GUILTY OF:

 

The largest Government building in the World, second to the pentagon. 

 

 

BREIF WANDERLUST OR SERIOUS RELATIONSHIP ?

 

When I first opened a web page about Bucharest, the first thing I read was that most people will have less than favourable initial impressions of this sprawling urban catastrophe. The guidebooks warned that when travelling in Romania, if you find yourself in the capitol city of Bucharest, you’ll probably want to scamper out of there as soon as possible.

So I’m not most people and wanted to find out where it is and how to get there. Bucharest was not a cruisey place and some parts proved exceptionally difficult to flatter in photographs mainly because of the ugly communist style developments that now stand as monumental and rancid reminders of Romania’s darker hours under fallen dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu. In fact it was frustrating to photograph at all. Perhaps a bit intimidating as nobody carries a camera (that they want to keep) around the bleaker corners because, although petty crime isn’t apparently rampant, it’s simmering beneath the surface and strutting around with map, a camera or even an IPhone is likely to awaken the ‘beast’. Notice I don’t have any photographs of the chroming station... err I mean train station. Bucharest isn’t necessarily “dangerous’ exactly but it is tense and chaotic and vast pockets are choking in poverty and urban decay. Buildings and roads are either in a state of being unfinished or undone. But I found that its impossible to understand Romania if you dismiss Bucharest with all its unhinged drama and its longing to be detached from a miserable past. The enormous parliament building that Ceaușescu built is the second largest government monstrosity in the world and everyone thinks it’s a big deal and wants to see it. Local Romanians think it’s a miserable iceberg,- I agree. But behind the inhospitable face of Bucharest’s main ‘attraction’ is a fascinating city that I’m glad I persisted with for several days before running away to somewhere greener.
 

Score/5:  ♥♥♥♥♡