Right. Train.
It wasn't too horrible. As soon as we stepped on, I felt as if I stepped into an Agatha Christie novel, and Hercule Poirot would be in the cabin next to ours. Everything looked uber vintage from the 40's or so, with original everything. And not in the up-kept way. And whoa, bonus, our window doesn't open.
The train left at 4:35pm and arrived at 6am. And the driver/conductor?/(i was homeschooled) must have been Estonian because cars were almost passing us. Overall the ride didn't actually feel too long. What took forever was the border officials on both sides. For some reason they thought it was really weird that two American tourists went to Moldova for two days. You and me both, dude. No one I know at home even knew what a Moldova was until I explained. Nevermind why one would go to visit.
Side note: they say Estonia is the most recovered and prospurous country, from Soviet ruling. Yes. I can completely see that. And I would put Moldova as one of the worst. It's poor and shows immensely. But then random contrast with a huge five story shopping mall...it was strange to walk around and notice all the stores were pretty much empty.
End side note.
But all was well, and we actually got stamps in our passports! One for exiting Moldova and one for entering Romania! This made us happy and receive yet more quizzical looks from the officers. We hadn't get one for Estonia or Belgium, and want as many as possible because they look cool filling up the pages. I mean, who wouldn't?
When our train pulled into the station 10 minutes early, we woke up pretty fast, threw everything into our bags, and motored out of there. (I've just been really wanting to use that word for a week now, sorry.) Now it's hard to adjust to yet another new country and language on a normal day. Now add: On four hours of sleep, and at 6 in the morning, AND while it's literally pouring buckets of water on your head and 30 pound pack.
Fast forward to 35 minutes later when finally some police officers (after asking three other people around the station) are able to tell us where we can buy our bus ticket.
An hour or so later we arrive at the hostel, completely soaked to the bone (which makes our packs 35 pounds with all that water weight. I love creating dramatic sympathy from you guys.) only to find the door locked. We had checked and they do have a 24 hour reception. Our dismay starts to roll off in waves.
...two minutes later I try PUSHING on the door and then feel very stupid when it opens right up.
There is a bathroom inside the room, I'm happy to report! That just kind of made my day. And there is a shower in that same room too. *fistpump* and it's just a two bed room. Once again though, we have only seen one other guest in this four story hostel. I swear all the backpackers are avoiding us. Phineas and Ferb's grandfather (from previous hostel) is staying at another,more in the city; we had asked. He took a baxi, not a train. But we may see him around.
We did laundry:
And the carrots at the grocery store here in Bucharest proclaiming their identity in eight different languages:
Some last cool views of Chisinau before we left:
Our train!
It's supposed to be sunny tomorrow. Hopefully. We want to explore!
30 pound packs will get no sympathy from me. We spent the day at the beach today.
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