Back home from Germany

I just come back from Germany and even that I am tired and sleepy I don’t have sleep if I don’t share to you some short opinions about my trip in Germany. You will see that in all my opinions I coming back to my Belgium experience trying to find out some differences between Belgium and Germany. Maybe you will ask yourself, why I don’t compare my experience from Germany with Romania and why I prefer Belgium? I don’t have something with my country and believe me that I would like to write about Romania, but unfortunately, there is nothing to compare with Romania. Romania is not Germany and it won’t be.

You need just 6 hours from Kortijk to Gelsenkirchen. In Gelsenkirchen I met my Romanian friends, they are studying there and that’s way I had a place to stay over the night. Nowadays is very hard to meet people like them.

In the next post, I will tell you more about the places I visited, but for now some short and general thoughts about Germany:

Trains. If you are coming for the first time in Germany, you will be surprised how big there are the railways stations, how clean, fast and comfortable can be. I think that every station has at least 11 or 12 platforms. And of course, all the trains are coming in time. It’s incredible how discipline, organize, punctual can be these people. It’s hard to admit, but these words like “punctual”, “organize” and “discipline” doesn’t have any meaning for Romanian people.

English. I couldn’t find so many people speaking English like in Belgium. If you are going in a supermarket or you are in a tram and you lost your way, I’m afraid that you won’t find so many people who can give you a piece of advice in English.

Weather. The weather wasn’t so friendly with us. It’s still winter there. Most of the time, it was raining and from time to time it was snowing. That’s way we couldn’t do so many things and we preferred to run from a pub to another.

Music. I am not very good in music but in the place where I stayed I had the chance to listen some german songs. I don’t understand all the lyrics, but from my point of view is more noise than music.

Beers. You will be very surprised to see people drinking beer in the street or in the tram. It’s not forbidden to take your beer and drinking it outside. In America, Belgium or Romania this habit is punished. They don’t have so many kinds of beers like in Belgium but they drink as much beer like them. Their famous beer is Beck’s, but is not the best beer from Germany.

Girls. From all the young girls I’ve seen in Germany most of them have at least one “piercing”: in the nose, in the eyebrow or in the tongue. It must be very painful. For those who have “piercing” in the tongue, I’m wondering how they could eat a chocolate bar full of nuts. A girl with a piercing in the tongue told me that most of the boys are really happy when they kiss (french kiss) a girl with a piercing. Can be a reason, why not?

Prices. The prices are really good compared with the Belgium prices. I dare say that the prices are really close to Romanian prices. That’s one of the reasons to believe that they have a strong economy.

I’m going to sleep.

Good night, Germany!

I passed my first exam! Intensive Dutch

“Here we certifity that

Costin Oane

Erasmus student from SNSPA, “College of communication and Public Relations”, Bucharest

Followed the EILC course between 28/01/08 and 15/02/08 totalising 60 hours of language tuition and including cultural activities, sat an oral and written exam and passed the test successfully.”

My mark is: B

Here I come Germany !

Tomorrow afternoon I will be in the train, on the way to Gelsenkirchen. I hardly wait to meat my Erasmus friends from Germany.

The people of Amsterdam are Amsterdam.

If someone asks me to make a sum up of Amsterdam, I will say that, Amsterdam is by far, the true city of tolerance and diversity. And I think that you must have some background, some training to understand this kind of freedom. The people of Amsterdam are Amsterdam.

Maybe you will say: millions of tourists can’t be wrong! Amsterdam. Can be true. But this place is not my type. People look very strange; you can smell marijuana from the street. Amsterdam is very very crowded and gives you anxiety feeling.

Amsterdam is one of the greatest cities in the world, a city which still receives millions of tourists every year. Is one of the most visited places in the world, after London, Paris and Barcelona. There are not to many things to visit (maybe I’m wrong) in Amsterdam, the main attractions for most visitors are:

Red Light District

You might be surprised to discover that this sex-for-sale zone occupies a handsome area of 16^th century canals and the “ordinary” people still leave here and go on with the daily business of life. If you are a boy, I am sure that your eyes will be for a moment focus on women behind the red windows. The whole area of town called Red Light District is always invaded by large groups of tourists walking in the streets and looking at the windows with the girls. I don’t recommend you to visit the Red Light section after dark. It’s more sinister and can be dangerous. According to statistics there are now over 25,000 prostitutes in the Netherlands. Prostitution has been legal in the Netherlands from 1815 and in 1996 the Dutch government started to tax it. By the way, no cameras in red light distict!

Coffee shops.
Here you can buy small amounts of cannabis. Coffee shops must not sell to anyone under 18 and they must not sell more than 5g to any customer. Hard drugs are strictly prohibited. Walking around the city I’ve seen a social campaign, that more and more kids under 10 years old, started to smoke and not everthing they started to smoke marijuana. In the midnight, we will find people asking you if you want some „ecstasy”.

Sex Museum. Erotic Museum
You will find a great collection of erotic art. The Erotic museum reflects what it is all about in the Red Light District.

You can be sure that Amsterdam is more than this, and you can get a most authentic experience from it. It was nice experience. It’s totally different from everything I’ve seen by now.

If you are in relationship, take your girlfriend and go in Amsterdam. Nobody will disturb you.

I can bet for this.

Happy birthday, Can !!

A nice and friendly person like you deserves the best that each day can bring. Happy Birthday!

After beer tasting

One day you discover these exceptional beers. After that, on each new occasion, all the meetings will be a pleasure. All the beers have made a big impression on me.

Another 10 mark for Katho University. They prepared a short presentation of the most famous Belgium beers. And then, we supposed to taste 3 different kinds of beers.

The first one was “Kriek” a light beer, and the taste was like a cherry juice. The name is derived from the Dutch word for this type of cherry. If you ask me, I can’t say that Kriek is a beer. But it was nice to try.

The second beer “Chimay”was a strong one, 9% alcohol. Very nice battle, interesting taste. Good to try it next time.

The last one was “Duvel”, another strong beer again, 8.5% alcohol. If you are new with this beer you can have some problems how to pronounce “Duvel”. The flemish pronunciation is “Doov’l”.

Beer tasting with our teachers!!

Yes is true. Beer tasting with our teachers. And it will be tonight. First time when I heard I thought that it’s a joke, but in fact is not. In my country it’s quite impolite to go to a pub and drink with one of your teachers at the same table.

P.S. By the way, the invitation came from them. And all the drinks are free.

Drinks for everyone! From the house..

Life is an orange!

It’s about a boy. Like all the kids. And there were moments in his life when even his life surprised him. And he could not find any answers for all his dilemmas. Every time our boy used to go to his father to find out a kind of answer for all his anxious dilemmas. „Life is an orange” was the father’s answer. But he never understood why this life can be an orange.

The time has passed, and our boy is not a boy anymore. He grown up, he has his own family and he is a dad. His father is old and sick, somewhere in a hospital. In every moment he can die. His son had in mind to ask his father before he die, why “life is an orange”? He came closer to his ear and asked him:

- Dad, please can you tell me why this life is an orange? Since I was a kid I was very curious to find out why for all my questions you gave me just one answer: “life is an orange”. Please don’t go away, without telling me the last answer. Pleeaasssseee…

- Son, you don’t know why this life is an orange? To be honest with you, I don’t know either.

And after these words the old man died.

Sometimes there are some moments in my life, when even this life surprised me. And I still have questions, like our boy. I still need to ask somebody for an answer. Growing up, I’ve realised that all my questions are in fact my answers.

Good night !

The secret to true friendship is simply to first realize

Maybe I should have start this blog writing about friends. I’ve realized that you can have real friends much better with foreign people. I don’t know way, but from my previous experience I’ve seen that I can socialized much better with them. The language can be like a wall sometimes, but every time I convince myself finding reasons that this is not a problem.

Because I start to write about friends a have to mention 3 crazy guys: Bart (Poland), Aytac (Turkey) and Can (Turkey again). I mentioned only them because I spent most of my time with them and I had great moments with them. Every one is special in his own way, they have different sense of humor, different stories etc. It’s so nice when you find out that we have common words, common habits, same challenges, and same problems.

All students from all over the word are the same. They really know what it means to save money, to be with out any penny in your pocket, the same stories about parents, girls and parties.

Here is for you Bart, Aytac and Can. I salute you !!!

Cheers Brothers.

Bruges, Antwerp, Ghent!

In the last 2 weeks I’ve been in 3 big belgium cities: Bruges, Antwerp and Ghent. Every city is special in different way. But there are still many things in common. The buildings, everything is very clean, the pubs, the cathedrals, people are the same. By the way, a have a new look.

Antwerp (8 march) is a very old city. Long time ago, Antwerp was one of the most important financial centers of the world, it is first of all a very dynamic city, offering a perfect mix of history and present-day modern life.

 

But in Bruges(21 Feb.) was pretty different. If you don’t know, Bruges was the capital of European Culture in 2002, a city which still receives millions of tourists every year. The historical center is not so big. The only mode of public transport inside the city is bus. So if you have a car, I suggest you to find a parking place outside de city. If you can stay away from the chocolate-shops, you can find wonderful places, but pretty expensive. If you have been in Sibiu, take a look and see Bruges, and please let me know.

Ghent (27 Feb.) is a university city full of students and young people. The center of Ghent is quite small, so you can walk around on foot.

In Ghent I had the opportunity to spend one day with a Belgium family. We took diner in their dining room, with their children. We were guests and they treat us like guests. They are very highly read persons, they were traveling a lot, very open minded, in special with children. It’s very nice to see and meet people like them. Really.

The Poem Event

At the end of this day we prepared a special moment for them: every one was supposed to read some famous poems from their country. Some of them read their pomes very fast only to “escape”, some of them did their best. More or less. I was the last one who read the poems and put an end of that beautiful day. But, being honest I was the “man of the show”. Because in my case, I preferred to read my own poems. Not just only read, but the way how I read them was very nice. When I finished, all the people raised up in their fetes and they applauded for couple of minutes. I admit, that day was one of my best days since I’m here. For more days like this one…Cheers.

Stay close, because the next post will about Amsterdam.

See you there.