A girl and her camera

It was such a beautiful day yesterday that I took my camera and filled up 16 mb of Timisoara goodness.

I wanted to show "average" Timisoara and not just the downtown core (although I don't know if I succeeded). We all know how many pictures I've taken of the cathedral and Piata Unirii but sometimes it's nice to show the non-touristic parts of the city too.

There's a street that runs perpendicular to my street. One side is all apartment blocks and the other side are "mansions". None of the houses have Dacias. Some are empty inside. I don't know who lives here, but they're all gated. Gated houses aren't unusual in Timisoara (Christi's is gated too) but this just makes the houses look forbidding.

At least the cars all have Timisoara license plates.

I saw a gypsy cart going down the street, so I finally got a picture of it.

Behind the afformentioned mansions is a true mansion. Whenever I ask Romanians about it, they always sneer and say it's a gypsy mansion.

Apparently, the gypsies go to beg in France, Germany, etc and return with the money and build these incredibly huge ostentatious mansions. I saw some on the way into town when I arrived in Timisoara last August. No matter how big you think the house in the pictures is, I can guarantee you it's bigger.

The yard is groomed and reminds me of a house you'd see on a golf course. However, instead of a broken Oldsmobile on cinderblocks in the front yard, they have a broken gypsy cart.

I asked a friend if anyone lives there but no one knows. If a family is there, certainly it's an extended family and includes all the branches of the family.

It's gated too.