Oh my mercy. Do I have adventures to fill you in on!
I'm going to risk confusing you by sharing the most immediate happenings first, and then going back to the rest of the stories from the past two weeks.
Yesterday afternoon, I took my most ridiculous adventure. My lack of directional sense is common knowledge, but I have turned getting lost into a true skill. The plan was simple enough: take a rutiera from my street to the bridge (about twenty minutes away), catch a rutiera on the other side of the bridge, get off at Str. A. Doinici, and walk up to the Raatz's house. If only.
I made it to the bridge just fine, but as it turns out the next number rutiera I needed to catch passes along the other side of the bridge and then turns towards the center of town. To get to Doinci though, I was supposed to walk a block down from the bridge and catch the same number on the next corner. That one supposedly goes the other way towards their house. I, of course, took the first option.
Twenty minutes later, I knew something was wrong. The leg of the journey was only supposed to take about five minutes, and I didn't recognize anything. Suddenly I read a street sign and realized we were entering the center of town. Uh oh, I was definitely supposed to be on the edge of Chisinau, not in the Center! So I get off this rutiera and start walking back to the next biggest intersection where buses were headed back in the same direction as I had come. Of course this means I had to walk a few blocks because I was on a one way street and not all the rutieras go and come by the same route.
*If you're curious as to how Chisinau is laid out, and the transportation system, check out this map. I use this one to look up all the different rutiera (maxi taxi) routes. For reference, I live in Botanica. I was trying to get to a region that is a bit farther west than Buicani.
Anyways, I decided to catch a rutiera headed back to the bus station near the Raatz's. The rutiera I chose stops at the bus station, but I though someone there could tell me which rutiera to take the rest of the way. When the driver and one of his colleagues didn't know where Doinici was and suggested looking at a map, I impatiently refused and decided just to walk. It would've been a great plan, if I had remembered what their street looked like. As it happened, I walked right past it and turned down the next street. Then I proceeded to get very confused and off track.
My annoyance and frustration were turning into concern.
Less and less rutieras were passing by. I finally stopped one. I climbed in to find four big tires filling the floor, a stroller in the doorway, and a man with his six month old daughter in the front. Between my ignorance as to what the driver was trying to say to me in Russian, my confusion as to where I was, and my stunned reaction to a rutiera full of tires instead of people, they some how realized I was a crazy lost foreigner. Amist rolling laughter, they asked where I was trying to go. The driver agreed to take me there, so I rode along talking to the other passenger about his little girl.
When the driver dropped me off at Doinici, I figured he had dropped me off at the other end of the street. So I thanked him and paid him. As I started walking up the street, I grew a little concerned that this might not be the right Doinici street. A couple of babushkas called out something to me, but it was in Russian so I just continued on.
Then this little brown yappy-looking dog started barking and growling at me. The hair on his back stood up and he started coming towards me. Normally such a pint size dog wouldn't bother me. But this is Moldova. "The dogs are feral," as Brandon always reminds me. I swung my bag towards the dog (keeping it strategically between my leg and the little mutt), and he backed off. I kept my eye on him as I continued up the street.
Went I arrived at the address that matched the Raatz's my heart sunk. The house in front of me was definitely not their's.
So I walked to end of the street and looked for the busiest intersection in sight. I walked up to it and was greatly relieved to be able to catch a rutiera number that I knew went back to my end of Chisinau. However, I wasn't about to let the Devil keep me from practicing and waste my afternoon, so as soon as we neared taxis, I got off the rutiera.
I picked a taxi and asked the driver if he could take me to Doinici. He asked me which one, and I stumbled through an explanation that ended up only confusing him. So we looked at his map, and he found Doinici street. He was such a patient, good-spirited driver. I'm so thankful for his good attitude, especially when I was making so little sense and completely baffled from the previous two hours of confusion.
He called a friend every five minutes to ask about where this Doinici street was. We pulled over three times to check the map. Finally he explained that there are three Doinici streets in Chisinau, and I should have specified the correct district. Oops.
We make it to the right district, with my dear driver checking every so often that I recognize where we are and that it's correct. I think he even offered to let me drive at one point. Hah. That'd be bad news.
We end up passing the street just like I had done on foot (not that I realized it yet). Finding ourselves lost in a maze of residences, he pulled out the map again. This time, he realized he had picked out the wrong Doinici street. We turned around to go back...well, we turned around once, and then, finding ourselves at the top of a narrow dead end street, he steered us deftly down the hill in reverse. Then he looks at me and says with quick improve, "This is completely normal." Hahaha, oh yes, completely normal.
Once we are on a manuveurable road again, he stops and asks some people how to get back to Doinici. They gave us directions and we continue along. Until the cars sputters. And then stalls. And then stops.
Out of gas. Great.
I lost it. I just started laughing.... and laughing and laughing....anyways. He turned the key in the ignition and the car would jolt forward a couple of feet. We did this until we were at the end of the street. Then he opened his door and pushed the car forward until we began to roll down the hill. The momentum carried us a few blocks further. Then the car simply refused to go anymore. The driver stopped a van behind us, and the van driver graciously agreed to tow us to the nearest gas station.
A little more gas and a clear set of directions later, we set off and finally made it the Raatz's house!
I did get one beautiful shot of Chisinau during my adventure. I'll add that in the morning :)
Praise to the One who guides my steps and leads me in the way everlasting!
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