by I’ve just spoken to Mum and Dad. They asked me if I’d seen the news. What news? Oh, I see. Someone tried to assassinate Donald Trump. I’ve since caught up with the news and watched the scenes of blood and mayhem. Living on my own, big news can pass me by at weekends – for instance I didn’t find out about the Christchurch earthquake of 2010, which happened on a Saturday, until many hours later.
We’re in the middle of an infernal heat wave. Far from my first I’ve experienced in Romania, but this one is unremitting. The last week has reminded me of Covid. Stay at home during the daytime if at all possible. Outside is scary and dangerous, or at least very unpleasant, between 11am and 8pm. If I visit the market in the morning, I can’t mess around. Make a list and stick to it, just like in the Covid days. Last night I played tennis between 8 and 9; I was glad Florin was happy to just bat the ball around without getting tangled up in a set which would have been brutal. Cycling is a breeze, literally, until you have to stop at a red light.
Last week was a busy and challenging one on the work front. Online lessons with tech falling over everywhere. A maths lesson where I had a girl (who is being taught under the British system) and a boy (doing the bone-dry, difficult and hopelessly impractical Romanian curriculum) at the same time, and felt all at sea. Wanting to print coloured worksheets when I’ve run out of coloured ink. A mother who printed out sheets for her son in black and white where he had to draw arrows to a blue ball or a red shoe. And in between, some much easier sessions with a new lady whom I’d put at an 8 on my 0-to-10 scale. She’s keenly interested in the language, and because she already speaks it so well, these lessons are a piece of cake and fly by in no time.
Apart from shortish trips to England in 3½ weeks and Vienna at the end of August, I don’t know if I’ll be going anywhere. I had planned to visit Maramureș and maybe even Slovenia, but the sudden uptick in my hours and the ridiculously hot weather might make those plans overly ambitious.
Sport. The final of Euro 2024 takes place tonight. England have lucked their way into the final, while Spain have been the stand-out team of the tournament and logically should win. But football doesn’t work like that. England could easily win their first big tournament for nearly 60 years, and it would be huge if they managed it. My brother mentioned a possible public holiday if “we” win, and I realised that for me the whole concept of a “we” in sport feels very weird now. I’ve been out of the UK for practically half my life.
This year’s Wimbledon has hardly featured in my life. Yesterday, however, I watched the deciding set of the women’s final between Krejcikova and Paolini. I thought about how the women’s game has changed beyond belief since the nineties when I watched it far more keenly. The first few games of the final set flew by, then there was a key moment at 3-3 on Paolini’s serve with break point against her. Her first serve was called out. She challenged it but lost, so she had to serve a second ball with her rhythm disrupted. A big double fault and a crucial break. Then Krejcikova just about served out the match in a long final game where nerves clearly got to her. The men’s final between Djokovic and Alcaraz takes place this afternoon.
In some good news, I got rid of one of my old bikes. The guy who nicked it in 2021 did a good job of buggering it up, so I was pleased to get even 100 lei for it. My latest one, by the way, cost 800 lei (£140 or close to NZ$300).
