Bucharest City Tour

August 14th, 2010

Saturday August 14th, one of our Romanian colleagues at our school hosted a tour of Bucharest for us newbie teachers. Our host grew up in downtown Bucharest with parents that were journalists, so her perspective on  Bucharest, and Romanian history, kept the tour lively with discussion. She was a child when Communist Dictater Nicolae Ceauşescu was overthrown in the revolution of 1989. She lived near Revolution Square (named many years previously, I think) where his last speech happened and the revolution started. Quite a story to be told here, and I'm sure I just got a small piece of it with this tour.

The tour started at the Athenaeum (Romanian: Ateneul Român) in downtown. This building opened in 1888, and was built with donations from the king and the people of Romania. It is definitely a national treasure, and for good measure. The inside is as amazing as the outside. The pictures don't do it justice, really. One of the cool features is a mural that tells the story of Romanian history until about WWII, if I remember correctly. Obviously, the mural (or at least some of it) was painted after initial construction in 1888... Tickets are cheap to see performances here, so we're planning on checking it out at some point in the future for a show.

We walked down past the "potato" as the locals call it. I can't even remember the official name, but our host suggested it was a new sculpture that just showed up about six years ago. It's never been very popular. Things that make you go hmmm.

Our tour continued with a visit to one of the monasteries that is still an active church downtown next to the Anthony Frost bookstore. (Apparently, this is a famous bookstore in Bucharest.) The day was quite hot, and we were all starting to soak in sweat, so we stopped in the Lipscani district for a quick snack and some coffee. We sat in a small outdoor cafe that struck me as prototypical European cafe dining. Of course, I've never been to any cafes in Europe so I may not know what I'm talking about here.

We were all running on fumes after six straight days of work, so we actually decided to cut our tour short after a walk by a few other landmarks such as a national archive and national bank. I have to say that a lot of the architecture of old Bucharest is simply stunning. And walking along streets that are original cobbles from hundreds of years ago is pretty cool.

I think we're going to like living here.

As usual, click on the images below to see a larger view.

The Athenaeum.	Inside the foyer of the Athenaeum.	Part of the mural inside the Athenaeum.	A national art museum that used to be a king's palace.
The "Potato" monument.	Contrast the new (on the left) with the old (on the right). Our host suggested the building on the left crumbled during the last major earthquake in the 80s. What is now there was rebuilt.	The outdoor cafe in the Lipscani district where we had coffee.	I couldn't resist the chemical reference on the graffiti. I'm still wondering what fascination the graf artist has with hydrogen peroxide?