Stuff around Bucharest and Sinaia

I have to admit, it's pretty charming walking around Bucharest.  The buildings are full of character.

But the traffic sucks balls.  I have zero idea when I can cross the road or how cars know when to turn.  It's a scary place!

 

They also really really like graffiti.  It's such as shame because these buildings are often so cool.  Many of them are in need of some large repairs though.  People have told me there are sometimes accidents when parts of the old buildings (awnings etc) fall on people.

Below:  some advertisements I saw in town.

Oh boy, I laughed when I saw this. Perfect.

This one takes the cake.  What is more sexy than popping a squat while naked with a billboard in front of you.  SO AWKWARD.

Anyways I took a train ride to a town called Sinaia this weekend.  In the train station:

Lots of pretzel food and people selling junk.  Not pictured:  Tons of homeless people :(

You can buy all this liqueur before you jump on the train.  Who doesn't want to get wasted on a train ride?  (Me)

The train!  It was a very comfortable ride.  The trains are quite smooth and the seats comfy.  Only problem is the signage at stops is terrible and they don't announce what station you are at.

Ok some guy came by and put like a keychain and a flashlight down.  And I was like this guy who's sitting with us has some weird shit.  Then he just started pulling out more and more crap and I was like "ooooohh ok I get it haha", also get your shit off my table! :P

Sinaia was really interesting.  All the houses and hotels were really old buildings. 

We took three gondolas up to the top of the mountain.  There were herding dogs and goats and sheep around, and they were playing yodelling music in the restaurant.

There's the town!

At the peak there's an area where tons of people spelled out things in rocks.  Over time, people have borrowed rocks from other peoples words and some of the rocks were getting covered by grass and moss.  I couldn't really make out much of what any of these were saying other than a couple names.

At the bottom we visited around the markets which were by the castle Pelas, Pelias  not sure of exact spelling.  Tons of weird tourist crap.  Like not what you would expect.  Lots of Dracula stuff I was expecting.  Hannah Montana items and plastic guns I was not expecting.  It's like they had some obsession with Hannah Montana.  There was shirts, Hannah Montana Monopoly, Bouncy balls, hats, slippers.  So strange and not at all appealing.  I left empty handed.

Lots of Dracula items.  The other thing I saw in abundance below....

......

Hey, what's more Romanian than a topless gnome? 

(If you want to be mentally scarred - topless gnome on left middle of picture)



Things about Romania

Romania.  National pass times:  Smoking and Drinking

Smoking inside?  Hell yes.  How about when I'm shopping, is that ok?  A: Of course!  How about in a restaurant?  A: Yep!  Next to small children? A: YES, in fact, its recommended that you hold many babies while also smoking.  It's for their health, and it helps them get electrolytes.  It's science.

When is the correct time to have a drink?  A: When is it NOT a good time to drink?  Anytime you are awake you may drink.  Have some wine with your toast at breakfast, have a shot with your sandwich at lunch.  Studies show that drinking is just plan good for you, so do it often and heavily. 

What about fashion, what should I wear? A: If you are a woman, anything goes.  You can wear skirts, dresses, pants, shorts whatever.  One caveat:  If you wear a dress make sure its as low as possible and your cleavage is showing as much as possible.  Also skip wearing a bra.  If you choose to wear white, make sure your underwear is either bright white or a colour that will show through.  See through clothes are really in right now, and everyone wants to know what kind of bra you have on.
What about my boyfriend, what should he wear?  A: Good question!  I haven't forgotten about all the guys out there.  Men have a lot of choices as well.  Jeans can be any colour but must be as tight as possible.  He should not be able to get his wallet out without standing up and digging for it.  These are the rules.  Also, ensure your man has some white clothes too.  They should also be see through, we're going for equality here, people!

On a serious note, people sometimes dress a little weird here.  I have also learned that there is NO shame in their game.  See through top?  Not embarrassed.  See through pants?  SO WHAT.  Taking off your top and laying in the grass if you are a woman?  YES, do your thang!  Hundreds of people passing over you on a gondola on a mountain side?   Take off everything but your thong, they need to see this. 

Other things Romanians have no shame over:  Making out in public.  I'm seriously weirded out by how many people of any age range I've seen just going to town on each other.  Park benches, subways, restaurants, buses, you name it.  And its not just teenagers, we saw a 40ish year old couple on a bus just giving it.  It was obscene. 

Probably hand in hand with this is the sex shops.  They are literally on every block.  There is even one in the mall...IN THE MALL!  Oh I'm just going to pick up some T-shirts, groceries and butt plugs, no biggie.

Subtlety:  You don't has it.

Ok rant over. Really though, it has been fun to visit and see the country. They really like to eat a LOT of meat and cheese so that's been working out for me. They don't eat veggies unless its pickled and the coffees are tiny and horrible, so that has not worked out for me. 

Now for some food I ate:

 Grilled cheese on right.  Deep fried olives, cheese balls, sausage, mushrooms, zucchini, chicken on left.  This was an appetiser!  I don't even like olives but I really enjoyed this meal.

Peasant style rice (mushrooms, carrots, dill), and pork schnitzel covered in gravy and mushrooms, AKA Joels nightmare food.

Beef with cooked apples and tomato with a cream sauce.  Looked good but I didn't eat it.

EVERY KIND OF MEAT.  Pork, ribs, sausage (of course), chicken and polenta.  This place also served a "Meter of Beer" which is a plank that is a meter long and they put beer mugs on it.  That's how much beer you get.  They also had a "Wheel of beer" but weren't serving it that night.

My fave: Spinach Risotto, lots of parmesan and a pink cocktail.

Too bright to see the peasant style potatoes on the left.  In the center is the "House Special" I got in Sinaia.  It turned out to be beef meatballs with pork bits and cheese inside.  Way too oily/heavy for me.





Good food - bad taxi's

Having a pretty good time so far, the city doesn't have too much to do during the day.  The malls are not as impressive as Vancouver's and there isn't a lot close by to visit.  Ive seem some pretty amazing buildings in my walks and taxi rides though so I do have a sense that I have seen a good deal of what is around. 

The best thing about Bucharest is probably the food.  The staple food of Romania is meat.  Meat and cheese.  Lots of it.  Their favourite is pork, pork in large amounts.  Like you can order a whole pig leg.  They also have a lot of gelatinous pork meat things which I'm not eating.  They look like head cheese, and since I don't want to eat pure fat I keep skipping that.  Another food item they really seem to like is pickles.  The pickles here are so awesome and they also pickle other items as well.  The veggie they seem most fond of is pickled cabbage which I only liked at one place where it was cabbage, vinegar and dill.  The other traditional side is polenta.  They make it less like corn bread and more like gruel.  It's ok, it doesn't have a taste really.

So I have had some bad luck with taxi's in Bucharest.  Somehow I am the only one getting all the bad ones, or I'm just good at complaining.  Coming back from Athens, one of my travel partners accepted a taxi ride for us from a totally non-legit guy just hanging around.  Then we go to get into the cab and its like somewhere in the parking garage and its just a yellow car that he put a decal on.  Thankfully we knew he was taking us the right direction and wasn't going to murder us.  Most of my other cab experiences have been "K+K Hotel, mersi" or "Sema Park" and the guy waving me away or saying no.  That or I get in, its like 34 out and the guy rolls up all the windows and tries to boil me to death.  Other options include smoking while I am in the cab, and calling everyone they know and having a rant for 20 mins.  I seriously can't even imagine having a rant while driving someone or even having that many people to call.  Its really weird.  Maybe its because the cabs are so cheap so they don't give a shit.  It costs about 3 or 4 dollars Canadian to get from my hotel to work (10-12 Lei).  I try to walk through town if I can because I have seen some interesting stuff.  They seem very fond of graffiti in Bucharest and Greece, and there are lots of stray dogs in both places.  They also seem to hate these stray dogs.  I saw one suring one of my walks and he wagged his tail at me and we totally had a moment.  I was like "You are a good dog, I can totally tell" and he was like "Save me from this oppression" or "Woof".  Anyways I guess I shouldn't take any of them home, I don't have enough room for all the dogs I have found.

Athens!

I had an amazing weekend in Athens, Greece.  So awesome, and I feel like we saw everything in two days.

The hotel was in a great location on a side street of the shopping area and close enough to walk to the Parliament buildings, Acropolis, museums etc.

The hotel we chose was in a great spot and was really cheap

Pretty standard, but air con not really working :(

Bathroom with zero clearance to the toilet so that was fun.  Bonus is that it had a shower with a tub rather than the tiny cramped euro showers that were in the other rooms.

Annnddd theres the view from my deck.

On the street: SO MANY SHOES!  All the stores were set up with huge display windows and all the shoes just right out front.  You have to go into some basement to try them on.  Very odd.

We took a day tour and went to the highest point in Athens.  So pretty from here!

Joel this ones for you, a car covered in sap and branches and flowers.  This dude will never see out of the windows.  On that note, in both Romania and Greece I think you cannot avoid denting the shit out of your car.  Most were missing mirrors as well.  Smart cars for everyone!

We went to the Parliament building and saw the changing of the guard.  This guy was in 35 degree weather still as stone.  Another guards job was to bring water and wipe his forehead.  Wool socks in the summer is so not in fashion, dude!

In front of one of the Olympic stadiums.  This one was restored and then used for realz.

Another view of some ruins.

We went to the seaside to see some modern Athens stuff.  The yachts here were insane.  You could put all your friends and family on it.

This one was so big it had jet skis and a boat in it.  So James Bond of them.

Back to the ruins!

We wandered around all the ruins on the bottom of the hill in town and then made our way up!

Looks so high up!

Oh also there are turtles around, this one was just chilling and having a drink.  Apparently there were also snakes somewhere but I didn't see any.

There was a small museum on the hill as well.  Tons of statues and pottery inside.

`Hey guys, what`s up`

Made it near the top

We were so lucky to get up here before all the tourists.  Perfect timing

Such amazing views, but lets be real...The architecture in Greece is all the same.  Its like one dude made everything. ``Uhh ok lots of columns, and throw some naked man statues in for good measure``

This is what the weird McDonalds burger is in Greece.  In Romania its a bunch of sausages on a bun.

After all the sightseeing I was ready for some mega shopping.  WRONG!  Apparently all stores are CLOSED ON SUNDAYS WTF NOooOOOo.  No shoes for Jenni :(