Day 1: Frankfurt, Bucuresti!

Wow. So I'm here. Bucuresti.
It reminded me immediately of New Orleans, narrow streets, decaying and beautiful architecture, drivers all over the road.
I'm going through some crazy culture shock, but it's good.

My parents dropped me off at the airport last night. They were very sweet, and insisted on parking and taking me to the check-in counter.
I can't really remember anything about O'Hare right now except that the staff seemed grumpy to be working on Thanksgiving. Thank you to them for doing that, by the way.

The flight left on time. I was luckily seated next to a really lovely Polish girl named Gosia. We chatted for a long time. Talked about learning languages. Talked about Romanian versus Hungarian food. (She prefers Hungarian.) She's a singer and her husband makes electric guitars, is a craftsman. Talked about Poland, talked about Auschwitz. Told her about the Polish roller coaster that I want to ride on, and the dream I had. She was impressed that I guessed how to spell her name right (I told her that I have a Kasia, so I just figured.) I watched some of INCEPTION on the plane, had dinner, dozed in and out listening to the classical music station. We watched the map on the little screen on the back of the seat in front of us. Got really, really excited when we left America. I probably slept for 10 minutes. And then the sun came up over Ireland.

Here's another picture of me officially in Europe for the first time:













We landed in Frankfurt about 10am their time, 3am Chicago time. I hung out with Gosia while she got her boarding pass to Warsaw, we were laughing and a little delirious. The ladies working for Lufthansa in Frankfurt are amazing. And then we parted ways. It was really nice to have a friend.

So I walked about a bit in the Frankfurt airport. Zombied and a-gog that I was in Germany. It's just surreal and wonderful to be overseas for the first time. German newsstand.
I got $25 changed to Euros and went up to a nice cafe/restaurant, after spending some time in the RAUSCHERZONE (or something like that, the little glass houses where the smokers can smoke in doors, and no one speaks.) It's interesting. Being in an international airport. No idea what language anyone knows. Sort of hesitating to say anything. However, a woman from Venezuela knocked on the glass to get my attention. "Venezuela!" she said, and held up her boarding passing. She was lost. I speak Spanish. Wild.
So, I got a MILCHCAFFEE and a chocolate croissant, and sat down to study my Romanian.




Made my way over to the gate and noticed a German newspaper called BILD lying around.

Realized that it is TOTAL SMUT, with an article on Putin in Berlin next to a topless spread of a
young lady named Steffi wearing nothing but a fur scarf ON THE FRONT COVER! AMAZING.

(Of course I have a picture, but for mature audiences only and Europeans of all ages of course.)
Had a good laugh at an article about a dog in the mafia or something, and then I noticed the interesting ceiling of the Frankfurt airport. Cool.


So now it's almost 2pm but it's really 7am. And I've been up 24 hours straight. We board for Bucuresti. I get seated next to a nice lady about my mom's age named Maria, who asks me the time in Romanian. I tell her that I would check my iPod, but I can't turn it on yet. So eventually I can turn it on, I tell her "Paisprezece si un sfert." We have a nice little conversation in Romanian, and then she offers to give me her turkey sandwich, because she already ate and wasn't hungry. I accepted after asking her if she'd already eaten, and asking why she wasn't hungry. Generosity. Beautiful. Romanian angel. Maria. I sleep for thirty minutes. Flying into Bucuresti, fields, fields, fields, gorgeous. I'm excited. I give Maria a piece of gum. The Lufthansa annoucements are in German and English. And then there's a recording in Romanian.

Bucuresti Otopeni. Dingy. Scary. Sad. "Tourist?" "Da" "Bucuresti?" "Bucuresti si Cluj." Stamp.

Cami isn't there right when I walk out the doors. I'm pretty out of it, and feeling very disoriented and kind of threatened in this airport. I walk out to have a smoke. Romanian taxi drivers swarming sort of. "Taxi" "Nu, merci" "Dupa tigar?" "Nu merci" "You speak English" "Da" "I'll give you a lift after you finish your cigarette?" "Am prietenii" "Pretenii vine pentru tine?" "Da. Dar, merci, domnule."

I come back in. Find Cami. She's nice. She walks me to the car. Asks me what I'm going to need to get done. Driving on the way into the city center it's very grim. It's like suburbia disembowled. Sort of like the area around Midway in Chicago. There's a big IKEA. She tells me about the corruption in the government. The abuse in the schools. The neglect of the disabled. The prejudice against homosexuals. (It was illegal until 2007.) She drives me down narrow streets, everyone's swerving. The neon signs and the circular drives remind me of New Orleans. The beautiful, decaying architecture. The scattered buses, trams, people and children running across the street in front of the cars. There's something lovely and sad and dirty and exciting about it, and I can't wait. She parks, takes me into an apartment block. We get into an elevator three feet by 2 feet wide. Like a red carpeted coffin. Up to the third floor. And then I'm here, and this is my apartment and I have keys and I'm in Bucuresti: