Salut!

Been back in Romania for a week now and boy, what a week! Met up with Ashley and Dara in Bucharest and went to see Aerosmith! Had such a great time, I decided to go see them again in August when they're in NJ :)
Then we went to Brasov. First missed our train because they sold 2 of us tickets for the 1:00 and one a ticket on the 3:15, and while trying to decide what to do the 1:00 train pulled away... eventually we found someone who would refund our tickets and put us all on the same train. Unfortunately, that also left us on the slowest train of the day, and we didn't arrive in Brasov until 7:00 at night. Nothing terribly exciting happened after that, we went for dinner and then watched the world cup because we were pretty tired. Headed to Bran Castle on Sunday... we decided to leave around 10am so we could get there early. Good thing we decided to go early because it took us 3 hours to figure out how to actually get there. We were given about 4 conflicting sets of directions, and they usually ended up with us in the middle of nowhere. We rode the same bus line in circles for an hour and a half before going back to the train station/main bus station and asking how to get there... finally got decent directions and eventually made it there after changing 2 bus lines and sitting in a field for half an hour.

Bran Castle (the castle Bram Stoker got his inspiration for Dracula from), is set imposingly on top of a hill cliff... kind of spooky, right? The inside of the castle, though, is all bright white walls with beautiful wooden supports and an interior courtyard, complete with wishing well and a secret staircase hidden by a whimsical-looking tree. Not QUITE what I was expecting, but still pretty cool. After we toured the castle we hung around Bran, looking at all the touristy souveniers. They had some pretty funny ones, 'Dr. Acula, Romanian Cardiologist,' and 'I survived Transylvania' shirts that had a picture of an impaled person; all sorts of mugs with dracula and recipes for blood cocktails (1 part AB, 1 Part B-, 2 parts A-), etc.

On Monday we headed up to Porolissum, taking a 6 hour train ride from Brasov to Cluj, where our friend from last year, Bogdan, picked us up and drove us to Porolissum. As soon as we got there it started pouring rain and it pretty much has not stopped since. Unfortuantely, that means I have no news on the excavation since we've only gotten a single layer up, with only the usual pottery and bone, and a single coin the romanians found, that is probably a commemorative Faustina coin that Pius Antonius (I think) had distributed after Empress Faustina died.

That's about all for now, look for another update sometime next week!

Pupici!