Fall Adventure to Romania (Day Two)

Woke up refreshed and ready to head into the heart of Transylvania. This turned into something of a day of acceptance and forbearance for Keary and me as we were perpetually denied food despite waking up ready to eat and maintaining that feeling throughout the day. First, Keary's go-to local covrigi place was closed so although we had coffee (sweet, blessed coffee) we did not have breakfast. No problem, we'll just grab some breakfast once we arrive in Brasov!

Except, whoops. The train ride was a little over two hours. By the time we got there we were both feeling it, and although we were almost immediately flanked by a slightly odd but gregarious fellow named Gabriel who offered his services for roughly the same price we'd pay to get a taxi into and out of Brasov (plus his conversation was scintillating) we headed immediately to a junk food stand for some paprika chips and soda first. Then we hopped in his 97 year old Soviet clunker. On the way he bragged about such topics as, actually having another car (a VW van, sweet), the many tourists he'd taken around various places, his place in the Lonely Planet Guide book, and the hostel he owns. His accent was thick but his English was alright, although I'm fairly sure he doubted my abilities in my own mother tongue. He kept checking to make sure whatever he'd just told us really landed by turning FULLY AROUND WHILE DRIVING to make eye contact with us. WE GET IT GABRIEL EYES ON THE ROAD OH GOD DON'T LET ME DIE IN A SOVIET CAR IN TRANSYLVANIA.

We arrived in one piece and Gabriel literally walked us to the entrance gate to Bran castle, my major motivation for coming out all this way. Yes, it's hokey and touristy but it's also awesome so shut up. This is the house at the bottom of the hill leading to the castle, perhaps a groundskeeper's home? There was an audio tour but you know I wasn't paying for that. I've got eyes and Google, thanks, I'm not paying you 45 EUR for anything.

 Dramatic angles. I don't want to talk about how silly I looked trying to take this photo. And now, some of my favorite architectural flourishes from inside the castle:

 Entrance to the (not so) "secret" stairwell.

Exit.

Courtyard views.

 Ancient Transylvanian border.

 Just a really excellent knife collection.

 ARTSY PHOTO™

 This was neither the first nor the last "Certificate of Authenticity" I saw laying around the castle. We get it you're authentic now pipe the fuck down with these certificates everywhere.

 Cool ceiling beams, no sarcasm. Just cool.

 Medieval stuff.

 Pomp.

 Circumstance.

(No but seriously GIVE ME THAT CROWN I WANT IT)

 Medieval torture device I secretly took a photo of! (Again, the exhibit was charging and I didn't feel like paying but the guard lady must have gotten bored or maybe was trying to entice people to come into the exhibit because she left this curtain open so passers-by could see inside. Pretty terrifying. I mean not Guantanamo terrifying but still.)

 Scales of judgment, on which people were sometimes weighed against Bibles. Ouch.

 Okay Romania, you win. Those masks left me unsettled.

 The black church, back in Brasov, which was beautiful. However it was while trying to take this photo, in which I backed up as far as I could from the church while practically laying on the cobblestone street but still couldn't get the whole church in the shot that Keary suggested it may, in fact, be time for me to purchase a new camera. Considering my current one runs on AA batteries, no longer zooms out (you have to turn it off and back on again) and is the same one I've been using since my sophomore year of high school... she may have a point.

That Brasov, so hot right now. (Brasov Hollywood sign)

 This is really just a no-brainer. There is a big hill with a scenic view and I can ride a tram up for several dollars? Done. So done.

 Inside the B.

 From further up and further in. (Narnia joke what what!)

 Back on the ground, appreciating the sunset and a para-glider in the distance.

 Some more witching hour shots- the Black Church again and the half-moon shaped fortress whose name I do not remember but which I could see while consuming...

 Some damn well-earned bread and beer. Although we did finally get some covrigi before heading up to the Brasov sign, besides sharing a bag of chips, that's all Keary and I had eaten after being perpetually denied the kind of out-and-out feast we were seeking throughout the day. So by the time Gabriel drove us back into Brasov and dropped us off in the center (thanks Gabriel, you  were the best I miss you already!) we were both fairly hangry. Conversation resumed after the covrigi but we weren't truly restored until we'd gotten some Silva Braun into us. I really like the dark Silva, by the way. As evidenced by the fact I think I drank it with almost every dinner I ate in Romania.

For dinner I had chicken with muj dei which tastes like a garlic bomb exploding in your soul (in the best possible way) but I didn't photograph that because it looked like a piece of chicken. Have you ever seen a piece of chicken? Great you know what my dinner looked like. But for dessert... oh God, for dessert... Keary decided we needed to try what the family next to us was eating, the gogoși. Cheesy, berry-topped fresh donuts soaked in a cheese-cream sauce. Words fail to describe.

During dinner and on the way back to the train station, we witnessed a small but passionate protest. The sign reads, "Romanian Monstrous Government Corruption".

If it makes you feel any better, guys, you're not the only ones feeling that way about your respective government.

And then we arrived to the train station at a perfectly reasonable hour, excited to get back to Bucharest and relax, possibly watch a movie, eat some cake, you know. Instead we were delayed an hour by a ticket-seller who forced us to buy the next train tickets (an hour after the next one shown on the board, which was leaving in about 5 minutes). And then the train was about an hour later than it was supposed to be. So we wandered around the mall, drank some Irish coffee, then returned to the train station where we played a lot (probably too much) of Gin and marveled, along with our fellow stranded Romanians, at the resident crazy woman screaming about prostitutes into a cellphone that may or may not have had someone on the other end of the connection until our train arrived. After getting scammed by a sketchy taxi driver, we were both more or less done.

Fall Adventure to Romania (Day One)

Yup. Went to Romania for a few days to visit with my cousin and see some sights. It was good fun and I took some pictures along the way. First up, here is what the Keleti train station in Budapest looks like at 6:30 AM. But there's a story here, because it's not really that interesting of a photo.

You see, I had to get up at 4 AM on my first day of vacation. I had to take the light rail from my little town into Budapest. It's about a half an hour ride and costs 465 FOR, but of course when I get to the station the ticket window is not even open and there is nary a sign of anyone from whom I could buy said ticket. But I thought, screw it, I did not get myself up and out the door by 5 AM just to admit defeat in the first leg of the journey! So i jump on the train when it comes anyway, ticket-less, and wait with bated breath for the entire half hour into Budapest. Generally, the ticket takers don't speak English and I dread the moment when I'll have to try and find someone to help me explain my ticketless state.

Half an hour later we arrive at Nyugati station and I have not seen a single ticket-taker. A relief, perhaps, but already I'm feeling nervous. How did I just do that? Are the 5 AM trains always free as some sort of apology to the passengers awake at that ungodly hour? Am I actually the ghost and all the other passengers are holding a seance to get me to stop haunting this train? What year is it? I need to go back to sleep.

So I'd looked up directions beforehand, knew exactly what metro lines I needed to take to get across town from Nyugati (west) to Keleti (east) station. Get to the metro, and... there's no one to take or from whom to buy a ticket... again. Down the escalator I go, fingers crossed! Waiting on the platform, seeing Metro cops milling around, I keep waiting for someone to stop me and demand I explain myself. Suddenly, every angrily glaring older lady is not your average Eastern European of a Certain Age but actually a Metro secret spy who's onto me, seconds away from having me arrested.... But the train arrives at last and again, nothing!

First half of the metro ride successful. Go to make the transfer, and... there's a cop standing in front of the escalator. Abort, abort!! I take the opposite escalator, rising to street level, hoping perhaps I can buy a ticket and ease this anxiety (which at 6 in the morning I do NOT need). Still no ticket-sellers. But while I'm standing there in front of a ticket machine I've found, attempting to decipher the Hungarian text by sheer force of will, a kindly older man walks up to me and explains very slowly in Hungarian that the second half of my journey is not running due to construction, and I need to go grab the bus. Sweet baby Jesus no. Anything but the bus.

Again, I stand there, waiting for the bus, sweat raining down inside my 6 layers of clothing (packin' light!). I have no ticket for this bus. I have no ticket for this bus. Just to make absolutely sure I'm about to risk a fine for the third time in less than an hour on the right mode of transport, I go pester a lady with a clipboard who looks like she might work for the bus line. Yes, she says (well actually she says igen but you get it). This bus to Keleti. Go get on it you dumb American. Leave me alone. Is what I imagine she is saying in her mind.

The sweat, oh god, the sweat. 20 minutes of riding the bus, torn between bus ticket anxiety and "where the fuck am I" anxiety, I can't even tell which is worse. Finally I see a giant glass structure that can't be anything else but Keleti station and I hop off, thankful for the cold October morning air. And sure enough I am here, with ample time to spare. And that is why this, though not in any way a sumptuous visual delight, is one of my favorite pictures from my trip. It is the acknowledgment of relief. Of success. Of victory over the adverse forces that do their best to ruin your brain and nervous system when you've woken up before sunrise to catch your 7 AM train.

 Perfection.

 The town we sat at for an hour after crossing the border, where we also sat for an hour after the hour we sat at the last town we stopped in before we crossed. No wonder this train ride took 14 hours.

 Even though this photo is pretty janky I love it. At one point in the ride we were up pretty high in the hills and kept crossing over rivers and highways. It was scenic.

 Greenified.

 After the sun set the trip was less interesting, obviously. Then I had to make my own amusement, mostly by watching movies and also by watching the man sitting two rows behind me, opposite me (so he was facing me) plow through a GIANT bag of sunflower seeds while he watched something on his laptop. Seriously, for the last two hours he was just snacking away contentedly. Early on I took a photo of his little sunflower seed shell mountain, finding it hilarious. Unfortunately I didn't think to document the final stack but trust that it was about three times the size of this one. First photo is my feelings on returning to the land of the sunflower seed obsessed and their messy, ubiquitous leavings.

The sunflower king himself.

My relief at finally getting off that God-forsaken train (only cost me $40!) translated into having an immature, giddy sense of humor. By the time I got into Bucharest I was so ravenous I was on the verge of chewing my own arm off so after dropping my stuff at Keary's place we went to an outrageously delicious gyro place around the corner and then headed to Old Town for a couple beers. When we stepped out of the cab I saw this out of the corner of my eye and obviously misread it. But, I mean... come on.

 So immature. Sorry mom.

 Beer O'Clock, a delightful delicious nirvana within Old Town.

 Keary and her Draak. (At least I think that's what it was.)

 Lest I end the first day's remembrances on a mature or tasteful note, this is a club entrance we walked past on our way home...