You Say Ukraine Weak?!

Ukraine is great. It's a lot like Russia but easier to get into and you don't have to avoid the police as much as an Eastern European man avoids showers. Ukraine hasn't been ruined yet by cheap flights like other Eastern European countries now plagued with hoards of Brits and Germans, so everything is really cheap and there aren't really any tourists there.They also really liked me for some reason. I think it's my beard, they seem to respect masculinity over there. The old woman selling me a train ticket actually blew me a kiss. My bus ride into Ukraine wasn't so smooth however, as the bus driver forgot his passport in Warsaw and we had to wait at the border in the bus, amidst the most potent B.O. stench I have encountered, for 5 hours while the driver's buddy came from Warsaw to deliver the passport. My Ukrainian companions were not pleased.
My first meal in Ukraine was also pretty interesting. I went to this outdoor patio-type place where Ukrainians seemed to be buying chicken wraps. So I went up and said, 'Chicken wrap please', this of course not being understood at all, but the lady started food-making motions anyways so I didn't care. Until she presented me with a whole fucking chicken on a plate. So I took my chicken and beer and tried to get cutlery, making a cutting motion with my hands. I was offered bread. I tried to explain how bread wasn't the greatest cutting utensil but was shooed away angrily. I have to say though, after the intial shock of having my fingerprints burnt off, eating a whole animal with your hands is probably the most satisfying way to eat something. Although I did need a shower after as I was covered in grease. Still only cost me 4 bucks though.
That was in Lviv, a very nice town blah blah blah. Then I took a train to Kiev and was joined by about 30 Ukrainian military guys who thought I was pretty special. They 'made' me drink beer and this Ukrainian cognac until 3am. If you've never heard of Ukrainian cognac, there's a reason. It's not their speciality. Our good rapport was maintained until one of the guys, a rather large paratrooper, got really drunk and told me that he 'needed' me to stay with him at his house and started giving me long stares. Everyone got a little awkward after that. But Kiev was fun, lots of partying going on. Despite the Norweigan guy who ran the hostel I was at, who kept lecturing me about the 'slant eyes' and 'curry munchers' stealing all of 'our' natural resources, there was a lot of good people in Kiev. I went out with a bunch of Swedes and Ukrainians one night and remember buying a few bottles of vodka at a grocery store and very little after that. I woke up in a different hostel in someone's bed. I don't know where they slept, maybe in my hostel in my bed but that seems pretty unlikely. The bad thing about partying with Swedes though is that I'm always the ugliest one there. The Brits are much better to party with.
Then Odessa. Odessa is full of Russians and, consequently, full of cigarette butts and beer bottles. It was like it was halloween and the only costumes being sold were 'washed-up prostitute' and 'aging male go-go dancer'. I have never seen so many mesh shirts on men before. It was nice though, in that drinking by yourself was once again socially acceptable, if not expected. This one guy on the bus (named Golya I would soon learn), at 10am on a Tuesday, accompanied by his mother, stumbled into his seat, mumbled/burped something to me, and promptly passed out. He was so drunk his mother couldn't wake him up at their stop. So she started hitting him and screaming at him. Then an old man came and started hitting him and screaming at him because he wanted the seat. Then other people started hitting him and I felt bad for poor Golya until I started hitting him. It was quite fun and his mother actually thanked me when Golya woke up/threw up.
But the weather wasn't so great so I headed to Moldova. If you know anything about Moldova (including where it is on a map), you're my hero. It's pretty weird. It's Europe's poorest, most corrupt country, it has a crazy communist breakaway republic in it, and it is really, really good at making wine. A nice bottle of wine costs a dollar. I went to a winery which had 2 million bottles of wine and we had to take a bus through the 55km of wine cellars. My inciteful comments at the wine tasting included, 'This wine is very bold, I enjoy the boldness very much','This wine tastes a little winier than the last one', 'I like the bubbles', and 'Do you have a bathroom in the immediate vicinity?' I didn't impress the guide very much.
After two bottles of wine to myself, the bus ride to Romania was fairly blurry. I do remember some Moldovans trying to smuggle stuff into Romania and getting caught when the bag they had hid under the bus got caught in the wheel and was dragged around the parking lot when the bus started to move, much to everyone's amusement. Those guys didnt make it into Romania. Poor Moldovans, you'll never win. I arrived in Bucharest in the morning, took a look around and immediately booked a train out of Bucharest. Bucharest is a hole. It has some interesting things to see but they don't make up for the packs of disgusting straydogs, scheming gypsies, and general filth. Not getting the exchange rate quite down, I took out $1000 out of an ATM. I tried vainly to shove it back in but that doesn't work. So now I am a walking jackpot for pickpockets and the odds are very good that I will lose a significant amount of money very soon. After a few somewhat uneventful but relaxing days in Transylvania, I am now in Budapest. Being in the EU is nice in some ways because people speak English and occasionally use logic but the prices are crazy. What cost me a couple of healthy chickens and an arm's length of sausage in Ukraine now cost me hundreds of dollars. But Budapest is sweet.

Bouche