[14x01] November 15th, 2009

[14x01] November 15th, 2009


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Please please please please please please please PLEASE can we stop using the word scripted!!!!!!

You make a very good point - it seems like it has been a disease ever since they took the whole Caravan camping fire a bit too far.
 
Really now, first time viewers and forum users from Romania should lay off the painkillers, roll up sleeves and start working on makin' our country better than it is as opposed to talking smack about anyone who won't see just the better part.

I live here, I am somewhat of a patriot, I don't have a car that would look the part in front of that hotel and I think the episode was great and that Top Gear did a great job in painting the picture. Yes there were jokes, yes there was mocking but there was also a great deal of appreciation.

The appreciation and the criticism that came with this season starter is what I would like to thank the Top Gear crew for and all I can say is that I hope my fellow countrymen will hear, understand and acknowledge that we are great, but there is still a lot of room for improvement (as there is pretty much everywhere in this world).

As for the accusation of racism please wake up and take a look in the mirror. Racism only exists if people believe in it, one way or another.
 
I live here, I am somewhat of a patriot, I don't have a car that would look the part in front of that hotel and I think the episode was great and that Top Gear did a great job in painting the picture. Yes there were jokes, yes there was mocking but there was also a great deal of appreciation.

I totally agree with you. After all, Top Gear is an entertainment TV series about cars and it does not pretend to portray the exact social situation of the places they visit.
 
What he probably means is that, out of the four dozen 'natives' that were filmed during the show (if you count the village people), over forty were part of a culturally different minority that makes up a mere 2.5% of the population. The only seemingly Romanian people were the young man at the People's Palace (an editor for Top Gear Romania), a man James asks for directions and a few people at a petrol station.

The equivalent would be a road trip from London to Manchester where 43 of the 48 people you film have Indian ancestry. Or a trip from Moscow to St. Petersburg where 43 of the 48 people you pick to film are Tatars.

Of course, for a country like the UK or Russia, this wouldn't matter much, as everybody knows plenty of things about both. But I bet you didn't know about our Arch of Triumph, People's Palace or Transf?g?r??an road. That's what Romania is all about. Instead, someone who doesn't know a whole lot about Romania can end up believing that the members of a small ethnic minority, who live in villages like the one on the show, are the country's true inhabitants - which is simply not true.


P.S. In case any of you were wondering, that building shown for a quick second at the seaside is the Constan?a Casino. As for the parking lot in Mamaia, it's behind the Rex Hotel.
http://www.deviantart.com/#order=9&q=constanta+casino
http://images.google.ro/images?hl=ro&source=hp&q=rex+mamaia&btnG=Căutare+Imagini&gbv=2&aq=f&oq=

Couldn't have put it better myself... As I said, the gypsy village bit could have been cut out and more transfagarasan shown, keeping in mind that TG is a car show. I saw no car in that village... :)
Anyway, it didn't bothered me that much, if clarkson is amused by the village poverty... nothing we can do. (Remember how the show started - with the presenters thinking that the romanians haven't seen cars like those... :)

How he jumped when he saw that doggy... Almost like a girl. How can clakson be scared of a small dog like that...?

P.S. The Constanta Casino was featured in the "Bloom brothers" movie, along with other impressive things from Romania: Peles Castle for example.
 
Really now, first time viewers and forum users from Romania should lay off the painkillers, roll up sleeves and start working on makin' our country better than it is as opposed to talking smack about anyone who won't see just the better part.

I live here, I am somewhat of a patriot, I don't have a car that would look the part in front of that hotel and I think the episode was great and that Top Gear did a great job in painting the picture. Yes there were jokes, yes there was mocking but there was also a great deal of appreciation.

The appreciation and the criticism that came with this season starter is what I would like to thank the Top Gear crew for and all I can say is that I hope my fellow countrymen will hear, understand and acknowledge that we are great, but there is still a lot of room for improvement (as there is pretty much everywhere in this world).

As for the accusation of racism please wake up and take a look in the mirror. Racism only exists if people believe in it, one way or another.
This. A huge number of Romanians turned out after the ep on the forums, some of them quite angry about what TG said/filmed.
 
JC: "Honestly, I'd rather just crap myself." :lol::lol::lol:

JC: "Turn right at the partially built gallows..."
RH: "That woman has an axe..." :lol:
 
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I don't know if this has been mentioned yet, but why did they do BMW 760 vs. Mercedes-Benz S63 AMG.

V12 twin turbo vs. V8 non-trubo?

Why didn't they use the S65 AMG? (I know its a bit more expensive, and powerful, but still)

Part of it is the large difference in price, but also the S65's 6.0l V12 generates significantly more torque than the 760's. And even then, the tests Top Gear have done with vehicles that have that V12 have noted the power is mostly wasted because with the traction control on, it severely dials back the power and with the traction control off, the car just sits there spinning the rear wheels because they can't get any traction.

The "best" choice would have been to use the 5.5l V12 in the current S600, however Top Gear has touched on that engine when Richard did a short review of the SL600. And the S-Class Jeremy "tested" in the front drive in Series 01, Episode 05 was, I believe, an S600 with the 5.8l V12 engine. So Top Gear has tested all the V12s, but I believe have not tested the 6.3 V8 in an S Class (they have tested it in an E Class and the CLK Black).
 
Couldn't have put it better myself... As I said, the gypsy village bit could have been cut out and more transfagarasan shown, keeping in mind that TG is a car show. I saw no car in that village... :)
Anyway, it didn't bothered me that much, if clarkson is amused by the village poverty... nothing we can do. (Remember how the show started - with the presenters thinking that the romanians haven't seen cars like those... :)

How he jumped when he saw that doggy... Almost like a girl. How can clakson be scared of a small dog like that...?

P.S. The Constanta Casino was featured in the "Bloom brothers" movie, along with other impressive things from Romania: Peles Castle for example.

But why should the gypsy village bit be cut? It is part of the country (this is said by someone who has lived in a remote Hungarian village, which was near to a gypsy village similar to that shown on the programme). Fine, no cars in the village were shown, but I liked the honest reaction by the villagers to the cars they were driving. I don't think that Jeremy was amused by the poverty of the village - I think he was amused by their situation and the reaction of the villagers.

I think the episode showed that, when you have pre-conceived ideas about a place, it often turns out not what you think at all. On the whole, Romania was shown in a good light. I've never been there, but I would love to go, and I'm not the first person on this thread to say that.
 
This is a bit tangential but I'm not sure we have a section where it would be more on-topic.
For a while I've been planning for a while to grab Him Indoors and take a road trip round various bits of Europe, and I think Romania needs to be one of the places we go, so I'm wondering, as this thread seems to have a few natives in it - and feel free to PM me rather than clogging up the thread - what would you say are the must-see places? The places which perhaps aren't the ones that all the tourist guides list.
 
This is a bit tangential but I'm not sure we have a section where it would be more on-topic.
For a while I've been planning for a while to grab Him Indoors and take a road trip round various bits of Europe, and I think Romania needs to be one of the places we go, so I'm wondering, as this thread seems to have a few natives in it - and feel free to PM me rather than clogging up the thread - what would you say are the must-see places? The places which perhaps aren't the ones that all the tourist guides list.

The ?I?m planning a tour of country X? type threads are usually posted in the Off Topic Forum.
You?ll get lots of help there and a bit of wise-cracking as well, I expect. :lol:
 
But anyone can drive TFG and I surely did. It is an awesome road but it still falls short of some roads in Colorado (Mount Evans; Pikes Peak; Trail Ridge Road).

You can't really drive like they did on any of those roads though, except maybe Trail Ridge.

For me, this episode made me look at eastern Europe in a new light.
 
I am from Romania , and every summer I go to that road and drive it like a complete maniac. I cannot even explain the sensations that I am living when I am inches from the side of the road , the car is sliding and the smoke from the tires inhales you. Unfortunately every year I come with a big ticket from the police. One time the have even taken my license for 1 month. But let me tell you something. IS WAS WORTH IT. And I do not care what every one thinks , if somebody lives more intense and has a better adrenaline rush from driving something beside that road I do not believe him. The road actually connects Sibiu , a big city to Curtea de Arges a small city , but more important it connects 2 parts of the country. It was built in the 70's with military purpose against the USSR.

Though I loved the episode I must say that not all what they said is actually true. Romania consists only of a population of 1 million gypsies and villages with 100% gypsies are rarely found. Also , NEVER , ANYTHING built in Romania was NOT built BY or FOR the russians of for any russian benefit.

Also , at the beginning of the show I must point out that the supercars that impressed the presenters were found in JUST one hotel parking. Mamaia has more than 20 luxury hotels with even more impresive parking lots. One year I even got to see a Bugatti Veyron.

Let me give you an ideea of what I mean : http://www.220.ro/9EA2aPNRe8/Hotel-Rex-Mamaia-Si-Masinile-Exotice ---- SLR in the movie :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcZwcfdqBfs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QncIXOWDqps&feature=fvw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLV3pm_B10Y&feature=related

also please check wikipedia for the TRANSFAGARASAN mountain road.
 
TG ep aside, if there's one thing about Romania that we can gather from the following video, it's that the girls are HOT.
[youtube]itfstFb8q1o[/youtube]
 
Does anybody else feel that Top Gear has lost a bit of the edge? The guys feel like caricatures of themselves. The jokes are now so scripted that they are not even believable. The Sandera thing was funny when James kept bringing it up in the news over the last two series, but in this it was just ridiculous. It wasn't believable that he was so thrilled at that car. and just destroying it a few minutes later made the entire thing even more pointless. James getting lost and ending up in Paris - come on! And falling asleep next to that dam. It just all seemed quite pointless because of course it didn't happen like that. It felt implausible and fake.

I noticed this trend beginning around when the caravan holiday episode aired. That was the first episode that really brought up the entire scripted vs spontaneous debate because it was so obviously scripted and felt a artificial and fake at the end - it was still hilarious though. Since then, it doesnt feel like james, jeremy and richard, but rather like three comedy actors based on the them.

You see they don't even try anymore! Jeremy is just so ful of himself that whenever they get a challenge he can't be bothered to make an effort. Instead he just messes up in a way he think might be funny and that's all. Thing is, it is only funny when they mess up while really trying and being incompetent in there own ways.

Bad top gear is still better than most other tv programs and I'll keep watching hoping for them to switch back into gear. I am looking foreward to the shit-episode made on a budget. That might force them to actually try and do something original.

Have you seen the car he actually drives on a daily basis? I can absolutely believe he was chuffed at getting a Dacia.
 
The Sandero thing was funny when James kept bringing it up in the news over the last two series, but in this it was just ridiculous. It wasn't believable that he was so thrilled at that car. and just destroying it a few minutes later made the entire thing even more pointless.

First off, fixed.

Second, James mentioned it only in Series 11. It was Jeremy who brought it up (twice) in Series 12.

Third, Skylock is right. You are aware that James owns a Fiat Panda, which he uses often, and that he really likes small cars, aren't you?

James getting lost and ending up in Paris - come on!

As mentioned, he didn't end up in Paris. Bucharest has its own version of the Arc De Triomphe.
 
I'm sorry to hear that you're upset, Timshuku. If you have a look at the thread, you'll see that mostly what this episode has done has made a lot of us want to visit Romania - and it wasn't somewhere I'd've thought of as a holiday destination before.
You say that Clarkson shouldn't be racist, but isn't your own comment - pointing out that most of the people there are white - itself racist? It seems to me that it has the implication that white = better. Perhaps you didn't mean it that way, but that's how it comes across - these sorts of misunderstandings are easy when there's a language barrier and, indeed, simply cultural differences.
Incidentally, if you ever do visit the UK, you'll probably be visiting London, so I would urge you to go to Brick Lane, which is where you'll find the best examples of contemporary British cuisine - a damn good curry :)
In the SIARPC segment when Clarkson is talking to Bana, he says something along the lines of Australians being one of the few nationalities who we can have a good argument with, putting each other down in a matey way - that they 'get' the british sense of humour in a way the americans, say, don't. I suspect that's what's happening here.
No offence was meant, and they're like that to everyone: Try watching it again, with the point of view not that they're belittling Romania but that they're laughing at their own expectations of the country and how wrong they were. Remember - the Top Gear presenters are always primarily making fun of *themselves*.
In interviews I've seen, and indeed at TopGearLive, they've been very complimentary of Romania, saying that it was a fabulous place to visit, and in the episode itself Clarkson indicated a desire to stay. I'm planning my bloke's 50th birthday, and I've had various ideas - but a holiday in Romania is currently top of the list. I'd say that actually, from a British point of view, Romania has just had a rather good advertisement.

I think it comes down to who you are and how you see yourself. I am an American with a southern redneck background and we all know what they say about "us" as a whole, but they can never say anything that will insult me to the point of making a complaint. I know the stereotypes. There is not a person alive that can not be put in some stereotype group. I travel a lot and I have found out people are people. I volunteer my time for a trip with doctors without borders once a year and my favorite people in the world are the poorest of the poor. I have never seen so much imagination and happiness, esp with the children. The culture I come from is worlds away from the actual life I lead now. But I can say one thing, my family knows how to throw a party. The only people that would look down on us would be the people that just don't know and I feel sorry for them, not for myself. If I had been given a choice, I would not have had it any other way. I guess I just don't care what the rest of the world thinks, because I know reality.
 
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