Southern Moldova - Post-Soviet, post-agrarian, post-...?

Thee town of Vulcănști

Trapped somewhere between the hilly lands of Southern Moldova, many settlements are trapped in a purgatorial state, this consisting of living in a socio-economic environment which is dominated mainly by shadows from the past and isn’t able to secure for itself a steady place in the modern European society. This area of Moldova, which shamefully holds the title of “the poorest nation of Europe”, presents a series of interesting characteristics that combined paint the perfect image of land trapped in a very solid socio-economic void. When we are talking about countries and their economies, we usually must highlight those areas that constitute the brain and heart of the national economy. In the case of Moldova, which still has an economy primarily based of agricultural production, the areas in which most of the country’s little developed industry is concentrated are the Center, the North and parts of Transnistria. Because of this, the Southern plains are left quite sterile and deepened in a chronic economic depression. Another interesting characteristic that stands out is the dig percentage of minority groups that inhabit the place. A unique merge of Moldovan, Bulgarian and Gagauz culture can be seen in this area, which also “hosts” Gagauzia, an autonomous entity within the Moldovan state.

Downtown Cahul 

Vulcănești is our first stop on the list, a town in Gagazia’s most southern territory. Situated on the Cahul river, the town constitutes a local “point of gravitational pull” for the proximities, which are constituted almost exclusively from rural settlements. It should be noticed that, and this can be applied to much of Moldova, there is a thing line between urban and rural, or it can be said that many urban settlements from the South, especially, don’t fit the Western idea of what urban should actually look like. Along with this, because of their small size and late development, the urban centers from Southern Moldova did not had a huge influence of the region’s cultural development. In 1965 Vulcănești takes the status of “așezare de tip orășenesc”(urban type settlement); unlike many towns and cities from the West, in the nations that constituted the former USSR sphere of influence, many big villages were granted with the status of urban settlement in order to further contribute to the development of areas in which there were no urban settlements present. This is why many urban settlements from Eastern Europe have a highly artificial and systematic look, because they were mainly the subject of soviet-type urban remodeling. Even so, looking at the town’s plan we can see that there were not too many interventions made for an accurate systematization plan. The town’s plan still looks quite village alike, with twisted streets and a lack of civic centers. The presence of some soviet era apartment buildings give the settlement a little bust of urban. The overall presence of urban decay, bad infrastructure and almost total absence of a cultural life turn this places in to true hellholes which ultimately create a dominant of unpleasantness.

Cahul is the second destination from our list; the change in landscape is not really that big, but if we were to compare it with Vulcănești, we would get a few stronger points here. Unlike the previous settlement, Cahul has a longer history as an important regional urban center, Cahul is the most important urban center of the South, sometimes competing with Komrat, Gagauzia’s administrative center, both of them hosting important regional university centers.

The town’s landscape is a hybrid between Moldovan, Soviet and Russian styles, the overall aspect being that of a dormant and opaque settlement, with greyish and monotone looking buildings, which mainly were designed under the guidelines of the slogan “functionality comes first, aesthetics second”.  Ideas of the self-identity are still made public through bold symbols, many of which put the base of a residual identity, one that is mainly based on a glorified past, on myths, and skepticism towards the present and future. Symbols may include military objects, symbols that are related to the post-Soviet nationalistic revival, or ones of religious and memorial inspiration.