photo #9295833

This is Vlad. Vlad Tepes. You may know him as Vlad the impaler or Dracula (son of the Dragon). His people knew him as the defender of Christianity, the ONE man who dared to stand up to the Ottoman Turks who were conquering the world. Nothing could stop their spread of islam. Until they ran into Vlad.He knew "negotiating" wouldn't work. He knew welcoming them and asking them to assimilate equated to a death sentence. So he did the unthinkable. He beat them at their own game. He became more brutal than the muslim horde. When the islamists entered Wallachia in the 15 century they passed thousands of earlier muslim arrivals, all dead or in the process of dying from being suspended on the poles he had them impaled upon alive. The Ottomans correctly named him a xenophobe. I suppose they called him a bigot, a racist, and a monster. Then they left. No one wanted to be Vlad's friend and he was perfectly ok with that. It saved his country.I've been to his house, Bran castle. Many go there to see "where the monster lived". It isn't scary at all. It is, in fact, beautiful and peaceful. To many, it is the home of a murderous madman. To me it is the home of a hero. Be like Vlad.