The Unsleeping Eye, as is its wont, sometimes goes down interesting paths. The other day, it led me to the OSCE‘s online presence. The OSCE has an office a 2-minute walk from my house, and they’re quite active in these parts because of PRM (Transnistria), so I was curious what they had to say about the country where I now live. Along the way, I … Continue reading Limba de Stat
When you have a language like Romanian, sometimes you get two (or more) similar words with subtle shades of meaning that come from two different linguistic sources. In Romanian, stiri (shteer) and veste (ves-teh) both mean “news.” The first comes from Latin and means “knowledge” while the second comes from Slavic roots and means “that which is new” or news. If you’re talking about journalism, … Continue reading Good News
If you ask someone from Cluj-Napoca what language they speak here in dear, quaint Moldova, you’d get a unanimous answer: Romanian. Indeed, if you remember my post Akum noi toti govarim pa romaneste, you know that Romanian is the official language of the Moldovan constitution and so you probably consider the case closed. As an early Christmas gift to all those dirty non-believers (in Orthodox … Continue reading Tongue Bath
Oh my word, what a crazy adventure I’ve been having lately with my new computer. It took forever to find what I was looking for at the right price, and now it’s paid for but not here and literally nobody knows when it will come. So where is it? Ah, that’s the story for another time. And so a lot of cool projects are now … Continue reading The King of Romania Podcast – Episode 1
If you’re learning Romanian, you’ll soon find out that there are a metric ton of strange and confusing grammar rules. The vocabulary and verb conjugations are relatively easy, but understanding noun cases is pretty tricky. And probably one of the most difficult things to learn is when and how to use the genitive “a”. If you remember my post The Case of the Frustrating Cases, … Continue reading Hey, Hey, It’s the Genitive A!
All Things Romania 