Making the Internet My Accountability Partner

I have been privileged enough to study abroad in Italy for my entire Freshman year of college. It was a wonderful experience and I may talk more about it in the future, but for the purpose of this prompt, what is important is that it gave me access to the rest of Europe for relatively cheap. For fall break (which was a week for our school) some friends and I decided to go to Romania.

This vacation was an experience from start to finish. We booked our trains, planes, and airbnb weeks before, so the vast majority of our trip was already paid for. However, a couple weeks before our trip I noticed that my debit card details were stolen and someone in Fiji had made significant withdrawals. One of which was dated two days in the future! So I had to cancel my card and order a new one. I had just gone grocery shopping before I noticed the suspicious activity. I, however, did not think to withdraw money to live off of. So I had to go to Romania with only a euro and 16 cents in cash, which didn’t matter because Romania doesn’t use euros. So I had to IOU all my expenses: tickets, food, and souvenirs.

The flight that was within our budget was from Bologna to Bucharest. Which meant we had to take a train from our apartment building in Florence, and the only train that got us there in time for our 6am flight was the last train the night before. So we got to the airport around midnight and had to spend the night outside of security because they had already closed for the night.

My friends slept upright in the chair and I agreed to watch over them and our belongings. I believe I did sleep on the plane, but I know it wasn’t very restful sleep. We landed in Bucharest and went to the train station. We got lunch at a gyro place across the street which was good and it was so much food, especially for the very reasonable price we paid.

We then got on our 10 hour train on time, however it was slow moving and there were times we just stopped. I’m sure there was an announcement but none of us spoke a lick of Romanian. We wound up being two hours late arriving to our destination. Thankfully, our host was amazingly patient and met us at the airbnb to let us in at 10pm past her normal check in hours.

We walked to McDonald’s a block away for food because we hadn’t eaten in at least 12 hours. As we are now outside of the typical tourist center, it was a little difficult communicating with the cashier, but we managed. As this vacation was almost 7 years ago my memory of exactly what order we did things in during our trip are a little hazy. I know that we had to walk an hour and a half into the historic center of town, which we repeatedly did and it was honestly fun. The weather was typically nice and we got to see parts of town that we maybe wouldn’t have if we were sticking to typical tourist routines. On one of our first days there we did a walking tour of the town. The guide asked us all what brought us to this town. Everyone else in the group had normal answers like they were visiting friends/family nearby or they were particularly interested in the town’s history. Meanwhile we are there because it’s October and the castle that allegedly inspired Bram Stoker to write Dracula is nearby.

Our friend, let’s call her O, convinced us that she needed to have KFC for lunch, so we stopped in and shared a bucket. It came with sides but interestingly Romanian KFC does not have mashed potatoes, which is what she was craving. We walked back to the airbnb and then myself and the other friend on this trip, M, walked to the grocery store. We picked up some essentials so that we didn’t have to eat out every meal. We were looking for basics like eggs, butter, cheese, bread, milk, and pasta. We were unable to find pasta. I don’t recall if we settled for grilled cheese for more meals than desired or if we picked out some sort of replacement. I do remember that we were looking at the packaged cheese section and found a package of singles that had a picture of a hamburger on it. We figured that meant it was probably cheddar or something similar.

We go back to the apartment and later that evening start making dinner for ourselves. Someone opens the cheese package and sees that the cheese itself is not plain yellow or plain white, there are specks in it. O is a picky eater so this is something of a problem. We try to figure out what type of cheese it is to assure her she’ll like it, but when we smell it it smells like pork. None of us expected that scent. M and I are not picky at all so while this isn’t what we intended we’ll make do, O however cannot be convinced to try it.

I believe it is that night that we are looking to book transportation/guides for the two things we really wanted to do, see Bran Castle (inspo for Dracula) and see the ruins of Vlad the Impaler’s fortress. As I have no money I’m not really looking into options, the other two are. Someone does find a guide that will bring us to both places, plus a third fortress (this one is intact) for a budget we are ok with. However, I get told that it’s Some Guy and his minivan. There is a bit of a discussion of safety because he’s not advertised as connected to a company, but he does have plenty of good reviews. We do book him, but I can’t remember if it was for the next day or the day after. Anyway the day of our booked trip arrives and he shows up on time. It literally is Some Guy driving a minivan, but thankfully he’s kind and chatty. He tells us about his daughter who is a couple years older than us and also studying in Italy. He tells us about Romania and the places we’ll be visiting.

We then take two hour drive out to Vlad’s fortress. It is a beautiful drive through the Romanian countryside. At one point, SG is telling us about how he feels teenagers are too immature and inexperienced to be driving and no one should be driving before 25 when the brain fully develops. However, as he’s saying this the roads are so pothole covered he has to drive on the wrong side of the road. The irony was not apparent to him as it was to us. We arrive safely to the bottom of the mountain that leads to the fortress. It is over 1400 steps to the fortress. Our trail to the fortress is quite literally a giant winding staircase. It takes us about an hour to make it to the top. We pay the entrance fee and spend some time looking at the ruins, reading the signs, and admiring the scenery. The scenery was gorgeous, partially because of the moody fog of the early evening, which you can see in the featured photo.

The drive back to the airbnb is uneventful. We get some much needed sleep and wake up the next day to do some final souvenir shopping and try some restaurants/dishes that were recommended by our tour guide on our first day. We walk the hour and a half into town, and it starts raining on us. I did not think to pack an umbrella or rain jacket. So I am in a pleather jacket that does not have a hood and I just deal with it. I am soaked by the time we get to our first shop and I don’t dry until we decide to stop for lunch. We stop at one restaurant and we were one of three tables eating at this time of day. M and O decide to order both a starter and a meal. I only order a starter. The food was really good, we wind up talking to server about dessert recommendations and we get three desserts. The donut and apple crumble type dessert that were excellent. The third dessert was a souffle of some sort. The top part was really egg-y and the bottom was just liquid rum. We weren’t a fan.

We ask to pay the bill and as we are wrapping up, we finally check our phones and see that 7 hours have passed since we entered the restaurant! Having lived in Europe for about three months at this point, we were used to a slower meal pace and spending a couple hours when eating out, but this shocked us. We honestly did not feel like we took that long, but we also hadn’t stayed significantly longer than the other tables. So it turns out we did not need to consider dinner as we wouldn’t be hungry for another meal, but we did decide to stop at a donut shop on our way home and pick up another dessert. Thankfully at this point the rain had let up, so we stayed dry.

The next morning we had requested a cab/uber to pick us up. We were literally exiting the building as the car was pulling away, we did try to chase the car down, unsuccessfully. We tried to re-order a car, but for some reason we were unable to. A teenager near us, saw our concern and even through the language barrier he was able to understand our situation and order a car for us. We got to the train station on time. We found our platform and were waiting out in the cold. There was an announcement, and again we didn’t understand. After a while we realized that it either said something about a delay or a change in platforms. I went inside to try and see the board and see if I could figure out what the announcement might have been. I did manage to see there was a delay but couldn’t tell how much of a delay. I rejoined my friends and we decided to continue waiting at the platform. We alternated between huddling together and dancing to music for warmth. Eventually a staff member of the train station tried to communicate with us and he wound up taking one of his tools and scratching a 2+ on the concrete of the platform and we finally understood that our train had a two hour delay. Not ideal, but there was nothing we could do about it.

We were taking an overnight train so we did get some sleep and arrived at the Bucharest airport the next morning. We arrived literally minutes before our plane was due to depart, we explained our situation to someone at security they told us top not even check our checked luggage and just to run. However the guy doing the security checks did not agree that we could just take our checked bag through security, so he wound up throwing away our shampoo, conditioner, and other large liquids. We are then at the ID check (which yes was after the scanner) and he tells us that the plan just left the gate. So we asked since we are able to check our bag now could we get the liquids back, but we were told no. Again as we were focused on finding the cheapest flights, our flight was the earliest one out of the airport. We are now stranded in Romania and the ticket booth for the company isn’t even open yet.

When they do open they explain that the only flight that went to our original airport that had three seats available would be flying out in three days. We literally cannot wait three days we have no lodging, I have no money, and school starts again soon. We do find a flight later in the day that goes to Rome, however it is a flight, so it’s too expensive for me to IOU my friends. So I have to call my mom in Maryland, it’s like 2am I didn’t even think of the time difference when I called her slightly panicking. She tells me what I would have expected if I wasn’t panicking that she doesn’t have money, but thankfully my grandfather is in Vegas visiting his brother, so it’s only midnight for him and he should be awake. Thankfully, he is able to buy the ticket for me. Our new flight isn’t even starting to board for another 5 or 6 hours, and as it’s a small airport we can’t go past security yet. So we spend hours sitting on the floor in front of security. A woman who was doing her own travelling was so kind enough to share a bag of snacks she brought with her, otherwise we wouldn’t have eaten that day. We land in Rome and now need to figure out how to get to Florence. We figure a train is always cheaper than a flight so we head to the station and my friend thankfully is able to spot me for the train ticket. We arrive in Florence and I run to the post office to check for my new debit card as it is closing any minute now. Turns out they close early during fall break.

That night not every classmate was back from their fall break trip, so the handful of us that were around decided to meet in the largest appartment to hold a seance. Many of us, including myself, had left our apartment doors wide open, because no one is in the building and we have a security guard who verifies everyone’s identity before they’re let in. However this security guard was a stickler for the rules including that all doors must remain closed so I got locked out of my apartment, had to spend the night on M’s couch and thankfully my RA was still in town, so she let me back in in the morning.

I check back with the post office every day for a week so I can repay my friends. I had kept a log of how much I owed each friend. Naturally, I kept most of the log in Romanian lei and that price added up fast, but I was prepared for a vacation to be expensive. When I finally got my debit card and did the conversion to euros, it turns out I owed them each $50 for the food, tickets, and souvenirs in Romania and then I owed my one friend $100 more for the train from Rome to Florence.

Romania was for a variety of reasons my most memorable vacation. Despite all the hiccups I had so much fun and am 1000% looking forward to returning someday. Although part of my preparation this time should be learning the basics of the Romanian language.