Saint Andrew’s Eve is dedicated to rituals that might seem pagan, meant to protect people, their households and the animals they breed. They were further thought as governed by Saint Andrews so that the protective rituals get a divine aspect.

Saint Andrew’s Eve is thought to be one of the few moments when the barriers between seen and unseen disappear. A night of magic, of specters and of unusual events. Saint Andrew allows good and evil to mix territories during this special night. Specters are thought to walk freely, steeling people’s minds and depriving their crops and livestock of fertility. Romanian peasants use garlic as main defense.

The most important action of the night is “Guarding the Garlic”. Girls and boys are supposed to dance and sing while guarding the garlic, to give it the needed qualities to fight the evil. The boys are supposed to try to steal it, while the girls need to stay vigilant and protect it. Thus guarded, the garlic will then protect people, sometimes even changing their fate.

During the same night, orchards and crops’ fertility is tested. Cherry tree branches are brought inside and they need to have flowers by Christmas, or grains are planted into small recipients.

Both Saint Andrew and Saint Nicholas are perceived as “Old”, the term used in Romanian being “mos”. They symbolize the beginning of winter and wolves packs movements, clear signs of aging and degradation of time. On 29-30 November, The Specters’ Night, chaos is reached, the state prior to Creation. It is a night reigned by fear, as dead spirits and living specters (“strigoii vii”) fight on boundaries, cross-roads and other unholy places. The living specters are souls of real people who leave their bodies during this night. When they wake up the next day, they have no recollection of the fights they took part in.

Bloody duels continue until cocks sing at dawn. As specters are known to be violent to people, some precautions are needed: garlic is used as an ointment for the body, for all windows and for all doors. The atmosphere is still tensed on the actual holiday, also Wolf’s day. On this day, wolves are faster and no pray can run free from them. The day is also marked by people transforming into “pricolici”, some sort of ware wolves, people with faces of wolves or dogs.

The wolf is a major symbol of the day. On Saint Andrew’s no one uses a broom and they never throw anything, otherwise wolves will eat their livestock. Also, during Saint Andrew’s Night, all wolves gather together and can talk, but those who hear them risk to be killed.

Saint Andrew’s Night is one of the most important times of the year for witches and charms. Girls use the magic of this night to find out the future. One common practice is to put nine cups of water into a bowl and leave it under a holly object. In the morning, they measure the water with the same cup. If they have more water in the bowl, they’ll be lucky, if not, they’ll be unlucky and will not marry.

Another practice is to put 41 wheat grains under their pillow. If they dream someone steals their grains, then they will marry. Otherwise the girl will remain single.

Young girls can also find out what their husband will look like by the shape heated and then cooled tin takes. Another way is to sit awake in front of a mirror, with a candle on each side, and look into the mirror until the face of the future husband is revealed.

Most practices of Saint Andrew’s celebration are extremely interesting and beautiful. However, they are disregarded and not promoted enough. We tend to forget them and replace them with imported holidays, such as Halloween.

Most people I know who smoke, even if not willing to quit, have moments when they are worried about smoking effects on their health. When I was smoking, I sometimes had the same issue. So cutting back on number of smoked cigarettes becomes a goal. It eases your mind and has some impact on your budget. And it looks like no more good would come of such a policy.

Recent studies show that quitting remains the only way to reduce risks. A long-term Norwegian study, of more than 51,000 men and women aged between 20 and 34, found stubbing out was the only way to cut the risk. More information on the study, published in the Tobacco Control journal, here.

What do women in a Romanian village that has been affected by floods need in the cold season? Well, red/white high-heeled boots of course! Some of them old and sick, most of them needing boots for daily use, they got something a little different as a present…

While I do appreciate humanitarian acts, I also think a little bit of thinking ahead would help even more. Full story on this little mix-up (Romanian only) on Realitatea.

There also needs to be a great love. Or a great adventure…Or simply something with a considerable greatness (given the right perspective). And there are the worshiping shrines people build in high-school. It’s not a musician you like, it’s someone you adore. And a book that impressed you, well one could speak of it for days…And the friendships! Ah, any mistake is a drama! And the making up process needs to involve tears…

Anyway, all this drama should remain in high-school, but we tend to preserve bits and parts of it. Stash them for the future, when the call for soap-opera happenings kicks in…Therefore the need to complicate things, to have double-meanings, mind games, rules never to be broken for the sake of human kind etc. But how exactly should we let it go? Wouldn’t life be less spicy? Wouldn’t there be less mockery material for those of us enjoying mockery so much?

I still have fuzzy memories of journalism classes…Fuzzy because it’s been a while and I have not read much on the subject lately, although I should, if I ever want my license back.

Anyway, I remember some explaining on how if a headline suggests a story that is actually never told in the actual article, readers might get disappointed. The author creates a hook and the reader will go through the entire article, trying to find the information advertised by the headline. The purpose is reached, but will the reader ever do it again? His refusal to read might expand from articles by that specific author to the entire paper.

Well, I never quite got this idea until I experienced it. See, we had a talk in class about extreme sports in Romania, the lack of proper promotion and how the business was evolving. So when I found an article called Extreme sports business is slightly taking off in the online edition of Ziarul Financiar, I expected a revealing analysis of the Romanian extreme sports market.

I found instead a nice piece on a company called Adventure Travel, a success story nonetheless, but hardly what I had expected…Oh, and loved how they squeezed in a second company in the end, so that the piece did not seem focused on Adventure Travel only! I was disappointed, as I was really looking forward to read an analysis dedicated to this business and its impact on tourism in general…I also am a bit frustrated, as I consider ZF to be a pretty serious newspaper, which has also been one of my favorites a while ago…Yeah, I am not stopping by around here for a while!

Now, why does that need to be repeated a few times per semester? It’s not that complicated, I can actually remember it for more than three months…Be it Tourism Economics, Tourism Geography, Management, they all start the same way. Simply boring.

Two tests today, same class. One with theory, the other one with applications. From 5 different types of applications they chose the 2 simplest ones. I sometimes wish RAU was more demanding and challenging. Maybe I would give more than about 3 hours to such tests...

A must see in Iasi is the Palace of Culture, a building worth seeing in itself and also for the museums it hold within. Built throughout two decades, from 1906 to 1925, the palace is the creation of architect ID Berindei. It is partly placed on the ruins of the Royal Court of Moldavian rulers, officially mentioned in 1434.

Today, the palace is home to the “Moldova” National Museum Complex. The complex is formed out of four large museum: Moldova’s History Museum, the Ethnographic Museum, the Art Museum and the Science and Technical Museum.

Through the Palace, Iasi became the farthest Eastern point to reveal the European Neo-gothic architectural concepts. Launched in 1926 by Ferdinand de Hohenzollern, second king of modern Romania, it is said to have 365 rooms, one for each day of the year.

The equestrian statue of Stefan cel Mare is placed in front of the Palace of Culture. The statue was made in Paris by Em. Fremiet using the sketches of Gh. Asachi and was revealed in 1883. On this occasion, King Carol I offered two Krupp cannons, trophies of the War of Independence.

I discovered a little bar tonight. Red, cozy and warm from outside. Quite different feeling once inside. I had a café latte, which was quite below any expectations I had. I one time experience in a red bar, just like Cardinal Club! That night was perfect! The night I fell in love with Morandi, “Love me”.

Talked a lot of past times tonight. High-school, the first years of college. And Alina, who I was supposed to call so long ago…And didn’t. I miss her quite often, the fact she pretty much understood everything about me. “I see through you” would apply here. As she is one of a quite tiny club, that is something quite important.

Walking the streets of central Bucharest at night. Long time, too much has passed since I last did it. And I should do it more often, just like other things I keep postponing.

Looking through my playlist, I found another of my many theme songs. Los Canos, Nina. One of the many signs one gets and chooses to ignore. And as I am not sure which is the song of the day, I will leave you with the next random song chosen by Winamp.

When I look into your eyes
I can see a love restrained
But darlin' when I hold you
Don't you know I feel the same
'Cause nothin' lasts forever
And we both know hearts can change
And it's hard to hold a candle
In the cold November rain
We've been through this such a long long time
Just tryin' to kill the pain
But lovers always come and lovers always go
An no one's really sure who's lettin' go today
Walking away
If we could take the time to lay it on the line
I could rest my head
Just knowin' that you were mine
All mine
So if you want to love me
then darlin' don't refrain
Or I'll just end up walkin'
In the cold November rain

Do you need some time...on your own
Do you need some time...all alone
Everybody needs some time...on their own
Don't you know you need some time...all alone
I know it's hard to keep an open heart
When even friends seem out to harm you
But if you could heal a broken heart
Wouldn't time be out to charm you

Sometimes I need some time...on my
own Sometimes I need some time...all alone
Everybody needs some time...on their own
Don't you know you need some time...all alone

And when your fears subside
And shadows still remain, ohhh yeahhh
I know that you can love me
When there's no one left to blame
So never mind the darkness
We still can find a way
'Cause nothin' lasts forever
Even cold November rain


Don't ya think that you need somebody
Don't ya think that you need someone
Everybody needs somebody
You're not the only one
You're not the only one

Out of curiosity, I started reading a little on this issue online. There is talk of tools, optimizing everything, efficiency, success, and rules like “Concentrate on results, not on being busy”. As far as I am concerned, they should start with one thing: first you have to convince yourself to act according to your plan. Because most of us can learn how to write a to-do list extremely fast!

Yes, you need to prioritize, see what is really important. True, but what if you know exactly what you need to do, the order of completing each task, but you simply don’t feel like it? Because, when there are things to do outside office hours and you don’t get them done, there are no immediate consequences to fear. Like writing an article after work, when you could just watch TV…

I see time management as something generally applicable. Work, school, spare time you dedicate to different people. It should be explained and taught using a broader view. Not only in relation to office hours. It should be an all time fail proof strategy! And include solution to overcome the need of a caffeine-to-veins pumping mechanism!

Everything that happens for the first time sets a pattern. It creates a “should be” concept that we then expect to repeat itself and try to apply it to subsequent happenings. The first relationship sets the standards for relationships in general, for example.

Why is that so wrong? Well, given the fact that we advertise our uniqueness so aggressively, being in contact with different individuals can hardly lead to the same type of reactions/answers/behavior and so on. Other than the always mentioned uniqueness, there are also circumstances which have this bad habit of changing at a fast pace.

But we come, in any situation, with our own set of expectations, kidding ourselves with a will to adapt. To be able to adapt to something, you have to agree it is new and that nothing already know to you is applicable. But you have that whole bunch of “should be-s” with you? What are you supposed to do? Give up on them? Change everything again and again? That’s revolting!

Yes, humans speak of adapting to anything, but they limit adaptation techniques as much as possible. Thus we end-up living in afterglows of situations put on a high pedestal that our mind also alters to the best possibility.

The past is gone, we say, yet we choose to linger on as much as possible. When we should simply sake it off, move on and wait for the new stage to take place. With no should have and would have attitudes. Otherwise we allow ourselves to be deceived by our own greatly wrong expectations and pass by what is really there for us to experience.

So I leave you to today’s song (INXS – Afterglow), reminding you of what NOT to do for too long:

Here I am, lost in the light of the moon that comes through my window
Bathed in blue, the walls of my memory divides the thorns from the roses
It's you and the roses

Touch me and I will follow in your afterglow
Heal me from all this sorrow
As I let you go I will find my way when I see your eyes
Now I'm living in your afterglow

Here I am, lost in the ashes of time, but who owns tomorrow?
In between the longing to hold you again
I'm caught in your shadow, I'm losing control
My mind drifts away, we only have today

Touch me and I will follow in your afterglow
Heal me from all this sorrow
As I let you go I will find my way
I will sacrifice 'til the blinding day when I see your eyes
Now I'm living in your afterglow

When the veils are gone, as I let you go, as I let you go

Touch me and I will follow in your afterglow
Heal me from all this sorrow
As I let you go I will find my way, I will sacrifice
Now I'm living in your afterglow

Bathed in blue, the walls of my memory divides the thorns from the roses
It's you who is closest

Most Bucharest inhabitants know the Nescafe coffee shop/pizza place/whatever from the Universitate metro station. Even if it’s just because the happen to pass by it on their way to the metro.

Last night I used it as a last resort. I met Alex C after work and we wanted to have a drink, eat (mostly me) and do the tons of pending catching up. As Bucharest people go out way to much for a Tuesday nights, the place we tried first was full. We entered this coffee shop and a guy with two menus popped out of nowhere instantly.

Great service! Fast and efficient! Well, that was what I thought of first. Then it took another 15 minutes for the guy to finally decide to hear me calling him to take our order. Two pizzas, a lemonade and a beer. Not that complicated. After another five minutes he came with the forks and knives and the ketchup.

He was basically moving fast enough to make everyone else suddenly feel sleepy. So another overzealous guy came out of, again, nowhere, asking us if we wanted something. We said no, it’s been taken care of. So he has the bright idea of taking the tray with the ketchup and forks back, without asking anything. We tried to stop him and barely could. By this time I could not help laughing. “At least I made you laugh”, he said. True, at least that.

The beer came long after the pizzas, after another explicit request. The request was answered to promptly, the problem was to actually make the waiter see/hear you or react in any other way than walking round the entire coffee shop, doing nothing useful.

The pizza, however, was delicious and not expensive at all. I ordered Quattro Formagi which they rarely get just about right, no matter where I have it. So that was quite impressive.

Getting the check, well that was another adventure. Before that we were waited on by a very nice girl who actually had some idea what she was doing. She also brought us the check, after another 15 minutes of trying to discover where exactly our waiter was hiding. Of course, when it was time to take the cash and the tip (yeah, there was a tiny tip cause I could not find a better solution!) he reappeared. Nice magic trick!

So if you want great pizza, a nice atmosphere and a rather empty coffee shop, you should try this one. But do bring all the available patience with you!

Four jobs I have had in my life:
Translator for my dad – can you imagine me explaining how complicated machines recycling oils work? I still don’t know how I made it through those days.
Editor for a press monitoring agency – by far the job that required me to wake up the earliest.
Marketing Officer – the first job I had in a company where the bosses did not understand Romanian.
Technical Supporter – would never have the strength to do it again

Four movies I would watch over and over again:
Heaven’s Doors
Love Actually – because it is so full of hope that it suits any given situation
Any movie with Vin Diesel – ah, yeah, a guilty pleasure still!
Phantom of the Opera – because I still don’t get the girl’s choice

Four places I’ve lived:
A village in the Vrancea county called Sihlea, with my grandma
Ploiesti, my first and everlasting love
Bucharest, the city they all love to hate, but me, I’ve always worshiped it for some obscure reason
….list still open…..

Four TV shows I like to watch:
Lost
24
Desperate Housewives
IT Crowd

Four places I have visited:
Italy, Rome
Germany
Hungary
Turkey, Istanbul

Four websites I visit daily:
Online edition of Evenimentul Zilei
Hotnews.ro
Ziarul Financiar
Linux news related bunch of sites (work related)

As this list shows, I am finally reading the papers again, online, but still…

Four places I would like to be right now:
Sahara Desert and generally any country with a warmer climate
Rome, in the exact same hotel I stayed 6 years ago, then running to Fontana di Trevi
On a boat trip around the world
Road trip with my car through Europe

As you can see, not really a fixed place. Wandering and vagabonding would do for me

For of my favorite foods:
As I am not allowed to eat half of them (doctor’s orders) I will skip this part.

Four bloggers I’d like to respond:
Anyone interested in the meme.

I remember times long ago (about three years ago) with a wide smile on my face. I was younger and used to go to a club, sleep for two-three hours, then go to work with the first bus, at 5 a.m. I was enjoying such outings with the crazy girls I was living with quite often.

So in my madness, I thought I still had it in me. Therefore, when A said something about going to a club on Monday evening, I thought that was the perfect plan for me. After serious doubts such as “Why go out when I can sleep instead?” I finally ended up in Club A. Club A pretty much copies the Ogilvy mentality I’d been hearing about: if you get a good idea ever, grab on to it and keep using and overusing it! It was pretty much the same atmosphere and music I remembered from my first year in Bucharest. And indeed it works, as the club was pretty crowded on a Monday night.

Why in the world would someone go to a club on Mondays (one of A’s many hobbies, as I found out)? I did ask the question and the reply was pretty relevant: “I used to have a reason once, which I really do not remember now. But I keep going”. To such invincible reasons, who could say no?

So I went, not exactly my type of music, but I did forgive them for two Depeche Mode songs and a few others close to my heart like “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Doors”. Did I mention they played quite a few songs I used to wake up to as a kid, as my dad loved them so much he listened to them every morning? You do tend to feel younger when there are songs from before you became an idea.

Consequences of my Monday party? Well I could not wake up to go to school the next day and stoned myself with coffee at work. As usual, when tired, the day at work was pretty much awful. So, to celebrate such a day and feel better, I met Cris and Baty after work for a “healthy” dinner in McDonald’s and lots of laughter.

Conclusions we reached when we caught our breath, in laughter breaks:

1. If you work too much and don’t take care of yourself AND actually get successful, you will also turn into a whale.
2. If someone tells you that you cannot eat what you have just ordered, don’t force yourself to eat it all just to spite them.
3. Employees swear only when bosses do their job. If no one is swearing, then the boss should get worried.

As you can see, the conversation topics have no real connection, but it was fun catching up and just relaxing.

What is there left to do when your world is changing fast, against your will? When everything is going from bad to worse and you feel powerless, forgotten and betrayed? Shop, party and plan a vacation, of course!

Therefore I headed for Iasi with my mom on Thursday night or Friday morning, as you prefer. We left at 1 a.m. while it was raining/snowing outside, on a road I had never been on. I was a bit tired as I had slept for one hour only, but all in all the trip was awesome.

I was expecting a longer drive, as it was night and stormy at times, but we got to Iasi in 7 hours (during which we had two pit stops, one of them to also eat). As the anniversary class was at the university in Iasi, but three hours later, we had to walk a little into the freezing cold.

However, I finally found a Montherlant book that I had been looking for at least half a year. And the second part of Anais Nin’s journal. I then took part in the famous class, got kissed and hugged by most of my mother’s colleagues (they’re all lawyers or legal advisers of different kinds as she is a Law graduate).

As it suited me so well, due to the rough week and long drive with no sleep, I had a major breakdown that afternoon. And after a few hours of sleep under my mom’s close watch and an extremely long shower, I suddenly started to feel a lot better. And headed for the dinner organized in a nearby restaurant.

I had brought this nice dress to wear. But I decided it was not warm enough for it (actually, it was, for normal people, not for heat loving lizards like me). So I decided to wear a more comfortable and warm outfit and let the look wonderful part to my mom. I saw people dancing and having fun, being a family and being friends, being warm and kind and interesting. Then headed to our room, to get some sleep. I didn’t as when my mom came back at 3 a.m. I was still watching movies on my laptop.

The second day was full. We got up at 9 am and by 10 o’clock we were having our breakfast and coffee downtown. We started doing some shopping at about 11 and by half past 12, I had spent so much money that my head was twisting. But who cared when I had chosen such beautiful looking clothes/boots.

I then met Ryan, took my mom to the hotel for her lunch with her colleagues and Ryan needed to go through the pain of walking around the whole city of Iasi with me. I will give you more details and photos of the beautiful places to visit in Iasi in my next post. They are too many to squeeze in this preview/overview.

We also stopped by his place for a quick glance of the Internet world and for me to transfer some movies and music. We shared an extremely good pizza and talked a little more about everything. Given that we had previously met online only and that we became close when we were no longer colleagues in BitDefender, I have to tell you he seemed in person as great as he seemed online. One more reason to regret the old team!

Another important aspect of this day was a long morning chat with my mom. The result: I decided what to do with my winter holidays: instead of feeling sad and lonely as I predicted before pulling myself out of the bad state I was in, I will be spending the winter holidays in Cairo, Egypt!!! Yes, my Egyptian friends, I am coming there and I DO expect to meet all of you. Even you, Haal, like it or not! I am sure you will all be willing to meet me, given that you do not want to start a world ending volcano eruption. Just kidding…or am I?

After two nights with little rest, I fell asleep at 9 o’clock on Saturday and only woke up at 7 am the next day. We headed home at 9 am, we first got to Ploiesti where I left my mom and at 5 pm I was back in Bucharest. I did not get lost in Iasi! Did I tell you how proud I was of that? I actually managed (sometimes with lots of struggling involved) to get to the places I needed to get to.

Sunday evening, after half hour of checking emails and blogs, my good mood was starting to wear off. So I talked t Cris and Alex and we all went out. We had something to drink at the Amsterdam Café, talked and laughed and I came back home again, happy and prepared for a new week.

Tags: Iasi, Romania, Travel Destinations, Alina, Alina Popescu

Therefore, wish me luck with the night driving and stay tuned for the stories and photos to come from my mom an my adventure!

Tags: Iasi, Jassy, Romania, Travel Destinations