After the Polish-Ukraine border crossing and the old stories of visa scams, I was expecting the worst for the crossing into Moldova. It was actually a breeze. We were through in no time at all, all passports stamped. One thing I didn't think I'd be doing was praising the Moldovians on their efficient buraucracy.
Now Moldova doesn't really have much of a hostelling culture. What it does have is a well-developed network of guesthouses/homestays which are basically the same thing: you sleep in a shared dorm bedroom with access to a bathroom and kitchen, it just happens to be in someone's house. Still, to be on the safe side I stuck with a recommendation and so I ended up in Svetlana's appartment on the edge of Chisinau, sharing a room with a French-Native American and a German-Russian.
It is true that Chisinau doesn't really have many (any) "must see" tourist attractions and it could never compete with L'viv's arcitectural beauty. However, it isn't an ugly city and there's plenty of quirky buildings around. There are wide clean, tree-lined avenues for wandering along and plenty of statues, fountains and parks. Oh and very cheap cafes. I spent a good proportion of my stay walking around or sitting in parks, and generally taking it easy. It is a very laid-back place. We even found a particularly huge park with a bit of a lake you can paddle in. This was much appreciated in the heat. There's a number of museums but I only went to one: the National Museum. It's not all the exciting but it did have a diorama, although not on the same scale as the one in Wroclaw. Obviously.
Public toilets are not very Western. I'm not entirely sure what the idea is but they are very low and 'squatty'. Also, I wussed out of drinking the tap water here, as I did in Ukraine. As such, I was drinking a lot of bottled water of which it isimpossible to find any that isn't carbonated. A random selection of bottled water bottles reveled that all of them were bottled by... the Coca Cola Company. It's also worth noting that a lot of folk take pity and speak English to you, even if you're attempting Moldovian (Romanian). Those that can't are more than patient with the pointing and smiling. I even had one waitress do a chicken impression to explain the meat on the menu. Now that was an entertaining ordering process.
So yes, I thoroughly enjoyed by 3 days in Moldova. But in the evening of 14th July I was on another night bus and on my way...
