Fine.

Well, I just got back from Romania. And already I'm posting about it. Because I love our readers. I hadn't been there in 8 long years and it was good to feel the Romanian soil under my feet once again. I wasn't alone though, I was accompanied on this journey back to my roots and into my very soul, if you will, by some of my best friends. We traveled the country together and we had a great time.

The top picture of the cool bananas is from Costinesti, the Romanian Ibiza, by the Black Sea. This mural painting from the Club Banana ( or whatever ) was gracing that wall last time I was there13 years ago . Being eleven at the time I thought it was pretty darn cool, and I was really happy to find it right where I left it. A lot of things were like that in Costinesti, it's like the whole city is stuck in the beginning of the 90's. ( This is a theory I also had about Madison WI, but with Madison it's 1996-98 in particular, musically and flannel-wise. ) In Costinesti people had mullets, which I thought was a myth about Eastern Europe. I like mullets though, so that was a pleasent surprize. Another fun observation I actually just made, was that the young party-people of that city are actually pretty similar to those bananas. I don't care to elaborate, you can just let your imagination run free with this one.

In Bucharest we found cooler people and this fun old club called Club A ( my mom has actually been there back in the day. Only there was apparently no dancing back then, only you know, really serious discussions. Of course). That's were the sorry-ass, poor, sweaty, dirty, foul-smelling students hang out. To quote the taxi driver who drove us there. The description made me hopeful, since we had just left Club Max, a place filled with 6-7 dancing brides ( wedding dresses and all), a lot of go-go dancers in cages, gross old men with mobile phone cameras and guys with mullets (again). And really slutty chicks with bad highlights. (Yeah. Take that, scary Romanian girls!). But seeing a bride is considered good luck in Romania, so I'm all set for the next few years after that night. That's pretty cool. Here are some more good luck and bad luck Romanian sayings:

Make a wish:

- First time you eat a fruit you never had before.
- First time you eat a fruit at the beginning of it's season, every year.
- Eyelash, put it inside your shirt.

Good luck:

- Seeing a bride.

Bad luck:

- Whistling inside.
- Whistling inside a car.
- Owning an in any way broken mirror.
- Owning anything broken.
- Pouring water the wrong way. Can't explain that one. Hopefully you're doing it the right way.

At Club A I heard this song about a beautiful gypsy for the first time. Everybody got up and danced in traditional horas ( circles), and sang along super loud. I was singing along too and watching it all when I became really aware of being in the middle of a city where I have so much more to discover.

Inima de Tiganca

The main part translates " Gypsy-girl you are beautiful, my gypsy-girl, I love you and I can never forget you". Enjoy.