In Romania
When we did get into Romania I could not believe how the people greeted you, it did not matter where you went or who you stopped to ask directions they all wanted you to come and meet the family, the neighbours', and every one in the place. It put me in mind of what it was like here in Scotland when I was growing up, where every one new every one and if you needed something then you would go to one of the neighbours and if they did not need it they would give it to you.
Also when you were distributing the aid you could not leave until you had something to eat and drink you did not want to but it would have been an insult if you did not, you have to remember these people had nothing or very little to keep them self's going but everyone would put together to make sure you had something, as for something to drink they made there own I think it was plum brandy it was called Tweaka I hope I have spelled it right anyway after a few of these you could not say it never mind spell it but it tasted great numbed the feelings after a while.
We think that times are bad in this country at the moment I only hope that it never ever comes that we will be as bad as some of the places and some of the sites I saw when I did these trips.
Some of the problems we had on our trips, we had a MAN it was a old on but she just kept going then we got a DAF I remember one trip we got to just outside the Romanian border with the DAF and the trailer brakes started to over heat we could not fathom out what was wrong when we got into Romania we got someone to look at it we finally found the fault it was a rubber diaphragm now there was no chance of getting anything like that so they made one from some rubber that they found and it seemed to hold some of the things I saw at the side of the road I could not believe there was one truck with a puncture and they had built a fire they took the wheel of and were sealing the hole over the fire so they could put air back in it and run it for while longer, any way about the DAF we delivered the aid no probs then on the way home we got to the border between Hungary and Austria when the diaphragm went again so we ended up finding a tyre tube from a truck that was lying on the road and cutting it up for to keep us going till we got home.
Another time 2 of us went over in a Transit Van and on the way there we had problems with wheel bearings and we just keep greasing them and on the way home the clutch cable broke and we drove all the way back to Glasgow without a clutch before we had it fixed.
I could just imagine some of to-days drivers doing some of the stuff we had to do years ago.
