Roamin' The World: Europe And Beyond...

 Yes indeedy... the 50 minute extravaganza was one of the most spectacular I have EVER seen!! I cannot even begin to imagine the extensive--and most clever--engineering that went into designing the various spouts that could do what they did...not to mention, the ever-varying patterns of lights on the water... The city center's fountains were packed with people--it was a most lively, happy crowd-- of all ages. All of us waited in great anticipation for the show to begin... I arrived early, but there were already many gathered before me. (The show began at 9:30). Especially magical was the fact that a 2/3 moon hovered in the sky, over the nearby high rises, and from where I sat, was perfectly positioned over the main fountain.  The whole show was set to an eclectic variety of music--from classical to pop to heavy metal (my faves being George Enescu's "Romanian Rapsody", some Michael Jackson, and Queen). The various fountains--of which there were hundreds--"danced...

  The morning (Saturday, July 29th) started out with a mind-boggling tour of the famed Parliment Palace, touted to be the second largest building in the entire world! QUITE incredible. (Presumably, only the Pentagon in the U.S. is larger!)  The tour was only an hour long, and only covered a small fraction of the building. Our fabulous tour guide, Francis, told us that it would take about 18 hours to actually walk the 30 kilometers required to visit all 1,500 rooms of this monstrosity!!   The construction of the famous (or infamous, depending upon your perspective!) building began in 1984-- ironically, the same year George Orwell wrote the novel "1984". (I suspect that this book--a warning against totalitarianism rule--might have even been inspired by the Romanian communist regime at that time.)  According to our tour guide, the vast majority of the old city of Bucharest was decimated (more precisely, a full fifth of the entire city), including 19 Orthodox church...