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Monday, June 11, 2007
Violence at the Bucharet Gay Parade
Unfortunately, it was all quite far from what I had hoped for. Apparently, we are quite intolerant, with one of the most narrow-minded religious leaders. This part actually pisses me off. I have never seen them protest (or do something relevant) against poverty, women being abused, children being neglected and beaten or forced to beg and other such real issues the church should really get involved in.
A call by the Romanian Orthodox Church for people to pray in the street for the salvation of homosexuals’ souls could not prevent violence at the gay parade that took place on Saturday at the end of the GayFest 2007 festival in Bucharest last week.
The marchers were helding banners urging people to tolerate minorities. The event was organized by the ACCEPT association for the rights of sexual minorities.
But the quiet still colorful event almost came to a halt when several hundred youth tried to attack the march. The police intervened with tear gas grenades and was welcomed with bottles and rocks in two rounds of clashes that resulted in the arrests of dozens of people.
The march was preceded by another protest organized by the Romanian New Right movement seen as many as the continuator of Romanian fascism. It was also boycotted by anti-fascist protesters in a rare appearance that also resulted in several arrests on Saturday morning.
The third edition of the GayFest festival of Romanian homosexuals opens in Bucharest on June 4. The event is dedicated to the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) community in the country and their supporters and friends. It will host a series of thematic films and exhibitions, peaking with a gay parade in downtown Bucharest on Saturday, June 9.
The full program of the event as well as information about the Festival can be found on the website of the Accept Association, where it is specified that the event is not a threat to the values of family and society in Romania.
What I pray for? More tolerance this year, no people getting abused in any way for their orientation, people shutting up when they don't really now what they are talking about (I do refer to those standing by, swearing and cursing during the gay parade).
Some say Romania is not the right country for such a parade. Which country is right? Aren't those right countries the models we try so hard to implement? Maybe now that we have joined the EU we will be less obvious about our being narrow-minded.
Romania Report: First Domestic dotcom Millionaires
This piece of news has been published by several newspapers and I think it's worth mentioning. As it proves there are successful Romanian businessmen. And we should all follow their lead: work hard and hope to get acknowledged.
The first Romanian dotcom millionaires are Liviu Dumitrascu (30) and Daniel Tatar (29), the two young people who, eight years ago, founded eJobs.ro, currently Romania's largest online recruitment website.
Liviu Dumitrascu and Daniel Tatar sold 30% of the company to US-based investment fund Tiger Global Management, for 4.2 million euros. The transaction was completed at the end of last week, sources close to the dealings told ZIARUL FINANCIAR.
I've been using eJobs.ro for a few years now. I got my job at BitDefender and then the one at AXIGEN through them. So up to now, I am pretty happy with their services. Great job and keep up the good work!
Facebook, the Internet’s second-largest social network, was originally popular on college campuses, but over the last year it has opened its dorm-room doors to all, and its membership rolls have exploded at triple-digit growth rates.
Now Facebook, based in Palo Alto, Calif., is inviting thousands of technology companies and programmers to contribute features to its service. They can even make money from the site’s users by doing so, and, at least for now, Facebook will not take a cut.
The move could foster some of the chaotic creativity that is more closely associated with MySpace, its larger competitor. It could also open the door to hazards like spam, and make Facebook’s identity less clear.
I think I have created an account on Facebook at a certain point. I have never used it since. For some reason, Facebook and MySpace both fail in convincing me. I am surely out of their target audience. Does any of you use either one? Why/Why not? And which do you consider better?
Lisbon, Portugal - The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) last night announced the winners of the 2007 Tourism for Tomorrow Awards at the Gala Dinner for the 7th Global Travel & Tourism Summit. The Awards recognize and promote the best practices in tourism development all over the world. The winners of the four categories are:
The winners were selected by a panel of five judges, chaired by Costas Christ, world expert in sustainable tourism. The judging process included on-site evaluation visits of all award finalists by a team of sustainable tourism experts around the world.
More on WTTC's site. I have to confess, I pray for the day when Romania or parts of it are considered for such awards.
According to a statistic carried out by BestJobs.ro, some 19,000 users of the largest headhunting portal in Romania look for work in Romania, rather than abroad.
BestJobs.ro officials said that the figures is constantly growing this year. The most interested are Romanians living in Germany, France, United Kingdom, Italy and Spain.
Interesting, but quite incomplete...So I checked the article in Romanian, hoping to get more details. Not much though. What I wanted to know is: -19,000 of how many? - is the proportion the same on other portals? - is there an estimation of how many people actually work abroad? - do most of them want to come back?
Using a Romanian jobs portal seems inappropriate. First of all, because the majority of jobs offered by it are in Romania. So if you offer only a few jobs abroad and they are not interesting for all users, of course you get such proportions...This seems like a nice and devious way to promote BestJobs. Am I wrong? I doubt it. I do have to say they chose an interesting approach. It does catch one's eye. But then again, to make the story work, it needed more data.
Traian Basescu will watch from the presidential palace the evolution of the Parliamentarian vote on his suspension and will hold a press conference tonight, after the procedure is completed.
Basescu said his resignation will be wrote as soon as the Parliament suspends him and will be submitted as soon as the Constitutional Court decides that the suspension procedure was properly conducted. Article from here.
The same news portal, HotNews, published an article on an attempt (Romanian only) to gather people for a protest in Piata Universitatii (University Plaza). The protest against Basescu's suspension is scheduled for today, at 6.30 pm.
The Constitutional Court (CCR) decided that Basescu's constitutional "deviations" are not of nature to cause his suspension as president, yet the final word belongs to the Parliament.
Well, I'm with the President on this one! I prefer him to the Parliament as they are all a bunch of backstabbers and they switch sides for any reason. The President might not be far from them, but he's got more points from me in the end.
I will be at the Opera at the time anyway...Better choice! I am seriously thinking of never voting again. I simply feel there is nothing to choose from.
Update! It is done. President Basescu has been suspended. More in Romanian here and here. We are officially :presidentless", to quote Ryan.
President Traian Basescu participated in the spontaneous meeting in the University Square several hours after the Parliament voted in favor of his suspension on Thursday.
The matter of the resignation - which Basescu promised to submit as soon as possible in the event of his suspension - remained unclear, as his only official statement in this regard was: “I will do what’s best for Romania”.
Seriously, what's wrong with EVZ's English section these days? They seem to just fill it up with translations that make me seriously think about how to react. To quote Cris Z, if it weren't sad, this would actually be quite funny. So, laugh or cry, I cannot decide.
Romania is ranked 21 in Europe as regards water sources as the most affected parts of the country affected by draught are the South and the East, where water quantities have been much less than when the climatology norm stipulated, in the last five months.
What is that? I cannot tell. It sounds so bad I don't know where to start complaining. Moving on, what do they mean by "grave" here:
The Voiculescu anti-presidential Committee presented its report of the President’s “grave wrongdoings” in which Traian Basescu is guilty of breaching the Constitution exactly the same day that the Constitution Court decided the Committee is legal.
If you check the options listed here, you'd see their choice was not that good. Serious would have worked better. Simple, not a great match here, especially when placed anywhere near wrongdoings, but way better than grave.
Now, I've never dared to think my English is perfect. Then again, I'm one blogger, writing in my spare time and during the little breaks I'd rather spend on the blog and not having coffee breaks. I am not paid to translate news. I'd do a better job. In fact I did it in the past.
I can understand lack of time, the fact that the English page is not that important. But if all that work and lack of time for more tasks is overwhelming, just don't translate anything. It harms the newspaper's image a lot less.
I was reading a 9 AM article on major comebacks of reunited bands in 2007, when I realized that I am really way behind in this field. As in many others. So here is what I knew:
Take That without Robbie Williams (sounds about right, he has a pretty good career going on without them). Yup, short list. Now let me present the list of other bands who decided they can still promote a pretty good sound together:
Boyzone. Yes, Ronan Keating and his crew thought they might give it another try. They also have a strong reason: 1 million pounds each.
Spice Girls. They had tried something like this once, didn't they? Only four of them, then they disappeared again. Well, better luck this time!
Michael Jackson, as part of Jackson's Five. To quote a line from Not Another Teen Movie, damn! That's just wack!
The Police have already reunited. And they're going to be on tour soon (all tickets sold already).
Genesis: they'd started to think Phil Collins would do just fine among them.
Yes, Reamonn will come and play in Bucharest this summer. To be more precise, the end of June or beginning of July. Photo and information from EVZ.
I can't wait to go. So I will keep my eyes on music stores selling concert tickets. I have to get mine as soon as possible! I really don't want to risk missing it, as it happened with the Depeche Mode concert last summer. Luckily I was blessed with tickets a day before the concert.
See you all there! Well, at least I hope to see you all there! Looks like it will be a summer full of great concerts!
P.S. For those of you who have no idea who these guys are, let me tell you their first hit was Supergirl. It was launched seven years ago and it's been my trade-mark song for about four. And I am pretty sure I have posted the lyrics here at least once.
If that was not enough to convince you, their latest hit it "Tonight". Lyrics follow:
She never took the train alone She hated being on her own She always took me by the hands And say she needs me She never wanted love to fail She always hoped that it was real She'd look me in the eyes and said believe me. And then the night becomes the day And there’s nothing left to say If there's nothing left to say Then something’s wrong.
[Refrain] Oh tonight, you killed me with your smile. So beautiful and wild, so beautiful. Oh tonight, you killed me with your smile. So beautiful and wild so beautiful and wild.
And as the hands would turn with time She'd always say that she was mine She'd turn and lend a smile, To say that she's gone. But in a whisper she'd arrive And dance into my life. Like a music melody, Like a lovers song.
[Refrain] Oh tonight, you killed me with your smile. So beautiful and wild, so beautiful. Oh tonight, you killed me with your smile. So beautiful and wild, so beautiful and wild.
Through the darkest night Comes the brightest light. And the light that shines Is deep inside. It's who you are.
[Refrain] Oh tonight, you killed me with your smile. So beautiful and wild, so beautiful. Oh tonight, you killed me with your smile. So beautiful and wild so beautiful... beautiful!
Oh tonight, you killed me with your smile. So beautiful and wild, so beautiful and wild. So beautiful and wild. So beautiful and wild.
One in ten Bucharest citizens believe foreigners come to Romania for its beautiful women
"Citizens of Romanian capital Bucharest believe that Romania is attractive for foreign citizens due to its possibility to invest (35.3%), beautiful landscapes (15.9%), culture and traditions (10%) and the beautiful women here (9.7%), a new study shows. Men named investment opportunities and the riches of the country in a larger proportion than women, while the latter leaned more to the quality of the Romanian people. 60% of those who named the beauty of Romanian women were male." Full story here.
Interesting findings, I might say. Beautiful landscapes and culture & traditions amount to about 25%. Maybe this will be a trigger, something to bring new ideas in what tourism is concerned. If Romanians are aware of the potential their country has, maybe they will also think of better ways to exploit it.
Name: Alina Home: Bucharest, Bucharest, Romania About Me: "This is my church. This is where I heal my hurts". It's also where I feel free and my preferred means of expression. See my complete profile
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