As part of Team Pokerstars Pro I get the opportunity to travel the world and play poker. I have been to many countries as an ambassador to PokerStars, but never to Romania. I was first asked to go to Romania instead of going to my original destination of Costa Rica this week. I agreed and began to do some research on the country so that I would know what to expect.

I knew little about the place and its people, and thought playing in the PokerStars Romanian Open was a great opportunity to see a place I would never pick out on the map as a place to go for vacation. After a 15-hour journey I arrived in Bucharest ready to jump into the poker scene.

The first thing I noticed was the cold weather - about 45 degrees. The ride from the airport to the hotel was long for a short distance. I learned from my driver that the short drive will be awhile as traffic is always an issue in Bucharest. The city has almost 3 million people and the highways are always packed. I arrived at the hotel and was pleasantly surprised. I made my way down to the tournament area and met with the tournament director who informed me that this was the first tournament of this size in Romania and everyone was very excited to see how many would show. The turnout was great, over 300 people (the cap was set at 300 originally) and the Romanian players were eager to play.

I sat down to play the tournament with my standard plan for playing poker with unknown players. I will play very tight and observe the players. I don't get involved early and want to see what style they play. After about an hour I had pretty much established my whole Romanian poker strategy. NO BLUFFING. Romanian poker players are gamblers and believe strongly in luck. The first thing I notice both in the tournament and the big cash game I would later play is that the Romanians open with 5-7x raises compared to the 3x raises which are more common. Also, you can expect to get 4-5 callers with these raises. It is quite different than what I am used to seeing on the poker tour, so I had to adjust my strategy to play premium hands and play them for maximum value. I made it through the day relatively easy as one of the chip leaders, I never had much issue and was a nice tourney day overall.

The next day was an off day so I decided to get out and see the area and other casinos. Casinos in Romania are small but extremely nice. Each has a lavish buffet set up and they are very well designed. Each casino has several roulette tables and blackjack tables, but craps is not played in Romania. Each casino also has two or three poker tables where the games they play are rather large. I learn from talking with players that Romanians play less poker hours but higher stakes. Again, they are gamblers. I sit to play in a 25-50 game and notice right away the 5-7x raises.

You notice two more things when playing in a Romanian casino that is different than in other areas of the world. First, smoking is allowed at the table and many Romanians smoke, therefore filling the air with cigarette fumes. Secondly, it is incredibly loud. If you play poker in most places, people are quiet and focused on the game. You could hear a pin drop as someone contemplates calling a big all-in or during hands. Not in Romania, everyone is talking, everyone is having a good time. I have never seen people talk as much and have so much fun at a poker table. It truly was a blast to play with the Romanian players, they love to talk and they love to have fun.

I have always told people that poker should be fun and it is a social game that you should celebrate with friends. Here in Romania they truly live that every day. They love to play and have fun while they are doing it. Bad beats are laughed about and losers give the winner a high five after hands. Always having fun, it is quite amazing here.

Any poker player looking for a great fun poker game should look into Romania. The stakes vary from 3-6 nl to 50-100 plo at the casinos I visited. But at every level and every casino the people were the nicest and most talkative I have ever seen. This is a great country to play poker in and amazingly fun. I have been very impressed with Romania and its people. I have made several friends while I have been here and look forward to coming back.

As a side note, I learned something I didn't know previously about my friend Daniel Negreanu. Everyone knows he is from Canada, but I learned his name is of Romanian descent. Daniel speaks Romanian very well also. I would say Daniel embodies what I think of when I think of a Romanian person. He is outspoken, friendly to everyone, a gambler, and someone that loves life and lives it to the fullest.

Heading into the final day of play at the World Poker Open, Team PokerStars Pros Chris Moneymaker and Chad Brown are the top of the leader board. And get this. With nine players remaining, the average stack is around 280,000. Brown is sitting on 433,500. Moneymaker? Well, Moneymaker has more than one million. If you couldn't deduce for yourself, that is good for the chip lead by more than double Brown's second place spot.

Though it may not seem like it anymore, there was actually a day when poker tournaments happened without television cameras around the final table. Frankly, it wasn't too long ago. At one time, the World Poker Open was a World Poker Tour event. As we all have seen recently, the WPT has changed what it covers these days, and the World Poker Open at the Gold Strike became just another place you could win a lot of money without the world knowing about it. Team PokerStars Pros Humberto Brenes and Barry Greenstein have both won this event. Daniel Negreanu has made the final table twice.

Now, Moneymaker and Brown are trying to reclaim the title for Team PokerStars Pro on the banks of the Mississippi River.

Good luck to both Pros as they go to work this afternoon.

Update: This evening, Moneymaker and Brown finished third and fourth respectively. Congratulations to them both.

Day 2 of the World Series is always a tough day. Regardless of age, nationality or gender, most people find it pretty gruelling to sit at a poker table, for ten hours at a stretch, with more than $9 million at stake - and stay focused and on the ball.

Day 2B of the World Series main event - which, with nearly 2,500 starters, had a much larger field here than Day 2A - was particularly arduous. You grind away and every time you look at the screen, there are STILL hundreds of players left in.

So you would think that once the day finally ends most survivors would be heading straight to their rooms to get some well-earned shut-eye before doing it all over again on Day 3.

Most people, yes. But not Team PokerStars Pro Chris Moneymaker. At the end of Day 2B, Chris bagged and tagged his $40,000, then headed straight to the No Limit room at the Palms where he handed over $500 and plonked himself down in Seat 1 at the $1-$3 table.

The rest of the table - almost exclusively players who had already bust out of the main event - were gob-smacked. Is the guy nuts? Or simply a poker phenomenon? Chris seemed totally unphased by the attention. He chatted for a bit, posed for photographs, signed some autographs, won three hands in a row - and then moved over to the $2-$5 table where a seat had just come up.

Chris finally left the room at around 3am, with what looked a load more chips than he'd started with.

So you would think that might be the end of his poker until he got back to the Rio today. But no. At 11am this morning, Chris was at the tables yet again, spinning it up in a $15-$30 cash game on PokerStars.

***

By noon today Chris was in the Amazon Room of the Rio, where he both hoped and expected to spend at least 13 hours playing cards. Alas, it is not to be.

Miuntes into the start of play today, Chris Moneymaker had his chance to double up, gtting AJ in against 9T pre-flop. Does it matter if it was a nine or a ten on the flop? Well, it was a ten, and Chris Moneymaker is done at the World Series for another year.

In other Team PokerStars Pro news, Vanessa Rousso managed to double up her short-stack at the start of play, while Noah Boeken has already found the door, his top trips falling to a full house.

That leaves us with John Duthie, Vanessa Rousso, ElkY, Hevad Khan, and Victor Ramdin. Ramdin is running hot at the moment and looks good to make a deep run today.

Moneymaker seems to be in a good place this week. He’s dropped some pounds, spent a lot of time with his family, and when playing poker (even just for fun in the Palms poker room), he seems happy. It’s not always as easy under the lights, though. After he limps, it’s a raise, and a re-raise before it gets back to him. His cards get to the muck quickly, and when the next bet is an all-in, Moneymaker literally reaches over his shoulder and pats himself on the back.

His constant sweater, aka his father, sits in the stands watching every move. When Chris turns to find his bottle of water empty, his father stands and brings a fresh one. These guys have been together at the World Series since that fateful night five years ago when Chris turned his $39 PokerStars satellite entry into $2.5 million. Now, Dad sits by while his son tries to create another storybook tale.

The past hour could’ve been better for Moneymaker. After limp-folding in the hand before, Moneymaker once again limped, but this time, after getting raised to 3,200, Moneymaker fired back a raise for 7,500 more. A smooth call came in, followed by a flop of Kd9dTh. Moneymaker put 11,000 in the middle and his opponent pushed all-in for 55,000 more. With not a hint of a smile, Moneymaker folded. He put his sunglasses on top of his head, put his head down on the table, and tried to stare under the bill of his opponent’s cap.

The crowd laughed appreciatively and a railbird called, “Good fold, Chris!”

The next time, it fails to go as well. Moneymaker got AKo all-in pre-flop against aces for a 40,000 pot. He picked up a gutshot draw on the flop, but bricked twice. He walked back over to his dad, talked for a bit, then returned to the table, flipping his 50-chip ante into the pot with a sigh. It wasn’t his best level of the tournament, but he’s still in good shape.

In other news, Hevad Khan, Victor Ramdin, and ElkY are all doing well today and sit with more than 100,000 chips.

Finally, the PokerStars Video Blog team caught up with EPT commentator and PokerStars-sponsored player Kara Scott at the break.

Watch WSOP 08: Kara Scott Day 2b Chat on PokerStars.tv

Earlier this year, PokerStars ran a series of tournaments aimed at giving players a chance to repeat Moneymaker's storybook $39 to $2.5 million tale. Thrity-nine bucks and a good finish got players a spot in the $215 final.

Fifteen players won their way onto Team Moneymaker for the 2008 World Series. As we reported yesterday, those players were treated to a Moneymaker Masterclass over at the Palms.

Today, around half of Team Moneymaker is in the field and vying to repeat the Moneymaker experience. m The other half will join us on Day 1D Sunday.

The situation has certainly changed since Moneymaker booked his revolutionary win back in 2003. Today's Day 1C flight has twice the number of people as the whole Main Event in 2003. By the time the surviving members of Team Moneymaker go to bed tonight, they will have outlasted as many people as Moneymaker did five years ago.

Sitting with the members of Team Moneymaker today is the man himself

Moneymaker is back in the field, playing the last of a few World Series events he chose to play this year. He started this day a couple of hours ago with 20,000 chips like everybody else. He ended the first level of play with 27,000.

by Chris Moneymaker

I have been playing a lot of poker the past to weeks on PokerStars.com gearing up for the WSOP. As I played, observers asked tons of questions. The most common recently is how many cashes do you have this year? The answer has been the same for two weeks now.

ZERO.

That's right ZERO cashes at the 2008 WSOP.

This sounds really bad/sad for a professional poker player 39 events into the Series to not have cashed. Well, thankfully for me it is not that bad, since you have to play to win. If you have been in the Rio this month, you have seen tons of poker celebrities roaming the hallways, but you haven't seen me. I have been at home with my family during the WSOP. I did make a trip out to Vegas and played in Event #1 the 10k PLH event. I busted out with 11 min left in Day 1 and played very well to make it that far, so I was pleased.

So why am I not playing many of the preliminary events? Well there are two reasons. First, historically I have never played many preliminary events at the WSOP. After winning in 2003, I played:

Secondly, I am having the best time of my life with my family. In 2006, my wife and I rented a house out in Las Vegas and planned on moving out there for the entire WSOP. We landed the day before Event #1 and got into our rental car. It was 115 degrees when we landed and miserable.

After one day in the heat we decided it would be better if our one-year-old daughter was back home in a cooler environment. I stayed at home with her and from that point forward I made a decision that I wanted to enjoy seeing my daughter grow up.

I travel a lot as it is and being gone for a month from my family is not something I choose to do. It doesn't help the fact that my daughter's birthday is in June, making it impossible to travel during that time. Anyway, I am making the trek to vegas on Sunday to play in the five remaining events of the WSOP. Hopefully, in a few weeks when someone on PokerStars.com asks how many times did you cash at the WSOP? I will say something other than ZERO.

Good luck on the tables