For some reason, we got it in our heads that we wanted to go to Romania while we were here in Bulgaria because it's only a couple hour drive away from our port. Lindsay, Liz, Paul, Aeriale and I got up this morning, ate breakfast, met at the gangway, and headed out to the port. We talked to one of the first cab drivers we saw and when we said we wanted to go to Romania he laughed. Then another cab driver came up and said, "I take you to Romania" After working out some of the specifics, we had a cab ride to and from the Romanian border for 80 lv a piece. I wasn't really sure what we were getting ourselves into and I later found out that we weren't even supposed to be going to Romania. I was under the impression that it was one of the countries that we were allowed to go to while we were there, but apparently not. Whoops.
We climbed in this cab and headed for about a 2 hour drive through farm land to the Romanian border. It literally made me think I was at home while we were driving along because of all of the corn fields and there were also a bunch of sunflower fields. As we went, we also saw a number of wind power wheels and apparently a lot of prostitutes as well. I was sleeping for that part though. We pulled up to the border and our driver went and talked to this large man sitting in a shady, filthy white van. Our driver came back to us and said, "I get you ride to Constanta, I come along too." We were a little confused at first, but then the large van driver came up to us and began speaking either Romanian or Bulgarian (it made no difference to us) and none of us got a word he was saying. Eventually we worked out the logistics and we had a ride to Constanta for 20 lv a piece. We hopped in this old white van and as soon as we sat down tons of flies swarmed at us. We all kind of looked at each other and gave a little shriek as we batted them away. Then the driver looked in at us and said something and then took a rag and started swatting wanting us to imitate him. So we sat and swatted flies as we drove through Romania. I think it was a little over an hour to Constanta, but I really couldn't tell you in all honesty. We didn't see very many exciting things along the way. We first entered a town called Veme Veche (I think) and drove through it, then the next one was Mangalia, and finally we reached Constanta. The entire way there, we couldn't help but invent horror scenarios in our heads and laugh as inconspicuously as possible at our current situation. While we were sitting at the border getting our passports stamped, Paul kind of addressed the problem we were all trying to not think about in our minds, he said, "Liz, if I tell you to run at any point in time in this trip, you open the door and all of you get out of here. I have my phone and I'll be fine...seriously...If I tell you, all of you go" This was seriously the last thing I wanted to hear as we were entering yet another foreign country, but well, at least someone was man enough to talk about it. Fortunately we never had to use that tactic.
I was praying for a good part of the trip that we didn't make a horrible mistake and that God would take care of us and as I looked at his rearview mirror, I noticed a little blue cross hanging from it and I took that as a good sign through all of the bad things that we figured could result from this. I was kind of shocked at the state of Romania. I thought that Bulgaria was bad off, Romania was ten times worse. The exchange rate between the Bulgarian leva and the US dollar is $1.40, but the exchange rate between the Romanian lei and the US dollar was close to $3. Romania is also not a part of the EU. You could tell that a lot of the people there lived in poverty as we drove along the highway to Constanta. It was a very sad sight, but not even close to how bad some countries are I'm sure. Not very far down the highway, our shady white van got pulled over by the police. We were all really nervous because we were confused and we all felt around for seat belts but found none. Our driver was out talking to them and he eventually got back in and we were on the road again. Although when he tried to get going again his gear shift seemed to keep sticking and he would keep hitting it. I must say, I couldn't believe that I was in that current situation.
We had our driver drop us off at a restaurant and we established a meeting time to be back at the van. We ate at this restaurant where I had an amazing calzone. They offered a lot of Italian foods and even though I have no idea what a Romanian dish would be, I didn't see many of them. We had a nice, relaxing lunch and went to wander around Constanta. We went to a little shopping area that was pretty much deserted which we found odd for a Saturday afternoon. We realized that it was pretty much a beach town and that probably most people were at the beach. We were all searching for some souvenir shops to prove to people that we were actually there and we found nothing but some great soft serve ice cream. It was so silky and reminded me more of mousse than ice cream. Compared to the Turkish ice cream we ate a few times, Romanian ice cream was heavenly. After we wandered around for awhile we went to a look out over the sea and the beaches. We stood there for awhile and then decided we'd go try and find our driver to see if he could take us to some touristy souvenir shops. The van and taxi drivers were sitting at the van and when we asked about souvenir shops the van driver took us to one, but it was closed.
Then he somehow communicated to us that he could take us to Mangalia and find some souvenirs there, so we were off again heading back in the direction we needed to go. As we were going there, a few times we thought we were going to hit humans either on bikes or pedestrians and Paul was attacked by even more flies. Only this time, the flies were actually Aeriale tickling him with her passport as he was laying his head down trying to sleep. That was our entertainment for about 45 minutes as we went to Mangalia. We were in this hot, non-air conditioned van, with flies swarming at us by the dozens, not knowing where exactly our driver was taking us or if this trip was even legit whatsoever. He turned off the main highway and headed down some random road. I got a little nervous, but then we pulled up to a place that was kind of like a mini bazaar in a place named, "Neptune". We got out and started walking around to find no other tourists but ourselves there and the only other people were those tending their little stands. We stopped at a couple but very nothing even close to what we were looking for. Finally we stopped at one that had post cards and I found one that said Constanta and Paul and Lindsay bought some random things because we felt so badly for the woman running the place. I bought a couple of magnets and we did what we could to contribute to them. Then we went to another woman's shop and bought a couple of bracelets. Everything was so cheap and I realized that I spent about $10 total for a decent amount of stuff. I bought two really pretty wood bracelets that were carved and painted and then I bought a wooden pencil holder from another woman. If I would've had more money I would've bought the matching vase, but I ran out of lei by that time.
Aeriale was in search of a flag and was unable to find one there, so we asked the driver to make one more stop actually in Mangalia instead of wherever we were. He seemed as though he was getting a little frustrated with us, but he complied to our wishes. We stopped in town, but everything seemed to be closed and we knew we couldn't take any more of his time, so we got enough money out to pay him and went back to our shady white, fly infested ride. When we got back Liz handed us little pretzel things that have been very popular in Turkey and Bulgaria. Apparently our driver bought us snacks! I knew he was a nice guy! We sat and ate them as we headed back to the border and joked about how they were probably drugged and that we were going to get human trafficked (which is really not something to joke about at all in reality...). When we got back into Bulgaria, we got some pictures in front of our shady white ride with our drivers and then got back in our little yellow taxi to come back to Varna. Needless to say, both drivers were incredibly nice men and we were lucky that we got people that were kind and gave us pretty decent rates.
Our trip to Romania was interesting to say the least, and like Montengro we now have another interesting story about hiring yet another shady white van to get there. It wasn't what we found in Romania, it was the adventure. We all commented on how our parents would probably kill us if they knew what we were doing and even though I felt as though this might not be the best idea in the world, I really didn't feel unsafe with our drivers. The van driver may not have been such a good driver...almost hitting people and getting pulled over, potentially for speeding, but they were very kind nonetheless. We have had some crazy adventures so far and I think it may only get more interesting as we go. By this time, I've been to 8 different countries on my voyage when I only bargained for 8. Life's too short to worry about jumping into shady white vans with creepy men...might as well live it up while we still have the chance!
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