Bucharest in spring

I flew from the Kazakh winter (it was below zero when I left Astana) into the Romanian spring. When we touched down in Bucharest I could see trees in blossom beyond the runway. Much of the road into the city was lined with parks, where the trees were already green with new leaves, and the verges – unlike the greying slush in Astana – were blooming with flowers. 

The owner of the short-term rental I had booked picked me up at the airport. In his car, I took off my coat and rolled up the sleeves of my shirt. Bucharest in spring was surprisingly warm. The sky was clear blue and the sun burnt down on my arm as I rested it on the open window.

We zoomed past big box stores – Ikea, Selgros, Bricostore – then the traffic ground to a halt as we entered the city. 

Return to Bucharest

I had been there three times before – in 1998, 2007 and 2012 – and recognised the Arc de Triomphe on one of the huge squares connected by equally vast boulevards on the route into the city. Nearby was a building in Stailinst wedding cake style. 

“What’s that?” I asked. It was uncannily like the Triumph building in Astana. 

“The house of the free press,” said Gheorge. 

At the next big square, roads had been blocked off with colourful banners and a group of cyclists were waiting to start a race. After driving through yet more parks, we entered a street I recognised as the Calea Victoriei, one of Bucharest’s oldest and most important streets. A few of the buildings had “de vanzare” (for sale) banners and I wondered if one of them might perhaps become mine. 

The flat I had booked was a tiny studio on the Calea Victoriei, in the university district just to the north of the old town. 

Discovering the old town

Tired by hours of travelling and my 4am start, I didn’t do much the first day in Bucharest in spring, just strolled through the old town, buying a pay as you go sim card and visiting the Carrefour supermarket for some essentials.

I browsed the vegetables, picking up a lettuce (for 40p not £6 like the last lettuce I had bought), cherry tomatoes, courgettes and beanshoots, all of which had been expensive or unobtainable luxuries for the last few months. In the dairy aisle a couple of French cheeses and some organic yoghurts followed them into my basket. 

Walking back through the old town, I marvelled at the people sitting outside cafes and restaurants (it would be another couple of months before they put tables outside in Astana), looking relaxed and happy.

Cafe society

With my sore feet and bulging carrier bags, I followed the map provided by Gheorge closely, not wanting to get lost in the narrow cobbled streets. I still took a wrong turn at one point, turning off one of the main paths, where every building seemed to be a bar or restaurant, with tables taking up most of the road, into a narrower street where many of the buildings were in an advanced state of decay.

A sign showing a pole-dancing stripper poked out from between wooden scaffold apparently holding the building up. I quickly retraced my steps, passing an H&M before emerging from the old town at the huge white building of the Romanian central bank. 

In my new flat shoes, my feet had already got blisters from walking around the airports at Astana, Vienna and Bucharest. Back at the flat I changed into my new fur lined slippers, which were so soft and lovely they felt as if they were kissing my aching feet.

I opened a celebratory bottle of Ursus (bear) beer and went to stand by the julienne window of the flat – I couldn’t squeeze out because the entire platform was taken up by a huge air conditioning unit. 

Bucharest nightlife

10 storeys below me, Bucharest was showing no signs of winding down for the evening. It was so lively, so noisy, so different from Astana. The cacophony of horns and screeching brakes were carried upwards on the warm air.

Sirens squealed as a VIP motorcade zoomed towards the main government buildings a couple of blocks away. A taxi driver (they had yellow cabs like in New York) got into a loud argument with another motorist, both drivers opening their car doors to yell insults at each other. 

Right opposite my flat was an ornate turreted building with Cercul Militar National emblazoned on the front, and a fountain and tables with awnings on the terrace in front.

Other buildings had smart frontages but their upper stories looked almost as if they had been tacked on afterwards, with unplastered brick and concrete, and much patched roofs.

In the distance over the closely packed rooftops, I could just see a corner of the huge Palace of the Parliament, its white walls lightly tinted with pink by the setting sun, so different from the harsh crimson of the Astana sunsets.