I want to live in fire

I felt compelled to write this after someone asked me in reply to this post how the Apocalyptica concert on the 31st May in Bucharest turned out. Then Mihai’s review through his music reminded me I wanted to write about the concert. And here is the tale from A to Z, the way I experienced it and maybe the way it was meant to be.

On arriving at the Arenele Romane at 19.34, 4 minutes after the concert was supposed to start, I learned an important lesson: NEVER arrive at a concert on time. It’s the same as with parties: the sooner you get there, the less fun you have. The opening of the concert was done by two Romanian bands of uncertain descent; the first one was Bucium I think, and as far as I remember played a sort of Phoenix-copycat music. The second sounded like Nightwish reloaded, with a wannabe Tarja shouting in a high-and-false-soprano-voice into the microphones that were configured for the four cellos. I prayed them out…

The concert itself left nothing to be desired (but to live in the fire they played… :-)). The Roman Arenas were well filled up by the time the Finns showed up, all dressed in leather and carrying their world-famous cellos. The intro was given by “Path” of course, an earlier melody from their Metallica reinterpretations, the ones which originally made the four classic music students famous. For the most part of the concert they played tracks from their newest album, “Amplified: a Decade of Reinventing the Cello.” The interesting part (especially for those who have not listened to more than The Cult and Inquisition albums) was the drums. What surprised us that night was the way a live rock concert with bass replaced by cello and accompanied by drums could tear our senses apart and put them back together like Apocalyptica did. I breathed in the energy as I let myself carried away on metallic tunes on classical instruments – excellently played and amazingly rock.

I want to live in fire

with all the taste I desire

it's all good if you let me dive

with some sharks on the ground

you lose your routine

you lose your routine

cause I found my path

(Apocalyptica, Path 2)

You pulled my sleeves around my heart

A short note about courtesy – since everyone is already discussing the Reader’s Digest’s Global Courtesy Test. There is more to courtesy than just a nice carton PR smile and trying to seem nice when all other gestures say something else. The essence of courtesy is being at peace with the others and appreciating them for what they are: persons (this is to say I love my team ;))

PS: Come to Sibiu – my hometown - sometime; I think you’ll note the level of courtesy of the people there to be above the one in New York… ;-)

Because you're gorgeous
I'd do anything for you
Because you're gorgeous
I know you'll get me through
(Babybird, You're Gorgeous)

Transit

… and so I’m back after a “short” break, which lasted just about long enough as to think about the new topic focus of the blog (some people told me it was rather on the literary side of the matter and that perhaps I should consider wrapping things up – or start publishing in some freaks’ magazine :)).

In the mean time, some new developments took place at work, my team is approaching an important deadline, everyone is tired out and stressed, but the team mood is just as good as it gets and we are really enjoying the project and the constant challenges (about 2-3/day, and if you consider that each has implications in further parts of the project plan, which needs to be modified accordingly, you might grasp the fun of the situation).

Today I will write about a topic that is dear to me: transit. It all started with asking myself what people think about when commuting from one place to the other – be it on bus, car, or by climbing stairs. Most think about nothing probably, they either put one leg in front of the other and mechanically reach the top of stairs, or just look out of the vehicle window and sing themselves some little song while the landscape changes. Some might think about what awaits them when they reach destination, or about the current issues that bother them. But generally, this moving is just some time to waste Is this transit? Is this what we do when moving from one phase to another in our lives, too? Just mindlessly taking on the change and only wondering about it when it is too late… ?

There’s a famous quote saying “Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans. ” (John Lennon). I can’t help wondering that planning might not be the solution to achieve success… and be happy.

Sing woman, sing for the year
Sing for the love, sing for the tears
Sing woman, if it's just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good lord will take you away

(Aerosmith, Dream On)