I had a meeting with the vice mayor of the neighbouring village today. The guy was wearing a t-shirt with "I Love Bunga Bunga" on it. On my way back I saw a guy in his late fifties repairing a tractor in the field with "I wish I could ctrl alt del my boyfriend" on his t-shirt ( Read more... )

So today after dinner I spent my time pulling ticks out of my legs. That was fun. Most of them are dark brown or black and relatively easy to see but some of them are really really tiny and close to the colour of the human skin and those are almost impossible to spot before the area around their bite becomes somewhat inflamed ( Read more... )

I managed to take a couple of photos of this Transnistrian border and passport control officer with my phone through the rear view mirror. Taking photos is strictly forbidden at the border crossing so this is the best I could do ( Read more... )

I was told that the wooden synagogue in Piatra Neamt, Romania was the last wooden synagogue in Europe. I haven't checked yet. But I did take a photo of it, here it is:


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A group of guests showed up unannounced at our Romanian host's house during our stay and I volunteered to move to a small house at the back of our host's parents's garden not very far away for one night as they tried to ensure everyone had a bed for the night. I did not regret it, the view was spectacular and our host's mother cooked an awesome ( Read more... )

Yesterday we visited Tiraspol, the capital of Transnistria. Last year we managed to visit just one village there right at the border with Moldova but yesterday we made it to the capital. We were impressed by the sky over the city. Note what is advertised on the right. Yes, it is caviar. Transnistria is the poorest break away region teetering on the ( Read more... )

We saw a lot of these in Moldova. They seem to be everywhere. In this case the American people financed the rehabilitation of the irrigation system in Cosnita (Cosh-nee-tsah) village.


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This is the entrance at the back of our host's garden. There is a stream a couple of hundred meters down the mountain path from there. I forgot a bucket near the stream and was going to go and get it but ran into our host's son at the back of the garden and he thought it would be better to bring the bucket back in the morning because "it is getting ( Read more... )

I had to drive through Bran in Transylvania yesterday (this is where the "Dracula Castle" is) and this time I noticed that all of the trade there is done in three languages, Romanian (obviously), English (understandable) and surprisingly, Hebrew. One also can hear Hebrew spoken everywhere in the shops and the restaurants too. Israelis seem to love ( Read more... )

We gave everything edible we had with us to these two friends.

In Transylvania (again), Romania


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