This is Hank Zonner, The Grape's Unwrapped. I'm here in New York City on West 47th Street
in the famous Diamond District. We're here to meet Mike's friend Dimitri Vickovano.
My producer, Mike, said, I've got a really great guy I want you to meet. He's a master
craftsman, watch repairman and salesman, but he's really got a fascinating life story and as always
I'm going to bring it back around to wine. Dimitri happens to be a native of Romania so I went and
found ourselves a nice Romanian wine. Let's go inside meet Dimitri and I think we're going to
hear some pretty interesting stories. Dimitri, thank you so much for having me here. Thank you,
I'm very happy to have you here. Thank you, thank you. So we're at Dimitri's kiosk and Dimitri's
interesting man with an interesting history and an interesting business here with you do high-end
watch repair and sales and you also are a native to Romania and you happen to be a lover of wine
and I always love to talk with people who are craftsmen who love what they do, have a passion for
what they do, but also love the enjoyment of wine. Thank you. Yeah, because the wine and the watches
has something in common. Both these kind of merchandises must be vintage to be very adorable.
Interesting, interesting. And if the wine is not aged, it's not so good like the very old one.
Very interesting. The watches is the same. If the watch is not old, it's not for collectors
and it's not interesting, it's not very rare. I like your analogy. I like this thing too,
that wine is very time-honored, if you will, right? In your country, your native country,
it wine has been made for over 4,000 years, but the other thing where I think there's
a difference between the two is you're here to make sure that watches keep accurate time
and my feeling is when you're drinking wine, time slows down. Yes, right. The watches remain. The
wine is very subtle because it's more adorable to be used in celebration and it's not to put on
the side to forget there exists. Like some people do with their collections of watches.
Yes, right. So you came to this country in the 1990s? 1998. And you had a background in art
restoration, correct? In any kind of museums, artifacts. This is for painting, archaeological
artifacts, textile, paper, and furniture and of course clock and watches. But when you settled
here, you realized, I think you told me earlier, you didn't have the space that you needed to do
real art restoration, so you really focused on watches? Yes, in New York it's very expensive,
the space to have restoration for big objects need to have big space and cost a lot of money.
And this must be a balance between these two to do. And I choose to do watches and clocks because
these are small and need not so much space. And it's also very good retributed for this.
I'm afraid to actually touch your hands because they probably should be insured with such fine
craft work that you do. You have all kinds of people coming in. I'm embarrassed to say this,
I don't wear a watch any longer, but a lot of people do and they collect watches as well.
So business is actually still very good, isn't it? Yes, it's very good because the watch is a part
of the instrumentation. You had other well-known people come in here to have their watches repaired?
A lot of people which work in the movie industry and big collectors and big personalities,
I receive a watch from New Jersey from somebody relative with Kennedy. And I restore the
card here from the Kennedy. I have a photograph for this. I was very happy. I had an inscription on
the back. Another time I restored a clock for Sotheby's was from Lincoln, the clock for the
desk clock. Many times I'm so happy to handle very important pieces. And this is for me
more payment as the time which it takes. It's part of the pride that you have in your craftsmanship.
Yes, right. So you're solving mysteries. You're doing research. You're doing historical research.
Yes, I have a huge library for this. I have one
serious watch question for you. Do people bring Mickey Mouse watches to get fixed?
It was a time when it was very popular. Many Mickey Mouse come to me to repair.
I have all the parts. I'm very good prepared for this. The Mickey hands, right? With the
little white gloves on them. It was in 1930. The first was a huge production, two million every year.
Wow. One of the things that a lot of people don't know is that Romania is a big wine culture. Wine
has been produced there for over 4,000 years, even before the Roman influence in the country,
which really sort of solidified I think wine making there. It is the sixth largest wine producing
country in Europe, which most people I think wouldn't realize that. But as we talked about
earlier, it's really been a part of the social fabric. It thought it would be fun and appropriate
to share Romanian wine with you. Yes, I agree. Now, you're going to help me with pronunciation.
This is one of the bigger wineries today in Romania. Rekas, as I pronounced that.
Rekas. Rekas. And the grape again, let me see if I got this right. You gave me a lesson earlier.
Yes, exactly. That's what I was going to say.
This is original from Dobrogea, from Fetești city around the winery. And then was transplanted
in Rekas, which is in Transylvania today. Right. People think of Transylvania in terms of
Dracula, but it's one of the biggest wine producing regions in the country.
It's a difference in Romania that people prefer to be from Dobrogea, from Fetești.
Because the wines have more flavor, they're riper. And I can see that. I'm going to share some wine
with you. And this is made from that native grape. It smelled great when we opened the bottle up.
It's, I could tell this is a wine I'm going to enjoy right just from smelling it. How would I,
how would we, what would we say if we were saluting one another, doing cheers in Romania?
What is our, what's the phrase? Lamuțan. Lamuțan. Lamuțan. Lamuțan.
Four years. To many years. To many years. To many, many years. Lamuțan. Lamuțan. Salute.
That's a nice way to start the day, isn't it? Yes. This is a really nice wine. It's a medium
bodied wine. It's got a lot of nice fruit to it there. Kind of like a good red fruit taste.
Nice like a raspberry kind of a zip to it. It's got tannins. So I could easily have this with a
hardier autumn or winter dish probably. This is what I would have this with. Ifavanu,
masters of time, I want to thank you so much for giving me your time and sharing your stories with
me and with all of us out there. Let's do one more salute to folks out there. Lamuțan. Lamuțan.
And I thank you very much for this. And this is good in advertising for both for watches
and for wine. Must be old enough to be to be good appreciated. Absolutely. Absolutely. This is Hang
Zone The Grape Zone Wrapped. We'll see you next time. Thanks for checking in.
