Tyulenovo

So my big adventure this past weekend was a trip to Bulgaria to do some rock climbing. On my flight over here, I read an article on deep water soloing in the climbing magazine that my mom bought me for the trip. I had never heard of it before, but climbing without ropes over water sounded amazing. Given that I had just heard of it, I was pretty surprised when I got an opportunity to go try it out less than a week later. One of the Romanians I met through CouchSurfing mentioned that he was going to Tyulenovo,Bulgaria to do some deep water soloing, and I invited myself along. I was a bit unsure about driving to Bulgaria for the weekend with people I barely knew, but the risk was definitely worth it. The group was great, the scenery was unbelievable, and deep water soloing was an incredible rush!

If you took a look at the video in my last post, I should mention that my version of deep water soloing was much more relaxed than that. It was sort like what you might do if you couldn't decide whether to hang out on the beach or go climbing, so you decided to combine the two. The people I went with were excellent climbers, and the routes were very difficult, so I didn't do as much climbing as I would have liked. But in addition to trying my hand at deep water soloing, I got to watch some amazing climbing, swim in the Black Sea, and lie in the sun. I took a lot of pictures, and since they are proverbially worth a thousand words, I'll let them speak for themselves:














And here's a short video of some of the climbing I got to see. Unfortunately I didn't capture any good falls or jumps, but I'm told that the guy on the right with the red stripe on his shorts is Romania's best boulderer.

"Hydration is Happiness"

I am still getting over my jet lag. I've made progress though. Last night, I was able to fall asleep by 2am, compared to 4am the night before that. This morning when I woke up at 9, I felt miserable. I figured that I was just tired, but then I realized that I felt a tiny bit hungover (and no, I had not been out drinking the night before). I had heard somewhere that a large part of the unpleasantness of jet lag is caused by dehydration. I have no idea what possible connection their could be between hydration and time zones, but given that hangovers are largely dehydration, I thought there might be something to that. Lo and behold, as soon as I started guzzling down water, I felt a lot better. I don't know if there is a take-away lesson here, like "drink lots of water if you're traveling across several time zones," but I did think it was interesting. So as a certain IU Outdoor Adventures trip leader claims, maybe hydration really is happiness.

I'll be away from my computer for the next day or so, doing something exciting so that I can come back and write about it. What will I be doing? Here's a hint.

Zacusca and Telemea

Today I rediscovered a few of my favorite Romanian specialties. For lunch today I had a telemea and zacusca sandwich on fresh, "peasant" bread. My friend Nicole (a fellow intern at the Embassy) introduced me to zacusca last summer. It is a roasted eggplant dip full of spices, roasted peppers, maybe some tomatoes, and who knows what else. It's delicious. According to Nicole, the homemade variety is even better, but I have not been so lucky as to try it. That said, store-bought zacusca is nothing to sneeze at. Last summer when I had to pack my lunch every day, I discovered that pairing zacusca with telemea de oaie or sheep's milk cheese (it tastes kind of like a mild feta) made for a delicious sandwich.

I have not mastered the art of food photography as my friends Martha and Tom have, but I thought I'd include some pictures anyway, just to make the blog a little more interesting.



Zacusca!


Zacusca and telemea sandwiches in progress

In my first few days back in Bucharest, I have been rediscovering simple pleasures like this one. Hopefully I'll have some new adventures to report soon, but for now, it's just eggplant dip and sheep cheese.

On the value of difficulties*

As those of you who are on facebook or have talked to me already know, I arrived safely in Bucharest. Both of my flights were uneventful and on time. So far my trip has been going amazingly well, so well that I'm a little worried about how long my luck is going to hold out! But for now, I'm not going to think about that; I'm just going to enjoy it.

For my two and a half weeks in Bucharest, I am house-sitting for an Embassy staffer. I worked with her last summer, and when I wrote to her telling her when I'd be in town, she offered to let me stay at her apartment for free if I water her plants. It sounded like an incredible deal to me, so I took her up on it and am doing my best to take excellent care of the plants! She will be back in town for the last week or so of my stay. At that point, I'll be moving to her guest room and trying not to be too much trouble. The apartment is beautiful: a large two-bedroom with a great kitchen. And it is in a lovely part of town, not far from a metro stop, shops, and bus lines.

If you read my blog last summer, you'll know that my arrival and first few days are going infinitely better than last year. I've decided that I'm thankful for the awful time that I had at the beginning of last summer. It was terrible while I was going through it, but I survived with no permanent damage to myself or my (or my parents') finances. Having experienced that, I have some good stories to tell (which I'm sure some of you are tired of hearing...), and more importantly, it puts a lot of things in perspective for me. Right now I'm jet lagged, I've gotten a bit homesick once or twice, and my cell phone didn't work when I got here. All of that? No big deal. I'm having an amazing time. If I didn't have the misery of last May to look back on, I might be frustrated or upset. Instead, I'm enjoying the sunshine and the sights of my new neighborhood, looking forward to the adventures that the next six weeks will bring.

* For anyone who saw the post before I changed the title, I decided that "hardship" was a bit too dramatic.

Third time's the charm

Welcome back, everyone! In about an hour and a half, I'll be leaving for my third trip to Romania. And as you can see, I'll be blogging again. This summer I'll be spending six weeks in Romania; three weeks in Bucharest to do research on the history of psychoanalysis in Romania and a three week intensive language program in Brasov. This time around I'm much more prepared (I have a place to stay, a bank account that will work in Romania, a Romanian cell phone, etc.), so I expect things to go much more smoothly.

I've retitled the blog for this summer. Ora a Treia e Vraja is my rough translation of "the third time's the charm." I'm not sure if Romanians have a similar saying, but I'll ask around and get back to you on that. Remind me if you don't hear anything about it in the next few posts.

Because I'll only be in Romania for six weeks, this trip promises to be very busy. Nonetheless, I'll do my best to see some new things and places and make time to post some interesting and entertaining reflections for you. As always, comments are very much appreciated!