A fine day today for a nation that’s one of a kind. No big news, in fact almost no news at all, still the newspapers manage to fill their pages with the most unusual facts and deeds of the most usual Romanians. A hacker in a monastery, experiments on the military, counterfeit underwear and all the small events that make living in Romania a passionate experience.

Serafim Pantea is a priest in Iasi, at the Golia Monastery, who spends most of his time disassembling software. He boycotts the Hotmail service and Microsoft and is a full-time Linux militant. Even more, given the fact that God knows everything, he says that the system security is an unachievable dream, according to Evenimentul Zilei.

Computer and network security is famous for breaches, but what about the national security?

According to Romania Libera, Ceausescu allowed experiments on fresh recruits and mentally ill patients. The experiments involved the use of psychodisleptic substances and aimed at the creation of a “psychiatric bomb” to replace the usual explosive warfare. Hopefully, none of the soldiers submitted to tests is today an army chief.

Or are they? The new Defense Minister, Sorin Frunzaverde, declared on Wednesday that the Romanian troops won’t be withdrawn, his target being the rising of the living standards for the military and the army equipment upgrade, Adevarul reads.

The Army is the national brand that helped Romania join the NATO. Ever since, other brands continued to rise.

One would be Dacia, a brand that covers, along with the Skoda imports, half of the entire Romanian new cars market, Gandul found out. Well, that really gives a boring landscape downtown!

Another major brand is the lingerie producer Jolidon. Adevarul discovered that the company loses tens of millions of euros because of the Chinese counterfeit bras and panties. Well, Romanians are indeed producing fine lingerie and that’s the naked truth!

The rest of the news is nothing but the everyday predictable scandals: former PM Nastase quits resigning from his own party and expects to be expelled (Evenimentul Zilei) and Europe won’t hesitate to enforce the safeguarding measures on Romania Romania Libera.

Meanwhile Romania loses 60,000 German tourists because of last year’s bird flu and lack of branding (Gandul).

Tourist or not, it’s not safe to have a car in Bucharest: the future parking lots will cost per month as much as the rates for a new car, Cotidianul reads.

Lucky us, we still have value, even though it left the country long ago: a Brancusi statue was sold on Wednesday at Sotheby’s for 1.69 million dollars, Cotidianul informs. A reminder: Brancusi left Romania on foot in order to achieve international recognition.