by Christmas Day was cool. I spent it at my ex-student’s parents’ flat on Take Ionescu. She’s 70, he’s nudging 80, and they’ve lived there ever since the block was built in the early seventies. Besides the țuică and sparkling wine, there was so much rich food – all kinds of sausages and ribs and venison rolls and sarmale and salată de boeuf (which doesnt actually contain beef) and two bowls of soup and other tasty bits and bobs that I can’t even remember. And then biscuits and chocolate cake. Would you like some of that? Yes, please. In between I spoke, and listened to, lots of Romanian. The listening bit in particular was tiring – it’s tiring enough in any language. Her mother talked a lot. Her father rather less, although the first thing he asked me was what I thought about Brexit. What’s “total shit-show” in Romanian? By the evening he needed a lie down, and I soon made tracks. I tried to speak to my family on Christmas evening, but my parents were in the wops, my brother was probably busy with his in-laws, and my aunt only ever picks up the phone in a narrow early-morning window.
Boxing Day didn’t start well. I had a lesson in the morning, and it was one I’d rather forget. Perhaps it had been coming. My student is an ice-cold single woman in her early forties. She’s a manager who reminds me of a boss I had way back in the dark days. (Also, I have lessons with a younger, much warmer woman who works at the same company, and she’s not a huge fan of my older student’s managerial style.) At the start of the lesson she told me about her non-Christmas. She’d received multiple Christmas dinner invitations but had declined them all. And there was me thinking I was antisocial. Anyway we chatted for a bit and then I brought out Bananagrams. Being the festive season, I thought she might like to try a game. I opened the yellow bag, the letter tiles fell onto the table, and unlike most people, she didn’t help me turn them face down so we could start. No big deal. But it was clear she really resented even the idea of playing. I tried to encourage her, but before long I gave up. I then said I was disappointed that she refused to participate. This, looking back, was a mistake, but I the level of pushback I got from her was greater than anything I’m used to from people over the age of ten, and I didn’t know how to react. (Mostly my students politely complete the activity or exercise or game I give them, I then ask them what they thought of it, and we repeat it in a later session, or not, depending on whether they liked it.) We descended into an argument where she accused me of being “strange” as well as inflexible – a bit of a joke considering our lessons are always scheduled to suit her, not me, and I’m constantly doing things that she wants – and then I told her I was glad she wasn’t my boss. Yes, I could have handled things differently, and honestly I felt sick afterwards.
After that debacle, it was off to some friends of Matei’s parents in Dumbrăvița for more food and drink. It was just what I needed to get my mind off what had happened in the morning. More shots of țuică, or maybe palincă – I can’t tell the difference – and then it was time for some WTF: weird-tasting food. I had piftie, jellied meat known in English as aspic, which in this case was made from pig’s trotters. When I spoke to Mum this morning, she said that aspic was quite a common dish in New Zealand in the fifties. After that I tried icre, or roe, from some fish or another. From there I was back into my comfort zone with salată de boeuf and cuts of meat. I mostly spoke English, with bits of Romanian and even (on one occasion) French thrown in. The hosts have a 20-year-old daughter who goes to Imperial College, London, and was back home for Christmas. I had quite a good chat with her. University life in 2019 sounded much the same as in 1999, just with a whole load more dosh involved. She pays £190 a week in rent. I know this is London, but holy moley. In my final year in Birmingham (2001-02) my weekly rent was forty quid.
So I’ve experienced some real Romania in the last couple of days. Bloody awesome. And I’ll be seeing Matei’s parents again on New Year’s Eve.
