Mar 2nd, 2010
by Craig Turp.
From the government that brought you a compulsory profit tax on losses, and a tax on fast food comes another wonderful initiative designed to see thousands more Romanian companies close: all Romanian companies (no matter their size) must hire not one, but two full time accountants.
Yes, you read that correctly.
More than 40 MPs, including big names in president Traian Basescu’s PD-L (such as Sulfina Barbu and Basescu’s favourite money-man, Silviu Prigoana) have put forward the idea as a way to solve the problem of Romania’s grey and black economies. The MPs claim that the proliferation of part-time and out-sourced accountancy means that too many unqualified accountants are signing off on documents, robbing the taxpayer of billions.
That might well be so; we haven’t a clue.
But forcing every company in the land to hire at least two accountants? That’s nonsense. For a start, where is Romania going to get one and a half million accountants from?
It is to be hoped that this law will never be passed: there must be enough MPs with enough common sense to make sure it never gets passed.
Or is that hoping for too much?
Posted in: Bucharest, Business, Romania, Romanian Politics.
Tagged: Business in Romania · Romanian Accountants · Romanian Fast Food Tax · Starting a Business in Romania · Traian Basescu
Mar 1st, 2010
by Craig Turp.
Ladies: if you are wondering why your foreign boss/boyfriend handed you over a Martisor today, it’s because we gave him a heads up in the current issue of Bucharest In Your Pocket:
You can also thank us for the flowers you will get next Monday...
Posted in: Bucharest, Romania.
Tagged: International Womens Day · Martisor
Feb 28th, 2010
by Craig Turp.
Art, apparently
It all looks like a load of rubbish to us, but then
we never understood contemporary art.
Sticking bits of paper on to other bits of paper hardly requires any talent. (So it is probably no wonder that the ‘no talent required’ part of the art world has gone loopy over this fellow).
Still, good luck to him. Sounds as though he needed a break.
The full story is in Saturday’s Guardian, here.
Posted in: Media, Romania.
Tagged: Ion Barladeanu · Romanian Art · Romanian Contemporary Art
Feb 25th, 2010
by Craig Turp.
(OR: Can you buy ashtrays in Bucharest?)
A Bucharest ashtray, yesterday. Note how no cigarette butts are in it: they are all on the city's streets.
We live on the ground floor of a small Bucharest block. It has four floors in all, and while it’s not in the most salubrious or sought-after parts of the city, we’re happy here.
The neighbours are by and large fine. No noise (you can hear a pin drop in the evenings), and absolutely no manelisti, which is quite remarkable given president Traian Basescu’s statement on Monday that 99 per cent of the Romanian population likes listening to manele. (Basescu himself loves manele: and the manelisti love him: they came up with a manea for him during last year’s election campaign). Our block must be part of that one per cent of Romanians who do not like manele.
In fact, all is fine and dandy, with one exception, or but. Or, butts: cigarette butts.
If you walk in front of any block in Bucharest you will see a familiar sight: cigarette butts. Thousands of them. They litter the areas in front of blocks for the simple reason that far too many of the capital’s smokers eschew ashtrays, instead throwing their cigarettes (and their litter in general) out of their windows onto the street below.
The front of our block right now, however, is as clean as a whistle.
Why?
Because the same fellow who throws his cigarette butts out of the window comes and picks them all up again once a week. What you might call a nesimtit de bun simt.
We have tried pointing out that he could cut out the middle man as it were and simply stub his cigarettes out in an ashtray, but such advanced, joined-up thinking appears to be beyond him.
Posted in: Bucharest, Romania, Romanian Politics.
Tagged: Bucharest · Civic Pride · Life in Bucharest's Blocks · Litter · Smoking
Feb 24th, 2010
by Craig Turp.
Dear Bucharest Life
I read the other day that the Minister of Tourism, Elena Udrea, is to invest €850,000 of her ministry’s money on new road signs to help tourists find Romania’s major tourist hotspots.
As I am sure that the Romanian seaside will be one of those tourist hotspots to benefit from the improvement in signage, I wondered if you might have a photo on file that could help us picture what kind of delights the Romanian seaside might be offering; to keep us tied over – as it were – until the new signs are in place to help us get there.
Regards
Ron Ionescu
Iasi
Posted in: Romania, Travel.
Tagged: Beaches in Romania · Elena Udrea · Romanian Coast
