Let us start with the positives: Romania is a beautiful country, with varied scenery and some attractive architecture which the years of communism failed to completely eradicate. Some of this hails from the distant past, with castles aplenty, citadels and fortified churches / monasteries and are in differing states of repair according to importance, provenance and means. Other buildings are just survivors of the prosperous time in the early part of the 20th century when the well-off and the growing middle class were investing in what they thought was a better future. I even saw an impressive if over-the-top vanity project - Pelesh Castle, but really a palace - built for Carol 1, first king of Romania, above the resort town of Sinaia in the mountains as a country retreat.
But while architecture may help set the scene it is the people who make it real and bring things to life. Much has been heard about the awfulness of some Romanians, who go to places like London or Paris to live a parasitic existence on the back of generous welfare availability and a credulous population - modern-day vultures of sorts; in my, admittedly limited, experience they are the exception. Most Romanians I met are good people ravaged by years of communism and corruption and suffering under difficult economic conditions. Immigration is for them an attempt at economic salvation, as their country is in a tight spot at the moment.
Why is this? How can a country that is fertile, blessed with oil and not overpopulated be in the financial doghouse to the extent that Romania is? This is not, on paper, a poor country.
The Romania that we see is a relatively modern creation, carved from the body of the collapsing Ottoman Empire at more or less the same time as other neighbouring Balkan states. Its transition from a feudal backwater to a modern state was not a smooth affair, caught as it was between powerful empires pulling and pushing, vying for control. The pace of modernisation was ponderous despite the efforts of an educated elite (mainly metropolitan, I believe), and met resistance from various quarters, some of whom were protecting their long-established privileges and others manoeuvring to acquire some. This explosive mix was not helped by two World Wars and numerous regional conflicts, nor by the rise of Fascism.
The arrival of Communism wiped away the old ruling classes and replaced everything with the party system, in which you were in or out. Whilst the Romanian communists may not have been as brutal as Stalin would have liked, their economic policies were just as utopian and unproductive as their counterparts elsewhere in the communist world; corruption, already a factor in the local way of life, became endemic and institutionalised. I am told that the fall of communism and the return of a democratic system (no King, though...) has seen little change in both the people in control and the levels of corruption: communist-era people largely still pull the strings, often behind the scenes, and corruption remains a major factor in everyday life.
So this large country, whose wheat once fed Europe, whose oil reserves made it wealthy and which had a very active trading economy on the Danube and the Black Sea languishes in poverty, with many Romanians seeking to make a life elsewhere. I am told (but have no first-hand knowledge) that doing business in Romania is a bit like the Wild West, something that, together with the rampant corruption, will make foreign investors reluctant to take the plunge. In a country with so much to offer that is nothing short of a tragedy, one whose effect the Romanian people are enduring every day.
I realise that this post barely scratches the surface, and would like to do a more detailed and extensive one on Romania once I've had the chance to study it a bit better. It may take awhile... If anyone out there has information that could help, I would be grateful. And do visit the place, there's a lot to see!
P.S. : I apologise that I have no 'gritty' photographs for you, no urban blight, no ruins with 'for sale' signs, no poor people selling tat so as not to be looked upon as beggars. I photographed in my ham-fisted way only beauty, in buildings and nature.
The Romania that we see is a relatively modern creation, carved from the body of the collapsing Ottoman Empire at more or less the same time as other neighbouring Balkan states. Its transition from a feudal backwater to a modern state was not a smooth affair, caught as it was between powerful empires pulling and pushing, vying for control. The pace of modernisation was ponderous despite the efforts of an educated elite (mainly metropolitan, I believe), and met resistance from various quarters, some of whom were protecting their long-established privileges and others manoeuvring to acquire some. This explosive mix was not helped by two World Wars and numerous regional conflicts, nor by the rise of Fascism.The arrival of Communism wiped away the old ruling classes and replaced everything with the party system, in which you were in or out. Whilst the Romanian communists may not have been as brutal as Stalin would have liked, their economic policies were just as utopian and unproductive as their counterparts elsewhere in the communist world; corruption, already a factor in the local way of life, became endemic and institutionalised. I am told that the fall of communism and the return of a democratic system (no King, though...) has seen little change in both the people in control and the levels of corruption: communist-era people largely still pull the strings, often behind the scenes, and corruption remains a major factor in everyday life.
So this large country, whose wheat once fed Europe, whose oil reserves made it wealthy and which had a very active trading economy on the Danube and the Black Sea languishes in poverty, with many Romanians seeking to make a life elsewhere. I am told (but have no first-hand knowledge) that doing business in Romania is a bit like the Wild West, something that, together with the rampant corruption, will make foreign investors reluctant to take the plunge. In a country with so much to offer that is nothing short of a tragedy, one whose effect the Romanian people are enduring every day.I realise that this post barely scratches the surface, and would like to do a more detailed and extensive one on Romania once I've had the chance to study it a bit better. It may take awhile... If anyone out there has information that could help, I would be grateful. And do visit the place, there's a lot to see!
P.S. : I apologise that I have no 'gritty' photographs for you, no urban blight, no ruins with 'for sale' signs, no poor people selling tat so as not to be looked upon as beggars. I photographed in my ham-fisted way only beauty, in buildings and nature.
No comments:
Post a Comment