Plepe's Blog

Last weekend I finally managed to go to Kosovo, although it was rather spontaneous, because my partner for the planned hiking tour got ill. Unfortunately CouchSurfing in Kosovo didn’t work out, so I had to stay at a guest house in Prishtina and didn’t really get in contact with people there.

You are wondering, whether Kosovo is a safe place to go? According to the channels that I checked (Wikitravel, Homepage of Austrian foreign ministry, …) the main danger in Kosovo right now are unexploded land mines, and you won’t encounter them as long as you stay „on the beaten path“.

I never felt afraid when I was visiting places, in fact people were always friendly and helpful … which seems to be natural in islamic cultures. The main population in Kosovo are Albanian origin, which was also the reason for the wish of their independence. The Albanian flag is also the second most seen flag around.

If you have already seen some places in Eastern Europe, it doesn’t look so much different. A lot of block buildings from communist times, in between smaller, older buildings. You see a lot of foreign organisations, especially the military organisations United Nations and KFOR (NATO), but also European Union and OSCE.

Striking to me was the presence of so many unfinished buildings, especially on the country side, where I passed them in the buses. I was surprised about the dense network of buses, there are buses to the other major cities every 15 to 30 minutes. For sure it’s not a big country, but still it takes up to three hours.

Prishtina
Prishtina is the capital of Kosovo and has the same problem that many capitals face: They grew too fast.

If you arrive in Prishtina by bus, it doesn’t look very welcoming. You first have to pass a highway crossing (there are some safe ways, but still it’s not very nice) and then you walk along Boulevard Bill Klinton to the city centre, passing some communist living blocks. The city centre consists mainly of big buildings, where the architects might have thought, they should be good looking. Many of them are used for the huminitary and military organisations. Around the city centre it’s getting more welcoming, a Turkish bazaar and smaller houses dominate these regions. You should definitely go to the ethnological museum (you can see traditional clothing and customs there, in a beautiful house from the 19th century), they guy there was very friendly and explained me everything in great detail. And he was for Erasmus in Vienna ;)

Central pedestrian zone	People selling cigarettes on the turkish bazaar	Political statements everywhere
An unfinished orthodox church near the city centre	Boulevard Bill Klinton	View on the Northern parts of Prishtina

Prizren
On the second day I went to see Prizren, a smaller city in the south-west of the country. First I was a little bit disappointed, but after some searching I found the city centre, with a small river flowing through it. Next to this you have a hill with a huge fortress (which is now used by KFOR) and some damaged houses from war. When I came there I saw, that some race will take place later on, but first the KFOR had to remove their tents from the main square. Later a womens car race where held, who had to find their way through a parcours.

An old turkish bath (hamam)	The river in the centre, with a view on snow covered mountains.	Another view to the centre, with the mosque dominating the scene.
The car parcours on the main square	Destroyed houses don’t keep children from playing. In the background the view on Prizren	Military everywhere

Peja
Peja is an even smaller town to the west of Kosovo. It has two centres: A turkish bazaar and a pedestrian zone with cafes and restaurants. I was surprised to see some many people on the street enjoying the day … although it was Monday. I also enjoyed some grilled meat with some salad. And I enjoyed the view on the snow covered mountains. When I left Peja I had a talk with the guy from the toilet. He lived in Germany for 23 years and got deported 4 years ago. He wants badly to go back, because he’s missing his wife and his two children, but unfortunately he was not married.

The crowded centre	Main square with snow covered mountains in the background	From the bus station to the mountains
The centre of the turkish bazaar	A common sight in Eastern europe: Communist living blocks	Also a common sight: horse carriages

So, my conclusion about Kosovo: People can live a normal life. For sure there are still many problems, but there’s a lot of development going on. Mainly with foreign money, we will see how they will develop, when they have to live from their own income (talking about money: the official currency is the Euro).

Finally I arrived in my (nearly) last stop of my travel – Timişoara. It’s the second largest city of Romania and – at least Geographically seen – the most western city of Romania. It has a large city centre with several pedestrian zones and squares, orbited by parks and on some parts by the river Bega. Around the city centre you have the typical suburban settlements of Communist era.

Again I spoke most of the time German, my CouchSurfer there is working as translator for German to Romanian language. And we even visited a performance in the German National Theater Timişoara (Deutsches Staatstheater Temeswar): „Alles zu seiner Zeit“ by David Ives.

Piaţa Opera, with the Opera house in the background	Piaţa Unirii (Union)	Piaţa Unirii (Union)
The orthodox cathedral, seen from a bridge over Bega	Bridge over Bega, a nice river where you can stroll and enjoy the sun	One of the many parks
Bulky tramways	High school for theater (you could hear an occasional shout)	People feeding pigeons on Piaţa Opera

The most interesting and touching thing I’ve seen in Timişoara was the Archive about the Revolution in 1989. Timişoara was the first city to protest against their leader Ceausescu and it was also the first city were the first people died. The director – who was veterinary before the revolution and got badly wounded – loves to talk and show you around. During a movie about the revolution and in the gallery showing the works of children after the revolution, I nearly started crying. Don’t miss it, if you ever come to Timişoara. I couldn’t find a homepage, but if you want to learn more about the revolution, I can recommend you this page.

Display of pictures of the revolution and the flag of revolution: the former Communist flag with the cut-out logo

Memorial statue somewhere in the centre

Demonstration on the central square in 1989

After Timişoara I had to find a way back to Sofia. It was not so easy, there’s only one bridge between Romania and Bulgaria, in the East of the country, options would have been to go over Belgrade (with a break of 12 hours) or with a ferry between Calafat and Vidin. I finally decided to go over Bucharest, which took me 18 hours and additionally 5 hours in Bucharest which I used to visit the Museum of Peasants, which was really nice (although more English or German descriptions would be nice). The even have some old wooden houses and an old wooden church on display.

Romania was an interesting place to visit. There are still many places to visit – the Danube Delta or the northern parts of the country, which should more rural. I will for sure come back. Here you can see a route of my travel (Data by OpenStreetMap):

(I also made a map like this for our travel through Macedonia)

Being back in Sofia, I got a message from my friend who should visit me on Monday (which was my reason to come back to Sofia), that he has to cancel his visit. So I have to go traveling again! Next stops will be Kosovo and Albania. First I thought about leaving Monday morning, but my new flat-mates told me they can’t afford the rent and will move out at the end of February. As my other flat-mate is not in Sofia for most of the month, I have to search for flat-mates now. But the new Erasmus students are arriving, so it will be easy to find people.

My last stop in Romania shall be Timişoara, but before I was recommended to go to Roşia Montană.

My CouchSurfer gave me a ride to Alba Iulia (she had to go there from her work), which is a not very nice city. It looks as urban development just happens there, without noticeably structure. The interesting thing: There’s a huge fortress from the 18th century, shaped like a star. Most of it is unused, and when I was walking through this place I started dreaming about a festival. It would be a great place with all these backyards and big places. Imagine stages, rows of tents and stands selling various goods.

Walking along the walls

View into this foritification

Satellite image of the fortress

Roşia Montană is a mountain village with gold and copper mines, which were exploited in antique times for the first time. During industrial revolution it became a wealthy place, many workers came there and populated the area. Unfortunately it all went down in the 1970s under communist regime. At the moment it’s a sad place with deserted houses, unemployed workers and aggressive stray dogs. But underneath you can still feel the beauty of this place, every church has it’s own place of worship, the workers‘ buildings are ornamented and it’s situated in a mountainous area with interesting rock formations.

In the last years Roşia Montană got some publicity, as there is one Canadian company, which is trying to built a new mining project (since 11 years). Especially the young ones fear, that the project would ruin the place. On the other hand the company (using fancy buzzwords like ‚Sustainable‘, ‚Ecologic‘, ‚Community Process‘, …) promises to clean the place (some of the streams are already heavily polluted), bring new jobs and develop tourism. Tourism is also the option for the people opposing the project, but I don’t know where the money should come from – you need some huge investments to renovate the place and make it better accessible. I was talking to „Pro Roşia Montană„, a non-governmental organization, supporting this project. They say, they would support any project, because as it is now, the people can’t survive there. But they are also thankful for the opposition, at least the company had to bring strong arguments and to think about alternatives.

In Roşia Montană there’s even a small hostel, managed by a young couple. They are nice, and it’s a good place, so if you ever happen to come to Roşia Montană, I can recommend to stay at there place (It’s situated 800m back the main road from the main square and called „La Gruber„). I was the only guest (in fact, they were really surprised, that somebody is coming), but they said, that in summer it’s usually full. They also oppose the project, in fear, that the company will ruin this place. I’m sure the hostel would make it, it’s a small place, and there will always be some people going to strange places.

View on the historic part of Roşia Montană	View on three churches (I think in total they have five)	The main square in the historical part
The old town hall	One of the many old buildings	The hostel „La Gruber“

I was happy to leave this place after a night, but I will follow news about it, I got interested in it. I hope it interested you too :)

I already told you, that my next stop is Sibiu (german: Hermannstadt), former Cultural Capital of Europe in 2007. If you expect all this modern things that happened and (partly) stayed, like in Graz, you might be disappointed, you can’t feel it. But the money in Sibiu was invested wisely, the centre has been well renovated and a huge pedestrian area has been developed. And it’s definitely worth. A short abstract of the history of Sibiu: Sibiu was founded in the 12th century by German settlers, but was destroyed by Mongols a hundred years later. Only about 100 inhabitants survived, who started to rebuild the town, but this time with heavy fortification. Soon Sibiu was wealthy again. As this region was threatened by many enemies, many castles and citadels were being built – like Braşov and Sighişoara, I visited before. Also many churches has been fortified, so called „Kirchenburgen“ were being built. And there are many, at least 300, maybe up to 700. About 140 still exist, but many need renovation.
In Sibiu I was couchsurfing again. This time it was pretty interesting, because my host was working for the protestant church, her current work was a EU proposal for the renovation of 18 of these fortified churches. I could even help a little bit. Unfortunately I didn’t meet one of her working colleagues (an urban planner from Berlin), who was responsible for the renovation of Sibiu for the year as Cultural Capital. I would have liked to hear some experiences from him.
So, back to my travel, I’m sure you want to see some pictures. Historic Sibiu has two parts, the Upper Town (for the merchants and rich) and the Lower town (for the workers). The Upper Town is arranged around three huge squares and has heavier fortification. The Lower Town has smaller buildings and narrow roads, crossroads are often enlarged to little squares. Everywhere in the historical centre, you have historical buildings (15th-18th century) and several churches.

The main square, Piaţa Mare (Großer Ring)	The newly renovated main pedestrian road	Somewhere in the Upper Town
Road to the Lower Town	The road, seen from the Lower Town	At the edge of Lower and Upper Town you have interesting roof landscapes.
View into the Lower Town	In the Lower Town renovation is still necessary	Some rests of fortification walls and some towers

On the last day in Sibiu I went to see some villages around Sibiu and two fortified churches. I wanted to take the tramway (there’s only one route left from the Southern end of Sibiu to one of the villages outside, Răşinari), but unfortunately I would have need to wait two hours. But there are some people who have some kind of informal collective taxi service, I could take one of these (for 2,5 Lei = 0,60€). From Răşinari (german Städterdorf) I followed a hiking route to the next village, Cisnădioara (german Michelsberg). I couldn’t find all parts of the way, but finally I managed. I had some really impressive views on the way. In Cisnădioara there’s one old Romanesque fortified church on top of a hill, with a simple wall around. Then I walked to the next village, Cisnădie (german Heltau), which is actually a little town, with another, bigger fortified church.

Tramway, waiting for the end of the break	Most of the roads in Răşinari look like this	In Cisnădioara the sun came out. In the background the hill with the church
The Romanesque church	Inside it’s very simple.	Wall around the church
On the way from Răşinari to Cisnădioara	View from the Romanesque church on Cisnădie	On the way to Cisnădie I walked through apple trees, followed by a friendly dog
In Cisnădie	The fortified church in Cisnădie	The wall around the church
Funeral march with horse driven carriage (one hour before I’ve seen one with a car)	In the church a small mass was going on	On the main road. Note the roof windows which look like eyes, they are very common

I hope I didn’t bore you with my tale about churches, but I found them rather fascinating. Maybe you want to see them yourself? Take somebody with you who speaks German or Romanian, there aren’t many people who speak English in that region (and texts are often only in Romanian and German, maybe a short description in French in English – even on the signs, which were erected for 2007).