Symbols

Yesterday I took a walk and went to see the Ceauşescu Palace, the second largest administrative building in the world, so I could at last answer my friends "Yes" when they ask me if I have already seen it.

A "giant" built during the "golden age" of the dictatorial regime and born in the mind of a man for whom the notion of "reasonable size" did not exist.

That´s Romanian Congress website, with the quotation marks included. What did I think? Well, I found the building... exhausting. Because it would be better to say that I took a walk around the building, great idea of me! I wouldn´t recommend it to anyone, 45 uninteresting minutes, specially if you start in Izvor part, the only nice view around.

But don´t blame the building: it is the wall around the building, with its "buffer zone" that makes the extension so huge, and the building so lonesome and unreachable.

Romanian Congress and Senate are now inside the building: became a symbol on democracy, so they say. I´m not sure that such a detached building is the representation I would like to have of democracy in my country.

This "Palace of Parliament" is on the South. To the North we find a Hose, the "Free Press House", former headquarters of the Communist Party, a "little" present from Stalin. But it WAS little: an imitation of Moscow Lomonosov University, and half its size (104 m vs. 240 m heigth). Stalin must have enjoyed doing this building, making clear his point on who ruled... This time the walk was nice: through Herăstrău park (parks are the best around here).

New times, same huge buildings. Next step was Grozavesti: I saw in my map that in there was the Technical University grounds, the Botanic Park, a little park, a church... And they were ther, but the main view was other... A too easy comparison? Probably, but I couldn´t help taking the picture.