Bed Size = King Size
We are currently in the process of moving house. We're changing one rented Bucharest apartment for another, closer to the center of the city, with more room to maneuver.
As tradition calls, we're building our own furniture once again. In fact, I've spent more time purchasing materials in the past 2 days than I did in the past 2 years put together.
I've planned my new bed to be 220 cm long by 180 cm wide, which lead many people to call me crazy, insane and a few other things not necessarily appropriate for public use. I've included a little sketch of my upcoming new bed in my new room. Give me an opinion! Is it really too big? is it too small? What?
|
| Christian Nasulea - 23.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
| |
| |
Balea Lac T-1
In order to reduce the number of "you never take me anywhere" complaints from my friends I will start to give a small amount of prior notice.
Thus, know I am going to Balea Lac in the Fagaras mountains tomorrow morning.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 22.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
Bikes on Trains
The National Romanian Railroad Company is conducting a poll on their website on whether we would like them to introduce special wagons for people who want to take their bikes with them.
I obviously think it's a great idea.
You can find the poll on the right side of the CFR Calatori website. I expect many supportive votes.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 18.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
Rock Climbing Cheile Rasnoavei
A couple of days ago when I was still in Greece I received an invitation I knew from the first moment I could not refuse.
Ionut (the man with the initiative, the plan, the know-how, the invitation and the enclosed photo), Alina, Elena and myself took for the mountains at noon today with all the necessary equipment, desire and determination to go rock climbing. We arrived at Cheile Rasnoavei (EN: gorges) around 1:00pm.
After the inevitable and very necessary bit of theory we actually started rock climbing. I'm not one to be scared of heights but there's definitely a natural human instinct directing people to stay away from narrow ledges that are so high up people below seem to be the size of ants. Add that to my extreme sleep deprivation from the past few days and you'll probably still be very far from guessing what that first 8m climb felt like.
Rappels, more theory, lots of fun and about 5 climbs later I was feeling surprisingly confortable hanging 30 meters into the air, relying only on a rope and the person holding it below.
You can see some extracts of my final climb for the day in this video:
A big thank you once again to Ionut for taking us, teaching us and taking care of us. Also, a big thank you to Elena for belaying me so well despite my droping her a few meters on the last run.
As far as pushing your own limits goes climbing ranks higher than most things I've tried so far. That's probably also why I enjoyed it so much. It's a hard sport compared to others so it's not something everyone should try but the satisfaction is worth it.
I've already found a few interesting resources on the Internet so, for starters, to stay ahead of the slang (in English) I recommend you have a look at the Climbing Dictionary.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 17.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
Mount Athos
Yesterday we went on our last big trip, here in Greece, which was centered around a cruise close to the shorelines of Mount Athos. It was interesting.
I'm only going to mention a few things I found out during the trip which I thought were more captivating.
First of all, Mount Athos is a state within a state, self-governed and independent from the Greek political power.
It's even got its own time zone (offset from GMT by a variable number of minutes), which together with the use of the Julian calendar is enough to make it seem like something out of Gulliver's Travels.
Mount Athos (the state) isn't actually just the mountain but more like the entire 3rd "finger" of the Halkidiki peninsla.
Romanian leaders from the middle ages (Ex: Stefan cel Mare, Vlad Tepes, Alexandru Lapusneanu) contributed large sums of money and support to the construction and reconstruction of the Athos monasteries.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 16.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
Athens
Last night, just minutes after midnight, we set off for Athens. Just as the new day was dawning we entered the city and drove around the historical center with our guide showing us the most important landmarks. We actually did this twice as we picked up a second guide and she practically gave us the same tour all over again.
At a quarter to eight, we were already at the gates of the Acropolis, tickets and student IDs in hand, ready to enter. The feelings you get contemplating such great history-filled places were a bit hard to pick-up, as we were struggling not to get lost in the interminable sea of people roaming about the Acropolis and making all kinds of noises in the many languages of the Earth.
After visiting and shooting the Parthenon, the Erechtheum, the Medieval tower, the Propylaea and just about every other piece of rock that was remotely interesting in shape and colour on the Acropolis we started decending on the narrow streets of Athens towards the cathedral. We passed through the renowned neighbourhood of Plaka where we spent less than 50 seconds in a shop and 25 euros. That's more than 50 cents per second which has to be some kind of a record for souvenir shopping.
We then rushed to visit the Temple of Zeus Olympian, Hadrian's Arch, the National Gardens, Zappeion and just before our time was up the Parliament, Syntagma square and the changing of the guard. At 1:20 pm we were back on the bus, heading north.
On the way back we stopped in Thermopylae to see the monument to king Leonidas and his 300 spartans.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 14.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
Olympus
Today we visited Mt. Olympus, the ruins of the ancient city of Dion, the city of Litochoro, and the Bath of Zeus.
It was more of a historical-cultural day. The history was made very easy, however, by Sophia's many stories.
The hike up to the Bath of Zeus also managed to slightly quench my thirst for the mountains.
Everything ended with a feast in one of the most picturesque restaurants I've ever seen.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 13.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
Skiathos
Yesterday, after a 2 hour bus ride to the port of Achillion, in the Pagasitic Gulf (this is where the argonauts set sail in search of the golden fleece), we went on a short cruise to Skiathos Island. The entire day was extraordinary.
Skiathos
Port was a very interesting place to visit. The church, the old
harbour, the white and blue houses and the narrow streets gave a very
nice feel to the place. It was livable, as in the kind of place I
wouldn't mind spending more than a few days in.
After our short visit of the city we sailed north to Koukounaries beach
where the crystal clear waters of the Aegean made a perfect snorkeling
spot.
Perhaps the most notable aspect of the entire day was
captain Kostas and his crew. With the cruise-ship sea battles and
races, the onboard Sirtaki lessons, and the general entertaining
attitude they created a very fun, albeit short, cruise experience. On
the boat I said that captain Kostas is probably a guy whom his father
really wanted to become a sailor, while he himself prefered dancing.
I'm really glad he finally became a sailor and didn't give up on the
dancing either.
When we sailed back into the home port, the captain, his wife and their
many children put on one final dancing show for us. It was really,
really fun... all of it!
Although I understand the show isn't always as spectacular as it was yesterday, Elisabet Cruises is definitely a place where people know what tourist entertainement is about.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 13.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
Crazy UFO
Today, at Koukounaries beach I tried another sea-based craziness. The name isn't that important because it seems it gets called by many different names depending on where you do it.
The idea is simple. You sit on an inflated raft that's being dragged by a speedboat as fast as possible through the waves. As you're hanging on for dear life, the raft sometimes takes off as it encounters bigger waves. It's very fun but you pay for it days later in terms of muscle fever.
A big thank you to Corina for endeavoring to go on the boat and take the pictures.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 12.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
FaceSaerch
Being on holiday doesn't mean I'm not looking out for the new, the interesting and the high-tech. This is how I remembered FaceSaerch, a search engine that uses Google technology and focuses exclusively on finding portraits of people.
FaceSaerch isn't just a fun toy, but potentially also a useful tool for all those doctoral papers where you'd really feel the need to stick a photo of the guy on the side of that killer quote.
|
| Christian Nasulea - 11.08.2008 | |
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
RSS 2.0
