Day Two

Day Two: I awoke before the alarm,showered,and checked out. I arrived at the airport and checked in...Paid the excess baggage charge as KLM failed to mention the charge for the second bag on flights originating in Europe, no big deal 25 euros and off we went. I met up with Stephanie, one of my students and we were off. The inflight meal service was just wonderful on KLM again which featured clotted cream with fresh blue berries. I sat with a gentleman that works in the Detroit area but is from Romania. The plane touched down on time and came to the hotel which was built for visiting Soviet dignitaries during the cold war era. The rooms are the older European type of accommodations but the Air Conditioning was wonderful. There was serious construction along the highway from the airport but things began to get better and you can see how the city was once called the Paris of the Orient. Admittedly, some of the infrastructure needs work but some of the older architecture is amazing and many are awe inspiring. It was interesting to speak with some of the people who told me just how important the Voice of America was during the pre revolution and Soviet days. The Soviet block style architecture is mixed together with the beautiful Romanian architecture. Some older churches set back off the street and one must wonder if the previous government used this technique to take the population's collective mind off of religion. What ever the case may have been, it clearly did not work as the city's many churches were filled with the faithful at the 7PM mass on a Thursday night. I attended Eastern Orthodox services tonight at a monastery in the center of Bucharest which is hundreds of years old, an almost mystical experience. After the service we drove over to the building that is now used for the government offices. It was built previous to the 1989 revolution and is almost as large as the Pentagon.
Dinner was a wonderful affair with the Chair of Theatre and Culture of civilization in a restaurant called LaMama. The meal was a Romanian meal with a salad course with the best smoked ham on the plate that I have ever tasted. Thia was followed by Romanian Glumkies and farina and a large hot pepper. Peter bit into it and it took the fire department to cool down his burning throat. We used liberal amounts of Romanian red wine to put out the fire.The derset course was perfection; what appeared to be a baked apple was in actuality a wonderful pastery covered in clotted cream and blackberries in a light syrup. All of this was followed again by a round of Romanian red wine; not too sweet, not too dry, and just fruity enough to dazzle the palate. The driver returned us to the hotel. As we drove up the drive I have to wonder who might have stayed here during the cold war days. When I was a young lad my father gave me a short wave radio and this was my introduction to Eastern Europe and the then called Iron Curtain. It is a very unique feeling to walk the streets of a place that you heard on your radio in your youth.
Well, I have had enough Romanian Red to sleep now; tomorrow we are up at 8AM and off to IASI, seven hours to the north near the border with Moldova and the Ukraine.

A side note. They publlished a brochure for out journey around Romania and published all of our names, a very nice touch by our Romanian hosts. I somehow feel like a foreign correspondent sitting here in the lobby of the hotel filling my dispatch to you all as a fan turns lazily on the ceiling. I look at the desk clerk and dream of the days when he recorded everything and held your passport. Oh for the old days
Good Night from Bucharest...
Mark

Day One

Well I flew to Detroit and went to a lovely Lebanese restaurant. It was just wonderful. The Chicken Sharwama was delicious. In a few short hours I was wheels up headed to Amsterdam. Klm's service to Amsterdam was very comfortable ( as comfortable as one can be in coach) and the Indian meal I had for dinner was wonderful. I met an interesting woman that works for US AID in the Sudan. She was telling me about what it is like to work and live in Kenya. She is involved with education for the Sudan and is currently working on a program that uses short wave radio to teach children living in remote areas of the Sudan. All very interesting to me as I am applying for a Fulbright to teach in Namibia.
I LANDED AT 7:25 AM in Amsterdam and took the shuttle to the Hotel Shiphol A4 on the main highway to Amsterdam. I was several hours early and they had a room reday for me and they checked me in and I took a shower and returned to the airport to take the 20 minute train ride to Amsterdam central station. The train ride was very pleasant and I met a fellow from Angola who works for BA in Luanda and we had a nice chat about his country and Windhoek in Namibia. I arrived in central station and went over the canal qand found a very nice coffee shop called Picasso's. I stayed there a bit and walked around the central station district before riding the canalbus over to the Van Gogh museum. This museum brought tears to my eyes just seeing the joy and pain in Vincent's work. What is amazing is the texture in his paintings; the thick impasato brushh strokes which is not usually discernible in prints or books of his work. It still amazes me that I stood just 2 feet from the painting of his bedroom. It was one wonderful painting after another . After that I walked for a bit and then rode the canal bus for about 2 more hours looking at all the houseboats that line all the canals in Amsterdam. There are approximately 2500 houseboats lining the canals all covered with potted plants and lovely flowers. What is really interesting is how the people of Amsterdam use the canals for transportation within the city. Amsterdam has to win the record for a city with the most bikes. It is not uncommon to see a bike park with over 500 bikes parked. Although Amsterdam does have vehicular traffic, you have to exercised caution because of the bike traffic and there is even special bike lanes and in some instances bike roadways. I had several "AMERICAN HOT DOGS" as the sign said, and took the train back to Shiphol and then the shuttle back to the hotel. Fell asleep at 8PM. Woke up in time for Day 2

Our Hotel in Sinaia

This is Hotel Furnica located high in the cool Transylvanian Alps. The altitude of Sinaia makes it a perfect retreat from the summer's heat of Bucharest. At the turn of the century the king and queen of Romania would relocate to the palace in Sinaia; which is now a ski resort town and a haven for lovers of nature with it's cable car and clean cool mountain air.

The 7th International Workshops of the Drama Schools

We are going to attend the 7th International Workshops of the Drama Schools of the ITI-UNESCO chair of Theatre and Culture of Civilizations in Sinaia, Romania. Follow this link to the offical web site and select the english language at the bottom of the page.
This is a photograph of Casino Sinaia where we will be showcasing our work.

Maria S. Horne

Here is a link for additional information about Professor Maria S. Horne and her International Artistic & Cultural Exchange Program (IACE) and Creative Research Labratory which I am a part of.

Alumni Arena @ U.B.

Home of the department of Theatre and Dance

There are just a handful of days left before we depart for Romania. It seems like an eternity as we have all worked so very hard on the workshops here at the University of Buffalo. The workshop was followed by the showcase performances in May at the Center for The Arts. The State University of New York @ Buffalo is the delegation from the U.S. and we will be joining with colleagues from the following Universities and academies:

• Academy of Dramatic and Cinema Art in Budapest, Hungary
• The Ludwik Solski State Drama School in Cracow, Poland
• Seoul Institute of the Arts, Korea
• Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb, Croatia
• Shanghai Theatre Academy, China
• National School of Drama in New Delhi, India
• Theater Academy of Limoge, France
• Universitatea de Vest, Timisoara, Romania
• Universitatea Ovidius din Constanþa, Romania
• Theatre Arts University in Targu Mures, Romania
• Arts University of Cluj Napoca, Romania

The themes of the actor's workshops are Ibsen's Ghosts and Euripides. All participating schools have worked on these themes and will showcase their work at this workshop. Other conferences that Professor Horne and I will attend are; the UNESCO International Conference of Teachers from European Drama Schools,the topic of the discussions: Master Studies according to the Declaration from Bologna, and the International Scientific Session "Ibsen – 100 years since his death". In addition to these conferences we will be attending the ITI-UNESCO intensive course on Ancient Indian Theatre taught by a team of three master teachers from the National Drama Academy in New Delhi. This promises to be a very exciting journey. Debbie and I have been busy preparing. Please stop back to see the journey unfolding day by day. I hope to post daily about our activities but this will depend on the internet cafes and my ability to access the web.