[Pavlov's Dog]

The last new city I visited was Bucharest, Romania 3 weeks ago. It was certainly an interesting place.

They style themselves the Paris of Eastern Europe. Certainly they have the boulevards and even an Arche de Triomphe (what triumphs Romania has had remains a mystery) but the place is a mess. There are some cool buildings from the Ottoman period and some more Parisian style gray piles interspresed with the kind of building that seems to have been pasted together over time with available materials that you might find in Athens, Cairo or Teheran. Cars are double parked all over the place, also on sidewalks. The telcom situation reminds of Buenos Aires with independently hacked and strung wires all over the place.

A lot the architecture is very Soviet in inspiration and the trams look like the ones in Saint Petersburg but even less well maintained. Service is very Eastern European as well.

The most pleasant surprise was that Bucharest seemed to have very few beggars and prostitutes. Considering how the rest of Europe is overrun with Romanians dominating those professions that left me to conclude that anyone in that line of work makes more money abroad than in Romania.

All in all I would describe Bucharest as a mix of the worst of Southern and Eastern Europe. Been there, done that, not going back.