Adding another notch to my world travel belt

Saturday I took a short train ride across the border into Romania into the town of Iasi ("yash"). I'll admit, this was motivated in large part by me wanting to be able to say I've been to Romania. Unfortunately it was, well, a whole lot like Moldova, something that makes sense considering that before political slicing and dicing Moldova was Moldavia and part of Romania. I suppose part of my disappointment -- and, likewise, other volunteer's excitement -- was related to language. For Romanian-speaking volunteers stuck in cities where they regularly are answered only in Russian, Iasi is a language immersion promised land. It was kind of fun and exotic to have to bust out my pitiful Romanian, though. ("Unde. Merge. Rutierra la Ungheni?") I'm so used to Russian now, however, that whenever I try to speak a foreign language I slip in Russian "filler" words; in France this was kind of funny, but in Romania you can really offend people, as all over eastern Europe Russian is, well, the language of the oppressor. Bit of a downer.

My brief train ride across the border got me to Iasi early in the morning, and I went to Pizza Hut for breakfast. Why? Just because it was there, and I hadn't had it in a year. (For the record it was the most ritzy Pizza Hut I've ever seen. Cloth napkins! All chrome and glass, and paintings on the walls!) Sadly, rather than blowing me away, I ended up salting it just like I do with the local Moldovan pizza. (Salt, a progressive addiction, I tell you!) During the course of the day I also tried on shoes in Iasi's small but delightfully western shopping center, had a yummy glass of iced coffee, and wandered in and out of various air conditioned shops in an attempt to escape the sun. Don't let my paltry praise turn you off visiting Iasi or other parts of Romania -- other volunteers tell me that cities such as Brasov are gorgeous, as are the mountains, and Iasi has some pretty buildings and more history than any city we've got in Moldova, where war and Communism cleared out much of the original architecture. In Iasi there were some great churches, including one which is entirely covered in intricate carvings. Oh, and I saw a car with a coffin tied to its roof. Try finding that in one of your favorite fancy-pants western cities!