Odessa and Iași

I was checking how many vacation days I have left and found that I had 9 days. And Peace Corps has several rules limiting my availability to use them. 1) No missing more than 3 days of school and 2) no traveling outside the country the last 3 months of service. Therefore, I have been doing these little long weekend trips before April 18 (three months before I leave Moldova). Kiev was the first of three. And I’ve just returned from my other two: Odessa, Ukraine and Iași, Romania. Both were beautiful places. And hopefully, these last little mini vacations will help me get through the last three months here.

Transnistria

So one of my worries about traveling to Kiev alone was not the being alone itself; it was because I was worried I would accidently travel through Transnistria on my way there.

Transnistria is a breakaway territory located on a small strip of land along the east boarder of Moldova and Ukraine that considers itself a sovereign country. You haven’t heard of it, you say? That’s not surprising seeing as it is probably one of the only “countries” that considers it independent.
Since its declaration of independence in 1990, and especially after the War of Transnistria in 1992, it is governed as the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR, also known as Pridnestrovie), a state with limited recognition. It has it’s own money and passport, but it’s not recognized by other countries. It probably wouldn’t still be around if it didn’t have support from Russia. 

As Peace Corps volunteers, we are not allowed to travel there because there’s a lot of corruption. Many Americans who travel through there have reported difficulties at the boarder crossing, such as harassment, paying ludicrous ‘fines’, or filling out ominous form, which are written in Cyrillic script. You might be directed by law to show them all your money – a way for them to gauge the size of the fine they can impose. Sometimes, they pull you off the bus to complete the process, presumably leaving you stranded.

If you are interested, here is a video about Transnistria.

My First Solo Abroad Trip: Destination Kiev

This was just what I needed: a daytrip vacation to Kiev, solo style. And the memories started right away.

I left my site right after my classes finished on Friday and headed to Chisinau. My first step was to find the bus station that sold the tickets I needed. I had never been to this station before, so I asked a friend how to get there. Even though it’s walking distance, she suggested that I take a rutiera since I didn’t know where it was. But it was a nice day, and I decided a walk would be nice. Silly Maggie.

I walked to where I thought it was, and didn’t see it. So of course I doubted myself and changed directions. And then I walked a ways and decided to go a different way. I stupidly decided to embrace this new direction and walked quite a bit. Eventually, I stop and asked someone for directions, and she basically told me to head back towards the direction I had originally been.

So I started back tracking, and I decided that I should just be safe and take the rutiera. I found one marked for the bus station and got on. After about 10 minutes, I questioned why someone would say this bus station was within walking distance. And another 10 minutes later, I saw a Chisinau sign, which marked the city’s boarder.

I now realized I missed the stop for the bus station. I figured the rutiera ran on a loop, so I would just wait and it would go back. After 10 minutes, it was clear we were no longer in Chisinau. So I asked the driver about the bus station. He said we passed it, and it would be awhile before we were back.

So he stopped the next rutiera he saw going in the opposite direction. I jumped off this one and hopped on the other, not before confirming with the new drive that he would pass the bus station. I then asked him to please let me know when we get to the stop for the bus station.

When we got to the bus station, the driver yelled nice and loud for me to hear, even though I was sitting right behind him. And low and behold, it was the first place I had tried and sort of looked at the very beginning; I just hadn’t walked quite far enough. So walked the extra 100 feet I should have gone, and I was finally able to buy my bus ticket. Phew. Step one was complete.

I took an overnight bus. Not the best night’s sleep, but it got me to Kiev Saturday morning so I would have all day to explore. The day started out cold and rainy/foggy, so my morning pictures weren’t great. Good news was the rain stopped by about 10am. The bad news was my pants, shoes, and socks were already soaked by then, leaving me rather cold for the rest of the day. Besides being cold and damp, I had good time explore the city. It was nice to do exactly what I wanted. At the end of the day, I took another overnight bus back to Moldova, getting back in cold and exhausted Sunday morning.

Despite its size, this trip was a big trip for me. It was the first time I had traveled by myself to another country. I was stepping way out of my comfort zone, and I mean way out of my comfort zone; like into another country (hehe). And I’m so proud of myself doing this because now I know I can travel someplace if I would like. And I can do it when it’s cold and rainy and still have a good time. This time, one day in Kiev; next trip, one week Africa? Probably not, but I’m no longer closed off to the idea.

Vacation

Well, it’s back to the real world for me. I just got back from an amazing two-week vacation with some awesome friends. We traveled in Portugal, Morocco, and Spain. It was wonderful, and it only made me want to travel more. And it made me start thinking more about what I want to do when I’m finished here; and more immediate, the trip I’m before returning to America. I’m planning on going to Greece with Sarah. After this vacation, I’m excited to start planning my Greece trip.

Fish and Farmer in Cahul

I just got back from my first visit to a friend’s site. I was hanging out with my friend Maggie in Cahul, which is a southern city on the boarder with Romania. Its population is about 20,000, so much bigger than my raion, but not close to the size of the biggest cities in Moldova (Chișinău’s population is about 794,800).

It was so nice to see what another site looks like. I could see a huge difference in the kind of lifestyle you can have Cahul as opposed to Criuleni, but I could also see so many similarities. The general feel and flow of things are the same. The big difference is just that everything is bigger. There are many more stores and shops. The piața is large enough to find anything there that you need or want. There are many restaurants to choice to dine at (Criuleni only has one restaurant, but it’s very expensive). The grocery stores have a much larger selection.

It took a 3-hour bus ride from the southern part of Chișinău to get to Cahul and then another 45 minutes to get to the center of Chișinău. With pain of travel and the easy access to one’s necessities, I can understand why most PCVs who live in Cahul rarely travel to Chișinău. But regardless of the annoyance of travel, I really enjoyed seeing another site and visiting a friend. I will definitely be visiting more sites in the future.

Ready To Face Semester 2

So I just got back from a 10-day vacation that was wonderful. I traveled with five other volunteers to Istanbul. And it was beautiful!! This was a much needed and well-loved vacation. I was often noting how breathtaking Istanbul is. It is definitely a tourist spot, but I kind of liked that about Istanbul. I enjoyed visiting the museums and mosques, as well as just walking around aimlessly. This was just right to rejuvenate me and make me ready for the second semester.