Romania: Good food, cheap beer, plenty of nice things to see and do, chain smokers, and stray dogs


Hey guys!

Well, this is my last day in Sibiu. Tomorrow morning, I'm catching a train back to Bucharest, where I will leave Romania for Bulgaria the following morning. It's been an interesting ride, for sure. Though there were some unexpected surprises along the way (it wouldn't be a trip otherwise), and not always of the positive kind.

Everything started rather well. Flew on an Air France A-380 Airbus, the largest commercial airplane in the world. There were no delays, and I arrived in Bucharest on time. My luggage landed with me, which was a relief. Made my way to the Midland Hostel without a glitch by catching a ride on the 783 bus from the airport. Had my first taste of delicious Romanian food at La Mama that first night. Also tasted two different Romanian beers, and at those prices I knew I'd be drinking plenty more of it!

Though the forecast was for rain, it only rained at night for the three days I was there. That second day, Alina, a girl I met on Couchsurfing, picked me up and drove us to a nearby village where we had a splendid traditional meal at some of her friends' house. We had a great time. The following afternoon, she took me on an "alternative" city tour that showed me all those places you never read about in the brochures. It was a day-long tour punctuated with beer stops instead of pit stops! All in all, I left Bucharest with a big smile on my face.

Arrived in Brasov and it was even more beautiful than I expected. Sunny and warm, it was a wonderful day as I made my way to the very nice little hostel called Jugend Stube. For a ridiculously low price, they actually cook breakfast for you every morning and you get a free beer every day. Can't beat that!

For 15 euro each, the owner, Alex, took me and three other guests on a day-long castle tour of the region. Our first stop was at the gorgeous Peles Castle in Sinaia. After lunch, we headed out to the Rasnov fortress, where my trip would take a turn for the worse. . . I was walking with a Brazilian guy named Lucas, on our way back down to meet up with the others. Out of nowhere, a stray dog attacks me from behind, bitting my calf, and then leaves. Taken by surprise, I shouted and then saw the blood. In case you didn't know Romania and Thailand are two of the absolute worst places in the world for errant dogs. The state does nothing about them, so they roam everywhere as they please. As a result, rabies is commonplace. . .

Of course, there was no first aid kit at the fortress. Not surprising, as any Romanians will tell you. They are very cynical about the fact that nothing quite works as it should in their country (gotta love them for that). That humorous trait was kind of lost on me at that moment, however, because I was in pain and leaking blood to boot. One of the shopkeepers poured some water on the wound, while another who spoke French couldn't stop apologizing for what had happened. A security guard returned with what I first thought to be disinfectant, only to realize that it was a bottle of Windex!!! Are you fucking kidding me!?! I would have paid a lot of money to see the look on my face as the guy sprayed window cleaner on my calf!

So they put plasters on it and we were on our way down back toward the parking. In North America, I could have made a bundle with a lawsuit for this. But in Romania, you get apologies and window cleaner on your leg. . .

Alex took me to the local hospital. Of course, they didn't have the injections required, but they did disinfect the wound, stopped the bleeding, and patched me up good. The pain wasn't bad and I didn't want to spoil everyone's afternoon, so I insisted that we all visit Bran Castle (Dracula's digs) before returning to Brasov. And we did.

So back in Brasov, Alex drove me to the hospital, where I finally received treatments. To my dismay, I also discovered that one of the vaccines came in five doses and that I had a schedule I needed to keep for those additional injections. Otherwise, there is no cure for rabies and I could die what is supposed to be quite a horrible death. No doubt some of the haters and my detractors would like that, but I'd much rather die of a heart stoppage as I'm having sex, thank you very much! The treatments cost a bundle, but that's what travel insurance is for, I guess.

Thankfully, my calf didn't swell overnight. There was no acute pain or skin discoloration, so in the short term all was okay. I'm still able to make the most of my trip, which is the most important thing.

So after another day in sunny Brasov, I took the train to Sighisoara. It was another glorious day when I arrived in the afternoon, so I spent a few hours wandering around the citadel. Oddly enough, I was the only guest at the Gia Hotel, which kind of sucked. But I had met a couple of Canucks at the train station, so we had dinner together. It was fun to talk about hockey and politics for a couple of hours.

It started pouring that night and it wouldn't stop for the mext 24 hours or so. The next morning, armed with that little piece of paper that's supposed to be my Romanian medical file and a small note from the girl at the reception explaining that I was bitten by a stray dog and needed the second vaccine, I made my way to the hospital in the driving rain, dearly hoping that someone would understand enough English to give the appropriate injection. Thank God it went well, though it took a while to make them understand that I had no Romanian health care card or whatever and that I was paying for the treatments in cash. Don't know if I was screwed, but the consultation and the vaccin cost me twice as much as in Brasov.

Arrived in Sibiu yesterday. Very nice city, though it's been overcast and/or raining here as well. I'm staying at the Flying Time hostel. Nice place, with all the amenities backpackers ask for. But where the fuck is everyone??? There were only me and a Swedish girl here last night!

Though the country suffers from several quirks that can annoy you, I've been enjoying myself immensely. Other than being bitten by an errant dog and perhaps having rabies, that goes without saying. The food is great, tasty, filling, and affordable. The beer is good and cheap. The two things that annoy me the most have to be that credit cards are accepted almost nowhere, even when there's a Visa sticker in the door. And my biggest pet peeve would have to be the chain smoking. Nothing better than a journey in Eastern Europe to make you appreciate just how lucky we are to now be living in a smoke-free environment. Some restaurants have a non-smoking section, but most don't. And Romanians smoke like it's going out of style! =(

But all in all, it's been a fun ride. Will need to go to the hospital in Bucharest tomorrow to receive that third vaccine, and then I'm off to Ruse, Bulgaria.

Have to tell you that I'm not looking forward to tackling the Cyrillic alphabet. . . ;-) This is going to a bitch, I just know it! They say that it takes about an hour and a beer to figure it out. Hopefully they're right!

Take it easy. . .

19 commentaires:

Anonymous said...

Have you been able to catch any Game of Thrones as you'd hoped?

Morrigan said...

Ouch, that sucks about the dog bite. O_O I hope you're gonna be okay.

Nitpick: it's spelled "vaccine" in English. ;)

Hadean said...

I can't really imagine there could be more street dogs anywhere in the world than here. And "here" is Bulgaria, so I don't think you are going to notice any improvement in regard of dogs during the next few days.
I doubt the amount of smoking would be lower either.

Regardless, I think you would experience a lot of nice sights, food and beer.
Sadly your route is kind of far from my hometown, so I wouldn't be able to provide any help with cyrillic. :)

Have fun!

Hadean said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Todd said...

Yikes, rabies would not be good. Take care of the leg and enjoy the rest of your trip!

Joel said...

Flights are really expensive right now... maybe that's why you are seeing fewer travelers?

Anonymous said...

Hope it all heals quick, Patrick. You are a lucky guy for the journey and will be stronger for the bite.

Neth said...

dude that sucks with the dog attack. I visited the Rasnov fortress with no problems last summer - other than it being hot as hell.

I really enjoyed driving the back roads in Transylvania and visiting all the old Saxon churches.

Yeah, the credit thing sucks - you have to have some European chip for it work in most places. Everytime I grew tired of paying for a hotel in cash and another trip to an ATM I just reminded myself just what the conversion rate was. And the chain smoking is ridiculous. One night I counted the number of cigarettes the couple next to me went through during dinner (with their two young kids). I got to 10 (each) in less than an hour - they were still going strong when I decided it was time to relocate.

My guess is that the empty hostels are due to the timing - it's still pretty early in June. A month later and things would be much more crowded (especially since once it gets hot in Romania, everyone heads to the mountains as often as possible).

Enjoy the rest of your trip and try to avoid contracting another exotic disease.

ito said...

I have good/bad memories of the stray dogs of Romania :)

Every neighbourhood had it's own dog pack and the kids would care for them. Also once in a while we'd get bitten, but luckily I never got rabies. Nor the unpleasant belly vaccines.

This piece reminds me of Ken's (Neth Space) story about his trip to Romania :)

Also here is a tip: If you find that you have to drink beer you don't enjoy just add some salt until it loses some of it's bad taste. No joke. Noroc!

Morgan said...

lol I can't wait to see what you have to say about Bulgaria! lol If that makes you feel better, we have more stray dogs and even cheaper beer! lol Just make sure you keep an eye for pick-pockets... They're a planty in the summer!

AM said...

Tip of the day:
Shoes with hard tips come handy when kicking dogs. Also they mainly move after dark.

If you don't have one, get a small med pack with atleast bandages, disinfect, antibac and painkillers.

Anonymous said...

"There were only me and a Swedish girl here last night!"...

Poor, poor Pat

Enjoy the rest of your trip!

Anonymous said...

Other than being bitten by an errand dog...

Another nitpicker here. I assume you mean "errant"? Unless the dogs are delivery workers.

Sorry to hear about the bite, but glad to hear about otherwise enjoyable experiences.

Anonymous said...

Dogs should stop running errands. no wonder they're mad running around biting people, they're not getting paid. I'd be errant too!!

Daniel B. said...

Dude. I lived in Romania for two years. I can empathize with your experience with the dog. I was bit, not only by dogs, but by a baboon brought back from Africa by some UN worker. You can imagine how messed up it was to deal with that...

john l. said...

Is this the start of some werewolf story?

David said...

Whoa, that witty line about preferring to die from a heart attack during sex is almost as witty as Tyrion's about dying drunk at age eighty whilst being fellated.

RaveAir said...

And when will you visit Hungary? ;)

You can found plenty of nice places, foods (and girls) here.

Patrick said...

Nope, haven't caught any GoT... =(

Yes, stray dogs are like the plague. Especially at night, when they become quite territorial and "patrol" the streets in packs. Very similar to street gangs. And the state does NOTHING about it...

RaveAir: I've been to Hungary, but it was in 2004. See-through pants were the trend then, something every men seemed to enjoy! :P