Sighet Winter Festival 2007-pics

set 1
set 2:

Superb music – Emancipator 2007

From bits and pieces I found out about this guy (Emancipator from NYC) that makes some of the best instrumental melodic downtempo music I heard ever. Resembling a bit to Bonobo’s style and arrangements, his music however convinces that there are some deeper roots than that. Beautiful samples, violins, guitars and beats are all present in one of the best LPs I have heard this year. A piece of advice: do not miss this one!!

My Latest Music - Nujabes and Kid Koala

I haven't written anything on music since...well...a long time ago. In the following I am going to attempt correction to this fact. A couple of things have delightfully enriched my existence over the last couple weeks.

Kid Koala - Some of My Best Friends Are DJs (2003)
My take on it: great and exquisite stuff.If you try it, you'll surely like it.
Professional review: Packaged with a 52-page, self-penned comic and a travel chess kit, Some of My Best Friends Are DJs offers less in the way of music, with the 35-minute running time meaning the restless sonic snippets wisely end before his humor has a chance to grate. Mixing sleazy whisky-bar vibes with adolescent antics, his second album never allows the listener to settle. Moments of playful mixing magic are at times followed by baffling inanity as "Skanky Panky"--with its wonderfully shattered Ska rhythm and frantic scratches--runs into "Flu Season", ostensibly a series of beat-accompanied coughs, sneezes, and sniffs. Blending blues, jazz, and funk with a myriad of bizarre samples, moments of pure eccentric genius such as "Robochacha" and "More Dance Music" make this a flawed yet fascinating slice of beat-driven bravura.



Nujabes - Metaphorical Music (2003)
My take on it: this is Nujabes' second album. It offers a combination of hip hop and jazz, and features artists like Shing02, Substantial, Five Deez, Cise Starr and others. Thanks to my Japanese friend and music lover (Akie) I picked up a couple of Nujabes releases and affiliated works. I recommend it to any instrumental/melodic hip-hopper fans. Excellent stuff...now thinking to incorporate some flows on my future-to-be-website.
Professional review:Metaphorical Music: the melodic full length debut of Japanese born Hip Hop producer Nujabes. The soulful, rhythmic, often jazz-based style exerted through Nujabes' music has made this album a Diggin’ favorite since its release in 2003.(Diggin' Music blog)


Nujabes - Hydeout Productions 2nd Collection (2007)
Mellow instrumental stuff + hiphop tracks + jazz samples = same great receipe
It seems that any Nujabes release has the same great flavor. (so far at least)
http://hydeout.net/hydeout/2007/10/hydeout_productions_2nd_collec.html

Death of a Symbol

Benazir Bhutto was shot yesterday (after which the assassin blew himself up) leaving a Pakistan on the edge of chaos. The next few weeks will surely be critical for the nation's trajectory towards democracy/dictatorship or civil unrest while those approx 80 national nuclear warheads are enough to make people nevous.

Sighet Winter Festival

Being again in my hometown (Sighetu Marmatiei) around New Year's I couldn't pass the chance of seing again the Winter popular parade (haven't seen one for 10 years or so--too much crowding and brrr.. cold).
Ever since 1968, on the 27th of December of each year, a winter carnival is held in Sighet. The heart of the carnival is the parade: hundreds of costumed and masked people from all the villages on the valleys sourrounding Sighet (and other regions of Romania as well--but less), horses and carts sing carols, utter “urături” (good wishes for the year to come) and perform traditional winter plays with Capra (The Goat), Ursul (The Bear), and Viflaimul.

(a short movie --16mb about this event)

Testing one's addiction

Being home and all, I had the interesting opportunity to test my internet addiction since the provider(UPC) at home failed to insure the connection throughout the holidays period (with some exceptions). Though is not that bad...at least emailing should be an emergency service:). Naturally, the client service is barely existing and the "business as usual" type thing applies still.

Casual Casualties of Flights- a limpin’ suitcase

One is always disappointed in how the luggage is handled. I always wonder how could they have done it ? One time they broke my metal handle of a robust big luggage. The only way you could do that is probably to through it on its head from about 2-3 meters at least on a rough surface (preferably concrete). Then you go and check if they could have done that. Although the chances are quite slim, it is possible, trust me. Now I had another problem, but quite similar. A robust plastic leg from my American Tourister 26inch luggage got somehow dismantled. Again after the initial outburst of good thoughts to all those brave luggage handlers, I started to think how can one (phisically achieve that) and I came up with some scenarios (a bit like the CSI type thing). Still hard to achieve but somehow those wonderful guys always deliver. Amazing, isn’t? So, THANK you for all your efforts and care. And a wonderful limping Christmas to you too!

Flying Pink over Europe

Started at 6:40am in Kiel to Hamburg flughafen via the Kielius bus. Then flew Swiss Air to Zurich. Pretty smooth until the landing where from some not so obvious reason we had to circle for about 25 minutes looking at the background of the Black Forrest Mountains. Finally it all came to an end but the airport was very crowded and with huge lines at the scanning area plus immigration (why do we need this?). Somehow I made through all of that with various objects (laptop, ticket,pass or wallet) under my armpits, in my hands or wherever I could stick them. The flight to Budapest with Helvetica (1st pink) was again OK, while in Hungary I had to change terminals (Ferihegy2-->Ferihegy1) and "enjoy" the Xmass crowd for about another 6hrs. Naturally, at the flight to Cluj (Wizzair-the low cost pink carrier), the Romanian and low cost heritage collided into a three line check-in and basically people rushing for the plane. Which was a big boy indeed (for such a short distance) an Airbus A320. Nice but a bit scary since I knew the incredible small airport & landing strip in Cluj. However, we made it ok, although the plane had to break a lot and for 7 seconds I was with my knees in the chair in front of me. From here the saga with the "sharks" (taxi cab drivers looking to strip you off your money) started. I always "enjoy" this stuff, especially when, I cannot get a regular cab, it's 11pm and I am stuck outside the airport (7km or so outside the city) on a -10C “sunny weather”. But that's another story...

Finally, a break

Tomorrow really early I am heading back to Romania and I can't wait to take a break and a change of landscape from Kiel to Romania. Should be fun...

Bali turnaround?

There is an old Romanian saying: "a small tree-stump topples the big cart". Can it be the case in the Bali meeting with Papua New Guinee slapping the US?

Battlestar Galactica - Razor (2007)

If you are a fan of the series, Razor seems like a good 1h 43 min way to remember the last season (3) of the Battlestar Galactica. However, objectively, the movie doesn't posses many strong points. Basically, it introduces the evolution of the second battlestar in the series (the Pegasus) through the eyes of Kendra Shaw from the Cylon holocaust to its death. Overall, a good way to sweet the waiting time to Season 4, which should air in March 2008.

How readable is this blog?

It seems that both my blogs (this one - personal and the 2nd one-research track) are doing really well. You do not have to be a genius (dohhhh!) but obviously they are not at the end of the pack either. The new economist blog finds it takes a lot of genial readers as well and concludes:
"So how do other popular econoblogs compare? Many are almost as unreadable as mine: try Dani Rodrick (college postgrad), Greg Mankiw (college undergrad), the Economist's Free Exchange (college postgrad) and George Borjas (college postgrad) for starters.

But many econobloggers' writing is more accessible. Alex and Tyler at Marginal Revolution, Mark Thoma, Brad DeLong, Brad Setser, Andrew Leigh, Dean Baker, Angry Bear, Newmark's Door, Tim Harford's FT blog and Megan McArdle's blog at The Atlantic were all assessed as having a high school reading level, while William Polley's blog was at junior high school readability.

And the only other blogs writing at genius-level I could find? John Quiggin and the Becker-Posner blog. I'm honoured to be in such company, though I have neither a beard nor a Nobel prize.

But maybe I'm just too obscure and high-falutin? Should I de-fog my posts? Feedback welcome."

You got my vote anytime. It is truly a nice and interesting economic blog.
To be even meaner, let's look at the nations' representatives. In fact, we don't have to; Christine Chen did it already for us. And the results are hillaryous.:)

"What about the readability level of some other popular Web sites out there? New York Times (junior high school), Washington Post (high school), Financial Times (genius), Economist (genius), Arms Control Wonk (college undergrad), Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish (high school), Daniel Drezner's blog (high school), the State Department's Dipnote (high school), and the Huffington Post (junior high school).

And the readability of the home pages of presidential candidates? Here are a few: Hillary Clinton (elementary school), Rudy Giuliani (genius), Barack Obama (genius), Mitt Romney (elementary school), John Edwards (genius! His blog, however, is at junior high-school level), John McCain (junior high school). "

Beautiful Sites - Colosseum

I have just posted some pics I took around the Colosseum. Great Stuff.

China is pushing up on Coal

A new World Watch report about China and its consumption of coal just came out and the numbers are staggering. The US and EU have to some extent curved up their coal dependency but China needs cheap energy for the long praise growth.
Read the short report.

Strange Inventions: part n+2: The Blowable Interface

Well if you got tired of the mouse or trackpad on your computer...you can always blow your way. At least that's what some people at Georgia Tech are emphasizing in the short movie below.

Glad I don't have Windows Vista

In the latest Mac versus PC ad, that put-upon Windows guy quietly concedes he's "downgrading" from Vista to XP. He may have good reason: new tests show that the older XP runs common productivity tasks significantly faster than Microsoft's newest operating system.
Researchers at Devil Mountain Software, a Florida-based developer of performance management tools, have posted data from their most recent Windows performance tests -- and Vista, even after it's been upgraded to the new Service Pack 1 beta package, is shown to be a laggard.
Source: Informartin Week

Downgrade to XP from Vista
Link2

How many cards one needs for a booking with Wizzair?

Flying Low Cost for the First Time. Well, yes...it is a first-timer for me. Again, not the very best one I guess. Objective: book a Budapest-Cluj Napoca and return flight. Price: unknown at the moment but expected to be cheaper and for sure faster than those small buses serving the same route. Instruments employed:4 cards (two debit and two credit; two Mastercard from the US and one Mastercard Romanian and one Maestro Romania). Result: no results.:) The two Romanian didn't work, as well as the two US ones (which is strange) so finally I just used another Mastercard from Belgium (with love?):)), which strangely enough did the job. Anyways, it is so interesting to see the taxes, fees and more fees pilling up from those 0.001 or 0.000 prices, that ones MUST be always aware of his/her final price (like on Ebay) in order to make the right choice. Plus, do not forger the getting-to-those-airports fees which may turn up to be equally if not more expensive than the low-cost flight. In my case, it quite even: price is about the same, time-I have to wait both trips about 6 hrs in Budapest (which I still value to be better than spending it on some microbus; moreover on the inbound flight I have to change in Zurich so..if there are any delays, I am covered). Let's not forget the free wireless in Budapest inside the terminal. Not so bad after all.

The Blogger, the Better

It seems that I have a need to do ALL the THINGS that I should do over the next few months..right NOW. Thus, along these lines, I finally started to write a small blog in Romanian as well, about all those little and characteristics of a transitional Eastern and Balcanic (mostly) country. First post is about the depreciation of the RON (Romanian New Leu, ROL- Romanian Leu was the previous currency which made us more of a millionaires than the Italians with their Lira). This relates also to the title of the blog, "The worlds of an Old RONin", which would be me.:)) Cheers! or Noroc! as we say it in Romanian.

New Blogger Strains

Recently, I have started working on a paper attempting to quantify and explain productivity growth in the transitional countries of Eastern Europe and Central Asia. While doing this, I though it would be interesting to open up a new blog which describes in detail the daily product and challenges of this new endeavor. Let's see how it works.

Over a 1,000 visits

Incidentally or not, for the right or not-so-right reasons, still, I am pretty excited about those 1183 visits that this blog has received over this past year. Naturally, perhaps 10% of those are "self inflicted" after certain postings to see how it came up etc etc. But still, you cannot dismiss as quickly the big one and three of thOse. The clustermap looks now a bit dissapointing since it seems that my annual cleaning period has caught up with me. Still, one can look at the overall picture of visits and use Google Analytics for more details. Personally I like this stock method of Clustermap rather better but it would be great if one would be able to just click a dot and get at least the basic info (exact location, date,lenght, pages visited, perhaps even links that were made).

Best things are (still) for free

Two of Caravaggio's major works are still in Santa Maria church in Piazza del Popolo, ROme: "The conversion on the way to Damascus" and "The Crucifixion of Saint Peter". Amazing pieces of art..the details are better than anything I have seen before in my humble existence. and amazingly enough that they are still there..exhibited for free and still hidden from most of the touristic waves (hopefully).
Caravaggio was considered enigmatic, fascinating, rebellious and dangerous. He burst upon the Rome art scene in 1600, and thereafter never lacked for commissions or patrons, yet handled his success atrociously.An early published notice on him, dating from 1604 and describing his lifestyle some three years previously, tells how "after a fortnight's work he will swagger about for a month or two with a sword at his side and a servant following him, from one ball-court to the next, ever ready to engage in a fight or an argument, so that it is most awkward to get along with him." In 1606 he killed a young man in a brawl and fled from Rome with a price on his head. In Malta in 1608 he was involved in another brawl, and yet another in Naples in 1609, possibly a deliberate attempt on his life by unidentified enemies. By the next year, after a career of little more than a decade, he was dead. (wiki)

Rome The Very Short Version

What can you say in a matters of few lines about such a great and complex city?Hard to solve, this one. A thing is clear though: ROme is exactly what I do like in an European city: historical street and small squares, charming little restaurants (and plenty of them), beautiful buildings, huge imposing churches worthwhile exploring and admiring. On top of that, the Roman legacy (Forum, Palatinum, Circus Maximus, Coloseum etc) makes it even more diverse while the Vatican city/state is the cherry on top.

Web Representation Needs

After my leave of absence for one year from RPI, the rules have canceled my webpage from their servers. I guess I should have at least anticipated it earlier and use some external provider for displaying my personal page..no matter what the rules are. However, I have a bigger problem with my Frontpage sleek page that cannot be displayed properly in Mozilla (who is still using IE nowadays??) so I guess I have to re-do everything...and since I am thinking more in terms of Flash it takes a lot of time to do it. And while time I do not have at all, my page still remains an offline forgotten projects. perhaps i will try a simple fast googlepages approach

PRIME Winter School

5-9 Nov at CERIS, CNR, Rome. Italy
A very good opportunity to revise, improve and finally present my work on national systems of innovation in transition countries. Moreover, I saw a couple of very interesting presentations on new ways of measuring Science and Technology like webometrics or nice bibliometric visualizations. Big thumbs up!

Use the black Google

When your screen is white, being it an empty word page, or the Google page, your computer consumes 74 watts, and when its black it consumes only 59 watts. Mark Ontkush wrote an article about the energy saving that would be achieved if Google had a black screen, taking in account the huge number of page views, according to his calculations, 750 mega
watts/hour per year would be saved.
In a response to this article Google created a black version of its search engine, called Blackle, with the exact same functions as the white version, but with lower energy consumption, check it out.

Great Rap Parody - Macs vs. PCs

Weird Science - raising live fish via USB

It seems that soon we are not going to leave our computer at all. I was (?) surprised when I saw this Korean invention: the USB fish bowl concept. No hassle, no knowledge, no fun (?) Remains to be seen.

Killer Cars

The Bugatti Veyron 16.4 is the former fastest, former most powerful street-legal production car in the world. But it keeps the title of the quickest (0-60, 0-100, quarter mile, etc.), most expensive street-legal full production car ever made and the fastest accelerating production car in history, with a proven time of 0-60mph of under 2.5 seconds. It can produce an excess of 1001 horsepower, in either the metric or SAE scale (see below), and achieve an average top speed of 253.81 mph. This speed and power was eclipsed by the SSC Ultimate Aero TT, which claimed the “Fastest Production Car” world record with a top speed of 257.45 mph and an average speed of 256.19 mph on September 13 2007, later verified by Guinness World Records on October 9, 2007.[4] The Bugatti Veyron reached full production in September 2005. The car is built by Volkswagen AG subsidiary Bugatti Automobiles SAS in its Molsheim (Alsace, France) factory and is sold under the French Bugatti marque. It is named after French racing driver Pierre Veyron, who won the 24 hours of Le Mans in 1939 while racing for the original Bugatti firm.(wiki)

Deep Dive Corp

(More) Great Electronic Music from Germany

The new Stata 10

When I saw the new Stata 10 software for Stata Corp. I couldn't believe how much faster it was. Moreover, it seems that the minimum requirements are given just for the sake of it since it works fine on my old T22 machine. Moreover, the slick look, expanded options make it even more appealing. But...hold your horses. Quite often I find out strange error messages and variables suddenly dissapearing from the dataset. So far I wasn't able to figure out what is going on but I will look into it soon. It is weird also because I never had this problem with Stata8 or 9 SE.

Schizophrenic Economics

This week was designated for a neat unconventional course in labor economics with Dr. Freeman (NBER, Harvards, LSE etc) which has proven to be also one of the best ones so far. The structure is still unclear but the topics and examples were very interesting between classical labor stuff and new behavioral/experimental/neuro economic approaches. The exam:)..remains to be assessed..next Tue.

Coming down with the flu

After some of my colleagues experienced really bad cases of influenza, I think I got it also...which makes it especially unpleasant in the bigger context of a coming-up exam on Monday or the Rome trip next Sunday. However, I am hoping for a milder and shorter recovery period (by the symptoms). Still, it's better without any..perhaps I should try other options as well:))

Hot Fuzz

Hot Fuzz is a brilliant British comedy about a London police officer that has to draw back in the country side and where he still fights crime (even more fearcefully). Excellent...I have just seen it yesterday and I felt quite pleased (which is rare in the case of comedies). Check out the trailer (link above).
Cheers.

Check out what kind of artist you are

Which Famous Artist I Am..results:
	You are part Ansel Adams. Your artistic tool of choice is the camera, but you've got lots of other skills as well. Spoiled when you were young, you grew up to be a loving person and you have a deep affinity for nature and all things black and white.
	You are part Vincent van Gogh. You were troubled at an early age and your art showed it. You're still in a growing stage and much of your brilliance and bottled up expression has yet to be revealed. Keep at it and you have the potential to become one of the greats.
Find Your Character @ BrainFall.com

Finally...we did it

Romania manages finally not to screw up a qualifying campaign to a major soccer tournament (that being either the World Cup or the European Championship). After two such events missed by the national team, today they managed to secure (almost) a seat for the Euro2008 in Austria and Swizerland by beating Netherlands in Constanta (1-0, goal by Goian). An awful weather, a though fought game and a lucky win taking into account the Dutch chances. But, again, who cares?? They are the pragmatic ones usually (score the winner with Albania in min 90+3) so it is a good change to see the roles inverted sometimes. Nice game & congrats! Maybe we can do it like Greece:)))(pics from prosport.ro)

Last But Not Least - Nobel Prize in Economics - Place your bets!

Although was not originally encompassed in the original vision of Mr. Nobel, Economics gets the last of the Nobel prizes, making someone rich and famous already an super-star sort of speak, usually a perfect way to retirement, speeches and generally mutual recognition. But , again, let's not be awfully mean, money and success are also a good proxy for excellence (hopefully, in most cases)and these Norwegians are pretty damn good in covering any "risks" (incidentally economists go often in "pairs"). Personally, I would like to see an excentric person like Sala-i-Martin wining but that is very unlikely, also considering his latest evolution publication wise. Then, perhaps Barro, Romer or Krugman. But again, nobody can successfully predict. We'll just have to wait and see.

** Friday the 12th **

Pavarotti died today at 5 am at the age of 71, fighting a pancreatic cancer since 2004. A great lost for humanity..


Al Gore (and the panel of scientists analyzing climate change jointly) won the Nobel Price for Peace. The question now remains if he will candidate again or not..

Experimental stuff from Ninja Tune to Warp Records

I just came across (not incidentally though) across the l'integrale of releases of Antipop Consortium...experimental hip hop suggested by Freddy, which again is not a fan of the style excepting a few songs. So far, pretty interesting. Arab singing on beats sounds different indeed..For more either visit their warp site or follow wikipedia's links.

Need 4 a BrEAk

Indeed I feel more often that I really need a break. After only(?) 8 weeks of ASP, I am very tired and in need of time for my own stuff, aka my proposed paper..
Just ten more (slow) days to go...:)

Season Two: New Heroes, new begginings

Current Study Schedule

Between EU Monetarism and Political Economy
Last week we had the exam for the European Monetary Policy course (Charles Wyplosz, Geneve) while the next one another interesting topic is starting (Political economy) with James Robison (Harvard). No time to waste (or relax for that matter):).

3 and 1/2 Days In Berlin - part 1-

After a couple of hardworking weeks and neverending one week courses an exquisite opportunity for a break came along. which was perfect for a medium getaway in the biggest GErman city, the lively Berlin.
It was a good experience, although not a cheap or surprising one. Berlin has proven to be just as I imagined. Still, I enjoyed a lot the time spent there. There are a lot of things to do & see and that 's part of every big city charm (compared to Kiel). Still much broken into the Western and Eastern part and quite rustic in many ways (subway stations are the best example) is quite interesting even for people not so fascinated by Eastern European architecture, facts and behaviors.

Ombladon's latest

The latest (Ombladon) release of the half of Parazitii stays on the same track of heavy beats and lyrics that are a custom for its two components. STill, not as good as the previous one, Prostu din curtea scolii, keeps the flag up & going..
*** funny only if you understand romanian slang:))***

Funny Horoscope

Today's prediction:

"The strategy you came up with for burying the black box could work quite well. Restrain yourself from violent acts towards your family! The failed attempt of a "buddy" to obtain something will please you in the meanest possible way."

Woowww...I must really be an evil guy or something. This site looks pretty screwed up to post such a "forecast" for all Aries.:) :)))
Mad, mad World

The Time Series Weekend

This week I had a crash course in time series and all the wonderful things associated with such econometrics like cointegration, stationary,bootstraping etc. Thus, the weekend looks quite un-promising ahead, just study & work (again!). I trully hope it rains (although the forecast changes here from our to hour).

Ship Baptising Party

Today a new cruise ship by Color Line, the company that serves among other destinations the link from Kiel to Oslo has grown richer by one. This was a good reason for a one day celebration festivities here in Kiel. It has all started at 10am with the new Color ship named Color Magic entering the Fjorde flanked by many other vessels.
A beautiful day again (coincidence? there were some really awful days prior to this) gave also the perfect setting for an open air concert of A-HA (Norwegians by nature) which was actually a pretty good set-up on a floating stage with lots of panels and screens.

Soccer Tournament IfW

After weeks of preparation and loads of fun {I even managed to make my nose bleed in premiere in one of these sessions, which I haven't yet succeeded despite a colorful childhood:)} the big day of the big tournament here at the IWE in Kiel proved to be quite unlucky. The guys played great especially the first three games (2 draws and 1 win); however the last was disastrous (1-2 lost) which took us from a possible 1st to a 3rd or 4th place.:)) As a result, no pride left and no trophy in our window:)).
"I chose not to choose life"? (Trainspotting) Guess not.:)) Just football and just for now.

Hamburg - short weekend trip

after some hard weeks of work & study in the ASP program, on trade and international new open macroeconomics, it was time for a break. and this seemed like the perfect principle to explore a bit the neighboring city of Hamburg.
Not so big but quite interesting and alive, Hamburg has a lot to offer.
Check my (other)pics on the link (photoblog) or perhaps facebook.
Cheers

Kiel und sofort -1-

Well, I guess this is my 1st post since I left the US for the ASP program here in the northern Germany, more exactly in Kiel. Things have been tremendously crazy, busy busy busy all the time. The classes are very intensive, basically a 1 semester grad course concentrated in fairly the same amount of time spreaded over two weeks of daily lectures. Although very interesting and thought by top scholars in the fields, the program is proving to be a killer in the end. :)) Especially when the exams are approaching:)). Forgot to mention that little thing there. It has been now three weeks since I am here but it feels like a life time.

The city looks beautiful and I can wait also to visit Hamburg with the first occasion we get some days off. A bike is a must unless you want to spend some serious money (2 euros per ticket) or time (the city center is about 30 min walk from the institute for world economy or zbw).

Simpsons - The Movie

I have seen it yesterday night. Well...if you are a fan of the series you will enjoy this, however if you are not do not expect the exceptional. The movie is a combination of three usual episodes with slow-paced action and not involving all the (numerous) characters consecrated in the show. I watched it mostly out of curiosity but it has proven to be OK after all, with Springfield being on the virge of destruction while the Simpsons work their way into saving it and obviously it was all Homer's fault.:)

W-end M-ovie: Shade

A great con movie with an exceptional cast (Stallone, Griffith,Byrne, Thandie Newton, Stuart Townsend and Jamie Foxx among others) this is definetely worthwhile.
Makes you wonder how I have missed it all this time.