Osterferien Update Romania: It Began in Bucharest and Ended in Braşov

Here are three fun facts about Romania:

1) Romania is pretty much tied with Bulgaria as the poorest country in the European Union.

2) Romania was under communist control until the dictator Ceauşescu and his wife were executed by firing squad on Christmas Day 1989.

3) While seemingly intuitive but easy to forget, the official language of Romania is Romanian which is a romance language with surprising similarities to Italian (and the people are just as loud and just as public about displaying affection).

Flying into Baneasa Airport in Bucharest led to a bit of a culture shock--the areas around the airport and the main train station seemed pretty torn up, dirty and full of people trying to take advantage of impressionable young people like me.  Get outside of these areas, though, and Bucharest is really amazing.  There was a huge city garden near my hostel, Parcul Cişmigiu, that was filled with people obviously enjoying the sunny, early Spring days.  You could feel the history of the city, like Berlin but less renovated and much, much more raw, and really see how modernization was competing with the lingering effects of a stagnant communist economy.  

One interesting thing I noted, Ceauşescu hated all of the ancient churches in Bucharest, and so he tried to hide a lot of them by building high rise apartment buildings all around them.  He apparently was pretty eccentric and also started building the Palace of the Parliament which I've heard is either the world's largest or second largest administrative building in the world after the Pentagon (conflicting reports).

After Bucharest, I headed to Braşov in Transylvania but made a stopover in Sinaia to visit Peleş Castle--the residence of King Carol I of the Romanians.  Just behind Peleş is Pelişor Castle which was built to house the king's nephew and heir and his bratty consort.

After Sinaia I got back on a train headed to Braşov and the Carpathian Mountains where I had a fun time day-tripping to Bran "Dracula's" Castle which was cool on the outside and disappointingly boring on the inside and then exploring Braşov and all of it's small Transylvania town glory.  Braşov was surprisingly really nice and had lots to see for a city its size (including a Hollywood-inspired Brasov sign on a nearby mountain) and amazing food for dirt cheap.

After two nights in Braşov I boarded my first night train which would take me to Budapest, Hungary, but for that story you'll just have to wait.