Timișoara - Romania

This place is beautiful, every building is diversely shaped and creative in design and colour, for a historically conquered people i suppose it makes a lot of sense to see so much variety in influence but it's fascinating for me to see. The people living here seem to take a lot of pride in the history of the city, everyone seems to know the date the buildings come from as well as the purpose and sometimes even the date of restoration, which I don't think you'd come across so easily at home in London. This is another place that embraces botanical beauty, there's roses growing all over the place and the current major seems very keen on fountains as there's loads here and allegedly they have only just been installed, definitely gives the place extra elegance. The city is made up of a lot of open squares which reminds me of Spain and has the same laid back vibe, food and drinks served at outdoor seating well into the night and often a accompanied by a lone guitar player singing sweetly and the quiet chatter of conversation in dark corners of the square.

Theres a real religious vibe here but no one religion seems to take importance over any other, each prayer establishment is equally sized and pristine. I love the variety of building's here, there's a real effort to preserve the important historical buildings and even a little bit of funding in place for those who want to preserve the building they live in, though you can also be fined for letting it go to ruin. I had the chance to spend several hours here chatting to an architect over drinks and she explained to me that there are some strict rules about what you can and can't do with old buildings, this limits her in terms of design and can be frustrating at times but it also means she knows her work is going to be cherished for years to come. Sadly some people here really abuse the rules. I've seen a lot of people have bought old buildings of significance and let them go to ruin in order to get permission to demolish them and build a new place on the land as it's hard to come by. Another example of the “rule breaking” is a lot of the gypsy communities here buy buildings and renovate them in a kitchy gypsy style, which is kind of a big mix of different influences, like roman pillars, Indian turrets and big elaborate iron fences, I actually like a lot of these buildings much to the horror of my friends who live here, this style is considered pretty tasteless to the people who live here in the city, not least because they have adapted buildings that used to be in a much more conservative Romanian style.

Thanks

It took me forever to be able to write about the traditional food here, because that's another area where there's a huge variety, the first place I ate at was Serbian (though I'm told that this is very similar) then I had Italian then soup as I'd been visiting the dentist, incidentally the dentist's here are so much better than the dentist's in England, even in terms of service but definitely in terms of equipment technology and craftsmanship, a lot of the common dental practices in England like Mercury amalgam fillings aren't done here any more at all and is considered outdated and yet interestingly it's significantly cheaper to see the dentist here too, definitely recommend a bit of dental tourism.

I've been having a great time on nights out here too, there's a lot of interesting bars with clever themes. I also went to an escape room here with a group of friends, it was a hilarious night, we got led to a basement with a paper bag on our heads and locked at the ankle then we had to solve clues to undo the locks and complete further tests, so stressful and hilariously fun. All in all a beautiful city with a lot to see and do!