Hi! What do you think about Romania?

before i read the answers, let me say this about Romania. i was there in 2002. first, my wife and i were afraid of the street dogs we read about. they did not materialize. we walked at night as fearless as we do in Russia. at an open-air market i met the sweetest old lady (grandmother) as we call them in Russia, selling pickled cabbage. i told her we could not buy any (somehow she understood my American accented Russian) but she gave me a sample of cabbage to die for. i remember it after ten years... we went on the train, the wrong one.. wrong track, right time... we were allowed to sleep overnight in a train-crew quarters for free. no privacy, but free. on the next train at 5 or so in the morning, the most fascist conductor was very glad to penalize us for wasting our ticket on the wrong train. in Transylvania, frozen Transylvania we bought THICK, heavy wool sweaters, handmade sweaters, from another "grandmother" to fight the cold. indeed they do! we stopped in some small city (where i bought a wall-hanging of what must be a Romanian folk dance. -he has a flag or ribbon on a stick, over his head) where we ate hamburgers. the meat was red, cooked but red. my mother's old explanation made me realize it was likely horse meat. a very tasty horse, indeed. i asked in some city about a national dish. i was told leustean (in USA i think it is Chinese celery) is a major flavoring ingredient. OOOOHHHHHH! what a tasty soup it was!!! we went to an internet cafe, the ONLY way to communicate in 2002, we were introduced to the "captcha" symbols as we had never seen them before. i remember a couple of Gypsie boys, late night, running around the metro (subway) station. one tossed a bread roll to his friend, down to the lower level; it went skidding thru the dust, wheel grindings, shoe residue and whatever. he picked it up and without even dusting or blowing it, began to eat the roll. i supposed it aided his immunity as i had recently read something to that effect. we rode the rails thru a city, some streetes were not paved. i was a bit surprised, though Romania has the reputation of being the second poorest European country, behind Albania. Russia does indeed have unpaved streets as does Texas. but this was a wide seemingly main street. it did not lower my opinion of Romania. in all the time i spent in the country, i can't say i was annoyed, disheartened, offended, or any other negative adjective one can imagine. i thoroughly enjoyed Romania and would happily eat more horses there, given the chance.

I had a great time in Bucharest, Brasov and doing a farm stay in Transylvania. People were friendly, we liked the food, the landscape was pretty and Bucharest had some fun bars

We don't think of Romania all that much, and a lot of Americans don't even know where it is. With a question like this, you are mostly going to get negative views, since positive events don't make the news. Romania has a reputation of acting even more extremely than its dominant allies, i.e. the Iron Guard during Nazi Germany and Ceaușescu during the Soviet Union. (Along the same vein, are they also one of the countries that hosted the CIA's secret prisons during the Bush Jr. administration? I think Poland & Bulgaria did, anyway.) In contrast, Bulgaria has a reputation for cooperating with the dominant power just enough to get away with moderation and a good level of independence. Romania suffered a lot of environmental damage during the Communist era. While Ceaușescu was in charge, he went on a crusade against abortion & birth control, resulting in the youth who brought about his demise. We think twice before adopting from Romania (or Russia), since the orphanages are so under-staffed that many kids come out warped. The advantage of the government raising kids is that Romania has top-notch female gymnasts. Most Americans know Transylvania as the home of Dracula a.k.a. Vlad the Impaler, who we consider a scary, ferocious & vicious man (even though Romanians like him for fighting the Turks). We thus see Transylvania as a fascinating place, the location in the world where werewolves, vampires, and situations like Grimm Brothers fairy tales are most possible. Since Transylvania is so rugged and forested, and has so many isolated communities, I would love to visit. Romania has loads of Gypsies, who are viewed as having many economic & social problems (epitomized by the hometown of "Borat", which was an exaggeration filmed in an actual Gypsy village) but also colorful clothing and a tradition for the best folk music in the world. I have heard that some of the other Romanians have been persecuting them. On a personal level, I once ate at a Chicago restaurant called "Little Bucharest" and enjoyed the homemade sausage. The cuisine seemed a lot like German food.

Beautiful landscape, ugly buildings. They should really remodel those Communist blocks.

gypsies, gypsies, street hookers, stole a lot of land from poor Hungary, and last but not least, gypsies. This is how generall opinion about Romania in Poland, but not much people visited it.