The Unfinished Europe
So, after this Eastern European trip, I pretty much finished seeing all the countries in the mainland of this most complicated, intriguing , and culturally rich continent in the world. Or, have I?
There are actually still a few countries I haven't been to. I decided not to visit some of them due to complicated visa regulation, or just simply that "they were not on the way for me to get somewhere"...
Belarus (白俄羅斯): Unlike Ukraine, Belarus still requires entry visa from everybody who wants to travel there and it is expensive. And different from Ukraine, it is actually not a very interesting country (it is landlocked by the way). Last time I checked, I think it is $100 for a single entry visa to get into that country. When I was in Vilnius, Lithuania, it is merely 4 hours bus ride to Minsk. But, was it worth it to make a trip there? At least I didn't think so at that moment.
Moldova (and its breakaway Republic of Transdniester; 摩達維亞 及 外聶斯特共和國): Again, the visa requirement ($65 or $85) was the main issue that made me skip this country. I was already losing time by not able to get into Romania from Ukraine. Thus, I also did not have spare time to travel to this Romania's next door neighbor. I did see a bus that left for Chisinau (Moldovan capital) when I was at Lviv station. Unfortunately, without a proper visa, I could not just jump on that bus and head to Moldova. I heard they are repealing the visa regulation in April 2007. Hopefully...It should be fun to visit Europe's poorest country anyway (yes, Albania, you finally moved up from the No.1 at the bottom).
Transdniester is very tricky to visit. Though they claim everybody needs visa to enter that region, there is no way to apply for a Transdniester visa (no country in the world recognizes them, so there is no Transdniester consulate anywhere to apply entry visa, believe it or not!). So you are on the mercy of a border guard to decide how much "entry visa" they want you to pay when you get there...Maybe it is not a good time to visit it yet.
Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (馬其頓): Somewhat awkwardly sandwiched between Bulgaria and Albania. This country chose to build a diplomatic relationship with Taiwan and then later dumped us. Okay, I know they were practically forced at knife point by China. But I do still have some problems with their unfaithful behavior...
Kosovo (科索伏): Not really a country but somewhat de facto independent from Serbia already. Again, it is in a awkward geographical position for me to visit (can only get there from either Macedonia or Albania). There may not be too many things to see anyway (I heard the capital, Prishtina, is quite ugly).
San Marino (聖馬利諾), Luxemburg(盧森堡): Too small to locate them....just joking! But they are usually not "on the way" for me to travel to anyway.
Malta (馬爾他), Ireland (愛爾蘭), Iceland(冰島): Mmmm...they are not on the "mainland" of Europe, so...
both Cypruses (南北塞浦路斯): Are they even really in Europe (even the Southern Republic is in E.U. now)?
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