Tag Archives: Europe

Q is for Ten in Qatar

Roughly one out of ten residents of Qatar is a citizen. The rest of the population are temporary workers from Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas. For five years, I was one of them. This post is one in a series of short posts including the number 10 in the first sentence, a requirement ofContinue reading “Q is for Ten in Qatar”

T is for Transnistria

“Transnistria” (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0) by  Marco Fieber/Ostblog.org  Transnistria, a sliver of land at the eastern border of Moldova, right next to the Ukraine, wanted to be part of Russia, not Moldova, when the former Soviet Union broke apart in 1992. Refusing to assimilate into Moldova, Transnistria continued to use the Russian ruble even after Russia had issued newContinue reading “T is for Transnistria”

R is for Romania

“Romania-1727 – Peles Castle” (CC BY-SA 2.0) by  archer10 (Dennis) (70M Views)  I learned I had been selected for a Fulbright grant to teach English in Romania just weeks before I expected to leave Iran in July of 1977. And I was astonished that a friend was able to find a Teach-Yourself-Romanian book in Tehran so I could get aContinue reading “R is for Romania”

P is for Paris

“Paris” (CC BY 2.0) by  Moyan_Brenn  Who doesn’t love Paris? There’s just one thing wrong with it for me–I kept being sent back there when I really wanted to see some other places, too. My first trip to Paris was in December 1987 1977, during the New Year’s break at Alexandru Ioan Cuza University in Iași (pronounced “Yahsh”), Romania,Continue reading “P is for Paris”

M is for Moldova

“Kishinev morning” (CC BY-SA 2.0) by  Clay Gilliland  When the former Soviet Union broke apart, the small country of Moldova was one of many that emerged from its ruins. Many pundits expected it wouldn’t last, that it would be absorbed by its neighbor to the west, Romania, as part of a grand reconstruction of what had been theContinue reading “M is for Moldova”

H is for Hungary

“Szechenyi scene” (CC BY 2.0) by  karaian  Five days in Budapest, Hungary, in October 2000: that’s all the time I spent there. On the Thursday of that week, October 12, while I was attending a conference on travel issues in Budapest, the USS Cole was attacked in Aden Harbor on the southern coast of Yemen. What’s the connection?Continue reading “H is for Hungary”