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Looking out over Bucharest from the Intercontinental Hotel, the capital’s 22 story empire state building reveals a perfect view of absolute mayhem. The city with its 10,000 years of settlements built one over another, conflicting Eastern and Western influences, and Communism has formed a kind of kaleidoscope of streets meandering between a mosaic of Avant Guard architecture against bloc apartment complexes. Getting from point A to B in Bucharest is never a straight line.  Just crossing the street can be a big enough hurdle due to the torrents of wild drivers. Numerous curbside shrines to their victims keep pedestrians on guard as well as any stop sign or traffic light.  Cars at the intersection line up like at a starting gate. They go even before the light changes turning one lane into two, and I swear they will run you down if you are in their way, or if you are lucky, just brush you back. It is a concrete jungle. Survival of the fittest is its only rule. I have spent 3 years in this city.  Born and raised in New York, having spent much time in Rome and a couple left-side-of-the-road driving countries where just crossing the road can be really confusing - I thought I had seen it all. As far as I am concerned there is really only one true way of getting around Bucharest - and here it comes!  Breaking through all the kinetic friction

For Chuck Todaro traveling and writing began simultaneously just after high school.  He chose to continue his education by hitchhiking across country. Today, his travel is primarily by motorcycle. He first visited Europe in 1994 with his trusty motorcycle "Blue."  It was while touring the war ravaged region of Croatia and Bosnia that he realized a need to get involved in journalism. He visited East Europe and Romania for the first time in 1997. He says,"I don't believe I will stop traveling till I find a place better than the place I was before. . .. Additional Resources Living Overseas  Unique Lifestyles  Moving to Europe  Maps Of The World  World Reference Desk Living in The Balkans  Articles on Living Overseas  Contact Chuck Todaro  .

The tram system has been in service for over 125 years and the preferred choice of city travel for over a million people a day. A $1.50 day fare or 15 cents a ticket will get you just about anywhere from the commercial center - to the Bucharest slums at Ferentari to the wealth of Colentina – to the Chitilei  suburbs - the circus or zoo – Ceausescu’s resting place at Ghencea cemetery - even the Baneasa Airport.

There is of course always the infamous Bucharest Taxis to choose from and the overloaded bus lines where passengers push their way in till coat tails hang out through the crack in the door. Too often it’s body against body inside the bus, like cattle loaded into boxcars.  It’s a mobile incubator spreading colds throughout the city as it drops off and picks up passengers.

The taxis are an entirely different experience best suiting the “thrill seeking” traveler.  These little Romanian made tin cans whip around the crooked streets cutting dangerously in front of unsuspecting drivers and even the monster tram if the opportunity arrives. One unforgettable driver of mine calling himself "Cowboy" and his taxi "a runaway stage coach" hopped aboard the tram tracks and rock and rolled our way past the lines of traffic.

The taxi’s back seat view goes by too fast to take in any sights, but I would recommend at least one ride on the roller coaster just to experience the view and the worried expressions of pedestrians quickly stepping back up on the curb.
 

On the other hand, the Tram, with its spaciousness and calm speed, offers the best tour of Bucharest’s great maze. The hard wooden seat, usually already warm from a previous passenger, is more comfortable than it sounds even while the tram bumps and sways along the iron tracks.  The tram is the city circulatory system constantly moving its work force along the tracks, and it is here, not at the upscale center and casino, where you find these city dwellers with their hardened faces - faces that blend the olive complexions of their indigenous Dacian and Latin forefathers – blending blue-eyed Germanic influences, fair hair Slavic and silky black hair Bulgarian.  It is on the trams where you will find the golden brown complexions of Romanian Gypsies with their colorful dresses, even the exotic mulatto. Tram line number 21 was the very first line laid out way back in 1871. Back then it was motored by a team of horses. Today, power comes from a web of electrical cables that hang overhead the tracks and shed a burst of sparks as the trams make their turns.  Line number 21 still exists, and ironically the first Tram I ever rode. Tram 21 is picked up just outside the Church of St. George built in 1706. Inside a large stone sarcophagus in the center of the church, alongside the hand of St. Nicholas, is buried the much admired Romanian Prince Brancoveanu who along with his four sons were

beheaded by the Turks after refusing to convert to Islam.  Just to further torture the family the cold blooded Sultan ordered the bodies hurled into the deep Black Sea and thus deny them a Christian burial.  Brancoveanu’s devoted wife spent the next six years scouring the beaches and picking up the pieces as they washed ashore.

Tram 21 follows the old Mosilor Boulevard to Bucur Obor where the old-time fairs used to be held.  It is this center of trade that bore the city’s wealth and culture and propagate its trademark, “Crossroads between East and West.” 
 

Today’s Bucur Obor is still the city’s major market place but to the foreign eye it takes on a whole other life - an amusement park of the outlandish and where you can find yourself easily drunk on the energy, the odd sights, strange odors and the sing-song heckles from the peddlers. A short walk from Bucur Obor picks up tram line number 16 - my personal favorite route which bumps and jerks its way through the crooked back streets of old Bucharest. Layers of soot over the building have sucked up all the surrounding color leaving behind a gray and black world. It is a nostalgic ride that always conjures up images of the 1930s depression.  The photographic images are telling; street venders line the walkways selling fruit out of baskets, 14 year old little-men peddling flowers, dangling cigarettes from their mouths, workman eat bread for their meal, raggedly clad Gypsy children playing with street dogs resemble “The Little Rascals.” Then suddenly appears the heavenly sight of the sun drenched white towers of the Armenian Church peeking up over the surrounding gray buildings before Bucharest’s normally perfect blue sky. It is a soon to be extinct vision as going up alongside it will tower an 18 story office building sadly putting a huge gray shadow over the special church.

Three stops later the tram passes the enduring 150 year old Coral Synagogue that withstood 1941 programs, 1977 earthquake, even Ceausescu’s wrecking ball that leveled hundreds of Romania’s old churches and architectural marvels.  It is an endurance that represents the Romanian Jewish community as a whole and which legend has it dates back to a Jewish legion in the Roman army.

The Armenian and Jewish communities are just two of dozens of cultures and their flavors form the eclectic Bucharest society. It is a maze, whether you’re referring to the cultures or the streets, and it,s the amazing tram that will get you through it.

Watching from the back window as the tram rolls forward you can see how old and ill Bucharest has become - yet the city refuses to die – rejuvenated daily by the circulating trams with its own  rattle and trailing clouds of dust.
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