Traveling to the “Worst” Country in Europe

[Music] i want to be honest here and start by saying that i don't love the title of this story that much not because of a bs pretense that every place in the world is equally amazing but because i do truly believe that one's opinion of what the best and worst place in the world is is so subjective mostly to one's experience with its people recently however the most common question i get asked in unfortunately 90 of my interactions is what is my favorite place i have ever visited i don't like this question because i don't have an answer i've been fortunate enough to travel to obscure places from the least visited country in the world to the most boring town in america and have found a disproportionate amount of kindness openness and hospitality in many of these lesser visited places and so choosing one place over another simply doesn't make any sense to me as i recently moved back to europe this led my curiosity to eventually google the strange question of what does the internet believe the worst country in europe is and i landed on multiple websites with unfortunately the same answer of moldova now the answer to why is obviously difficult as the soviet union fell apart in 1991 a power grab led lots of corruption in the country and a very challenging time for moldovans with country-wide economic strain this led to a lack of government funding for wages housing and infrastructure for decades which resulted in many of the streets and buildings becoming decrepid and over one third of the entire population leaving in the past 30 years and so as an attempt to once again hopefully prove the opinion of the internet wrong we decided to fly the moldova for three days and see what unusual adventure we could find to commemorate our travels from last year to transnistria the country that doesn't exist on a map that is technically located inside the borders of moldova i brought my friend eric who speaks fluent russian i'm very excited that i get to go to uh supposedly the worst country in europe as we celebrate seekers day for this entire week and an incredible seven years of creating stories on this channel our all-time best sellers on steep discomfort.com are all 30 off right now for only the next seven days with the code seeker at checkout which will be our only sale of the year we decided to bring back one of our most memorable strangers we met on the street stefan from sweden who agreed to swap lives with another stranger from the u.s three years ago to join us today when i woke up i was looking in my wardrobe but i one t-shirt left and the t-shirt says and so with the dream team assembled we were extremely excited to discover what moldova had to offer baby yeah we're the all-new foreigners coming here right now everyone's staring at us [Music] i got a nice little tourist map i think it'll tell us exactly what we need to do here oh dude it says uh absolutely nothing look at this beauty whoa huh oh how lovely oh here's our hotel look at this this is so nice well our moldovan adventure officially begins [Music] as soon as we step out there's like all the buildings with graffiti on them and like brand new buildings right here every block or so there's like a pretty big abandoned building i see a lot of european flags the flags of the eu so why are there flags are they trying to become a part of the eu future future great thank you youtube they're trying to become a part of the european union but they're not they haven't been accepted yet we have absolutely no plan right now we are literally just trying just walking around like an entourage we are just looking to meet moldova basically and although we walked out of the door of our hotel with the only plan of finding the rusty soviet amusement park the city still has we could never have predicted that the person we were about to meet next was going to completely transform our trip i'm gonna ask this one [Music] friend and talk tell me his whole life he's singing in the background now great listener i haven't met everything you're listening for two hours we were just asking if there was an amusement park and we got stuffed for an hour and a half why is none of this on the internet what about moldova this is really nice this is so beautiful i said it was like the worst place on earth it's so beautiful look at this little plaza oh this is the pickup he wants to show us something okay so this wonderful man mikhail is just taking us somewhere he's uh not taking no for an answer and he's like i'm going to show you some stuff where are we going this place is called drunk cherry okay i said what should we order they said we only have one drink wait is he not joining us i think we've just met the most spontaneous elderly man in moldova and while eric was listening to mikhail's entire life story we got recognized by two moldovan subscribers i know we had people that knew also who gave us some insight into what the youth think about moldova's future our last president who was like very like communist and with like russia like he really wanted to blend our countries together back today you are like uh yeah but like our new president she's so amazing with the leadership we have right now if we continue on this path we'll definitely like we just got elected to be like hopefully in the future to be part of the european union i'm not all brainwashed we're not all pro russians broke with him there's a lot of us that like actually want to change and actually hope for the better yeah wow i'm getting like goosebumps over my entire body you can like record it right now what is happening in mikhail's story oh he's telling me a lot of stuff are you guys telling me about his military career [Laughter] hello yeah make a film yeah enjoy wow thank you enjoy thank you so much see you moldova kindness this is what happens when you go to places that nobody visits everyone is just excited to see that people are visiting yeah mikhail had beef with that guy just arrived at one of the main monasteries of the country whoa [Music] is [Music] accept your [Music] i was asking him like if he knows that guy that he clearly has beef with and he's like yeah that guy like he tries to get money from people and he always hits him with a stick because he's like get away like stop messing with my thing and mikhail didn't want you guys to get scammed by the dude he's really our grandfather grandpa is eating some food how's grandpa doing and he goes [Music] i just found out his family story his whole family wearing a car got hit by a truck wife his daughter and her husband they all died in the same in one car accident it's the craziest thing his wife his grandson daughter and her husband but like he's like doesn't really want to like frown upon that because it's been a long time since this happened so yeah he's like a guy from up he's really an adventurer how could when why are you celebrating away from him because he told us earlier he loves to go on road trips to like different places when he gets bored and totally bailed on his plan today to join us after spending the morning getting to know michael we said our goodbyes we're not going to say goodbye we're not going to say goodbye guys we'll see each other later ventured off again in the search of the old soviet amusement park we were looking for at the start of our day oh this is it it looks very abundant it looks very abandoned i would be shocked if any of these rides are still working holy is this one safe yeah can we do a quick lie detector test this is the rustiest ride in this entire place my mom is gonna kill me look at this seat like i'm really really scared of hiding stop shaking you're shaking oh my god it's so hot oh my god oh my god oh my oh my god we're not doing this though that's all stefan remember safely wow that goes fast oh my god dude oh my god oh my god [Laughter] well the park is closing we survived another abandoned soviet amusement park on our way out of the park we happened to meet a family of ukrainian refugees how has it been because it's still once my parents and my wife parents at home as well we had the apartments there and this apartments and just now it can be bumped by one swept hopefully man hopefully yep somewhere soon this is my this is my older one that's it so real man their family like walking here and experience all this pain so [Music] you saw this suffering in the world right for a new reason of all like it's just so unfair so let's keep spreading love guys right yeah it's crazy to think about though i didn't realize the amount of stress that moldova probably has because if the war expands it comes with that wow people are gonna go in here because there are ukrainians here there are moldovans and then we just met a guy who grew up in russia and lives here conflict must be super strange because there's so many there's so much overlap right i really didn't expect moldova to be such a melting pot yeah you know but it but it is really it makes it like a very special country actually at the moment right real fun family energy well definitely yeah come from welcome to moldova yeah this time everywhere around the world it's just always the most positive kind and open-minded people it's it's crazy it's crazy we thought this was just a brief encounter with the subscriber until moments later this happened i can go what are we doing we're gonna have fun fun let's go did you just abandon your friend no i just sent him to him there are some nights when we start filming and we don't really know what we're filming this is one of them we've arrived this is very different than what it was earlier today moldova in three one two three tell him that we're happy he's here he said i'm really happy i found you guys oh can you be our adopted grandpa one more time get that dress you can call him grandpa grandpa the thing is we literally don't have his contact we just keep running into him he doesn't have a phone he likes to swim are we going to the beach with him tomorrow i think so talking to mikhail i can't fully understand what's going on but he kind of seems a little bit like a nomad like he doesn't really have a place to stay tonight he's going to the doctor because he's got an issue with his foot so he was just going to sleep at the hospital stay at our hotel tonight and he was like yeah maybe let's see how the night goes also something that i forgot to mention so far was that at midnight it would actually be my birthday and the clock just struck 12. [Applause] thanks for reminding me thank you thank you grandpa we just met some uh really nice girls and mikael is giving stuff on dating advice he's like yo if you're going to talk to girls you got to entertain them you got to tell them stories we're going to joe's house tonight and where is it joe when you go out in other countries sometimes they're like ah tourists are here here it's like buddhists are here it's like an attraction it's like let's find out where they're from look bro come with us let's go party bro [Music] you thought that was an ad didn't you it's not it's a part of the video it's a part of the video you can't skip this one well they could skip it please move forward please please please today marks seven years of yes theory and today seekers day which is something we've been celebrating the past three years where we put all of the best sellers from seekdiscomfort.com 30 off it's the only time of the year we put any kind of discount on seek discomfort and it is a way to kind of say thank you three percent is a lot that's a big discount it's like if if something was 100 that means i could get it for 30 instead no no there are 300 000 people who have bought from seek discomfort in 180 countries we keep running into people all over the world who wear it it's just like an amazing tool for connection seek discomfort allows us to have the freedom to go after the trips that we want to go after so thank you for supporting us it would mean the world to us if you go to seekdiscomfort.com right now 30 off so we highly recommend you go check it out right now and i guess back to grandpa we have two hotel rooms he's gonna take one of them and the three of us will share one little slumber party yeah how do you feel about this keep continuing to remind me mikhail thank you the hotel is gonna be so confused these three young tourists came they went out until two in the morning and they brought back a 74 year old local grandpa there's a bunch [Music] he's such a funny man he just like takes life as it comes like there's no level of like oh i'm in this hotel now like guys this is a crazy thing he's just like okay i sit here and this is my life this is my room he just she's just here now new level literally he's a kung matata he's just taken as it comes [Music] he's just butt naked showering no he's naked don't touch it it's dry okay is this how you imagine your birthday is going on right now [Music] mikhail hasn't had a phone this whole time so we haven't been able to reach him he doesn't know what time it is so we're just going to get him a phone exactly he said i used to i used one to call people i used to know the time yeah that's only once but but he was also like i'm gonna buy it we were like we'll get it for you he's like no i'm gonna buy it i'm like no dude let us get you this nokia no store okay you got a phone [Music] it really does feel like he's the real life up character by the way he's he's very sweet and kind of grumpy eric is like the little character and a little scout who like keeps trying to take care of grandpa and grandpa's like ah whatever he's super smart i just can't piece his life together toyota see i don't know what to do with that information sometimes i can't so far mikhail's life was really one big mystery to us so we decided to sit him down and ask him a few questions [Music] i think trying to understand how does he survive right [Music] can you ask him if he's comfortable telling us a bit about what happened foreign [Music] is tell him like we know that um like pension here is not very high and what not and we just wanted to help him and give him this letter and he doesn't have to open um he has no idea but we just gave him five hundred dollars which is ten thousand of the local currency so you just gave him uh eight months of his account he won't know that until he opens he probably has no idea what he doesn't probably doesn't even know that there's money in there no i don't i don't think he thinks there's like a letter yeah we're we're really grateful that you've been such a big part of our experience absolutely literally we're just following this man we just asked him for directions to a park and now our entire life depends on him yeah is this the right bus we're going an hour away from here what is he trying to do oh he was trying to pay for our ticket no hi man he's always like just leave everyone alone he's like anyone who's not a part of the boys [Music] each day with grandpa [Music] this is the best birthday ever freaking crazy grandpa taking us around the least visiting country [Music] with our beach adventure over it was time to get mikhail a fancy new outfit for a party at a castle that a stranger had invited us to tonight we're in like a really nice italian tailor right now we're a little bit out of place however with only three tickets to the event we had to sneak in grandpa while we've arrived at a traditional festival at a castle that's really good wine [Music] so we are here completely on our own without the people who invited us today is my birthday and somehow i ended up at a castle in the least visited country from europe going along with the flow and after four hours of enjoying the event at the castle we once again lost grandpa where is mikhail yeah we're looking for michaela mikhail mikhail where is he grandpa have you seen this old grandpa oh miguel is lost it was like like three or four five hours ago three four hours ago grandfather grandpa's missing and he's had wine that's not good he might have gone down maybe he went down that way okay let's cut through that thank you [Music] he was on the dance floor [Music] [Music] other pieces [Music] while you pet his hands it's fully comfortable that you get him i'm a complete stranger all right grandpa we love you love you man he said i love you yeah he did say he love you not and what i'm finding so fascinating about him is that he's always like telling us let's go you would think that someone who's 74 and doesn't really happen he said this looks like a piano he likes to observe he's very observant but he says let's go stand up like he's telling let's march outside isn't it [Music] [Music] he can have mine he can have mine did he have fun of course he just fell asleep on the bench we [Laughter] [Music] you're so excited he's like you got to read this thing this is his organization that like created this whole monument for this famous captain in the war we actually couldn't have had a better guide to the city i know the dude knows everything grandpa was saying missions are done everything on his checklist is over now if we want to just hit the bell here at the cemetery then we can go home we can do whatever we want his job is done once this bell is ringing michelle's mission will be accomplished he just whistles away there's a story here [Laughter] oh what did i say what did i say and thomas oh grandpa i mean yeah [Music] [Music] grandpa's taking us to the airport he wants to send us off and that's the weirdest thing ever [Music] heading to the airport with bonnello and i said how are you gonna get back to the city and he said what do you think i'm gonna end up in paris or something i'm gonna i'll figure it out we also gave him the number to the grandma we met in uh transnistria so he's excited to maybe meet her as well when he goes to you said i'm grandpa and she's grandma grandpa is dropping us off putting his shoes on yeah but yes [Music] need i'm gonna love you to the end of time because a love like us is hard to find [Music] that's the saddest thing i've ever experienced you really feel that this is exactly why i don't like the question of what i think the best and worst place is because at the end of the day it is impossible to predict an experience like this one for a place that seemed pointless to visit according to the internet moldova really had so many great things to offer and is seemingly on track to a brighter future but we ended up discovering this place through the eyes of mikhail and had a much more meaningful trip than we could possibly have ever orchestrated ourselves if you do decide to go visit moldova there's plenty to do and see but my personal recommendation would be to try and go find michael roaming around the drunk cherry bar take him out for a lunch and make his day and your own a little bit brighter as an unusual addition to the strangers we've gone on adventures with we couldn't have imagined a better way to celebrate seven years on this channel final reminder that seekers day is live right now for this week only on seekdiscomfort.com using the code seeker for our only sale of the year with 30 off our all-time best sellers it would mean the world to us if you went to seekdiscomfort.com and found some clothing you loved and repped wherever you go we are about to take our yearly break in august so we will probably see you in september [Music]

Channel: Yes Theory

Views: 7,252,783

Keywords: yestheory, seek discomfort, yes theory strangers, yes theory travel, yes theory subscribers, getting out of your comfort zone, Amazon FBA, moldova, travel, worst country in europe, least visited country in europe, most boring town, most boring town in america, eastern europe, moldova travel, soviet travel, yes theory soviet, transnistria, country that doesn't exist on a map

Id: _T2Avd3tFHc

Length: 30min 45sec (1845 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 31 2022