Excerpts from e-mail I wrote to Ken.3 responses total.
(For the last month, Leslie has been in the city of Plovdiv, Bulgaria,
coaching and rehearsing the role of Donna Anna in a production of
Mozart's opera "Don Giovanni." Her performance was last Friday, and now
she's off to be a tourist in Eastern Europe. )
Date: 24 July
Location: Velika Tarnovo, Bulgaria
So, I went and had some dinner at the Mustang Food pub, which purports to
be American style, but really isn't. I also went to the internet cafe
around the corner, which has probably 100 machines, but no telnet, dammit,
dammit, dammit, so I can't use Grex party to talk to you. And no
downloading is possible either. Everything is strictly controlled, no
normal windows access allowed. I got the message from Internet Explorer
that the telnet protocol was forbidden. I tried asking the guy running the
place for help, but his English was minimal, and he apparently knew nothing
about telnet. I don't know if it's worth it to look for another internet
place, or if I'll just have to be satisfied with email for a few days.
So, today was interesting...
The bellboy that helped me with my bags (Konstantin, who
speakis excellent English) disapproved highly of taking the train to Velika
Tarnovo, as did two other Bulgarians I talked to about it a few days
ago. It's an extra slow train, and very scruffy, apparently. He suggested
hiring a taxi to drive me there, and I hemmed and hawed, because it was a
lot more money, but decided that it would be worth it to really see the
mountains on the way, and also to feel safe (avoiding those train fears
I've been having). It was 120 leva, which is a lot, but the mountains were
glorious. On the way we (I never got my driver's name, alas, but I do know
that he's originally Turkish, and that Konstantin the bellboy trusts him
more than his ex-wife, for whatever that's worth) stopped at the Shipka
memorial. Shipka is a high mountain pass where in 1878 many Russian troops
and Bulgarian volunteers died defending the pass from the Turkish army
during the liberation of Bulgaria. It's quite a spectacular site, with
views over the Thracian plain on one side, and the Valley of the Roses and
the Stara Planina mountains on the other (there are two mountain ranges
fairly close together here, with the Valley of the Roses in between). Let
me tell you, though, it's pretty weird visiting the sights with your taxi
driver. You may be proud to learn that I climbed and descended 202 steps
to get up to the monument from the parking lot. I declined to go inside
and climb the actual tower, though.
I saw some interesting animal sights along the way. In one small town, an
elderly man and woman were taking their two goats for a walk, each with a
leash around her neck. Then a bit later I saw one woman driving one cow
along the road. A Woman and Her Cow: Sounds like a movie title.
And then I took a short nap, so I missed the entrance to Velika
Tarnovo. My hotel is the tallest building in town, at 14 stories. It
looks to have been built about forty years ago, and not had any new
furniture or rugs or telephones added since. Although the phone may be
from the 70s, it's rather funky, but it's still a dial phone firmly
attached by a non-modular cord. I couldn't even figure out how to call my
friend Rosen in the next town over, so I didn't bother to try to get on the
internet from the hotel. I think I may have to call the front desk to make
a call. Oy. The room is tiny, with two dorm type beds (not uncommon in
eastern europe) end to end. I think if we stayed here together, we'd be
bashing our feet together all night, since I hang over the end of the bed
into the other bed. Head to head, we might knock each other out... The
towels are small, and greatly resemble sandpaper. I'm glad I brought my
lightweight travel towel. I had trouble plugging my European travel fan
into an outlet, because said outlet (after I removed the reading light plug)
was kind of falling apart. I will report it to the desk on my way out,
because it's probably dangerous. I simply won't unplug the fan before I leave
on Saturday.
I have a "bathroom" in my room. I say it in quotes because there's no
actual shower or bath, but rather a hose and shower head attached to the
hand sink, and a drain in the floor. Kind of reminds me of our room in
Rome, if you remember what that was like, except that was at least a
dedicated shower fixture, sans curtains or anything like that. So, I could
easily sit on the toilet and take my shower. I do plan to remover the
toilet paper from the room before doing my ablutions tomorrow.
One other interesting feature about Bulgarian toilets... You can't throw
toilet paper or anything else down the toilet. There is a little
wastebasket next to the toilet where you put the used TP. Yikes, I REALLY
hate this. The Sankt Peterburg has very modernized toilets, which is I
suppose why I never realized this quaint Bulgarian custom before. I did
originally put some TP in the toilet, and was distressed when it refused to
go down the pipes, even after multiple flushes. Then I checked the "toilets"
section of the Lonely Planet guide, and sure enough, these older toilets are
*designed* that way. So, after flushing my paper clean a few times, I fished
it out of the toilet and put it in the bin and washed my hands. I really hate
having the chambermaid bag up my human waste like this, ya know?
What else can I complain about? The beds are quite low, a bit saggy, and
surrounded by wooden frames that reach the top of the mattress, so I have
to bruise the backs of my legs a bit to get out of bed, and sitting on the
edge of the bed is not too pleasant. The only other sit places in the room
are a desk chair (fairly sturdy and not uncomfortable), and two small
upholstered cubes that are if anything lower than the beds. I have not
risked sitting on those, using them instead as places to put stuff. There
is very little room to put stuff. The desk is small. I am using the
second bed to store my large suitcase and assorted clothes and junk. There
is a closet, but I don't feel like really unpacking and then repacking 36
hours from now.
No AC, so I have the window open, which means flying bugs, which means I'm
keeping the lights off in the main room, using the hall light by the
bathroom for general illumination, which I hope will discourage said
bugs. The night air is cool, but has a hard time getting circulated around
my small room, especially since my fan is plugged into the hall side of the
room (and I ain't gonna redo it, because of that dodgy outlet it's
in). Wow, I've been so spoiled in the Sankt Peterburg hotel! I really
miss it. I'm starting to embrace my inner ugly American, who really wants
AC and a minibar and a big room and a big bed and a REAL SHOWER!!! Oy.
((The Sankt Peterburg hotel in Plovdiv was Leslie's home for a month.
It is a modern hotel which she said compared very favorably with
upscale hotels in Chicago. -- krj))
Two good things about this room: A fairly new TV, connected to *genuine*
cable, with fifty channels, including some that are actually of interest to
me besides CNN (Cartoon Channel, in English, Hallmark, with Bulgarian
subtitles instead of dubbing, a couple of French and German channels). The
other good thing: A really nice view. I will take some pictures tomorrow.
Veliko (Great) Turnovo was once the capital city of Bulgaria (middle ages) and is built in a ravine, with the houses on really steep land. I found it beautiful. Bulgaria is a poor country and probably does not get enough rich Western tourists to maintain a western-style hotel for them in most towns. Nobody in the country seems to have screens. When I was in a summer school dorm there had been an exceptionally wet spring and a large crop of mosquitoes (there are usually none) so we were all trying to tack cheesecloth over the windows. (I recall my Polish roommate using her shoe as a hammer, and while she was hammering there was a mild earthquake which she thought she had somehow caused by hammering too hard.) In fact I don't recall window screens anywhere in Europe - the north is probably too cold for bugs at night and the south is too dry. We used to close the window at night and spend half an hour jumping against the ceiling with books to kill mosquitoes. Leslie, I am sorry you are feeling lonely and unable to read things or speak to people. I wish I were there with you. You will probably run into college students to talk with.
You have several choices: