Constanta

Thursday 18 March 2010

I started this entry on Thursday on the plane ride back from Romania, but found that it was just too cramped for comfortable typing. I am now back in Germany, so I’d better write about my last weekend in Romania before events overtake me again. (Actually they already have, but oh well…) Nonetheless I am going to leave the date from when I started it, as I also have an entry to write from today (Sunday).

I decided to spend my last weekend in Romania visiting Constanta, the largest city near MK. It is a city of about 450,000, not quite a half hour south by car. The civil airport next to the MK Airbase where I’ve been working is officially the Constanta International Airport. Constanta is actually pronounced “Constantsa”, as the second “t” is a special Romanian letter with a little squiggle at the bottom, and is pronounced “ts”. For this reason I am going to write it as “Constantsa” from here on. In ancient times the city was known as Tomis, and was an important port on the Black Sea trading routes. It therefore has a lot of history behind it, and several museums dedicated to that history were the primary object of my visit.

I got a recommendation on where to stay there, and I took it. I had an idea that I wanted to stay at a more picturesque hotel, but the one I had selected was listed in the guide as a two-star hotel. Since my German tour guide recommended downgrading any rating by one star, that meant it would have been a one star hotel – and I didn’t want anything quite that “picturesque”. :-)




This is my hotel room. I stayed at the Ibis, which was constructed in 2005. It was a three-star hotel, which meant two-star by German standards, and it was ok. It was simple and plain, but new and clean, which is more than you can say for 95% of the city. It was also within very easy walking distance of the old city where all the stuff I wanted to see was located. So it was a good choice. At first I couldn't get the lights to work, but then I noticed a card slot inside the door. I put my key-card into it, and voila! the swiches worked and the lights came on. Take the card out, the lights go off. I decided that this must be an energy-saving measure to minimize electricity consumption.

I had a similar experience with the toilet. It was very frustrating trying to flush it, as no matter how long I held the button down, all that would come out was a steady, weak trickle of water. Later on I flushed it once almost by accident, and learned the secret - you have to press it twice! So I guess the first one is for if you just want to freshen the water or flush it very weakly. But if you want any power, you have to release the button and immediately press it again - it has some sort of ratchet mechanism that releases the water on the second iteration. I wish they had posted instructions. German toilets have a similar water-saving feature but a much more logical design. They have two buttons, a small one and a large one, and you take your pick. Oh well, live and learn. At least they had toilets!




This was the view out my window, overlooking the Black Sea. There is about a thirteen mile stretch of beach from here north that is a major tourist destination, with a number of resort hotels. Just to the right, out of view, is the portion of Constantsa harbor dedicated to tourist vessels.




I arrived on Saturday morning around 0900. After I checked into the hotel, I went out for a walk around the town. One of the first things I saw was this statue depicting the legend of Romulus and Remus, and highlighting the fact that this was an important trading port in the Roman Empire.





This stone was on the corner of the square block that contained the city hall (perhaps the equivalent of a county courthouse, I’m not sure). It was surrounded by a park.




A more expansive view of the stone, with a monument containing elements of ancient and modern architecture and the city hall in the background. I had admired the monument for its blend of ancient and modern. Teresa, upon seeing my photo of it for the first time, simply said “It looks like a big paper clip.” I had to laugh at that – it was very perceptive. I doubt if it was intended as such, but what could be a more fitting monument to place outside of a government building?






As I headed into the district where the museums and churches were to be seen, I passed all too many scenes like this one. It was really unbelievable how decrepit and run down the whole district was. Not at all what I would have expected around the major tourist attractions, but not a complete surprise after my previous observations in Romania. In addition to the generally run-down nature of the buildings, there was next to no infrastructure. There was not a single traffic light of any kind to be seen, nor were there any storm sewers. I’d hate to see what the place looks like during a rainstorm.

Later, someone explained to me that this is the oldest section of town, located on the peninsula that was the original site of the ancient city of Tomis. They further explained that many of the properties were confiscated from the owners under communism. Since Romania regained its freedom in 1989, many of the owners have sued to try to get their property back, and they are mostly in legal limbo. In the meantime no investments or improvements have been made, and gypsy (Romani) squatters have moved into many of the buildings. This went a long way towards clarifying how such an important district could be so neglected.

I was surprised to read in my tour guide that the Roman poet Ovid had been exiled from Rome by the emperor Augustus, and that he spent the last eight years of his life here in Tomis/Constantsa. This statue of him is located in the main public square of the old town.

This is the archaeological museum, one of the places I wanted to visit. Before going inside, I walked around outside a little more and saw some interesting things.

As I’ve written earlier, there are loose dogs everywhere. In Constantsa there are also a lot of cats. While I was standing here, a couple of dogs chased this cat up a tree. Wahnsinn!

This was a very interesting exhibit. The building in the background houses a large mosaic floor, one of the largest surviving Roman mosaics in the world. Unfortunately it was not open. It was supposed to be, and there were no signs indicating that it was closed, but there was just nobody at the ticket booth and the door was locked throughout the entire weekend. I was disappointed not to be able to go in and see it.

Lined up in the plaza outside (and just to the left of the archaeological museum if you’re looking at it from the front) is this row of ancient grave markers, with plaques translating the epitaphs in both Romanian and English. This turned out to be a very good first exhibit for me to examine closely, because it really made me think about the centuries of history in this place. It also kind of put my own life into perspective (isn’t that what museums are for?). I’ll just show the pictures – the epitaphs speak for themselves:

These are the silver buckles, clasps, and ornaments of a Roman centurion’s uniform. A centurion was an officer in the Roman Army that commanded a “century”, a unit of 80 men (I always thought it was 100, but I looked it up). Roughly the equivalent of a company commander/ captain in our army.

I had read about these but never seen them. The Roman way of cleaning the body was to rub it all over with oil, and then scrape off the oil (and the dirt it lifted off) using these scrapers. Here is the whole routine: http://www.falcophiles.co.uk/facts/romanbathing.html

When I read the description of this piece “Aedicula with Nemesis”, I thought Aedicula was some goddess I had never heard of. But it turns out that it refers to the little house structure framing the statues. Both of these figures are of Nemesis, goddess of balance and vengeance. Hmmm….I wonder why they needed two of her?

I noticed something in the museum that I found interesting. Whereas the signs on the gravestones outside had been in Romanian and Engish, the signs inside were in Romanian, French, and German. A very few included English, but by no means a majority. I'm guessing that Americans and citizens of the Commonwealth don't come here all that much.

I wanted a traditional Romanian lunch, and I walked all over looking for a likely restaurant. I began to think that every restaurant in the city must be a pizzeria - that's all I could find, no kidding! I finally broke down and went inside a nice looking one, and had a pizza.

Almost as soon as I walked out of the hotel on Saturday morning I heard a rooster crow. Later in the morning I passed this on one of the streets. How often do you see this in a major city? This was the only one I saw actually visible from the street, but I heard lots of animals, and saw evidence of pens and enclosures in many yards. I also saw a lot of clothes drying on balconies and in windows, and learned to be careful walking under the balconies as people were throwing stuff off of them (mostly dirt - probably from sweeping the floors).

This building is an old casino on the waterfront. You can see the commercial port of Constantsa in the background. Constantsa is a very important port of entry for goods going in and out of Romania.

This man was playing folk tunes on his accordion right by the casino. It made for a very pleasant atmosphere. I put some money in his box, and asked to take his photo. He nodded yes, so I did. I didn’t see until I looked the photo later on that he had an unhappy look on his face. I hope I didn’t offend him…anyway the music was nice. Come to think of it, I did notice that very few people ever smiled the entire time I was in this country.

Here is a better view of the casino. It’s quite an imposing building, and must have been very impressive in its day. It’s obviously closed now – many of the windows are broken and it’s just falling apart. This city brought many clichés to the forefront of my mind – the one I thought of most when looking around at buildings like this was “crumbling edifice”.

This scene seemed somehow to encapsulate the whole atmosphere of the city – a grandiose socialist-era statue on a cracked base, an ornate church in the background, and interposed between them, a trio of ugly rusting billboards.

This looked to me like an Eastern Orthodox Church. There was a guy in a black robe and a funny hat walking down the street when I took this picture. He went inside, and later I saw him conducting a baptism. He reminded me of the young priest in the movie “Chocolat”.

They certainly had some graphic imagery – no question about where *these* people are going! I went into the church and spent quite a lot of time inside, but did not take any pictures as I have in other cathedrals and churches I’ve visited. It was very dark inside, and not all that large. But it was crammed full of paintings, icons, and various artifacts and relics. The thing that really stayed my hand from photography, however, was the fact that there was a steady stream of people making the rounds from one icon or relic to another. At each one they would stop, make the sign of the cross several times, and then stoop and kiss it. It was a very hushed, reverent atmosphere, and it just didn’t seem appropriate to take pictures.

This elegant wooden balcony was on the side of a house I walked past. I was getting tired by this time, so I went back to my hotel room and took a nap for a couple of hours.

When I awoke later on Saturday evening, I wanted to go out to eat at a Romanian restaurant. I had gotten a recommendation from the cab driver who drove me to Constantsa, and since that restaurant (“La Protsap”) was also number one in the tour guide, I decided that would be a good choice. I had mentally noted its position on my map – right on the other side of the square with city hall – so I knew where to go and did not drag the tour guide along. I simply walked to the general area expecting to find it.

I did not find it right away, so I wandered a bit until I found a familiar landmark – a musical theater that was shown right across the street on the tour guide map. But still no restaurant! I looked for awhile longer, then spotted a couple of policemen and went up to ask them where it was. They did not speak English well at all, but the younger one understood what I wanted.

“Not here” he said with a bit of a regretful look. “Yes”, I said, “it’s on my map, right here” and gestured around us. “No”, he said, “not here”. I must have looked doubtful, as he said quite earnestly “I know, not here. Big distance”. Actually what he said was more like a caricature of Italian – it sounded like “I-a know. Not-a heer. Beeg-a deestunts”. I certainly understood what he meant. I smiled and thanked him, and said I’d go get my book (while making book-reading gestures).

So I went back to the hotel and got my book. I studied the map closely, then looked up the restaurant on Google on my iPod using the hotel’s wireless internet. I soon realized my mistake. The little black arrows on the street next to the restaurant symbol did *not* mean “one-way street”. They were an indication that the restaurant was off the map in that direction, some indeterminate distance away. Chastened, I started walking. I walked, and walked, and walked. Then I walked some more. Just when I was about to give up and turn back, I came to the street the restaurant was on. So I turned and walked. And walked. And walked some more, until I was about to give up again. I set my sights on a brightly-lit intersection, and sure enough there it was!

This is probably a good place to add that the rest of the city was much more modern than the part I had been in all day. It still had somewhat of a run-down feel to it, but was much better kept and had traffic signals and other infrastructure that had been lacking in the old city.

I had a nice dinner at the restaurant. They assigned an English-speaking waitress who was very accommodating. I quickly stopped using my phrase book and just ordered in English. They had a live musical act that sounded like it consisted of an accordion and a vocalist. I couldn’t see them, however - this was also a lesson in European dining. I had asked for the non-smoking section, and was therefore stuck in the back in an out-of-the way alcove all by myself. I guess if you want the full experience, you have to accept the fact that they smoke, and just deal with it.

I had too much to eat, and was feeling very sleepy by the time I was done. I fully intended to catch a cab back to the hotel, but on the way to the cab stand I decided that a walk would help settle my food and that the exercise wouldn’t hurt me. So I walked back to the hotel, which was quite a hike. I was pretty stiff when I woke up on Sunday!

This is the folk art museum, which I visited first thing on Sunday morning. I had read about it in my German tour guide and decided to go, but was initially stymied by a language problem. In German it is referred to as the “Ethnographisches Museum”. I read the description, decided it sounded interesting, and added it to my list. When I walked past it for the first time, however, I did not recognize it. I don’t know what I thought “Ethnographisch” meant, but I didn’t translate it to “Folk Art”. I was looking for “Ethnographic-something”. Finally on Sunday I figured it out and went inside. :-)

The museum was fairly small, with only two floors in what amounted to a large house. But it had a very nice sample of various “folk art” – meaning tools, implements, and artifacts of everyday life. They had an interesting display format – glass cases and diorama displays were complemented by large framed photographs up above them showing the natural settings. On the first floor these were mostly the various types of houses, buildings, and other structures from different areas of the country.

On the second floor they had an extensive collection of native costumes. They shared a generally similar appearance, but with many differences of detail characteristic of the places of their origin.

I thought the young woman in the picture up above was interesting. She looked so happy and vibrant – I wondered about her life – where she was from, what she did, and what she thought about the person taking her picture. Do you suppose she had any idea her photo would end up in a museum?

Elsewhere on this floor they had displays of painted ceramics, metal and wooden implements, etc. One caught my eye – a hefty stick about 2 ½ feet long with a knob on the end of it, called a “Wedding Stick”. I wondered what it was, imagining the worst (think of the scene in “The Quiet Man”, where an older woman gives John Wayne a stick as he drags Maureen O’Hara to her brother’s house with the comment “Here’s a stick to beat the lovely lady.”). So I just *had* to ask the attendant. She explained that it was for going around the village knocking on doors to announce the wedding. Ahhh…not for the groom to beat the bride, then…so much for stereotypes!

Speaking of the attendant – there was an interesting phenomenon at the museums I visited. In each, an attendant was present on each floor. As I approached, they would turn on the lights in that section. When I was done in a room, they turned the lights out behind me. I have to think that it’s about saving money. Interesting when you think that it’s cheaper in their country to have a person stand there all day and turn the lights on and off than it is just to leave them on.

This map of the ancient cities of Dobrogea (the name of this region) was on the side of a building overlooking a public park.

This was the park, its walkways lined with ancient artifacts and including a long section of the fortifications.

I thought this house was interesting. I wonder what the people on either side think of the person in the middle who doesn’t maintain their part of the house?

This monument commemorates Romanian freedom. Freedom from what, and when, was not clear in any of the references I could find. It has a sort of socialist-realist style, and also evokes our Statue of Liberty when viewed from a certain angle. I was struck by the similarity to the war memorial I had seen in Seoul, Korea. On the side is shown a row of people – soldiers at the front, people with guns in the middle, and at the back, a worker with a stack of rifles handing them to the people going up to fight. The other side similarly celebrated agricultural production.

The final museum I visited was the Naval museum. It had displays from ancient times all the way up to the present. This map showed ancient trade routes in the Mediterranean and Black Seas.

This was pretty cool – an original Marconi wireless (radio). You can see the huge vacuum tubes and coils as well as the telegraph key. This would have been the main (and probably only) radio on a ship in the early 20th century. I took lots of other photos in the museum, but most of them are of things that probably only I would be interested in. Highlights were a couple of MP-40s, an MG-42, a Czech ZB-26, a Naval Maxim gun on wheels, a Steyr-Hahn M-1912, and various swords and daggers, all of which I’d only ever seen in photos.

They had an outdoor exhibit area behind the museum for larger pieces, including some river patrol boats (the cliché here would be “rotting hulks”). Most of it was not too interesting to me as I am not a Navy guy, but this caught my eye from clear across the park. The last gun on the right in this row is a German 88mm anti-aircraft gun, the infamous “88” that wreaked such havoc on allied tanks and planes during WWII. This was the first one I’d ever seen up close.

This is another one that reached out and grabbed me by the eyeballs – a Bofors anti-aircraft gun. This was Swedish-made, and since they were officially neutral they sold them to anyone who could show up and pay. They were also made under license, so they were in service in both Allied and Axis forces. After seeing these two I looked all over for an Oerlikon 20mm cannon, but didn’t find one. It was a Swiss design, and like the Bofors was used by both sides in WWII. The only Oerlikon I’ve ever seen up close is outside the Hardin County Courthouse in Eldora, Iowa. That one came off the battleship USS Iowa.

This was an interesting feature of the city. These little white booths are sprinkled around at various locations, and serve as police outposts. There were officers patrolling on foot, but most of the police I saw were in these little booths.

By early afternoon on Sunday I’d had enough. I called the cab and went back to MK. All in all it was an interesting visit. I guess some of my recent posts have been more like photo albums than actual blog entries, but then again, I’ve been seeing some interesting places since I got here. How many photos could I post of sand and camels, anyway? :-)

Mood: Glad to be home
Music: Bach – Orchestral Suite in B Minor (see my next entry!)