The first real snow

Last night, while getting out of my building to get inside the cab that would take me to work, I was surprised to see it had started snowing! It kept snowing the whole night and then in the morning and these are some of the results:
I am hardly a winter person, I am terrified of cold, but I can't help loving snow.
The trees are full of snow and they don't look that depressing without leaves anymore.
What more could one ask to have a perfect scenery? A horse sleigh ride? Most surely!

The Bear Dance

These are photos of what's left of a very old winter season tradition, the Bear Dance. Usually accompanied by gYpsies, the Bear Dance brought good fortune for the new years'. To train the bear, as the animal was not that a good dancer, they used hot coals thrown on the ground, so that the animal could lift his paws very fast while they were playing. After a while, the coals were no longer needed.During the rest of the year, the bears for taken from town to town and village to village and were used to walk over people with back problems. Word was if such a bear would step all over one's back, one would no longer have back pains.
It turns out this wasn't only performed in Romania, as a recently found out it was also performed in Turkey and there is an onld Turkish movie on this subject. So I wouldn't be supprised if the neighbor country would know this dance.
These days they no longer use a real bear, a man is impersonating the wild animal, which is highly preferable to hot coals! It is still mainly performed by gypsies, or Roma minority, to be politically correct, and I think this tradition of theirs would use some promoting, as we all have almost forgotten it.

Illustrated trip to Ploiesti

The first stop on my way, the statue of Mihai Viteazul. The park around it has been the place where I would meet Oana for years, under the horse's tail, as we used to call it.Next, the Petrom office in Ploiesti, presenting a nice reflexion of the Cathedral and other buildings around it. The only biuilding in the city with a hellioport on top of it.
The "Sfantul Ioan" (St. John) Cathedral, with an impressive facade...Well, yes but the rest of the church behind it is quite small, thus generating an eye-catching contrast.
The Trade Union House, mostly use for theatre plays and other entertainmend shows, was also, for six summers in a row, home of my ballet shcool's anual shows, proudly presenting miss Kayla Vincent...This tradition continued long after I stopped attending the classes.
Statue of Mihai Eminescu, my favorite Romanian poet. I've always needed to see this statue when I need to trust I could do it all, shool related or work related.
The Palace of Culture - you can find the Cunty library here, the small theatre Equinox where I took some theatre lessons. Most important, here is were Marilena Eftimie still teaches ballet classes to little girls wanting to learn a little about grace. I attended her classes for 6 years (age 5 to 11)
The City Hall, we call it the White House, yes, I know, very funny! Ploiesti inhabitants do think they are on top of the world...
Omnia shopping centre, the largest one in the central area of Ploiesti. It's a symbol of how a huge comunist boring and extremely large shop can turn into a modern shopping centre, with places to eat, shop and a bank of course!
The Central Hotel, our very own Phoenix bird. It had decreased to one star after a fire but it was then reestablished. It's a three starts hotel right now, although the Western wing is still not finished.
As you can see, we like old traditional Christmas Trees, not the light bulb replacements from Bucharest. This huge one is placed in front of the City Hall, but there are two more, one in front of the Cathedral and one in front of the food and vegetables market. All three are properly decorated.
The clock, this one has been around for at least 12 years. It's the most common place to appoint a meeting, especially for students of all ages.
The statue of Nichita Stanescu, poet born in Ploiesti. This statue was unveiled in my third year of high-school and we all cut classes to attend the event.
Such little places to shop for books are specific to Ploiesti. There are around ten like this one down town.
A closer view
The Court of Law...The place I always associate with my mom, she's a legal advisor and sometimes appears in court here. Behind it is the place where I meet my mom after work.
Toma Caragiu, famous actor born in Ploiesti. The Theatre in the city has his name. He died during the great earthquake from March 4, 1977
My mom, on her way to meet me...Smiling, as always when she sees me waiting.

A nice little thins that I've discovered...At the fish market, live fish swimming in a little pool.The City Hall by night, lots of lights and the nicely decorated trees.
A view of the winter amusment park.
Another angle of the City Hall.
And of course, our huge sparkling real Christmas Tree...

Christmas lights in Bucharest

You will all have to excuse the quality of these pictures. Your truly is new at this camera and also got the wrong manual from the shop (it was so nice of them of course), so the night picture taking needs some tutoring for now :)

There are different kinds of light for different areas of the city, but the Unirea-University-Romana area usually has the best lights:
In the centre of the University Plaza there is a huge Christmas Tree made from lights only. Although I like real trees with decorations, this one will have to do.
The Intercontinental Hotel has it's own lights, not that spectacular, but it is all bright and shiny.
Tje Christmas Treee again, from a different angle:
And the decorations along the boullevard
And now, the heroes of this photo-taking adventure:Cris and I...

The little fellow I was talking about...

This is cutie here made my St Nicholas day! The full story on how I got him is available on the mother blog.

Tribute to an old passion

I've always had this unknown passion for the Desert. I have no idea what triggered it or when it has actually happened. Was it caused by Carl May's description of the Saharian adventures? Was Dune the reason? I don't know. What I know is that seeing images of the desert realxes me, it puts this smile on my face, the one you have when you remeber extraordinary and pleasent events from your past. Maybe it was an experience from another life. Maybe it's me being a Fire star-sign, therefore triggered by the heat of the desert, the sometimes reddish nuances...Regardless of the reason, here is a small tribute in images to this unexplained passion of mine. I have never seen any desert in real life, but I do hope to experience it first hand.

Photos taken with my new camera!

Me sitting at my computer, I was actually chatting with a customer at the time:

Me again, looking very happy when the chat conversation was finished :D

And a long expected coffee/cigarette break!

Mountain weekend #2