Andrea Hearts Traveling

I really didn’t know what to expect of Timisoara and to be honest I only went there because Ryan Air has some cheap flights to Berlin so why not?

Well, after spending a couple of days there I was so glad I went! The city had beautiful architecture and parks all around.

Sibiu is the kind of city that makes you want to cry because it's so beautiful!

I arrived in Sibiu after an easy bus ride from Cluj Napoca and settled into my hostel which was perfectly located a stair case away from main town.

As I arrived I checked in and talking to the volunteer he told me that the whole week was Sibiu's famous theater festival and that around the old town they have had super cool performances and that it was the last day of the festival.

View from the hostel

I took my time to settle in then went out for lunch and walked the pedestrian street in the old town and found a couple of performers walking around entertaining people. It was so cool!

The streets of the small town were so cute! Many shops lined up the streets, especially pastry shops selling all kinds of sweet delights!

Pastry shop on the right.

I kept walking and was so in love with the beauty of Sibiu!

Walking the bridge of lies

Some people were gathering by a plaza so I decided to check out what was going on and then realized that they were scheduled shows in different parts of the city where one could go and watch for free. I stood there amongst the crowd and watch an amazing show called cupid. This guy started the show in a woman's night gown and little by little he transformed himself into cupid and gave a spectacular show with the help of many volunteers, mainly children.

After watching cupid I decided to go out of the main town and get lost for a bit before the next performance. All the streets near Sibiu's old town were so charming! I especially loved the roofs that looked like they had eyes looking at you... a little creepy, but still cute!

The weather wasn't the best, the sky had dark clouds, it was raining on and off, but even without the best lighting I found the city to be so beautiful and so unique. The rustic look of it, with most of the houses looking like they needed an extra coat of paint gave the city character, it made me feel like I had just walked back to a place somewhen in the middle age.

Kids hanging out in one of the town's square.

After some time walking out of the main streets I went back for yet another show on the small square, this time a couple of french guys.

From the show I made it back to the main square where the big spectacle for the closing of the festival began! A huge electronic mosquito looking thing came out of one side street and made it through the crowd and into the big square. Hanging from two of the legs were some acrobats and on the back two violinists were standing. It was so weird but so cool!

Ok... this was crazy! The violin players were not just only violin players but also acrobats who could hang from two strings and be upside down and still play and hold their violin in place! it was impressive!!! This is a real festival, not the joke of Kapana festival in Plovdiv!

The following day I spent it walking around town and checking out more of the landmarks of beautiful Sibiu!

The last thing I did was to go up the councel tower and get an amazing view of Sibiu from up top!

The beautiful Cathedral of Sibiu!

Sadly only after two days I had to go but this medieval town for sure stole a piece of my heart!

From Brasov I decided to go to Sighisoara but everybody kept saying that there wasn't much to do in there and it could be done just in a couple of hours so I decided to change my plans and go for the day but take my bag and move to the next city.

Transportation in Romania is a little complicated, many long distance busses have to have a reservation and when you call the day before they are already full, trains take forever and run only a few times a day to some cities, so I decided to go and figure it out later.

I arrived at Sighisoara's bus station with the idea of spending the day there and taking the 5pm train that would get me to Cluj Napoca around 11pm but thought of asking for a bus schedule just in case there was a bus earlier but there wasn't! The only bus to Cluj was at 7am! Bummer!

On monday I left the hostel mid day and went to the train station to catch a train to my next stop… Brasov!

The more I travel the more I open my eyes and notice things that I didn’t before. I think this journey had made me more aware of the way women are treated around the world.

Sitting in the train to Brasov from Bucharest I sat across two people reading the newspaper, both of the newspaper had barely dressed women on their cover and back cover (one was holding a horse’s rope in a bikini! Really?) and it just made me uncomfortable to see that women are being objectified and that as a society most people are totally ok with it. But that is not news, I just feel like this should be changing by now but it isn’t and its because of how we (women) are portrayed everywhere that we are still being harassed, disrespected, and blamed for actions from others upon ourselves.

While standing in line to get my train ticket I witnessed a guy, probably his late 20s, taking a picture of the girl in line in front of him and then texting it to a friend with a happy face, he then proceeded to look at the picture several times and then stare at the woman’s butt in front of him. I felt like I needed to say something but I don’t speak Romanian, I feel all the time that women are being disrespected and nobody is doing anything. The picture taking wasn’t the worst part, he then started looking at his pictures and there were hundreds of pictures of girls on his phone I couldn’t help but wonder: Who is raising these men? I know my mother raised us to be respectful, to respect men and women alike, my brother would never take a picture of a girl’s butt and text to his friends!

It’s really horrifying! Will this ever change? A better question… What can we do to make this change?!?!

The whole point of visiting Veliko Tarnovo last was because apparently it was easier to get to Romania from there but it turned out to be really tricky! I left my hostel at 10:30am and got to Bucharest at 7pm. I had to change 3 different trains and ended up spending more time waiting at stations than in the actual train, what takes 3 hours in car took me 8 and a half hours by train and this was a taste of what transportation would be like in Romania!

I got to Bucharest, checked into my hostel and was so tired that decided to stay in and relax and go out thenext day.

My favorite part of Bucharest weren't its buildings, or the museums, or its vibe, it was the one dulce the leche ice cream I had while walking Bucharest's old town! haha

My second favorite was sitting at a park bench and watching families in bicycles, dads pushing strollers, watching a grandma waiting for her family with a balloon, watching a girl learning how to roller skate falling down all the time but getting back up and trying again. It was the sound of birds chirping at the top of the trees, it was the light sound of an acoustic guitar far away, it was the feeling of freedom, the feeling that I could just sit there and do nothing other than taking it all in.

Timisoara

Sibiu, a place that steals your heart!

Sighisoara and Cluj Napoca

Brasov and beautiful Transylvania!!!!

Romania! First stop: Bucharest!

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