Suflete Gemene

After some Romanian-style delays, Danut's book at last has been published.
The events surrounding this achievement involved a couple of radio interviews, a television interview and a book signing party which was attended by the local news station and broadcast the following day on channel 11.  This blogger would like to state for the record that she would have preferred forewarning regarding the presence of a camera crew as she would have made certain her hair, if not overall appearance, was somehow less tragic.
Regardless.  Below are photos from said event which took place at the Atlantys Club in downtown Craiova on a sweltering July afternoon.

To date, the book is only available in Romanian but, with great assistance from Mihai, friends and neighbors, I am in the process of translating it into English.  Its taken 5 days to finish one chapter so you can expect a fully translated English version to be available sometime within the next decade.

Here are two links for one of the television interviews:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dainij_Vp-Y  part 1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbyawzxLjwo&feature=relmfu  part 2

Barcelona: the FCB Story and Leftover Photos

Long ago Luci asked for a Pedro jersey.  He's not the FCB fan that I am but he demonstrates the proper amount of enthusiasm when they score goals.  Plus he is generally willing to make another batch of popcorn or refill my glass so that I don't have to leave the vicinity of the screen while a game is on.
That adds up to deserving a cheesy jersey, right?
I'm proud that Pedro is his favorite and not Messi or David Villa (nothing against them its just that aren't they everyone's favorites?) and, while its not as easy to find number 17's home jersey in a child size, it can be done (I know because I looked it up on ebay).
Still, I thought it would be cool (a loose interpretation of cool-don't judge) to wait until we were in Barcelona to buy one for him.  I figured FCB paraphernalia would be omnipresent. But in fact, it wasn't as bad as I expected; I'm happy to report that I never saw a mug in the shape of Messi's face or beach shoes with "La Liga 2011" on them.  But there were stores aplenty and it was just a matter of picking one out of 1,000.
The unexpected bonus from getting an FCB t-shirt in Barcelona is that you can get your own name printed above the number 17.
The other moment of unexpected pleasure is that while you wait the ten minutes in the store for the printing to be done, you can meet people like Anil.
Anil, originally from northern India, speaks English with the most delicious accent (I confess I have a thing for Indian accents) and surprised us by stating we were the first Americans he had met who were Bollywood fans.  Really?  Almost everyone I know is a Bollywood fan.  Surely he was saying this as some sort of guise to entice us to buy more in his store.  But no, he was genuine.  In fact, as we were walking out, he rather impulsively chased after us with a bag in which he had stuffed some souveniers and gave them to us for free because "it was so nice to meet you guys."  Who knew just liking Aamir Kahn movies would prove to be such an ice breaker?

After that pleasant encounter we realized we were starving and decided on an Argentinian restaurant where we saw this painting with which I fell in love

and also where we met Ulises who is from Uruguay and learned his perfect English while he was going to University in Utah.  He shared our distain for the subways of New York (he was far more polite about it than were we) and a desire to see California. We exchanged email addresses and told him that even if he's too afraid to contact us, he should remember to avoid LA and stay north when he visits next summer.  I could tell from his eyes that LA remains firmly on his 'to-do-in-California' list.  Well, he was warned.

On our way back to the hotel Mihai was desperate for a shot of espresso so we stopped at a tiny bar.  Inside were the barista and a duo of local men who spoke Catalan with such rapidity that I could understand absolutely. nothing. no matter how hard I tried.  It didn't seem to matter, one of the duo seemed delighted with however I responded and was also very interested in my camera which I took to be a hint that he might want his photo taken.

and now for some pleasant randomness:

So our Barcelona trip comes to an end.

And we did not go to Camp Nou.

Why not?

Alas, I knew that if I were to visit, I would undoubtedly learn that it is not Mount Olympus and that the players are mere mortals.  What good can come from that sort of soul-crushing discovery?

Also, I don't like crowds and I doubted I could have persuaded my family to endure the tour.  Maybe Luci would have but by that time he had his number 17 jersey and for him, that was enough.

Barcelona: Deja Vu or, as the Spanish say, Deja Vu

Barcelona unsettled me a bit.  It reminded me so much of so many other places I have been that my first impression was that I was either in Savannah, Vienna or back home in Monterey County.

You may think that the Spanish being spoke all around would be enough to remind me that I was somewhere new but if you think that, you probably have never been to California where Spanish is spoken as prolifically as English.

So I was a bit worried that we had seen so many places in such a short period of time the world was in danger of turning homogeneous for us.  Were we going to need to travel to Laos in order to experience something that seemed totally foreign?  The irony is that Spain is the only place on our list where not one of us had been before.

But then we went to places like Gaudi Park and shopped for FC Barcelona jerseys and then it all eventually sunk in.
Spain.  Barcelona.  We're here.  Crisis averted.

Barcelona: 50 kilometers

We don't do tour buses.
That is to say, Mihai doesn't do tour buses.  I'm willing to hop on one if it means I don't have to wear my feet bloody and raw on the pavement of foreign cities but Mihai is indifferent to the discomfort emanating from his metatarsals.  I think it has something to do with being raised under communism.

But let's face it, how else are you going to see a city up close as well as burn even a portion of the 5,000 calories you are consuming as you sample the local fare?
You walk.  And walk.
And you become intimately aquainted with the city's metro system which in Barcelona is a dream.  Its true that after dealing with the New York City metro system we tend to judge every place by that standard and its true that when you set your bar that low everything but a windowless bus in Los Angeles rush hour traffic can surpass it.
But really, Barcelona has a fantastic metro.  I don't consider myself a tour guide of any shape or form and I'll tell you that as a general rule you should never follow any traveling advice I might be tempted to dispense.  There is one thing, however, that you can take to the bank:  Barcelona's subways are user-friendly and they do not double as the city's public toilet so while its a little stuffy in summer, at least you aren't assaulted by the smell of urine when you descend into the underground.

We tried to see it all.  And I think we came pretty close but since the only research we do before arriving in a city is looking up a couple of restaurants we want to try, usually we have no idea what we are doing.

So for those of you who have lived in or visited Barcelona extensively I'm certain it would appear we barely scratched the surface and managed only to visit the most touristy, unimaginative places the city has to offer.  But since we're clueless about what else is out there, we're pretty happy with the way things turned out.

Who says ignorance isn't bliss?

The Gothic Cathedral and Parc de La Ciutadella

50 km is the total that we walked during our stay