Bucharest (part 1)

I write this on the bus as it makes its way towards our gig in Bucharest. It's currently seven pm local time and we're still a good fifty kilometres from our destination. The doors are already open to punters and the venue has a strict ten o'clock curfew. We left Budapest at two in the morning and have done what seems to be the equivalent of driving the length of the British Isles via the back roads. Seriously, we've been through some proper nutty terrain - village after remote mountain village of tumbledown shacks, the only indication someone's living in them being the lines of washing hanging outside. Cows are herded across the (very busy) roads, donkeys pull hay-filled carts and entire families wander along with little regard for the trucks thundering by mere inches from them. Add to that the suicidal overtaking manoeuvres attempted by local drivers and the manky stray dogs running out to attack passing vehicles and you've got one seriously uncomfortable ride.