Roaming Romania
After visiting the country of Romania this summer, I wrote down a few key pointers that tourists might find to be handy. I've read tourist guides for Romania, and I certainly don't think they give the right impression to the would-be visitor. Thus, here's Greg's Guide to Romania:
First and foremost, there are far too many prostitutes throughout Romania. This is bad if you're looking to get laid in a foreign country the legit way. However, this is a great thing if you're just trying to get laid, period.
The only thing that competes with the amount of hookers is the amount of gypsies. Young gypsies, I might add; toddler gypsies, even. If you have a soft spot for kids, leave your wallet at home. Wherever you go, gypsies as young as 5 years old will follow. They will not stop begging you for money (often in groups). If you manage to ignore their non-stop nagging while you're sitting down at an out-door café, you will then have to put up with "stage 2" of the baby-gypsy assault: kicking, angry puppy faces and hearing their limited ability to curse at you in English.
Here are some tell-tale signs of a gypsy: Black bare feet, dark skin (whether from the sun or from lack of bathing); lack of parents nearby; arms extended with palms facing up in a request for money.
Your money is worth millions in Romania, literally. One U.S. dollar is worth roughly 30,000 Romanian moneys (Lei). The exchange rate is so low, that they recently had to eliminate all the zeros from their currency. Therefore, a bill with "1" on it actually meant 10,000. The elimination of zeros from their currency was probably due to the fact that everybody was not only tired of writing so many zeros, but they were running out of space to write them! Could you imagine trying to fit the number 2,900,000 on a tiny grocery price tag? I could; I saw it (it was for a pair of sneakers). If that's not confusing enough, the ATM machines still spit out both old and new bills. So after asking for a $30 withdrawal (this will, by the way, last you all week), you will end up either with two 50's or two 500,000's.
Bargaining with merchants is a breeze. In any other country, the general idea in bargaining is to ask for a price that's low but still high enough for the seller to give in. In Romania, the general idea is to just offer any price you want. A Romanian seller—or any Romanian, for that matter—will never consider any amount of U.S. dollars "too low." Be sure to wear a pair of Levi's jeans when going shopping, so that the merchants know you're not fooling around. The downside to this, however, is that locals will actually come up to you and ask to feel your jeans to see if they're real.
Possibly the worst thing about Romania is the food. There really isn't much of a choice of what you can eat when going out to any restaurant. The chicken is out of the question due to the country's problem of bird flu, so that cuts about 50% of the menu. None of the restaurants I've been to could cook a good piece of steak to save their lives, so I don't recommend that either. With chicken and beef deemed inedible, certainly you can't trust them to get it right with the seafood. Added to the fact that their traditional "mashed corn" tastes quite like mashed cardboard but without the flavor, you're left with just two options for your meal: Shitty salad or whisky. My suggestion is skip the salad, pound the whisky, and catch the next flight out of this country.
Written by Gregory Kogan on Apr 18, 2007