Romania in photos

Taken in Janis la stuf, Cluj Napoca.

I'll write an article about my entire journey, and add some pictures too, as soon as I'll get back to Bucharest.

Kindle your mind,

Romania in photos

Kindle your mind,

Romania in photos

Now... is that nice or is that NICE :) ?

The picture was taken between Ramnicu Valcea and Sibiu, on Sunday, somewhere on a mountain top.

Kindle your mind,

Personal

I'm leaving in 10 minutes. I got the next week off.

Consequently, my next post will be written from Cluj. I guess you want to know a few things worth knowing about Cluj, so I'll see you around here, my friends.


With love,

Bucharest in photos. The city by night

Although this picture was taken last night, the image was very familiar to me more than 20 years ago.

I used to spend a lot of my time in Bucharest as a child (meaning, generally, a few months a year), which explains why I never had a strong Transylvanian accent. Back at home, in northern Transylvania, I was asked where did I come from and why I pronounce words with a Bucharest accent.

Well, a lot of my time in Bucharest was spent next to the Parliament's Palace (back then, called "Casa Poporului"), in the yard - and the church - of a splendid monastery, called All Saints (picture to follow, btw), intentionally hidden by one of the blocks in the left of this picture. You know, religion was not welcome in the Bucharest of the '80s - dozens of splendid old churches of inestimable cultural value were completely destroyed at the time. On the very place you see now the Parliament Palace, six churches had this fate. And lots of others were translated behind blocks (All Saints monastery among them), and hidden from sights. So that you know why many beautiful things in Bucharest are so hard to spot - it was a intended Communist policy: war against the old, promotion of the Communist urban "accomplishments".

The boulevard was still in the making (I remember soldiers working at the pavement of the new sidewalks), and the palace was never finished until today (if you visit Bucharest, you can still see the cranes in the back of this huge building). The main differences, tough, between then and now, consist in the fact that back then it was much darker, as electricity was scarce in Communist Romania, and of course there were much less cars.

There are quite a few people appreciating the images of this city taken during nighttime (thank you, guys!). In a Communist Romania, it would have been impossible, if not unthinkable to take this sort of images, because of the darkness and the lack of electricity.

Kindle your mind.

Bucharest in photos

The picture was taken back in 1987, if I recall properly, at the International Fair in Bucharest.

I liked that wheels, believe me, they were about 3 meters high. The truck itself - DAC 120 DE - was a curiosity and weighting about 100 tons, and was presented as a sort of a big realization of the Romanian industry at the time. 5 such trucks were exported to Australia, as far as I remember.

Imagine such a monster galloping at 50 miles per hour - its maximum speed. The back of the truck almost didn't get in the picture.

Of course, it was not a common thing to see in Bucharest, but for me it was one of the lasting memories, one of the trade-marks of the city, if you like.

PS. The blog celebrates today its 4th anniversary. Quite a performance, quite nice, don't you think, my friends? I'll celebrate this anniversary by attending a concert tonight. And I hope many years of good blogging on this very page still lie ahead. Being a blogger defines a part of who I am.

With love,

Personal

Our journey through the Bucharest of the 80s' begins with the presentation of the guide.

Our guide is a young, small - and a little scared - fellow, discovering (certain parts of) the big city while visiting his grandma and intimidated by the air of a metropolis - a city of more than 2,000,000 inhabitants even back then, during the 80's.

I chose to show this picture first because this little guy will show up in the vintage part of the voyage. The picture was taken back in 1984. I was four years old.

I loved that suite, by the way. It was mostly black and white, and combined with my blond hair, it worked wonders on women. Just kidding :)

Kindle you mind,

Personal

I am lurking around, my friends. More or less, but around.

My deep personal problem, though, is that I feel empty and de-motivated. And very tired. It is personal. And real.

I have tons of very good pictures of my city - Bucharest -, pictures taken for months now, but I just do not get to see them published.

I guess I'll write more, about things going through my head, rather than publishing photos. I feel the need to exorcise myself. or to confess - whichever you prefer, it is the same.

And I thought of a more personal project: I would like to show you Bucharest as I got to know him as a child,  when I got to spend my summer vacations here. You see, I was a normal Romanian child, but instead of spending my summer holidays in the countryside, I would usually get to spend a few months a year in Bucharest, at my granny's. Some of the pictures - as much as possible - will be vintage. Some will be 2011, as a sort of remembrance of the Bucharest I got in touch to back then.

PS. The fact that one of my grandfathers was Bucharestian makes me a honest to God Bucharestian :) ? Just kidding.