Sighisoara, in Romania's Transylvania region, is a picturesque city with winding streets and spiky towers, centered around a medieval fortified city center on top of a hill. It is well set-up for tourism, with comfortable hotels and dining places that are reasonably priced and strategically located for sightseeing. But it gets full of tourists in the hot months, so come slightly off-season ... Read Full Article
Sighisoara, Romania: a Tour of the Towers
Sighisoara, in Romania's Transylvania region, has beautifully preserved medieval city walls, incorporating nine fascinating towers. Let's visit the towers in clockwise order, starting with the most famous. The clock tower is the citadel's main tower, and is intentionally located at what was considered a sacred compass point, the east. It's easy to see from a glance that its robust, chunky ... Read Full Article
Alba Iulia, Romania: Six Centuries of History in one Hilltop Fortress
Alba Iulia, in Romania’s Transylvania region, has a hilltop citadel where many historical eras come to life, dominated by two massive cathedrals with over 600 tumultuous years dividing them. But far from being stuck in the past, the city is a trailblazer in terms of renovating its assets and achieving recognition on the international stage. In 2012 the municipality was named a European ... Read Full Article
A Visit to Deva Castle in Romania
Deva, a city in Romania's Transylvania region, has an evocative hilltop fortress that pays testimony to many past conflicts - military and religious. Deva's extensive ruined castle perches atop a volcanic hill 370 meters high. That makes it easy to see from anywhere in town, especially with the large white letters that spell DEVA around the hill. Unusually for a Transylvanian city, the ... Read Full Article
Transylvania Incorporated: a Case Study in Globalization
Transylvania is a part of Romania that many tourists visit in search of unspoilt rural life, ancient traditions and centuries-old buildings. But if you explore it with a slightly different mindset, the region could serve as a case study in economic and cultural globalization. Keep your eyes peeled, and you’ll see pseudo-western T-shirts saying things like "Dream Princess," along ... Read Full Article
Prejmer, Romania: a Transylvanian Stronghold
Prejmer is a village in Romania’s Transylvania region that has the biggest and most spectacular example of a medieval fortified church in the country. Inhabitants of this part of Transylvania used to be so frequently plagued by marauding invaders that they built thick walls, lined with chambers, around their churches, and would live in these walls in times of danger. They would keep a ... Read Full Article
Targu Mures, Romania and its Gorgeous Culture Palace
Targu Mures, in Romania’s Transylvania region, is a quiet city that just happens to contain a glittering marvel of 20th century architecture - the Culture Palace. It also has a jumble of other attractions that reflect its legacy as a city of trade, law, scholarship, and cultural diversity. The city’s most famous building, known in Romanian as Palatul Culturii and in Hungarian as ... Read Full Article
Visit the Renaissance Castle of Fagaras, Romania
Fagaras, a small city near Brasov in Romania’s Transylvania region, boasts one of the finest Renaissance castles in the country. At least, that is how it looks now. But the castle in this mountainous, strategic border post has been here in some form or another ever since the 13th century - originally as a wooden fort. Successive rulers and regimes used the site for various purposes, ... Read Full Article
Tune in to Germany’s Business Culture
Doing business in Germany can be an unfamiliar experience for someone from an English-speaking country. And the differences can start right from a first meeting. Seniority within a company is important, so it’s good to be clear about someone’s job title and responsibilities. The distinction between the executive role of managers and the monitoring role of directors is quite clear-cut. The ... Read Full Article
Chisinau, Moldova: a Classic European Metropolis, Minus the Crowds
Exploring the downtown area of Chisinau, the capital of the Republic of Moldova, you may start wondering why other national capitals need to be so big. This city of less than 700,000 people has a center that offers the grace and grandiosity you’d expect of any European metropolis, but laid out on a compact, easily walkable grid. All the typical institutions - parliament, government buildings, ... Read Full Article