Written by Valts Rozentāls
Sleep a bit in – no, practice. Tasty breakfast and off we go to conquer the day. After a short bus ride we arrived at “World of Mini Transylvania”, just a bit outside of Udvarhely. We had to wait a bit, so we started a round of “the circle”. A team game against boredom. We didn’t get to finish it as we had to move forward towards the entrance.
I don’t think there was any perception for anybody of the group what “World of Mini Transylvania” meant, but from the start to the end it was very beautiful. You start off with the Castle of the Vlad (yes, the Dracula!) and go through with bigger and smaller castles, fortresses, strongholds, churches, abbeys, monasteries, manors and even sunken island in the middle of the river. The spectrum and history really makes it interesting and at some point you even become overwhelmed and understand – I will have to visit this place again. Amazing experience of the History of Transylvania with exquisite miniature models.
After we left, there was no time to spare as we wanted to take the bus to our beloved pizza place for lunch. As it happens – when someone sees the bus standing at the stop, we start to think we will miss it. Solution? Gun it! Run, run for your lives! At least we were not sprinting… I mean the group can only be as fast as the coaches right. It gets your blood pumping and you can enjoy the climatised bus even better. We even get some kind of “sightseeing” experience out of the bus ride as it does not drive directly to the stop near the pizza place, but takes its time and cruises through the city making a decent loop. There is the church, the “Alexandria” (as we call it, it’s a confectionery/pastry shop) and the school. Unfortunately, the building hosting boarding students is not there anymore. It caved in and took a couple of innocent lives with it.
At last we arrive at the stop we need to get off near the hospital. Then it’s less than five minutes on foot until we can work towards eliminating our hunger. This time we were smarter and had Johannes, Paul and Nadine arrive before us and already make an order of the first pizzas. We did it again – we hit them by surprise and the personnel had to check with their owner if they could produce the pizzas for a group of this size. I mean, for the time being we pretty much occupied a good 90% of their facility. At the end everything turns out good, pizza is as tasty as we remember and of course – kids love some pizza.
Time for some swim – do not worry, we still have some distance to cover until we get there. And basically the youth is always so hungry, that everything we put into them just evaporates and is directly transformed into pure energy by their bodies. Truly athletic group of kids. By the time we get to the swimming pool, food has settled and we can have some quality fun in the water. Despite the warm day, there are not so many people there and we have a decent part of the swimming pool just for us. Swim, enjoy the sun, swim some more, jump and close it all out with some throwing ball around in the water. It is amazing how competitive it can get if you just make out two teams and include some throwing of a ball. Not even goals or baskets.
Now, one of my personal favorite parts, which I enjoy perhaps way too much. Music box, techno and train. Somehow we are missing time today. So we hit the street with the techno and light running towards the train station. In the end, I think we would have made it in time anyway, but perhaps I only think it because we made it in time and had to wait… who knows. Train arrives and we board. And again some Romania magic happens. Evi has to get off of the train in the city to get to her car – she’s not coming all the way with us. The catch is – there is no train stop for her to get off. Then, somehow, she manages to convince the locomotive engineer to make a stop in the middle of well, city – no stop, nothing and let her out so she can get to her car. This would be UNTHINKABLE back in Germany or even any other place. But here – here is the place where stuff happens. And it’s so random, nobody even notices that it’s a stop out of ordinary.
We top the evening off with some practice, at this point we are really crushing it. Dinner, feedback and let’s hit the blankets.
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