But the ride back was distinctly different.  To our mutual surprise, the same lady and I would be sharing a cabin again, alone, until the door slammed open and a very drunk, very disgruntled man in his fifties burst in a sidled up next to me, ignoring the three other open seats at the other end of the cabin. For the next three hours (until Brasov) we got to hear the mad yelling drunken man tell us we were communists, and that he was not a communist, and, “LOOK! Out the window! There! Do you know what that is? ROMANIA!” He then produced a small electronic stuffed dog with flashing green eyes that barked and jumped around on the floor hysterically while he gave it various commands, which the dog of course ignored and was punished for.

At some point he left with his two liter bottle of Ciuc to talk to people in the aisle outside the cabin, and the woman asked me in English where I was from. Thus began a very interesting discussion. I asked what the man was on about and she said, “He is furious…about everything. Yes, of course he is crazy, but we have to appreciate his right to say what he wants.”

While I agreed in principle, I had had enough of the shouting in my ear and stale beer belching, and was happy when he fell asleep just outside of Brasov but was wary of the next three hours to Sibiu, should he reawaken.

Luckily, our cabin caught fire as we approached Brasov. Apparently, something under the train was burning and we were advised to move to another cabin. We gathered our things and left the now passed-out social objector in the cabin alone. I felt bad about not waking him up, but to my simultaneous relief and irritation, he started shouting through the window something about how the burning train was a communist and how no one was going to make HIM move.

Fortunately, he did not join us in our new cabin. We continued our conversation. At some point a Romanian about my age interrupted asking a political question. He spoke perfect British English and took over the entire conversation from there. We all spoke about religion and politics and philosophy for the remainder of the trip. We exchanged information said goodbye, and parted company.

On the way home from the train station as I sat in the back of the cigarette-smoke-filled taxi whose driver had removed the window cranks, and was blaring Manele, I realized that this was the most normal part of my trip and started laughing. The driver looked at me over his shoulder and also started laughing saying something I didn’t catch, turned up the volume on the radio and began to sing.

Mateo Urquijo

Communications Angel