On the rails again: On my way to Anatolia (9)

The capital of Transsylvania

The train arriving from Budapest for Brasow will leave Debrecen station at 9.40. It arrives much earlier because in Debrecen the electric engine has to be exchanged for a colleague running on Diesel. There is no catenary between Debrecen and Dej Calatori, where I will change for a correspondence to Cluj Napoca.

Train to Brasov arriving in Debrecen station

There is one first class and three second class carriages. All are basically empty. But to my surprise the last second class carriage is an old second hand Interregio carriage of Deutsche Bahn where you still can open the windows. Some of the labels are still in German. The carriage is already a bit worn out. The door to the electrical cabinet does not close any more. The entrance doors do not close very well either. But what is better than sitting in an old fashioned compartment, alone, the window open, head in the sun and hair blowing in the wind. It is also great to take pictures.

My compartment

The trip of 231 km will take until 16.29 – almost 6 hours since the clock is set forward 1 hour in Romania. Then, after one hour of waiting in Dej Calatori, it will be another 1.5 h to Cluj Napoca. For most of the time the journey will be accompanied by the rhythmic clac-clac…..clac-clac of the wheels hitting the rail joints. There are no welded rails here. For the few km where the rails are, at least partially, welded, you can appreciate how much quieter the journey becomes.

Hungarian border station of Nyirabrany

Another feature which will stay with me for this whole trip are the weeds and branches, which almost reach to the window. It is better to pull the face back than getting scratched. Between the scrubs and trees you can see little fields where, in Hungary, they plant tobacco on small clearings along the line.

Nyirabrany

The Hungarian staff and Diesel engine will bring the four coaches only to Valea Lui Mihai, the Romanian border station. But first of all, after only half an hour, the train stops for half an hour in the last Hungarian station before the border, Nyirabrany.

Different Romanian electric engines

I did not dare to ask why the Hungarian police checks the passports of those leaving Hungary after they had let them in in the first place. Are we not in the EU? Since there are so few passengers, they are finished in less than 5 minutes. But for more than half an hour a cop stands motionless in the sun and guards our train.

Boarding a train at Valea Lui Mihai

In Valea Lui Mihai it is on the Romanians to check the passports. Here, most of the waiting time is spent on changing the engine from the Hungarian to a Romanian Diesel. Things are complicated by the fact that another, delayed train bound for Vienna has arrived in the other direction. All the available tracks are used. And between the shunting engines, passengers cross the tracks to get to their trains, a cyclist balances his bicycle across the entire station, an old couple drags a big bag between them across the tracks to our train, heaves it inside and disappears without boarding the train. The conductors hand papers with driving instructions to the enginemen on the locomotives.

Finally we depart. The view from the window makes immediately clear that this is a different country. Little villages with shabby looking brown houses disfigured even more by numerous makeshift additions. Many farmers display a whole museum collection of rusty machinery in their yards. But in most of the backyards I see well-kept and spotless vegetable gardens with neat rows of plants while the big fields are patchy and full of weeds and flowers. A country where old people spend their remaining life weeding vegetable plots or breeding bees instead of getting sunburnt and fattened on a Mediterranean beach. A shepherd stands next to his herd like a statue while his dogs try to keep his sheep from running away in confusion after they notice the arriving metal monster.

Tending vegetable backyards

Romania is one of the poorest countries of the EU. The GDP of Germany is 54000 $ per capita, in Romania it is 20.000 $. Only Bulgaria with 17000 $ is even poorer. Are those little farmers less happy? Do they have to live from their products? Is it a catastrophe for them when the slugs destroy one piece of cabbage after the other like they do in my garden? The rich European countries have their highly developed farms, factories for food production. Millions are spent on machinery and chemicals to increase the yield. Are the German farmers happier than those in Romania?

Telephone pole sculpture

Snapshots from along the line. A fallen telegraph pole looks like graphic art. Stationmasters stand at attention in spotless blue suit and red cap in front of their station between white flower beds. A white horse feeding in an overgrown railtrack. A woman in a headscarf, her face distorted to a caricature, waits with her bundle on a platform and only she knows that there is one. A tire hangs from a tree for children to swing, but there is no house in sight for them to grow up in.

Each of the few stops is announced by ruins of abandoned industrial sites. Few new construction to replace for what is gone. But the main road parallel to the railway is in a perfect state and full of cars. They are building on the railway too, but most is run-down. Yet most of the stations are in perfect shape. Freshly whitewashed with beautiful trees and flowers in concrete containers.

In the station of Jibou wait long rows of wrecked old blue carriages, the windows broken, ready to be overtaken by nature. Only a couple of kilometers further is a similar graveyard for busses in a green grassy field.

The weather was nice for most of the ride. But the closer we come to Dej Calatori the darker the sky gets. A thunderstorm releases its floods. While the window of my compartment closes well the one in the aisle keeps sliding open and turns the floor of the aisle in a slimy slide.

Market on a plot along the line. There is not much to buy

We arrive at Dej Calatori. The timetable claims that there are two trains to Cluj at 17.21 on track 3 and 17.28 on track 1. The later train is not in the interrail timetable. It is an express and indicated in red.

Station master standing guard

I meet a woman from Austria with a big heavy roller case on her way to a bishops conference in Cluj. She wanted to come by night train, but her night train bookings were canceled last minute. Now she has to go back by Flixbus. I get two coffee and a pastry for us at the kiosk in front of the station. The kiosk is managed by a friendly, good humored lady who seems to be embarrassed to charge 15 Lei, about 4 € from me.

Thunderstorm coming up

The train on track 1 comes first and we board, pushing up the roller case from the low platform with combined forces. This time it is an air-conditioned coach, windows eternally closed and air-condition out of order. It does not matter, after the rain it has cooled down considerably and one of the doors of the carriage doesn’t close any more anyway.

A German 628 DMU restored to honor

After we sit down a train on track 3 arrives. It is an old german DMU, freshly repainted and looking smart. I ask several people and all confirm that our train will go to Cluj. They are right, but the railcar also leaves for Cluj, earlier and it arrives there 20 minutes earlier since our train stops at every hut on the way.

Dej Calatori

Cluj: in front of the station a jumble of miss-matched architecture and chaotic traffic. Eventually I find a spot to cross the street. It is 1 km walking to the hotel, which again requires self check-in and the search for a key in a box. Fortunately there is a girl who helps. The room is on the first floor of a structure built around a motel-like parking lot courtyard. It is a nice, quiet place and has got everything I expect.

Union square Cluj

It got late, I was on trains all day and didn’t have any food except one apple which I carried around with me for the last 10 days. I walk into the town center to find an ATM and a restaurant. The traffic is murderous. I am glad I find the pedestrian zone and an ATM that gives me 500 Lei for 113 €. There are better rates.

Pedestrian zone Cluj

When I search for a restaurant a couple of girls invite me into a courtyard. It looks like a vernissage or the opening of a restaurant is going on. Free food and drinks are handed out. But everybody is very well dressed, smart looking men and beautiful women. I don’t fit in here. The two girls at the entrance do not understand that I leave. “It is all for free”, they say.

Art in the pedestrian zone

Eventually I find a posh restaurant at the central square. Nice tables and cushioned seats. German wheat beer. I show the waitress how to pour it properly and I have made a friend. Next to me a man as old as I am. His phone-cover as worn out and shabby as mine. I feel at home. Next door there are other fashionable bars. One, in a covered courtyard, features Cuban decoration, music and food. It is beautiful and fashionable.

Cuban style restaurant and bar

I manage to book a reservation for a free guided walking tour of Cluj at 11 am. I usually get up early and there is plenty of time to get breakfast and work on my notes. Then I pack my stuff and walk into town. Everything is a bit chaotic in the town center. They are preparing for a big 4 day festival. Stages are set up in several places including the main square and the Museumsquare, they install stalls where you can buy snack and drinks and provide all the cable connections. The old town of Cluj has quite a big pedestrian zone, but today even the pedestrian zone is full of cars and trucks to provide all the material.

Second hand book shop

When I finally get to the main square for meeting the guide I do not see anybody. When I check the time on my phone I realize that I am almost an hour late. I write my notes on a laptop which did not update the time zone. The phone does. Since I relied on the laptop I missed the tour. It messes up my schedule. I like to start a day in a new town with a guided tour. With the knowledge I assemble I then can check out the most interesting spots for details. I write an excuse to the tour guide association and ask whether there is another tour today.

Busy traffic in the city center

When traveling I sometimes have moments when I would prefer to get on the next train home. This is one. I have trouble to get a feeling for this town. The streets are a mess due to the preparations for the festival. The old town, even so there are many pedestrian only streets, is crisscrossed by main streets with hellish traffic. Crossing such a street at another point than a traffic light is suicidal. And the traffic lights take a long time for pedestrians to turn green. Without the guided tour I have no motivation to organize my own day.

Eventually I enter the tourist information. They do not provide guided tours, but the lady gives me a map where the main sights are indicated. In a shelf I discover a selection of folders: Cluj, tours and bastions, citadel hill, napoca romana, palaces of Cluj, churches, the central cemetery, and historic squares and pedestrian zones.

Most pedestrian zones are designed to shovel people into a cafe or restaurant to sit down, or into the shops. Not here. There are plenty of benches, even lazy chairs where you can sit, relax and read. Especially the latter folder gives a good clue about where to start.

Present from Rome to all Romans

Cluj has seen a whole procession of people coming through to dominate the area. The Dacians, the Celts, the Romans, the Slavs, the Hungarians, German Saxons, Szekler, the Turks, the Austrians and finally the Romanians. The oldest visible relics are from the Romans. In 106 AD the efforts of the emperors Domitian and Trajan had led to the conquest of the Dacian empire. On the main square, Piata Umini, the Square of the Union, they have unearthed foundations of roman buildings which are now stylishly covered with glass plates to observe from above. In 1921, the town, which at the time still was called Klausenburg, got a present from Rom to underline the Roman roots: it is the copy of the statue of Romulus and Remus being reared by the wolf. It still stands in the pedestrian zone.

Statue of Mattias Corvinius in front of the gothic cathedral

The Romans were replaced by all those waves of Barbars and Vandals. Later the Huns played havoc. It took a long time until the Hungarians established a stable rule. Their king Mattias Corvinius de Humedoara (1443-1490) was especially strong, efficient and popular. He was born in what is now the oldest house in the town. There are two plaques at the wall. One is from the Austrian emperor Franz Josef I, whose summer residence I visited in Bad Ischl (part 4). He visited his Transsylvanian possessions in 1888. It is about 1000 km away.

Birth house of Corvinius

The constant attacks of the Barbars and deseases had caused the population of Transsylvania to decline. Therefore the rulers invited the so called Saxons to settle here, people who originally came from Germany of Austria. The town still has a remaining small German part of the population.

The church of the Franciscan monastery

The birth house of Mattias Corvinius is around the corner of the Franciscan monastery. It is the best preserved gothic medieval monastery in central eastern Europe. The church, meanwhile transformed to baroque, can be visited while the monastery itself is still used by monks.

Mikes palace

The Franciscan church is at the Museumsquare. Because of the preparation activities the square itself is a mess. But around the square are a couple of beautiful palaces. One of them is the Mikes Palace, built in the 18th century. It houses a restaurant. I am curious how it looks inside and ask the guy at the entrance whether I can have a look. The restaurant has tables in the inner courtyard surrounded by arcaded walls. It looks beautiful. Although I just came in for a look, I sit down for a drink, then I decide to continue with an excellent risotto and finish off with a coffee.

I am just finished when it starts to drizzle. Meanwhile I also have received a message that I can participate in the second walking tour of the day, in the evening at 6 pm. The tour is given by an enthusiastic guide called Rado. There are nine participants, from Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, and Romania. Apparently there are very cheap flights to Cluj, amongst others from Milan. So people take the advantage and come for a weekend city trip. You can hear it. Constantly arriving planes roar across the old city on their way to the airport.

Inside the gothic cathedral

In the medieval time Cluj was a walled town about the size and location of the original roman town where Piata Umini already was the central square. Already in 1316 they had started building a gothic hall church, the second biggest in Hungary, in that square. It took more than 100 years to finish. To honor their popular king Mattias Corvinus they have ordered a huge statue, which came by train all the way from Paris.

The firebrigade tower

Of the first city wall of the times of Corvinus only one tower, the weavers or firebrigade tower, is left. It is also called the tower of three eras, because the lower medieval part was extended later and recently they have added a lift and a viewing platform from where you have a beautiful view of the town. And all, entry and lift, are for free.

The second city wall

In the 15th century the first city wall had become too limiting and therefore they built a new, much bigger one. One more tower and some pieces of city wall are preserved.

Banffy palace

In the Turkish times Transsylvania managed to keep a certain independence due to its wealth. After the Turks disappeared the Austrian Habsburgs took over. It is from that time that many of the grand buildings of the town originate.

Banffy palace inner courtyard

The grandest probably is Banffy Palace at a corner of the main square. It was built in 1774-1775 at the order of Count Banffy, who later became governor of Transsylvania. The palace hosted a couple of famous people, like the composer Franz List and emperor Franz-Josef I and his wife Sisi. Today it is the seat of the art museum.

Double Roman catholic palaces

Next to the Banffy Palace are the symmetric double Roman catholic palaces. They were completed in 1899.

Szeki palace.

Than there is for example Szeki palace, built for a professor at the university in 1893 in eclectic gothic style.

The carolina column

From the time of Austrian occupation is also the Carolina obelisk on the Museumsquare. It was built to honor the first visit of an Austrian emperor into town in 1817. Emperor Franz and his wife Karolina came to soothe the commotion about hunger and poverty after the napoleonic wars. Carolina tried her best to help with donations and is gratefully remembered.

The orthodox cathedral

Transsylvania was not only a melting pot of people but also of churches. Reformation was introduced at a quite early stage and the Roman-catholic believers were in minority. However, the Austrians had not big tolerance for other beliefs. Most Romanians are orthodox. An orthodox cathedral was only built between 1923 and 1933 when after the fall of the Austro-Hungarian empire in world war I and the declaration of Romania the ban on orthodox churches was lifted.

The theater

Facing the orthodox church is the neobaroque theater. I look at the programming. There are plays of Ionescu, Shakespeare and Herta Müller. A statue of Ionescu is on the square in front of the theater. The building next to the theater is the courthouse, which was built around the same time.

Building a new Greek catholic cathedral

At the other end of the Piata Avram Iancu they are busy building a new, enormous Greek catholic church. Progress is slow due to lack of funding. There are few Greek catholics in town. There is also a Calvinist reformed church, a Lutheran reformed church and a Synagoge.

Unitarian church

The Unitarian church was founded in Cluj. It’s idea is to reduce the faith to the essentials. The essential includes a big beautiful church.

Also the communist times have left their architectural monuments. One has a clock tower. The clock stands at 12.10. Somebody stopped the clock at that time on 17.12.1989, the moment when dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu took off in his helicopter to flee from Bucuresti.

Communist caricature at the Soviet Cafe

But with Nicolae Ceaușescu departure the problems were not finished. The Romanians call the following time the black 90ies, when a corrupt class of politicians started to enrich themselves. Only the membership in the EU finally brought hope and improvement. The state based on sound legal principles was established. Two of the first prime ministers, the mayor of Bucuresti and the mayor of Constanza all were convicted and went to prison.

Old woman selling flowers

For a poor country like Romania there are surprisingly few beggars in the streets. No drunks or drug addicts lying in dark corners like in many western countries either. But then, there are these old women in head scarves selling flowers at the street corners. Like the gypsy women they get the flowers at one of the official flower stands and then try to sell them with a profit. You can hear them from far. They are very loud as if constant in a fight.

The first communist housing estate ...

And then there is the young guy who wants money from us or our guide when the tour is finished. It is raining and we are hiding under a tree. He wants to have money too. He does not mind the rain and is soaked. His hair has blonde highlights. We will not know what his story is, but the guide is embarrassed.

... at night with entrance to a cinema

The biggest disadvantage of missing the 11 am tour was the weather. There was constant rain during the afternoon tour. I did not bring a jacket, nor did I find a shop to buy an umbrella. I was soaked when I finally went to a restaurant for dinner.