The Story Goes On... And So Does The Walk

If I have to pick a favorite place to go for a walk in my hometown, Bucharest, then Victory Avenue is it. It is a place where I like to walk, at least once a week, for several reasons.

The first one is that I find the past more interesting than the present, and I don't have many expectations about the future (probably because of my age). The past is the history of the city, the place where the modernization of this 500-year-old city started, but what is left has been done since about 150 years ago.

Most "remnants" of those years are, of course, on Victory Avenue!

The second reason why I choose this place for walking is that the whole several-kilometer-long avenue is "given" to pedestrians every weekend. "Given" away means that cars are not allowed to walk on this boulevard which remains only for pedestrians and cyclists!

_{Written for and as part of the #wednesdaywalk, with the guidance of @tattoodjay, who encourages us to share once a week, (on which day I'll let you guess!) what we see most interesting and special in our walks.}

A beautiful May day, when spring shows the first signs of summer, is always an invitation to go for a walk. I can say this by looking at all those strolling along this lovely avenue called Victory!

_{This presentation is a continuation of another post, about the Victory Avenue walk, if anyone is interested in seeing more, please go to it: Victory Avenue Again (The Day The Cars Stopped)}

This city does not have many places that are entirely pedestrianized and this explains people's joy when they have the opportunity to walk without worrying about the dangers coming from cars.

The city of Bucharest, the capital of Romania, has been modernized since the end of the 19th century, following the French model, that is, a small copy of Paris was attempted. That's why it was called Little Paris!

The period between the two world wars of the last century seems to have been the city's glory days. Then the war and after that, even worse, the communism brought by the USSR, did a lot of damage, stopped modernization, and disconnected the country and the city from the Western civilization of Europe and from democracy. It was only after 1990, after communism was replaced by democracy, that the attempt to recover, became what it had been in the past, a modern European city.

The model was again the Parisian one, at least in terms of the joy of life and its pleasures. Terraces began to occupy the sidewalks and young people tied their bicycles to trees, as the old-timers did with their horses, and stopped at tables for coffee, beer, ice cream...

Every free piece of pavement is thus "exploited", especially to the delight of young people.

There are many enjoyable things that can be done, primarily by taking short or longer walks. Something very pleasant and useful can be visiting a museum.

A very beautiful building from the past houses the Museum of Collections, a museum of plastic and visual art.

The old buildings built at the beginning of the twentieth century, the buildings that are a permanent historical vector and that contribute decisively to the beauty of this avenue, are mostly repaired and renovated. Some of them offer their own indoor and outdoor space for terraces and restaurants

In these central places and with a lot of history in everything that is built it is very hard to build something new now. Real estate developers have found a way to get these permits. They buy an old building that is in an advanced state of decay and restore it but add new and modern elements... I don't know if this is right or not, I haven't managed to have an opinion yet.

This is an example...

Other, more rapacious entrepreneurs did something else in the early 2000s when the laws were not yet respected in Romania. They bought an old building, demolished it, and built a building on the site that was much too tall for the height of the area.

Their misfortune was that they built far too close to the Catholic cathedral and the Catholic church sued for demolition. After ten years of lawsuits, they won and this tall building will be demolished and the building owners will lose many tens of millions of dollars.

As I said, this avenue is closed to cars on weekends and that's why I really appreciate these flower barriers...

Throughout this walk, we were able to see many of the historically, culturally, and even religiously important buildings and institutions. In Romania, churches are the most numerous and oldest historical buildings.

Also here we can see the headquarters of the Romanian Academy, a place where there is a beautiful garden, unfortunately, access is only allowed to... academicians. They don't really walk around anymore, they are much older than us, haha.

I must admit that this time it was not the buildings, not the monuments, not the history that attracted me the most.

This time, on this walk, I was most happy to see many people, let's not say happy, that may be too much.
I saw people happy with life!

_{I try, when I use the #phototravel tag, to write travel blogs, of different sizes and with lots of photos, because there are, in my opinion, two benefits that such blogs should and can bring. To let those who can't travel to a certain destination, SEE what it's like there (not to imagine) or, to help those who will travel there, to recognize the places seen in the photos, to be a kind of guide.}

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