Brasov to Bratislava Via Vienna

I thought I had a closer picture of the Black Church but apparently not--it's that gigantic building in the left corner that looks like a church. I read one place that the Germans built it; then another place that the Bulgarians built it but what really happened was the Germans of the city hired Bulgarians to build it. It's called the Black Church because the outside turned black in a fire. The inside is white, Gothic, very impressive. It's pipe organ has 4000 pipes making it the largest in Europe. Someone was playing it when I was there. All instructions in the church are in German first, then Romanian, then English. As you can imagine, the German took 3 lines to translate the simple phrase "Please do not sit in this pewage."  I don't know much German but from what I could tell, it seemed that the Germans must want to know why they can't sit in the pewage.

I was sad that I didn't get to take the tram up the mountain to walk to the Brasov sign and maybe encounter bears--most of the bears that hang around the sign don't kill people, according to the tourist information. But, according to Vlad, Romania has a bear problem. The bears come down the mountains to the affluent neighborhoods at night and scrounge for food. The well-meaning residents feed them even though the wildlife people feed them in the forest. Every spring, the authorities take the bears far away in the mountains but every year, the bears find their way back to town. Vlad claims if you are stumbling home drunk at night, the bears will probably eat you.

So Romania is my new favorite country; I know I say that about every country but this time I might mean it. The people are nice, the towns are charming, the food is great and it's cheap. Now I'm into Euro land and everything already looks more expensive. My flight from Bucharest to Vienna was an hour and fifteen minutes so naturally, they gave us a full meal. Romanian airplane food isn't much better than American airplane food, except for the bread and butter. Plus, they gave us a bite size Milky Way. The bus to Bratislava cost 7 Euros and was amazingly easy to find--I had 10 minutes to find it and I did, unlike the buses at CDG, Paris, which are impossible to find. 

I got here at night so I haven't been out. Tomorrow I'll try to figure out why Johnny made me come here. It's sweltering--temps. in the 90s the whole time I'm here.