Balkan Trains: Key learning: Take the Inter-city (IC) trains, and get into the first class car. It is still very difficult to climb up into the car, but once on board the seats are quite comfortable, and there is space to stow your luggage.

The washrooms are bad, but so it goes.

Wrote here on a crisp blue sky fall morning, trundling across farmed valleys and through wooded hills. Romania might be a bit down at the heels, but this is a pretty country. The villages we pass look interesting and it seems to me that a wander around road trip through the Balkans could be a pleasure.

Arad

Earlier I had changed my plans and shortened my stay in Arad, based on it being described to me as a “little county town”. But it was as interesting as anyplace I visited it Romania. You can guess its history: captured and belonged to everybody over the centuries.

Pictures around town.

 

What I liked best about Arad is that it is a living working city. Bustling in fact. And therefore plenty to see.  Sibiu as a contrasting example had a great old town, but after seeing it in one day not much else going on.   Arad street scenes:

 

 

Part of my stop here was to figure out how to cross into Hungary. The people at the ticket booth at the train station had never heard of the train I had researched for my plan and wanted to put me on an overnight trip with train changes.

However capable travel agent Cristina

 

Piggybacked me into a car taking two travelers to the Budapest Airport who dropped me in Szeged. Which proved to be a very easy trip on a brand new motorway. Across farmland as flat as Illinois.

 

 

I can truthfully say that I enjoyed this visit to Romania. And I do not always say that leaving a country.  Everyone I met was friendly, helpful and kind.  It is an interesting country and perhaps I can see more of it one day.

Hats off for the food and wine.

Some bonus photos around Arad.

 

A Romanian Bus ride

Journeyed to Sibiu by bus. Had come from Oradea to Cluj by train and not noticed I had been sold a second class ticket. It was a difficult trip. Very hard to get luggage onto and off the train and nowhere to put it. Crowded, stuffy with wretched bathrooms.

But there are many independent bus companies operating in the Balkans and I decided to try. The hotel arranged a reservation for me. ($8.33)

The company operated out of a little shed at the bus station.

The bus was crowded with small hard seats. The proverbial “cheek by jowl”.

We made very slow progress because of many stops, and at every stop a laborious process of new passengers buying tickets from the driver.

One rest station. Fresh new paint.

Pay this woman a quarter and use the wash room. No towels. No problem, dry your hands in your hair.

 

Sibiu

I came to Sibiu as surely all tourists do, to see one of the best preserved medieval old towns in Europe. And it is very nice. The town was originally founded by Germans and was one of the six Saxon cities of Transylvania. Here are some photos of a few of the more spectacular areas and buildings.

There are also interesting little nooks and vistas around the old battlements.

Even the unrestored streets in the old town are are interesting. And there are still plenty of crumbling buildings worthy of saving.

I was attracted to a large produce market down by the river in the real town.

 

This is a very tidy town with block after block of fine houses with well-tended gardens. There are also areas of gritty soviet style apartment blocks, and poor people with the history of hard living written on their faces.

Cathy asked me why my “indoor” pictures were always pubs and restaurants (woops) and so I took these:

 

Tomorrow back on the train. Six hours across Romania. Did get a first class ticket ($27). Will lay over two nights in Arad, a little town near the border and figure how to best cross into southern Hungary.

So impressed by the price to quality ratio of Romanian wines. Googled it up and learned that they have been making wines here for 6000 years. Wow indeed.

Divide by 4 to get dollars.

Cluj Napoca, the capital of Transylvania.

This city was known to the Greeks as the capital of Dacia. Which fell to the Romans. But the Romans packed up and left before the year 300, so only fragments are left of their colony.

In Medieval times one of the six Saxon cities of Transylvania.  In modern times back and forth between Hungary and Romania, and now within Romania.

The city is within a valley between rolling hills along a fast moving river. Not too big and easy to walk around. Lots of effort is being put into the renovation of of the city:  streets, sidewalks, buildings. But there are also still many rundown buildings that could be wonderful if restored.

As always the communist infrastructure has fallen into ruin and blight. The town gas distribution system throughout the city is (you guessed it) ghastly.

There are some fine buildings here, notably the Orthodox Cathedral.

And the Roman Catholic Basilica.

And to go along with them here are some street photos of some other interesting buildings.  Starting with the opera house.

One photo I posted on Facebook for my urban planner friends is this impressively designed street accommodating cars, parking, bicycles and pedestrians.

I have enjoyed my visit and time spent in this city. And for future visitors have made up this little catalog of “Things you could do in and around Cluj”

Ride a Romanian train and meet nice people

Find a nice Pub/Restaurant

Go to a Craft market

Or a farmer’s market

Walk along the river, or in the hills, or the Park

Go to the game

Track down history

Or philosophy

Get married

Make a new friend

Here are some random indoor pictures

And I must share with you my best pictures from Cluj.

The happy eggs.

 

 

 

Off tomorrow deeper into Romania.

 

 

Oreada, my first stop in Romania. Five hours south via super slow train seemed like it would be enough for one day, and it was.

The town is said to have been at its best in the 1300’s. Before the Turks flattened it. The first time. They flattened it again in the 1600’s. Everyone in the neighborhood has ruled it over the years. The Hungarians, Habsburgs, the Ottomans, etc.

Oradea has some nice buildings. Lots of churches. And as many coffee shops per-capita as Seattle. Here are some photos. Around town.

Romania is poor. The infrastructure from the Communist past is run down and broken and ugly. Bacos, the bartender at the wine bar Tapta is leaving with his brother to find work in Manchester where “the wages are better”.

Work is underway to restore this city. They are rebuilding the pavement in the central square and it looks like it will be beautiful when complete.

There is a nice pedestrian only street.

 

But more work is needed. There are too many closed shopfronts and crumbling buildings.

People who allow themselves to be bored would certainly be bored here in this little country town. I had a fine time. Nice walks along the river.

Good food and wines.

The prices are amazing. Unlike some poor countries (e.g. Portugal, Argentina) where prices are inexplicably high, prices here are in proportion. In a pub had a bottle of a fine Romanian Pilsner beer for a dollar 4 cents. A Cepressa salad is 3 dollars. A good bottle of wine in a restaurant is between 6 and 16 dollars.

At the restaurant “To Chefs” I had one of the best dishes I have ever eaten: a bacon wrapped Tenderloin heaped with black truffels. For eleven dollars and 50 cents.

Some random indoor pictures.

Everyone I have met has been friendly and welcoming.  There is plenty of English. In fact almost all the indoor “Muzac” backgroung music is in English.

A few observations:

Like Texans, the women who can, dress up, but the men don’t bother. The women paint their eyebrows a startling black. And wear false eyelashes.

Service is spotty. Excellent in some places. Pretty bad in most, where working seems to involve standing (or sitting) around talking with the other employees.

Cigarettes are smoked everywhere. Here is something we have forgotten, ash trays and a cigarette menu in the coffee shop.

The Balkans !

Such a tumultuous history that even the name is a metaphor for fracture and strife.

A crossroads between Asia, Europe and the Middle East the borders have been redrawn over and over throughout history as the area has fallen in continual conquest to every migrating tribe, expanding city state, nearby country, or empire. Not to mention the intra area conflicts.

In my lifetime the formation and then dissolution of Czechoslovakia. In almost everyone’s time the emergence of new countries from the Bosnia war.

I arrived a few days ago in Budapest, once with Vienna the twin capitals of the Habsburg empire. Today the Capital of Hungary. Have been hanging around the Marriott getting over jet lag and mostly sampling the food and wines. Will be back here in a month or so with Cathy, so no need to do serious sightseeing museums etc.

I was very surprised by the Grandeur of Budapest. The city seems more Grand than say Paris. It makes Rome look shabby, and cities like Prague a discarded peanut. Here are some random photos of grand buildings.

 

Budapest has emerged from the coma of communism and is alive. There are countless cafes pubs and restaurants. Crowds of tourists but also locals out everywhere enjoying the city. Also shops, supermarkets, malls and fancy shopping.

 

The city has an extensive metro system coupled with trams and busses. Very orderly. The taxis are spotless. The metro stations have spacious underground areas al la Moscow. Some underground photos.

 

There are still lingering communist hangover traits:      Occasional inept and surly service. Spurious charges on bills. Lots of leather jackets. And an incredible number of cigarette smokers (outside only).

This is a low income country and the populace have not yet recovered elegance. But the city seems elegant nevertheless from the legacy of the endless grand architecture.

One particular note. The streets are very very clean. No litter, some but not much graffiti.

 

And no dog poop. Quite a contrast from many European cities (e.g. Paris) where it seems to have rained dog poop. Perhaps not many dogs, but also these dog convenience stations located here and there.

 

I am currently on a train south to Romania. Trundling at Russian train speeds (slow) across an endless plain. Flat as a pancake. The villages look like Germany 40 years ago.  But with new investment.  New train stations, electrical infrastructure, road construction.

Will be continuing as this “Around the Balkans in 80 Days” tour continues.

Some train pictures.

 

 

 

It was a rainy day so I went over to the National Museum.

Sorry, no pictures allowed.

But if you are ever here don’t miss it. This is one of the great museums of the world. 6500 years of Chinese history.

When the Nationalist government fell to Mao it did not happen over a weekend. They had plenty of time in their retreat to Taiwan to run trains south with the contents of the museums and their homes and the banks.

I was told that the National Museum can display less than 15 percent of what they store at any time. They have rare books, 400,000 documents, bronzes, porcelains, jewelry, art objects, clothing. Most of which would have been destroyed by Mao’s red guards if left in the North.

Every year when I come they have a new special exhibition or two. The calligraphy section seemed to be reworked, an exhibit on ancient book binding, and a porcelain exhibit of flower pots, which sounds dopy, but was good.

They have the best technical exhibit on bronzes. As an old Engineer who got an A in metallurgy, and like museums with the bronze work of different cultures, I love it.

They explain the ancient formulas for combinations of tin and copper so that arrow heads are sharp, while cooking pots are strong, and bells ring without cracking, and mirrors are shiny. And complicated constructions like a copper core for a sword for toughness with a high tin overlay that can be sharpened.

Unfortunately with busloads of Northern Chinese every day it is almost impossible to visit anymore with really a hundred people in lines for the most interesting exhibits.

But it is still a world treasure.

Went by train up the coast on a pilgrimage to the city of Quanzhou.

Expected a small town but encountered yet another big sprawling Chinese city.  At 6 million people the biggest city in Fuzhou province. When China was open between say 1000 and 1400 this was one of the largest and most important ports in the world.

There were trading ports up and down this coast, but Quanzhou was by far the most important. The great Chinese discovery voyages left from here. The Khan’s fleet to invade Java left from here. And Marco Polo departed China for home from here, and that is why I came.

There were perhaps 100,000 Arabs living on this coast at the time, and in retrospect Quanzhou was named the beginning of the Arab Silk Road. Exports of silk, porcelain, tea were the Chinese trade goods. The city state of Venice had the monopoly with the Arabs for ongoing shipments into Europe, hence the great wealth of that city during this period. Hence the tremendous efforts of the Portuguese to find a trade route around Africa and around the Venetians. Entrepreneurs like Marco’s father and uncle attempted overland routes to China.

There were Portuguese here by the 1300’s. Great sailors. I have journeyed to Lisbon to pay homage to Henry the Navigator. But they were pretty much despised in Asia. Their flavor of twelfth century Christianity afforded them huge arrogance and over the top acts of savagery against non-believers. In Calcutta they filled a boat with hands and feet and promised one every day until the city was opened to them. Here in China, the Kahn was finally so pissed off over their raiding and murdering that he ordered the Portuguese to be “killed on the spot where they are encountered”. Their garrison at Quanzhou was attacked and the survivors fled to Macau.

I became interested in the stories Marco Polo told when I found myself spending a lot of time in some of the cities he described. Especially two of my favorite Chinese Cities, Hangzhou and Suzhou.

He arrived at a very interesting time in Chinese history. Everyone does. I was in a museum last week looking at 5000 year old artifacts. And once visited a 6500 year old village where the pots were marked with the origins of Chinese writing. While we had Mesopotamia and the Greeks and the Romans and all the rest, they were here independently going on with their own civilization.

Anyway, so a group called the Jin invaded China from the North and the Song Dynasty (say 650 to 1300) moved down the Grand Canal and set up the capital of China at Hangzhou, where the Grand Canal reaches the sea. This is around say the mid 1200s. But the Jin were overextended, and the Great Kahn, Kublai Kahn, came down, kicked them out, moved into Beijing, and began to rule the north of China. Marco Polo’s father was just arriving in China about this time and was reported to be the first westerner the great Kahn ever met. Anyway, they hit it off and Marco’s father brought a fortune in goods back to Italy and met his grown son Marco and they turned around to go back for more.

Marco Polo arrived in Beijing around 1270 to 1275ish. But he spent a lot of time down the Grand Canal around Suzhou and Hangzhou for reasons I do not know. The Song were falling to the Kahn around then and the capital would soon move back to Beijing. We know that Marco got caught up in some military advisory capacity, so perhaps this was it.

Everyone knows about the Great Wall of China. But it is a surprise to me that another of the truly magnificent achievements of the ancient world: the Grand Canal is hardly ever mentioned. It is both gigantic and astounding. It is an artificial river, wide enough for two very large barges to pass and it runs for 1100 miles connecting Beijing with 5 interior rivers and the sea at Hangzhou! It was completed in about 600 AD, and allowed China to have a safe interior transportation and trade route for centuries.

When Marco arrived in Hangzhou in the late 1200’s it would have been as he describes it a magnificent city. The Imperial Capital, the southern harbor, open to the sea and via the canal to the interior. With around a million people easily the largest city on earth.

But back to Quanzhou.

Marco Poly was allowed to leave China and came to Quanzhou to join a fleet of 14 Junks carrying a 17 year old Mongol girl to be a bride to the ruler of Persia (roughly Iran), a relative of the Kahn. Here are some photos of a model of the kind of Song Dynasty Junk he would have left on.

And here is the keel of an actual Song Dynasty Junk recovered from a ship wreck that gives you an understanding of the size of these fully ocean going vessels.

There is nothing left at the ancient harbor. But some nearby pagodas and this ancient temple. So I sat here with the Buddhists for a while.

And indulged my self with the thought that Marco might have visited here before his fantastic journey home. Around Thailand and Malaysia. Around India. Up the red sea. By caravan to the Mediterranean Sea then by boat to Italy. Facing that he might have come here for a few good luck prayers. A few joss sticks. Sitting here dressed as a Mongol Baron. His fortune converted into precious jewels and sewn into his clothes.

Besides overlapping with Marco in Beijing, Xian, Suzhou and Hangzhou I have even dragged Cathy to the edge of the Gobi desert where the great wall ends, where Marco Polo entered China and to follow some of his route southeast. That journey turned out to be more interesting than I expected because this is also the route through which Buddhism entered China, leaving a plethora of very ancient historic sites.

With this pilgrimage to Marco’s departure site I have pretty much completed this little quest of mine.

Today is my last day in China. I am looking forward to hosting myself to a really good farewell dinner. And moving on.

 

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Some random musings about Suzhou and Hangzhou.

I used to love visiting Hangzhou. Today it is effectively a suburb of Shanghai, quickly accessible by train. But my first visit took me 5 hours on dirt roads to arrive at a little one to two story village on the north end of the famous west lake. Today the city circles the lake with high rises. I guess I have been there every 8 or ten years or so, watching it change. First responsible to establish a manufacturing joint venture, years later to buy a local company. A few times just to visit.

Even 30 years ago there were 200,000 tourists a year visiting Hangzhou. Because the west lake is the most romantic site in China. The moment of the full moon rising over West Lake is by tradition the most romantic moment on earth. It is a special place with warm memories for me.

Marco described Suzhou as the Venice of China. Much of the old areas are being torn down as Shanghai inexorably creeps to take it from the east. I once took Cathy to these cities. In Suzhou we hired a boat and poked around the old canals. Walked some ancient streets. Visited some remaining garden homes of the Scholar Officials. Suzhou is a very old town occupying a strategic position on the Grand Canal with an amazing history. One chapter is worth a quick summary. Probably not perfect, but here is the way I remember it.

With the collapse of the Ming Dynasty in the mid 1600’s the new rulers, the Manchus were suspicious of the power of the Mandarin Scholar Officials. Since these Mandarin had the virtual monopoly on reading and writing and transmitted all imperial decrees, proclamations and information throughout the country the Manchus were probably right. So, they set about to weaken and circumvent the Mandarin system of high official selection based upon a hierarchy of intelligence and knowledge tests and a consensus around a person’s competence and ability. This was a thousand plus year old system.

Many ministers saw the writing on the wall and took themselves off to early retirement. A good number went down the Grand Canal a distance out of easy reach from Beijing, to Suzhou. They were very very rich and from their positions we can guess very competent brilliant people. So after building their houses and gardens they could only spend so much time painting, making music, writing poetry, and admiring nature, their traditional areas of ongoing learning when not governing.

So, as the generations passed these families built elementary schools, trade schools, western style universities. Undertook civic improvements, roads, lighting, and security. Sent students abroad for study at foreign universities, and delegations to study of foreign industries. Established local banks, manufacturing of silk, dying, silk products.

And the most interesting story (maybe only to me) is how as the French and Americans expanded their trading city at nearby Shanghai, the Suzhou families leveraged the nearness of the trade and technical and financial opportunities. This continues to play out with Suzhou today having a standard of living comparable to Portugal. If I could write, this is a story I would like to tell. But it is probably already on the internet somewhere.

 

 

Spent a month last week in Fuzhou. Ok place but pretty BORING. Did get to eat a lot of dumplings.

But, it was total language immersion. No English for a week. In fact to brag a little, I was just with the Concierge, who does not speak English, arranging a pilgrimage for tomorrow and actually for the first time in my life wrote to someone in Chinese. But before you are really impressed, it was only chu (go) and hui lai (return).

Came back by fast train.

Had to return to Xiamen because getting from China to Taiwan is very difficult. I have to fly from here 2 and a half hours south, stay overnight in Manila and then fly two and a half hours north to Taipei.

Anyway, back to my apology.

This is a key learning for me for this kind of travel. Last time I was here I opted for a too cheap hotel, and it was bad, in a bad area surrounded by people living very hard. That with a little bad weather and I trashed the entire city on this blog.

Sorry.

Now I have move up market into a very good hotel.

 

In a beautiful area. I am on the river.

And have a great mountain park just next door for walking.

That with sunny weather in the 70’s and Palm trees, the city looks entirely different to me. The people are still pretty stiff. I passed two westerners walking this morning and both times got the big smile and a “good morning”. A few hellos from the locals, but not much.

BUT, look at all these places for dinners and perhaps a glass with the locals. These are in two blocks directly on my doorstep.  These pictures were taken at 9AM when they are almost all closed, but I have high expectations for them come dinnertime.

OF course it is still China with the milky air, but so it goes.

A fine day today in Fuzhou. It rained and then this morning sunshine. First I have seen in China this trip.

Took a long walk out to West Lake Park. There is a central “island” in the lake .. connected with a causeway. On the island is a thousand plus year old temple.  Lots of people enjoying the day and the spring weather.

To see this backwater Provincial Capital so modern and built up enough to rival say Chicago is astounding to me.   There are many canals with quiet walkways along them, and plenty of parks and trees, making it an enjoyable city to walk in.

I have never been here before but I will tell you what it looked like 30 years ago. Concrete. Everything made of concrete. No buildings over four stories because no elevators. Uneven sidewalks of cast concrete pavers. No lights at night. Nothing in the few shop windows but industrial wares like generators and pumps and pipes.

Heaps of food at the intersections, brought rough straight from the fields in Army trucks and dumped onto tarps on the ground and sold using a hand balance. Almost no cars. A river of bicycles, all the same copy of a 1930’s British design.

Everyone wearing a blue or a green suit. With a cap, some with red stars on them. No sign that a dentist or a barber had every lived here. Very difficult to tell the women from the men and you wouldn’t care anyway. A very few grey suits which with a cheap ballpoint pen or two in the pocket designated you as a manager.

Only a few big trees. No bushes or little trees or grass. No cats or dogs or songbirds. Because they ate them all during the famine Mao launched with his great leap forward program in the 70s.

If you lived here you lived in a communal building with common toilets and a kitchen on each floor. No hot water. The communal houses were organized into blocks. Every block had overseers whose job was to know everything every family did and did not do.

Extremely backward industry ran around the clock. The language had evolved such that a discussion of time involved being on shift or off shift. Your company fed you your one substantial meal of the day, rice with the topping of the day (tsai). Your housing was assigned to you through your work. Plus your papers allowing you to have housing and stay in the city. When you were not on shift you were in your rooms.

Yes, it is a surprise to see this city so modern and prosperous.

China has doubled the living standard of the poorest 200 million every decade for 30 years, with the upper income levels doing even better. They are currently building housing units at a rate such that they could replace all of the housing in the USA in 6 years. I have been here for one reaason or another to watch this unfold: the greatest rural to urban migration and wealth creation there will probably ever be.  And the unfolding environmental disaster.

Yesterday went to the old section of town, built between roughly 1400 and 1800. Restored and restored, but still the “original” buildings. Full of lots of interesting things to buy. Some pictures.