As I mentioned before, we decided to buy a car right away. My brother and I didn't have the money, but Nastya, one of the girls we were planning to do "business" with, did. Since Nastya had arrived a month earlier than us, she had managed to save up some money, enough to buy a car. Nastya was happy to pay the full price for the car, as it was intended for our common goals and, naturally, for our trip to California at the end of the summer.

In my opinion, the best place to buy a car in America is from a private seller on craiglist.org. Such a site exists in every town, even the smallest ones, where people post things for sale. For example, ours was called outerbanks.craiglist.org.

But since one of Nastya's coworkers, Vova from Ukraine, was selling a 1995 Mazda 626 at a very reasonable price—$800—we decided to buy it from him. So, we called Vova and arranged to meet the next day. We looked at the car and decided to take it. According to Vova, we would have no trouble registering it and could just drive around. We believed him—we thought, what the hell, it's America. It's not that I didn't think registering it would be difficult, but not like this. I mean, if you don't know anything about car registration in the USA. Now I know how to do it in one day from the moment of purchase. Back then, we knew nothing and started doing everything by trial and error.

When you buy a car there, the previous owner must hand you the title, which is something like our vehicle registration certificate, and remove their license plates. You have to take this title to the DMV (Division of Motor Vehicles) after filling in your name as the person who bought the car.

So, right after the purchase, the four of us gathered and drove in that car (without any plates, of course) to Manteo, where the nearest DMV was located, the place where cars are registered in America.

And, of course, on the way, we were stopped by our first cops of the summer. My brother was driving, as he was the only one with any kind of license and he drove the best. So, a cop pulls up behind us, stops us, gets out of his car, and walks toward us. Well, I thought I'd get out too, what the hell, it's my second time in America, I'll talk to him. As soon as I got out of the car, he immediately grabbed his weapon and said to me, "Get back in the car immediately and wait until I come to you." I said, "Okay, no need to be so nervous." He came over and explained to me that you shouldn't get out of the car until a cop asks you to. I said, okay, I didn't know. He immediately asked us where we were going without plates and where we got the car. We explained that we had just bought it. The cop believed us—he issued a warning ticket, something like a warning, and let us go. So, we drove on.

For some reason, the DMV in Manteo was located in a pharmacy. I don't know, maybe that's how it's supposed to be. :)

Anyway, we arrived at the DMV and told the woman there that we wanted to register the car. She said, "Okay, give me your ID or a North Carolina driver's license." But we didn't have either. She said, "Well, come back when you have them to register the car, and then you'll get your plates." So, we went to another establishment called the "Driver's License Office" to get an ID. I wasn't even dreaming about a license at that moment, since I never even had a Ukrainian one. That day I applied for an ID and found out that I had to wait 2 weeks for it. Damn. 2 weeks without driving the car. It was so frustrating back then to see the car sitting in the yard and not be able to drive it... We fully registered the car a month later, but more on that later.