My husband, Sergey, is from Moldova, though it has now been more than a decade since he lived there. Before he left, his few family members also emigrated—his brother to Russia and his mother to the United States. Until recently, I hadn’t had the opportunity to meet his brother. We had planned to visit Russia while I was in grad school, but then the pandemic began, and then the terrible war in Ukraine, and the prospect of setting foot in Russia dimmed. So, when Sergey heard that his brother, sister-in-law, and their children would be coming to Moldova, we took the rare opportunity to see them. Given the effort of getting to Eastern Europe, it only made sense to add stops so Sergey could visit Moldovan friends who had emigrated to Romania and Germany.

In the midst of time with Sergey’s family and friends, and on days when I wasn’t in bed contending with the foodborne bacteria and airborne virus that in quick succession welcomed me to Eastern Europe, I limned some word portraits of the three cities where we stayed: Bucharest, Chisinau, and Munich.