Arriving in Romania

 Saturday 10th August 2024

Today was the day I left for my placement in Romania with GRAMPUS Heritage, an organisation that offers and funds opportunities to different countries, mainly around Europe to work and learn from a different culture. My placement description is an archaeological one, as I am an archaeology and anthropology student it was perfect for me. In more detail it is to survey vernacular buildings in the Rimet, a group of villages located in the Apuseni mountains of Romania, near Aiud and Alba Iulia. I am very excited as I will be joining a group of other students, including my friend Ethan from Bournemouth University. Plus, I have already organised to meet my other friend, Natalia, I also met her in Bournemouth but she is Romanian and her family are from Alba Iulia, so I have arranged to meet her there as it is on the route to Rimet from Sibiu, the city I will land in tonight. 

I travelled to Luton airport ready to fly at 8:20pm, I met the other students I am working with. Their names are Saoirse, Lauren and Natalie, and they all seem very nice. We landed in Sibiu at around 1:30am local time and met Monica, our supervisor at the airport. We made our introductions but everyone was very tired so we got a taxi to our hotel in Sibiu. I was getting a train to Alba Iulia at 7:30am so went straight to bed. I did not get much sleep as I was not used to the time difference and was also excited about my coming travels. I woke up to my alarm and managed to complete the slumberous walk through the empty streets of Sibiu, it was actually very nice and I bought a ticket with my pathetic attempt at Romanian. The train journey was 2 and a half hours of winding tracks through all the tiny villages of the Transylvanian countryside, which I enjoyed very much. When I arrived in Alba, Natalia and her dad, Iosif, were waiting for me at the train station. We drove to Natalia's Grandma's apartment, which was empty and generously offered to let us stay there, Iosif gave me a little run down of the town during the car journey and then dropped us off. We then ventured into the town to the main attraction, the huge Roman fortress, there is a long boulevard of shops, bars and restaurants that leads up to the entrance of the fortress. We walked over the bridge that had been repaired in glass and up to the imposing entrance, I hadn't eaten so we aimed to go to Nati's favourite cotos calak stand, unfortunately it was shut so we sat at one of the many restaurants in the fortress, I had a delicious chicken salad and we had a great catch up. After food Natalia gave me a tour of the fortress and a bit of insight into the history, including the monument at the back end of the fortress that commemorates three men that plotted against the government that were imprisoned and tortured in the bell tower, to later be killed. We walked around the mote that took us back to the entrance, the place was full of restaurants, bars, gardens and more, it was a really nice set up and looked beautiful. 


We then went to visit Grandma (name), her and her husband didn't really speak any English so I was communicating through Nati's translations, which was slightly tricky. She had an amazing garden with grapes vines, nectarines, plums, pears, squash and loads more. We picked a few to sample and they were some of the freshest and juiciest fruits I'd ever tasted, plus, we got some of her home made wine that literally burst with fruity flavours. It was super easy to drink and double strength, a dangerous combination!

The rest of my first day in Romania consisted of me meeting the rest of Natalia's family, which was really nice, including the huge amounts of food in the form of schnitzel and meatballs made by Nati's other grandma. In the evening, we went out for drinks at a bar/restaurant in the fortress, I was introduced to the Hugo, a twist on aperol spritz. I can now say I am full time lover. 

12/08/24

The next day I woke up early planning to get picked up by Monica, my supervisor. However, she gave me a call and said it was easier to pick me up the next day, so I got another day with Natalia and her family. It was another day of getting shown around the town and attempting to immerse myself in the culture. I had the pleasure of meeting uncles, aunts, cousins and the remaining grandfather. His name is Ghiță Ignat and out of complete coincidence he grew up in a little village in the Rimet area, where I would be spending the next 3 weeks. What are the chances! 

After a great first two days of my time away, that really felt like a holiday, it was time to set off for actual reason for being here. My task was to get the train from Alba Iulia to Teuis, at 10am to meet Monica, where she would pick me up from the station. 

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