Photo: Ileana Johnson 2015 |
The seven
and a half hour flight to Zurich finally took off two and a half hours late amid
scary dark clouds and soul-rattling sudden altitude drops. Fortunately, as we
reached a cruising altitude of 39,000 feet, everything calmed down and we
settled into a routine of getting up, stretching, bathroom trips, and watching
movies for seven and half hours. I can’t sleep on planes; all my limbs go numb rather
quickly.
Once we
arrived in Switzerland, we were greeted by a huge, modern, and empty airport unlike
any airport in the U.S. Bored, with no Wi-Fi or book to read, I started looking
for interesting things around me. I was not disappointed. The vending machines
were selling Cannabis Ice Tea for 3 Swiss francs a large can.
I bought a
Swiss Army knife which would prove quite useful in the next two weeks and a
couple of magnets for cousin Dragu which set me back almost $50 because the
dollar was so weak against the Swiss franc and the credit card company had to
get their lion’s share of exchange charges for generously allowing me to do
business with them.
A huge
chocolate bar was calling my name. Who goes to or passes through Switzerland
without buying the biggest chunk of chocolate one can find, an act of sheer visual
greed since nobody can bite into the gargantuan bar without the help of a good
knife.
We finally
arrived in Bucharest the next day, almost 21 hours after we started our half
way around the globe trek. But the entire flight time was only nine hours and 10
minutes. The Otopeni Airport seemed shinier – the international terminal had
been completed since I was there three years ago.
We were
elated that our luggage had made it and all suitcases arrived with us. A shower
and clean clothes would become a reality soon. We headed to the Avis counter to
claim our mid-sized car, a black, sporty, and spotless Ford Mondeo running on
Diesel. We would find out soon enough that both gasoline and Diesel cost over
$6 per gallon but the nice bonus was that attendants pumped the gas, a service
that is lost in most states today. On the bright side, three years ago, Diesel
was over $10 a gallon, and bio Diesel was $11 per gallon, so $6 seemed like a
bargain.
For Romanian
roads and the few designated parking spots, this Ford Mondeo was quite a large
car, but it was just big enough to accommodate our luggage in the trunk, out of
sight of potential thieves.
To mitigate
for the lack of legal parking, intrepid Romanians double- and triple-park on sidewalks
everywhere. I’ve never had to dodge traffic and cars on sidewalks in the U.S.
but in Europe, it is common. Because many drivers carelessly blocked the exit
of private garages, some owners posted signs that they would slash tires of
anyone who obstructed their car exit and they meant it.
The engine
purred nicely but it shut off every time we stopped in traffic. This feature paid
homage to the environmentalist wackos who want to save the planet from a
non-existent anthropogenic global warming, while endangering the lives of drivers
who must press the accelerator hard before the engine roars again to life and
the car can move. The sport transmission feature certainly helped when climbing
the Carpathian Mountains and when managing hair pin curves.
The drive to
Ploiesti flashed before my eyes long-ago forgotten memories of places, names,
bridges, creeks, and fruit and vegetable stands lining up the main highway.
Beautiful potted plants were decorating the fruit-laden trays. The May cherries
were ripening just in time. The road was better paved and traffic police was seldom
in sight. The GPS kept alerting us of electronic speed traps instead. James would
tell us in a punctilious and robotic British accent to slow down. But nobody
minds the speed limit as traffic rules are just laughable suggestions that no drivers
take seriously.
We arrived
at Ana’s house in the town of Ploiesti 50 km later, after getting lost numerous
times, with the GPS telling us to go on non-existent roads, dead-ends, and closed
roundabouts. With few traffic lights, we were in roundabout hell until we
managed to learn the secret yield system, the meaning of hand gestures, and
verbal cursing clues. The whole town was a construction site as the city
planners had decided to dig up at the same time all the tram tracks and replace
them with newer, more modern ones, paid for with EU funds.
Light rail,
trams, trolleys, and buses are certainly encouraged and imposed in most towns
by the lack of parking for individual vehicles. And pay garages are not
adequate in size. Any way elitists can remove people from their cars and put
them into public transportation like sardines, money is no object, while they
personally jet around the world to locales ordinary humans can only dream of.
Their private planes, yachts, and huge homes apparently can leave a huge carbon
footprint – do as they say not as they do.
The town was
dustier, dirtier, and more polluted than I remembered it. We drove by Brazi
Refinery were my Dad used to work, now called Petrom. It was surrounded by
green fields and the air appeared much cleaner than the air in town.
Ana’s
three-story villa was even cozier; her daughter had made some wonderful changes
to the décor. Our room was slightly hot so we opened the windows to the city
noise and smells, loud gypsy music piped from speakers across the street, the
trolley buses running all night, the incessant barking of dogs, and the
cock-a-doodle of a time-confused and pesky rooster.
We slept
fitfully that night but were glad to be horizontal, even on a mattress whose
coils were stabbing us in the back every time we moved. But the price was right;
our accommodations were free and came with unconditional love of my Romanian
family and Ana’s spectacular cooking.
A huge herd
of stray dogs, at least thirty “maidanezi” as the Romanians call them, were
having a major street fight right below our window around 3 a.m. I was home again, welcomed by the warm
embrace of my family but missing tranquility and our home in Virginia.
To Be Continued
Can't wait for chapter 2! But that pack of dogs sounds unsettling.
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