Jul 2nd, 2009
by Craig Turp.
Back in January we made a few predictions for the coming year. Not all of them have so far been entirely accurate (though the year is still young), but today, one proved to be spot on.
We said that Anamaria Straus, a wealthy business woman who killed a young student, Tatiana Duplei, on Sos. Kiseleff last year (Straus did not stop at a pedestrian crossing) would not serve a prison sentence.
This morning she was sentenced to two years in prison. Suspended, of course. She also has to pay €135,000 to the student’s family, the kind of money we would assume wealthy people like Straus no doubt have in change down the back of the sofa. She will also, poor thing, have to attend some road safety classes.
The Romanian justice system. Dontcha just love it?
Full story here.
Posted in: Bucharest, Romania.
Tagged: Anamaria Straus · Romanian Justice System · Tatiana Duplei
Jun 29th, 2009
by Craig Turp.
The Bucharest Life kids are off to the countryside this week for their annual peasant experience. We went to get their train tickets this morning, one each for them and one for Bucharest Life’s mother-in-law.
Not for the first time this month, we turned up at the CFR agency on Strada Brezoianu and were left gobsmacked. This time, it wasn’t inefficiency that left us speechless, it was the price.
A return ticket for one adult and two children, from Bucharest to Satu Mare, including reservations in a sleeping compartment, on the overnight Rapid, costs 830 lei. (380 lei for the adult, 320 lei for the first child and 130 lei for the second child). That’s almost exactly €200. That’s a lot. Especially as the sleeping coaches are nothing special (we will tell you later this week exactly what kind of accommodation that money gets you), and the journey takes a soul-destroying 12 hours. (Distance covered? 746 kilometres).
Driving, apropos, with a complete lack of motorways the whole distance, and with two kids in the back of the motor, takes about three weeks.
When we got back to the office we priced up a flight. We hadn’t considered it as we just didn’t think the train would cost that much. (And we do not actually have to spend 12 hours on the train ourselves).
Price for one adult and two children for a Bucharest to Satu Mare return with Tarom? €196, all taxes etc. included. Almost exactly the same price. And Tarom has a monopoly on that route (as it does on most internal routes in Romania).
So, lesson learned. Next time we (or our offspring) travel somewhere in Romania will not even consider the train. We suggest anyone reading this does the same. Try Tarom before booking any train tickets.
Posted in: Romania, Travel.
Tagged: CFR · Romanian Railways · Tarom
Jun 26th, 2009
by Craig Turp.
With eternal thanks to George Hari Popescu, who wrote about this yesterday on his terrific blog, it now looks as though Bucharest is to get some kind of tourist bus route. The final decision will be taken on Tuesday, but it looks a done deal.
In a nutshell, some kind of hop-on, hop-off bus (probably a double decker, see below) will run from Piata Scanteii to Casa Poporului and back, stopping at all of Bucharest’s worthwhile sights. (It’s a non-stop service then? – Ed). Tickets, valid for one day, will cost 25 lei for adults, half price for children.
The proposed route of the Bucharest tour bus
And there’s the first problem…
We do not want to be cheap (although we are), but 25 lei? That’s almost €7, or five quid. For that money you can buy a one-day travelcard in London (a city not until now famed for its accessibly priced transport).
Reading through the deadly dull as dishwater proposal last night (Romanian bureaucrats are still living in the 1980s when it comes to the language they use), we did discover one real nugget that kind of gives the game away:
If done well...
Somebody called Mircea has noted that the project might succeed, if implemented correctly. The implication of course being that it will be one massive fuck-up all round. Also note the brilliant last comment he makes ‘perhaps I am asking for too much.‘
Alas, experience leads us to agree with Mircea on this one.
Posted in: Bucharest, Travel.
Tagged: Bucharest Tour Bus
Jun 25th, 2009
by Craig Turp.
The wealthy, or those who like to see monopolies thrive can ignore this post…
It is much easier than you think to avoid the monopoly held by expensive taxi company Fly Taxi at Otopeni Airport, Bucharest main airport. (Of taxis at Baneasa airport, stand by for a separate post).
Fly Taxi, to remind you, charges a whopping 3.50 lei per kilometre, meaning that you will get little – if any – change from 100 lei when taking a Fly Taxi into the city. Romanian newspaper Adevarul touched on Fly Taxi last week as part of a wider investigation into general rip-offs practised at the airport.
Though Fly Taxi is the only company allowed to park its taxis right outside arrivals, there are ways around the monopoly (which do not involve the bus or the minibus-train combo).
Option 1:
Call a taxi from any of Bucharest’s trusted taxi companies. You will find their names and numbers at Bucharest In Your Pocket, here. You will need to wait ten minutes or so, and taxis from other companies can’t stop right out front: you will need to wait for it in the car park, opposite.
Option 2:
People still seem unaware of the fact that there is now (and has been for sometime) a walkway from Arrivals to Departures. Turn right as you exit baggage claim and keep going. Once at Departures, simply go outside and pick up an ordinary taxi as it drops somebody off. Easy. You never have to wait more than a couple of minutes, except after 9pm or so, after which few planes depart, and this tactic does not work.
Posted in: Bucharest, Travel.
Tagged: Bucharest Airports · Fly Taxi · Otopeni
Jun 24th, 2009
by Craig Turp.
Increasingly desperate to prove that he is a ‘man of the people,’ Romanian president Traian Basescu yesterday went shopping at Carrefour, in a carefully planned and stage-managed attempt to boost his flailing poll ratings, badly affected by the election – which his party arranged – of his daughter Elena to the European Parliament. Perfectly timed to guarantee maximum coverage on all the evening news bulletins, Basescu was seen doing his shopping without any visible security presence, queuing patiently and cheerily shaking hands and posing for photos with other shoppers. We can only assume the televison news cameras were there by complete coincidence, covering another story.
This is the second time Basescu has pulled such a stunt in the past fortnight, and is a further sign that his advisors are keen to see him out amongst ordinary people. If they can’t think of anything better (and more original, and more convincing) then sending him shopping, then they need sacking.
Apropos – in a story not worthy of telling were it not such a stark contrast – about six weeks ago we saw Basescu’s old nemesis Calin Popescu Tariceanu at Budapest airport. The epitome of good manners he was late checking in and had been assigned a seat some distance from his wife. Even though there were no cameras around, he politely sat down in his assigned seat (in goat class: anyone flying business class from Budapest is irresponsibly wasting their or their company’s money) and only when the chap sitting next to him turned up did he ask if he wouldn’t mind changing seats with his wife.
A good upbringing. There is no replacement for it.
It would be nice to know how Basescu is off camera, but as he insists on living every minute of his life in front of it, it’s impossible to tell.
Posted in: Romanian Politics.
Tagged: Presidential Election 2009 · Traian Basescu
