I’ve just been speaking to someone at a call centre – I still haven’t got my wi-fi connected. (I’m writing this from the café close by.) Dealing with call centres can be hard enough in my own language, but in Romanian … forget it. The woman on the other end rattled off some long number that was neither my phone number nor the number on my contract because it ended in a three. Shit, what am I supposed to say now? Um, er, yes? She then kept repeating something that sounded like the French word saisissez but with the Z in a different place. Normally I absolutely hate it when people offer to speak English, but when she did so it came as some sort of relief. At a guess she was 25 and started learning English 22 years ago. Speaking (or more to the point, listening to) Romanian on the phone is still a real problem for me, even though I’ve handled dozens of incoming and outgoing phone calls since I arrived in the country. When you can’t see their eyes or their lips or make gestures, you’re almost flying blind. When people ring up about lessons it isn’t quite so bad because at least I know what sort of questions they’re likely to ask and vaguely how to reply. People are still calling me, even though I’m (sadly) no longer putting posters up apart from in the university campus.
If it wasn’t for those posters I wouldn’t have found this apartment. And it’s awesome. I love it. In fact I’m more excited about this place than the one I bought in Wellington because that didn’t represent anything. This represents a dream. And the location, the view, is a dream. I’ve got the beautiful cathedral that graces thousands of postcards and fridge magnets staring me in the face, with the hustle and bustle of the southern end of the square in the foreground, and Parcul Central and a tram line in the background. This is most definitely Timișoara. (Consciously or otherwise, I have a habit of ending up in places where it’s pretty obvious where I am. I think I like that. Suburbia, where you could often be just about anywhere, doesn’t do it for me.)
My apartment is 50 square metres; both the lounge and the bedroom are a good size. I neither feel hemmed in nor am I rattling around. And it’s peaceful up here; I feel a long way from the busyness down below. My second night here was New Year’s Eve – tens of thousands packed into the square for the fireworks display, many of whom cracked open bottles of bubbly as the clock struck midnight. All the festivities and illuminations have made this spot even cooler than it would otherwise be. The night before last the priest called in to anoint me and wish me a happy New Year. And to collect money. I gave him 6 lei. Should I have given 60? Probably not 600, but really I had no idea.
My only real worry here is what would happen if we had a fire. Alarms? Sprinklers? Extinguishers? Escapes? Romania, I know you’re beautiful and everything, and I like the way you haven’t gone overboard with the whole safety culture thing, but jeez, basic fire protection in high-occupancy buildings like this is common sense. You lost 64 people in a nightclub fire not that long ago. It’s time you got your shit together. Plus some of the wiring around here is as dodgy as anything, so we’re more likely to have a fire in the first place.
Last night I gave my first lesson at home – that was a milestone of sorts. I haven’t got a table set up yet, so we just sat on the sofa. He wanted to go over a song so I played him Our House by Madness and we went through some of the lyrics. He said he liked the song because the lyrics actually have a point to them unlike so much of today’s stuff. Continuing the early eighties theme, we went over an article about the Brixton riots in London.
I’m still playing Words with Friends with my cousin. As the name suggests, it’s a good way to catch up. I’m currently leading 4-3, though I was hammered 455-299 in our last game. There are eleven “power” tiles in WWF (five S’s, two blanks, the J, Q, X and Z). I only drew two of them, the X and an S, and that’s really why I lost so heavily. There were a couple of interesting moments that might have changed the game, however. On just my second turn I had a load of vowels that didn’t want to go anywhere, so I decided to exchange five tiles. My cousin said I shouldn’t exchange in almost any circumstances, and I actually disagree quite strongly with that. Then, in the middle of the game when I was down but by no means out I played RAVED, and my cousin followed that up with HIVES vertically in a very dangerous spot, with the H directly below a triple word score. Wow, both the C’s are still out. She must have one and be gambling that I don’t (and she’d be right; the only way I’d have a C is if I drew one last turn, because otherwise I’d have played CRAVED). So I played the only move I could see that blocked CHIVES and a potential monster score. She didn’t have the C after all, but still went and played RAJ on the opposite side of the board for nearly 60 to give her a three-figure lead, and that was just about game over for me.
Both BRR and BRRR are allowed in Scrabble. I’m not so sure about Words with Friends. But tomorrow we’re in for a top temperature of minus 8. That’s getting into proper brass monkeys, BRRR-with-three-R’s territory.
That was almost a thousand words. Sorry about that.
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