Netherlands in 3 days

It is not about Amsterdam, though it could be. Imagine all the clichés you can about that city… well, most of them are true. As random as a tourist can be, we managed to get in the first 5 minutes of our trip after arriving to the Amsterdam Central train station straight to the Red Light District… and no, it was not our primary objective, not only because I was really hungry but rather because it was obvious there were better things to do. The area has for sure a unique touch, and yes, you can smell weed everywhere, get lost in hundreds of coffee shops, or find a quite good looking girl… and if you consider it a way of having fun, buy one hour of her time… 1 square km2 (or more) of Amsterdam that made me realise how sad is some people’s life…

As we were trying to get out of there, we finally managed to arrive in the Dam square. We’ve started to walk trough the small streets with the canals that resemble Venice but they rather look like taken from a fairytale. We’ve realised that we have to pay attention to the bikers, which somehow drive like suicidal on the city streets… I guess they just want to get rid of the tourists but I cannot stop wondering how many bike related accidents are happening each day. We stood in Amsterdam 3 days trying to discover its real side, the people and the mentality that made that country such a liberal one. Obviously we got only the very end of the iceberg but I was surprise how this country resembles USA, or better said a combination between the easy going American lifestyle and the European way. We visited the Rijksmuseum (with an impressive collection of Rembrandt paintings, the Van Gogh Museum, we took boat ride on the channels and we got the chance to see the Golden Age houses of Amsterdam with their cozy apereance).

But beside all this, if there is something that I will always remember from the Netherlands, it will be the train trip from Amsterdam to Hague… with the country side looking like in Rembrandt painting: the channels, windmills and black & white cows... the North Sea with people surfing and docks…

Branding Romania

There happened a lot of great things for me recently. Most of them are not some that you necessarly want to share with the entire Internet comunity as I hardly believe they are ment to be enjoyed in a smaller circle. I am saying that somehow to motivate why the title of my blog this days is reffering to Branding our country rather then how I've been doing recently... the idea of Branding at a national level came to me last year when I was staying in US and it comes back to me now even stronger... It is so important, that I somehow thinK that I should dedicate it a big part of my blog, and I would like to start today.

Our country image abroad is in the best case unexistant. In the worse case, it is a very negative one, and it is like this not because we stood hepless in front of time and space, but because this is how we marketed our nation. And for this we have used all the methods posible, for the last 50 years.People. Media.Our own belief...

It is really sad to write all this, but each day staying here I realise how terible we are in selling an image of a country which economicaly is not that far away from Hungary, Slovakia or Poland,culturaly and spiritually reach... why did we have the bad chance of being the black ship of Europe (or one of 2-3 of them)? Is this image reflecting reality? How can we improve it?

Clubbing in Cologne

Last night we've decided to go clubing in Cologne. It seems to be the best option for Saturday night... compared to Cologne nightlife, Bonn is a small village :)It is a 30-40 minutes ride by train, and most of the young people do it.

In Germany, drinking alchool in public is allowed. That means, especially at night, you will se many people drinking a beer on the street or in a bus. It is common to buy a drink and walk with it to a club... which was an interesting image for me, as in most of the countries, including Romania, you will get a categoric fine for this.



We went to a nice club called Diamonds (www.club-diamonds.de) The people were cool, the girls quite hot and we had a great time. When you enter the club, you get a card... everything that you order at the bar will be recorded on the card... and you pay on your way out...

On my way back home, I've realised that although people drink on the streets, the city is relatively clean... talking into consideration its size (around 1 mil) I would say it handles it great

It is interesting to see how common is to travel so much between cities in this area of Germany... which by the way concentrates 18 milion of the entire country population, being one of the largest world conurbations. The comuting time is small... I was traveling for 40 minutes from my home to downtown Chicago last year to get to work... so traveling from once city to another in less time, it is not that hard to get used to.

My appartment

I live in a 5 room apartment... really spacious and neat with 4 other trainees for Deutsche Post World Net (DPWN)...

Amit form India - maybe some of you know him, he was MCVP in Slovakia and VP AI in Rotterdam - really cool guy ... we had our first drinking contest last night :)

Dei from Sweeden - really nice also

Segal from Brazil and a girl from Mexic - i didn't meet them yet


The house has everything that I need: washing machine, wireless internet, 2 refrigirators, boilers, 2 bathrooms, couches, desks and so on...


My address is:

Drachenfelsweg 32, Apt 28
53227 Bonn
Germany

Drachenfelwseg means the Dragon rock :)

First days in Bonn

After a 7 hour trip by bus to Budapest, 4 hours waiting in the airport and 2hours flight I have finally arived to Bonn... the place where I'll by working as an intern for Deutsche Post World Net for the next 5 months.

My first impressions regarding Germany are quite positive... people in the city are far from being cold, as foreigners tend to say about Germans. They are friendly, open and they do smile a lot, not as much as the Americans but way more than Romanians do it on the street or while serving you in a shop.

Another busted myth is the one regarding the girls... the are acutally really beautiful, slim (maybe beacause a lot have a bike to travel around the city) and dress simple and elegant...

Bonn is full of bike lines and bikers...it has an excellent public transportation network. In this area of Germany cities are so close to each other that it all looks like a megapolis. You can actually take the subway in Bonn and arrive in Koln :)

What I don't like about the city so far is the wather... it's been bad since I came, raining constantly so it doesn't make you feel to good. I was told it has been like this for more than 3 weeks but today looks a little better.

1 month untill the start of my traineeship

It was in my plans to start this blog soon and going in a traineeship would be a good reason to finally put it on track. For the next 5 months I will use this site to share with you my impressions about the life in Bonn, Germany and work at Deutsche Post World Net.

As any trainee going in a international working experience I hope the time I have invested in finding this opportunity (around six months...) will pay back.

Few things I've learned so far: Bonn has a large Aiesec trainee comunity with more than 30 trainees, most of them working at Deutsche Post/DHL and Deutsche Telekom / T-Mobile. Being the former German capital, Bonn is still an important center for organisations like United Nations and various NGOs.

I hope all this with make my staying more relevant and my netowork larger :)

Check out this blog starting form September 1st, 2006 for the real experience insights.