So many options

Riding the bus in Romania is probably like anywhere else, but I have little experience elsewhere on buses.  On the RATB  (Regia Autonomă de Transport Bucureşti) website, I can get a route planned for me. Using the Google browser, I can use Romanian websites and Google translates them for me. Holy Cow Batman! Right out of Star Trek!!  The RATB site does have its own English language version though, and it is easier to read.

Google is a literal translator, which can be amusing sometimes. For instance, it can change the numbers of prices, but then it changes the currency without doing an actual conversion. Something that is 1,3 Lei can show up as 1.3 Euros, which is about 4 times the actual cost. Oops.  I am glad I don’t depend on it to translate Klingon or Ferengi !

Of course, if the bus on which we are riding has a scrolling destination screen that does not update, we could miss our stop and go the whole circuit, back to where we started. Which we did. Now we know everywhere the 301 line stops, and doesn’t. And, Katherine and I had several interesting conversations. 

I also ate way too many pastries. Yes- I can consume wheat in this country without getting a migraine! Even if I eat two pastries, a soft pretzel, and have half a dark beer with lunch. I may never move away from here, but I don’t know if it will be because I love it or because I will have gotten too fat to move at all.

Bucharest is an interesting mix of old and new, traditional and imported, cheap and high quality. This mix applies to the merchandise as well as the people, but as you can see from the photo, some things are basically the same in all big cities. I keep finding more reasons to love it here. Oh, the waterfall is running in the pond in our backyard now. Perfect place to enjoy a beer.