In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  08/08/2002  No comments

I arrived in the train station by the end of the afternoon, it was like getting downtown São Paulo. I went to the underground part trying to find a place to get money. There, it was dirty. There were street sellers everywhere, lots of people in a hurry, others observing, a little suspicious for me. The police was agitated, I think something had happened, because they were walking from one side to another, unquiet. I went to the closest hostel I could find. It was a little messy and dirty. I was tired to try to find another place, so I stayed there.

Next day, it was cloudy and raining. I walked all over town, for about 6 hours. I started in “Pest”, the cathedral, opera, commercial town. Then I crossed one of the bridges to “Buda” and walked by the river. I visited some Turkish bathes. The city seamed to be beautiful but it had no glitter, it was opaque. Maybe because it was raining and the days were gray...

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  07/08/2002  No comments

My visit to Bratislava was a little fast, I had just two days to get a sense of the place. I liked the city because there weren’t so many tourists as in Prague. The old town is full of restaurants and bars. I walked through the small streets. Since it was cloudy I couldn’t photograph that much. At the same time, I thought people was friendly. Many would speak with a smile, it looks like they were happy with tourists. There was a day I had no coin to pay the tram and a girl paid for me, she didn’t accepted my money back. That’s what I call hospitality…

The castle is by the Danube. It is more modest than the one in Prague but has a great overview of the city. There one can have an idea of the communist Slovakia. From the top I could see almost the whole city. It was good to “appreciate” the buildings, all similar on the other side of the river. There were a lot of them, lots of uniform rectangles. They looked like a toy by its symmetries.

I stayed only two days in town but I liked, I ...

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002, Traveled places On  06/08/2002  No comments

I decided to go to Vienna to see a cousin, Lucia, who is there doing her post-doc. By my arrival she suggested me the next day program: to bike around the small villages near Vienna. I seams that she had read my thoughts, I was tired of cities, people, museums, monuments… It would be great to spend a day biking near nature.

From Vienna we got a train to Tulln where we met her workmates and got the bikes. We got a train to Melk. From there we biked to Spitz where we stopped to have lunch. Then we continued to Krems, passing through small villages, wineries, apple, plum and apricot trees… On our way we stopped at Dürstein to enjoy the landscape. We end up the tour in Hadersdorf, in a Heuriger, where we had the local wine. It was incredible to see how they are prepared to cycling. There are bike road all over Austria. One can go anywhere by bike, the special bike roads are by the freeway, or train rail, or the Danube, or through the woods… I loved it.

Following day we went back to...

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  03/08/2002  No comments

A minha visita a Praga foi um pouco decepcionante. Tinha ouvido muitas histórias de amigos que visitaram a cidade anos atrás. Já na chegada na estação de trem vi que a cidade tinha mudado, as placas estavam todas em checo e inglês: já estavam preparados para o turismo.

Nos três dias que passei na cidade me impressionou o número de turistas, eram ônibus e mais ônibus de turismo. Caminhando pela cidade todo o tempo encontrava com grupos enormes de japoneses, americanos, italianos, espanhóis e brasileiros. Havia horas que se via mais de duzentas pessoas na frente do relógio astronômico.

Quase todos os restaurantes tinha o cardápio em inglês e checo, alguns até em 4 ou 5 idiomas. Os preços também eram diferentes para turistas. Caminhar pelas ruas do castelo também estava claustrofóbico, grupos de turistas por toda a parte. Acho que é um dos lugares mais turísticos que visitei em minha vida, e já viajei por uns 30 países...

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  31/07/2002  No comments

The arrival in Berlin was great. The first day I met a friend, Pepe, and we went to the park. It was a Sunday picnic in the Tierganden park with his English, Australian, American, Bolivian friends… There was no Germans though.

Then we waked to the Reichstag to have a general view of the city. It impressed me the amount of cranes, sometimes I would count 5 or 8 cranes together. Yes, we can see that Berlin is a city on construction. I pointed to my friend all the cranes and construction sites, he wasn’t so impressed. I think when people live there they get so used to see construction that they get indifferent to the amount of it.

We walked on the Unter den Linben avenue to the Berliner Dom and the museums island. The city was quiet. It was Sunday and there wasn’t many people on the streets. A strange feeling, wide streets with large buildings: an emptiness.

Next day I walked around Mitte, a neighborhood in East Berlin...

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  27/07/2002  No comments

In Moscow I met a Spanish couple who told me they haven’t liked Warsaw. They said the city was too modern and the buildings weren’t attractive. I, on the contrary, liked the city. I think the reason for one to like or not depends a lot on his/her experience on the place. Even though the days were cloudy and I couldn’t photograph that much I had a good time in Warsaw. I thought people were very educated, many could speak English, I didn’t have communication problems and I found the old town really beautiful. For me there it was not modern, since I came from a city that it is a little more than one hundred years old. It was like a small town.

My first day I went to see the symphony from the Mozart Festival in the Royal Castle. It was worth it not only for the music but specially for the place, a room all decorated with golden motifs. It was like going back in time a few centuries. Another of my cultural programs was going to the movies...

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  24/07/2002  No comments

I was a little worried about this trip to Warsaw, it would be a 20 hour train trip. I got a first class train ticket because it has only two beds. Almost all the short distant trains I got in Russia there was a drunk man sitting next to me. I started to imagine 20 hours smelling someone’s alcohol breath. I ends up being lucky, there was nobody sharing the cabin with me. I was by myself.

There was no passport check when we left Russia and entered Belarus. The way out from Belarus they came to see if I had the transit visa. I had to pay 45 dollar to get it in Moscow. I believe almost all nationalities need a transit visa just to go through Belarus in the evening. People say it is just for them to make some money out of the tourists.

The trains stopped for about two hours so they could check everyone. When they came to my cabin, they asked me to leave and checked every single thing. They even unscrewed the roof and wall and looked in there...

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  22/07/2002  No comments

Sorry, this entry is only available in Portuguese.

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  21/07/2002  No comments

Sorry, this entry is only available in Portuguese.

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  20/07/2002  No comments

Here I also liked the subway. The stations are well decorated with marble, statues and huge lamps. The escalators are not so big and deep as the ones in St. Petersburg.

My first day I went straight to see the Red Square. It shouldn’t be called red square, its name comes from a word from old Russian that means beautiful. Nowadays this word also means red, it is why the square started to be called red.

I stopped I few subway stations away and I went walking. As much as I walked more I was surprised by the amount of shops. I can’t think of a clothing or sport brand that there is no a shop in Moscow. Streets, trains, underground passages are loaded with advertising. I really didn’t expect that much. I believe they are a lot more capitalists than we are. The scary part is that they stared not so long ago. It is sad to see it…

Next day I visited the Kremlin. I had problems to get in with photographic equipment. They didn’t let me go in with my equipment backpack...