by Let’s talk about yesterday. I didn’t sleep fantastically the night before last; I spent a fair portion of the night on the sofa with Kitty. When it was time to properly get up, I had a low-level headache, and with five lessons scheduled I got straight into the Advil before it got any worse. My parents decided to call me just before my first lesson was about to begin. That lesson (from 8:30 till 10:30) was online with the teacher in Slobozia. Her students had to do short presentations in English and she wanted my help in extending them from two minutes to three, or thereabouts. This talk of two or three minutes makes me think of sex, she said. I burst out laughing at that point. My next lesson (from 11 till 12:30) was with the twins in another part of town. It was an effort to get there in time on my bike. I’d planned to do some life admin tasks and visit the supermarket on the way home after the lesson. I was carrying 6000 lei (just over £1000) in cash in a bum bag.
After that lesson, I visited the bank nearby but the machine for depositing money was different to anything I’d seen before and when it rejected my card I simply left, declining the lady’s offer of help. I cannot possibly deal with explanation and communication and some new sodding machine right now. Thanks, but I’ll try somewhere else. Wise decision when I’m feeling like this. Next stop was the mall. Malls are horrible places at the best of times. I got a few bits and pieces from the supermarket, then went to the branch of the bank that sits somewhere in the middle of the god-awful mall complex. Hang on, where even is the bank? It’s so hard to navigate that place, partly because I try to avoid it so I never get to know where anything is. I went up and down escalators and around the horrible fake park, all the while worried that I’d forget where I’d left my bike. Finally, the bank. It took four attempts for the machine to accept all my notes. Each attempt is a rigmarole as you try to smooth out the notes or swap a 100 for two 50s but it still rejects some of them. By previous standards, four wasn’t too bad. I was about to go straight home when I remembered I needed to visit the clinic to look at the roster. I didn’t know whether my after-hours doctor would be available that day or the next day. He seems to switch between Tuesdays and Wednesdays. It turned out it was that day. On the way back I saw that fuel prices had already gone up since the morning. I got home at 2pm, exhausted after being disoriented by the traffic and very nearly falling off my bike in Piața Traian. My headache intensified a little, so I took some paracetamol in addition to what I’d already taken earlier, plus the ibuprofen.
I made myself a late lunch (pasta with bacon, kidney beans and vegetables), then tried to do as little as possible before the rest of my lessons started at five. I even took a nap. My first lesson was a 90-minute face-to-face session with the guy who works in insurance and his niece. I then had a boiled egg and some jam sandwiches before my two back-to-back online sessions. Both my students were called Olivia: a 12-year-old in Germany and a 24-year-old in Cluj. At 9:15, while I was still teaching, Dad called me again on Teams. I called my parents back after I finished at 9:30, but I kept it short because I needed to see the doctor. They were about to go to Moeraki in their electric car. All of a sudden, electric cars are in high demand over there. It reminds me of the oil price spike at the start of the global financial crisis (before people had electric cars) when people were practically giving away four-litre Ford Falcons. I remember a litre of 91 smashed through $2 for the first time, while a block of Tasty cheese hit $16. I wonder what cheese costs now.
I got to the surgery at ten. There was only one guy in the queue in front of me. When it was my turn, I told the doctor about the headaches and my conspicuous lack of energy and how I’d also had a cold last week which I’ve maybe sort of recovered from. Astenie, he said. Ah yes, asthenia. Weakness. It’s a useful high-probability Scrabble word. Have you been taking ibuprofen? Oh yes. Let’s take your blood pressure. I rolled up my right sleeve. It was higher than I’d ever seen before; the bottom number was over 100. Hmmm, let’s do the other arm. That gave an even higher reading: 151/109. “You won’t die from this,” he said, in English for some reason. Was that reassuring? I don’t know. He told me to drink loads of water and put me on some specific headache pills called Quarelin, which I’ve just got from the pharmacy. They were quite expensive. After I got back last night, I started to feel dizzy, though I’m fine now in that regard; I’m just tired and have a headache, this time on the right side.
Tomorrow evening Mark’s school are putting on a performance of The Wizard of Oz at the Opera House in town. He got me a ticket, so I’ve rejigged my lessons so I can go. In 1988 I was in a Christmas production of The Wizard of Oz. The bigger kids had proper parts, while I played the wind at the beginning. Even though I’m not in the mood for very much, The Wizard of Oz is great, so I’m kind of looking forward to it.
In a few minutes I’ll probably have to do Simon Says with a young girl. Simon Says just leave me alone.
Update: That was a tough session. She seemed to have forgotten every word I’d ever taught her, as if she’d hit “select all” and “delete”. Maybe it was just that she didn’t want to talk. The only time her face lit up was when she said it was her ninth birthday soon, on 2nd April. So two weeks today, right? Will you come and see me on your birthday? No, it’ll be on a Thursday. Are you sure about that? She was right of course. I should have taken her word for it – young kids generally have a good idea of how many days it is till their birthday.
