The second edition of the eLiberatica Conference will take place Friday and Saturday,
30th and 31st of May 2008, at World Trade Plaza, in World Trade Center - Bucharest.
The Place
World Trade Center Bucharest
is one of the biggest and most important business centers in Romania and the
owner of an "Excelence Center" title awarded by the Committee of the International
Association World Trade Center from New York.
Located at about 10 minutes from downtown, the complex offers a multitude of
services and business facilities: companies' offices, restaurants, a 4 stars hotel
(Sofitel),
conference rooms, banks, shops and others..
The space where the conference will take place -
World Trade Plaza
- is a perfect location for an event as important as this; it has a surface of 800 square
meters and it is surrounded by shops, banks and restaurants.
The Sofitel hotel has 7 conference halls of different sizes, in accordance with the
different business needs of its clients. The hotel has 203 rooms (single / double and presidential suites),
2 restaurants, 2 coffee shops and a bar.
Location
Address
World Trade Center Bucureşti | Bd. Expoziţiei Nr.1, Bucureşti
Tel: +4 (021) 202.44.50/ +4 (021) 202.44.33 | Fax: +4 (021) 319.11.00 / +4 (021) 202.43.11
Mail: wtcb@wtcb.ro | Website: http://www.wtcb.ro
Dress code
The organizers have no special requirements as far as dressing is concerned,
but they suggest a decent outfit. For cocktails and special events
like "Networking and Freedom Party", we also expect the participants to
dress accordingly.
Security
Security will be high throughout the duration of the conference.
Having an identity document with a picture of you is mandatory at registration.
You are kindly asked to bear the badge you will receive at registration at
all time during the conference.
About Bucharest City
The City of Bucharest
is situated in S-SE Romania, on the rivers Dâmboviţa and Colentina.
Being at the Orient's gates, the city became the capital city of
Valahia
in 1698 and grew rapidly in the peaceful times of the 18th century.
Between the two world wars, the elegant architecture, the bourgeois lifestyle as well as the
mixture of western and eastern influences made it gain its name of
"Little Paris".
Today, having a surface of over 228 square km and more than 2 million inhabitants,
the capital city of Bucharest is the political, administrative, economic,
financial, banking, educational, scientific and cultural center of Romania.
Day life and nightlife
Maybe the best idea about the colorful and full-of-life city that Bucharest is,
can emerge after watching the images and reading the comments below.
We asked no professional photographer to take pictures or a copywriter to write something interesting;
Instead we looked at some online communities - especially
flikr.com -
since we strongly consider that their images and comments are showing more than a
formal description of the places where eLiberatica 2008 will take place.
" Romania is the most unexpected country I've ever seen.
I've been living here for more than 3 years, and it's still astonishing me every day.
If you're from a West-European or North-American city, you couldn't choose better
than Romania as a place to visit if you're looking for contrasts, diversity,
and a unexpected and never-seen-before atmosphere.
When I'm taking pictures in Romania, I'm trying to show the typical atmosphere of Romanian cities,
as I feel it : colors (there's no cities that I know with so many colors, melted together without any sense),
contrasts (regarding people, architecture, standards of living...).
[...]
My point of view may not be neutral, as I'm naturally focusing on what I've never seen before,
all those things that are different from what I'm used to see in my native country [France].
However, you're able to see many occidental and European aspects in Romania, but you
can't really see them in my pictures.
[...]
hey... there's also a many modern buildings [....], many business men wearing black suits and
never smiling (as everywhere in the world), many supermarkets like Carrefour and Cora, selling the same
Coke as at home, a lot of Mac Donald's selling the same Big Macs that make you as fat as they do in France... [....]
but I sincerely doubt you'd be interested on seeing that kind of stuff on a photo album about Romania :) "
Useful information for foreign guests
Entry visa:Member of the European Union since 1st of January 2007,
Romania doesn't require entry visas for citizens of EU-member states and for
North Americans (USA and Canadian citizens). For more information,
please visit the your country's Embassy website or one of the following links:
-
List of the states which citizens can travel to Romania without a visa"
- PDF document
(document on the official site of the Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
-
Ministerul Afacerilor Externe Român (Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
- visa information
Currency:
Leu (RON) ("lei" - plural)
is the national currency.
In few years, once the complete EU integration is achieved, Romania is expected to adopt the Euro currency.
All banks are providing currency exchange services
(most foreign visitors will rather go to a bank than a shady exchange office).
-
The exchange rate can be checked on the website of the National Bank of Romania (BNR)
- www.bnro.ro
Foreign currency, credit cards: The most widely used foreign
currencies are the Euro and the US dollar. There are countless exchange houses in
Bucharest, as well as ATM machines witch can be used without problems in case you
have a credit/debit card with you. The most commonly used are Visa, MasterCard
and American Express, witch are accepted in most hotels, rent-a-car companies and
restaurants. We advise you, though, to check in advance.
Communications services and Internet:
both fixed and mobile telephony, as well as Internet connections are very well developed throughout the country;
usage of the mobile phones is very common and most of the hotels, but also other public spots offer Internet connections.
Bucharest Transportation:
during last years, significant improvements and developments in
the city's transportation and road infrastructure have been made.
Bucharest has an well developed underground transportation
system witch meets the modern standards. Yet, surface transportation still
tends to be overcrowded, therefore we advise our guests willing to
travel inside the city to use either the subway or a taxi service.
- Bucharest taxi companies - www.taximetre.ro
-
Recommendations (together with the phone numbers): Cristaxi (9461; 9466; 9421), Taxi 2000 (9494),
Taxi Meridian (9444; 9484; 9888), Taxi Cobalcescu (9451), Fly Taxi
(9440 - servicing Bucharest airports).
- Bucharest City Public Transportation Company ("Regia Autonomă de Transport Bucureşti") - www.ratb.ro
- Information about the Bucharest subway system - www.urbanrail.net
- Bucharest North Railway Station ("Gara de Nord") - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gara_de_Nord
- Train schedule - www.infofer.ro
- Henry Coanda International Airport, Bucharest ("Aeroportul Internaţional Henry Coandă") - www.otp-airport.ro
Other Information
Weather:
Bucharest has a temperate-continental climate, with occasional excesses and differences in air
temperature caused by the overheating of the city's streets.
In the months of June to August the temperature climbs over 25°-30° Celsius (77°-86° Fahrenheit),
while in winter it can drop to -10° Celsius (14° Fahrenheit).
Accomodation in Bucharest:
In order to provide affordable prices for the participation tickets to the conference,
unlike the past edition of eLiberatica, accommodation will not be included in the conference ticket,
so participants are free to decide where they will stay for the duration of the event.
(The international speakers should check with the conference organizers for special reserved rooms at
Sofitel hotel. )
You can check a list of useful links to help you decide where you will stay here:
Interesting things and other information regarding the surroundings:
There are just too many interesting things and places to see and try in Bucharest to
fit in just one list. Therefore we recommend the following sites as search base for additional information:
Panoramic images of Bucharest and its surroundings:
Useful links about Romania:
For any kind of information about the conference venue, please write us at pr@eliberatica.ro.
We would like to thank all those who helped creating this page
by allowing us to use their extraordinary pictures (they are listed in descending order by the number of pictures provided):
Jean-François Schmit,
Kathy Kavalec,
Marian Teodorescu,
Simon Laird,
Adrian Zanfir,
Andrei Zdetovetchi,
Andrés Sanchez,
Leo Koolhoven,
Mihai Verdeş,
Alexandra Iancu,
Octavian Rizea,
George Agafiţei,
Viorel Mocanu,
Iulia Lefter,
Adrian Durlea,
Alex and
Karoly Czifra.
Română
