{"id":289075,"date":"2020-08-21T22:41:53","date_gmt":"2020-08-21T19:41:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/basilica.ro\/?p=289075"},"modified":"2020-08-21T22:41:53","modified_gmt":"2020-08-21T19:41:53","slug":"el-pais-sulina-boasts-the-first-church-on-continental-europe-seen-by-the-rising-sun","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/el-pais-sulina-boasts-the-first-church-on-continental-europe-seen-by-the-rising-sun\/","title":{"rendered":"El Pa\u00eds | Sulina boasts the first church on Continental Europe seen by the rising sun"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Spanish daily El Pa\u00eds<\/em> has recently published<\/a> a story about the Romanian port of Sulina, at the mouth of River Danube. The article names the city \u201cThe Kilometre Zero of a river which tells the story of Europe\u201d and quotes the priest from the local Orthodox cathedral, the easternmost church in Romania.<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n

The story is part of a series dedicated to key-places along a European route linking the Northern Sea and the Black Sea, which the reporter took 14 days to travel. The journey started in the Belgian port of Ostend and ended in Sulina, which keeps the old lustre of a cosmopolitan city, former residence of the European Commission of the Danube (1856-1948).<\/p>\n

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Sulina\u2019s \u201cSt Nicholas and St Alexander\u201d Orthodox Cathedral seen from the Danube. Photo: Wikipedia \/ Oqmioritei<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Here, at the terminus point of their journey, the journalists discovered the place and its people.<\/p>\n

Parish priest Marian M\u0103c\u0103il\u0103-Ivanov presented them the \u201cSt Nicholas and St Alexander\u201d Orthodox Cathedral, founded by Romanian Kings Carol I and Carol II, saying it is \u201ethe first church on Continental Europe seen by the [rising] sun\u201d.<\/p>\n

Bukovina-born Veronica Niga told them in Spanish how she returned to Romania forever, leaving her children and nephew in Barcelona, where they live and work.<\/p>\n

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Fr. Marian M\u0103c\u0103il\u0103-Ivanov at the \u201cSt Nicholas and St Alexander\u201d Orthodox Cathedral. Photo: El Pa\u00eds \/ Oscar Corral<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The article names Sulina a former Far East<\/i><\/em> of Europe and evokes \u201can institution which preceded the European Union by a century\u201d: the European Commission of the Danube, created to respond to the economic interests of the European states at a time of unsteady balance of power on the continent when the Crimean War between the Russian and the Ottoman empires had just ended.<\/p>\n

The commission had the role \u201cto pacify the region and ensure that the mouth of River Danube is navigable based on widely-accepted regulations, to build costly infrastructure, ensure the rule of law and a common administration which involved people of all nations\u201d. Ten countries had once a consulate at Sulina.<\/p>\n

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The Observatory Lighthouse in Sulina hosts the Museum of the European Commission of the Danube and the memorial work cabinet of Jean Bart, author of the novel Europolis<\/em>. Photo: Wikipedia \/ Dora Dom\u0219a<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sulina is compared by the reporter with a port from Gabriel Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez\u2019s and Graham Greene\u2019s novels. They also quote Romanian writer Jean Bart who, in his novel Europolis<\/em>, presents the city as a \u201cmosaic of races: all nations, all types, all languages\u201d. The novel names the European Commission of the Danube \u201ca miniature state\u201d and Sulina \u201ca miniature Europe\u201d.<\/p>\n

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The Sulina beach at sunrise. Photo: El Pa\u00eds \/ Oscar Corral<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Iulian Vizauer, Head of the Tulcea County Directorate for Culture, said once in a press release<\/a> that the institution which functioned in the 19th century at Sulina was a sort of \u201cEuropean Union\u201d at the margins of Europe.<\/p>\n

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The lighthouse on the northern pier, built by the European Commission of the Danube. Photo: Wikipedia \/ Valentin Manus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This multicultural specificity is reflected in the eclectic architecture of Sulina, a \u201charmonious and colourful mixture of Mediterranean atmosphere dotted by elements of Northern austerity\u201d, the Romanian official was explaining.<\/p>\n

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Street from Sulina, the easternmost city in Romania. Photo: Flickr \/ \u0218tefan Jurc\u0103<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sulina has four lighthouses: the Old Lighthouse, or the Observatory Lighthouse (1841), which hosts the Museum of the European Commission of the Danube and Jean Bart’s memorial work cabinet; the Old Lighthouse on the northern pier (1887), built by the European Commission of the Danube; the Lighthouse on the southern pier (1922) and the New lighthouse (1983).<\/p>\n

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The city lies at the mouth of Danube, where the river flows into the Black Sea – in the background, the New lighthouse of Sulina. Photo: Facebook \/ Romanian Waterways Dobrudgea-Seaside<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Photo courtesy of TravelGirls.ro (article opening)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Spanish daily El Pa\u00eds has recently published a story about the Romanian port of Sulina, at the mouth of River Danube. The article names the city \u201cThe Kilometre Zero of a river which tells the story of Europe\u201d and quotes the priest from the local Orthodox cathedral, the easternmost church in Romania. The story…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":288731,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[23977,15208,10386,246,15620,23978,23976,21067],"class_list":["post-289075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cultural-en","tag-crimea-war","tag-europe","tag-orthodox-news","tag-romania","tag-stiri-ortodoxe-en","tag-sulina-en","tag-the-european-commission-of-the-danube","tag-travel"],"better_featured_image":{"id":288731,"alt_text":"","caption":"","description":"","media_type":"image","media_details":{"width":800,"height":532,"file":"2020\/08\/sulina-0.jpg","sizes":{"thumbnail":{"file":"sulina-0-360x360.jpg","width":360,"height":360,"mime-type":"image\/jpeg","source_url":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/sulina-0-360x360.jpg"}},"image_meta":{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0","keywords":[]}},"post":289075,"source_url":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/sulina-0.jpg"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289075\/"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post\/"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19\/"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments\/?post=289075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289075\/revisions\/"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288731\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/?parent=289075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories\/?post=289075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arhiva.basilica.ro\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags\/?post=289075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}