020 Transnistria, Moldova

So, then we were off to Odessa, by night train from Simferopol. Because of the days we lost by waiting for a train, we decided to stay in Odessa only for a day, arriving in the morning and leaving in the evening. Odessa is a nice city, but I imagined it a bit grander. We were walking around in the center, along a boulevard, down some stairs, up again via a big pedestrian bridge. Then we consulted our guidebook, and decided to visit the famous Potempkin steps. So we went there. And then we found out that we already walked down the steps without even noticing. Slightly underwhelming.

In the morning we got a message from Nick, the guy who would host us is in Tiraspol, telling us that we should take the bus from Odessa because there wouldn't be any trains. We were a bit disappointed, since we try to do as much as possible by train. We decided just to make sure, and it turned out that there was one train going to Tiraspol in the afternoon, so we decided not to take Nickas advice, and thake the train anyway. When it was time to go there, we went to the big train station in Odessa, and looked at our ticket. Platform 10 it said. The station has only 9 platforms. Interesting....
After some very complicated talks with various train station employees, platform 10 turned out to be outside of the train station, along the road, hidden at the side somewhere. Apparently the international train from Moldova was not really important enough to completely reach the station :)

At the boarder, the Ukrainian border guards checked our passports, and graciously allowed us to leave the Ukrainian territory. The train crossed a small stream, and we were in Moldova, according to the United Nations and all its members. According to the people living in this part of Europe, we were not in Moldova. We were in Transnistria, a breakaway republic wedged between Ukraine and Moldova. It has Russian speaking inhabitants, strong ties with Moscow, their own money (rubles) and their own passports.

And their own border control, or so we assumed. We didn't really know how the boarder situation would be, information on the internet was a bit conflicting, but most people said it was a hassle, with people having to bribe the guards to get in etc. No-one checked us in the train at the boarder, and we just drove on to Tiraspol, Transnistria's capital. The train stood there for about 20 seconds, just enough for the two of us and two locals to jump off, before the rest of the passenger drove on to Moldova proper. It was dark, and the platform was completely deserted. At the very end, we spotted two guys with big hats, but they didn't seem to make any move to come and stamp our passports. Maybe inside the station? So we entered the huge, dark and empty station hall. No-one there. No big sign saying 'Tourist Register Here!'. Maybe someone would be waiting for visitors through the door on the other side of the hall? And then we were standing outside on the street, and inside the country, without any official stuff happening. That's not what was promised to us! We were expecting big signs, fences, guard dogs, corrupt officials, 12 different stamps and the likes. Hmm, we probably missed something.

Nick came to pick us up, and told us that indeed we had to register. He found a police officer somewhere, we filled out his address, and, without even taking a look at our passports, we were finally officially inside the country. They cannot stamp your passport apparently, since the republic is not recognized by anyone, and having a Transnistrian stamp in your passport would invalidate it. Bummer.

Tiraspol was very nice. It is not by itself a beautiful city, with a lot of gray concrete and soviet statues. But the people we stayed with were very nice, we learned a lot more about the history of the place and the current relation with Russia and Moldova. And we got to see two different departments of the ministry of internal affairs to get our registration papers stamped for a second time.

After Tiraspol, we visit the small town of Bender on the 'boarder' with Moldova. Bender, done that.

And then we were off to Chisinau, Moldova's captial.

Chisinau was very nice as well. We surfed with Arthur and met some of his interesting friends, including the one who kept on singing 'I've got the moves like Jagger' by Maroon 5.