On the Road Again...FINALLY!: Living Like a King

For the afternoon, we had an optional "tour of Communist Bucharest," to which I had really been looking forward. For this tour, we were joined by one of the so-called "Gavroche's" of the revolution -- in other terms, one the children/teenagers who fought in the 1989 revolution. Our guide was fantastic, and he told us all about his upbringing and what it was like growing up under Ceausescu. He was 15 when the government fell, and was one of the young people who stormed and occupied the balcony at Community Party headquarters as Ceausescu fled. Both his father and grandfather had tried to escape Romania, and both were captured and sent back. Evidently, the highest chance of success was to cross in to the former Yugoslavia. They had a treaty to return all refugees, but in reality they only sent back about half -- depending on what skills they had. Our guide's father and grandfather were both sent back. His father was penalized by being sent as a forced laborer to work on the notorious Danube-Black Sea Canal, which was another grandiose building project of Ceausescu. In this case, the Danube River terminates in Romania, when it empties into the Black Sea. If you look at a map, the river takes a wild 90-degree turn north before it meets the sea, due to the fact that most of the terrain is pure granite, and the river -- over time -- couldn't cut through it. Ceausescu elected to build a canal essentially bypassing the dogleg in the river, hoping to generate money from ships that -- he thought -- would pay to use the canal and save several hundred miles on the open river. Needless to say, if the river couldn't cut through the granite naturally, it was even harder for human laborers to do so, and untold thousands of forced workers died while digging the canal over the span of decades. Like the Palace of the Republic, it was not completed until after the regime fell, and today it is extremely underutilized, as the lock tolls are exorbitantly high. In addition, our guide told us how his mother died of cancer when he was 12. He said that while health care was free, for example, in hospitals you were expected to share your bed. One patient would sleep while the other walked the hallways. His mother required chemotherapy, but the drugs were not available, so she suffered a very long and painful death.

The Danube-Black Sea Canal (Blue is the Danube, Red is the Canal)

We were shown several landmarks around the city; remnants of the former regime, but the main focus of the afternoon was a visit to Ceausescu's private home, which was tucked in a very toney area of north Bucharest which, when Nicolae was alive, was completely barricaded off from the general populace. Since the regime fell, huge tracts of land have been returned to their rightful owners, most of whom turned around and sold it to foreign embassies. The Ceausescu villa now abuts to the Kuwaiti Embassy, whereas before there were acres of gardens around the house. The house and it's furnishing survived the revolution, as most people had no idea the house even existed, and the Securitate continued to guard it even after the Ceausescu's were assassinated. It was even offered to Ceausescu's surviving son, but he declined and turned it over to the Romanian Government, which has turned it into a museum. It is still very much like it was when Nicolae and Elana lived there with their three children, to include all the clothing and furnishings. Each room seemed to be influenced by the Ceausescu's oversees travels, with heavy influence from the villas of Fidel Castro and King Il Sung, of North Korea. The remaining grounds are also home to a surviving brood of peacocks, the progeny of an original pair gifted by the Mao Zedong of China.

I found the tour fascinating, and the stories of the family's eccentricities were wild. For example, the villa has no on-site kitchen or place for food storage. Ceausescu was so paranoid about being poisoned that all food was prepared offsite, in a secure kitchen, where tasters would sample everything cooked for the family, before it was rushed to their table. Another interesting tidbit from the tour was the behavior of our tour guide. As we walked through the house, we came across a photographer and bride and groom, who were taking photos. I watched as the tour guide made excited and exaggerated movements to get out of their way, and then kept looking over her shoulder to see if they were following us. I was with her a few minutes later, as we prepared to open a door and reenter into the arrival hall, before heading upstairs. They had been taking pictures in the arrival hall. The tour guide literally held her breath, said what I presume was a prayer, and then quickly opened the door. She was visibly relieved to see that they were no longer in the foyer. She walked upstairs quickly, and continued to peek over her shoulder. I then made an assumption that maybe our guide was engaged, and perhaps there is some superstition about seeing other brides before your own wedding. I finally asked her, and she said that she has an "unnatural fear" of brides. She said it is like some people who are scared of clowns; she just happens to be terrified by brides. I have never heard of that phobia! I was going to ask her how she planned to handle that when/if she got married herself, but she was still visibly shaken up, so I didn't want to add further insult to injury.