On the rails again: On my way to Anatolia (12)

Desolate Places

After more than 2 weeks of traveling, sleeping in different beds almost every second night, I need a break, a quiet, comfortable place to write my notes and plan my progress. From Constanta, I decide to go to Mangalia. I think it is a quiet beach resort at the end of a rail line leading south towards the Bulgarian border. I book a hotel room with balcony and sea view and walk to the station.

Inside Constanta station

People are already waiting at the platform. One is a Gipsy woman shouting at the others. It is not clear what she really wants. She sits down on the platform floor in front of the benches where all the other sit and mumbles in herself. I would love to talk to one of these people but so far everyone I met seems to be too crazy for a conversation.

The train to Mangalia waiting in Constanta

It is Sunday evening and a train arriving from Mangalia is packed with beach goers, little children refusing to deflate their inflatable toys and parents with beach bags. The train to Mangalia, however, is next to empty. With a lot of noise a Diesel engine tries to maintain the air condition of the two double deck carriages. The entire train shakes from the effort. It still is hot inside.

Industrial estates south of Mangalia

The train to Mangalia ambles down its track in a leisurely speed with frequent stops. Station masters stand to attention. For the first part, the sea is lined with harbor cranes and industrial estates. Than the train runs on a narrow stretch of land between the beach and a couple of inland lagoons. Along the beach the usual unfinished development projects. Shepherds wander freely between the concrete skeletons of building sites which look like they will never be finished. Sometimes an unpaved road ends at a couple of finished beach houses which appear deserted. In between the odd family having a BBQ or picnic next to their car.

Skeletons and sheep

The train arrives at the tidy station of Mangalia. The station master is already waiting, as well as a guy to uncouple the engine and another one with a hammer, which he hits at the wheel to check that nothing is broken during the one hour ride. Five station dogs check the new arrivals. There is a water faucet, toilets and the ticket counter is open.

The station in Mangalia

The station dogs wait for their chance

Outside the station the idyll ends. A busy four lane road linking Constanta to Varna in Bulgaria crosses the entire town. The constant traffic, also with heavy trucks, makes crossing dangerous. There are no traffic lights, it is hot, dusty and noisy.

Apartment blocks in Mangalia

The road is lined on both sides by apartment blocks which seem to be set down without any obvious order. The free space between the blocks is used as parking lots. It is a walk of 20 min to get to the hotel and I do not see a single attractive building.

At last I find a passage towards the beach promenade. It is quiet here. The beach is the main attraction of Mangalia. Visitors, city council and population spend their time here.

It is my personal view, but allover the world beach resorts are the most boring and ugly places you can find. The presence of a beach has promoted development. And the more recent the development is, the more the place suffers from it. A sandy beach is a guarantee for the ugliness of the town which comes with it. The entire Spanish Mediterranean coast is a good example. Or the big beach resorts in the south of France like La Grande Motte or Leucate Plage. The Italian Adriatic coast between Rimini and Trieste. Belgian seaside resorts like Knokke or Dutch like Scheveningen.

Sandy beaches don’t provide any shade. The sand ruins your book, your telephone and your laptop. When you eventually go back you carry it back into your room and it starts invading everything from bathroom to bed-sheet.

A handful of big hotels line the beach in Mangalia. Mine is one of them. At least they have tried to paint it in cheerful colors. I enter covered in sweat. A huge, passive fish with a scornful expression looks at me from an aquarium which seems not big enough for him to turn. On closer inspection I see a second one, much smaller, hyper actively trying to find something which is not there.

The girl at the reception is very friendly. Her father works in the Netherlands fixing plumbings. She herself has worked in London and Germany. Now she is here. The salary is poor. She doesn’t want to take into account that in London or Germany a big part of her higher salary has to go into renting a miserable room. Her father is doing well and sends home money.

The grumpy looking big fish

After I have left my stuff in the room I go to take my first dip in the Black Sea. The water is much colder than expected. However, it is a refreshing dip. On my way back to my room I leave a trace of salt water and sand on lobby and stairs. I have a shower and the bathroom floor is covered in sand.

My balcony

The hotel does not have a restaurant but apparently they are on good terms with their neighbors and send their guests there. They have a nice garden terrace facing the beach promenade and the sea. There is some quiet, pleasant background music. The waiter is efficient and friendly. I order some food, grab my book and look forward to use the remaining daylight for a couple of hours of reading.

My room

One or the worst aspects of the existence of internet and GSM is that suddenly everybody can distribute his noise where-ever they are. This can be on a train, on a nature walk, or in a quiet seaside garden restaurant. Close to me two guys have started a video call with a friend or family. One of them shouts as if he wants to transmit his words to the entire settlement. The call goes on until I am finished eating and retreat to my balcony in frustration.

I leave the window open at night. The black sea is so calm, you do not even hear any waves. There isn’t any other noise either. The main road is too far away. The hotel is empty and nobody has any nighttime discussions on the balcony. Eventually I have found a quiet place.

If you don't have anything useful to do you can always go fishing... there always is a creature more miserable as you

The next morning I start with a swim. The black sea did not warm up over night. However, there are some early beach lovers. There is a group of joggers. Somebody does his personal interpretation of Yoga in the sand. Dog owners try to chase their pet into the water. What are they doing with the sand caught in the fur?

Abandoned beach bar

The other hotels have beach chairs and sun screens set out on the beach ready for rent. The sunscreens look like asian straw hats. Somebody rakes the sand in the area around and it looks beautiful and clean. He does not care about the empty bottles, pieces of plastic and the odd sandal just a couple of meters outside his own area of responsibility.

Closed beach bar

There are a couple of beach restaurants in Mangalia. They are all closed, some look like they will never open again. At the fast food places they only sell food in the weekend. Somebody has started to construct more and the concrete skeletons are already there. As are their abandoned predecessors, verandas built from wood.

One of the few attractive buildings of Mangalia in unattractive setting

I go to the same place for breakfast where I had dinner. The moment I sit down a guy from the hotel starts with his noisy lawn mower. He could have first done the far side lawn behind the hotel. But then nobody would hear him. So he starts next to us, the few people who want to have their breakfast in peace.

To try something new I order a Romanian style breakfast. It is an omelet like any other omelet. The difference might be that it is solidly baked to the plate. I scrape it off and set out for my room to do the work I came for.

There is a German series of short stories published in the paperbacks “Öde Orte” (desolate places). Upon publication, residents and mayors of the affected communities were outraged. But every place has a disadvantage. Even a beautiful historic town can be criticized, for example for the amount of tourists. And doesn’t even the most boring place have its hidden secrets, which the authors of “Öde Orte” might either have overlooked or disregarded since it was not their taste or personal interest? A visit to a town always happens under the idea of an intention, an expectation. What if the visitor is looking for “Öde Orte” because he enjoys “Öde”.

Straw brooms for sale

Late in the afternoon I go for a walk. There must be some other point of interest, even in Mangalia. I walk to the South. There is a big industrial port, but it is on the other side of a bay and not accessible. On the way I admire the diversity of the offers of the local market. I haven’t seen brooms of straw for a long time. Both the male and female mannequins are quite erotic – in contrast to the clothes they put on display.

Mannequins

The place seems to entirely consists of the haphazardly assembled collection of apartment blocks which I already had seen on my arrival. Between building and car park some of the owners have made a great effort to create a little paradise of flowers.

Exemplary display of flowers in front of an apartment building

Between the facelessness of the settlement I start to discover little points of interest. A rusty, retractable bridge. It was probably never used by any other pedestrian before because some of the metal plates on the sidewalks are missing. A wrong step would send you down 10 m into the waiting cold waters of the black sea.

Retractable bridge

There is a yacht harbor which is even more boring than yacht harbors usually are. Somebody offers some kind of 1 hour cruise. To see what?

Tomb display in the archeological museum

Suddenly I stand in front of the archaeological museum. If you ever wanted to prevent your children from being interested in archaeology, you should send them to Mangalia. The museum is stuffed with a multitude of similar looking stuffy exhibits. Explanations are few but you can guess that somebody must have been buried here since in the main room there is a rectangular hole in the ground.

However, the museum gives the indication that there must be some excavation sites in Mangalia. I find three of four. One is between the sports fields, a white wall with arches and the main street. Some remainders of walls fight for space with a number of concrete foundation slabs. There is an explanation in Romanian.

Number 2 is in a grass field behind a 2 m high fence. The grass field needs a lawn mover. The exhibit needs a sign.

Number 3 is at the main square of town. There are some foundations and an arch, which was completed with a concrete top. Most of the young populace has come together here, some to use the arch as a soccer goal, the others to listen to a band which is playing on a temporary stage. It is a gift of the mayor for the youth in town.

The mosque

Behind the stage I eventually find two nice buildings. One is an eclectic villa from turn of the century like those found in Constanta. The other one is a little mosque in the middle of a beautiful quiet Muslim cemetery. But why should anybody come here when you can have a quiet sandy beach?

Burial stele in the Muslim cemetery

Don’t understand me wrong. I did not come to Mangalia for sightseeing and neither for beach combing. I wanted to do some writing. And for that it is the perfect spot. If you ever want to go to a place where there is no distraction, go to Mangalia.

Train in Mangalia station ready for departure

To continue to Bucuresti I have to make a reservation. The problem with a reserved train is that you cannot choose your neighbor. Mine is an elderly lady playing tik tok on her phone. For next to 3 hours I hear rather softly the noise sequences of around 3 sec of music or all the other shit what is shown on tik-tok. I already start to long back to the silence and boredom of Mangalia.