This post originally appeared in VICE RomaniaRomania hasn't been very creative when it comes to choosing presidents so far. We've only been a democracy since 1989, so I guess we're still figuring it out. So far three of our leaders have had names that ended in "escu," while most of them were former members of the Communist Party or had something to do with the "Securitate," Romania's secret police force. But a few weeks ago something weird happened—a German citizen named Klaus Iohannis won the Romanian presidential elections.
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This is even stranger when you consider that Romania has a rather deep-seated racism issue. Also, Iohannis is rather somber and straight-faced, a stark departure from the populist, Berlusconi-esque personalities we've traditionally been drawn to.Other than the fact that he used to be the mayor of a city called Sibiu, which was a European Cultural Capital in 2007, I didn't really know much about Iohannis. I feared most Romanians my age didn't either, so I followed him on the campaign trail and took the below photos.
See more photos from the series on Mugur's site.