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We aren't the hostelling kind of girls (us and them), but we stayed in one last night (again). We ended up chilling in Transylvania with an interesting mix of youth hostel people.

Things I remember:
- Pissing on the sidewalk and using Romanian money to wipe. (Yes, the money is that worthless.)
- Two adorable boys from London.
- Elliott.

Things I do not remember:
- Inviting Morris to follow us around Europe for two weeks.

Morris (I think that's his name.) is some guy who stayed in our youth hostel in Brasov. He knew we were going to Istanbul so he figured out which trains we should have been on then took a taxi and a bus to catch up. After he invited himself into our cabin, we paid to upgrade to first class. He tried following us but the ticket collector took care of us and told him there wasn't space available. Morris lurked in the hallway of the first class car and talked about following us around Europe for the next two weeks. My God, kill me. We decided to jump off the train in Bulgaria in the middle of the night, endure a six hour layover, then travel five hours in the wrong direction to a city we had not intended to visit.

Yeah, that's a bit much, but you must understand we tried being subtle then we tried being not so subtle. In fact, we tried everything short of saying go away until we realized go away was the only way to go. We fought over who had to say it. It's a difficult thing to tell someone to go away, especially when that someone is your age and isn't a bad person. He was nice, just incredibly annoying and the thought of spending the next to weeks with him yapping at our heels was frightening.

Fortunately it didn't go that far. As soon as the train arrived in Istanbul we ran like cowards. We ducked into the first restaurant we saw . literally. The waiters didn't speak much English and probably wondered what in the hell we were doing, but they took off their shirts and dressed us like Turkish women. We saw Morris circle around the train station a couple times. We're assuming he didn't see us because if he had he'd be following us around right now.

American Guys Are Easy

On the train from Budapest to Bucharest Erin left me for a few minutes. When she came back she said she had met two American guys and one of them was a best selling author. What luck. We could use some connections and insight. So we brought a three-liter jug of wine to their compartment and ended up chilling for the rest of the ride.

They told us how lucky we were to have met them . they only stay in five-star hotels, only fly first class, only buy the best. The author talked about what it was like to be on every major talk show in America, how he played golf with President Clinton, how Anna Nicole Smith made out with him at a book signing, how he opened the National Airport, blah blah blah blah blah. Had we met them in Budapest we could have stayed in their five-star hotel with them. Have we ever stayed in a five-star? Oh, we were going to love it. And we were going to love the Opera. We were going to love visiting them in Vegas and getting the hook up. Five-star everything. Blah blah blah blah.

Yeah, sounds like fun, huh? Not only were we in the company of men who flaunted money, but they could also help further our careers. We should have been thanking our lucky stars and kissing serious ass, right? But all we have to say is: BRUCE, GREG, USE YOUR FUCKING MONEY AND BUY YOURSELVES A DAMN HOOKER. These guys (at least twice our age, maybe two and a half times) were pathetic.

Greg dropped out of the picture early. He didn't make it past the train ride. I was wearing a tee-shirt that said www.AmericanGirlsAreEasy.com and reading a book called Wild Girls Club: Tales From Below the Belt and I chose to sleep on the piss-infested floor rather than make out with him. What was wrong with me?

Brucey lasted a little longer. He met up with us in Bucharest for five minutes with some pathetic story about the Marriot being overbooked. His five-star accommodation shrank to the same two-star dive we were staying at. We went our separate ways but he came to our room at 3am when we were passed out. The necrophiliac five-star bastard went from me to Erin back to me back to Erin back to me back to Erin, trying to figure out which was more likely to put out. Uh, neither. We don't have time or patience for five-star losers.

Train ride from Budapest to Bucharest

Things got interesting before we even left the station in Budapest. I went to the bathroom to freshen up. I was in there for a half a second before someone started yelling and banging on the door. I made some noise to let them know that the bathroom was occupied... I guess the locked door wasn't enough of a clue. The guy kept yelling and, wouldn't you know, got out keys and opened the door. There I am, sitting on the toilet, pants around my ankles and there is a conductor yelling at me. I slammed the door. I thought the guy would have been embarrassed by his mistake and gone when I was finished. Wrong. He was waiting for me. (You have to see this guy. He is a shining example of bitter beer face.) "Come pass now," he said. That meant show him my passport. He followed me to our compartment screaming about how this was his train, he had a name, he was president, or some shit like that. I'm not really sure. The guy was crazy. I showed him my passport, then he left.

About fifteen minutes later the guy comes back with another dude yelling about our passports and our tickets. I couldn't help but laugh. He was pretty close to hilarious. I think it kinda pissed him off. "What is problem?" he asked me. Dude, if he couldn't figure out the problem, I sure as hell wasn't going to tell him. He continued to harass me throughout the entire trip. I'm glad he did. It was really amusing.

The train ride got better. I remembered seeing two American guys in line at the train station who bought tickets for the train we were on. They pissed me off from the beginning because they held up the line asking the dumbest questions three times each. I kept thinking, what assholes these guys are. Nonetheless, I wanted to give them a business card so I went looking for them on the train. Come to find out, one of them was a best selling author. Dumb luck, we just found some connections. I went to get Meghan and the wine and we sat with them for the rest of the train ride. These guys really liked themselves. They shared stories about how much money they had and how good their lives were. All I was thinking, was hell yeah, we just found the sugar daddies we were looking for in Vegas.

At the border from Hungary into Romania, in a drunken stupor, we thought our passports had been stolen. This caused major drama. Suddenly we were being surrounded by about seven border guards, trying to assist us and figure out who stole our passports. Nice guys. One was particularly helpful. I decided it was a good idea to make out with him. Hell, you only have one chance to hook up with a Romanian border guard (I think), and you should definitely take it. Besides, he was very helpful. I kissed him for a couple of minutes then I went to the bathroom. When I came back the guy was waiting with his shirt off. I was like, whoa buddy, I don't know where you thought this was going, but it wasn't going there. As it turns out, American girls are not so easy, we are actually big teases.

I went back to the cabin with Greg and Bruce and ended up hooking up with Bruce. You only get one opportunity to hook up with a best selling author and you should take it. Besides, I really wanted a sugar daddy. What I got was some superficial loser that couldn't make up his mind between Meghan and I, no expensive dinners, no five star treatment and no shopping spree. What a waste of time.

Casinos in Romania

In case you were wondering how a casino in Romania operates, here's how... You have to give them a photo ID and they xerox it. Then you have to sign in, get your picture taken, have your purse searched and walk through a metal detector. Don't even think about trying to bring a camera. All this for $3 blackjack and no free liquor. I miss Vegas.

Taking a Taxi in Romania

You're never supposed to take a taxi in Eastern Europe, but if you do you're supposed to make sure it has a meter and/or negotiate a price upfront. We weren't sure how to get back to our hotel from the multitude of places we'd been, so we opted for a taxi. We'd seen taxi signs earlier that said 4500 lei/kilometer ($0.25/mile) so we figured that even if the asshole drove in circles around town it wouldn't be too pricey.

I didn't see a meter in the taxi so I asked the guy how much it would cost to get to our hotel. He said 80,000 lei ($3.00). Sure, why not. When our hotel ended up being 2 km away, Erin and I were a bit pissed. It should have cost 30 cents. Then as if we weren't angry enough, he uncovered his meter and showed us the price 198,000 lei. Bastard had a meter the whole time. He explained in broken English that 80,000 lei had just been an estimate and 198,000 lei was the real price.

I really wish I had told him to blow me and paid nothing. I know it's only a couple dollars, but the point was that we were being ripped off. Unfortunately I suck and handed over the agreed upon $3. I hate tourists like me.

Rip Me Off, Please

From the moment we crossed the border to Eastern Europe people began trying to dick us over. The waiter in the train cafe tried to steal our passports. The burly Hungarian passport control guy demanded to see my tits. People from the "tourist agency" were very persistant that we stay at one of their "discount" hotels. When we ordered water at a restaurant the bottle had a broken seal. I mean come on - do we look like morons?

It's not just the Hungarians... We met this American on the train. Erin introduced herself and he said he had a daughter named Erin. Then what do you know? - he happened to have a daughter named Meghan too. He wanted us to stay with him in his hotel. He said he'd be there for three days. We said we'd be in Hungary for a week. Then he extended his trip for four days.

We must look naive. The sweetest Hungarian woman got to talking with us. She told us about the city and and things we should make a point to see but she also spent a lot of time warning us. Don't trust anyone... don't leave bags unattended... don't don't don't. There must be 'dick us over' signs on our foreheads.

American Girls Are Easy... And We're Bitches Too

While we were eating dinner last night we noticed a table of American girls eating with some guys from Australia. The guys were fairly attractive and the girls were fairly stupid. They were so dumb it made us look bad because we shared their nationality.

We've have these hot pink American Girls Are Easy business cards and we handed the guys one with a message written on the back. It said: too bad you didn't meet us first... we're fun and smart. We were expecting a brawl - there were four girls and two of us. But all they could say in their defense was, "Come back here." If someone had dropped a card like that off to a bunch of guys I was eating with, I would have much more to say than "Hey come back here." I would be pissed. This only goes to prove that we were right in what we did. Any girls who let themselves be placed in such situations, deserve it. Hopefully these guys learned a lesson about how real American girls are... ballsy bitches that don't sit around and act stupid for attention.

Seattle-Vegas-NYC-Europe

If you're flying with frequent flyer miles you're allowed one layover in a major hub (ie: New York, Houston, Cleveland), but if you're extra super nice you can talk them into flying you from Seattle to Vegas to New York to Frankfurt for free.

SEA: It's a good idea to begin your trip in Seattle because there are plenty of casinos to practice winning at... and you want to be an expert at winning so you can afford your trip to Europe.

LAS: There's something to be said about a city full of ATMs that only offer increments of $100. I can't get ATMs in my hometown to give me enough cash for a car payment, but Vegas would have no problem overdrawing me.

NYC: The bad reputation is undeserved - everyone we met in the city was so nice. Next time we'll stay long enough to do something other than pick up our mail.

Two brilliant ideas for money this summer:

1. Good old fashioned begging: One random Sunday in high school, my friend and I had four hours to kill so we went downtown Frankfurt and begged for money. We used several methods and kept tabs on what was the most profitable. We ended with about 50 Marks ($30).

2. Roofies on our tits: As we all know, men are idiots.