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Why We Left New York for a Romanian Homecoming · Whereabouts Tales | Stories of Belonging and Immigrant Experiences

• 0:00
  Hello there and welcome to Whereabouts states.
• 0:03
  Today we have a truly special conversation that might just
• 0:06
  challenge everything you thought you know about moving abroad.
• 0:12
  Join me as I chat with Anthony and Sam.
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  An incredible couple made the leap from the United States of
• 0:19
  America to settle in Romania. I walk.
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  Down to the corner where people meet.
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  They're here to share their unique journey, from Santoni's
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  deeply personal story of being adopted from Romania and
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  reconnected with his biological family to their unexpected
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  decision to leave the hustle of New York for a new life.
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  In CBO, we dive into everything. The surprising cultural
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  differences, Hilarious food revelations.
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  Missing Red 40 anyone? And how they navigated
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  bureaucracy to build a life and even a music career in their new
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  home. Get ready for an episode full of
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  heart, humor and eye opening insight.
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  You won't want to miss this. I'm Paul and this is whereabouts
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  tales. Enjoy.
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  Welcome and nice that you click this video because you don't
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  know if it's a day or a night today at Whereabouts Tales.
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  I have a really special case and I have to say case first of all,
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  Hi, Anthony. Hi, it's Sam.
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  I'm happy to see you guys. Hello.
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  And thank you for for accepting the invite.
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  I want to make a bit of an intro.
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  I left Romania 10 years ago and I always like to chat with
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  people that moved to Romania and Anthony and Sam is the first
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  were the first people that accepted to chat with me which
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  I'm happy about and thanks. Thanks again guys.
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  How is life lately? How's life?
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  I'm content. Very content.
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  It's good for us here. Yeah, that's always a big thing
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  that we have to tell people, you know?
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  For us. For us, yeah.
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  Yeah. It's important to mention, it's
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  really important to mention. But if if you would have to sum
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  up the difference between Romania and US in one vibe, one
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  word, what would it be? Culturally different, I would
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  say. I mean, that's the biggest
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  thing. It's.
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  I feel like community. Community.
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  There's a stronger sense for us of community here, like sincere,
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  authentic, genuine relationships, not only with
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  Anthony's family, but like friends we've made along the
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  way. That's so interesting for me and
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  I have to dig into that a bit deeper because I, I'm AUS
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  fanboy. I told you when we talked.
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  I, I'm telling you this again. And I always have seen in the
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  movies this nice communities that exist when everyone is
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  taking care of each other. I've read Michelle Obama's book,
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  and she's writing inside there about exactly that, that the
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  neighborhood was raising the child.
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  There was no one that if you're doing something wrong down the
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  street and Miss Thompson was seeing you, she was calling your
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  mother and telling her, you know, she did this and that.
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  Is that not a thing anymore in the US?
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  Not anymore. Not anymore, no.
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  In most places. Yeah, I mean, like we're, we're,
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  we're children of the 90s. So, so growing up in the in the
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  1990s in America was was all about that.
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  It was all about community. And, you know, you knew your
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  neighbors. People used to have this thing
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  called block parties. Exactly.
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  Really popular, you know, like the whole street would kind of
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  come out in the evening and get together and people would bring
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  food and stuff. But I mean, I think, I think
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  sort of a dividing line of that was 911 in America when, when
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  911 happened, things changed a lot.
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  I, I, I remember like what big change was when I was in
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  elementary school. It was really we, we had this
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  big kind of park in the back where the, where the playground
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  was. And before 911 happened, parents
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  would get out of their cars and they would walk right up to the
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  to the playground and they would bring their kids home and, you
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  know, people would talk to each other and say hi, how you doing?
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  After that there was a list, you know, you had to sign your kid
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  out. You know, there was a, there was
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  a perimeter put in place around the school with fences and all
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  the sudden it wasn't open. I just, I remember that being
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  young as like a moment in time where like it was relaxed and it
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  was, you know, chill. And then it became very unchill.
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  I think too, I mean the extreme prevalence of mass gun and
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  shooting events. Like I was, I was 8 years old
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  when Columbine happened, which was like the first thing.
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  And so after that, like school started installing metal
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  detectors and things like that. I mean, I didn't have any of
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  that growing up, but it depends on where you grew up.
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  That's the thing about the US, like it's 50 little countries
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  because every state is allowed to do their own thing.
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  So I grew up in New Jersey and we did not have block parties in
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  my neighborhood, but my mom's like best friend from high
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  school, they lived in Staten Island and they would have block
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  parties. So we would go to that.
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  And that was, I mean, it's like a fond memory.
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  But also I think too the the development of technology and
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  like now kids have phones and like, kids are not out on their
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  bicycles, like playing in the street until the street lights
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  come out anymore or come on their home, like playing video
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  games maybe with each other online.
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  So I just, yeah, I mean, I think in small town America, the you
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  still kind of know your neighbors and stuff.
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  But I think it really depends on where you grow up.
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  Yeah, for sure. There's a, I don't know if you
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  know, but there's a fun thing on, on, I think I see it on
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  Instagram. There is a guy who built a bike
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  bus ride to school for the neighbors for the neighborhood,
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  which I find really interesting. That's awesome.
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  That's and I think it's really depending on the place where you
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  are for sure. And you're, and then you're
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  talking about the, the block parties.
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  I growing up in Romania and this is really part of Romanian
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  culture, at least for my age group.
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  We have watched Life with Louis. I don't know if you know the
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  series. It's a it's a series done by AUS
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  comedian Louie Anderson. He was a stand up comedian.
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  Yes, yes, yes, absolutely. And the series is amazing
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  because it's tells a lot about the tells a lot.
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  A lot of the stories from this block parties from the
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  neighborhood parties. And then his father used to hate
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  all his neighbors because they were but it's it's incredible
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  funny. It's if you haven't seen it, if
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  you haven't seen it, I fully recommend it.
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  What you, what you miss the most from US if you if you, if you'd
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  be to pinpoint one thing. I guess maybe some conveniences.
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  It's going to sound incredibly shallow from my end.
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  It's I just miss certain brands of foods.
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  Junk food. I miss red 40.
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  That's what I meant. We grew up on these chemicals
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  and now we're like our bodies are craving them.
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  Whenever my mom comes, we're like, this is our list.
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  We get in the suit. We call her a mule.
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  Yeah, he's our, he's our donkey. Yeah.
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  I mean, you know, because we have these these devices, I, I
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  still like to watch, you know, shows on YouTube.
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  I, I love to watch the reruns of late night shows, occasionally
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  check in on my, my beloved sports teams.
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  But you know, I think, I think for US, one of the one of the
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  biggest things and moving to Romania was a desire for change,
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  a desire for new landscapes, a desire for new experiences.
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  Because you know, all, all we knew was the bubble of the
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  United States, which you don't really quite know how far that
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  extends when you're living inside of it.
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  But I think Romania is is just far enough away where you can
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  sort of forget about those things.
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  Like, I forgot about most of our US holidays, to be completely
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  honest. I was like, oh, right.
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  Today's today is Labor Day. Yeah.
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  My mom's like, oh, I don't have to go to school.
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  I'm like. You know, oh, right, right.
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  Oh, 4th of July, Yep, no, not a thing.
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  And so I mean for us that's that's sort of one of the parts
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  or components of having wanted wanted to move.
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  I do miss some cultural institutions like entertainment,
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  like Broadway and like the opera and like the Philharmonic,
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  because we did live in New York for five years before we moved
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  here. That's true.
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  That's like, I really think that is the kind of my biggest thing.
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  It's the live performance and the quality of talent.
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  It's exquisite. New York, yeah.
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  Absolutely, absolutely. I think it's it's one of I think
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  it's the greatest city in the world.
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  I, I dare to say it, I've, I've seen it a few times and I, I
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  have to say I love it. I said that at least six months
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  in my life. I want to live there.
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  I don't know when, I don't know how, but at least six months.
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  But being born in, in New Jersey, you're not that far
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  away, right? So you have better experience
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  with than me? Yeah, I was.
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  I was born in Brooklyn. And when we moved to New Jersey
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  when I was small because there was like violence on the street
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  and was like, no, I can't raise a kid here.
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  We got to get out. So I did grow up in the suburbs
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  of New Jersey, but like my grandparents lived in Brooklyn
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  for pretty much my whole life. And I would go to the Macy's
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  Thanksgiving Day Parade on a regular basis and go see, go to
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  the Metropolitan Opera and the, you know, go see shows on
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  Broadway and stuff. So I was spent a lot of time in
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  the city as a kid. It was only 45 minutes away on
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  the train so it was very easy. I, you know, I had the, I had
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  the discussion with a friend of mine after I came back and said,
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  what's the most impressive thing from New York?
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  And you know what I like the most?
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  The the metro system. Oh my God, that's impressive.
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  It's very impressive, yeah. That's impressive.
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  Impressive. Do you know that it's it's built
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  and and and created by a Romanian guy?
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  I didn't. I didn't know that, but props to
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  us, right? I mean, hey.
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  I like it how you. Say that.
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  I mean, come on, you know? Yeah, it's it's a it's made by a
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  Romanian engineer which moved to USI think in the 80s or 70s
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  eighties and here expanded it. Wow.
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  Yeah. That's really.
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  Really interesting story. So Sam, New York, we all envy
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  you for that. At least in my family, me and my
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  wife, my kid as well. What, where was your where?
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  Where was your upbringing, Anthony?
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  Well, I, after I was adopted, I, I grew up in Houston, TX, so
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  down South and I, I lived there until I was 1314131414.
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  And then I relocated with my mom to Boston, MA and from 14 until
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  about 21, I was in Massachusetts.
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  And then after graduating from the Boston Conservatory, Sam,
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  who's a year ahead of me in school, we were together at that
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  point and she, she would move to Chicago.
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  She was already there. But I moved to Chicago and I, I
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  lived in Chicago for about 7 years.
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  And then we moved back to the East Coast for four.
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  And now we're now we're here. Nice.
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  I I want to when you started you you that you grew up in Houston,
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  I want to ask you how did you how did you met because.
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  In completely, yeah. But you met in in university.
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  We met in college. Yeah, it was my.
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  We got together my senior year, his junior year of of
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  undergraduate university. Yeah, 1414 years ago.
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  Yeah. Almost. 14 years.
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  Ago. Don't say that we we don't.
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  Just don't this year. This year is my 15th wedding
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  anniversary, so Oh my God, no, I don't want to say 15 sounds so
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  old. How was your life in the USI
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  know, I know, at least from the research that I've done before
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  this episode, that you were singing Opera Sam, right?
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  Yeah. Anthony, you.
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  The same, Yeah, same. We both have the same degrees
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  from the Conservatory in music. Anthony was never as passionate
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  about opera singing. I don't think you he played the
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  violin for 30 years. He started playing when he was
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  3. So he was always a musician.
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  But he kind of like changed trajectory in college.
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  But then when I went to Graduate School in Chicago, we didn't end
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  up going to the same Graduate School.
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  And he did pursue voice, but his father in the US had passed away
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  like his senior year of college. And so I think it was like a
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  difficult time. And I don't know if his mind was
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  like in it, not to speak for you, but you.
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  Speak so much better. I was really like actively
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  pursuing it, like really hardcore.
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  And I think Anthony was a little bit of a wayward, A wayward soul
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  for a little while perhaps. It was tough.
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  It was very tough. I think if I could have gone
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  back, I would have taken a little bit of time between all
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  of that happening in my life and but hey, you know, can't change
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  the past. I definitely, I think I learned,
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  you know, like how to be an adult, how to, how to, you know,
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  stand on my own 2 feet. When we moved to Chicago, you
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  know, I, I worked many different jobs, from being a dishwasher to
• 15:30
  a Segway tour guide to an executive assistant in a
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  corporate office, you know, so. Got to pay the bills.
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  Got to pay the bills, got to, got to fund the art.
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  And it was a wonderful experience.
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  I mean, you know, I, I have a lot of fond memories of, you
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  know, really good times with friends and family, really
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  incredible experiences, incredible opportunities that I
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  had because I was fortunate enough to grow up in the United
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  States, right? It's, you know, it's, it's a
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  place that is, is so vast and, and complex and, you know,
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  beautiful and ugly and just, you know, every, every single type
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  of feeling and emotion, you know, 'cause it, it's just, you
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  know, it's a big country that it can be overwhelming at some
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  points. You know, I think we were
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  feeling that a little bit in New York just, you know, with
• 16:34
  respect to like the cost of living and the amount of time
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  that we were dedicating to our jobs, leaving very little time
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  for ourselves that, you know, I, I at least I felt before we
• 16:46
  moved to Romania that like I'd had enough, like my glass was
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  more than full. And I wanted to see what else
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  was out there in the world, you know, and, and we just happened
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  to be fortunate that we were able to move here, you know?
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  What's my take on? It, it's, it's, it's an amazing
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  country, the US and of course I'm biased because I, I told you
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  already, I like it, but I think it's, it's, it gives you a huge,
• 17:15
  it gives you huge opportunities, but also has huge challenges,
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  has also toxic cultures. We have to talk open about this
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  and this hard working culture like push, push, push, push
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  work. I don't know how many hours and
• 17:26
  how many days a week just to get to make ends meet.
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  It's not something which is which you can do for a long
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  time. You cannot do it for, I don't
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  know, for for years because you you end up in a bad place.
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  And I think what makes it even sad for me, at least as a as a
• 17:46
  person looking at the US from outside is what's happening at
• 17:50
  the moment. You'd mention late shows and I
• 17:52
  think we are leaving a sad, sad moment for free speech.
• 17:56
  But who knows? Things are changing and we hope
• 18:00
  that at the end something will change in the in the good
• 18:03
  direction. 11 day or another. Anthony what?
• 18:10
  What made you What made you take the DNA test?
• 18:17
  Well, I never took one. Well, you did it.
• 18:20
  You did a 23 and feet took that one.
• 18:22
  Before we even. Yeah, that was curiosity.
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  Me. It was me, Paul.
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  It was her. We're Paul while we're here,
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  while while we're sitting in this kitchen, in this tree.
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  I was the curious one. Yeah, you know, there was never
• 18:38
  a question on my side of. Like you knew.
• 18:41
  I knew because, yeah, to make to make a very Long story short
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  right now, like I had a photo album that my adoptive mother
• 18:50
  took of my family. She came to.
• 18:53
  Romania in in 1991 and I grew up with that photo album.
• 18:59
  My parents in the States were always very open with my
• 19:02
  adoption. They never tried to hide
• 19:03
  anything, had access to all of my vital records so.
• 19:10
  The most information of any adoptee I've ever met in my
• 19:13
  life. When Miss Curiosity over here
• 19:16
  was like, do you want to blind your family, it was pretty easy
• 19:21
  to do so. Well, cuz the first time I went
• 19:23
  to his house when we first got together back almost 14 years
• 19:27
  ago, he shows me this. He's like, here's my book, look
• 19:30
  at my photo album. Like oh, how nice.
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  Do you ever think about your mom?
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  I bet she thinks about you everyday.
• 19:36
  I don't think it's possible to have a child and not worry about
• 19:40
  them. What are they doing?
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  Are they OK? And I think before that, since
• 19:45
  he grew up with them, it was like, they were characters in a
• 19:47
  book. They were just, like, images.
• 19:49
  They were like, yeah, that's my family.
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  But he didn't have, like, any tangible connect to, like,
• 19:54
  that's actually my family. And so then we got married in
• 19:57
  2017. And that Christmas, I was like,
• 20:00
  I want to do something nice. We're married now.
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  Let's, like, you want to find your family.
• 20:05
  I'm curious. Aren't you curious?
• 20:08
  And so I was doing some research and I found the Facebook group
• 20:10
  called The Never Forgotten Romanian Children, who are
• 20:12
  dedicated to reuniting Romanian adoptees with their biological
• 20:16
  families. And again, because it's a
• 20:19
  Hallmark Disney story and he has so much information, I filled
• 20:24
  him in. I was like, hey, you want to do
• 20:25
  this? So at the time we did not have
• 20:28
  the photo album. We talked to his mom in the
• 20:31
  States. We were in Chicago at the time.
• 20:33
  She was in Massachusetts. She sent us the photos of like
• 20:36
  his mom here, her, his biological mom, her ID card and
• 20:39
  such and gave that information to the never forgotten Romanian
• 20:43
  children, ladies. And within three days, I think
• 20:48
  30. 36. Hours.
• 20:49
  Then the information they had sent, one of their local people
• 20:52
  knocked on the door. They lived in the same place, so
• 20:55
  it was like, hey, you had a kid 1991, and they're like, Oh yeah,
• 20:59
  that's me. And we found them.
• 21:02
  And then you connected with Stella on the phone like just
• 21:08
  after Christmas, like just after New Year in 2018 was the first
• 21:11
  time. But OK, so it wasn't really only
• 21:15
  a Facebook group was also someone that you could contact
• 21:18
  there and and ask them for to search for the for the family
• 21:21
  members. Yeah, they're like a registered
• 21:24
  nonprofit and so they have very well connected network.
• 21:29
  And so the woman who founded it, Ileana, she founded it because
• 21:33
  she herself as an adoptee and wanted to reconnect with her
• 21:36
  brother. And it like has grown to, I mean
• 21:40
  over. Thousands.
• 21:42
  For. Families, yeah.
• 21:42
  I think they've been around for about 10 years now, yeah.
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  So they have people on the ground in Romania.
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  Bus network. Villages and stuff.
• 21:52
  How was how was that call Anthony for you?
• 21:56
  Well, I mean, I'll, it's something I'll never forget, you
• 22:00
  know, because of the time difference and such.
• 22:02
  It was about 7:30 in the morning in Chicago, and I'm standing
• 22:08
  there in a kitchen, much like we're talking to you right now.
• 22:13
  And there was a woman there who was part of the Never Forgotten
• 22:19
  Romanian Children Network. My mother was there.
• 22:24
  This woman provided sort of the language translation side of it
• 22:28
  because at that point they hadn't learned any Romanian.
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  And yeah, the next thing I know, I'm hearing my mother's voice
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  over the phone for the first time in my life.
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  And it, it was like an incredible moment.
• 22:47
  I mean, it was just kind of like a surreal moment that really, I
• 22:53
  don't know, it was an out of body experience on some level.
• 22:57
  Like, you know, her voice was like familiar but unknown.
• 23:02
  You know, in some ways, 'cause I mean, I was, I was a little over
• 23:07
  2 weeks old when I was adopted from Romania.
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  Not even 12 days. 12 days and so I don't really have like any
• 23:17
  memories at all of, of her, but there's just something about
• 23:21
  that, like the sound of a mother's voice.
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  And I don't know, psychologically you're sitting
• 23:27
  there you're thinking like, wow, this is her voice like this is
• 23:29
  her she's talking to me through the phone right now.
• 23:33
  I asked about, you know, my, my brothers and my sisters and, and
• 23:37
  how everybody's doing and everybody was doing well and it
• 23:42
  was it was kind of a short call. I think it was maybe only like
• 23:45
  15 or 20 minutes or so. And then, you know, after I hung
• 23:50
  up the phone, I was like, wow, I talked to my mother, you know,
• 23:54
  in Romania. And shortly after that came a
• 23:58
  slew of friend requests on Facebook from.
• 24:03
  And so we kind of started like an online relationship, I would
• 24:09
  say for about. Two years.
• 24:12
  A year and a half before we decided, hey, look, we're going
• 24:15
  to, you know, let's meet them. And and that was in 2019 in May
• 24:21
  that I first came back that same.
• 24:23
  Came together. We came together to Romania to
• 24:27
  see how. How was so first of all, I have
• 24:29
  to say that the Romanian is getting really fast, better and
• 24:33
  better. And I've I've, I've both of you.
• 24:35
  No, no, no, both of you. No, it's really both of you.
• 24:38
  I've watched the other interviews that you gave and I
• 24:41
  have to say, respect. It's not easy.
• 24:43
  It's not easy for someone being raised in a culture that where
• 24:46
  you actually don't need to know any other language than English
• 24:49
  because you can get along everywhere in the world with
• 24:51
  English. And it's not easy for someone
• 24:53
  going from that culture to have such a good progress in a
• 24:56
  foreign language so fast. So.
• 24:59
  Not so mean in so flat out. You are very, very welcome.
• 25:05
  But what was the so you said you you traveled 2019 to Romania?
• 25:09
  What was your first thoughts land landing in in Bucharest?
• 25:14
  A week we we live, we went to auto Penny.
• 25:17
  We landed in Bucharest the first time we came here.
• 25:23
  I don't know, it's just like weird nostalgia, you know, like
• 25:25
  again, completely unconscious as a 12 day old.
• 25:28
  Don't remember anything, but I remember like sitting on the
• 25:32
  tarmac, like before the plane got to the gate, you know, and
• 25:36
  looking out the window and just being like, I'm back, I'm home,
• 25:42
  you know, and I was just like, I, I'm a very open minded
• 25:48
  person. I, I, I keep myself open to
• 25:51
  experiences as they come. I don't pass any judgement upon
• 25:55
  people. I, I, I want that sort of
• 25:59
  interaction, you know, so I was like, my eyes would literally
• 26:02
  glued open, I think for like the 1st 24 hours just being like,
• 26:06
  wow, these are the streets. And look, there's a block,
• 26:09
  there's a communist block, you know, like a, the architecture.
• 26:13
  But you know, Bucharest is such a like it, it's so confused
• 26:18
  about what it is design wise that, you know, one second
• 26:22
  you're looking at a beautiful building built in the like early
• 26:25
  20th century and then you're like, oh, this is definitely
• 26:28
  built in the 1960s, you know, So, so it was, it was cool from
• 26:33
  that 'cause I like, I like architecture.
• 26:35
  So it was really cool from that perspective.
• 26:37
  And what do we spend like 2 days?
• 26:40
  And yeah, a couple days, yeah, really.
• 26:44
  Really funny thing happened, the Pope was in town.
• 26:50
  On the day we were leaving to go to the to go to the train, yeah.
• 26:53
  And and so we're staying at this Airbnb that's in a block and,
• 26:58
  and I, I was like, I want to get something to drink real.
• 27:01
  Quick Yeah, we like went to get a.
• 27:02
  Coffee. So there was like a cafe right
• 27:04
  at the corner. In the 10 minutes of time
• 27:09
  between being at the coffee shop and coming back to get our bags,
• 27:12
  suddenly there was a police officer, you know, with a, with
• 27:16
  a gun like standing in front of the block because they were
• 27:18
  providing some sort of security for, for the Pope and start
• 27:23
  asking us for our papers and stuff.
• 27:25
  All of our papers were inside of our Airbnb 'cause we literally
• 27:29
  just like rant. Like pull out my phone.
• 27:30
  I'm like Airbnb and. Like no, man.
• 27:34
  And there's a guy that like kind of maybe knows English.
• 27:39
  And it was just kind of one of those moments where I was like,
• 27:41
  welcome to Romania, you know, in some respects.
• 27:43
  And then we were like, let's, let's get we're.
• 27:45
  Going right now we're. Going to the train and we got
• 27:49
  our like, we had like big, big hiking backpacks, like 60 liter
• 27:54
  hiking backpacks and we walked to Ghana Nord because we were
• 27:59
  going to take the train from Bucharest up to Sigishwada.
• 28:06
  And that was, that was a journey.
• 28:11
  That was a journey on the Chieffete, Oh.
• 28:15
  My God, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.
• 28:20
  For you guys, we we have terrible trains in the United
• 28:23
  States. So this was really kind of you.
• 28:24
  Don't have that many, so they they cannot be so terrible.
• 28:27
  We have a lot and they're all bad.
• 28:29
  I I like the, it's endearing, the check on it, you know?
• 28:33
  I've experienced it more than I think than you have.
• 28:35
  I've experienced it a couple times and I have to say I'll
• 28:38
  drive, I'll drive. You know, I, I, I keep hearing
• 28:45
  my colleagues in Germany complaining about the the
• 28:47
  Deutsche bans for the National Railway system and I keep
• 28:50
  selling you entitled son of a guns.
• 28:53
  Yeah, you have. No idea what it means to have 19
• 28:56
  hours to go to the seaside from Kluge.
• 28:59
  Like you have no idea. You have no idea.
• 29:01
  You have no idea what is to go 8 hours for 250 kilometers.
• 29:05
  You have no idea. Shut up.
• 29:08
  Yeah, there were definitely times I'm like, we could walk
• 29:10
  faster, couldn't we? Yeah, maybe 23 kilometers an
• 29:13
  hour, you know. You know what, what shocked me
• 29:16
  always, now that I think about it, the lack of of transparency.
• 29:19
  Like you're getting on the train, but you don't know how
• 29:23
  long it will take. No idea.
• 29:25
  No clue. You don't know what you're in
• 29:26
  for. So that we we went.
• 29:29
  We went. So you, you met your family in
• 29:33
  the first. So you you went to Bucharest
• 29:35
  first and then you you went with the train to Sigishwara.
• 29:39
  Yeah, Sigishwara was a absolute dream.
• 29:42
  I, I think I, I've, I fell in love.
• 29:45
  We fell in love, I think immediately.
• 29:47
  Yeah, it's one of the places it's so that we had seen like,
• 29:50
  oh, you have to visit if you go there.
• 29:52
  And it's not that far from his, his family.
• 29:54
  So that's where we stayed. Yeah, I.
• 29:56
  Think 3, three or four days. Three or four days.
• 29:59
  That was sort of like our home base for that time, like leading
• 30:03
  up to meeting them. And then the woman that was
• 30:08
  actually involved with the phone call was the one that sort of
• 30:15
  translated for us, but also like provided us transport to where
• 30:20
  my family lives. So that like that morning,
• 30:25
  there's a famous an infamous TikTok video where Sam is like,
• 30:30
  how you feeling? You know, like the morning of
• 30:32
  meeting my parents. And I'm like, the weather's
• 30:35
  good. The weather should be good today
• 30:38
  looks sunny out. And I'm like disassociating
• 30:41
  like. I've sitted.
• 30:43
  I've sitted. Yeah.
• 30:45
  And like she's like, you're not to meet your parents for the
• 30:48
  first time and you're over here talking about the weather.
• 30:51
  But it was it was, it was cool. Like they, they picked us up, we
• 30:55
  went and then, you know, we're pulling, we're pulling down the
• 31:01
  road in which where they live. And the next thing I know, like
• 31:06
  the van stops and my mom is standing right there and I'm
• 31:10
  like. But like, everyone on the street
• 31:12
  came out 'cause like, they're like at the end of the road.
• 31:14
  And so the street was lined with people.
• 31:17
  I was like, Oh my goodness gracious, this is a big.
• 31:21
  Deal, wasn't it? It was a little bit of a parade
• 31:24
  and it was just kind of like, I remember like saying, you like,
• 31:26
  oh, that's my mom, and like sliding the door back of the van
• 31:30
  and she's standing right there, you know?
• 31:33
  There's no mistaking she's she's your mother.
• 31:35
  You look exactly like her. Like there are copies of each
• 31:39
  other, unfortunately. And I gave her, I gave her a big
• 31:44
  hug and it was kind of natural in normal, you know, like she
• 31:48
  was just like there. And I was like, come here.
• 31:53
  It was an amazing moment that I'll never forget.
• 31:59
  You know, it was just everything I could have hoped for and more.
• 32:06
  Very interesting point too, was that my siblings.
• 32:10
  So my, my two, I'm, I'm one of five.
• 32:14
  I'm one say I'm 6, but you know what I mean.
• 32:17
  And both of my brothers live next door to where my parents
• 32:22
  live. My sisters live in and other
• 32:25
  towns. But I just remember my my oldest
• 32:29
  brother, Beilu, standing behind my mom with the exact opposite
• 32:34
  expression on his face. He was crying and he was really
• 32:39
  upset. And so it was such a contrast
• 32:41
  between everybody who was like smiling and laughing and
• 32:46
  clapping and, and full of joy. And then there's like my brother
• 32:49
  who's like, you know, and that's because when I was adopted, he
• 32:55
  was 9. He was nine years old.
• 32:57
  So he remember, yeah, he remembers the my adoption very
• 33:02
  clearly out of all of my siblings, 'cause my, my brother
• 33:08
  Audie is only two years older than me.
• 33:10
  So when he was two, I was 0 and Audie was Bella was 9.
• 33:16
  So for a while he and I kind of had a weird sort of relationship
• 33:22
  where he was kind of like very stoic and, you know, I don't
• 33:27
  know. I want to say indifferent.
• 33:29
  A little distant, I wouldn't say indifferent, but a.
• 33:31
  Little distant, which now we're good.
• 33:33
  Now we've broken that down and we're like, he thought.
• 33:36
  He had died. That's why he had heard all
• 33:39
  these stories about these kids who had left and never come
• 33:42
  back. So it was just like he kind of
• 33:44
  came back from the dead a little bit.
• 33:47
  Yeah, Speaking of dead. Oh, your grandmother.
• 33:51
  My grandmother that was that was sort of that was also one of the
• 33:55
  like impetus for wanting to come was because my adoptive parents
• 34:03
  were older. So like I never grew up with
• 34:05
  grandparents and I wanted to meet a grandparent, you know, I
• 34:10
  just to have that like experience, right.
• 34:12
  And luckily my mother's mother was still alive.
• 34:19
  And she is this like tiny little Bonica, you know, like, like I'm
• 34:25
  not that tall. But she like comes up to here.
• 34:28
  I had the. Zoo.
• 34:29
  I had the zoo. I got to meet her.
• 34:34
  I, I, you know, I gave her a hug and she whispers, now that I met
• 34:38
  you, I can die in peace. And a year later, like on the
• 34:43
  day she died. So I met her once and that was
• 34:47
  really, like, amazing. So yeah, that was that all.
• 34:54
  It's, it's interesting, you know, it's the first time when
• 34:56
  I, when I, when I hear this, I think nobody's talking about the
• 35:00
  trauma of the people that are remaining there during the
• 35:03
  adoption. Because like in your case, two
• 35:05
  weeks. It's nice that, that your
• 35:07
  adopting parents told you about this, but you didn't know much.
• 35:10
  You didn't felt much. So, but for, for your brother
• 35:14
  who saw it, I think it's, it's, it's such a traumatic moment.
• 35:19
  And like you said, you, we heard, Oh my God, we heard so
• 35:23
  shitty stories. And I can tell you that from the
• 35:26
  experience of living there, we heard I, I, I do have a Side
• 35:30
  Story. I got lost from my grandmother.
• 35:33
  I went with my, I was living close to Kluge and we, I, we
• 35:38
  went to the big city every time we need to do some shopping, we
• 35:41
  need to, I don't know, before school started and so on.
• 35:44
  And I went to my grandmother and she went into a store and right
• 35:48
  immediately I was, I had, I was six or seven years old.
• 35:51
  And I saw her coming out. And in fact, it was not her.
• 35:53
  It was a different 1. And I, I pulled that woman by
• 35:57
  the, by the coat and I saw, oh, it's not her.
• 36:00
  And it was in front of the bigger square back then in
• 36:03
  cruise the Piazza Mihavitas, which was the farmers market as
• 36:07
  well, It was crowded. I got so scared because of the
• 36:12
  all those crazy stories like be careful where you go, be careful
• 36:15
  if you get lost because they will sell you and all these
• 36:18
  crazy stories and they will kill you.
• 36:20
  And I don't know what I got so scared.
• 36:22
  Luckily, somehow I don't know how I managed to get in back
• 36:26
  inside that store. And I met again my my
• 36:28
  grandmother. But that was a terrifying moment
• 36:30
  for me. Mom, that is scary, that is.
• 36:33
  Scary. Yeah, that was and that's why
• 36:38
  I'm saying knowing all those stories from back then, I know
• 36:41
  exactly how how your brother must have feel.
• 36:43
  I I don't know exactly, but I can imagine how how he could
• 36:45
  have felt. What does what does most the
• 36:48
  most surprising thing about about your family, Anthony?
• 36:52
  The most surprising thing about them is that I there isn't a
• 36:58
  place there. There wasn't a place before
• 37:01
  meeting them where I felt I could be more of myself than
• 37:07
  anywhere else, you know, like it was.
• 37:10
  Yeah, man, It was like we picked up where we left off 12 days,
• 37:14
  you know? And I think that's because of
• 37:19
  two things, that there is a lot of love there.
• 37:26
  There's a lot of love there. They're rich in love and they're
• 37:30
  rich in family. You know, they may not have
• 37:35
  everything that everybody else has, right?
• 37:38
  But again, that's a never ending list of materialism, right?
• 37:45
  But there's a lot of love in my family.
• 37:47
  And I, I, we, we came to find out many years later, pretty
• 37:54
  recently. More details and more
• 37:58
  perspective on what my biological mother felt when this
• 38:03
  was all taking place. And one of the things was that,
• 38:08
  you know, at that time with the additional, you know, statement
• 38:17
  that they are aroma coming out of communism, like they they
• 38:24
  were really in a bad, bad place. And I always likened my adoption
• 38:32
  situation to something called the trolley problem, which is
• 38:36
  you sacrifice something for the greater good of what's around
• 38:40
  you, which makes my adoption story very different.
• 38:44
  I think on level. It also doesn't create a lot of
• 38:49
  empathy for them in the general public when when I talk about
• 38:53
  this, right. But I don't think anybody in
• 38:57
  their right mind would ever want to be in a position where that's
• 38:59
  an option that's on the table, right.
• 39:01
  So that in mind, you know, we find out that it really wasn't
• 39:07
  my mom that was pushing for my adoption was actually my
• 39:11
  grandmother, who if we remember a few minutes ago said, now that
• 39:15
  I've met you, I can die in peace.
• 39:18
  And my father that were the ones sort of Wheeling and dealing
• 39:21
  this whole situation because at the time the family lived in
• 39:26
  sort of an earthen Hut, shack, if you want to call it, with a
• 39:31
  dirt floor, with one soba, with one bed, you know, and leaves
• 39:36
  for a roof, right? And there was there were now six
• 39:40
  kids that had to be fed, right? But there were five really.
• 39:46
  And here comes this gentleman from Bucharest with, you know, a
• 39:50
  briefcase full of cash going around saying does anybody want
• 39:54
  to sell their kid? You know, basically, sure.
• 39:58
  I mean, like, here's a bunch of cash, we can get a new house.
• 40:01
  We can, you know, some upward mobility.
• 40:03
  We can provide things, buy food for our kids, you know, clothes,
• 40:07
  etcetera. They would prey on them at
• 40:09
  church. They would go to the churches
• 40:11
  and do it. We heard this from the mother of
• 40:13
  a student of mine. So.
• 40:16
  But so all to say, all to say that my, my, my mother here, my
• 40:25
  biological mother, she, you know, I, I think she always knew
• 40:31
  I was going to come back to her in some way.
• 40:34
  I don't know if that would been in this lifetime or the next.
• 40:37
  I'm glad that it was in this lifetime that it happened.
• 40:40
  She told me the story, which my adoptive parents told me that
• 40:44
  she insisted on feeding me one more time before she, like,
• 40:47
  handed me over. And so, you know, that bridge
• 40:51
  was, was always there between us.
• 40:53
  It was just somebody had to walk across it.
• 40:56
  And so we picked up, like I said, from where we left off.
• 40:59
  You know, what's the what's the crazy thing is that nobody is
• 41:02
  understanding or, or maybe it's hard to understand.
• 41:05
  Again, I lived in, I lived in that culture and I know that it
• 41:09
  was not get rich money that they got.
• 41:10
  It was survival money that they got, which makes the story a lot
• 41:14
  different. And I think I don't know if
• 41:15
  anyone can understand, but this is the most important detail
• 41:18
  which has to be mentioned there because it's not nobody wanted
• 41:22
  to buy another Ferrari. It was survival money.
• 41:28
  It was really survival money, not nothing else.
• 41:30
  And Anthony, you said before that you figure out how to be a
• 41:34
  grown up in Chicago, but I I really think you figure out how
• 41:37
  to be a grown up when you accepted the fact that that you
• 41:44
  took one for the team. If we put it in a sports term.
• 41:47
  And this makes you, this makes you the bigger person in every
• 41:51
  room. Trust me.
• 41:53
  I have to say the it's not easy. What you have done is not easy.
• 41:57
  And I have you have my respect again, that, that even that,
• 42:00
  that that being said, that that's such an important piece
• 42:03
  of information that says a lot about you.
• 42:05
  Yeah, really, really all my respect for that.
• 42:09
  I have to say it's it's impressive for me.
• 42:12
  It's impressive, at least. I mean, look, I didn't really
• 42:14
  have a say in it, you know, that's the thing.
• 42:16
  Like no. But accepting it in accepting
• 42:19
  you do. Hesitate sure.
• 42:20
  I mean, I, there was no doubt in my mind like I, I can't, I, I
• 42:24
  was never, you know, again, everybody we were fortunate to
• 42:28
  know a lot of adoptees, right? Especially women in adoptees
• 42:31
  that have reached out that have seen my story and stuff.
• 42:34
  Everybody is on a spectrum, you know?
• 42:37
  Every. Situation is so different.
• 42:40
  So I completely understand if the presumption is like of of
• 42:46
  somebody who doesn't know the story.
• 42:49
  Were you angry? Were you upset?
• 42:51
  Were you, you know what? And but I'm like, no man.
• 42:54
  Like for me, like this was a full circle moment.
• 42:57
  This was like a healing. This was like my way of like
• 43:02
  correcting a wrong right That that's sort of what I've now
• 43:07
  that we live here, we, you know, we have visited them multiple
• 43:10
  times. That's sort of the biggest
• 43:11
  conclusion that I've come to, which is that I might not be
• 43:15
  able to buy them a new house. I might not be able to get them
• 43:18
  all these things. But like, for my mother's sake
• 43:21
  and for my siblings, I was able to correct the wrong.
• 43:26
  I was able to change that narrative and change that story
• 43:29
  because I know ultimately, you know, again, adoptees are always
• 43:34
  told like you should be grateful and you should do this and you
• 43:36
  should be in all this. I am, I am grateful for those
• 43:40
  things, but that's a different part of my life that's separate
• 43:42
  from the reality in which they will know or ever know or
• 43:45
  understand them. The world ends at the end of the
• 43:49
  street. For me, it was I didn't have to
• 43:53
  think twice about getting on a 14 hour plane ride to come and
• 43:56
  visit them. That's objectively terrifying
• 43:59
  for them to even comprehend, you know, So it's always a tough
• 44:04
  negotiation with the general public when I'm talking about
• 44:07
  these things because you have all of these people that are
• 44:10
  like have savior complexes that they like, oh, they saved a
• 44:14
  child or they did this, so they did that, you know?
• 44:18
  But I also don't think I'm there's not enough space and
• 44:21
  there's not enough empathy given to the other side of it, which
• 44:25
  is why was this person ever in a position where this was an
• 44:29
  option? I think that's your knowledge of
• 44:32
  reproductive justice now, Like I was very involved in that in the
• 44:36
  US and I think like, having you come to protest and things with
• 44:40
  me and like start talking about this kind of stuff.
• 44:43
  But also you had photos, you had actual evidence of the situation
• 44:46
  that they were in. And it's not difficult for us to
• 44:49
  understand, like, why someone would be in that position.
• 44:51
  And I think in general, we've been talking a little, again, a
• 44:54
  lot of adoptees lately about like, the whole concept and
• 44:57
  situation of adoption. And that's a situation that
• 44:59
  really preys on two groups of extremely desperate people, One
• 45:04
  being the people who desperately, desperately want a
• 45:06
  child, and then the other people who are in a position like your
• 45:10
  family was to not care for the other child that they are now
• 45:14
  bringing into the world. And had, I mean, immediately
• 45:18
  after his birth, his mother got sterilized.
• 45:19
  It's not like she went on to have more kids and did this
• 45:22
  again and again, like she didn't want to do it in the first
• 45:24
  place, but she had not been given that opportunity
• 45:29
  previously. So who knows if there would have
• 45:31
  been more if they had family planning or contraception
• 45:34
  options, if it even would have happened in the 1st place, of
• 45:36
  course. But my thing is like, people
• 45:38
  really vilify your biological family and they're like, how
• 45:42
  could you ever love the mother that abandoned you and quote UN
• 45:46
  quote, they sold you. But no one ever talks about like
• 45:49
  if somebody sold you something, then somebody bought something
• 45:52
  and like. That's when we get into the
• 45:55
  ethics of adoption, which is a very sticky wicket.
• 45:58
  But you're in the your American mother will acknowledge the fact
• 46:03
  that she said, oh, when I gave your dad the money and when I
• 46:06
  bribed the judge in order to move this thing along.
• 46:09
  Like she acknowledges it in that regard.
• 46:12
  But we've made a video or two in the past about like, oh, what do
• 46:17
  you mean they needed the money? Like elaborating on that and
• 46:19
  like this whole thing that we're talking about.
• 46:21
  And I think she took offence to that and doesn't want to see it
• 46:25
  as like a transaction because why would you ever want to think
• 46:28
  that you like purchased a human being like that is that's human
• 46:32
  trafficking. That's we don't, we don't like
• 46:34
  that. Well, like you said, the being
• 46:36
  two types of people, I think from the adoptive families
• 46:40
  perspective, at least from the adoptees I've talked to, you get
• 46:43
  two types of people, right. And I hate to put everything
• 46:46
  into a binary because it's obviously not the case.
• 46:48
  That's not reality. But you get the kind of parents
• 46:51
  that, like, want to erase every last drop of where their child
• 46:57
  came from, of like who they are. They'll change their name,
• 47:01
  they'll keep documents from them.
• 47:03
  They won't talk about it. Or you get the exact opposite of
• 47:08
  that, right, which is, you know, my case.
• 47:11
  I know another adoptee who most of his siblings in the States
• 47:15
  came from the same situation. They were adopted too, and their
• 47:20
  parents did the homework. They took time to understand the
• 47:24
  the psychology of an adoptee, the the psychology of identity,
• 47:29
  to try to make sure that their children were as well adjusted
• 47:32
  as they could be, right. Fortunately, they that's the
• 47:35
  exception. I get a lot of situations from
• 47:38
  what we've seen and not the rule, yeah.
• 47:42
  Yeah, absolutely. And it's always a tool A2 story.
• 47:46
  You always have two stories. You like you said, you have,
• 47:49
  it's a transaction. We have to, we have to call it.
• 47:51
  It was a transaction back then. I think now the things are done
• 47:54
  completely different. And we have a social system
• 47:56
  which is in place also in Romania that is protecting the
• 47:58
  kid and so on. But back then was wild.
• 48:01
  And back then, like the, the, the, the beginning of the 90s in
• 48:04
  Romania was wild. And if you had the money you
• 48:07
  had, you did whatever you want. Absolutely, absolutely
• 48:12
  holograph. So you went 2019 in in Romania,
• 48:21
  you met your family which was which was an amazing experience.
• 48:24
  I can imagine you went back to the US, back to the work, not
• 48:30
  life balance. Depression.
• 48:33
  What was what was that? Was it a single moment when you
• 48:37
  said enough is enough? We do this Or was the sound of
• 48:41
  moments. Again, me, yeah.
• 48:47
  So in we went and made 19. We went back to Chicago.
• 48:52
  We had already decided that we were moving to the East Coast.
• 48:54
  Like we already knew we were moving to New York that year and
• 48:58
  we moved like in July and I had already gotten a job before we
• 49:02
  moved and so then that's where I worked for like 5 years.
• 49:06
  So then the pandemic happened obviously in March 2020.
• 49:12
  So we were only in New York for a few months.
• 49:14
  And then obviously we couldn't visit for quite a while.
• 49:17
  And at that point, it really was we were living to work at that
• 49:23
  job. For me particularly, I was, I
• 49:25
  was living to work. And so then we came back in 2022
• 49:29
  with my mom. We came back in Christmas.
• 49:34
  That was Christmas, Christmas of 2022 to, to New Year's.
• 49:38
  You know, we came back right after New Year's 2023.
• 49:41
  And that first day back at my desk, sitting in our lovely
• 49:46
  apartment in Brooklyn, I had a panic attack as soon as I had to
• 49:50
  open my computer. And I was like, this isn't
• 49:53
  right. This is not what we're supposed
• 49:55
  to be doing. I like was extremely anxious and
• 49:58
  I don't have that like I'm, I don't have an anxiety issue
• 50:02
  normally. And so I had, you know, we
• 50:06
  didn't have work for a couple weeks.
• 50:08
  I was like logging on with my bosses to like have my
• 50:10
  one-on-one conversations with them.
• 50:11
  First words out of my mouth. I'm moving to Romania.
• 50:15
  Like I'm not sure when, but I'm leaving.
• 50:18
  And so I gave them about a year and a half notice and he like,
• 50:23
  heard me because he was like, oh, because we had kind of been
• 50:26
  talking about it at this Christmas trip of like, do we
• 50:29
  want to move here? Like maybe we do.
• 50:31
  He had mentioned, you know, in 2019, that first visit after we
• 50:35
  had met them. We're getting back on the train,
• 50:37
  Siggy Schwarat a brush off this time.
• 50:40
  But he was like, maybe one day we'll move here.
• 50:41
  Like, I don't know. So you already talked about this
• 50:45
  during your visit? We had an idea about it.
• 50:48
  He was like, I just want to like be here for them and like we, I
• 50:51
  don't know, we could do something good.
• 50:53
  Like we didn't know we were, we were in love and we were
• 50:55
  romanticizing for sure at that point.
• 50:59
  But when we came in 2022 in the summer with my mom, she loved
• 51:02
  it. She was like, Oh, I get it.
• 51:03
  We had already kind of been like, maybe one day we'll move
• 51:06
  here. Like we have that option.
• 51:07
  We could maybe do that. And then that Christmas holiday
• 51:10
  trip was like the icing on the cake.
• 51:12
  And I went back to that job and I told them and they were like,
• 51:17
  oh, and I think they definitely thought I was kidding.
• 51:21
  But shortly after that. That kick started sort of the
• 51:25
  process. Oh, because when we were here,
• 51:28
  yeah. Was it in January or was it in
• 51:30
  February? Because we ended up coming back
• 51:31
  in February of 2023 because his father here had a stroke.
• 51:34
  It was in February. And that's when we started
• 51:36
  paperwork because we needed to get a a Romanian marriage.
• 51:40
  Certificate. So backing up a little bit, it
• 51:41
  was in, it was in November before we came for Christmas.
• 51:45
  Oh, that you got that? I went to the consulate in New
• 51:49
  York City of Romania and I had Googled.
• 51:55
  I did a Google and I was like, how to get Romanian citizenship,
• 52:00
  you know, and then, yeah, and you know, Google, I don't know.
• 52:07
  There was no. There was no back then.
• 52:10
  How to bake bread, you know? Yeah.
• 52:17
  So, yeah, I looked, I found out, you know, because of the
• 52:19
  constitution of Romania, you know, you'd never lose your
• 52:22
  citizenship regardless. There is an exception to that,
• 52:26
  which is that if the biological parents renounce your
• 52:30
  citizenship in the process of adoption, that you do lose it.
• 52:35
  But in my case, and even still, that's a little bit of a Gray
• 52:39
  area because of like the just sound waste, like the blood of
• 52:42
  soil, all that kind of stuff. I get a paperback from the
• 52:47
  Romanian government through the consulate that says, yeah, we
• 52:50
  found you in the system. You, you still have citizenship.
• 52:55
  So because my adoptive mother was like Ken Burns when she came
• 53:00
  here, documented everything. She she kept all of my vital
• 53:05
  records. So I have my original birth
• 53:08
  certificate and my original health certificate and my
• 53:11
  original, you know, passport that they used to Get Me Out of
• 53:14
  the country and all of these supporting documents.
• 53:17
  And I started calling around to try to find immigration attorney
• 53:23
  because just no clue what to do. I had tried to go on through the
• 53:29
  portal of the consulate to like start this process.
• 53:31
  I didn't know if I was doing anything right.
• 53:34
  So then we go. Then I found a lawyer who's
• 53:40
  based in Bucharest but also worked in the States that
• 53:43
  specialized in this kind of stuff and just like sent her
• 53:47
  everything that I had. Then we put, you know, we put
• 53:50
  her on the retainer and and we slowly started up this process.
• 53:54
  So I would say by Christmas, it was kind of a little bit more
• 53:58
  than just maybe it was kind of like, OK, well, you know, we've
• 54:02
  got this going on in our back pocket here.
• 54:04
  Maybe something will come. And by the time we came back in
• 54:10
  February, we had to sign documents that was going to give
• 54:15
  us the ability to be married under Romanian law.
• 54:18
  So we have like a certificate Castorit here.
• 54:22
  We started that paperwork and then I had to go through a whole
• 54:28
  process of like, I Anthony M Vasile, which was my Romanian
• 54:35
  name and the proof of all of that, which was a lot of fun
• 54:40
  because my name changed and my name changed several times.
• 54:44
  So like. Literally 6 * I.
• 54:47
  Had to get a court order name change from from the court and
• 54:50
  his. Mom and the US didn't keep his
• 54:52
  name consistent. So like, yeah, his his original
• 54:57
  birth certificate says one thing, then the passport says
• 55:00
  something else. It was Vasile and your current
• 55:02
  last name. Then his naturalization
• 55:06
  certificate had like all of the names, but never again on any
• 55:10
  other paperwork did all of those names exist.
• 55:13
  And his driver's license and Social Security number and
• 55:16
  passport are like the name that he has now.
• 55:18
  So we had to go to the Kings County Court in Brooklyn because
• 55:21
  that's where we lived at the time.
• 55:22
  And he has like, an AKA. It's like this person, AKAAKA,
• 55:26
  formerly known as like a block of yeah, literally all of these.
• 55:31
  This is connect. So all the same person.
• 55:33
  So that was that was like probably the most critical
• 55:37
  document for the government here to say, oh, right, OK, they are.
• 55:42
  He is the same person. The whole process took about a
• 55:46
  year and a half I would say for, for it to be completed.
• 55:50
  And we finished the process. I think everything was completed
• 55:54
  in about March or 8, like just before we left because we left
• 55:59
  in May of 2024. But yeah, it was a journey just
• 56:06
  getting through all those steps and crossing TS and dotting I's
• 56:10
  and the work that the our lawyer here did was just an incredible
• 56:14
  job. Like I recommend her to
• 56:17
  everybody because of how professional she is and and how
• 56:21
  well she knows the system here. Very diligent.
• 56:24
  And, and just like a little bit more on this, like it was a
• 56:28
  first for everyone. It was a first for my little
• 56:31
  village that I come from to kind of receive this information and
• 56:35
  requests. And so everybody was terrified
• 56:38
  to do anything because they didn't want to wind up.
• 56:41
  But yeah, you know, and, and, you know, there was a whole
• 56:45
  rigmarole of me getting my carte that in the thought day and, you
• 56:50
  know, judettes having to call towns and towns calling judettes
• 56:55
  and calling Bucharest and Primarias going back and forth
• 56:58
  and all this stuff because nobody had ever done it before
• 57:03
  from, from my from my village. So, but we were set up to be
• 57:08
  able to move here. I mean, we spent the what the
• 57:11
  that year and a half saving money and, and preparing
• 57:14
  ourselves and downsizing and getting rid of stuff and packing
• 57:18
  and just upgrading our lives so that we can move here with our
• 57:23
  two cats. So.
• 57:26
  Yeah. So it does complicate it.
• 57:29
  So it does a combination like you started the process before
• 57:33
  with the idea in the head that it could happen one day, but
• 57:35
  then the work situation got complicated and said, OK, I
• 57:41
  don't want to do this anymore. What you said your mother was
• 57:45
  supportive and she said, OK, I understand why.
• 57:48
  But what, what were your friends saying like when you said we
• 57:51
  want to move to Romania? Well, I mean well, my mother was
• 57:56
  supportive. I can't.
• 57:57
  Speak, I think, I think my mom, my mom is very like stoic in
• 58:01
  some ways in the States. Like she doesn't really like
• 58:05
  tell you everything she's thinking or feeling.
• 58:07
  You know, I think for her, there may have been mixed emotions to
• 58:13
  say the least, of course. But with everything that I've
• 58:16
  done that that we've done, you know, she's ultimately at the
• 58:20
  end of the day, been supportive of that.
• 58:22
  And I think me on a personal level, she supported everything
• 58:27
  that I've ever wanted to do. But our friends weren't
• 58:33
  surprised. Weren't surprised.
• 58:34
  A lot of people that we know, like share our values and
• 58:42
  worldview in a lot of ways and a lot of people totally understand
• 58:47
  stood where we were coming from. And a lot of people that we know
• 58:50
  in particular would love to have the opportunity to be able to
• 58:56
  move abroad. But it's not just an easy peasy
• 59:00
  thing. I mean, I'm here because we are
• 59:02
  married and like, that is why he's a citizen.
• 59:05
  That's why we could be here, you know, but for other people, if
• 59:08
  you're not going to university, if you're not getting a job,
• 59:10
  like it's very difficult to just like, get a visa.
• 59:14
  Just like, OK, now I'm going to live here.
• 59:15
  It's not possible. It's not, you know, it's.
• 59:17
  Let's put it like this. A realistic option for most
• 59:20
  people. A lot of people, it was like,
• 59:21
  wow. I would say colleagues that I
• 59:24
  worked with at the time were like, oh, you're moving to
• 59:26
  Romania. Like, why Romania?
• 59:28
  I remember talking to the president of my former company
• 59:31
  before shortly before I left. He was like, why Romania?
• 59:33
  And I'm like, why America? I know, Sir.
• 59:37
  Have you ever been? You know it's not communist.
• 59:40
  What's so great about this place?
• 59:41
  Anymore. So I would really push back on
• 59:44
  people. But for the most part people,
• 59:47
  people got it. They knew how we would talk
• 59:49
  about it. They knew how much we enjoyed
• 59:51
  being here. I mean, you had visited, what,
• 59:53
  five times before we moved? Yeah, We would just get so like,
• 59:58
  sad when we would come back from Romania.
• 1:00:03
  And I just got tired of feeling that way, you know?
• 1:00:06
  That's the short version of it, right?
• 1:00:08
  Like. I also always wanted to live
• 1:00:11
  abroad so I was like got very lucky.
• 1:00:13
  Got very lucky with having somebody, a partner, you know,
• 1:00:17
  that wants that too. I mean, we've been together for
• 1:00:22
  a long time. We've, we've had a lot of
• 1:00:24
  experiences. I think that perhaps may have
• 1:00:27
  prepared us for this all along the way, you know, that it
• 1:00:34
  really didn't feel like we were jumping into like the deep end.
• 1:00:39
  You know, we, we were, we were pretty familiar.
• 1:00:41
  Like we had done our homework to an extent.
• 1:00:44
  Now obviously like moving here, living here, big learning curve,
• 1:00:48
  like there's a. Whole.
• 1:00:50
  There's a whole other side of it, you know, but I keep.
• 1:00:52
  Saying I keep saying the same thing, sorry for interrupting
• 1:00:54
  you and I keep saying the same thing.
• 1:00:56
  Holiday is a demo version. When you move somewhere is the
• 1:00:59
  full version and it's the paid version as well.
• 1:01:02
  Demo for free. It's cool.
• 1:01:06
  It's true, it's true. I mean, I think I think anyone
• 1:01:09
  romanticizes the place whenever they go on holiday.
• 1:01:12
  Oh, I could see myself living here all the Amalfi Coast.
• 1:01:14
  So this place or that place, and it's like, but your day-to-day
• 1:01:17
  life is very different than a holiday.
• 1:01:20
  You know, my mom's been, she loves it and she wants to
• 1:01:23
  retire. But it's also like, I do worry
• 1:01:25
  about her having that same kind of realization that we had of
• 1:01:28
  like, OK, girl, you live here now.
• 1:01:30
  Like how are we spending our time?
• 1:01:32
  When we were in the States, we had a serious, like nostalgic
• 1:01:36
  appreciation for things that now are so mundane to us that we
• 1:01:40
  live because we live here. Like we found like 3 Uno OK, and
• 1:01:47
  Jacob's brand too. Not not Nuss Cafe, all right.
• 1:01:51
  And like a ritual took place, you know, like it was just like
• 1:01:56
  this like, Oh my God, three and one.
• 1:01:57
  Oh, tastes like home. You know, like it was.
• 1:02:01
  Just like we would drink at the family's house.
• 1:02:03
  So it's like you know it. Was just screwing us up like the
• 1:02:06
  whole time, you know, and then it's like not go back to work,
• 1:02:08
  you know and so. How was how was Larry?
• 1:02:13
  You said that the the demo version was finished as as as
• 1:02:16
  you said, but how was day one in Cebu?
• 1:02:21
  It was. We live here now.
• 1:02:23
  Yeah, we took a walk. I think we were living, we were
• 1:02:27
  staying in a really small Airbnb with our two cats, so.
• 1:02:31
  It was. It was Airbnb first.
• 1:02:32
  It was Airbnb first. It was Airbnb first.
• 1:02:35
  We came in May. I had booked the Airbnb until
• 1:02:39
  the end of August and we ended up moving out of it sooner.
• 1:02:46
  That was a whole thing because we thought we were going to buy
• 1:02:48
  a house and that was like a whole process and we kind of got
• 1:02:52
  like screwed. It all is for the best because
• 1:02:54
  everything happens for a reason. But they didn't have their
• 1:02:58
  paperwork in order and so then. But I had already shortened the
• 1:03:00
  Airbnb so we left in July. So we were there for like 2
• 1:03:03
  months. Luckily, we found a really
• 1:03:04
  great. Apartment and now we're in our
• 1:03:06
  apartment that we have been in. We love our landlords and
• 1:03:08
  they're they're good people and stuff.
• 1:03:10
  But it was surreal to, like, be here.
• 1:03:13
  I mean, we had been, you know, we had spent time in Sabia.
• 1:03:15
  Now it was really just like, Oh my God, like we live here now.
• 1:03:19
  Like we don't have to go home. Yeah.
• 1:03:22
  This is home. Yeah, that's true.
• 1:03:24
  That's true. Like just to that point, like
• 1:03:26
  every time, like Sam's mom comes and visits us and we drop her
• 1:03:31
  off at the. Air, he's always like, I'm so
• 1:03:32
  glad that's not us. So glad I don't have to get on
• 1:03:34
  that plane right now. Like, that sucks.
• 1:03:39
  But then the real work began. You know, once we moved here,
• 1:03:43
  right, 'cause I felt like for at least the first six months or
• 1:03:48
  so, there was a never ending list of like stuff that we had
• 1:03:54
  to get done, right? And whether it was like getting
• 1:03:58
  my bulletin or signing up for the health insurance or.
• 1:04:05
  My immigration. Buying a car or but, you know,
• 1:04:08
  buying her immigration stuff, yeah, that was that was huge.
• 1:04:12
  Like there was just always one more thing to do, you know, and
• 1:04:15
  that that got tiring. That was.
• 1:04:18
  There's a lot of Mad Men. We had to deal with a lot of
• 1:04:20
  that stuff at the beginning, absolutely.
• 1:04:23
  Now I think we're pretty much settled.
• 1:04:25
  Yeah, we kind of know how it goes.
• 1:04:26
  Yeah, how was the how was the apartment hunting process?
• 1:04:32
  Well, when I tell you we OK, we were like we're going to find an
• 1:04:36
  agency because we went to the go sign this paperwork for this
• 1:04:39
  house. It was the day that the pre
• 1:04:42
  contract expired. We had a friend that, you know,
• 1:04:45
  had spoken because again, we had been really working on our
• 1:04:48
  Romanian up to that point, but I still didn't feel confident or
• 1:04:51
  fluent to take care of that. Phone calls it's.
• 1:04:54
  Something different when you first of all, phone calls.
• 1:04:56
  Second, when you move in a country we compare with
• 1:04:58
  Duolingo. No, no, no.
• 1:05:00
  No, no, no. And I could use a bunch of
• 1:05:02
  resources that I was like, nobody prepared me for how to
• 1:05:05
  buy a house. So a friend of ours had spoken
• 1:05:08
  to the, the owners of the house and she was like, OK, like, is
• 1:05:12
  everything ready? Do you want to extend this pre
• 1:05:14
  contract? And they said no, no, no.
• 1:05:16
  And the day we find out that the, the, the notary tells me,
• 1:05:20
  ah, Farah Tehran. And I was like, I understand
• 1:05:22
  enough Romanian to know I'm Farah Tehran, so we walked out
• 1:05:27
  of there. Because it was a kamuna.
• 1:05:29
  It was a kamuna. So like.
• 1:05:30
  Their last piece of paper was from 1990.
• 1:05:32
  After the state gave the land back, you know you have to go
• 1:05:35
  through the intabulare. Process.
• 1:05:37
  Wow. They never, they never did that.
• 1:05:39
  We know this now. We know a lot more now about how
• 1:05:41
  to buy a house, but yeah. But we walked away and so we
• 1:05:44
  like got home that night and we're like, obviously this isn't
• 1:05:47
  going to happen. So we started looking for
• 1:05:48
  apartments and so a few nice apartments that we had seen were
• 1:05:51
  from like one particular like rental agency.
• 1:05:54
  So the next morning we get there, it's like raining a
• 1:05:56
  little bit. We're like, really desperate.
• 1:05:58
  It's like 859. Before the woman even gets out
• 1:06:01
  of her car, we like harassed her as she's getting out of her car.
• 1:06:05
  We're like, can you please help us?
• 1:06:06
  We really need an. Apartment like can I make some
• 1:06:09
  coffee for? Yeah, she's like, OK, come
• 1:06:11
  inside. But we got there so early.
• 1:06:15
  Like early bird catches the worm.
• 1:06:17
  You had the whole office working for us, every single agent.
• 1:06:20
  I know this place. I know this.
• 1:06:21
  Place all and their friends are like, yeah, I got something
• 1:06:23
  over. Here it's because we had cats so
• 1:06:27
  we had actually seen this apartment online and we really
• 1:06:30
  liked it but they're at 1st called and we're like oh they
• 1:06:33
  have cats Oh yeah no pets everywhere was no pets some
• 1:06:36
  places were also no kids and I was.
• 1:06:38
  Like welcome. Welcome to the media.
• 1:06:40
  But I know. But then I was like.
• 1:06:41
  But then she's like, she's a friend of mine.
• 1:06:44
  But also will. Pay.
• 1:06:47
  I'll pay you the whole year in advance.
• 1:06:49
  How about that? And then like, oh, OK, so we got
• 1:06:55
  our apartment. They no, they're great.
• 1:06:58
  I, we got really lucky again. Like it was a crazy situation
• 1:07:02
  because we were really out of time crunch because it was like
• 1:07:04
  we have to move out from. Airbnb.
• 1:07:05
  Now in like 2 days. Yeah, it was like 2 days.
• 1:07:08
  It was like that week that we left.
• 1:07:10
  Yeah. And we didn't have a lot of
• 1:07:11
  stuff. We just had our suitcases.
• 1:07:13
  So we just threw that in. The car came down.
• 1:07:15
  It was like a few trips for like.
• 1:07:17
  Took a lot of trips to Jumbo after that.
• 1:07:19
  Yeah, it's just fun. Jumbo.
• 1:07:22
  Jumbo. I miss Jumbo.
• 1:07:24
  I have to be honest, I miss Jumbo.
• 1:07:26
  It's the store where you buy all the stuff that you never need.
• 1:07:32
  What's the what's the weirdest thing that you do in Romania
• 1:07:36
  that you could never imagine yourself doing in the States?
• 1:07:48
  That's a good question. What's the weirdest thing that
• 1:07:52
  we do? I don't know, the recycling
• 1:07:55
  thing is like odd. Yeah, the recycling.
• 1:07:57
  I mean, it's good. It's a good thing.
• 1:07:59
  I like the, you know, the machines.
• 1:08:01
  I mean, we got a Racine. When we go to like Coughlin,
• 1:08:04
  like we get those little like iced coffee cups, you know,
• 1:08:06
  where that's like always a big deal.
• 1:08:07
  Like we do that. I don't know.
• 1:08:09
  That's not that weird though. Well, because I only say the
• 1:08:12
  recycling thing because in the US, like people don't recycle
• 1:08:15
  their cans that way and like people specifically like search
• 1:08:18
  for them. But here everywhere it's like,
• 1:08:19
  oh, I have a bottle, I'm bolage. OK, like that's my 50 baht that
• 1:08:26
  for sure. I mean, I teach English.
• 1:08:28
  I would never thought I was going to do that.
• 1:08:30
  I would say the weirdest thing that we also we do together is
• 1:08:33
  is music. Well, not weird, but we never
• 1:08:37
  made music like. Weird in the sense that, like,
• 1:08:40
  this was never part of the plan. Yeah.
• 1:08:42
  Like what we had, you know, where we are logical people.
• 1:08:46
  We before we moved here, we were like, we're going to do this,
• 1:08:49
  we're going to do this, we're going to do this.
• 1:08:50
  And somebody in the universe was like, no, you're not.
• 1:08:54
  You're not doing any of you're. Not doing any of those things,
• 1:08:57
  you're going to do this. And that really speaks to the
• 1:08:59
  fact that we have more time now to do the things that we want to
• 1:09:04
  do, right? And one of those things is
• 1:09:07
  music. And it was never on my radar
• 1:09:09
  that we would write an album of original music, that we would
• 1:09:12
  record that album in Sabu, that we would have a vinyl, that we
• 1:09:16
  would suddenly be playing shows and playing at festivals and,
• 1:09:22
  you know, starting our own satellite.
• 1:09:24
  Like that was never on the table.
• 1:09:28
  You know, we didn't know about those things.
• 1:09:30
  So sort of a weird change of events, you know, of us saying,
• 1:09:35
  oh, well, yeah, why not, you know, let's do this.
• 1:09:38
  And that's probably the most like.
• 1:09:39
  That's a real good point. Left field thing that we were
• 1:09:41
  not expecting. And then of course, you know,
• 1:09:44
  like Slamina, that is the antithesis of the American diet,
• 1:09:52
  man. How can we explain this to
• 1:09:56
  someone not speaking Romanian man?
• 1:10:01
  It's pig fat. Yeah, You know, I tried to
• 1:10:04
  explain it to my German colleagues.
• 1:10:05
  Man, it's hard. It's really hard.
• 1:10:08
  It's really hard. I mean, they have something, but
• 1:10:10
  they said, you know, the meat on top.
• 1:10:11
  No, no, no, no. We take the meat off.
• 1:10:13
  Nope. No, I was so rich and you know
• 1:10:22
  well, you don't like the that's the one chorda that we don't do,
• 1:10:26
  but every other chorda is on the table.
• 1:10:29
  You don't. I mean, could to be honest, like
• 1:10:33
  I've, you've had it once. I think so, yeah.
• 1:10:37
  But. It's a texture thing.
• 1:10:38
  Yeah, well, but a lot of people don't even eat the burta, they
• 1:10:40
  just eat. The.
• 1:10:41
  Soup. Anyway, the.
• 1:10:42
  Soup is good. Turbay Burta.
• 1:10:43
  It's a It's a thing that you either love it or hate it like
• 1:10:46
  there is no in between. It's very.
• 1:10:48
  Polarizing. Absolutely.
• 1:10:51
  Absolutely. We have to say it's the it's the
• 1:10:53
  meat done from the cow stomach and for the for the people not
• 1:10:58
  understanding what Turbay Burta is, but the traditional Romanian
• 1:11:02
  dish, it's actually not Romanian.
• 1:11:03
  I find out here that they are had actually having in Germany
• 1:11:06
  us two of the same thing. So they are not eating it as a
• 1:11:10
  trova. They are having is that as a
• 1:11:12
  Stew. So without that much liquid
• 1:11:14
  inside. So basically the same.
• 1:11:16
  Got it. Yeah, I know.
• 1:11:17
  It's there's a Mexican dish that's similar to that too, like
• 1:11:20
  a tripe soup. Yeah, I mean, other cultures eat
• 1:11:22
  tripe. It's just not.
• 1:11:26
  It's not an American thing. And like how wasteful American
• 1:11:30
  culture is with like, animal products.
• 1:11:32
  Like, I appreciate that. Are like really great.
• 1:11:35
  I appreciate here like you're using every part of that pig.
• 1:11:39
  Absolutely. That, but that's that's called
• 1:11:41
  being poor. Yeah, well, that's the only.
• 1:11:43
  Reason. That's the only reason.
• 1:11:45
  I think that's the other thing too.
• 1:11:47
  Like some things that we like absolutely.
• 1:11:49
  Perhaps the first time we encounter them, we're like,
• 1:11:52
  well, that's a little weird. But then when you like really
• 1:11:54
  think about it, you're like, wow, that's like really
• 1:11:56
  resourceful. And that's really like, cool.
• 1:11:58
  Because in the States it's got to be in a box and shiny and
• 1:12:04
  new. And here it's like, well, what
• 1:12:07
  else can I use this for, you know?
• 1:12:09
  And I'm not. I have such a jar collection
• 1:12:11
  now. Yeah, she's got a huge jar
• 1:12:13
  collection now, because you never know.
• 1:12:15
  You never know my cabinet here, we've got like 5 or 6 bottles of
• 1:12:20
  gifted Pickles and gem and you know, Zacuska and all that kind
• 1:12:24
  of stuff. So it's like that.
• 1:12:26
  That's such a like, a wonderful thing, I think.
• 1:12:29
  Most probably you know the stories already because you you
• 1:12:32
  lived there since a while. But the the problem with the
• 1:12:35
  companies was not that you couldn't not necessarily that
• 1:12:37
  you couldn't find stuff. You couldn't buy stuff because
• 1:12:40
  you didn't have the money. No, money was not the problem.
• 1:12:42
  Like procuring stuff was, was the biggest problem and that's
• 1:12:46
  why you kept everything, everything I do remember and I
• 1:12:49
  think I, I hope I will not get my father into trouble for that,
• 1:12:52
  but it has to be already. So I do remember a moment in
• 1:12:56
  which my, my grandpa or my grandparents used to had cows in
• 1:13:02
  the, in their, in their yard. And whenever they the the cows
• 1:13:05
  were having a baby, they were killing that baby, but inside
• 1:13:09
  the closed doors during the night, inside the the like the
• 1:13:13
  barn with I had that there was AI would call it the drama for
• 1:13:18
  my kid had because they were covering everything with butter
• 1:13:24
  like you know what butter like. With.
• 1:13:26
  With so that the light from inside the bar was not visible
• 1:13:29
  outside, so the people would not know that they were doing
• 1:13:32
  something inside the barn because they would have reported
• 1:13:35
  to the Securitate. So that was that.
• 1:13:37
  That was the crazy thing. Like we know like, but now we
• 1:13:41
  got the habits of doing that and I think some of the things are
• 1:13:44
  coming from there. I I still think that that it's
• 1:13:49
  crazy that we eat. I don't want to say balls
• 1:13:56
  because it sounds bad from the pig, but I don't know the
• 1:14:00
  literally world is that the literal world.
• 1:14:02
  No testicles, testicles, ICE that was AI had AI had AI had a
• 1:14:07
  yeah, but that the big testicles.
• 1:14:08
  So that's something which is crazy for me even.
• 1:14:10
  More that's not that. I mean, like we have what they
• 1:14:13
  call Rocky Mountain oysters in the States, which is.
• 1:14:16
  The same. Ball, the same thing, yeah.
• 1:14:18
  Oh, really? Yeah.
• 1:14:20
  OK, I didn't know that. And so original.
• 1:14:22
  Guys, you said you talked about Mexican food and I have to ask
• 1:14:26
  you because I asked, I had a few guys from US until now in my in
• 1:14:30
  my podcast and every time when I'm ask them which food do they
• 1:14:34
  miss the most from US, everyone said Mexican food.
• 1:14:37
  So is your president going to hate you as well?
• 1:14:39
  You're also going to say Mexican food.
• 1:14:42
  I, I for me, before we moved here, I was concerned in general
• 1:14:46
  about all kinds of ethnic food. Like Romanian food is great, but
• 1:14:54
  I was like, I love it. Oh my God, Thai food, Indian
• 1:14:59
  food, Mexican food, like American breakfast, like not a
• 1:15:04
  crepe, but a pancake. Bagels.
• 1:15:10
  I do miss a bagel, I have to be honest with you.
• 1:15:13
  But I was. That was a very big concern of
• 1:15:15
  mine that I had. And we got very excited when we
• 1:15:17
  found an Indian restaurant here in CBU.
• 1:15:20
  However, the Romanian palate doesn't love spice.
• 1:15:27
  I would say it's the same with the German one.
• 1:15:28
  I have to, I have to tell you, it's even worse than Germany
• 1:15:31
  when you ask really spicy. In Germany it's a joke.
• 1:15:35
  It's a. It's even a joke in Romania, but
• 1:15:38
  it's an even bigger joke here, yeah.
• 1:15:40
  I can't imagine like it says Picanth on the menu it says.
• 1:15:44
  No. The pepper, that's the hottest
• 1:15:46
  thing that I get. I was so sad in Kluge because I
• 1:15:49
  we go through many every once in a while and I was so sad in
• 1:15:51
  Kluge because in an Indian restaurant they was used selling
• 1:15:54
  French fries and I, I, I don't understand that.
• 1:15:57
  I'm that makes no sense. Sorry.
• 1:15:59
  I'm. No, no.
• 1:16:01
  No, I think. I think I mean for me, like I
• 1:16:08
  that was just not a concern on my, on my.
• 1:16:10
  Because you love Romanian. I mean, like I was just a lot
• 1:16:13
  even like I was like, alright, bye.
• 1:16:15
  Like, you know what I miss is there used to be this Chinese
• 1:16:17
  restaurant near where Sam? Lived in Yon's garden.
• 1:16:21
  Shout out to Yon's. Shout out to Yon's like I miss
• 1:16:25
  like that real. American Chinese food.
• 1:16:29
  New York style Chinese food. You know that's what I'll.
• 1:16:33
  Call it. I miss.
• 1:16:35
  I miss. Texas BBQ, but I've been missing
• 1:16:37
  Texas BBQ for decades because it's been so long since I've.
• 1:16:41
  Lived there. Pappy's smokehouse in Saint
• 1:16:44
  Louis. I mean like the thing.
• 1:16:47
  Interesting. This was interesting too about
• 1:16:49
  this food question. Is that like I see things
• 1:16:52
  changing too, right? Even in the last 5 or 6.
• 1:16:57
  Years When we first came here, it was all Romanian food, all
• 1:16:59
  the time. You.
• 1:17:00
  Know and I and I think that's a cool thing because it really
• 1:17:03
  speaks to I think two things which America has in spade,
• 1:17:07
  which is like tons of people from all over the world living
• 1:17:11
  there right and they absolutely right so you encounter like a
• 1:17:16
  lot of migrant workers immigrants, they bring their
• 1:17:19
  foods they bring their spices and all the sudden there's a
• 1:17:22
  restaurant there that is there for them but really it's there
• 1:17:26
  for everybody right and so like even in Cebu like that's that's
• 1:17:31
  the thing right like there's now like a Vietnamese restaurant and
• 1:17:33
  there's 2 Indian restaurants and you know it's not just all
• 1:17:38
  chorba de fazole like it's it's not you know it's.
• 1:17:42
  A nice mix. It's a.
• 1:17:43
  It's a nice mix, but I think it depends on where you are like at
• 1:17:45
  the same time. But this is, this is again, a
• 1:17:48
  big question about, about the combination of cultures, which I
• 1:17:51
  love, which, and I think US was really famous about that.
• 1:17:55
  I, I was in the USA few times and I remember eating at this at
• 1:17:58
  the Mexican restaurant who where the owner was not even able to
• 1:18:01
  speak English, which had an amazing food there.
• 1:18:04
  I was in, I think in North Carolina, if I remember
• 1:18:06
  correctly, I was a few times for work as well.
• 1:18:08
  That's why I visited different areas.
• 1:18:12
  And I have to say the, the, the, the, the best Italian
• 1:18:15
  restaurants in Germany are owned by Italians who came here to
• 1:18:19
  work and established themselves here.
• 1:18:21
  And they open a restaurant and that's why the food in there,
• 1:18:24
  it's amazing. Like like you said this open you
• 1:18:27
  have to be open minded to have multiple cultures because it's
• 1:18:30
  only expense the way in which you see the world. 100% of food
• 1:18:34
  is the greatest way to understand someone's culture and
• 1:18:37
  where they come from. I mean, like, you can talk about
• 1:18:40
  borders, you can talk about, you know, clothing or architecture,
• 1:18:45
  whatever you want, but the food, it will tell you exactly what
• 1:18:47
  you need to know every single time, you know, and that's, I
• 1:18:52
  would say too, we've been very spoiled in some ways because we,
• 1:18:55
  I think lived in arguably the 2 greatest food cities in America,
• 1:19:00
  which is New York and Chicago. So, you know, I'm going to get
• 1:19:04
  in trouble for saying this, but I think the food is better in
• 1:19:09
  Chicago. You're.
• 1:19:11
  Not going to get in trouble. It's a that's.
• 1:19:12
  A bad New York and I. Think now you made me curious.
• 1:19:18
  Chicago is an amazing Food City. The the culinary stuff they got
• 1:19:22
  going on in Chicago is insane. And, and it is, it's both
• 1:19:26
  experimental, but it's also like reasonably priced.
• 1:19:30
  You know it's good. Food and not as many roaches or
• 1:19:34
  rats. Or rats.
• 1:19:36
  Manhattan is wonderful, but. Pizza rat, Yeah.
• 1:19:40
  Look, look, I always heard the stories, right?
• 1:19:43
  And I, I went, I think it was 2022 with my wife.
• 1:19:47
  We're there for a city break like 4 days.
• 1:19:49
  So four days. You didn't adapt to the to, to
• 1:19:52
  the time zone. So you are still on the time
• 1:19:54
  zone from here. Sure.
• 1:19:55
  Yeah. But what that lead up to where
• 1:19:57
  wake up at 3:00 AM in the morning, we're up, and then 4:00
• 1:20:01
  AM we're outside waiting for the first Starbucks to open to get a
• 1:20:04
  coffee and then to walk around the city.
• 1:20:06
  Right. So everyone said, yeah, don't go
• 1:20:08
  during the night. First of all, it's dangerous.
• 1:20:11
  No, it's not. I'm sorry.
• 1:20:12
  I that I and we haven't been in a extremely expensive area, but
• 1:20:17
  still it was OK. And there are other rats.
• 1:20:20
  No, they are not that we've seen one.
• 1:20:22
  So 1 is OK. I mean, we were two months ago
• 1:20:25
  in Italy in a famous, I have a crazy story in a in a old city
• 1:20:31
  and there a rat came out of nowhere and there was a lady
• 1:20:34
  with her daughter, said Cabello. I said no, that's not Bello,
• 1:20:39
  that's a rat. Yeah, are there?
• 1:20:43
  They're there too. Yeah, no, true.
• 1:20:45
  Yeah. So I think you cannot avoid
• 1:20:48
  that. I think of course the metro
• 1:20:49
  system has a problem. I was there with with my son and
• 1:20:52
  in the bag of chips, there was a tail coming out from a bag of
• 1:20:55
  chips and my son was saying, look, that's a mouse.
• 1:20:58
  I said that's not the mouse, that's a slightly bigger mouse.
• 1:21:02
  That's. Yeah, I'm sort of like the size
• 1:21:05
  of a VW. It happens in the metropolitan
• 1:21:09
  place 100%. Absolutely, 100%.
• 1:21:12
  I what I loved about New York, about New York culinary picture.
• 1:21:18
  Let's say like this. I love the fact that they you
• 1:21:21
  have a lot of local old stuff in there.
• 1:21:24
  Like you have the formers. I don't know Israeli place where
• 1:21:29
  you had this. I don't remember the name.
• 1:21:32
  Unfortunate. I had this one, sorry.
• 1:21:35
  Katz's. Exactly.
• 1:21:36
  Yeah, the deli from Katz. Then you had the pizza places
• 1:21:40
  made by by. So you have the local places
• 1:21:42
  that you have the the international food, but with the
• 1:21:45
  local touch. And that's something which is
• 1:21:47
  really, really nice. And the sweet and the sweet and
• 1:21:51
  the sweet. The Carlos Bakery.
• 1:21:54
  Carlos Bakery is called. It wasn't even that Swedish
• 1:21:57
  candy store that we went to. Remember, you get the Swedish
• 1:22:00
  candy. Yeah, I forget what it's called,
• 1:22:01
  but that's a new place. That's not an old place, but
• 1:22:05
  yeah, the Italian bakeries especially, like in Brooklyn.
• 1:22:08
  Yeah, truthfully. Oh, I miss that.
• 1:22:10
  Oh, I mean, and I, I think the one of the best coffees that I
• 1:22:13
  had in in my life was in US in, in New York in black at the
• 1:22:17
  Blank St. Oh yeah, Blank St's nice.
• 1:22:20
  Absolutely amazing and the best salmon burger that I had in my
• 1:22:26
  life was in a Jack's wife Freda. Oh, Jack's Jack.
• 1:22:32
  No, I don't think we ever went. I don't think we actually ever
• 1:22:34
  went to Jack Sway Frida, no, but I know which there's a few
• 1:22:38
  locations, but. We were in, I think in Chelsea,
• 1:22:42
  OK, somewhere close to Chelsea, if I remember.
• 1:22:44
  We walked a lot and we just. Fired.
• 1:22:47
  I do. Lower Manhattan is my favorite.
• 1:22:49
  There's an incredible Romanian restaurant in.
• 1:22:52
  Ooty. Chelsea called OT.
• 1:22:55
  I heard about it but. After I was in the.
• 1:22:57
  Lower East Side. Sorry, Lower East Side.
• 1:22:59
  It's it's when you get back to New York, go there.
• 1:23:02
  I really recommend it. It's it was a really, it was
• 1:23:05
  really cool, fascinating way they're doing like tapas, small
• 1:23:08
  plate style Romanian food. Like it's obviously not your
• 1:23:12
  mom's Somali, right? But like, I think it's a really
• 1:23:16
  interesting way to bring Romanian food to a wider.
• 1:23:18
  Experience for sure. Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:23:21
  Yeah. Well guys, we could go to the
• 1:23:22
  down to the food rabbit whole a lot because I see we all like
• 1:23:26
  this. Early kitchen, that's true.
• 1:23:31
  Guys, what's what's one thing about Romania that that what
• 1:23:37
  about Romanian culture that you you wish every expert with knew
• 1:23:40
  when they were coming in? I mean, the hospitality I found
• 1:23:52
  like is it? But I don't know if for us
• 1:23:56
  that's the thing, right? Like that's what I hear
• 1:23:58
  Romanians are like as well. We're not nice to each other.
• 1:24:02
  We don't like each other. But like I have been welcomed so
• 1:24:05
  warmly into so many strangers homes that have never like I've
• 1:24:10
  never met before. And.
• 1:24:12
  Like I get a bag of like Pickles and like, you know, suit up this
• 1:24:18
  sulk and whatever. I don't know, I just find that,
• 1:24:21
  oh, I missed that. It's very, it's one of my
• 1:24:24
  favorite things of the spring season, I have to say.
• 1:24:26
  I think my advice to to to people that are either visiting
• 1:24:31
  Romania or that want to live here that are from other EU
• 1:24:36
  countries is like it's easy to go on YouTube, right or wherever
• 1:24:44
  and watch somebody else's perspective, right or their
• 1:24:49
  travel blog on it or read a book about, you know, a certain city
• 1:24:53
  that you're going to go to. Leave your preconceived notions
• 1:24:58
  about Romania at the Leave it in your hotel, leave it in, leave
• 1:25:05
  it on the airplane, OK, and see it for yourself and then form an
• 1:25:09
  opinion about it because you'll probably be surprised pleasantly
• 1:25:14
  I. Think, I think Mark Twain said
• 1:25:17
  that the cure to preconception is traveling.
• 1:25:20
  Yeah, yeah. Because I, I, you know, like we
• 1:25:23
  talked about Bucharest, right? Like architecturally it's a
• 1:25:25
  mess. But there's something beautiful
• 1:25:29
  in the chaos. There's something beautiful in
• 1:25:31
  the disorder that, you know, you kind of have to accept.
• 1:25:37
  It's not going to look like the place that you came from, right?
• 1:25:41
  And you shouldn't want it to, you shouldn't want to force
• 1:25:44
  that, right? And you also shouldn't allow
• 1:25:45
  that to upset you on some level, right?
• 1:25:49
  And I think that like for us, you know, having the upbringings
• 1:25:54
  that we had where we were exposed to a lot of culture and
• 1:25:58
  a lot of people from different walks of life, that we've always
• 1:26:03
  kind of walked into a new space or an experience or place in
• 1:26:07
  Romania with no expectations, no preconceived notions about it.
• 1:26:12
  I mean, that's the cool thing about living in Romania is the
• 1:26:16
  how different Romania is depending on where you are.
• 1:26:19
  You don't really get that if you're just going to Braun
• 1:26:22
  Castle and going to Cluj and going to Bucharest and you know,
• 1:26:26
  but the regions, I mean, like Buco Vina is amazing, right?
• 1:26:34
  Old Danya, you're like going going all the way down to
• 1:26:37
  Costanza, like. But we've learned so much since
• 1:26:40
  being here. I mean.
• 1:26:41
  There's so much variety that like, you just can miss it all
• 1:26:46
  if you're not really being open. Yeah.
• 1:26:50
  To it, I mean that that's right. That's what I love about.
• 1:26:53
  It, I mean, Romania is not a monolith and neither are
• 1:26:55
  Romanians. Yeah, and.
• 1:26:57
  Every, every, I don't know if you know that that saying in
• 1:27:00
  Romania that every, every forest has its dry trees.
• 1:27:03
  So yes, it's absolutely correct, and it's never forcing.
• 1:27:06
  Up the drought, right? Exactly.
• 1:27:08
  Every. Was that the correct translation
• 1:27:10
  that I said no right? I I think I that's so that's why
• 1:27:14
  I've heard it. But I want to remember.
• 1:27:15
  I need to get better with my idioms.
• 1:27:17
  Idioms are really hard for me in Romanian.
• 1:27:19
  They never translate exactly. No.
• 1:27:21
  No, that's the problem. You can never.
• 1:27:23
  You maybe try, try to translate the meaning of them, but they
• 1:27:26
  don't fully makes sense. I'm not, you know, the Romanian
• 1:27:29
  saying. That's what I think.
• 1:27:34
  And of course I'm biased here guys.
• 1:27:36
  And you have to understand this. I'm biased.
• 1:27:37
  I was born and raised there and I'm biased.
• 1:27:41
  I'm, I think what's the common thing about Romania, which,
• 1:27:45
  which I've seen it everywhere else where I've travelled until
• 1:27:48
  now, is that we are not entitled this entitlement in some cases,
• 1:27:53
  not everywhere of course, but in this entitlement is not
• 1:27:55
  necessarily there. And we are, I would say we are a
• 1:28:00
  hard working culture. It depend what everyone from
• 1:28:03
  outside is saying. And we have this, we this could
• 1:28:09
  come. We know how to get out of
• 1:28:11
  situation which we were not trained for.
• 1:28:14
  And I think that's something which is typical and this is
• 1:28:17
  something that you don't see that in in so many cultures.
• 1:28:20
  Did have you had that feeling as well that you need to have this
• 1:28:22
  kind of a street smart as well in in doing stuff in Romania?
• 1:28:27
  For sure. I mean, I think it's not in in
• 1:28:30
  most places. It's not what you know, it's who
• 1:28:32
  you know. You know what I mean?
• 1:28:35
  And if you can live in Brooklyn, NY, you can live anywhere in the
• 1:28:38
  world. If you're going to make him
• 1:28:40
  dead, you can make it everywhere, like as Jay-Z was
• 1:28:42
  saying. Just a little like it's a step,
• 1:28:45
  it's a notch down, notch up. You know, I mean that's the
• 1:28:49
  preparedness I think like that we've garnered along the way
• 1:28:53
  along my life's together that like, but you're right too.
• 1:28:57
  There is an industriousness. There is a sort of like I.
• 1:29:00
  Mean communism will do that to you.
• 1:29:01
  As we said, like. You know, and I respect it, man.
• 1:29:05
  There's nothing like that's the, that's the other thing too, that
• 1:29:09
  like really makes me proud being like Romanian American, like
• 1:29:15
  reconnecting with my roots. Is that like, I have no problem,
• 1:29:22
  like telling somebody else that they're wrong about what their
• 1:29:27
  preconceived notions are about Romania or the people that are
• 1:29:32
  that live here. You know, I, I respect if you're
• 1:29:35
  a Romanian that left at a certain time in Romania's
• 1:29:38
  history and you want to live in the United States and, and never
• 1:29:43
  come back. And that's where you want to be
• 1:29:44
  and that's who you are. Fine, but don't like be trashing
• 1:29:49
  the people that live here that work every day that try to make
• 1:29:53
  things the, the needle of progress only goes so fast.
• 1:29:56
  Like I say, you can either look at Romania as a region that it
• 1:30:02
  has a 1000 year history, or it's 35 years old.
• 1:30:07
  You pick, you know, and I think if you go with the latter, you,
• 1:30:11
  you, there's a little bit more understanding, there's a little
• 1:30:14
  bit more acceptance, there's more grace in the fact that
• 1:30:18
  like, you're not going to get everything right.
• 1:30:20
  You've been a functioning democracy for 35 years.
• 1:30:22
  This takes time. Like, England's been around for
• 1:30:26
  1000 years. America's been around for 250
• 1:30:30
  years. Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:30:33
  You know what I mean? And and we didn't move here
• 1:30:35
  being like, oh, the grass is greener, this is a more perfect
• 1:30:38
  place, blah blah, blah blah. We knew it was going to be
• 1:30:41
  different. But you cannot knock the fact
• 1:30:45
  that there are some people and even in my own family that bust
• 1:30:49
  their ass to put food on the table the same way that
• 1:30:53
  Americans try to do that day in and day out.
• 1:30:55
  You know that there should be a common respect there.
• 1:30:58
  I, I think one thing I'll just close with on this soapbox is
• 1:31:03
  that I've heard from other Western Europeans, you know, the
• 1:31:08
  further W you go, you know, there's a, there's a, there's a
• 1:31:12
  totem pole and there's a common miss or common belief that
• 1:31:17
  Romania's at the bottom of that totem pole.
• 1:31:19
  Like the further westernized you are, right, you come from France
• 1:31:25
  or, you know, Germany or England or whatever, Spain.
• 1:31:28
  And it's like, Oh yeah, I've got a couple Romanians in the back.
• 1:31:30
  Like watch out. It's like, no, man, like that's
• 1:31:34
  not the case, you know, because of what we've experienced and
• 1:31:37
  what we've learned is that there's some of the kindest,
• 1:31:40
  most hard working, most sincere, almost to a fault.
• 1:31:44
  Like, I appreciate the humor so. Direct.
• 1:31:47
  So direct and that's refreshing to me.
• 1:31:52
  That's exciting. I love it, but I think we love
• 1:31:54
  it because we're like mostly East Coast people, yeah.
• 1:31:57
  I mean, like I said, because. Not every American is like that
• 1:32:00
  either. This.
• 1:32:01
  Is a good cake wall, yeah, You know, yeah.
• 1:32:05
  I can tell you that in in Germany the rumour has it that
• 1:32:09
  the Polish guys are stealing of the Romanian, so I'm lucky.
• 1:32:14
  That's fine, they can take that one.
• 1:32:18
  Guys, you're you're amazing persons.
• 1:32:21
  I'm extremely happy and thankful that I got to meet you, that
• 1:32:25
  this talk was so so so comfy for me at least.
• 1:32:28
  So so nice. It went so smooth.
• 1:32:32
  Before we wrap it up, I have some some small rapidfire
• 1:32:36
  questions and at the end I would like to tell you what you're up
• 1:32:39
  to in the upcoming period. But so favoured Romanian snack.
• 1:32:49
  Snack. Snack.
• 1:32:52
  And here I'm talking about some winter Pufols, Yeah.
• 1:32:54
  Yeah, yeah. Gusto Poufolat.
• 1:32:58
  Gusto. Gusto not *.
• 1:33:02
  Poster, absolutely. Posto for sure.
• 1:33:05
  What else do I like? Croco Steaks.
• 1:33:07
  Yeah, but that's, I don't know, I've said that's actually
• 1:33:09
  Romanian. I mean, I like, are they coped?
• 1:33:14
  I just eat that out of the jar. I.
• 1:33:16
  Am on an are they coped cake lately?
• 1:33:18
  Actually I. Don't know if that's a snack but
• 1:33:20
  I just eat that salami. Are they coped rules rules?
• 1:33:26
  Are they coped rules that I want to say that?
• 1:33:29
  Yeah, yeah, Salata de vinete, like hands down.
• 1:33:33
  That's so interesting, and I have to ask you guys, do you
• 1:33:35
  know something similar to salata de vinete from the American
• 1:33:39
  culture? No.
• 1:33:41
  The only thing that I can care can compare it to is Baba
• 1:33:44
  Ghanoush Turkish. But that's Turkish as well, and
• 1:33:48
  that's most where our salata de vinete comes from as well.
• 1:33:51
  Yeah, yeah. But I don't think they're.
• 1:33:53
  They were not a big, we're not a big eggplant eating culture.
• 1:33:58
  Like my grandmother was Italian. And so they eat eggplant, you
• 1:34:03
  know, And it was is usually like fried eggplant.
• 1:34:06
  Yeah. But I would say like American
• 1:34:08
  cuisine overall, eggplant is not the biggest.
• 1:34:12
  No, I mean, you don't see it like you see it here where you
• 1:34:14
  could see it on the side of the road.
• 1:34:15
  Yeah. I have to say that also the
• 1:34:17
  produce area in the US is slightly smaller as.
• 1:34:20
  In oh, it doesn't. No taste, no taste.
• 1:34:24
  And also that, yeah. Garden, Tomato and Romania.
• 1:34:27
  I was I was shocked during my first visit where I paid I think
• 1:34:31
  7 bucks for a 2 point no for a pound of mandarins.
• 1:34:37
  Yeah, I believe that. I believe that for sure, yeah.
• 1:34:41
  Favorite local phrase? Styling.
• 1:34:49
  Oh, I've been. I've been a little on my chest
• 1:34:51
  of fuck, just a fuck lately. What's the other one that they
• 1:34:55
  tell children that? Yeah.
• 1:35:03
  Oh wait, you know, I mean like, I'm not going to do it here, but
• 1:35:05
  like the curse words in Romanian are.
• 1:35:07
  I still haven't even begun. It's poetry.
• 1:35:11
  It's poetry, and I can't even begin to try to.
• 1:35:15
  It's so explaining, yeah, and so crazy and actually, but the
• 1:35:23
  Eastern cultures are all like this, so it's not.
• 1:35:26
  Only with your mother and your dad relatives.
• 1:35:29
  I don't understand this, this, this passion that we have with.
• 1:35:33
  That relatives I don't it's like something your mother in the
• 1:35:37
  grave and then there's like an animal involved and a candle.
• 1:35:42
  Exactly what's your favorite chill activity in Romania?
• 1:35:50
  Fashion Gratar. You do you do love.
• 1:35:55
  Fashion Gratar Co Familia man True Ingradino.
• 1:36:01
  True. I don't think there's anything
• 1:36:03
  better, man, than like in a garden making a grill.
• 1:36:08
  Meat. Meat chava we.
• 1:36:14
  Yeah. With a with like a solata rocia
• 1:36:16
  she Casa vets she. Yeah, have a coffee, have your
• 1:36:20
  family. It's just like taking a walk
• 1:36:22
  through, like an Old Town, you know, like through a Piazza,
• 1:36:26
  like very chill. In Sibiu.
• 1:36:28
  We like the Astra Museum. Yeah, it's like very nice, very
• 1:36:32
  calm, you know, but just like the connectedness.
• 1:36:36
  For me it's. With nature, how much it's.
• 1:36:37
  Like for her, it's like, let's take a walk.
• 1:36:40
  I want to be outside, Yeah. I want to take.
• 1:36:44
  A walk. Is also nice.
• 1:36:48
  It's very nice. What's your favorite place that
• 1:36:51
  you have visited in Romania and you have to give me one?
• 1:36:59
  1. 1. All right, we'll say 123 and see
• 1:37:05
  if we say the same place I. Don't know, OK.
• 1:37:10
  Are you going to say like a place or are you going to say
• 1:37:12
  like a? Region.
• 1:37:13
  I'm going to say an extremely specific place.
• 1:37:15
  OK, fine. All right, one, two and three.
• 1:37:18
  Paul Paso Bacho 3I. Was going to say that too.
• 1:37:22
  In Bukovina, in Kampalu, Mondovanesque, the next time she
• 1:37:25
  comes around me. It's a restaurant that has the
• 1:37:29
  greatest papanach I've ever had in my life.
• 1:37:32
  It's amazing. But Bukovina I like.
• 1:37:34
  I really like General. I'm sorry, master expert
• 1:37:38
  Papanach eater here. No, I don't know.
• 1:37:42
  I don't think so. So.
• 1:37:44
  Have. You been no.
• 1:37:45
  Have you been? No, But I.
• 1:37:47
  You have to know. You have the benefit of the
• 1:37:50
  doubt until I get there, OK. But I'll take that.
• 1:37:54
  But pal, I will take it. But papanash comes from the idea
• 1:38:00
  of papanash comes from the old German, no Hungarian Austrian
• 1:38:05
  Empire, right? That means it's close to the
• 1:38:10
  it's close to Hungary from a recipe point of view and from
• 1:38:13
  how they because Hungary has the sweetness in the food most in
• 1:38:17
  the food. They for example, they make the
• 1:38:20
  the salate Castrovitz, for example, they make it with
• 1:38:24
  sugar, but with a lot of sugar, like it's extremely sweet.
• 1:38:28
  It's it's but it's completely different.
• 1:38:30
  So and I because why I'm telling you this, I've just been not
• 1:38:33
  been in July. I've been in Romania and I was
• 1:38:35
  to the old place where I used to eat Papanachi as I was a kid and
• 1:38:39
  it's a it's a Popas like it's a it's a restaurant on the side of
• 1:38:43
  the European road and it's there since I since always it's called
• 1:38:50
  Dahlia, like the name of the owner.
• 1:38:52
  I will send you the location. Don't.
• 1:38:54
  Worry I. Will.
• 1:38:54
  Send you is it, is it like near? Is it near Timisoara?
• 1:38:58
  Is it no. It's between Kluge and Huidin,
• 1:39:01
  so I don't know if you know Kluge even.
• 1:39:02
  There not that long ago like in the area.
• 1:39:05
  Yeah, in the opposite. Exactly, exactly.
• 1:39:08
  It's on the way to opposite, Absolutely.
• 1:39:10
  So it's from Kluge to Huidin. It's closer to Huidin than the
• 1:39:14
  Kluge. You just stop there and you take
• 1:39:16
  a big port of Papanos. Oh my God.
• 1:39:19
  You don't order food, food because you're not able to eat.
• 1:39:23
  You'll not be able to eat the Papanas at the end, OK?
• 1:39:26
  We'll report back. We'll please.
• 1:39:27
  Yeah. It's important.
• 1:39:28
  OK? I'm sorry.
• 1:39:29
  I got that. I took that person.
• 1:39:32
  OK. Were you mad at ease pursuit of.
• 1:39:35
  Knowledge. I think we could talk about food
• 1:39:37
  for about hours. Probably.
• 1:39:42
  What was the last TV show that you binge watched?
• 1:39:46
  Binge watched yes Love is blind OK Love is blind trash trash TV.
• 1:39:56
  Picky blinders. Well, that's what you've been
• 1:39:58
  watching. Yeah, picky blinders.
• 1:40:00
  Yes, picky blinders. Cool.
• 1:40:01
  My wife was a is a big fan of picky blinders, but I was not
• 1:40:05
  that big in picky. But thank you guys.
• 1:40:12
  I usually have a nice text prepared for the finish, but I
• 1:40:16
  will not read it now because I, I, I have to speak from my, from
• 1:40:20
  my heart. I have to say that I'm, I'm
• 1:40:23
  deeply impressed by your story because I, you come from a
• 1:40:27
  culture that we all from Romania dream of living in.
• 1:40:32
  And you went away because you find something better in Romania
• 1:40:35
  to do. And you actually did that.
• 1:40:37
  I see that in you. Like I said, how in how you talk
• 1:40:40
  about Romania and that makes me happy.
• 1:40:43
  I'm, I'm, there is a small Romanian guy in me which is
• 1:40:46
  really happy and proud now good. I'm, I'm, I was, I'm fat.
• 1:40:51
  I'm still fat. So I have a lot of small guys
• 1:40:53
  inside me from different cult places that I've visited.
• 1:40:58
  And there is a small Romanian guy in me happy.
• 1:41:01
  And I want to thank you for being so open to do this with a,
• 1:41:04
  with a small podcast on the Internet, which really loves to
• 1:41:08
  talk with, with people. And I want to ask you what
• 1:41:12
  you're, what you're up to in the next period?
• 1:41:13
  What are your upcoming projects? What you're what is something
• 1:41:16
  interesting that you're you're doing the next time?
• 1:41:21
  Yes, I'm trying to look. Too late, but OK, you're.
• 1:41:27
  Good. We're we're going to be going
• 1:41:30
  back into the recording studio to work on our second album.
• 1:41:33
  Oh nice. Yeah, that'll probably be out in
• 1:41:37
  in the spring. We are anxiously awaiting Sam's
• 1:41:42
  mom's arrival for Christmas. It's going to be good.
• 1:41:47
  And we, we hope to, we hope to have a big hope for 2026 is to
• 1:41:54
  have a lot more gigs on the calendar for, for music, for
• 1:41:59
  place to play. You know, perhaps we'll buy a
• 1:42:03
  house next year. We'll see.
• 1:42:05
  We've. Got, you know, those kind of big
• 1:42:07
  life things coming up. I don't know anything else.
• 1:42:11
  Yeah, we're where we are going to be filming a little something
• 1:42:14
  that's going to come out next year, which we're very excited
• 1:42:16
  about, which we can't really talk about, but we are super
• 1:42:18
  pumped about that. No, but yeah, I'm just, I'm, I'm
• 1:42:22
  teaching and we're enjoying that and I'm excited to get back into
• 1:42:27
  the studio, though I think, I think sophomore albums going to
• 1:42:29
  be. Sophomore albums going.
• 1:42:31
  To be real solid. Yeah, so.
• 1:42:33
  I will link all your social medias in the show notes caption
• 1:42:36
  on YouTube and and and Spotify. I thank you guys.
• 1:42:43
  Kumari Drau, thank you Moto min din.
• 1:42:45
  So flat. Moto Mesk, thanks a lot and
• 1:42:49
  thank you for your time and I hope we do this in person one
• 1:42:51
  day. Yes, in the next year.
• 1:42:54
  Yes, please. Please.
• 1:42:56
  I'll let you know when I'm there and maybe we get to set up
• 1:42:59
  something. Thank you, guys.
• 1:43:01
  See you next time. It's going to be your next time,
• 1:43:04
  yes. Take care.