We wanted to expose how Romanians are the main nationality of male prostitutes in Rome… and we did not do it An article co-authored with Vlad Odobescu and published in The Black Sea A taxi driver told us where to find boys. His name was Mario. He wasn’t an average taxi […]
Category Archives: Comment
Opinion pieces with a satirical edge from 2012 onward
Today a cool March light is giving way to a humid afternoon, and I have just left the Anthony Frost English Bookshop in Bucharest, which has closed its doors. The reaction from the city’s passionate reading community has been shock and grief, as though a well-loved relative not seen for years has suddenly announced […]
A piece of invective published last year in the second issue of Jug magazine On the face of a ten-story 1980s block inspired by the architecture of Pyongyang, abseilers risk their lives to raise a giant poster of Marilyn Monroe sipping the metal lip of a Coke bottle, or Alicia Keys perfecting her skin with […]
A comment piece published in Scena9 During the negotiation process for Romania’s accession to the European Union in the early 2000s the question echoing through European capitals was: is Romania ready to join the EU? It was this word, repeated, again and again: ready. This was a subjective and emotive issue – there […]
A comment piece in Romanian on Contributors.ro A petty argument in the British conservative party between supporters and enemies of the European Union has forced the UK into a disaster. If the country leaves the 28-member bloc, financial ruin will spread across the continent, far right groups will seize control and the peacetime success of 70 […]
A comment piece on Bucharest’s northern district Baneasa, published in English and Romanian in Jug Before the financial crash of 2008, Bucharest’s northern zone of Baneasa wanted sex appeal. Real estate agents targeted citizens living with their parents in Communist high-rises with the dream of a home that could be secure, fashionable and seductive. Adding the […]
A comment piece published in Romanian on Contributors.ro In the Icoanei garden in Bucharest’s 19th century centre, there is a fountain which gushes out water and tumbles into a stream that winds to the other end of the park to meet a large pond. Children play here. They jump over the stream. Sometimes they kick […]