Coroana Brasov

... outlast them and then rebuild what had been destroyed outside. Not ideal but all alternatives probably were worse. <br><br>The result of this concept has a neat church inside, which may be early gothic or later, in case the original one was conceived too small or not built solidly enough for the occasional earthquakes. Right around the church runs a wall of up to 5 meters in width and 15 meters in height, at the inside clad with emergency housing and ...

... now". She also recommended that we see Peles Castle. Peles Castle is (relatively) new, and gorgeously maintained. It was built for King Carol I summer residence. I loved the Turkish rugs, crystal mirrors. Calvin loved the extensive arms collection from the 16th to 19th century(including full armor for horse and rider), and the Turkish smoking room. The central vacuum system and elevator (operational in 1901) were impressive.

... leave for 4 hours. He said there was a bus soon though. Next, I found out that Romania does NOT in fact use euros but has their own money. Also, that the worst traffic i have ever seen is in Bucharest!! It took about an hour to go the 11 KM to the station and cost 400 of their money. 100 Euros. Oh well, i'm in Transilvania!! I'll make it up later. The bus ride was 3 ...

... but pleasant site near Cluj Napoca, a city founded by the Emperor Trajan then destroyed psychologically by a huge pyramid scheme which left many people destitute having just found their freedom from Ceausescu's autocratic regime. Then what should have been a straightforward 180 mile drive to Bran, near Brasov, in the heart of Transylvania at the edge of the Southern Carpathians. At the first town we followed the signs ...

... take the funicular back down. It was on the way down that all of us were slipping and sliding on our asses as every bend of the path - I later decided to climb some trees and was feeling free. At the bottom of the footpath there is a very large ice patch covering the stretch of a very steep and long staircase, rather then slipping on the stairs down I convinced my friends to follow me down the slide. After they seen how much fun I had down the slide, they didn ...

... were laughing, whistling and started to drop their pants to give us a brown eye for the pic. Amelie arrived home not long after me. It was the first day of her placement yesterday. She is at a home similar to where i go, but there are only 6 kids. She was very nervous about it the night before so we chatted about some of the things that we had done with the kids that they liked. It was her birthday yesterday so she decided to make a cake with the kids. She ended up having a really ...

... audience like when i do an AX demo ;-) I even sang for them. I sang the rainbow song.. red and yellow and pink and green etc. I had coloured cards that i put up for each colour so they could sing with me. Was quite cool having them all standing there around me tryng so hard to sing the song. They are lovely kids though, the girls all fight to sit next to us and give us hugs. They are all dying to tell us their names, count in english and name animals and colours ...

... In the middle of the road. And then there were groups of people walking next to the street and this girl crossed herself, when walking past the cemetery. And the castle looked even more beautiful than the previous day; it was lit up in the morning light, while the rest of the valley was still resting in the shadows. For a very short moment I pictured the Count, standing next to one of the windows, observing modern world.

... run for over 2 kms... from the front of his future offices right to the centre of town. Quite pretty - but still they are only fountains and there's not to much to look at after a while. We had a 12.30 pick up and Nev planned to drive for a little bit and then have a service stop and lunch, except there were no service stations open. At all. Eventually we found a Carrefour, which is a BIG supermarket, that was open and we parked the bus there. We angled ...

... only just met. We sat in her kitchen with her roomate, eating too many cookies. Occasionally the doorbell would ring, and a troop of young boys, or occasionally, grown men, would come in and - as is the tradition the day after Easter - spray each of us with scented water as though we were flowers. We were having so much fun, planning a future for me in which I live in Brasov, teach English at the school where Andi teaches, and then start a hostel, that I nearly missed my train.