Mission in the city
Yesterday we went out on a mission of exchanging Polish zloty to Romanian leu. We took a subway to the center and the first exchange we found had polish currency, but the exchange was 1leu for 0,90pln. That's robbery! Official exchange rate is 1,10leu for 1 zloty! We went out in a heartbeat and decided to try in a bank, as their rates are supposed to be closer to the official one... And we did it! With quite a good rate, so I got 81 leu more than could get at the first place we visited. The conclusion of the day? Don't trust dodgy exchange places, they're just random robbers! Go to the bank - use services of certified robbers.
Life in plastic is fantastic
Romanian leu. When my friend first handed me a 1 leu bill I was feeling very weird, expected to feel paper but the soft plastic fiber created a really strong cognitive dissonance I couldn't overcome for a while. I was so surprised! My first thought is that it's needed to protect the money from damage, because you can literally take them out from the mud, wash it and it's good money! I never thought about the concept of money in plastic. I'm not a very big fan of plastic and it still confuses me as much as it disgusts me a bit...
On the other hand you can't deny the design is really nice. I'm always very curious to see the bills and coins. Every bill has a flower on it, a see through design and several holograms that are seen in the UV light. I made a few caleidoscop pictures of the design. Trippy :)
Later on we went on a walk around the town to explore a bit. Having a round I couldn't help but notice the communistic remains. Big, monumental buildings and long tall blocks of flats, untouched and slowly falling apart on the course of years. Right next to fancy structures, new apartments and shiny office buildings.
An alley on the side of an old shopping centre. On the right of the structure it was actually a big square with a multiple line road and enormous buildings that couldn't even fit well in my camera picture. Walking around Bucharest it reminded me of London in some parts, especially those a bit further from the center, less maintained, one would say "more dangerous" but I see them as very true. Bucharest is like an open book. You can read it's history in it's streets. I didn't take many pictures of the places I wanted as we were walking quite fast. Shame on me.
One of the very visible contrasts in the city. This is even not the biggest. We'd find many tiny old buildings right next to a big glass skyscraper. Old city tenement houses covered in graffiti and fancy shops.
Another shocking thing was this metro station! We arrived at it and I was thinking that were not there yet and people crawled into the tunnel a bit, bit it's a functioning platform!! My friend told me that it was built in the times of the last Romanian dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu and in the last phase his wife decided it won't be open for use so it wasn't finished. Now it's in use and gives thrills.
Other thing that might be a shock for a person from a more Western-ish country (I think my homeland is one of them because it wants to mimic Germany as my friend @movingman noticed) is that you find loads of random home trash laying on the pavement. I was a little bit worried when I saw this particular pile of trash. Because of the shoe I thought it's a human crashed under the tree trunk. Fortunately Romania is not such a wild country to have dead bodies laying on the streets! :D
Also you can see a lot of concrete structures mimicking oriental designs or just enormous concrete communistic blocks as theatres or public institutions. I mean bare concrete like this bow gate. Reminds me of Gypsy houses I used to see in my hometown as a kid. Built with fantasy of tales of 1001 nights.
And abandoned.
And to sum it up there's a picture of a Romanian hyperinvestment. I'm lucky enough that it can be seen from my friend's balcony, so I don't have to come closer.
This is the biggest church in the world. What do you think about the country when you see patchy roads, big part of buildings falling apart and a massive church in progress...
It's a sad view. Romania actually reminds me of Poland about 20 years ago. That's approximately how far I can remember. There's a big visible difference between the rich and the poor in the Romanian society.
For the end a picture that sums it all up. Not only Bucharest. I feel it addresses a lot of modern societies...
The text in Rick's eyes says "vote".