My fourteen hour overnight bus ride from Odessa finally arrives in the Southwestern Ukrainian border city of Chernivtsi. Due to its colorful past, formerly the principal city of Bukovyna (now Moldova), then apart of the Hapsburg Empire, and finally a brief stint in Romania after WWII, Chernivtsi has an unquestionably unique populace. This inimitable history, and youthful vibrancy drawn from the numerous Universities dispersed across the cityscape, creates an unavoidable charm.

Today, however, Chernivtsi will only be seen through the windows of local buses. I am trying to hop the fence into Romania. Unfortunately I arrive fifteen minutes too late to the bus station and miss the 7:10am bus I need to Suceava, Romania, a small city on the other side of the border with a train station that services the whole of the country.

The heat from the early morning sun creates steam on the wet parking lot outside of the bus station. I buy coffee and peroshkee (deep fried dough filled with either mashed potatoes, cabbage or meat) from a middle-aged woman pushing a wobbly tin cart across the crowded platform. I sit on my bags and lean against a wall, calmly dissecting my current situation. Before my travel weary brain can develop viable options, a taxi driver approaches and intuitively asks me if I want to go to Romania. It continues to surprise me after spending more than two years in Ukraine, clothed often times with items I’ve picked up in local bazaars, how obviously foreign I am.

The taxi drivers here make their living finding the right customers, meaning those that will pay the most. These circumstances have bestowed them with an especially good eye for those that appear unacquainted with local prices and ways of business. Unlike America, the price of a taxi ride in Ukraine is not based off of a meter and is usually agreed upon before the trip. This leaves the inexperienced as helpless bait for ambitious drivers. From Chernivtsi to Suceava is about seventy km, with a border crossing in-between. The common price for a taxi in Ukraine should be three UAH for 1 km. With the exchange of USD to UAH at about one to eight, and considering the border crossing, I’m prepared to pay at most thirty dollars for a ride all the way to Suceava, Romania.

My Ukrainian language kicks in and the taxi driver and I begin to bargain.

“Do you want to go to Romania? I can get you to the border, no problem. Very cheap.”

“How much?”

“Twenty dollars to the border.”

“Twenty dollars, no way. That’s too expensive, and I don’t want to go to the border, I need to get to Suceava.”

A ride to the border would mean I would have to flag down another van or taxi to get me across. Since I’m in no real rush to get to Romania, I have a decisive advantage in bargaining.

“To Suceava is eighty dollars.”

“Eighty dollars? Very expensive, I don’t need a taxi, I can wait for the bus tomorrow.”

With that I pick-up my bag and go into the station to check the bus schedules and look at a map for other possible options. Also this is a good bargaining tool to lower the price of my trip. I re-enter the steadily warming day outside, and the taxi driver approaches me again, this time with a salesman’s grin.

“Hey, I’m a good businessman. I have a colleague (the taxi driver is referring to his smuggler friend sitting in a van across the street) who will take you all the way to Suceava for twenty Dollars, just pay me twenty-five Hrivnia for the introduction. I’m a business man.”

Finally with a price I’m comfortable paying and the intrigue this man evokes I decide to give it a shot. Why not?

“Ok, let’s go.”

We cross the street into a parking lot opposite the bus station. The taxi driver’s “colleague” is a Romanian man named Vlad who appears to make most of his money smuggling cigarettes, and laundry detergent. Both items are considerable cheaper in Ukraine, and can turn a nice profit across the border. After I load my bags up and further observe the situation, I can see no real threat to my safety and decide at least it will be an entertaining story to tell. I pay the Ukrainian for his services in introducing me to his friend, and hop in the van with the grizzled Romanian driver. Before we depart, a man opens the passenger door, fills up a bag in the front seat with carton’s of cigarettes, adding to the already visible contraband, and more money is exchanged. Finally we pull out of the parking lot and begin making our way to the border.

I’ve witnessed the smuggling of cigarettes several times before and spoken with people that make their living crossing over into the EU everyday with illegal cigarettes. I’ve been on a train from Ukraine to Budapest where the Conductor was found smuggling cigarettes under the floorboards. Every bus I’ve been on from Ukraine to Poland has at least one person trying to smuggle cigarettes across the border. Usual a monthly bribe is negotiated with the border police, allowing the smuggler to operate freely.

After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the big multinational tobacco companies descended on countries like Ukraine to acquire the state-run cigarette factories. Now Ukraine boasts the smallest cigarette tax. Ukrainian made Marlboros (one of the more popular brands for smugglers) cost about one dollar and five cents where the same pack will sell for nearly ten dollars in the United Kingdom and five dollars in Germany. Really the smugglers are buying cigarettes at the same price as legal wholesalers. The illegal trade is modestly estimated to be worth two point one billion dollars annually. Organized crime has been on the rise due to these huge profits and light penalties.

This is the first time I’ve been the sole passenger with a smuggler going across the border, and because of this intimacy I am provided with a behind the scenes look at this multi-billion dollar illegal business.

As we near the border I observe Vlad exchanging hand-signals with other vans headed away from Romania. All the other drivers respond to his inquisitive gestures with a ‘thumbs-down.’ This seems to displease the Romanian and he begins making phone calls. He remains on the phone until we arrive at the border. We pull off the rode in front of a string of dimly lit cafes hundred yards from the first checkpoint. Vlad gets out of the van, after a curious glance and nod in my direction, and joins a circle of men gathered outside of one of the cafes. After about five minutes he walks out onto the road and flags down several vehicles that have just entered Ukraine. He appears to be friendly with everyone he talks with. I notice they all share the same dodgy and restless eyes, leading me to believe their career paths run parallel.

Vlad appears to be gaining information regarding the border checkpoints, and more specifically which guards are on duty. He constantly is on his phone, making and receiving calls. After about an hour of waiting he returns to the van with a vagrant looking man. Neither of them addresses me, nor provides any information concerning what is happening. The van fires up and we roll to the first checkpoint. After a brief exchange, Vlad hands the guard several folded money notes, which only adds to the wad of cash in the man’s hand.

We continue to the next checkpoint where I hand over my passport and Vlad steps out of the van into the Ukrainian customs office. I try to break the silence with the new man sitting in the passenger seat. I offer him some of the pastry I had purchased in Chernivtsi. He looks at me suspiciously, but accepts. The silence quickly returns to the vehicle. Soon the van door swings open. Vlad looks at me and points to a lady sitting at the window of the customs office. Not knowing what else to do, I wave and can see through the weathered glass that she is comparing my face with my passport photo. After she gives a nod, Vlad slams the door shut. I can hear him continue to talk with the attendant in the window. Her name is Valya. Apparently this isn’t the first time they’ve met.

The Romanian customs officials are a lot less friendly, but also seem to know Vlad, as well as the gruff passenger we picked up just before the border. Two police officers open the side door with a German Shepard drug dog at their heals. All of this intimidation seems to be for show because they never actually search the van. I can feel a stack of cigarette cartons against my heels. The Police do however pat down the other man and find his jacket’s sleeves are lined with cigarette packs. All they do is berate the man with insults, while he stands dormant. Nothing is confiscated, however, and the police send us on our way.

The hand signals continue in Romania, except now we are the ones giving the signals the other drivers receive. I assume this is because we just crossed over. I notice, with a van load of cigarette cartons and laundry detergent, Vlad gives everyone we pass a ‘thumbs up.’