Poland-Romania world cup 2018 elimination

At 11 of November 2016 polish national football team was supposed to play a match against Romania in elimination to World Cup 2018 in Russia. We were really exited about this match mainly because it was to take place in Bucharest and we've managed to buy ourselves tickets.

At the day of the match we've painted on our cheeks polish flags and went to the town to drink some beers before the game. We felt a little bit ashamed at the bar because on TV we could see reports about polish team supporters destroing the city.... Around 2 hours before the match started we went to catch the bus that goes to the stadium. Although stadium wasn't that far away from the city center we barely made it at time - it took very long for polish supporters to enter. We were searched couple of times and there were some riots with the police that slowed the line down.

Fortunatley, we've made it right on time for the polish national anthem. After we sang the match started.

The match was very fortunate for us - Polish team has won 3-0 with Romania so we were really happy about the outcome of the game. For me I was only time that I've seen polish national team playing on stadium, so defienetly, it was good introduction in the world of football. However, I found the behaviour of some polish team supporters quite embarrassing and disappointing. At the stadium many of them were calling romanian stuff 'gypsys' with was unfortunate because in polish in romanian we use the same word to descripe this enticity.

My romanian trips Chisinau, Odessa - part. 4

The next day we were strolling around the Oddesa a little bit. I was suprised by the city's architecture. The city was quite simmilar to romanian Constanta, but surprisingly, much better preserved. Unfortunatley we were there during the winter - I think that this has way more to offer atsome other, warmer time of year.

After sightseeing we wanted to party a little bit, but the city was depressingly empty. We went to some local bars, had couple of beers but nothing was really happening. At some point we went to some outside winter market where we had mulled wine and there we've met some great ukrainan pepole with whom we were talking for a while.

Although it was really cold the mulled wine wamed us up and we were roaming around the city for a while. Unfortunatley the next day we were supposed to go back to Romania.

The next day we had a breakfast in local mall, and then we went to the store to buy some food for the way and, of course, some cheap ukrainan vodka as a suvenire. Around 6 PM we got to the bus and the way back  was AWFUL. It was 12 hours of constant bouncing and jumping in the unheated small vechicle on terrible hungover. Moreover, the diver was playing some kind of dumb russian cabarets at full volume. We had to cross Ukrainian-Moldovian border three times because the only road that was possible to drive on leaded in such way. Everytime on border we've been searched by the patrols with ak's and we had to wait outside in the terrible cold.

We got to Bucharest at the moring and I finally felt like in home.

My Romanian trips - Iasi, Chisinau si Odessa part 3.

The next day we got up quite early in order to walk aroud the city before our bus to Odessa. We've seen some more monuments but unfortunatley we didn't have that much time - our bus was leaving at 1 PM. We've bought ourselves some food for the journey and we entered the bus. Traveling conditions were quite harsh - it was really cold in the bus and the roads were full of holes so the vechicle kept on bouncing the entire time. Fortunatley the journey didn't take that long; we arrived at Odessa in 5 hours.

On the road again

After we arrived in Odessa we had to find a way to our accommodation. We booked an apartment on airbnb so we had to meet with our landlord first in order to get our kees. Fixing details of meeting wasn't all that easy because he was speaking only russian. Luckily I was learing russian in hight school so I was able to communicate with him on the basic level. After all he proved to be a really nice person - he even picked us up from the bus station and gave us a lift to our apartment.

Warming up in our apartment.

We we got to our accommodation it turned out to be really cold - owner told us that it was unheated since the last winter. We were quite dissapionted with that fact, but the price that we had to pay for this apartment was really low; considering that and a fact that we were staying in the city center we couldn't complain. Fortunatley the girls had hair dryers so we were able to warm our apartment up with those wonderful devices. I was really glad that we were able to rise the temperature level because at one point I was thinking that I'm going to freeze to death.

After a while spent in our apartment we went out to eat some dinner. We got to the one of the most fancy restaurants in the city but still prices were really afordable there - I had the best beer in my life for equivalent of 4 PLN.

Unpasteurized chernihivske beer

My romanian trips - Iasi, Chisinau and Oddesa - part. 2

After we've arrived to Chisinau we were really surprised by the poor conditions of the roads in the city. It was after all the country's capital and the acces road that we were going on was in really bad shape. After we got off the bus, we still had like a 2 km of walking to our hostel. The other unpleasent suprise that we've encountered was the fact that there were city lights only by the mainroads, so to our hostel we had to walk almost in complete darkness. After we checked in in the place of our accomodation, we asked the hostel's stuff for the directions to the closest restaurant and we went to eat something.
The third surprise that we had that day was the price of our meal. Everything was so affordable that we decided to order some drinks too!

Our meal

Next day we went to see the city and it turned out that in this day there was a great manifestation in the city square. People gathering on this event were showing their support for reunification of Republic of Moldova and Romania. The day of protest was no an random one. It was 1st December which is the biggest romanian national holiday - the day of unification of all three romanian states: Wallachia, Transilvania and Modlova.

As we all knew the problem we decided to join the manifestation. For me it was extraordinary experience because during my studies I had to do some research about unification trends in Republic of Moldova. Together with protesters we held one kilometer long romanian flag and we've been yelling out pro-unification slogans.

It may not look that way but this flag was way heavier than it seems to be. I had to hold it with a bare hand because otherwise it would slip out. We were standing there for maybe an hour and we started to feel how cold it is. Then our pro-unification zeal faded away and we decided that we are going to eat someting.

After feeding ourselves with good moldovan cuisine we went to see the city. It looked better then during the night but I have to admit that it had very socialist type of architecture - even stronger then Bucharest. After seeing some monuments we've bought tickets for tommorow's bus to Odessa and we went back to our hostel.

My romanian trips - Iasi, Chisinau and Odessa - part.1

So at the end of the November the friends of mine and I wanted to go on a longer trip. We have been thinking for a while where to go and after several days of debating that issue we finaly have decided that we will go to visit Iasi, Chisinau and Odessa, from where we will come back to Bucharest with a direct bus.

We took a night train to Iasi at the 28th of November and we arrived there next day at the morning. We have been really exhausted with the journey so after we've left the train we went directly to the hotel. Unfortunately only one room out of two was available, but we've managed somehow to squeeze in one. We've slept few hours and we went off to see the city.

In train

Palace of Culture in Iasi

After sightseeing the city we went to a store near our hotel to buy a couple of drinks and we went to drink them in the place of our accomodation because Iasi, in contrast to Bucharest got a little bit empty in the night. We also coudn't party all that much because the day after we had to catch a bus to Chisinau, which was a little harder then we expected.

Next day, after we got on the bus station we were informed that going to Chisinau from Iasi is not that simple at all. The only buses that had courses on that route were those in a type of "marshrutka" - small buses typical for the countries of former Soviet Union. We wanted to go to Moldova day before Romanian day of unity - the biggest national day, and of course, a day off. The number of people that wanted to cross the border was stunning - most of them were workers returning to Republic of Moldova for holidays. We weren't able to get to any of those buses so we went to the train station but they told us there that the first train goes to Chisinau in two days. Having no other option we went back to bus station and, after 3 hours of waiting we managed to leave for Chisinau.

Albanian Gjakmarrja

Albanian Gjakmarrja is an name for a social obligation to commit a murder in order to restore a honour of a family that was questioned by an earlier murder or some kind of moral humiliation. This principle is dictated by albanian Kanun.

Although the concept of killing people in the name of family's honor seems barbaric we have to remember that albanian blood feud was regulated by many laws. First of all, when we read on internet about albanian Gjakmarrja we offen can find informentions about cases in which one murder leaded to unending chain of crimes that could last even for generations. I have to agree that those situations indeed have occured in the past but we have to emphasize the fact that they are unaccebable by traditional Kanun. According to albanian customary code a family creates basic cell of society. Well being of a family is often determinded by a number of a grown-up men that it has. If a man from one family kills a man from another family, he's making a blood debt that he and his relatives have to pay.

I think it will help us understand this principle better if we would explain it on a example: so let's say that two men have argued in a bar, one of them takes out his gun and in fury kills the other incuring blood debt to his family. The frist thing that he does after comiting a crime is probabbly running away to his home where acording  to Kanun he can not be harmed because "a man's home is his fortress". In the first 24 hours after a murder the assasin's family has to be extra caution - this is a time of so called "hot blood" when a victim's family can vengance their loss basicly without any regulations.

24 hours after the murder is it customary for the victim's family to give the perpetrator's relatives some time of peace so they could regulate their personal matters. This promise of peace is called "besa" and braking it is one of the greatest crimes according to albanian Kanun. It is also customary for the murderer to attend the victim's funeral and also the victim's wake. After the time of besa, all men on the side of the perpetrator have to stay in home for this is the only place where according to Kanun they can not be harmed. In traditional albanian law feud aplies only to grown-up males for only they have value to the family - they can work.

Albanian rules of blood feud are based on the laws of talion. For example, if person designated for providing a vengeance (alb. gjakos) tried to assassinate one of the perpetrator's relatives but only injured him he no longer gets to kill someone from murder's family (one murder+one injury is more then one murder). He can not also kill someone by delivering several injuries - he has to do it in one clean shot. If he fails family no longer has a right for murdering relatives of actual perpetrator. However, it doesn't mean that the debt is paid - in those cases village elders were deciding what should be done: rest of the debt could be paid with money or livestock.

However, if the avenger was a good shooter and he managed to kill the murderer's relative with one clean shot he still had some things to do. He had to approach the body, lie it flat on the back and place his weapon near his head. He also had to tell the closest person that is a "blood avenger" and that he took the blood that the other family owned his family and then he was allowed to leave. For negligence of those principles he could incur other blood debt - this time ti his own family.

My romanian trips - Vulcanii Noroioşi

During my stay in Bucharest I've heard alot about interesting mud volcanoes that were located apparently really close to the city that I was living in. I've asked some friends that have already been there about directions and I took a train from Bucharest to the town Buzau, from where we were supposed to go with a local train to the small village of Berca.

After we've got to the Berca, we were quite lost. We were in the middle of nowhere, without any clue where to go. We roamed around for a while until we've encountered some middle-aged romanian people. Fortunately, one friend of mine and I knew romanian so we where able to ask those people for directions. They told us that those mud vulcanous where around 20 km away and there's no way to reach them on foot. Moreover I was leaving the train in such a rush, that I've left my backpack there where I had food for entire day of traveling.

Magnificent flags of Berca

Luckily those local people were so hospitable that they offered us a lift to the volcanoes. Moreover, they gave me food and water when I told them about losing my backpack. They were eight of us, so we all wouldn't be able to fit in a one car, fortunatley they had a pick-up. The three friends of mine and I got to the pick-up trunk and we were on our way!

Getting closer..

When we got there we've eaten something in the mountain shelter and then we left for the volcanoes. On our way we've bought some homemade liquor from local shepard and provided with the booze we were ready to see some romanian nature!

After reaching the volcanoes I was so thrilled with their unspeakable beauty that I didn't pay attention where I was stepping. I thought that the only dangerous places are vulcanos themself. As you can predict I was wrong. When I relalized what I had done I was already up to my ankles in the mud. Involuntarily I wanted to go foward in order to get out of mud and then I lost my balance (legs where stuck in mud) and I fell down. Fortunately my hand landed on a relatively clean place and I didnt fall entirely in mud - only my hands and boots where got dirty.

After visiting the volcanoes I've clean myself up with some water, and we walked to the closest road to catch a bus for Buzau. From there we took a train back to Bucharest.