Another sea of concrete
Trip Start
Apr 08, 2007
1
91
144
Trip End
Oct 01, 2007
Pitesti,
Romania
Friday, July 20, 2007
My expectations for my current stop turned out to be pretty spot on. The girl I CouchSurfed with in Craiova last night said Pitesti was basically more of the same. Actually, it's far worse. While I wouldn't say it's a dreadful, grim place, it doesn't really have much left in terms of history
01: Main square in Pitesti
. This place got thoroughly systematized, and by the looks of things, they pretty much finished the job. The main center got fully reworked in the early days of Communism, so it has an ultra-retro 1960s-Socialism look to it. Totally out of congruence with the faceless modernist blocks all around the square is a small Byzantine church plopped right smack in the center of everything. Apparently it was meant to be demolished along with the rest of the old center, but some deft negotiations by the local patriarch saved it just before it happened. It's a good thing too, as it's probably the only real tourist attraction in town, with an incredible frescoed interior that's been remarkably well preserved. Athiestic authorities can sometimes have a heart after all, I guess.For anything else of historical note, you've seriously got to search. The pedestrianized Strada Victoriei that runs from the main square northwards has a few old villas remaining, as well as an attractive French-style town hall. A larger old palace has survived as the county museum just a couple streets over, and here and there you can stumble upon the odd, isolated historic building along a random street or around the corner from a row of apartment blocks. I even managed to find one (that's right, one!) cobbled street with a few original houses and a historic church on it. Other than that, Pitesti is one sprawling sea of concrete. What sections of the old town survived the "urban renewal" of the 60s got bulldozed and replaced with numbingly identical blocks in the 70s and 80s
02: 1960s apartment blocks along the square
. Funnily enough, there are some classic postcard images of the old, beautiful city it once was in the local McDonald's, but pretty much none of the structures pictured have survived. As the county seat of a relatively "backwards" (read: rural) region in post-war Romania, the town was basically marked for serious industrialization and the authorities were going to achieve it come hell or high water. Goodbye centuries-old heritage.Needless to say, half a day (less even, since I got in at almost 3pm) was more than enough to spend in town. Really, I could have headed straight on to Curtea de Arges, which is the main point of my coming here, but I thought I'd make one more stop rather than push on (and risk not finding a place for the night easily). Anyhow, the local hotel is the cheapest I've drummed up yet in Romania, so at least that's somewhat of a financial relief. But the mountains are sounding better and better . . . the heat down here in the plains is seriously wearing me down (though Pitesti isn't quite as roasting as Craiova was). So I'll get up early - though not "5:30" early - tomorrow and move on to the next destination. This one is supposed to be a real tourist attraction, so from here I'll be getting back on the path a bit. Should be nice, I hope.
