Niet Christmas trees on the Metro!

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Having managed to enjoy the dramatic Romania scenery, see more castles than you could poke a stick at and have my photo taken with Dracula (I paid 10c for the privilege), the closest I came to vampires were the bedbugs that gave me little bitey track-marks.
Short of rubbing myself with garlic (sexy) or whittling 1000 little stakes - I moved hostel. But eventually the green pine-covered mountains and the stories of the backpackers who, failing to find the danger and adventure they were hoping for made up stories about wolves and bears, became too much for me, and I decided to go to Moldova.

The only reference I had to Moldova was Tony Hawks 'Playing the Moldovans at Tennis' - and the 2 factsI could remember were that it was dangerous to walk around at night due to the lack of street lighting and the fact that they had melted down all their manhole-covers to make other useful metal implements.
He was right about one of those. They don't do street lighting in Moldova. Following a 6 hour bus ride, and 6 hours of the Ukrainian version of Prision Break, we crossed the border at 3am leaving behind a lady who didn't have the correct paperwork for the 2 children she was travelling with - though why she would want to smuggle children INTO Moldova is beyond me - directly into pitch blackness. The funnest bit about the dark was the road (not very well maintained) and the horses and carts which I only realised were driverless when they veered into the path of the bus (the drivers were asleep in the back of the cart, which was probably safer).
I had no expectations of Chisinau, and was happy to have all of them fulfilled. True, its never going to be a major tourist destination - listing the post office and the train station as 2 of the top 3 impressive buildings in town, but they do have some lovely parks and an extra large park where the lake should have been. It is entirely possible that their economy is in trouble due to the fact that the women spend ALL their money on clothes, shoes and accessories - but there must be more to it??
It was great to be in a place where there was nothing to do except read in the park and eat Icecream, but Ukraine was calling!

Leaving Moldova was a lot more difficult than arriving. Getting on the wrong train was merely the beginning, I was heading to St Petersberg (rather than the Moscow train) and right bang smack through Transnistria. They kicked me off the train - its never nice to see the conductor of the departing train pointing you out to his colleagues and laughing maniacally - and I managed to get into the correct train/car and bed!
I'm the first one to say that my passport looks like a forgery - but I'd rather that the Moldovan border guard didn't agree with me. He was very excited to find a possible arrest, but when he started throwing out words like 'terrorista', I got a little worried. He checked every page in my passport with his little spy-glass and tried to peel off my Russian visa while I tried to explain that Great Britain and Northern Ireland were one country, and that I wasn't from the Ireland part. His superior (more gold on the uniform) came in and took one look at my passport, stamped it and berated the other guard for holding up the train!

Ah Ukraine!
So friendly, so welcoming and after Turkey - so many random rules. e.g. NO Xmas trees on the metro, or NO balloons in the park. There are even signs that warn you that you may be hit by a car crossing the road. 😊
I had a great time in Kiev, though I was sad to find that Chicken Kiev was a dish made up by a French Chef for Americans, and they don't actually serve it in Kiev (had it in Lviv though which made me happier than you could imagine).
They love their monuments to everything, and have spectacular architecture - made more spectacular when you've had a glass or two of the $2 a bottle vodka! I managed to get to their 62m statue of 'madre' which is apparently labelled 'tin-tits' by the expats, though I think Lonely Planet made that up!

Lviv (in the East) is more laid back and also lovely. I think everyone comes here to get married as the whole town carries flowers and is dressed to the nines (even more so than usual) - and they all troop around the major sites to have their photos taken.
The women even look like they walked out of a magazine after 4 hours sleep on an overnight train - whereas I looked like crap... no competition.

I'm heading to Poland - I've got 2 weeks to get to St Petersberg and I'm desperately trying to teach myself Cyrillic.

KTx

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Comments

[Flic]

russian phrases...
I'll have to dig up my notes from when Mick was teaching me Russian at uni... there are some phrases I KNOW you'll find handy (and which you won't find in any phrase book!) :) Flic