Sunday

Everyone had to leave early for their flights. We piled into two busses but made many pit stops in order to keep saying goodbye.

I feel so pathetic. I get so attached to people sometimes. I think it just comes back to being alone in Romania. I live alone, cook alone, eat alone and pretty much work alone. Am I lonely? Yes, a bit. Now that Delphine's gone, I don't know anyone and it's hard to make friends when school hasn't started yet.

Those of us who didn't have planes to catch met in Sofia for the day. The Serbs wanted typical Serbian food. We found a restaurant but they proclaimed it "too clean to be a Serbian restaurant". I had my heart set on burec but I was hungry and depressed and just wanted to eat. Iany asked me what I wanted and since the menu was written in Cyrillic, I answered "I don't know". "Well, I can't translate the whole menu for you" "I know, but could you at least read the categories so I know what kind of restaurant this is?" "Just tell me what you want to eat and I'll order it for you!" "But I can't even read the menu so I don't know what kind of food there is!" Eventually, I settled on some greek rice-grape leaves-yoghurt concoction with fries. It wasn't that good but it was food.

We saw a movie being filmed downtown. Apparently, many "European" movies are filmed in Sofia because it's cheap and looks European. This one was about some Russian revolution. I saw extras milling around holding signs with the president's face X'd out in red paint. Very interesting.

We also saw a church from the fifth century in the middle of the presidental palace courtyard. The old and the new, both of which were oppressing in their own ways. I found it strangely appropriate.

Afterwards, I met up with Rob L., a FAC intern in Sofia. We spent the afternoon together while I debated returning home with the Serbs. I weighed my options:
a) staying in Sofia for an extra day
b) returning with two absolutely hillarious guys who would make the 31 hour travel seem much shorter.

I decided that if I wanted to see Sofia, I should give it more than just a day. Rob also wanted to show me some monmasteries, so I thought that I should make a special trip just to see Bulgaria. Plus, I was feeling sad and I just wanted to get back home to my own bed.

I got Rob to message Belgrade Rob, who had all my money in order to see if he could meet me the next morning. An hour later and no answer, so I decided to go ahead with the travel. If he could meet me, great, but if not, oh well.

The trip to Belgrade was hillarious and not without incident. Our train was supposed to leave at 8:50 pm. At 7:30 pm, we went to a trendy cafe for drinks. At 8:10, I warned the others that we should start moving. At 8:20, I said that the train was leaving in 30 minutes. Everyone decided to leave at 8:30. We still had to find a taxi, get our luggage and buy water.

We arrived at the station at 8:40. Never have three people moved so fast. Petar joked that this was exactly like a teen movie with the protagonists running to catch their train. We couldn't find the baggage claim and were asking everyone. Luckily, Serbian is close enough to Bulgarian so Momir and Petar could make themselves understood. Finally, we saw the baggage symbol and ran like hell. Then with all our luggage, we had to find out quay.

We saw the trains but didn't know what side was ours. We asked everyone but no one was willing to help. A maintenance man showed us quay 3 but there were two trains there. Can't Eastern Europeans make anything easy? As soon as we stepped on, someone told us it was the wrong train. So we ran faster than we've ever run before to get on the other train. The whistle was blowing and we were so scared that we wouldn't make it. As soon as we hopped on, it pulled away. Out of breathe and exhilirated, we collapsed in a couchette.

The ticket controller heard us laughing and talking. I'm sure he was very upset at us, but I'm the dumb foreigner so what can he do? When he came by again, he ordered them back to their seats. They said that we met on the train and as I don't speak Serbian, they were helping me get settled in. He said they had to go back in five minutes. He came by a few minutes later so we made a big show about saying goodbye. He went back to his room and we continued to talk.

I wanted them to stay in my couchette with me but they already had seat reservations, they couldn't stay with me. Or so I thought. They told me they like to do things the illegal way and they hid on the top luggage racks. Then Momir found a small space above the door and crawled up there.

So we hung out for another two hours until we almost got to the border when they had to go back to their seats. They promised to come back after we crossed the border but ten minutes later, I was fast asleep.

Luckily, they weren't in the couchette when the border guards came. They inspected every inch of the cabine with a flashlight. I don't want to think about what could have happened had they stayed with me.