There is another thing I will say candidly. A great deal of what you find written about a city online is there to sell you something, a hotel room, a tour, a river cruise, a castle ticket. I never fully trust those pages. They are paid to make everything sound magical, and they rarely tell you what a place is really like underneath. So I have read what I could, taken most of it with a healthy pinch of salt, and tried not to repeat anything I could not see for myself in a photograph.
So I will not pretend to give you a true reading of Bucharest today. It would be dishonest, and you would know it. What I can offer is an outsider's first glance, the kind of impression any thoughtful traveller forms before a trip, sharpened a little by years of looking at cities for a living. The serious reading, the one that earns its keep, only begins when my own feet are on your ground.
And that is exactly why I want to come. A city that hides a real history behind a borrowed myth, that names itself after joy, that wears a necklace of lakes and calls itself Little Paris, is a city I would be honoured to read properly one day, with my eyes open and my notebook out.
Until then, this is the most I can fairly say. A warm and curious hello, from far away, to a place I hope to know much better.
Joey Yap
P.S. To my friends and followers in Romania, this one is for you. I have written it from photographs and a handful of articles, which means I have almost certainly missed the things only a local would know. So tell me. What did I get wrong, and what did I leave out. What is the one part of Bucharest you would want me to see first, the moment I finally arrive. Leave it in the comments, show me your city through your own eyes, and help me plan the visit properly. I would like that very much.
P.P.S. One more thought, since we opened all of this with Dracula. The castle the world calls Dracula's Castle is real. It is Bran Castle, perched on a high rock up in Transylvania, a few hours north of Bucharest. I will be candid with you, as I have been all the way through. The Dracula link is largely a tourism legend, and the real prince behind the myth kept his fortress elsewhere, at a place called Poenari. Even so, a brooding castle standing alone on a cliff, guarding an old mountain pass, is exactly the kind of place I would love to read with my own eyes, and perhaps to sit in quietly for an evening. So here is my question for you. If I make the journey, should I do a proper Feng Shui and spiritual excursion up at the castle while I am there. Tell me honestly. If enough of you would want such a thing, I will give it real thought.