I swear I wanted to write a review of my entire year but what can be written that could sum it all up?

I had fun, I made fun, I smiled and made people smile. I continued my quest for the unseen glory and lived my life to the fullest the entire year which could actually make this the first year I did that.

I traveled a lot. And I mean, a lot, at least for my own tiny standards: I’ve been in shitloads of countries and unfortunately I did not get the chance to get more out of them.

What stresses me a lot is this humongous question: “When the hell did 2009 pass?!” Looking back to these 364 days, memories cross my mind from all directions and with no purpose what so ever! I swear, I am going to try to calm down, settle on a point of view and then I’ll have another attempt of a late review of 2009…

Meanwhile, Bon Jovi’s lyrics are stuck in my head and they don’t have any plans to leave: “I don’t know where I’m going, only God knows where I’ve been” and yes, this is a valid argument for all the aspects of my life: geographical, professional, personal and whatever other aspect there might be.

See you guys in 2010. I don’t know about you but if things are going on the same upward stream, this might just be the year I will do something amazing!

I said farewell to Aarhus and I embarked on a journey to Romania. It’s already full of unexpected events but hope none of them will be decisive for the outcome: me getting safe to Bucharest this evening.

On the ferry while writing this. Just left Aarhus and it’s snowing as hell. Come to think about it, I think it’s a lot better in hell in regards to the snow. Unlike last thursday when we had the first snow in Denmark this year(winter), the busses travelled fine and the only delay I have had so far are 5 minutes with the bus from skjoldhoj to downtown and 10 minutes late on getting on the ferry, because of the huge queue of cars which are going to Sjaelland.

As I said in the previous post, I am afraid. Not sure though what I am afraid of anymore but my heart is pumping as it never has. It might be because of all the chocolate I ate and all the coffee I drank but then again, I do that each day so it’s not a good enough reason. I was saying the ferry is packed. Fuckin’ hell, it is! I barely found a seat to sit on and write this complete non-sense! I keep on wondering how Romania will be like. Yes, it will be cold and dusty at the same time but that is not what I mean. What will I do there? Who am I going to go out with? Will I make new friends/accquaintances or will I start going out again with the people that used to be my friends? God knows…

I do know one thing though: no matter what happens there, I do have a lot of things and people to think about in Aarhus. I can safely say that Aarhus is my home at the moment and I am seriously considering finishing my bachelor degree in web development here. Screw Copenhagen, Edinburgh and any other towns, I just feel like Aarhus is the place for me to be in for the next couple of months/years.

Never thought I would say what I’ve just said. Nevertheless, life takes you to some situations and feelings that you were never accustomed to. It’s intriguing how things change in a matter of years, months or even days!

So, back to the journey! It never felt so nice to listen to Mourning Beloveth. Staying on the ferry with the headphones on my head while looking at the misty sea and the snow that hits the window is just marvelous. I’m getting more and more calm by every minute that passes and this is just wonderful. Funny enough, I just remembered that my luggage changed its lock code by mistake! It went from 0-0-0 (the classical combination) to a very odd 0-1-0. I found that by mistake but at least I did! Otherwise, you might see me opening my luggage with a screwdriver!

Ah.. Romania. Except my dear ones back there, there are a couple of things that I really really miss like the Timi?oreana beer, King’s Club, Fire Club, Revenge Club and whole lot of other shit. Ok, I will stop with the writing here for the moment. Last thing I want to say is that I have two friends who had the same route as I do (only they did not have to go to Copenhagen since they live there) and they missed the connecting flight from Prague to Bucharest. Czech Airlines assured their accommodation for that night and they got home the next day. I can’t say I want that to happen but seing Prague during winter might be awesome…

Oh, did I mention I’m going to Wien for my birthday? Hypocrisy concert!!

Back on the bus now. Well, I’ve been back on the bus for the past 50 minutes or so but I’ve watched a tad of “The Descent” and played some FIFA 10. It’s so strange to listen to Negura Bunget while seing this Danish snow on the window of the bus. Well, I met another Romanian who is flying to Bucharest but he will be flying with Malev and leave/arrive one hour after me. Meh, at least I will not be staying by myself in the airport.

Isn’t it funny how I always get in the mood of writing on the blog whenever I don’t have any internet access? Yeah, thought so…

I’ll be leaving from Skjoldhoj kollegiet in around 30 minutes and I just realized that I am scared. It wouldn’t be hard to realize that considering I didn’t get much sleep last night because of a huge heart beat but nobody said I’m too smart, eh?

It’s the first time I feel so afraid of flying. It’s not because of the snow, the take off or the landing. It’s more about the destination and the shock that flying brings into ones heart and mind. One minute you’re in one shithole, next thing you know, you’re in another one, waiting for the flight to your next shithole.

I don’t know how home is going to be like but I do hope it will be alright. I took all the books I have (either in .pdf or in .paper formats) and in case I am left out of things to do, I might as well start studying for the exams in January, right? Meh, I have to see how things are like though.

I had to pack more stuff than needed just to have the luggage more full. That’s embarrassing but I have no clue how that happened. I mean, did I lose some clothes since August? Did I drop anything anywhere and forgot to pick it up? Fockin’ hell, this is odd.

So, going back to the flying part, here are some tips when you book plane tickets (just personal experience):

• they are always cheaper on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
• before buying a plane ticket, be sure to check more than one agency to see if there is any other cheaper combination. Ignore expedia, they are a piece of shit.
• think large so even think about buying both sides of the flight by yourself. Say you want to go from Aarhus to Bucharest, like me, there are multiple options: 1) go to copenhagen and then travel with scandinavian airlines, austrian airlines, malev or czech airlines (even finnair had routes this summer), 2) go to billund, fly to milano with ryanair and then to bucharest with wizzair, 3) fly from aarhus to london (ryanair) then from london to bucharest (blueair), 4) fly from aarhus to london (ryanair), london to milano (ryanair), milano to bucharest (wizzair). Any combination is possible but you have to take care when buying the tickets.

This would be about it. Hope I’ll have a pleasant journey and speak soon, guys. If I get the chance, I might post something on my twitter account. All the best!

Finally, our 3rd semester final project has been finished, printed, uploaded and handed in. There were good times while working upon it and there were bad times but, as usual, we managed to pull it through. The examination will be on the 13th of January so that gives us/me plenty of time to focus on other aspects of life such as writing on this blog. The URL can be seen at http://herrera.victorelu.com and this is everything I write and will write about this project.

Meanwhile, stuff has changed. I still feel a little bit like how I felt before my last visit to Romania in July this year (article about that here) but time surely changes things. To be honest, the only reasons I want to go back to Bucharest are my family and my friend. Yeah, you read it right, unfortunately it seems that I only have one friend left back home whom I can trust and whom I care about and I do that although he’s a bad ass ugly bastard. Other than that, I have all the reasons in the world to want to stay in Aarhus. I even got a double, 140cm wide double bed now so…

Comparing to last year, August – December 2009 was a lot better. I went out, I made friends, socialized, worked, programmed, made friends and learned how to live life at its fullest. I’ve learned to appreciate the simplest things in live and see good where there’s bad. This was about to cost me during the work upon the last project but since I promised to keep my mouth shut in regards to it, I will keep my word.

I’m 4 days away from being home now and I’m still wondering what to do till then. I am also wondering what to do in Romania but I can safely assume that my schedule is going to be easy to fill. Come to think about it, the first thing on my agenda starting now is a drinking session on my return to Aarhus on the 7th of January lol.

Last but not least, I would like to say that I hope you all passed your projects, exams and so on with high grades (or handed them in on time) and have a happy week until the Merry Christmas that is about to come! Oh, and if we haven’t spoken about this already or haven’t settled for anything and you want to meet for a mulled wine/beer/coffee/pool game, just drop me a line somewhere because maybe, just maybe, we can go out. Victor.. Out!

Unfortunately, I find myself in the impossibility of figuring out how the teenagers now-a-days think like around the world, either in Romania or in Denmark. I am mostly referring to the way they interact, socialize and create impressions about another one of their age.

I remember when I was in the 6th grade and one of my classmates had a black and white (actually, black and orange) screened Alcatel 301. We were all playing on it, creating stupid ringtones on its software. And yes, some of us did consider him cool for having a mobile phone! Then I got to high school and everyone had a mobile phone. Come to think about it, when I got in high school, nobody really gave a crap about which mobile phone you had but then again, the iphone was not launched at that point.

Now I got to college and mobile phones are the least of anyone’s worries. Except receiving messages from extremely beautiful girls, my mobile phone is only used as an alarm for waking up in the mornings and evenings. However, the only gadget we can actually compare in class are the laptops and nobody seems to give a crap about them anyway! I mean, I do have this feeling that people owning a Toshiba are noobs but I am trying to change my mind…

I’ll just go back to the teenagers now. I honestly have no idea how they think like and how it is like to be a teenager. 5, 6 or 7 years ago we didn’t have any social media network on our hands (well, maybe MySpace but nobody really used it in Romania). When you liked someone, you were struggling to find out whether or not they have a boyfriend or girlfriend. You were dying to see them the next day at school since you couldn’t see any photos of them on hi5 and it also makes me sad to imagine how teens ask for the messenger id of the people they like.

Therefore, I would like to ask for anyone who has some info about this: how is it like to be a teenager, today? How often do you use the internet to contact your “friends” and how often do you actually interact through some old fashion methods?

So, there I was on Thursday morning at school when one of my classmates invited me to go with him on a trip to Skagen, Denmark’s most Nordic point. We left from Aarhus sometime around 8:30 in the morning and we only had 2 stops till Skagen. They are marked with the round dots on this map but their position is somehow approximate. Obviously, the green dots are the markers of the starting point and the arrival point..

The road to Skagen was pretty fun since our talks were interesting, to say the least. Yeah, we gossiped, drank coffee, made fun of different countries but we deserved it!

Our first stop was at a gas station close to Aalborg where we bought that bloody expensive coffee and we tried to sit down in the gas station but we were not allowed to sit because we hadn’t bought the coffees from that exact same shop. Needless to say that out of 30 tables, only one was occupied… Yeah, it did feel like in Romania. After passing by Frederiskhavn and getting off the E45 highway, we stopped to check out some sand dunes and to see one of the best places for camping during the summer, on the beach, in Denmark.

And then, we got to Skagen. Honestly, I never thought the place could be so beautiful and cold at the same time. The wind was blowing like never before. I actually felt sorry for my hair since it hadn’t been washed for 3 days and we couldn’t take any perfect shots hehe Basically, Skagen is the place where two seas meet together and waves from both seas hit eachother. Well, that’s what the story says since we were not able to get all the way there because of the following wonder of the nature that keeps Romanians and Macedonians away from Denmark’s extreme Nordic point:

We did manage to take some pictures though and they can be seen below:

And a very short video with some stop-motion pics that my friend took with his brand new camera, a Canon 500D. Hope you enjoyed seeing these pics!

Serban sent me the following problem and I have no idea what-so-ever about how to resolve it. Any input would be nice, honestly.

Out of 214 computers with viruses, each of which is infected with
at least one of Magistr, Badtrans and Hybrid, 79 have Magistr,
111 Badtrans, and 82 Hybrid. 16 have Magistr and Badtrans,
29 Badtrans and Hybrid, and 22 have Magistr and Hybrid.
(i) How many have all three viruses?
(ii) How many have exactly two?
(iii) How many have just one of these viruses?

I guess I am willing to give a prize for any correct solving.