It was just another travel day for me on this big adventure. And like all ‘travel days’ (this is not what I call every day—just the days I go from one place to the next), I feel a bit of melancholy. On these days, not only does it mean schlepping my 20 kilogram (roughly 40 pounds) pack onto a bus to a train and/or onto a plane, it means leaving behind a new language I was getting comfortable with, leaving behind a new home I was settling into, and most of all leaving behind new friends I made and connected with.

I had returned to Romania for two weeks to a town where, when the shops run out of change, they just give you whatever they have lying around instead. ‘We owe you ten cents…here have this stale old candy instead.’ ‘Your change is thirty-three cents, but we’ve run out of coins, so you can have a couple squares of gum.’ At the drugstore, I bought some hair products and instead of change they gave me one black elastic hair band. Wow, thanks. This is quite a system…one that locals are pretty sick of. I think after a week you could go back into one of these stores, plunk down a fistful of gum and buy whatever you want and they shouldn’t complain.

After two weeks of relaxing and enjoying their company, I left Mona and Florin’s cozy apartment home in Northern Romania at three o’clock in the morning (oh joy) after a not-so-relaxing two hours of sleep. We arrived at the tiny, inconspicuous Transylvania Airport about two hours later. Through teary eyes we said our goodbyes (“Pa” and “La Revedere”) and I hugged Mona like a true old friend. I haven’t felt this sad painful tug of a farewell since I said goodbye to a man I had dated in the east.

I flew back to Budapest where I had been just a few weeks ago, accumulated more happy Hungarian stamps in my passport, bristled at the now familiar and yet so foreign sound of Hungarian—probably the one language I just outright decided not to deal with, and waited, and waited…about six hours for my Easy Jet flight to Germany.

I waited so long in the main part of the airport that I nearly missed my flight, being ignorant of how long the security check lines had become. I guess arriving bleary-eyed at 6am to a just waking airport had me in some kind of bubble that no crowds would form. I let out a few impatient breaths in the security line as the moms in front of me chose the last possible moment to collapse their baby strollers and take off their jackets (this can be quite frustrating—we wait on line for 30 minutes with all the time in the world to get yourself ‘defrocked’ and ready for that moment when you must drop your crap on the belt and walk through the metal detector). And one of the moms even handed her kid to the security man to hold as she organized herself. Oh, it was so cute and everyone got a nice little chuckle…but not when your plane is leaving in five minutes—let’s go lady!

I boarded the crowded, seat yourself budget flight and grabbed one of the last remaining aisle seats. Then it hit me. I was with a bunch of white, large, loud, and fun-loving Germans. No more mysterious Asian villages. No more exotic Muslim temples. And no more Eastern European backwardness or lingering Communist vibes. Hello Capitalism. Hello wide perfectly paved roads. Hello big cars and big people. Hello Ikea.

I was back in Western territory and not sure I liked it. Everything was clean. Everything was efficient. Everything was running smoothly. Wait—I’m a Virgo—of course I liked it. But perhaps, for the first time in my life, I missed the clutter; I missed the chaos; I missed the ‘Turkish/Romanian/Thai’ way of doing things.

But deep down I knew what I felt was just that old sadness of ‘transitions’ again. I knew in a day or two I would love it. I told myself: It’s a travel day. It’s a transition day. It’s a hurry-up-and-wait day. Just soak it all in and let in happen. So, now I must hop on the bus from the airport to the train station, to the bar where my good friend Claudia will pick me up in about four hours. It was almost exactly one year ago, she came with me to Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport with red wine and snacks at three o’clock in the morning to bid me farewell on my journey around the world. We laughed and cried and I felt such an odd uncertainty of what lay ahead of me. There is no way to express the feeling of time flying—it’s unforgiving, never ending, and always seems to be going full speed ahead. And since I left my home one year ago, she has moved back to her homeland of Germany and now I was coming home to her.

Okay, remember what I’ve said before about it ‘being all about the journey?’ Well, forget it. I just took a 25 hour train ride from hell. Well, actually it was from Krakow, Poland to a small, practically unreachable town (maybe horse and buggy would have gotten me there faster?) in Romania. Like on a few other occasions during my trip I’ve decided to return to a place where I really met some wonderful people to just enjoy their company and hospitality and get to know them better…because I’ve learned that’s really what the trip is all about.

When I bought my ticket at the train station in Krakow, I inquired about getting a couchette (compartments on the train in which the seats fold down to form narrow beds). But, I was told there were none. None? I couldn’t believe on such a long journey including an overnight stretch there were no sleeping cars. I never heard of this. I asked again. She shook her head again. No, none–only compartments with eight seats—four on each side facing each other. This can get pretty tight and in turn pretty smelly for twenty-five hours. Ugh.

The night before my dreaded day of departure, I slept restlessly worked myself into a frenzy recalling possible truths or myths I’d heard from other travelers and on the internet regarding various thefts on overnight trains—unlucky for me the most popular routes with problems were those to and from Poland. Supposedly, unsavory characters spray some kind of gas or chloroform into your compartment knocking you out while they make off with your valuables. Of course if you could get a couchette with bunks this was much safer because you could lock the door. And even though this would be my third overnight trip in the past few weeks (none of which I had any problems—well, not unless you count sharing a car with a David-Duke-loving and Iranian-president-supporting Croatian who shared with me his beliefs that Jews were plotting to take over the world—eek), I dreamt up all kinds of things that were going to happen to me and felt like this was the one time in my trip that maybe I would not be safe…and I kind of had no choice.

The next day, I made one more attempt to make sure that there were no couchettes available and went to the travel office in town. The lady behind the glass also shook her head. No.

“Really? How can this be?” I inquired. After a couple more ‘nos.’ She actually started clacking away at her keyboard and said, ‘Oh yes, there are some’ but you’ll have to change cars in the morning at 8am as the train splits—one half heading towards Budapest and the other into Romania.’ Why hadn’t someone explained this to me before??? Of course I could do this! So during the whole night I could sleep in an actual horizontal position and in the morning I have to move to a seat?? Big deal. What could be more normal! I was annoyed at how much I had to ask people the same question until I miraculously got the answer which I thought was right. I was excited—at least I could lie down and lock the door.

And then she said, “Sorry, no sleepers or couchettes are left. All full.” Bastards!

At 10:30pm the train pulled into Krakow’s busy main station and I headed to the last car which was labeled Bucharest so I would be sure not to be on the half of the train that split of for Budapest. Well, the good news was it was way less crowded than I imagined and a young Polish guy ducked into my reserved car as I came up behind him. I thought at first maybe I would just go take an empty compartment of my own, but after chatting with him for a few minutes I surmised he wasn’t a crazed lunatic about to embark on a murderous rampage. Actually, he was getting his masters in Finance and was heading to a conference in Romania and was even wearing a fleece with the financial groups name printed on it. This was a good sign. I doubted he was in disguise as a finance geek and was really a train bandit. So I thought I’d be better off sharing the car with him as my own protection in case some undesirables came knocking in the wee hours of the night. Things were looking up. Except for the fact that it had become one of the coldest days in Krakow’s summer history and the heat was not turned on at all. We froze trying to sleep across the velvety seats that faced each other in our cold compartment and my toes turned a nice shade of purple. Since I felt safe, I actually had popped a couple sleeping pills I’d gotten from an Australian friend I’d made in Krakow. And they worked like a charm—except for the fact that during the night we were awakened several times by guards as we crossed the borders into Slovakia and Hungary. When our slow-going former Soviet train finally reached the Romanian border at some ungodly hour, we stopped in a train yard for a bit to add a string of cars to our lonely and tiny 3-car train. These included some sleeper cars (like I wanted in the first place!) with fold down beds and a sink in your own compartment, plus some more regular compartments, which now made each car have its own unique style—some seats were like pleather (that lovely fake plasticy leather), some velvety, and some old school bus green– and a pretty swanky looking dining car. Well, I guess I am using the word ‘swanky’ lightly, but in comparison to the rest of the Russian-looking, ‘stylish-less train’, it was like the Rainbow Room in New York City.

I wasn’t hungry, but sat down in the dining car’s bar area just for a change of scenery and change of butt cushion (this makes a big difference after twenty hours). The windows were large and the flat golden plains of Western Romanian gave way to misty mountains way in the distance. The tall, skinny leathery-faced (or perhaps ‘pleathery-faced’) man with a mustache and friendly smile that worked behind the counter came and sat down next to me. He spoke a smattering of English with a healthy dollop of Romanian and of course, his native tongue, Hungarian. When I told him I was from Chicago he beamed at me, jumped up and grabbed his address book. He paged through the scribbled contacts and pointed to someone that lived in Chicago—actually probably five minutes from where I lived right near Wrigley Field. It was a Hungarian friend of his who’d moved there some time ago. He then said, ‘Baptist.’ I thought maybe I misunderstood him and cupped my ear making the ‘I didn’t quite hear you’ gesture. He repeated ‘Baptist.’

“She’s Baptist?” I repeated wondering why this was an interesting thing to share with me.

He nodded and pointed to me as if to ask what my religious background was. This was an odd line of questioning to just start getting to know each other but I answered ‘Jewish’ never knowing what reactions might await me—especially in Eastern Europe where it is no secret that there is still some strong Anti-Semitic sentiment floating around. He then stroked my hair, and said ‘ah, beautiful.’ Ooooookay….

I sat back down at a table and he offered me some coffee, but I explained I had brought no money with me (which was true–even so true as that I had no money really until I got off the train and to an ATM). My remaining three Polish Zloty ($1) would do me no good now anyway. I’ve gotten quite adept at spending just the right amount of cash my last few days in a country and using my credit card to even out the rest. Of course, after traveling this long, it has become a kind of game that I enjoy playing with myself. ‘Dining-car man’ had become persistent in giving me a complimentary cappuccino which I finally accepted with a smile. Perhaps this was a mistake. I thanked him and to be gracious, introduced myself and shook his hand. He shook mine and then, as you guessed, held onto it for an uncomfortably long amount of time before he reached his thin slimy lips down and kissed it and repeated to tell me I was beautiful. Ok…check please! Time for me to make my escape back to the second class carriages. Now, he wanted to know if I could visit him in Budapest. Aw, too bad for me (and him), I’d already been there. I explained that I had to go watch my bags, shook his hand again and got away back to my chilly cabin and good looking, but much less flirtations compartment partner.

To continue my amazing lucky streak of meeting helpful and friendly people, as soon as cute yet boring finance guy left—and even though the train was still quite empty–a sweet Romanian girl joined me in my compartment. We chatted a bit and then it was finally time for me to get off and change trains. Hallelujah! I was in the homestretch.

Well, I thought I was. After about 18 hours on the first train, little did I know the shorter ride in the second train would be more hellacious than the first. After waiting about two hours in the tiny station in the middle of ‘nowhereville’ Romania, I boarded the train to my final destination. It appeared to be an even clunkier vessel from Communist times and was old and creaky and reeked of urine. Mmmm. It was bursting at the seams with country folk who were smoking and chattering. This four hour journey seemed nearly as long or longer than the first ride. There was really no where to walk around so I was glued to my grotty plastic seat in an uncomfortably full compartment of friendly, non-English speaking Gypsies. But, once again, they were sweet to me and when at last I reached my stop, they helped me off the train with my suitcase and bid me a fond farewell.

Twenty-five hours after I’d left Krakow, my dreaded longest travel day was over and besides needing a good ass massage, it actually wasn’t so bad after all. And instead of being robbed or beaten by lunatics, I encountered only friendly, albeit a bit smelly, people every step of the way. And as I stepped off the train waving goodbye to my new friends, thankfully there was Mihai, Mona’s brother, standing on the other side of the tracks with a big smile on his face. I was home.

My adventures have been amazing, but the best part would have to be all the wonderful people I have met from all corners of the globe—good, kind people. I’ve developed new friendships and had some ‘romantic’ experiences as well (for more juicy details you will have to read the book). The people I’ve met from all over—Vietnamese, Maori, Argentinean, Pakistani, Muslim, Buddhist, Atheist, Jewish, Christian—have touched me in ways I will never ever forget. The kindness I’ve received from virtual strangers has been the highlight of my trip. Yes, I’ve gazed in awe at the Angkor Watt temples in Cambodia, shared the beach with the animals of the Galapagos Islands, and marveled at the ancient cities of Turkey and the modern monstrosities of Dubai. But nothing can compare to meeting the people that I now call my friends. There are bad things going on in the world and always will be, but at the basic level of day to day existence in big cities and in small towns all over the globe people are smiling and chatting and making their little slice of the world a friendly and welcoming place.

Before I left for my trip, many friends were sure I would meet a sexy man in some exotic country.

“Oh you are never coming back…I’m sure you will meet some hunky Australian surfer dude.”

“Wait ‘til you get to Italy, some Roman God will sweep you off your feet.”

“Watch out, the Turkish men are irresistible…”

It’s funny the countries we associate with hot lovers—Italy, France, Spain. No one ever said to me ‘you are going to meet some amazingly chic sheik Emirati man’ or ‘I bet you will fall for a Cambodian hottie’ or ‘some pasty white Brit is going to take your breath away.’

Now ten months into my little adventure, I have met some very cool guys during my travels, but perhaps not the ‘soulmate’ everyone else seemed to be dreaming up for me. But I think I just traveled half way around the world to meet someone who, in just a matter of days, has become one of my best friends and perhaps a soulmate of a different kind. Things like this always happen with lovers…why can’t it happen with two friends? It made me realize everyone was so focused on me meeting some amazing man that no one said, ‘maybe you will meet the best friend of your dreams.’

My brother’s best friend since high school, Ed, had visited Bistrita (BIS-treat-sa), Romania years ago. He fell in love with a Romanian girl and in turn, the country, stayed for three years and ended up marrying his love and taking her back to America where they’ve just had their first child. He so much wanted her to feel at home, that he would introduce her to any and every Romanian he could find in south Florida. In fact, while she was still in the hospital, just after giving birth, Ed presented her with some random Romanian he’d grabbed out of the hallway.

Before my visit, when I thought of Romania, three things came to mind: Transylvania’s Dracula, sad orphans, and Ed. I contacted him when I got there and he was insistent that I go to his former ‘home’ to meet his in-laws. He said I would love them and he was right.

Mona is Ed’s new sister-in-law. From the moment that she and her husband, Florin, picked me up I knew I would be comfortable with them. I was greeted with warm smiles and hugs and they took me home with them to Bistrita where I stayed for four days. We laughed, shared personal stories, and even cried together. We went from being virtual strangers to nearly sisters literally overnight. And this is not something I normally do. Anyone who really knows me, knows I’m very selective with boyfriends AND girlfriends. I’ve said many times, the older I get, the more discriminatory I get with who I spend my time with. And if I have the choice of hanging out with someone I don’t really like all that much or being alone, I would happily be alone. During my stay with Mona and Florin, I met her brother, who charmed the pants off me (not literally—okay just my shirt—well, he is a licensed massage therapist and I am never one to turn down a good massage…) with his good looks and sense of humor, her parents, her son, co-workers, and some of their friends. They treated me like I really was part of the family and it is a feeling I will never forget. Her mother hugged me hello like I was a long lost cousin and cooked me her famous Romanian specialties–supa dulce (basically matzoh ball soup!), sarmale (stuffed cabbage) and mămăligă (polenta). Pofta Bună (Bon Appetit)! I think her parents were thrilled with me because I ate a bit more than they were used to with Ed who seemed to spend too much time chowing on chow mein at the local Chinese restaurant and sinking his teeth into his favorite local specialty—the Big Mac.

Mona and Florin are now planning to quit their jobs and take a six month trip to America to stay with her sister, Nico, and Ed in Florida. She says that my ‘spirit’ and independence helped her decide she could leave her home. If it wasn’t for Mona and her family my visit to Romania would be a nice memory of medieval towns and green mountainous villages, but now it was so much more. Something between us just clicked and we connected on a deeper level. Everyone talks about meeting your ‘soulmate’ while traveling the world, but no one thinks about it happening between two friends, and it just did.

Our bus drove out onto the steamy tarmac of modern Ataturk International Airport in Istanbul. It came to a halt in front of a tiny propeller plane that would fly me and my fellow passengers to my next destination on ‘The LL World Tour:’ Bucharest, Romania. The aircraft looked like it was built in 1973—the gray leather seats were worn around the edges and super shiny in the middle—from the hundreds of butts that had sat there before me. There were no high tech movie screens or anything near what I experienced on Emirates Air just a few months back on my flight into Istanbul. In fact, the flight attendants still did the safety ‘song and dance’ themselves.

After one and a half hours bobbing and weaving our way through the puffy-clouded skies, we landed in the former Soviet city of Bucharest and one of the newest countries of the European Union. Back in independent traveler mode—I hit the ground running—smiling through passport control, picking up my checked suitcase, getting Romanian Lei out of the ATM, and finding public bus number 783 into the city. It felt good to be ‘on the move’ once again.

The ride into town surprisingly was quite lovely and we passed what appeared to be a very green city with shady trees all around. Because of its wide leafy boulevards and public squares, Bucharest is sometimes called the ‘Paris of Eastern Europe.’ I think practically all countries I’ve been in seem to claim their city as some sort of ‘Paris;’ Buenos Aires—the Paris of South America, Dalat, Vietnam–the Paris of Vietnam, Montreal—the Paris of Canada, Dubai—the Paris…no I’m just kidding about that last one.

After hearing several warnings from various friends who said Bucharest was a ‘dump’ (I can’t confirm this for myself) I planned on seeing more of the countryside and headed straight for the train station. Oh, and by the way, I was back in a country where the cars stop for people—ah civilization.

Before I left Istanbul, I’d wondered if I’d be lonely my first few days back out on my own again. But so far, this was not the case. On the bus I’d spotted a couple guys that seemed like English-speaking tourists…well it’s not detective work to spot a backpack or suitcase, but as far as the English…they just had a ‘look.’ I bumped into them in the metro station and said ‘hello.’ And just like that, as is so easy in the travel world, I had two new best friends for the next couple days. Derek, originally from Los Angeles and more recently Seattle, was on a whirlwind tour of Eastern Europe. Now that I’m an experienced loafer…committing my time in big cities to at least a week (to several months) or small towns to at least three nights, I hate to see others rushing around so much. He was spending, at most two nights in each city he hit. He’s getting a small taste of the biggest tourist areas, but never a genuine feel for the ‘real’ place, but, hey, at least he’s traveling. Bobby lived north of London and was a bit of a real estate mogul, buying up properties all over the globe, from Dubai to Sofia and Venezuela to Poland.

I was planning on taking the train to Brasov, but the guys had read that something called a ‘Maxi Taxi’ (a minivan, basically) was cheaper and faster. We schlepped our bags and ourselves over crumbling sidewalks several blocks away from the train station in the not-so-quaint part of the city where locals pointed us to the ‘maxi taxi stand.’ Unfortunately for us, when we got there we found out the one we were looking for did not even stop here. A tall young Romanian guy with a cigarette dangling precariously out of the side of his mouth who never made eye contact told us gruffly that we could head across town to find it or just go back to the train station and take the next train. So much for the ‘two heads are better than one’ theory—I guess three heads are like a quarter brain? I had planned on buying a ticket and waiting for the train. Now, I was walking around in circles in Bucharest. We headed back to the train station and hopped on the next train for Transylvania. Of course, we found out later we’d gotten on the excruciatingly slow local train that made every stop along the way and would take about four hours instead of the express train that would have gotten us there in half the time. Oh well—it was just how things were going. At least this gave us time to get to know each other in our sweaty, hot train car with sticky pleather seats that we shared with friendly, yet smelly villagers.

During the long rail journey, we climbed higher into the mountains where the air was fresh and crisp and my spirits lifted. Brasov (Bra-shov) is the quintessential medieval European city full of old Bavarian-like stuccoed buildings with red-tiled roofs and petunias spilling out of window flower boxes lining cobblestoned lanes where locals stroll arm in arm. A church bell gongs in the distance and the air is misty and cool. Cafes line the streets and idle chatter fills the air. I love it.

Romania is perhaps the most beautiful country in Eastern Europe, a last bastion of a medieval past long since lost elsewhere. The mighty Carpathian mountain range cuts right through the heart of it surprising you with jagged mountain vistas and lush green valleys with several fortified centuries-old villages. You can just imagine the middle ages with fierce horsemen galloping by on their way to attack and pillage the next tiny hamlet, killing the men, stealing the women, and eating wild beasts with their bare hands. The mythic land of Transylvania is the region of Vlad (the Impaler) Tepes, the real-life torturous prince who was the inspiration for 19th-century novelist Bram Stoker’s ‘Count Dracula.’ The intact medieval villages of this region are a trip back in time, with their charming town squares, foreboding stone watchtowers, stately churches, and surrounding Bavarian-style homes reflecting the Hungarian and German ancestry. I wasn’t sure what exactly Romania would be like and this was just perfect. I am reminded once again how much I just love the look and ‘feel’ of Europe and am glad to be back.