'Adventures of Tourists/ Aventuri de excursionist'

I went to Humanitas Kretzulescu Bookstore in order to find some books for my to-read list. Before entering, my husband asked me if any of my books can still be found in bookstores. I replied that I was not so confident that they can be found.

Inevitably, I passed by the English books section. And no sooner had I reached the corner for Romanian authors translated into English that I saw one of my dear works. I was so happy! 

Especially, since soon there will be four years since the publishing of the bilingual edition (in Romanian and English) of ‘Aventuri de excursionist/ Adventures of tourists’.

If you cannot go to the bookstore, you can order the book from here or here.

My Tree

(image copyright)

People say that every one can find comfort and a match for one's personality in a tree.

My tree is the Traveler's Palm. I saw it first a couple of years ago, while visiting the Botanical Garden in Cluj-Napoca, and I felt the connection.

What is your tree?

Ode to Poetry

To those thirsty for poetry, here's an alleviation:

"...

The general belief is that readers are stupid. 

A reader is especially attentive. A writer does not write for the stupid. A writer only writes for her/ his equals.

..."

Nichita Stănescu was a Romanian poet. On March 31st 2021, he would have turned 88. For those of you curious about his work, you can find here some of his poems translated into English. 'A Poem' is one of my dearest poems by Nichita Stănescu. 

Springlike

 

Resilience

We love success stories. Actually, we only read success stories. And this because it helps us get closer, even though only in our minds, to the success for our project or the solution to our issue.

But we often forget that success does not come on a silver platter. Success is not guaranteed by how well one appears, how well one presents one’s project, the vast experience, the impact that project will have once launched or how much that impact will last after its launch, if one is famous or not, if one brings something new to the table already piling with similar projects, if one is credible or not in one’s role of initiator/ supporter of the project, etc.

To tell you the truth, success is all the above united. Somehow, they all must occur at the same time. Moreover, one must be willing and ready to receive discouraging replies or refusals and keep insisting. And even after all the above are fulfilled, success may still not happen. Here comes the balancer, chance, and nothing and no one can influence it.

There are many cases of people that have tried the above, but chance was not on their side. I love to read encouraging examples of ‘successful people’ or ‘successful projects’. But every time I finish reading the story, I realize that there is more to it. Something that is not actually mentioned in the article or interview.

I give you an example – J. K. Rowling. This author is the most given example when we talk about resilience. The manuscript of ‘Harry Potter’ was refused twelve times before being accepted for publishing. Have you tried proposing a project more than twice?!

I have. And is indeed very hard to stay strong when people dismiss your project, or they give you such a moronic reply that you think that no answer would have been a good policy. But twelve refusals are a lot to take. Well, this is a true proof of resilience. The sad part is that for each success story, such as the one of J. K. Rowling, there are hundreds, maybe thousands of examples of writers that did not make it. Even though they proved resilience in submitting their projects.

Thus, I must come back to the importance of having the chance by one’s side. I will not refer to runes for I know nothing about them. But yes, I do believe that chance makes the difference.

And in order to have it, one must show resilience. Supporting my view with my inspirational quotes, below is the one from Rocky:

“The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It is a very mean and nasty place, and it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t how hard you get hit; it’s about how hard you get hit, and keep moving forward.”

Rocky Balboa in Rocky, 1976

Therefore, the secret is to insist, and then insist some more. Take a break, and then start again. Maybe the next time around the chance will make its appearance.

And to my inspirational quotes, I add today the following: An oak is not felled at one stroke. 

'If I Understood You, Would I have this Look on My Face?' - Alan Alda

Bad dentist experiences? Well, we’ve all had them. The difference is that Alan Alda decided to put his own bad dentist experience to good use. This book is a plain and simple how-to guide for those of us wanting more from us and from our experiences in relating and communicating.

Simplicity is key, and I absolutely love the fact that this idea came over and over throughout the book in order to set us straight. That and making sure our words are in tune with the people with which we communicate (that is vocabulary, experience).

I took notes while reading, and below are my lessons to be cherished from the book. Take a look, maybe they are useful to you, too.

 ‘A lot of communication takes place in ways that don’t use words.’

‘The responsibility of getting the message across is on the person speaking, not the person listening.’

‘Communication works only in cases when you understand something about what I’m going to say to you.’

‘Pay attention to what you are paying attention to.’

The International Day of Writers

Today, people globally celebrate the Writer's Day.

I had no idea, but I have dear ones that keep me in the loop. And I received best wishes and lots of readers.

I told myself that it's surely a day to take a selfie with my books. 

If you want to read them, you can order them online (you can find them on Amazon or on Romanian websites). 

Here's a link to a Romanian website.