no idea I was back in Romania. One of things that I gave was a note saying that "Some Christmas wishes come true". The minute she finished reading I knocked on the door. That's a moment to remember. Some freak imagination I have. Hope it helped.

Next day went to another friend 80 km from my city and again was a big surprise. More photos here:

Was great to meet with all of them again and somehow I think that I will have to get use to this kind of living.

One more day and 2010 ends. Makes me really reflect on the people that I had around me, the ones that I still have, the experiences, the ups and downs. Probably I will write an article about the year that is about to end and to write a new years resolution.

In Istanbul after all

2010-12-28T17:34:00.000+04:00

[Written at 09:00, 23rd of December]Had a final good sleep in a bed. We arrived in Istanbul at 10:30 in the evening 8 hours earlier than expected.. Just gotta say that it is my third time in this city and it never stops to impress me. The city is huge and I am amazed by the network of roads and highways that the Turkish have build.

The bus left us somewhere where all the buses are parked and it was definetly not where we were suppose to stop: Aksaray bus terminal. We were so wasted and we had the luck to see a hotel nearby which didn’t look so much expensive.

We got the room for 30$ after getting the price from talking with pen and paper with the hotel personel. Took a long awaited and desired shower and went to sleep for the first time in two days on a bed.

I got up from the bed a little bit earlier to see if I can get the reservation for Romania from the parking lot where the bus left us yesterday. I got lucky and this guy approaches me and asks me: “heeey ! How are you ? How can I help you ?” in Romanian. I was sooo happy to talk in Romanian and not by body language or basic English. We have everything settled. Bus is leaving at 15 o’clock, enough time to buy some stuff and show Crina the historical center of Istanbul.

Santa Claus is coming to town….

Getting close to Istanbul

2010-12-27T20:00:00.000+04:00

[Written on 22nd of December]Changed the clock to the Romanian time zone an it’s 11:20. We stopped in or close to Samsun which means we are half our way to Istanbul. We had a lunch stop a couple of minutes ago and I just could not stop myself eating something warm and cooked. I payed a two dollars Turkish soup and ate in two minutes.

As I see now there are some possibilities of arrival. We arrive in Istanbul earlier and we have the luck of catching a late bus for Romania, we arrive earlier and stay in Istanbul over night or the bus just comes on time and all goes as planned. I asked a guy earlier with a lower basic English how many kilometers and when are we arriving he said that we have 600 km and that we are going to be there at 9 or 10 in the morning. I am curious of how things are going to happen.

Until now nothing so special for me except that we had a beautiful ride a big part of our trip near the Black Sea. I was dreaming to have a view on the Black Sea from a different angle J. Other than this hills and houses that just found their places on them somehow, the typical mosques from a muslim country. Sometimes I just wish I can have one of those cool smartphones with GPS so I can see where the hell I am on the map. It’s an obsession of mine of not getting disoriented.

Most of the road I slept which is great. There’s a one year old kid in front of us and I am so happy that he screams just enough for me to get some good sleep.

Got a message earlier from someone in Azerbaijan telling me that one of our members that I was putting all my faith and hope into having so many results in the organization decided to quit for some reason. I don’t know exactly the reason but I am just getting tired of people leaving because of ego, parents, lack of responsibilities or fear of having one big responsibility for the first time in their lives.

Sometimes it’s just exhausting when you put trust and faith in people, have high expectations and then, in the end, get a bit disappointed.

It’s nothing that I can do now just admire the landscape or have a little nap…600 km to Istanbul.

Passing through borders

2010-12-26T17:10:00.000+04:00

[Written at 06:00 22nd of December] It’s six o’clock in the morning and we just passed the Turkish border. We learned the drill when it comes to pass the border with this mean of transportation: get out of the bus with your hand luggage, go to passport control, walk 200 – 300 meters in freezing temperature and darkness and reach the second border.

We went to 4 checkpoints already and one thing keeps annoying me. None of our people from the bus is respecting the queue. This is how some people are used in Azerbaijan, I remember when I wanted to buy train tickets for Sheki it was the same thing. Didn’t really matter if I was buying a ticket or not people were just pushing me to ask something to the seller or even buy something. Either is a cultural thing or lack of common sense it’s just annoying.

It has been 15 hours already of bus ride. Nothing so special, just the usual Caucasian step, Crina saw Tibilsi while I was sleeping and she was impressed. The longest part is ahead of us, 25 hours getting to Istanbul. It’s gonna be a looong trip.

I am just glad that I was not in the position to be asked to give a bribe at the border. I heard so many stories about people that were somehow asked to pay in order to pass the border. I would not do such thing anyway.

Another Christmas story to tell my kids

2010-12-26T00:20:00.000+04:00

[Written on 12:45, 21^st of December] This is the story of another plan that I've set up for this year or maybe a dream that I and Crina had after two months and a half in the land of fire

A dream of getting our salaries and our living permits(green card) on time, a fifty hours ride by bus to surprise our family and friends back home. I hope, we hope this will be the greatest surprise ever that we have done.

It all started with the question of how we can do it. Boat was geographically impossible, plane ticket was 600 euros financially impossible, and bus financially affordable around 200 euros, time consuming but barebale. Fifty – sixty hours by bus was worth the sacrifice for the people back home.

I had all the information needed for the bus, was suppose to leave every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at 11 o’clock in the evening and would arrive in Istanbul after 40 hours of travel and the cost was 70 $ after two rounds of a traditional negotiation. We just did not have the green cards and a big part of our salaries.

On the 20^th we got them both. So it was all settled, I asked a member to make all the reservations ask about the hour, time to travel price. In 24 hours we had to pack our stuff, buy souvenirs, buy and cook food and of course get some present for our families.

Next thing today, Tuesday morning we had most of our stuff packed and we went shooppping. Went buy the city center for some fridge magnets and Baba, the member that made the reservations for us asks me: “How are you Mihai ? Is everything ok in the bus?”, “What bus ? The bus is at 11 in the evening”, “No Mihai, bus leaves in the morning” he replies. Silence….”Shiiiiittttt, shhhhiiittt”. A few calls happened between me, him and the tourism agency, he was right and he tells me that the driver decided to wait for us but we have to move FAST !

Next 40-5o minutes I and Crina were like a couple in the reality show the amazing race, running like crazy, finishing packing in 5 minutes, telling the cab driver to drive faster, getting stuck I traffic, again talking with Baba to tell the driver to wait for us, swearing at the cars that were in our way to the bus terminal.

But we caught the bus, we’re all sweaty, tired, I know my throat is hurting from all the hard breathing, we got no food, just some drinks, no really cool presents for our family and friends, just some freaking fridge magnets.

I think it will be worth it, I know that in the end I will surprise my dear ones and make them happy, my parents, my sister, my friends and especially a good friend of mine who did have a full year. I just want to make her Christmas wish come true….at least a part of that wish.

Memorable scene with Tom Cruise in Magnolia

2010-11-14T00:45:00.000+04:00

I don't know how many of you saw the movie Magnolia but there's a memorable scene with Tom Cruise who's playing the role of a pick-up guru.

Has some pretty dirty language in this scene but the whole movie is great. You should really see it !

One amazing night in Azerbaijan !

2010-11-13T04:17:00.000+04:00

It's 5:00 in the morning, now when I got back from on of the best nights of my stay here in Azerbaijan. Basically we started the whole thing by being invited by a Romanian woman, Simona, who's working for Bakcell(one of the biggest telecom companies in Azerbaijan) for her 35th birthday. So I and Alex kinda left house around 9 PM, took the metro and wondered in the city center for 20 minutes before finding the pub where was the whole thing happening. We got in a pub with a whole kind of decorations: flags, guns, stuffed animals, all kind of old pictures and a typical pool table which was for free. There I met a community of Romanians who worked for Bakcell who actually raised the company in two years in one of the biggest telecom companies in the country. Of course they worked in a team with other internationals but still... Anyway I got to know them a little bit and they worked with the Romanian telecom companies from their early beginning and after that with a lot of exotic countries in telecom. It was really awesome to talk with them ! Got to play pool and get my ass kicked by a South African, ate cake and drank a lot of vodka with cola and vodka with Red Bull.

After pub I went for the first time in a club in Baky. Maaan it was so awesome. I could not stop dancing. Of course Romanian dance music most of the time. The thing is that in Romania I always stay outside the circle of people that are dancing because I have a bad reputation in how I move but here....I ROCKED the dance floor ! I didn't care what other people were thinking and shit I danced like hell ! In the last two days I've been dealing with cancelling one event that I was organizing and I've been feeling REALLY bad. I danced and I didn't really care about other things. This is really what I needed !

Here are some pictures from this awesome night:

Simon's cat

2010-11-07T22:05:00.000+04:00

I've being watching a cartoon series called Simon's cat. It's really funny. This is just one episodes you might say. You can find the whole series on YouTube.

We have time....

2010-11-05T23:32:00.000+04:00

This is a poetry written by one of our greatest artists of our times. I received it a few months ago in Romanian and because it has so many lessons of life I decided translated it and share it with you...

Octavian Paller - We have time

We have time for all,
To sleep, to run to the right or left
to regret that we were wrong and be wrong again
to judge others and to absolve ourselves from guilt
we have time to read and write,
to correct what we wrote, to regret what we wrote,
we have time to make plans and not respect them,
we have time to make illusions and stir through their ashes later.
We have time for ambitions and diseases
to blame faith and details,
we have time to watch the clouds, some ads, or a random accident,
we have time to drive away the questions and to postpone the answers
we have time to crush a dream and to reinvent it,
we have time to make friends and to lose them,
we have time to learn our lessons and forget them later
we have time to receive gifts and not understand them.
We have time for all.
It's just not enough time for a little tenderness.
When we do it, we die.
I learned some things in life that I want to share with you!
I learned that you cannot make someone love you
All you can do is be loved.
The rest ... depends on the others.
I learned that how much I might care
others might not care at all.

I learned that it takes years to gain trust
and only a few seconds to lose it.
I learned that it doesn’t matter WHAT you have in life
But WHO you have.
I learned that you can handle and use your charm for about 15 minutes
afterwards though, you'd better know something.
I learned that you should not compare yourself with what others can do better
But what can you do
I learned that it doesn’t matter what happens to people
What matter is what can I do to help
I learned that no matter how you cut
Everything has two sides
I learned that you have to leave the loved ones with warm words
It might be the last time you see them
I learned that you can continue for a long time
After you said you can’t.
I learned that heroes are those who do what it’s needed, when it’s needed

Whatever the consequences
I learned that there are people who love you
But don’t know how to show it
I learned that when I'm upset, I have THE RIGHT to be upset
But I don’t have the right to be mean
I learned that true friendship continues to exist even at long distance
And this also goes for true love
I learned that if someone does not love you as you want
It does not mean he does not love you with all his heart.
I learned that no matter how good a friend is
He will hurt you from time to time
And you must forgive him for that.
I learned that it’s not always enough to be forgiven by others
Sometimes you have to learn to forgive yourself
I learned that no matter how much you suffer,
The world will not stop running because of your pain.
I learned that the past and circumstances may influence your personality
But YOU are responsible for what you become
I learned that if two people argue, that doesn’t mean that they do not love each other
And the fact that there's no arguing does not prove that they love each other.
I learned that sometimes you have to put the person first
And his actions
I learned that two people can look to the same thing
And see something totally different
I learned that regardless of the consequences
Those who are honest with themselves get farther in life
I learned that your life can be changed in a few hours
By people who do not know you.
I learned that when you think you've got nothing to give
When a friend calls, you'll find the strength to help.
I learned that writing
and talking
Can soothe the soul pain
I learned that people you care most
Are taken away too quickly ...
I learned that it is too hard to figure
Where to draw the line between being nice, not to hurt people and to support your opinions.
I learned to love
To be loved.

Letter for my friends

2010-11-01T17:30:00.000+04:00

Dear friends,

I know we didn't talk or seen each other for a long time. You probably missed my presence and the moments when we talked about our day, about our shared hobbies, about our dreams and goals, about our deceptions, about boys and girls, you missed having fun with me, going to parties, restaurants or just going out, you missed playing poker and telling me that I have a bad poker face and that I can't lie, you missed the fact that I am the one that gets mad a little bit quick and takes things sometimes too seriously.

The be sincere I missed you too. In whatever part of the world are you, be sure that I missed you.

I arrived here in Baku at the beginning of September and I found a growing city. I was first amazed about the three lanes highway between the airport and downtown when I droved in the night of my arrival. I saw many buildings under construction, I saw historic and modern buildings under renovation.

Baku is a mixture of Western influences by those described above, the ex-Soviet buildings, very deep underground stations that were designed to have the role of anti-missile bunkers and not the least the Muslim influences. People here are still very conservative and put first the family values. Parents and their children stick much closer together. They are much more united in this part of the world compared to my country.

I had bad moments and good moments here. In the last period it was pretty hard. A lot of hard work, dealing with lack of money and the coldness of our apartment. Probably the hardest period in my life. But we had people that helped us here and we got over it. Bright horizons are coming up, at least for the next months or so. We have now new members in AIESEC Azerbaijan that will be the future of this organization for the next years to come. Today it's the first day we meet all of them. Pretty excited about the days to come.

You probably wonder why I chose this part of the world ? There are many reasons coming up in my mind every time. On the surface I can tell you that I wanted experience, maybe independence from my parents, maybe the fact that I felt some of you were doing better than me professionally and I did not want to feel inferior. But I can tell you this: two weeks after my arrival here I was in a meeting with the alumni of the FLEX program and I can tell you that there in that ordinary meeting I had the biggest deja-vu of my life.

There are more to tell of my deceptions, my dreams, my wishes, my desires and my fears. I just wanted to tell you that it feels right here and that I am going to be ok....

Your one and only,

Mihai

Great interview with Barack Obama at Daily Show

2010-11-01T10:06:00.000+04:00

Some might say that it's one of the best interviews with Barrack Obama. Why ? You will see at the end when the interview it's been commented.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

Barack Obama Pt. 1

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show Full Episodes

Political Humor

Rally to Restore Sanity

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

Barack Obama Pt. 2

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show Full Episodes

Political Humor

Rally to Restore Sanity

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

Barack Obama Pt. 3

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show Full Episodes

Political Humor

Rally to Restore Sanity

Average frustrated chump or something else

2010-10-31T22:21:00.001+04:00

You would probably expect a post about my wonderful experience in the land of fire or how things are going here and all the bla bla. I will get to that soon. I was thinking all this time of writing something. This blog it has been like an abandoned house. Now(at this hour of writing) I would've love to go for a Halloween party but it seems that now I didn't have the right energy level or the resources to be there. The topic would be something different. It's about something that I've been thinking and dealing in terms how to act next in terms of future relationships.

I want to move on and there I see that are two ways of being:

1. One is kind of being an AFC - average frustrated chump a stereotypical nice guy who has few pickup skills or some understanding of what attracts women; a man who tends to engage in supplicative and wimpy patterns of behavior around women he has any relationship with. Let's just say I am not like that but still believing in principles and having values(wimpy). A part of me really wants get rid of this believes. Why ? Let's just say that I've seen some examples from the early past where values and principles didn't apply on picking up someone. Values or principles don't get you anywhere.

2. The other choice is being someone that really just uses lines or anything in a contact with a girl to be interested in him, who doesn't put to much feeling into it and just does what he does to sleep with his target. And that worked and it's working everywhere in the world at any time. Not with all women but it works so easily.

I do want to be with someone right now and I am kind of confused about how should I act.

The International Day of Awesomeness

2010-09-22T20:30:00.000+05:00

I got invited to this event which I'll probably attend and you can all subscribe too on facebook. What is really more awesome is that this day is right after Men's day in Romania. :)

"The International Day of Awesomeness is a celebration of awesomeness. People are awesome every day, frequently don't realize it, and their feats of awesomeness are rarely recognized. We aim to fix that, with a special day to both perform and celebrate feats of awesomeness!

The way to celebrate The International Day of Awesomeness is simple. Just be awesome.

The International Day of Awesomness occurs every year on March 10th. Why? Because that's Chuck Norris' birthday."

Subscribe here: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=234153442978.

Get Psyched song

2010-09-15T23:04:00.000+05:00

There is one episode from "How I met your Mother" where Ted, the main character, is trying to avoid the usual letdown of New Year's Eve, rents a limo for his friends so that they can party together. Barney gets a "Get Psyched" mix CD to psych them up. The song playing over and over is this one and it's awesome !

Memories from Turkey

2010-09-14T00:42:00.001+05:00

Hearing the prayers from the mosques, here in Baku, reminded me of Turkey. Reminded me of my first time there with the executive board of AIESEC Galati and of course the trip that I had with my friends Cami, Tzu Tzu, Isabella and her friend Wesam. It was a trip that we planned for some time, a promise that we took last year for our Turkish friends Arda, Onur and Eren.

Our trip began from Galati and then Bucharest. We decided to take the train to Istanbul as we did two years ago. Unfortunately for us I think we forgot how it was to ride by train in the middle of the summer, second class and NO AC. Until the evening we were all saying “Oh my God, it’s too f***ing hot”. But we got through that day drinking some cheap beer at a stop in Bulgaria. We also forgot about the never-ending passport controls from every custom. The good part is that doing this road again reminded us that somewhere at 3 o’clock in the morning we had to get up for the passport control and visa at the Turkish border. We were the first there and also the first to go back to sleep.

We arrived in Istanbul in the morning somewhere around 9 o’clock. Our friend Eren was the one waiting for was he kindly offered us a place to stay at his parents over night. During the day we revisited the places that we liked the most: Hagia Sofia, Blue Mosque, the unique atmosphere in the center of Sultanahmet area. Turkey, for me and for any other non Muslim person has its own rhythm, its own people and it’s own charm that nobody can forget. I will always remember the first night when on our way back to the apartment, we bought a big water melon and tried to tell Eren’s parents through Google translate and body language that we would like to eat it with some bread. It took us a while to get our message clear but eventually we did it. Above all we got to eat our water melon with cheese. It was the first time for us and it was pretty tasty.

Because we didn’t want Eren’s apartment to get too crowded , the next day we decided to book a hostel. It was a cheap one actually. We paid 10 euros for a hostel that was near to everything you can visit in Istanbul. We got what you can get for 10 euros. Even breakfast in the morning was included. We again circled around Istanbul, went to the airport to wait for our friends and waited a lot. I was at one exit and there were all this kind of important people getting out and sincerely I didn’t care that much. I didn’t know them. Later I found out that one football star just passed by me. It was one of the football players from Galatasaray Harry Kewell. Too bad I didn’t get autograph. That would’ve been sold pretty good on eBay. Our friends got out of there after one hour or so and we were back to the hostel. The gang was complete now. We spent the night at a bar getting mugged by a waiter with 10 euros and the next day visiting Istanbul and catching our ferryboat to Bursa, hometown of over Turkish friends.

The ferryboat was something else. When I thought we’re going to take this way of transportation I imagined something similar like I have in Galati for crossing the Danube, an old, rusty ship that can take up to 20-30 cars and where passengers, most of them stay outside on their feet. This ferry was bigger, cleaner, newer, faster and much more comfortable. There were more than 500 seats for passengers, three bars, playground for kids. It was so fast you were not allowed to get outside. The doors were sealed shut during our way to Bursa.

Bursa is is somewhere on the northwestern slopes of Mount Uludağ in the southern Marmara Region, 250 km away from Istanbul. The city is frequently cited as "Yeşil Bursa" meaning "Green Bursa" in a reference to the parks and gardens located across city, as well as to the vast forests in rich variety that extend in its surrounding region. We just realized why is it called Green Bursa the second day. Our main objective that evening was to arrive at Onur’s place and just get to sleep. What long way that was. Seeing all the old houses on our way to his home I was expecting the worse but it turned out that he had such a lovely home. We enjoyed every last day at his place. He and his father were really great with us. Our staying in Bursa comprised of sightseeing, clubbing, beer drinking going to the beach and just chillax !

Last day in Istanbul and we spent it with Onur. He was the one that helped us to leave our luggage in the AIESEC Turkey office. We owe him a lot for our whole trip in Turkey. The awesome apartment that we got in, the meals, the guide around Bursa and for that last day in Istanbul. We got him really tired from being the translator in Grand Bazar. Everyone of us telling him what to translate and ask him all different kind of questions. We said our goodbyes in the evening in the MC office. We took a shower and we were off to the train station.

Our way back to Romania was so much better. Weather outside was cloudy and we could enjoy our sleep.

Promises are meant to be kept or broken. I always like to keep my promises to my friends. This trip was the commitment to that promise. I am just happy that we did it. You get with all these kind of meaningful memories and things to talk about. I always remember the walks that we had in the center of Istanbul, negotiating with with the sellers in GrandBazar, eating durum and Turkish delight, laughing our asses off in Starbucks, visiting the AIESEC offices in Bursa and Istanbul, taking a shower in of them J. These are the things that I am going to remember. In the end I think it’s all about friendship, spending quality time with them and have something to share.

I have another promise that I have to keep for a Georgian friends of mine. Being here in Azerbaijan will be much easier to visit her next year.

First feeling of freedom

2010-08-16T23:54:00.000+05:00

I’ve been travelling a lot these days and when I say days I mean for the last month. I will keep doing this with 12 days in Italy and from 8^th of September I will be going in Baku, Azerbaijan to work on the development of AIESEC in that country. Faith made it to work with a good friend of mine from Iasi, Alex Apetrei. I will be staying there for 10 months, a period where I will not be able to return in my country (if the visa process goes as smoothly as possible). I will return to this topic in my further posts.

By travelling I a lot I meant 7 days in Bursa & Istanbul, Turkey, plus two days on the road, other 7 days in Romania driving all around the country and another 6 days in Constanta reporting soccer games and attending to parties from AIESEC Olympics. It has been one month where I could get distracted from the feeling that I had in the last period. A feeling of loneliness and of craving for affection that broke my heart into pieces, a feeling that kept me awake during the nights and got me plunged in memories and deceptions. It was pretty damn hard get rid of it. Got all this kind of distractions like playing World of Warcraft, jogging, watching some TV series and meeting with friends and family, even applying for Azerbaijan helped. The fact is every time I go somewhere I need to have someone to share these experiences. I am tired of experiencing places all by myself. I am tired of conflicts that consume me. I am tired of people that think that in a conflict where they are involved, throw 100% of the blame on the other side. Everyone has his own part the guilt and every side has to learn something from it and how the other side works . At least this is how I think it’s just.

This weekend I attended the parties from AIESEC Olympics. I know lots and lots of people all over the country and it was great to reencounter them. Being reunited with my old EB team felt great. I got to swim in the warm see during the night, I got to laugh and joke with my friends, I got to see the sunrise at the seaside, first time in four years. In the morning while I was watching the horizon I got to think that I am going to be on the other side of the sea. From September on I will be there. I know that four years ago I wasn’t even thinking of it. Suddenly I got a feeling of freedom, of exuberance, happiness, peace and hope. Hope that I will gain the experience that I need for a better future. Hope that I will find someone there that will share my passions, that will focus on the meaningful things in life, that believes in self evolution and in changing herself for the other half, a person that will have the four s: simple, sensitive, sexy and smart. I know she is there.

Eminem ft. Rihana - Love The Way You Lie

2010-08-08T13:12:00.000+05:00

Two days ago Eminem(one of my favourite artists) launched a new video with his song Love the way you lie ft Rihana. In this video we have Dominic Monaghan and Megan Fox are playing to roles of Eminem and his ex wife Kim. In order to get into his character, the "Lost" actor listened to the Slim Shady's first two albums and tried to catch whatever the rapper rapped in there. The filming was as hard as the preparation as Monaghan got a lot of bumps and bruises when shooting the violent scenes. The video stands against domestic violence and you need some time to get it.

In addition to help stop domestic violence, the filming of this music video has also raised money to benefit battered women. Fox donated fee she got from appearing in this upcoming clip to Sojourn House, a shelter for abused women. Sojourn provides battered women and their children a safe space to regroup, rebuild, and reestablish their self-esteem and lives.

Just gonna stand there

And watch me burn

But that's alright

Because I like

The way it hurts

Just gonna stand there

And hear me cry

But that's alright

Because I love

The way you lie

I love the way you lie

I can't tell you what it really is

I can only tell you what it feels like

And right now there's a steel knife

In my windpipe

I can't breathe

But I still fight

While I can fight

As long as the wrong feels right

It's like I'm in flight

High of a love

Drunk from the hate

It's like I'm huffing paint

And I love it the more that I suffer

I sufficate

And right before im about to drown

She resuscitates me

She fucking hates me

And I love it

Wait

Where you going

I'm leaving you

No you ain't

Come back

We're running right back

Here we go again

It's so insane

Cause when it's going good

It's going great

I'm Superman

With the wind in his bag

She's Lois Lane

But when it's bad

It's awful

I feel so ashamed

I snap

Who's that dude

I don't even know his name

I laid hands on her

I'll never stoop so low again

I guess I don't know my own strength

Just gonna stand there

And watch me burn

But that's alright

Because I like

The way it hurts

Just gonna stand there

And hear me cry

But that's alright

Because I love

The way you lie

I love the way you lie

You ever love somebody so much

You can barely breathe

When you're with them

You meet

And neither one of you

Even know what hit 'em

Got that warm fuzzy feeling

Yeah them chills

Used to get 'em

Now you're getting fucking sick

Of looking at 'em

You swore you've never hit 'em

Never do nothing to hurt 'em

Now you're in each other's face

Spewing venom

And these words

When you spit 'em

You push

Pull each other's hair

Scratch, claw, bit 'em

Throw 'em down

Pin 'em

So lost in the moments

When you're in 'em

It's the rage that took over

It controls you both

So they say it's best

To go your separate ways

Guess that they don't know ya

Cause today

That was yesterday

Yesterday is over

It's a different day

Sound like broken records

Playin' over

But you promised her

Next time you'll show restraint

You don't get another chance

Life is no Nintendo game

But you lied again

Now you get to watch her leave

Out the window

Guess that's why they call it window pane

Just gonna stand there

And watch me burn

But that's alright

Because I like

The way it hurts

Just gonna stand there

And hear me cry

But that's alright

Because I love

The way you lie

I love the way you lie

Now I know we said things

Did things

That we didn't mean

And we fall back

Into the same patterns

Same routine

But your temper's just as bad

As mine is

You're the same as me

But when it comes to love

You're just as blinded

Baby please come back

It wasn't you

Baby it was me

Maybe our relationship

Isn't as crazy as it seems

Maybe that's what happens

When a tornado meets a volcano

All I know is

I love you too much

To walk away though

Come inside

Pick up your bags off the sidewalk

Don't you hear sincerity

In my voice when I talk

Told you this is my fault

Look me in the eyeball

Next time I'm pissed

I'll aim my fist

At the dry wall

Next time

There will be no next time

I apologize

Even though I know it's lies

I'm tired of the games

I just want her back

I know I'm a liar

If she ever tries to fucking leave again

I'mma tie her to the bed

And set the house on fire

Just gonna stand there

And watch me burn

But that's alright

Because I like

The way it hurts

Just gonna stand there

And hear me cry

But that's alright

Because I love

The way you lie

I love the way you lie

The risks of buying an iPhone

2010-07-01T20:41:00.000+05:00

Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

One song that I will get out of my mind...eventually

2010-06-27T13:11:00.000+05:00

There's one song in particular that I remembered listening to last year while watching "Closer", a movie with Jude Law and Julia Roberts. I watched it with my Turkish friends and with the girls in Sibiu. The song is the soundtrack or the main song of the movie and I started to listen to it again in the last two weeks. I don't really know but I really got caught up with this song. Can't get it out of my head. Last summer and autumn meant something to me and brings back some memories of people that I still care. Some of them which I will meet in July. Some, just want to forget...

And so it is
Just like you said it would be
Life goes easy on me
Most of the time
And so it is
The shorter story
No love, no glory
No hero in her skies

I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes...

And so it is
Just like you said it should be
We'll both forget the breeze
Most of the time
And so it is
The colder water
The blower's daughter
The pupil in denial

I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes off you
I can't take my eyes...

Did I say that I loathe you?
Did I say that I want to
Leave it all behind?

I can't take my mind off you
I can't take my mind off you...
I can't take my mind off you
I can't take my mind off you
I can't take my mind off you
I can't take my mind...
My mind...my mind...
'Til I find somebody new

Jokes with Bill and Steve

2010-06-26T14:46:00.000+05:00

The 10 kilometer run

2010-06-24T21:54:00.000+05:00

Today was the day when I ran 10 km in 57 minutes and 24 seconds. Weather was great for running, 14 degrees Celsius outside, had to run at the riverside which was partially flooded to my surprise. Although I trained myself for the past month with a training program provided by http://www.myasics.co.uk it was really hard to do it. I had to go through different stages a fight my body and mind in order to cross the finish line:

1-2km. Beginning of the first few kilometers I was thinking if I don’t have some kind of walkman, CD player or the latest iPhone (that would’ve been great ) I could focus my attention to the waves that were hitting the shore and so I would not think at my knees or any other pain that I could have.

2-4 km. The waves trick didn’t work that well and at the third and fourth kilometer I was alone in my thoughts pushing through and keep on running.

5-6 km. I was asking myself one question over and over again: “Why am I doing this? Why all of this effort?". I was even thinking at the marathon runners who are running over 40 kilometers: “Why are they doing this? What motivates them to run so much? Is it money? Is it the glory and fame? And again, why am I doing this?" I found one answer straightforward that could keep me going: “Because I can, because I want to and because I can reach any goal that I set. Any big goal requires sweat and effort”.

6 - 10km. After I passed the fifth kilometer I just thinking that I could just quit and leave it and postpone it. Also I was thinking of cheating . I didn’t. I thinking that I can finish it but I will not repeat this experience again.

The last 2 km were the easiest of them all. I have fought with my mind and with my body and I just kept running. Better, the last kilometer I was running faster than ever.

The finish was the most satisfying moment of that hour. I didn’t feel that tired and I could’ve probably run more. I stopped. My goal was reached! And then I started thinking again at those marathon runners and especially the winners. The pain, the joy and the satisfaction you must feel when you cross over that finish line. This is what keeps them running and what will keep me running.

Looking down at that moment a thought came into my mind: "I need to buy a new pair of sneakers :)".

What about those six pack abs

2010-06-17T22:30:00.000+05:00

All working out just OK until now. It has been almost a month since I started working out and trying/wanting to lose weight. I must say it is pretty challenging to do it.I started to have an ab routine where I am doing some cool exercises. When I am comfortable doing one routine I am evolving to the next level.

Now I am doing a level two routine which consists of these exercises:

Lying leg thrusts – 3 x 8
Reverse crunches – 3 x 6
Ab bicycles – 1 x 24
Stability ball crunches – 1 x 10 - don't have stability ball so I am doing normal crunches
Alternating crunches - 1 x 18
Bench crunches - 1 x 18
Abdominal vacuums

I am also doing a lot of jogging at the riverside and I do have the goal of running 10 km under 85 minutes on the 24th of June. Although jogging doesn't really help in losing belly fat it helps my state of mind, makes me focus on the goal I have to reach. I have found a really cool online tool on http://www.myasics.co.uk/ that helps joggers reach their goals. It scheduled all of my trainings four times per week, it has a log book and statistics regarding my training and my fitness level. Here's a really nice capture of my performance until now:

So what are the results until now ? I had 79 kilos on 17th of May and now I have 77 kilos in weight. Even better on Sunday I had 76.5. So 2 - 2.5 kilos in one month it's a reasonable result. I should have some visible results on my abs in the next 2 or 3 months.

Presenting the new iPhone 4

2010-06-08T15:27:00.000+05:00

I spent almost an hour watching Steve Jobs presentation on iPhone 4 and the new features that were brought to this device. The guys from Apple definitely know how to sell their products.

Hopefully I will get one next year.

Being an achiever

2010-06-07T01:20:00.000+05:00

I always say motivation comes from within. You may be influence by the environment you live in but not determined by it. It's a big difference.

I was saying in my last post about my graduation festivity about a special moment that I planned for my colleagues and didn't really manage to do it due to some public persons that rented our room and forced us to finish quite quickly the whole thing.

This one was the movie that I was going to play. Maybe some of you know it:

This one was planned to play at the festivity but it was not really appropriate for it and I had to cut it from the program. I think for the people that do not know it will be a real positive shock. He has an impact on me every time I watch it.

His story it's pretty impressive. You check out more movies on You Tube about his life and he become the person he is now.

Last 100 meters

2010-06-02T22:45:00.000+05:00

Well my dears it’s almost over. My studies I mean. I had my graduation course last Friday and I must say it was quite interesting. But first let me rewind. I spent my last Thursday in Bucharest taking up a test for an internship in Human Resources at Unilever. Thought I might give it a try. This kind of experience would help for an internship abroad. The test was in English and had some math problems that I had to solve in 60 minutes. It was basic math more or less and it kind of made me regret for judging the things that they teach me in school and high school. Some of the questions got to solve them and for some of them I just randomly picked an answer. I will receive an answer this week regarding my next step in the selection process although I am not quite positive about my performance. After all this I just spent my time with AIESEC people & friends, we had an alumni meeting which was pretty cool and after that we cooked a late dinner with fries, meat, sausages accompanied with wine, beer and liquor. Pretty cool way to spend an evening/night with some people that I worked with within the last year.

Next day, graduation day, woke up with a medium hangover. Mixing drinks after a long break of not drinking alcohol not a good idea. Energizers helped although I just wanted one. The damn machine couldn’t give change from a 10 RON bill so I had to take two energizers. 10:30 AM was in Galati and prepared myself for the big event. I was the designated person to chair it and had all planned by minutes, what to say when to say. Wasn’t really nervous at all. Felt that it was a good opportunity for me to show my colleagues what I am capable of. I even had a motivational movie followed by a motivational speech just for them.

Arrived at the location the administrator approached me and says: “You know, you have to cut your agenda down to half of the time scheduled. The minister of education will keep a small conference and you have to finish earlier.” There was no point to fight against it. They paid for the conference we didn’t. So we just had the speeches from our dean and some of our teachers and the handing of some symbolic diplomas. And that was the show. No special movies no nothing. Short and simple but it was cool. I liked it.

After the whole event we grabbed some beers and we walked by home. On my way home I could see the rainbow after the rain and I thought: “Hmmm….The rainbow has finally come on my street. I finished my faculty.” and my second thought was: “NO, I didn’t finish it. I still have three exams and to present my thesis and besides that what’s the point of a rainbow if you don’t have someone there to share it with”.

Back home at 8:00 PM I slept watching Seinfeld.

The surprising truth about what motivates us

2010-05-30T14:24:00.000+05:00

Awesome commercial from Nike

2010-05-21T03:18:00.000+05:00

For the guys and girls that are fans of soccer this commercial is really interesting:

One of my favorite songs

2010-05-20T11:48:00.000+05:00

Ukrainian road trip proposal

2010-05-19T14:04:00.000+05:00

My dear followers from Romania and especially Galati I have an interesting proposal for you on the 5th and 6th of June:

Do something crazy and get out of the country for a road trip. This way we can celebrate Children's Day in a different way. :)
Visit Odessa, a city from Ukraine, 300 km away from Galati.
See some new places: http://www.tripadvisor.com/LocationPhotos-g295368-Odessa.html
Accomdation with AIESECers (working on that as we speak).
We can try some of the Ukrainian food, beer and hospitality
Have a chance to see one of my old good friends Alex Apetrei who's going to work for a while in AIESEC Odessa.
Check a new Country/City on your list of places you've seen :D.(I know I am doing this )

Things that you'll need:

A passport. We will get the visa at the Ukrainian border and there's no need for visa anymore to enter Moldavia.
40-50 RON for gas.
10 -20 EUROS for food and souvenirs.
Good mood.

I will probably take my car for this trip. I am negotiating with my parents :). Anyone who is willing to join me contact me at mihai.negru@gmail.com or you can call me at 0729 323 723.

Looking forward for this trip.

Going for the six pack abs

2010-05-17T22:07:00.000+05:00

As you’ve probably seen on Facebook I posted an image with someone’s perfect abdomen as it’s called the six pack abs. I’ve put a text below the image saying that I am going to look like that in 3 to 4 months. The reactions were different from jokes to even proposalsJ. I am going on this quest because it’s something that I want to see it happen, to see if I am capable of doing it.

I went with Mike Geary’s book “The truth about Six Pack abs” and to be sincere I was pretty impressed by it. It is well written, explaining everything that is going on with our bodies in terms of food that we eat, the effect that has on, some healthy food that we should choose in order to get slim and also how to exercise.

This is what I intend to do for now on:

Have intense exercises 3 to 5 times per week.
Have 3 to 5 meals per day and not exceeding 2200 calories.
Avoid as much as possible beer, soda or any kind of carbonated drinks.
Avoid products that have artificial sweeteners or unsaturated fat.
Olive oil instead of sunflower oil.
Eat products that are as much as possible in their natural form.
Healthy dairy products – it reduces fat absorbance by our body with 50%.
Salads.
Whole grain bread instead of white bread – this I’ve been doing for quite some time.
4 cups of ice green tea per day – it’s a good fat burner and really tasty by the way.

First week of life style(or diet) is over. This Sunday morning I had 79 kilos in weight. I am aware that during this period I will lose some of my fat weight but also it’s certain that I will gain muscle weight.

I will keep you posted with my evolution :D

The cap and trade story

2010-05-16T21:17:00.000+05:00

Truth about the IMF, World Bank, Corporatocracy, economy today

2010-05-14T13:14:00.000+05:00

I've been an admirer of John Perkins work until now and I got to say that everything that is happening in Romania and other countries regarding loans from the IMF, World Bank or other sister organizations somehow gave me a feeling of deja-vu. Loans were giving before to other countries and the consequences were not that positive for the majority of the people. Hope this give other perspective on the world's view and not always believe the crap that is told in the media.

John Perkins Interview from MrXfromPlanetX on Vimeo.

Amazing 80 years old woman at Britain's Got Talent

2010-05-12T11:12:00.000+05:00

Neighbor's cat opening the door

2010-05-11T21:15:00.000+05:00

Couple of months ago one of my neighbors sends me a video on youtube with his cat opening the kitchen's door. I find it really amusing. Hope you like it :D

Loneliness is such a bitch sometimes

2010-05-09T22:36:00.000+05:00

“It’s loneliness that makes the loudest noise” said an American social writer and philosopher. In this moment he could not be more right. In the next three months I am planning to take all my exams, chair my graduation event, of course graduate(so help me God), apply for internships, getting matched, getting my visa, visit my sis’ in Italy and my friends in Turkey. Some of these things are for fun and simple to do and some of them are so important so life changing. Graduation is one of the examples. I will not be a student from July. Raising money to go in an internship is a bitch also. I am doing all kinds of small jobs and raising every cent I can get and putting them in my economy account. “The plan” is not a plan anymore and I am going solo from last week. The way we solved our issues was not that opened and I hope that, as friends, we got some lessons out of the whole deal.

I’ve applied for a really awesome internship in India at Tata Consultancy Services as partnership coordinator. Tomorrow I will see if I am getting in or not…in the first interview.

So many ‘I’s and so few ‘we’s.

Amazing speech from Iraq war veteran

2010-05-05T12:56:00.000+05:00

Thinking of the wars that are taken now in Irak and Afghanistan I could not find any better words than this guy below.

Millenium Development Goals for 2015

2010-04-28T22:17:00.000+05:00

A different view on cancer

2010-04-14T16:55:00.000+05:00

Yesterday I got one of those big e-mails telling you something big people on the top of the pyramid are hiding things from normal people. I like conspiracy theories and I do believe in those that are so evident that it almost punches you in the face like invasion of Irak or Afghanistan. Who believes now that they are fighting terrosism there they should really draw a line and see what were the results until now and then think again when they start believing the bullshit on TV.

This theory is based on how cancer is viewed and how it can be easily cured.

My first exchange movie

2010-04-12T11:25:00.001+05:00

Good morning to you all !

Got back yesterday from a really from one day and one night of a AIESEC Galati conference. Felt so damn good that I slept only three hours on Saturday night and when I got back I just dived into my bed and recovered by sleeping 13 hours :). Maybe I will get back into it with another post.

Now going back to the lost movie. In 2008 when I was facilitating a conference some DVDs with some photos from my exchange experience got stolen along with some other items from my other colleagues. I was so damn happy when I stumbled on one DVD that contained the movie presentation of my exchange for the sharing session in my local committee. It was made in proshow gold with a .exe extension and I had no chance to convert it into .avi or any other video file. So I got the idea of recording my desktop while playing the movie and it went pretty good. Camtasia Studio is a good software for desktop recording.

So guys. Here's my movie, my experience, a lot of beautiful places that I've seen and beatiful people I've met. Some of then are not in it but they mean a lot to me. All of them will be remembered for a really long time. Three months(129 600 minutes) captured in 13 minutes, three months of working in Trieste and visiting England, Croatia, Slovenia and Spain.

It was the first time when I realized a movie in video editing software so please don't be too critic about it. and also my English was pretty bad back then. I have no idea what was in my head back then.:)

If you did not have a international experience hope it will inspire you to have one.

One principle that we tend to forget

2010-04-08T15:13:00.000+05:00

Few years ago I have read one of Dale Carnegie's books "How to win friends and influence people", a good book actually. Over the past few months and days I reminded myself of the first principle of that book. I will just quote some of the things and stories written there:

"....Wanamaker learned this lesson early, but I personally had to blunder through this old world for a third of a century before it even began to dawn upon me that ninety-nine times out of a hundred, people don't criticize themselves for anything, no matter how wrong it maybe.

Criticism is futile because it puts a person on the defensive and usually makes him strive to justify himself. Criticism is dangerous, because it wounds a person's precious pride, hurts his sense of importance, and arouses resentment.

B. F. Skinner, the world-famous psychologist, proved through his experiments that an animal rewarded for good behavior will learn much more rapidly and retain what it learns far more effectively than an animal punished for bad behavior. Later studies have shown that the same applies to humans. By criticizing, we do not make lasting changes and often incur resentment.
Hans Selye, another great psychologist, said, "As much as we thirst for approval, we dread condemnation," The resentment that criticism engenders can demoralize employees, family members and friends, and still not correct the situation that has been condemned.

George B. Johnston of Enid, Oklahoma, is the safety coordinator for an engineering company, One of his re-sponsibilities is to see that employees wear their hard hats whenever they are on the job in the field. He reported that whenever he came across workers who were not wearing hard hats, he would tell them with a lot of authority of the regulation and that they must comply. As a result he would get sullen acceptance, and often after he left, the workers would remove the hats.
He decided to try a different approach. The next time he found some of the workers not wearing their hard hat, he asked if the hats were uncomfortable or did not fit properly. Then he reminded the men in a pleasant tone of voice that the hat was designed to protect them from injury and suggested that it always be worn on the job. The result was increased compliance with the regulation with no resentment or emotional upset.
......
When dealing with people, let us remember we are not dealing withcreatures of logic. We are dealing with creatures of emotion,creatures bristling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity
.....
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain - and most fools do.But it takes character and self-control to be under-standing and forgiving.Instead of condemning people, let's try to understand them. Let's tryto figure out why they do what they do. That's a lot more profitableand intriguing than criticism; and it breeds sympathy, tolerance andkindness. "To know all is to forgive all."

As Dr. Johnson said: "God himself, sir, does not propose to judge man until the end of his days."Why should you and I?"

The principle within these quotes that we tend to forget it's this one: don't criticize, condemn or complain. I guess it is something that I regret doing for the past year and I am sorry that I see this happening with some close people around me.

Last week

2010-03-31T13:36:00.000+05:00

I know my blog was like a desert since I never wrote something of what I’ve being doing lately. Had some things going on my head. Things that I’ve regretted doing last year, things that I’ve could’ve done better and things that I didn’t do.

Last weekend I’ve attended National Congress (NC), a preparation conference for the new elected boards in AIESEC Romania and Leaders of Tomorrow (LOT), an event for the people that will leave the organization soon and will head for the future. My role there was to facilitate and attend sessions at both conferences. For NC it was my last conference with the current MC team and the first one with the new MC team. I must say it was an amazing year with 9 “beautiful creatures” as Iulian would say it and I am pretty confident the new team will kick our asses.

I did some pretty cool stuff there at LOT: an exit interview, a mini career planning, got to know a little bit more about outsourcing and got to know some of the people that work for P&G and Accenture Romania. I had a session with Dani Patru(alumni of @ Ro) where he talked about people that leave organization and how do they confront themselves with the “outside world”. You either get people that don’t use most of the thing that they did in AIESEC and have the attitude of “welcome to the real world, AIESEC was just a pretty dream” and you have the people that take the values, principles, knowledge an adapt them to the “outside world”.

At the end I had the opportunity to see Octavian Bellu keeping a speech about career and performance. It was not something WOOOOW, or some steps that you have to take to be successful just some things that you have to keep in mind: have passion for what you do, hard work and patience.

At the end I felt good about myself professionally speaking of what I’ve done this year as LC Coach. Although I know I’ve could’ve done much more than this I got appreciated from people that I’ve got in contact within the MC and AIESEC Constanta and even from people that did not know me at all.

With all this going on at both conferences I felt so f***ing lonely, personally speaking. Yeah I got friends and people to talk with but that was not that kind of loneliness I was talking about. It even got worse when people around started to hook up for a one night stand or just going to their rooms. Even my roommates were with their girlfriends and I was alone during the last night. Good for all you guys for the “fun” that you had. When I start think about it….I am planning to leave for one year or one year and a half abroad. Why should I hook up with someone and get burned? Why should I care ?

Mad Mad and dirty Mario

2009-12-06T23:52:00.000+04:00

On facebook and getting married

2009-12-03T12:21:00.000+04:00

Let's save someone's life !

2009-10-31T15:13:00.000+04:00

Hello there !

I really did now know how to begin this post....I got the news that one friend of mine that I know from AIESEC Sibiu is in the hospital brought down by an aggressive type of cancer. It kind of makes you wonder. He is 23 years old and at this age you kind of start thinking about your carrier or family and being in a hospital. He has a chance for an operation in Turkey but - there is always a but in life - it will cost his family 50 000 EURO, money that they do not have.

I believe in the readers of my blog and network of AIESECers from all around the world that they can contribute for saving someone's life. I will also donate money as soon as I get my paycheck next week from the website that I am administering.

You can save a life donating money in this account:

Name of account owner: Ruxandra Calinoiu
Account: RO73ABNA0000001001312457 (you can deposit Euro, Dollars and Romanian lei)

Swift Code: ABNAROBU
RBS BANK, Sibiu Office

For further information you can visit the website: http://constantin-botezatu.net/.

You have there all the information that you need to know and if you are outside Romania you can use Google translate for now.

Failed moonwalk

2009-10-26T11:15:00.000+04:00

The Story Of Human Rights

2009-10-20T13:40:00.000+05:00

Google wave explained in 7 minutes

2009-10-19T14:32:00.000+05:00

Maybe you heard it or not but Google Wave is an online tool for real-time communication and collaboration. A wave can be both a conversation and a document where people can discuss and work together using text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

Lucky for me I got an invitation for the preview of this service but I really can't use it because I need friends that have Google wave to communicate with.

Lucky for you this is a short movie that I found on one of my "waves" that explains the usability of this service. I repeat this is a short movie. On the official website they have an 80 minutes presentation. :)

World never stops to surprise me

2009-10-16T12:14:00.000+05:00

While I was in Constanta two weeks ago I went to have a meeting with two friends of mine. I had the surprise to see in front of the mall a naked lady washing in the fountain. I don't know if you can cry or laugh at these pictures. Enjoy !

September....

2009-10-03T13:22:00.000+05:00

Hour of writing: 13:15 am, 2^nd of October 2009.Got to hate the rail road company in Romania. I got 1 hour and delay on my way to Constanta right now. So I guess after some hours of sleeping and complaining with my compartment neighbours about the waste of money spent on the train I thought I will give some time to think about the things that happened in the last few weeks.

I got to say that September had its ups and downs. Downs was the disappointment in some of the people that I worked with in 2008, disappointment in Romania and its people because I had my phone stolen and never got it back and the fact that I got spit in the bus because I was speaking English with a trainee, received a fee for 50 lei in Bucharest for not having a ticket with me and the fact that I had some conflicts with my sis in Italy. Ups were the moments when you realized that you have true friends and people that care about you and acknowledge you the effort and the results, the moments when communication is important in solving a conflict and create a stronger bound between two persons or more persons, when you have fun traveling Romania with friends, meet people that had an impact on you and you amaze yourself how much money you spent.

Tour of Romania. I heard about this idea when I was in Italy and I had some doubts about taking it or not. Being a person opened to spontaneous actions I said what the hell and do it. Six persons, three Romanians(Alexadra, Cami and I) and three Turkish boys(Arda, Eren, Onur) went in a 8 days tour to see Iasi, Cluj, Sibiu, Sighisoara and the surroundings of Brasov. My stop from the trip was Sibiu and heading to Constanta for a LC visit and after that Bucharest for a MC days. I created and reinforced bounds with my friends and met people that I miss for a really long time. I met the facilitator of my working group from my first national conference: Mihaela Huluta. It was truly emotional meeting. It was really nice to see how people do remember you after a three years break without actually talking and seeing each other.

I learned two valuable lessons this month.

1. From all the bad and good that happened I learned that I want to be more emotionally independent. The way I feel should be defined by my own principles and values and not by the environment that surrounds me.

2. One another thing that I learned in the last few weeks and made me thinking. I was afraid in my last posts about my fear of loving someone and I read this little story from a book of Stephen Covey that can be applied in anywhere in life when it comes to love:

"The feeling isn't there anymore?" I asked.

"That's right," he reaffirmed.

"And we have three children we're really concerned about. What do you suggest?"

"Love her," I replied.

"I told you, the feeling just isn't there anymore."

"Love her."

"You don't understand. The feeling of love just isn't there."

"Then love her. If the feeling isn't there, that's a good reason to love her."

"But how do you love when you don't love?"

"My friend, love is a verb. Love -- the feeling -- is a fruit of love the verb. So love her. Sacrifice. Listen to her. Empathize. Appreciate. Affirm her. Are you willing to do that?"

Picture of the week

2009-09-25T11:59:00.001+05:00

This week Sydney and other cities from Australia were covered in a big sandstorm. A first time phenomenon in 72 years. This is how the opera was looking like:

UPDATE: you can find more photos here

Picture of the week

2009-09-15T13:25:00.001+05:00

Source: http://www.pidjin.net

Tribute for Michael Jackson in Bucharest

2009-09-07T19:40:00.001+05:00

I actually did not find any word for this or any kind of description. Just the fact that there some dudes and dudettes in Romania that are dancing all over Bucharest as a tribute for MJ. Have a look: