Visiting And Shopping Inside And Outside The Former Soviet Union.

[Christophe]

One of the most interesting stands I saw...

Ch.

Pic : © Christophe – ChR Collection

[Christophe]

And some good old friends...

Ch.

Pic : © Christophe – ChR Collection

[Al-muell]

Life may surprise us sometimes.
I have just been informed, that tommorrow evening I am going to Romania for about a week. Well, last time I have been to this country was in 80's, so I don't remember much and thus think it will be nice to visit the country fullyconscious...

Anyway, Do any of You have any ideas on where to find romanian militaria in:
-Bucarest?
-Sighisoara?
-Constanta?

Many thanks in advance!

[Al-muell]

Well, it looks like I have been a pioneer here.
Since nobody could answer, I will share the places I have found.
In Sighisoara there's a nice antiquities shop on the main square of the old town. Militaria's not their speciality, but still some awards (Romanian, but also some hungarian) are available. Also other collectibles. The owner is friendly and speeaks fluent english. Prices - I would say reasonable: I got romanian orders of military merit I&II class with boxes and ribbons (no documents, but apparently from the same person, since the boxes were switched) for 155 RON (about 50 $) with a small discount. It's not much since in Constanta I was offered II class only w-out box for 100RON...

In Constanta there is a Faleristics shop at one of the main boulevards (it was either bulevardul Mircea cel Bartan or the one parallel to it whose name slipped my mind). Warious medals (romanian, CzS and Soviet), badges, insignia, cions etc, but also uniform elements sometimes (I got a romanian navy cap there). Prices are high.
They also sell militaria in some souvenir shops there, e.g. I came across a romanian navy dagger w/belt and akselbant in one of those for 270RON, which is a very good price.

In Bucarest - I highly recommend "Galeria Noi" - theoretically it's a book shop, but they also (or rather - above all) sell antiquities there, a wide variety of militaria inclouded. Prices are reasonable. It is at strada Halelor nr 1-3, but in fact it's right at piata Uniri, which is the nain square there.
I also know there is a flea market, but I don't know when and whwere it takes place.

As for the soviet militaria - I spotted only medals and badges (not surprisingly - the Soviet Army left Romania in 1958), but they are expensive - e.g. Victory o/Germany for 30Ron, and that's at least 3 times more than in Poland.

I will have a few questions regarding romanian militaria soon and I will post some photos as well.

[Art]

Great! We all look forward to seeing and hearing more! You are correct, you are a pioneer and the info you share here will be a valuable guide for members who happen to be in that part of the world.

[Al-muell]

Well then, Romania is worth seeing, even apart from the militaria that can be found there and one week is definately not enough. Tough the north-western part looks much like Hungary (not surprisingly), but the poverty of the inhabitants is more than visible...

I have failed to visit any military-related museum (lack of time, and the navy museum in Constanta was closed due to repair for the whole year 2007). I was told tht the military museum in Bucarest is a must-to-see, but I didn't have enough time. However, In Museum of archeology and national history in Constanta, they have awards exposition, as well as some pre-war militaria (photos coming soon, but are of poor quality...)

As for the languages - in most of the institutions and shops people speak at least a bit of english. The number of inhabitants speaking french has decreased, but it seems that knowledge of it helps. Russian is uncommon in Romania. Funny thing is that in a shop in Constanta, the thing that help me communicate was a mixture of spanish and latin(!) words, so I think that roman languages may help a lot - most of the vocabulary in romanian is roman.
In some parts there is a German and Hungarian "minority" (majority?), so this languages may help as well. I have also met 2 peopole speaking polish(!), but this is due to the fact that some romanians work in Poland from time to time.

It is good to have euro and USD, since they are accepted in most of the shops. I was even offered a good price for polish currency (impossible to buy in Romania), but I didn't have the amount the guy was interested in. And after all - I thing it is illegal in Romania.

More info later.
Now: the awards I aquired:

[dragos03]

Sadly, I haven't visited the forum in a while and saw this topic way too late to help. However, if you ever visit Romania again, contact me by PM and I'll guide you around. I'm afraid that both the prices you paid for awards and your overall impression of Romania are quite innacurate.

First of all, there are only a few shops for real collectors in Romania. All the ones that you have visited are more like souvenirs/antique stores, with few interesting items and very high prices. You paid 50$ for the most common communist-era awards, which usually go for 5-7$ each in a real collector's store. The real stores are hard to find unless a Romanian collector can tell you where they are.

You said that "the poverty of the inhabitants is more than visible", I'd say it's as visible as in Poland, without notable differences. About languages, most ppl do speak at least basic English but any Latin-based language does help. As for other languages, Russian is useless, German almost useless (there used to be a sizeable German population in some areas but they are long gone), while Hungarian is also of little use for a tourist (there is an area with Hungarian population in the middle of Romania, but it's not a touristical one and is likely that a foreign tourist would never get there).

[Al-muell]

Hello,

I was glad to purchese the awards for a price much lower than in Poland, but it's always sad to know I have paid too much

Anyway, I would gladly welcome any info as to where to find romanian militaria at better prices, especially that I am likely to go to Romania next year.

I cannot say I had a bad impression about Romania - what I wrote about poverty in northern part of Romania was to compleate a sentence about it's similarity to Hungary. You cannot deny that in smaller towns and villages it all looks better in Hungary than Romania. As for Poland - I must disagree. The poverty in Poland is on an unacceptable level, however, the situation at least looks much better (maybe except for Bieszczady region, but tjhat's a different story). But for example it cannot be denied that Bucarest looks much better than Warsaw.
I realy liked those medieval-looking towns, like Sighisoara or the old town of Brasov (another thing You would hardly seen anywhere), but in all cases - much yet has to be done: we spend 3 hours in Brasov looking for the Old Brasov, since there were NO signs in whole area from the train station to Old brasov itself. And here we come to the langage problem: The people were very friendly and everybody tried to help, even if it meant looseng some time of their own and going the opposite way they wanted, but we could not find anyone who spoke english or french (not to mention any other language). Finally a girl we askked called her friend or relative (that's something I would never expect) who knew eanglish quite well and he gave us a guidance.

More: Altough in Sighisoara almost everybody knew english, in Brasov we were unable to communicate at the information desk at the train station, and we had serious problem to buy tickets.

As for Hungarian - I don't know statistics for hungarian minority, but during our trip we traveled mostly by train (for some reason I start to get the impression that the trains in most of the older former east block countries were made or at least designed in my home town), and quite a common to hear was hungarian or a mix of hungarian and romanian (or at least it sounded as it). I don't speak any of this languages, but I can tell the difference.

If You somehow felt offended by my words - I am, sorry. It was never my intention to offend aybody.

I would really appreciate any info about militaria in Romania You can provide.

[latinmajorac]

Sooooooo,

i am going to europe this summer for 2 months on a backpacking trip. i am going with a female friend and i a decidedly paranoid about safety. i was wondering three things

1. are there laws regarding carrying weapons for self defense across borders? (not guns, but a knife or a steel baton)

2. those of you who are/were in the military what are your opinions regarding small personal defense weapons? i know a knife can be as dangerous to an inexperienced user as it is to an enemy, but i am just looking for opinions

3. how safe is europe in general? i have heard good things, but not being able to understand the language and traveling with a rather attractive woman i am rather nervous

the countries i am visiting are

Egypt (not europe but still waaaaay cool)
Greece
Italy
France
Belgium

thanks to anyone who has an opinion or comments, and i apologize for being so far off topic, but this is the one place i know i can get a lot of informed opinions in one spot. thanks again!

[medals73]

Somehow, suppressed paranoia and maximized humanity tend to get you further when traveling than weapons. Knowing some (any) of the relevant languages and not being an a-hole always helps too.

Most civilized countries -- such as the ones you plan to visit -- take a very dim view of over-armed foreigners (or even nationals).