The Hollywood of the Carpathians
Putting your city's name in giant letters on a hillside worked for Hollywood, so why not for Brasov? Two years ago, the mayor of this multicultural city of 350,000 people in the heart of Transylvania (a mix of (mostly) ethnic Romanians, as well as Hungarians, Germans and gypsies), decided to put the theory to the test. Although a little smaller than the Hollywood sign, the letters B-R-A-S-O-V on the side of Mount Tampa certainly attract the attention of all visitors to the city. Brasov (pronounced Brash-ov) is already the centre of Romania's small but growing tourist industry, thanks to a charming medieval old town, picturesque countryside and the nearby Bran Castle which, despite its tenuous links to the historic Vlad Tepes (Vlad the Impaler), has been succesfully promoted as 'Dracula's Castle' to legions of foreign visitors.
Mentioning the Brasov sign to my driver, George, on the way to Bran Castle, he lets out an exasperated sigh. "Our mayor spends money on this sign, instead of on our schools." A self-confessed patriot, George is fed up with his country. And, at 37, he he wonders whether anything will change in the '30 years or so' he has left to live. As we pass gypsies in wooden carts on the road to Bran, he points to the surroundings and says, "This is where they filmed 'Cold Mountain'. I was a driver for them." It's certainly a wild and beautiful landscape and incredibly verdant. George laughs as I points this out. "To us it is normal."
Pulling up at Bran Castle, I am surprised how unimposing it seems from the road. And the bazaar of stalls selling handicrafts (a wooden mace anyone?), tacky t-shirts ('a smile from Transylvania') and other tourist tat doesn't augur well for the experience. But, despite its manifest inauthenticity, there is a certain ludic quality to the castle (particularly in the courtyard and surrounds) that is reminiscent of the 1960s TV Series, 'The Prisoner', or MC Escher's drawings 'Relativity' and 'Ascending and Descending'. The ideal home for a shape-shifting vampire.
My visit to Brasov coincided with the Golden Stag ('Cerbul de Aur') festival. The medieval town square was converted into the venue for a series of evening concerts, the first of which featured the superannuated Joe Cocker. Having always despised his blue-eyed soul, it was a slightly disconcerting experience to hear Cocker's voice echoing around the streets of old Brasov while I checked out some of the local hostelries. When those bars (Deane's Irish Bar and Grill and Groove Garden) then starting showing a live telecast of the Cocker gig, I knew it was time to go to bed.
The following day, sitting in my room at the Aro-Palace, a 1930s Busby Berkeley extravaganza of a hotel remade on an arthouse budget (although currently undergoing renovation to restore it to its former glory), I decide to watch some TV. On the Romanian station, TV Pro, a bleached blonde in leopardskin top, black leather mini-skirt and knee-high boots is performing alongside a bunch of guys who mix folkdance moves with breakdancing, including one chap in a t-shirt sporting the slogan, "I'm so fucking precious." Clearly, Romania dances to a different drum when it comes to taste in music!
The one exception to that rule so far has been O-Zone, whose 'Dragostea din tei' was a monster hit across Europe lat year. After a pleasant evening at the Carpathian Stag restaurant on my last night in Brasov, it was a shock to walk out into the old-town square and hear the final bars of that monster hit. Following the Norman Greenbaum school of live performance (17 renditions of 'Spirit in the sky'? Yes, thank you!) O-Zone proceed to immediately encore their one and only moment to remember.
Leaving at 2.30 am for Bucharest Otopeni airport with George the driver, I recall a conversation between us the previous day. Upon learning I was a journalist, George had asked that I do something to correct the negative perception of Romania in the West. Well, I can't do much, but my experience of the country was generally positive. I wasn't ripped off or mugged, people were friendly, trains ran on time and the scenery was fantastic. Perhaps, after many years of failure and corruption, things are finally looking up again for Romania.
Mentioning the Brasov sign to my driver, George, on the way to Bran Castle, he lets out an exasperated sigh. "Our mayor spends money on this sign, instead of on our schools." A self-confessed patriot, George is fed up with his country. And, at 37, he he wonders whether anything will change in the '30 years or so' he has left to live. As we pass gypsies in wooden carts on the road to Bran, he points to the surroundings and says, "This is where they filmed 'Cold Mountain'. I was a driver for them." It's certainly a wild and beautiful landscape and incredibly verdant. George laughs as I points this out. "To us it is normal."
Pulling up at Bran Castle, I am surprised how unimposing it seems from the road. And the bazaar of stalls selling handicrafts (a wooden mace anyone?), tacky t-shirts ('a smile from Transylvania') and other tourist tat doesn't augur well for the experience. But, despite its manifest inauthenticity, there is a certain ludic quality to the castle (particularly in the courtyard and surrounds) that is reminiscent of the 1960s TV Series, 'The Prisoner', or MC Escher's drawings 'Relativity' and 'Ascending and Descending'. The ideal home for a shape-shifting vampire.
My visit to Brasov coincided with the Golden Stag ('Cerbul de Aur') festival. The medieval town square was converted into the venue for a series of evening concerts, the first of which featured the superannuated Joe Cocker. Having always despised his blue-eyed soul, it was a slightly disconcerting experience to hear Cocker's voice echoing around the streets of old Brasov while I checked out some of the local hostelries. When those bars (Deane's Irish Bar and Grill and Groove Garden) then starting showing a live telecast of the Cocker gig, I knew it was time to go to bed.
The following day, sitting in my room at the Aro-Palace, a 1930s Busby Berkeley extravaganza of a hotel remade on an arthouse budget (although currently undergoing renovation to restore it to its former glory), I decide to watch some TV. On the Romanian station, TV Pro, a bleached blonde in leopardskin top, black leather mini-skirt and knee-high boots is performing alongside a bunch of guys who mix folkdance moves with breakdancing, including one chap in a t-shirt sporting the slogan, "I'm so fucking precious." Clearly, Romania dances to a different drum when it comes to taste in music!
The one exception to that rule so far has been O-Zone, whose 'Dragostea din tei' was a monster hit across Europe lat year. After a pleasant evening at the Carpathian Stag restaurant on my last night in Brasov, it was a shock to walk out into the old-town square and hear the final bars of that monster hit. Following the Norman Greenbaum school of live performance (17 renditions of 'Spirit in the sky'? Yes, thank you!) O-Zone proceed to immediately encore their one and only moment to remember.
Leaving at 2.30 am for Bucharest Otopeni airport with George the driver, I recall a conversation between us the previous day. Upon learning I was a journalist, George had asked that I do something to correct the negative perception of Romania in the West. Well, I can't do much, but my experience of the country was generally positive. I wasn't ripped off or mugged, people were friendly, trains ran on time and the scenery was fantastic. Perhaps, after many years of failure and corruption, things are finally looking up again for Romania.
Labels: On the road
posted by Justin Toland at 8:07 pm
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