No more poop?

I went to see 2012 last night and although parts of it were not as bad as I was expecting, I ran out of that theater at the end of almost three exhausting hours faster than those people from the movie were running out of the exploding buildings. The movie's well paced but although there's much banging action on the screen  you rarely feel any suspense. The effects are poop-notch most of the time, so it feels more like watching cartoons rather than watching a live action movie.

I kept scratching my head all night trying to figure out which genre does this belong to. I finally figured out it's some kind of strange comedy, since watching 6 billion people die isn't really that funny, but the script is pushing for so many jokes that it can't be considered a serious movie either.

I loved the ending though ... the honesty in the little girl's voice ... "No more poop-ups"... I whish Hollywood could say the same.

Extreme Offroad = Extreme FUN

Well, apparently it's been a busy busy busy month for the petrolhead in me. Renault F1 Roadshow, Rally Day, and now ... caraazy offroad fun.

It all started when cousin Raducu invited us to go play with his little monster on the outskirts of Bucharest on a very nice offroad trial course. I've never been to offroad trials so I didn't have a very clear idea of what this means. It was shocking FUN, and I did get an adrenaline rush out of it.

Ready for FUN!


It's not VERY muddy out here...


You want to go THAT way??

I will embed the playlist from youtube. I saved the BEST for last so it is really worth watching throughout all the videos (... we did go THAT way).

Yes, that's a couple hundred euros fuel pump regulator something next to the mustard jar cover. The point is to get the job done ... and it does!

I am wondering what was more fun ... Rally Day or this ... it's close ...

Tokyo Basics

OK, time to get down and dirty with TOKYO. Surprisingly few people know it is the most humongous metropolis in the world with 30 million inhabitants. That's like ... a lot ... I think. Here are a few facts I can say about Tokyo:

* Tokyo is CLEAN
* Tokyo is SAFE
* Tokyo is FUN
* Tokyo is full of caarazy people, on a "cool scale" from 1 to 10 these guys go to 100...
* Tokyo has the best infrastructure I've ever seen in any of my journeys
*Getting around Tokyo should be done with a one day pass (1000Y) which gives you access to all means of transportation
* The Harajuku girls are real
* There is no "city center", all Tokyo areas need to be seen and have lots to offer
* For fun go to Shibuya
* For shopping go to Shibuya, Shinjuku (east - in the pic on the left), Harajuku(- in the pic above)
* If you want your brain to implode take a tour of the shops in Electric City



That's a small summary ...our adventure continues next ...

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Rally Day Movies

I finally got the movies from rally day. It was tons of fun, although the movies may not look like it. What really surprised and impressed me was the car ... The Dacia Logan Cup is an amazing little slugger. I've had the real pleasure of sitting in the passenger seat with G. Grigorescu driving. In the hands of a professional it turns into a true breathtaking rally machine.

I'm not the rally legend and I was throwing the car around way too much at some points so please indulge me :). So, without further blah blah, here are the movies:














I think I'll start up a donation plan to start my rally career :P.

Hollywood meets Prince of Persia

I'm having trouble even asking this question, BUT ... can it be possible that after decades of producing one humongous pile of pooh after another, Hollywood has finally produced a movie based on a video game that is not a complete waste of time and money? Could it be?





Well wrap me up in tar and feathers and call me chicken, but I can sense a tiny possibility here ...

Cristina Vicky Barcelona

I got to see Vicky Cristina Barcelona the other day, and I really enjoyed it, and not only because it has Penélope Cruz in it. Uhm, what I meant is that it's not so great just because Penélope Cruz makes out with Scarlett Johansson somewhere along the line. Hmm, I think I'm thouroughly failing at making my point. It's because of the funny threesome relationship between them two and that painter guy played by Javier Bardem ... and the fourth girl played by Rebecca Hall...

Oh, darn it ... there I did it again ... It's a comedy, darn it, A COMEDY! And it's quite a good one. I particularly loved the ending... talk about falling out of love ..

Must see from me.

Big Budha, LOTS of Deer

Our trip to Nara was full of surprises. We've heard that there is a deer reservation there, but we thought it's just like a small zoo with a couple of deer. So, first time it was something like this ...

Whoa? What was that?

Oh ... how cuuute ...

She likes you ...

And skipping a few steps in the process ...

They ALL like you!!(Yes, that's another group of "may I speak to you?" children)

Soon enough it was SWARMING with deer. They were going up to people with food, even stealing from picnics. It was quite funny...

But, this is not why we came here ... we came here for this:

Not dor the temple itself, but for what is inside it ... and because you can't really see from the inside pictures just how humongous it is, look at how big the temple is, and that's just how BIG this is:

This very impressive Budha statue was going all the way up to the ceiling, flanked by two other smaller golden guys.

It was quite shocking going inside the temple to see the statue is really this big. Japan didn't seem to want to stop with it's amazing moments ...

This was our final pitstop before heading back to Tokyo ... and there, into chaos, we shall go next ...

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This is Amazing

I went last night to see THIS IS IT, and I must say from the start that I was very deeply impressed. I am not Michael's number 1 fan, but I respected and admired him as an artist. Starting from last night I can't really think of him as just an artist any more ... the man was a genius ... the connection he had with the music and the rhythm is something that nobody else has ... had ... or will ever have.  I also liked the movie in itself a lot, mostly because it doesn't try to do anything else except show you the footage. There is no emotional effort involved in the film making. All the emotion comes from what really actually happenned there. Michael's performance is simply jaw-dropping and all this while he was not pushing for it... I don't really care what the stupid press says, he was in amazing shape for a fifty years old. His moves and his voice are at the same level as they were twenty or thirty years ago, and I think we all know just how good those were back then.

I was blown away by this man ... he had so much more to give ... go watch this movie and see what I mean.

Walking on the Moon

Giant steps are what you take,

 Walking on the moon.

I hope my legs don't break,

 

Walking on the moon.

We could walk for ever...

Walking on the moon.

We could live together,

Walking on...

walking

 

on the Moon.

The Black Sea was just beautiful this weekend...