topum

Look, they emailed back.

In Sibiu, Transylvania, Romania.



Btw, In Romanian Transylvania is called Ardeal although Transilvania (with "i") is also used. In Hungarian (some parts of it are predominantly Hungarian-speaking) it is Erdély (pronounced [ɛrdeːj]). In German (unfortunately the majority of Germans are gone from the region) it is Siebenbürgen (seven fortresses). And in Turkish it is Erdelistan or Erdel.

Yes, this is how write my posts here, I often have no idea what it is going to be about when I start. Here I started with a picture of some dude flashing his underwear and ended with how they call Transylvania in Turkish. Makes sense. If anyone needs tips on how to improve the flow in say your fanfic, I have a lot to give obviously and will be happy to help.

First, more Brasov this time from the other side:



My Romanian is still not nearly good enough (it is pretty much inexistent) to understand what these guys in Brasov's central street were singing about:



But I assumed it was an ode to my tomorrow's glorious victory here:



And why wouldn't it be. Makes perfect sense.

It wasn't busy at all at Brasov's central square and the bike rental guys, the DHL guy and the street musicians were having a chat and entertaining themselves. The DHL guy was not very useful in this, he had nothing to offer, nothing to contribute really except perhaps his bright shit.



For more from Brasov and Transylvania in general see here.

Rasnov is a small sleepy Romanian town that looked like most of its residents left for the cities or went to work in Germany or other Western European countries.



The citadel on top of that hill has an interesting well with verses from Quran on its wall:

"The absence of an internal water source led to the limitation of long term resistance during sieges. Because of this lack, it was decided to start the digging of a well in the rocky soil, in 1623.

The legend says that during a siege, the inhabitants of the citadel made two Turkish prisoners dig a well in the middle of the citadel in order to regain their freedom. The captives dug for 17 years, during which time they wrote verses from Quran on the well walls which can be seen even today. The fate of the prisoners isn't known, with some saying that they were released, and others that they were killed.

The well was used until 1850 when a broken wheel in the well windlass caused its abandonment.

The elders from Râșnov believe that deep in the well lies a treasure at least 300 years old. However, recently alpinists have closely explored the well, without finding any trace of it."

- No mate, it's that way. Look at this map if you don't believe me.

This guy ignored the bronze dude and just kept running.



In Brasov, Transylvania, Romania. And the bronze dude is Johannes Honter who is best known for his geographic and cartographic publishing activity (well that and for implementing the Lutheran reform in Transylvania) so he probably knows a thing or two about directions.

She got a sword, he got a hat and the eldest brother got an ice cream and is crazy 4U.

In Sibiu, Transylvania, Romania. For more from Sibiu see here.

In Brasov, Transylvania, Romania.

One of our volunteers challenged me to a tennis match last year and lost big time.

This year he is coming back to volunteer with us again and he couldn't stop bragging how he was a much better player now and how I did not stand a chance against him this year.

Obviously I accepted the challenge and we are going to play this year too and I am going to destroy the little bitch again clearly.

This is the club in the centre of Brasov we played at last year and this is where we will play this year too.



A nice Transylvanian dinner with wine at one of Brasov's top restaurants paid by him (the loser pays for the dinner) for the whole gang of our volunteers who will decide to join us on that trip to Brasov (and that will be a big gang) will follow. Can't wait.

On both sides of the highway just outside Bucharest on the way to Brasov, Transylvania.

During our road trip through Transylvania I had to overtake quite a lot of these both during the day and at night. We were told that they would ban them from the roads very soon in Romania because of some EU rules and most horses would be slaughtered then.