cry baby

Ron, remember those tears of joy we were talking about?

Well I was sitting in the bus from Veliko Tarnovo to Plovdiv listening to Groove Armada watching the landscape pass by and my eyes just welled up. It was such a great feelin -- and it had been a while since I had had them too. Just total happiness and innerpeace and love. Just thought I'd let you know.....

Bucarest, pt.II

Well the weather here is absolutely wonderful (in German, I would say herrlich, which really is the most appropriate term I can find) and I had a great day. Adrian (Bobo) from Hospitality Club (like Couchsurfing) that I met over the weekend met me in the morning. So we walked arround and he helped me find the Macedonian embassy and I am really excited! I got my visa for Macedonia! Wooo! So although Tim won't be joining me anymore due to unforseen cicumstances I think I am setting myself up for a pretty good trip. I have only been in Bucarest two days, but I really like the city and the grandiose feeling it gives off. The Casa Poporolui (the house of the people) was absolutely amazing. Apparently Ceaucescu bulldozed many churches and made a large number of people homeles in order to build it and it's 3.2 km "champs-elysee" style bulevard that leads to it. Might I remind you, it's called the house of the PEOPLE! (?!?) some favour he did the people by bulldozing their houses and rendering them homeless.

Being the well informed traveller that I am, I didn't realize that about 80% of the population was Orthodox. (duh.) I find Orthodox churches so esthetic! They are colourful on the outside and spacious on the inside and coverd with paintings and frescoes. Once I can download on flickr again (I have reached my monthly maximum :( ) I will put some pictures on it and my blog again. For now you'll have to bear with my (poorly written) text!

Well, I think it's dinner time and tonight I am going to Vera's place (met her at the couchsurfing party on the weekend) for a drink and some shisha.

Welcome to Bucarest, baby

Well I arrived in Bucarest last night and what a difference from the small mountain towns I was in before. The buldings are huge! MASSIVE! I've never felt so small in all my life! I've also had a shocking first taste of Bucarest and Romania and realize what people were warning me about -- I went to the Canadian embassy to ask about getting a visa for Macedonia and saw a girl there crying. I asked what had happened to her and she told me her back pack got stolen on the night train while she was sleeping...I guess I won't be taking the night train then. After getting all the info I needed to get the visa for Macedonia (now I have to find the Macedonian embassy!) I decided to walk arround in the centre a little bit. So as I was taking a picture of a building, two street kids came up and asked me for money. Of course I said I had none, and of course they kept asking. Since I needed an internet cafe i decided I would give them each 1 lei (like 40 cents or something) if they could show me where an internet cafe was. They did, but I think they were taking me for a ride, cause I never acutally found one. So they kept following me and pointing "that way, that way" and all I wanted was to get away from them but they kept lurking. I figured they were up to something -- I mean, I had seen them checking out my pockets earlier and stuff. Low and behold they both walk up to me, one on each side and ask for money and tell me that they are hungry, and one guy grabs inside my pocket for my camera. So I hit him, told him to fuck off and walked away. While walking away I kept wishing I had decked the shit out of them (you know, adrenalin and all) but I think I traumatized them a bit! I don't think they saw that one comming...little #@$%@%^#%^. Needless to say they stopped following me. Nonetheless, I am happy that I was at least AWARE I was being pickpocketed, and was able to catch them. But I am also kinda freaked out and am glad Tim is going to meet up with me in Sofia so I will at least have a travel buddy. I am in a bit of a weird head space right now, so I am gonna go find me some eats and take some more pictures, figure out where the hell I am in this city and try to enjoy it.

Riding the Carpatians

riding the carpatians
Originally uploaded by borderlys.

Well I have been in Romania for about two weeks now and I am really starting to like it! Every place I have been has had something different to offer -- Timisoara was filled with many an alcoholic beverage, intellectual conversation, getting used to hearing Romanian; Sighisoara was REALLY quiet, as I was the only one in the hostel for the first night; Sibiu was lovely and snow-covered, but muddy as hell; Brasov good eats, good nightlife (happy st. patricks day, by the way - I know what I am doing tonight!) and SNOW and SNOWBOARDING! MY GOD! If I lived here, I would be here at LEAST 3 times a week! The snow was unbelievable, and although I am so sore I can barely walk today, it was WELL worth the trip out there! The next day went to Dracula's Castle and Rasnov, gorgeous citdael ruins in the midst of being rebuilt. Myh trip to Bran and Rasvno was very enchanting as it felt like I had just walked into a Christmas village in the north pole or something. All the houses were covered in snow and it was white everywhere! I loved it! This weekend I am going to some sort of Couchsurfing party in Sinaia, (also in the mountains) afterwhich I should be heading off to Bucuresti for a few days before heading out to Bulgaria.

all aboard!

all aboard!
Originally uploaded by borderlys.

So I just left Serbia yesteday for Romania in which the trip there and first night were a bit on the ridiculous (but good) side! First off, the train station was deserted and in ruins. It kind of made me wonder as if there was even a train but low and behold, a one wagon emtpy train was sitting there, waiting for me, the sole passenger, as the police and border guards looked over my passport. I was in a pretty good mood from the two beers I had had with Darko before coming and was excited about my trip. So when I got on the train it was chat chat chat chat chat with the conductors! When I got to Romania they even asked the Romanian rail workers if It would be ok if I bought my ticket in Euros, since I didn\t have any Lei and there was no time in between trains to go exchange money. I have to say, I quite enjoyed the special attention I got and had a smile going from one ear to the other!

After that I got to Timisoara and was greeted by my couchsurfing host, who has proven to be REALLY interstesting and we have already covered major subjects in our disussions! So we went out for a few beers and this is where the story gets intense...So we're in the place called Papillon and there are some French guys there - excellent - so we get talking and then I have go to pee, which should come as no surprise for those of you who know me and my bladder size! So all of a sudden I am greeted by this new aquaintance in the (unisex) bathroom where I am kindly invited to go back to his appartment with him. ?!?!??!?!? Wha? Did I miss something cause all this time I thought we were just talking!

Then later, a fight breaks out right behind me, I got some blood on my scarf, hair and jeans. Now I don't consider myself to suffer from princess syndrome, but I didnt thing some fat guy's blood on my clothes and body was pretty gross. Aparently that's not typical though, and I believe that. Romanians acutally have a rather peaceful history and that cafe/pub was sort of an artsy cafe that shows films on a screen and is populated with painters, sculpters, photographers, etc. and the people I met last night were really great!
Anyay, so after all this, I got hit on by a drunk hungarian-romanian sculptor that coulndn't formulate a sentance. All in all it was pretty interesting!
After all this, went back to Ron's place to head into some more discussion on a wide array of issues, watch part of a movie that I have yet to finish, and then head off to bed at the wee hours of the morning!

Now I am having coffee with lemon (definetely a first, but I can't say it's bad...) and will be heading out to town shortly.

off to a good start

YARGH! I am an idiot. I haven't even LEFT yet and I have screwed up already. *note to self -- never confuse train times as there is a big difference between 13:45 and 15:45.

Now my fellow couchsurfer will be waiting at the train station for ...well..no once cause I won't be there yet!

Can I still call my self a rookie and pass this off as a rookie mistake?!

Up and at 'em!

Yowzers! I COMPLETELY forgot about my blog!!! And now, just as I am about to "set sail" again, I figured I should probably let you all know where I am at and what I am doing (not that anyone reads this anyway?!) Anyway, I won't go on about why I am leaving earlier than predicted - things just didn't turn out to be what either of us on both sides expected and there are 7 neighbouring countries here, so why not hit'em up?! First stop is Timisoara, Romania, which is about 2 hours away from here, then I plan going through the mountains and stopping by good ol' Vlad's castle (Drakula) and am hoping to find a hiking tour of some sort since I am not fully equipped to snowboard (It's gonna be painful to go to the mountains while the snowboard season is still in full swing, but what can you do?! I'll get my mounain fix through a little hike or two....