Romanians are Smart

On the 1st of December, Romania celebrates its national day. With this occasion, ROM, an old rum-chocolate brand, decided to launch the campaign Romanians are Smart. The idea behind it is that if you type in the Google search barRomanians are, the suggestions that pop up are far from putting us in a good light. Therefore the wish is to change Romania’s image by searching the phrase Romanians are smart (in English as well as other well known languages) so that hopefully, in the future, it will be among Google’s search suggestions.

• Constantin Brâncuşi (19.02.1876 – 16.03.1957) was a Romanian-born sculptor who made his career in France. As a child he displayed an aptitude for carving wooden farm tools. Formal studies took him first to Bucharest, then to Munich, then to the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. His abstract style emphasizes clean geometrical lines that balance forms inherent in his materials with the symbolic allusions of representational art. Considered the pioneer of modernism Brâncuşi is called the Patriarch of Modern Sculpture.
• Ştefan Odobleja (13.10.1902 – 4.09.1978) was a Romanian scientist, one of the precursors of cybernetics. His major work, Psychologie consonantiste, first published in 1938 and 1939, in Paris, had established many of the major themes of cybernetics regarding cybernetics and systems thinking ten years before the work of Norbert Wiener was published in 1948.
• Emil Palade (19.11.1912 – 7.10.2008) was a Romanian cell biologist. Described as the most influential cell biologist ever he was awarded in 1974 the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine, together with Albert Claude and Christian de Duve. The prize was granted for his innovations in electron microscopy and cell fractionation which together laid the foundations of modern molecular cell biology, the most notable discovery being the ribosomes of the endoplasmic reticulum – which he first described in 1955.
• Maria Tănase (25.09.1913 – 22.06.1963) proved to be a versatile talent, irresistibly drawn towards art. She distinguished herself as a theater and film actress, as an operetta singer, a music hall star but mainly as an interpreter of folk songs. She passed away carried off by an unforgiving illness, lung cancer. In my opinion, she could very well be compared to her French counterpart, Edith Piaf.
• Amza Pellea (7.05.1931 – 12.12.1983) was one of the most important Romanian actors, being remarked both for his theatre and his film acting. Pellea was the creator of a comical character that portrays an archetypal Oltenian peasant. However, he was also noted for his historical characters. He won in 1977 the award for the best male actor at the  Moscow International Film Festival.
• Eugen Pavel is a Romanian scientist and the inventor of the Hyper CD-ROM, a 3D optical data storage medium with a claimed initial capacity of 10 TB and with a theoretical capacity of 1 PB on a single disc. It is considered by some to be the next revolution in computer storage.
• Victor Velculescu is a Romanian/American doctor and scientist. He is Associate Professor of Oncology and Co-Director of Cancer Biology at the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center at The Johns Hopkins University. Velculescu and his team gained international recognition after identifying the genes that cause breast cancer and colon cancer. His research aims have been focused on identifying genes that underlie human cancer and using this information to develop novel approaches for diagnostic and therapeutic intervention. He also invented the SAGE methodology for detecting gene expression from multiple genes in a single experiment.
• Ciprian Manolescu (24.12.1978 – ) is a Romanian mathematician. He is presently an Associate Professor in the mathematics department at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is among the handful of recipients of the Clay Research Fellowship (2004–2008). He was the winner of the Morgan Prize in 2002. He has one of the best records ever in mathematical competitions: he holds the sole distinction of writing three perfect papers at the International Mathematical Olympiad. He placed three times in the top 5 on the William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition for college undergraduates.

And if I still haven’t convinced you, here’s a video that maybe will. I hope that next time you’re on Google you’ll give us a hand and tell the world that Romanians are smart!

Putna monastery

The Putna monastery (Romanian: Mănăstirea Putna) is a Romanian Orthodox monastery, one of the most important cultural, religious and artistic centers established in medieval Moldavia; as with many others, it was built and dedicated by Prince Stephen the Great. Putna was founded on the lands perambulated by the Putna (which has its source in the Obcina Mare mountains, Bukovina). Stephen the Great is famous for building and influencing the building of dozens of churches and monasteries all over Moldavia (allegedly, he founded a religious edifice after each important military victory). The Putna Monastery houses the tombs of Stephen —nowadays, a place of pilgrimage —, and several of his family members. The icon veils and tombstones are held as fine examples of Moldavian art in Stephen the Great’s time.

Right after Stephen the Great won the battle in which he conquered the Kilia citadel, he began work on the monastery as a means to give thanks to God, on July 10, 1466 - the church was to be dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The terrain on which the monastery is built is believed to have been previously occupied by a fortress. A chronicle of the time mentions that Stephen bought the Vicovu de Sus village in exchange for 200 zlots, and awarded the land and revenue to the treasury of the monastery.

Putna was completed in three years, but was consecrated only after four more years passed, given that the Moldavians engaged in other battles. On September 3, 1470, during a ceremony attended by Stephen and all his family, the monastery was consecrated, and subsequently became the most important religious site in the area.

The present church was practically rebuilt between 1653 and 1662 by Vasile Lupu and his successors. Although the building follows the ground plan of a typical 15th and 16th century Moldavian church, it has many architectural and decorative features that are characteristic of 17th century architecture.

For long, the site was believed to have been designed by a Greek architect named Theodor - the interpretation of the Kilia chronicles on which this was based has since been proven wrong.

In the 15th century, Euphima, a Serbian nun, daughter of Vojihna, together with her daughter Euprasijka embroidered an altar cloth for Putna Monastery in gold thread

Sapanta Merry Cemetery

The Merry Cemetery (Romanian: Cimitirul Vesel) is a cemetery in the village of Săpânţa, Maramureş county, Romania. It is famous for its colourful tombstones with naïve paintings describing, in an original and poetic manner, the persons that are buried there as well as scenes from their lives. The Merry Cemetery became an open-air museum and a national tourist attraction.