Back In the U.S.S.R.

Chris and His Tiraspol Bitches








In Tiraspol people know that Stalin was simply misunderstood and that's why they've erected this monument to him.








"Afghanistan was SO not cool...". I don't know what's up with this Afghanistan war monument.



It's been over a week since I've updated this page so here's the short version of what Chris and I have been up to.

Following our arrest for walking Chris and I decided we weren't yet done with Soviet police state adventure. We relaxed in Chisinau on Monday before heading to the unrecognized, mafia-run communist state of Transdniestr. The fun began as soon as we got on the bus in Chisinau as we were herded to the back of the bus to sit next to a young drunk Russian family from Tiraspol. Dmitri, the father of the family, offered Chris and I swigs from his beer bottle as his wife stared out the window and drank her brew in silence. On the way to Tiraspol views of vinyards, decayed industry and rolling green hills were occasionally obscured by Dmitri's face as he hugged Chris and I while whispering sweet nothings in Russian into our ears. It looked like Transdniestr was going to be a barrel of laughs.

Maybe an hour after leaving Chisinau we were greeted by an enormous hammer-and-sickle emblem indicating that we were on the frontier of the last remaining remnant of the Soviet Union. After an exciting game of charades with the customs agent he was content that I did not have any heroin, guns, knives or bombs with me. After obtaining this approval we moved onto the immigration officer who instructed Chris and I on our obligations as visitors to Transdniestr; essentially, we had to register with the police every day that we were the there which seemed agreeable enough. As people from our bus were yelling at us for delaying them we were shunted off to the next office in order to pay for our visas. At this point Dmitri came up out of nowhere to honour his earlier promise to help Chris and I. He grabbed my shoulder as I was about to enter the office behind Chris and looking me straight in the eye and said: "Steve - I help - friend" before running off, blind drunk, down the road. After paying our fine and going back to the bus it was apparent to Dmitri was not coming back - he had either disappeared or been arrested. The bus departed without Dmitri and Chris and I sat next to his crying wife and child for the final push to Tiraspol.

In Tiraspol we headed directly for Hotel Drushba ("Hotel Friendship") and were told there that before renting a room we would have to register with the local militia. We got directions and headed directly to the militia office. Along the way we passed the House of Soviets and an enormous bust of Lenin; how weird this place seemed. Unlike our last encounter with the local police in Chisinau this was a completely different affair; the local militia were entirely young, attractive women in short skirts and high heels. The weirdness of this place seemed only more acute. Anyway, Chris was particularly excited as the militia officers asked us questions and giggled the whole time at these two Canadians in their midst. If anything the comedy of our visit to the militia was enough to relax us from the stress of the previous few hours. We returned to Hotel Drushba and dropped our stuff off before heading out to explore the town.

While looking for a restaurant and internet cafe Chris and I were approached by two girls on the street. With hardly any English they walked us around their town and gave us a tour of the town's sites such as the Afghan war memorial, a bust of Stalin, a tank and another statue of Lenin. After sightseeing we went to hang out with the girls and a group of their friends at the local cafe-restaurant-bar-nightclub. For the next few hours we pounded back bottles of vodka and mugs of beer while having next to no conversation with each other. Chris made good friends though with one guy named Victor who spoke no English but was able to announce at least 200 times "Canada ---- Tiraspol - FRIEND!!". As much as I was intellectually stimulated by such company I eventually spent all of my 20 dollar budget for the day and returned to the hotel leaving Chris and his newfound friends to keep drinking.

Upon waking the next morning Chris filled me in on the events following my early departure the night before. After having bought 6 or 7 bottles of vodka for everyone they brought him to another club that was completely vacant. He made out with the only mulattoe girl in all of Transdniestr the locals ordered a bottle of vodka and servd Chris the bill - only 5 times more expensive than it had been at the last place. He told everyone to fuck off and tried to fight everyone before making his way back to the hotel and vomiting all over the place.

We packed out gear, said goodbye to Tiraspol and Transdniestr and headed to the bus station. Our next stop would be Vulcanesti in the south of Moldova to visit our friend Matt from the Peace Corps who we had met in Chisinau on our last night there.