One of my favorite bands came with his favorite bands to play a concert out in the woods in Codlea, judet Brasov. They were celebrating the release of the new album. As always, the concert was high energy and there was a lot of jumping. I love that it was way out in the woods and even though there was a big stage set up, it still felt intimate. I’m glad they came and shared their new music with us. The sound of the new album is much darker than the previous one, in my opinion. It will grow on me, I’m sure of it.

Lots of Romanian pride at the concert! The whole point of this band is to connect your Romanian culture and heritage to your modern life – so they encourage flags. There were some beautiful flags there.

The age group of this concert was skewed very young. I’m glad to see the youth getting into a band like Subcarpati and reclaiming their heritage. It’s encouraging and I wish our American youth would do the same.

I’m going to get on my soapbox (of sadness) now, so if you want to skip the next few paragraphs, feel free. All of the next section is strictly through an American lens and my experience only.

I saw a lot of kids there getting drunk. This is something I’m so not used to – here in Romania the legal drinking age is 18, but what the really means is that as long as you look like a teenager you can buy alcohol.

Or maybe not, one time I saw a girl who couldn’t have been more than seven carrying a 2 liter of Ciuc beer down the road. I’m assuming it was for mom and dad, but you never know. I saw a group of 15-16 years olds arguing with a shop lady about buying alcohol. She wanted to see ID, but obviously they didn’t have it. In the end, she sold the alcohol to them anyway.

It’s still kind of disconcerting to me to see 14 and 15 year olds stumbling around wasted. I want them to have their fun, but at the same time I want to shake them and tell them to stop poisoning their livers at such a young age. Sheesh. You literally have your whole life to get cirrhosis. What’s the rush? Don’t get me started on the smoking. Almost all of the teens here are smoking. ~weep~

This country is pretty relaxed about things like alcohol and cigarettes (with the exception of the zero tolerance BAC % for driving). The government and the law doesn’t care what you do really, as long as you’re not hurting anyone or yourself. Which is good, but that leaves the responsibility on the parents of the kids…and most of them don’t seem to care too much either