This is a memoir of a young emigrant to the U.S. who applied to an Ivy League college simply on mistaken recognition of the name Dartmouth. The few short years there and the answer to a surprisingly simple question: "How much time do you waste every day?" affected much else in his life on four continents: adventure, journalism, cartography, urban affairs, high-tech consulting, teaching, ancient cultures, filmmaking, nature conservation - and a return to his parents' homeland: Romania. Punctuating his accounts are snapshots of events that shaped the post WW-II world. The Cold War. Collapse of empires. Social upheavals. Wars won and lost. Red flags of irreversible climate change. All of which brought his story to the fateful 2020 year.