Long story short: I’m (24M) American, and I’m visiting my long-distance Romanian boyfriend for the first time soon. In Romania, most cars are manual - including all the ones owned by my boyfriend’s family (I’ll be staying with them). I’ve never driven a manual before. His dad told me he can give me a quick lesson, and that I’m welcome to use their cars if I want; otherwise, I can rent an automatic. I don’t have access to any manual cars here in the U.S. to practice on, so I’m not sure what to do.
It’s really easy, there’s just a few things that you have to remember and there is a bit of muscle memory. I suggest watch a bunch of videos on how to do it properly on YouTube and just practice in a parking lot for like 2-3 hours and you should be completely fine to drive. You might not have cars to practice on where you live, but you might be able to just do it when you get to Romania. Just go for like two hours to practice before you start driving around.