Loose Ends

So - I sort of dropped out during the last week and half or so of the trip. This last entry to the Eastern European blog will be an exercise in piecing together the events of those past few days and summing up the trip. The last entry finished up with Chris and I about to leave Kiev. After saying good bye to Lana and Zoia at the station we climbed aboard a night train bound for Uzhorod - the town bordering with Hungary and Slovakia. Having learned the importance of being well-prepared Chris and I stocked up on healthy train snacks like pig lard and potato chips as well as a good supply of beer. I expected I'd be pretty popular with that 3 litre plastic bottle of Ukrainian suds at my side but Andre, our Russian compartment companion, outdid me with his bottle of cognac and bucket of fried chicken. Naturally, the drinking session began only a few moments after the train left the station. Andre called his best friend in from another cabin and the four of us began to down the cognac and carry on general hand-sign-grunt type conversation. The cognac came and went and we quickly started on the beer. My 3 litres quickly disappeared and Andre surprised the whole gang with a large bottle for each of us and quickly bought a second round from the bar. It was already apparent that I wouldn't be going to bed comfortably and early that night. In the bar car Chris insisted once again that we were morally obliged to buy our cohorts booze and I had to spring for another bottle of cognac (which Chris still owes me for). Aside from a flash memory of looking out the window and screaming some nonsense my last memory of the evening was standing between the train cars as Chris and the Russians lit up a joint. Trying to recollect this night makes it clear to me that I've got a touchy relationship with alcohol and need to take it much easier in future. I had blacked out and the next memory I have of that nighttrain was waking up at 6 in the morning with a busted lip and covered in my own vomit and also our compartment itself being covered in my vomit. What a humiliating and terrible situation. After being yelled at by the car manager, having to clean up the vomit and also having to pay a bribe to get myself out of the threat of being arrested (I wasn't going to question the legitimacy of such an action) I fell back asleep for a period. Andre, who I susupect was probably the one who tucked me in with a knuckle sandwich, asked me every few minutes or so, "Alive?" and I would respond "Little" before pinching my fingertips together. These last couple of hours of the train ride were terribly awkward. After our drunkenness, rambunctiousness and my vomiting our compartment companion, a middle-aged babushka, was moved to another compartment but not before I was told-off again by the car manager. Andre was the next to leave and he was off to a business meeting (vomit stains fresh on his pantleg were a fair trade-off for my busted lip I thought). Chris and I were left alone in the compartment with another hour and half to our destination. We locked the door and hoped that there would be no more trouble. We were truly ready to leave Ukraine at this point and Chris spoke of making a run for any border at the earliest possibility. The threat of "police-militia" was still ringing in our ears and I said my goodbyes to Chris and disembarked at Chop, because it was supposedly the best place to head to Hungary as it was right on the border. I admired the socialist realist murals in the train station before walking, hungover and dirty, to the bus station, only to find that no busses crossed into Hungary from there. At this point I boarded a bus for my original destination, Uzhorod. At the bus station in Uzhorod I had discovered that I would have to wait until the next morning before catching a bus to Hungary so I went to a hotel and freshened up before heading out to see the town.

After a night of severe drinking, violence and vomiting it was nice to check into the Hotel Baltika and have a shower in my very own hotel room. Although Uzhorod didn't offer much in the way of excitement or sights it was a worthwhile place to spend my last day in Ukraine. I walked around the typically cute streets of the old town past old abandoned buildings and eventually found my way to the castle. Like everywhere else in Ukraine the neglect of decades was present here as well. Cobblestone paths andd streets were overgrown. The castle itself housed various ancient museum exhibits on the evolution of man, the history of the surrounding region and an extensive exhibition of stuffed animals and fish and lizards soaking in formaldehyde. After making my way out of there and quickly surveying a mock village of traditional Ukrainian houses and churches I made my way back to town. There, were crowds of people hanging out enjoying the weather. I took a bench overlooking the river and watched a group of Gypsy kids run back and forth from the river to the square above and scrounge for cigarettes and change. They'd all run back to the river and smoke their butts (some of them couldn't have been more than 5 or 6) and fight with each other.

At one point I decided to investigate an odd Moorish building on one side of the square. Although beautiful the building was in a state of disrepair and surrounded by fences on all sides so passerbys wouldn't be subject to the falling masonry and bricks that were falling from above. Inside I encountered two old ladies who urged me to go upstairs where a concert was going on. I made my up to the concert hall above and sat down to take in the show. It's interesting that in this part of the world a brass band can fill a concert hall on a hot Wednesday afternoon with no problems at all; the hall was full of enthusiastic music lovers. I quickly realized that the band's repertoire was composed mostly of tv show theme songs and sappy show songs from the 60's and 70's. I can't recall the exact program but "My Way" and the theme from Dallas were certainly in there. The height of the show for myself was the rousing version of Tequila they played and at the end the whole band shouted in unison "TEQUILA!" before exchanging knowing smiles (I can only imagine the weeks of preparation required to realize this glorious moment). That shout of "TEQUILA!" I took as my cue to leave.

I walked out on to the square outside and wandered around town before making my way back to the hotel. I had to catch the bus to Hungary at 5:30 the next morning and planned on taking no chances of missing it.

At the bus station the next morning I struck up a conversation with a guy who had spent time living in Toronto. He was from the Czech republic but had gone to Canada as a refugee and after eight years of living there was refused landed immigrant status. It was odd to be standing at a bus station in some grimy little town in Ukraine listening to someone tell me how he had invested eight years of life into my country and in the end was sent back to his own; Canada seemed so remote, not much more than a concept, that I felt as if I couldn't have counted on it as refuge . He also volunteered the fact that he was illiterate, something he may not have been proud of but seemed to think was important enough to share with me. Seeing as my bus was about to depart I wished the Czech well and climbed aboard to join the ranks of gypsys and marketeers going to sell their goods in Hungary (I forget the name of the town exactly). The atmosphere was jovial and people passed around snacks and shared their thermoses of coffee. The gypsys seemed to be pre-occupied with preparing themselves for Hungarian customs; whisky bottles and cigarette packages were creatively stowed so as to go unnoticed during inspection. One guy took several minutes to pad his shoes with wads of cash and this obviously held the attention of all of those around. As Hungary is part of the EU inspections at the border were an incredibly long affair and we were not long idle after leaving Uzhorod; only a few minutes after leaving town we were parked on a bridge between Hungary and Ukraine. The gypsy men and myself jumped off the bus to have a smoke and watch the river below and at 6 in the morning it was beautiful and fresh outside. I was looking at my travel guide when one of the gypsys asked to look at it and I watched as 3 of them studied it intently; they couldn't read English but struggled to make sense of the words and they obsessed over the maps and pointed out the places they knew. I don't think I've ever seen anyone taken so much by the very act of holding a book and turning its pages - let alone one that they could not read; their enthusiasm was a treat in itself. As we finally approached the customs and immigration checkpoint on the opposite bank of the river one Hungarian Ukrainian guy on the bus grabbed my arm and motioned for me to grab my bags and follow him. It seems he had secured a ride with two guys that were going through customs in a van - apparently the public buses were subject to a great deal of scrutiny and took a long time to get through customs and this guy thought I shouldn't have to experience the longer wait. In any case I made the rest of the trip to Budapest with the Hungarian-Ukrainian, driver Dmitri from Israel and his business partner Andre. They fed me lunch along the way and the best part was I arrived in Budapest hours early and didn't have to pay for the ride.

From here there's not much to tell. Arriving in Budapest almost felt like arriving at an airport. I was tired and simply wanted to get home but I had 4 days to go. My enthusiasm for travelling was pretty much exhausted but over the next few days I took in the Hungarian National Opera (the best possible way to spend 4 dollars that I know of), the Terror Museum and explored the caves under Budapest Castle. I occupied my Saturday by going to Lake Balaton and cooling off at the beach. Other than that I was too tired and it was too hot in Budapest to party or drink. World Cup football matches occupied my evenings and I had one memorable conversation with a French guy (on his way to do volunteer work in Syria) who absolutely insisted that the United States was as bad as the Soviet Union in terms of being a police state and abusing human rights. I didn't pay to much heed to his words - the French are simply contrary and after experiencing the remnants of Soviet style arbitrariness in Moldova and Ukraine I couldn't take him too seriously. Other than that I visited the famous baths again and enjoyed eating and drinking to my gluttonous heart's content... ...... I KNEW IT WAS TIME TO GET BACK TO MY BEAUTIFUL AND WONDERFUL GIRLFRIEND, JESSICA.

It's been couple of months since I've arrived home but that's about as good as I can sum it up. Hope you found the blog interesting.

Odessa>Kiev>Kamyanets-Podilsky>Kiev

Our friend Lana on the right with her best friend Zoia in the Kiev metro.







Chernobyl Museum. Here are photos of the "bio-robots"; the volunteers who were sent in to clean up radioactive debris following the explosion at Chernobyl and died as a result. Many of them died within weeks following their services or else a few years later of cancer and other problems related to their work at the exploded nuclear reactor. We watched a video of this clean-up and these guys were given nothing but useless lead-aprons and rinky-dink shovels to do their job with - it makes you a little sick to see how little regard there was for these lives. Apparently they were offered release from military service if they did one minute of this clean-up - Chris pointed out that at the time going to war in Afghanistan was a likelihood for those in the military.





Big Momma, Rodina Mat (Nation's Mother) - the largest statue in the world which was built along with the Museum of the Great Patriotic War (WW2) in order to commemorate the defense of the Soviet Union.





View from fortress at Kamyanets-Podilsky. I wasn't able to find any information on the circle of stones in the background, although it appears to be some sort of pagan site along the lines of Stonehenge.





Fortress at Kamyanets-Podilsky in Western Ukraine.





This is St.Michael's Monastery in central Kiev. The small chapel on the left survived the demolition of the monastery by the Soviets in the 1930's.





Maydan Nezalezhnosti in Kiev - This is the public square and centre of Kiev where the Orange Revolution protests and mass gatherings were held.





Stalinist architecture in Kiev


The title of this entry gives an idea of where I've been since leaving Odessa. I left on a nighttrain to Kiev after having spent last Wednesday in Odessa exploring it's catacombs with Ilsa and Carey from the hostel. It was pretty wild to see where Soviet partisans had hid out and based their campaign against the Nazi's during WW2. The tunnels still contained such basic things as hospital beds and a kitchen but also wall etchings and paintings that glorified the Soviet Union, and its leaders, while mocking Hitler.

Arriving in Kiev the next morning was exciting and stressful all a once. I was supposed to meet Chris in Kamyanets-Podilsky the next day and it looked as if I would have to board another train that evening. Deciding to make the best of it I left my bag in a locker at the train station and decided to visit few sites in the city. Kiev is famous for its city centre monasteries and I decided to visit two of them: The Caves Monastery and St. Michael's monastery. The Caves is most well-known as a tourist attraction for the mummified monks that are interred there. The bodies are displayed in glass-topped coffins throughout the hand-dug tunnels and though they are wrapped in robes there is the occasional hand or foot sticking out - enough to give one the morbid jollies I suppose.

St. Michael's monastery was interesting for the fact that it had only been rebuilt in the past 12 years or so - it had been completely destroyed by the communists in the 1930's. Before this the monastery had stood since the 1100's and had been one of the oldest constructions in Ukraine. Although the Soviet past is always present in the decayed infrastructure, or the suffocating bureaucracy, such attempts at rebuilding are almost convincing in giving the impression that Soviet excesses had not happened.

For myself this initial taste of Kiev was enough to make me not want to leave it immediately. People are friendly, helpful and curious here and, aside from getting in and out of the metro, the atmosphere here is relaxed and pleasant. Also I simply wanted to hang out and take in the Stalinist architecture, wide boulevards and the metro with it's hammer-and-sickle emblems and bust of Communist leaders. In the end I had to leave and meet Chris in Kamayanets-Podilsky.

Taking the train out of Kiev was a bit stressful. I had ten minutes to take the train and was given the usual tourist treatment at the ticket counter, meaning I was offered only the most expensive ticket. Although pissed off when I realized the diference in cost I ended up sleeping like a baby on the train as I had a whole cabin to myself; needless to say I woke up feeling refreshed in Kamyanets-Podilsky.

Waiting in line for the bus to town I asked a girl if she spoke English and could help me find the bus I needed. Lana, it turned out not only gave me directions but was kind enough to walk around with me to help me find a hotel and also negotiate the price. She was in town to meet some of her profs but offered to hang out and show me around town. Chris arrived later that afernoon and the three of use went for dinner and drinks in the evening. At the restaurant we were overheard speaking English by Andre and his girlfriend, Olga, who invited us to drink vodka with them. Although memories of Tiraspol seemed still fresh in our minds Chris and I agreed a shot wouldn't hurt. Over the next hour or more Chris, Andre and I did shot of vodka and made petty conversation with Lana as translator. What's funny is that in this region people are often more than willing to offer you drinks for hours on end - often expecting the equivalent in return at some point - but they don't mind drinking with someone who is effectively mute. It's interesting that foreigners are sometimes such an attraction that sitting in silence and drinking with them is still considered to be interesting.

After viewing the famous fortress of Kamyanets-Podilsky, and missing out on the canyon that surrounds it, Chris and I decided to join Lana who was going back to Kiev where's she from. Hanging out in the capital with a local was enough reason to head back East. We caught an express train the next day and arrived in Kiev later that evening. Outside the train station Chris and I were able to find an apartment for rent from one of the babushkas hanging out there. We agreed on a price and showed up to the apartment content that we'd found a good deal. Unfortunately the next day we discovered that there was no hot water causing relations between Chris and I to disintegrate as he was content to do without the hot water. We ended up at a real rip-off of a youth hostel yesterday but as we're leaving Kiev today our quarrels over accomodation are over.

In the meantime Kiev has been great. We've visited the Caves Monastery again. On Sunday we visited the WW2 Museum where we saw recovered Nazi artifacts (such as boots and gloves made out of human skin) and the tallest statue on Earth, Rodina Mat. Outside of that, eating good Ukrainian food, hanging out with Lana and her friends, watching World Cup football with thousands of Ukrainians in the street and checking out Kiev's nightlife have been some of the highlights of our visit here. What's nice about this place is that it's a real gem and the locals are not yet jaded by tourism - they find out you're from Canada and the response 9 times out of 10 is genuine enthusiasm and curiousity. I can't help but feel a bit of regret that I'm not staying longer.

For moms sake

Hi everybody,

So I ve been getting alot of negative feedback regarding my non-involvement in this blog project. Really, I don t have any excuses, apart for lazyness, and a general sens of nonchalence.

Well as everybody knows by now, Steve and I have been spinning round east-central Europe for the better part of spring. My trip started a bit before s Steves, so here's the jazz for the first 3 weeks:

I got off the plane in Vienna, and rushed down to Bratislava in order to be in the Warsaw Pact countries as soon as possible. I hooked up with a friend of a friend from Uni (Thanks Marcel) and Crashed at his lovely soviet estate.

Me and Pavol quickly became friends, and in no time at all, I was introduced to a whole group of friendly Slovaks that took me round town for a few drinks. After recovering from Jet lag and one of the worst hangover of my life, I headed for the Tata montains. After being assured that it was ok to speed on the highways in Slovakia ( 160 km\h will only get you a 10 dollars fine) I strapped on my imaginary seatbelt and rushed to one of the most aw inspiring scenary I ever had the chance to see.

After a few shots of Vodka, my gear on my back, we proceded to climb up the more then 2 km strech of montain. It was one o'clock in the morning. Got up, prayed a non-existent deity, bursted into nervous laughs, and, of course, drank more vodka!

The people I know may not actually believe this, but this was all part of a rafting trip. Its amazing how being overseas effects your psyche. Anyway, I did fall in the water a few time, got yelled at in Slovak and ended up in a local village pub, alll eyes watching me, as I was offered the traditional food of the place. Now, I m pretty open minded when it comes too food, but for some reason I just coudnt handle this potatoe purree mixed in with goat cheese and bacon.

I left for Gyor, a little Hungarian town were I was put up in a University dormitory. It was mixed, and as soon as people heard my english, they wanted to know where I was from, what was I doing here, what were my plans. The people in Gyor were probably some of the friendliest "strangers" I meant in my journey. They showed me the town and invited me to one awsome riverside party.

I stayed a few days in Budapest before the arrival of Steve. I longed arround the city and explored its museams. Learned alot about my Hungarian heritage. The scariest of all was the terror museam, were I shaw first hand the horrors of the Soviet regime. I hooked up with some interesting characters, had some fun and slept in alot.

And then Steve arrived, and the rest, as they say, is history...

The Odessa File

Typical beautiful architecture of Odessa





Wall etchings from Soviet partisans in the Odessa catacombs






Lone Fisherman Off the Pier At Arkadia, Odessa





So, about Odessa. Getting there ended up being another Transdniestr adventure. You see the bus from Chisinau to Odessa goes directly through everyone's favourite unrecognized state. Anyway, getting in was fine - a small fee for the visa and otherwise smiles and handshakes all around. Leaving Transdniestr going into Ukraine was another affair altogether. I should have expected it but being the only Westerner on the bus I was naturally singled out for extra attention. Brought into an office and sat down it was explained to me through a series of gestures and grunts and the word "problem" that I was supposed to have "closed" my Moldovan visa in Chisinau, showing that I had left Moldova. How I was supposed to have done this when I remained in the country I don't know. Also I pointed out that this shouldn't have mattered as I had already been allowed into Transdniestr and that the Moldovan visa was now no-one's concern. Point is though there's no reasoning with the mafia. So $15 worth of Serbian dinars as a "donation" to the Transdniestr border guards foreign currency collection and I was free to leave.

Once in Odessa I searched the centre for an internet cafe to find the hostel Chris was staying at. It was already dark and the strangest thing happened when a kid riding a horse appeared out of nowhere - just clip-clopping down the sidewalk slowly. I don't know how to explain it but it was like something out of time. For me this sort of defines the atmosphere in Odessa. Sort of lonely and romantic, there's a lot going on but there remains a quietness about the place. In fact it seemed really akin to Montreal - the water, the beautiful buildings that need a fix-up, the second city of former glory type of place. Also, you get the impression that Odessians feel independent of other places, a lot like Montrealers - it's a bubble of sorts.

Eventually I found the hostel. I was greeted at the door by Carey, an Australian expat who was in the midst of opening Odessa's first hostel with his brother. These two guys were classic Australian dudes, easygoing, friendly and straight-on about everything. Because the renovations weren't finished Carey basically let Chris and I stay there for free. It was a great base to explore Odessa from and Carey, Todd and the staff, Ilsa and Katya were fun to hang out with as well.

Because Chris and I had been out of touch over the weekend he had already made plans to go to Lviv so he took off the second night I was there. I decided to hang out and see a little of the city at least. The hang-out, beach area of Arkadia was my favourite of all Odessa's neighbourhoods. I was there in the middle of the day but the clubs and bars were opening up and getting ready for the coming evening. Carnival-type fun games were all over the place as well fast food joints. All of this lent Arkadia a certain kitch and made it appreciable. What's important about Arkadia though is the water, the Black Sea. Once past all of the touristy shit things changed completely - kids were hanging out swimming and having dive contests off the end of one of the piers, couples and groups of friends sipped on beers and talked while dog owners played with their pets in the water. This seemed like something realy genuine and uniquely Odessan. I headed out to the end of one of the piers to sit down and relax and have a beer of my own. My only company was two old couples that were fishing and a single fisherman who had somehow gotten himself out to a concrete block in the middle of the water. There were a few drops of rain here and there but everyone seemed content and quiet, there were even restaurant staff that had come out to the pier on their breaks to see how it went with the old fishing couples. Although central Odessa is beautiful and not to be missed I think hanging out on a pier in Arkadia is as good as it gets.

Down Home in Vulcanesti

Vulcanesti, Moldova





Our friends Matt and Erin in Vulcanesti.



On our last night in Chisinau Chris and I became acquainted with a group of American Peace Corps volunteers based in Moldova. One volunteer, Chad, overheard Chris and I talking loudly in English and invited us over to join his group of friends. It was refreshing to hang out with people who spoke the same language, were articulate and well-informed but also understood our experiences travelling in Moldova. At the end of the evening Matt invited Chris and I down to his assigned village, Vulcanesti, in the southern Gagauz region of Moldova. Following our visit to Transdniestr Matt's place seemed the perfect respite. Over the next three nights we relaxed in Vulncanesti with Matt, Andy and Mattš girlfriend Erin, eating and drinking to our heart's content. Vulcanesti may not be the greatest of tourist destinations but I won't forget the Russian karaoke, the great food nor the farm animals that roam the town and it's surroundings. I remember feeling as if any negative feelings that I'd developed towards Moldova (following being arrested in Chisinau) dissolved the moment we entered into open pasture only minutes from the town centre. Such a beautiful country and the people here seemed so close to it in the way they lived, by working the land and raising their animals.

Chris had decided that either way he was going to Odessa whereas I was undecided until Friday - I was thinking it would be more attractive to head directly to Romania. After thinking it over I decided that I would regret it if I did not see Odessa as well; in my case though I decided to go via Chisinau. On Saturday I headed to Chisinau while Chris crossed the Ukrainian border. It turned out later on that Chris foolishly had not anticipated having to enter the country he just left (Moldova) in order to travel from one point in Ukraine to another (Odessa). Basically, he left Moldova and had to re-enter it at another point in order to get to Odessa, but without a re-entry visa he was held up at the border for 6 hours. In the meantime I was having drinks and playing pool with Peace Corps volunteers in Chisinau. I had met up with our friend Andy and his friend Casey who I spent the evening hanging out with. Andy split at one point so Casey, myself and two other Peace Corpsers, Nicole and Mona, hung out at a Syrian restaurant bar. As if we needed more alcohol Casey won a bottle of Kvint Cognac. Our livers were already sodden with alcohol and Casey had decided the appropriate thing was to donate the cognac to charity. Eventually the girls departed so Casey and I chose to split a hotel room. An hour later we were settled comfortably into a hotel room watching a Chuck Norris film on the tele. Chuck Norris apparently is partially Moldovan descended and people here often cary icons of him. There are also plans to erect a statue of Chuck in one of Chisinau's central city parks.

Having said my goodbye to Moldova I boarded the bus to Odessa on Sunday morning. I'll leave details of that adventrue for the next update.

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.

Still Alive and in Chisinau, Moldova

One complete day of travel from Sofia we brought us to Chisinau, Moldova, last Friday the 2nd. After checking into the wonderfully decrepit Soviet-era "Hotel Turist" we decided to familiarise ourselves with the city. Full of parks, cafes and restaurants Chisinau seemed the most relaxed of the any of the cities we'd visited so far on our trip;in fact, it's a little hard to believe over 800,000 people live there. Wandering around all day we ended up at a cafe where after asking for help with a menu a group of Moldovan Russians invited us to hang out with them and one of them, Natasha, invited us to the club where she works as a dishwasher: "Military Pub". We jumped on a bus with her and headed directly to the club. The place had a tank in the middle of the dance floor and soviet type paraphernalia all over the place. Chris and I hung out with Natasha, and drank a pile of beers before the mid-evening show: the Soviet national anthem followed by a weird cabaret featuring three fat girls in uniform dancing while the audience laughed and cheered. Chris and I wondered what the deal was: were these three fat girls dancing because no one here is fat and fat is sexy OR was everyone laughing at them?. Turns out they are paid to wear uniforms and dance a burlesque routine so everyone can have a chuckle at them -I don't know what this says about Moldovan society but it was pretty friggin strange.

On Saturday we rented an apartment as it costs the equivalent of a hotel and was much more comfortable while affording us the opportunity to see how the locals live. I passed the day doing nothing and resting up but on Sunday Chris cooked a meal and invited our new Moldovan friends, Natasha and Rigina, over. We hung out, ate, drank and talked before heading out for a walk. Not 10 minutes after we left the house a group of Chisinau's finest accosted us on the street demanding our passports. Not being accustomed to living in a police state, nor bringing travel documents with us whenever we left the house, Chris and I didn't have our passports on us. We all argued with the police saying we could get our documents if only they'd let us go back to the apartment but they insisted we follow them to the police station. For the next hour or more we sat there as these corrupt cops yelled at us, yelled at our friends and threatened them before the pig in charge suggested we could give them some money and we'd all be allowed to leave. Chris handed over a couple of hundred lei (16 dollars maybe) and we all walked out worse for the wear. Unfortunately this sort of shit could have been avoided if cooler wiser heads had prevailed but the end result is Moldova seemed pretty ugly all of a sudden.

Food, Drink and Conversation with Sofia

It's been a few days since I've properly updated the blog but here are a few photos from Sofia, Bulgaria. After arriving with Igor and Petya we spent a short 3 nights here. Bulgarians thought we were pretty lame for spending such a short time in their country but Chris and I were eager to get back "on track" so to speak and head towards our original destinations: Moldova and Romania. Sofia was very cool though. The city itself is attractive and not too big so it's easily managed on foot. In terms of sightseeing though we didn't indulge too much. We took the attitude "people make the place" and were content to spend time with Igor, Petya and their friends as well as chatting with any other locals we ran into. Food, drink and conversation was enough to occupy us here and we had a great time.





Our favourite Bulgarian couple, Igor and Petya. They're the coolest people in Bulgaria so we count ourselves pretty lucky to have made friends with them.





Typical suburban apartment blocks from the Communist era with Mt. Vitosha in the background. The city centre is only 12 kms from it's 2200 metre peak. I took this photo from our friend Galina's balcony.





The centre of Sofia is full of these little courtyards and spaces behind buildings. Overgrown and unkempt they provide a little break from the routine cityscape.





Decaying Socialist Realist sculpture in central Sofia.