by I’m off to Poland just 36 hours from now. I’m spending five nights in Bydgoszcz (say “bid”, then “gosh”, then add a “ch” at the end, and you’ll get pretty close to pronouncing this intimidating name). Because it’s close to 1300 km which is much too far to go in a single drive, I’m breaking up the journey by spending two nights in the Czech city of Olomouc (say “o-lo-moats” in three syllables). Bydgoszcz, which is in the northern half of Poland, has great architecture and isn’t touristy at all from what I can gather. Avoiding expensive touristy cities (theme parks, if you like) is an absolute must for me. Because I’ll have four full days in Bydgoszcz, I’ll have plenty of time to look around and maybe even make a day trip to Gdańsk on the coast, which does get a bit of tourism. I should accomplish two main goals: one, simply to get away (and visit two new countries which is a bonus), and two, to escape the heat. On the way back I’ll have a one-night stop – probably in Olomouc again.
Kitty has added an extra wrinkle to planning this sort of trip. What do I do with her? As an experiment, I dropped her off at Dorothy’s on Tuesday morning, just for the day. Dorothy got a kitten in June. Maybe the two felines would get on fine, even though mine was twice the size of hers, in which case a longer stay could work. No such luck. Her kitten was scared of Kitty (don’t blame her) to the point where she hid for four hours. Dorothy couldn’t find her. They had to be separated, and even that didn’t entirely work because their scents lingered… So I’ve booked Kitty in for nine nights at a so-called pet hotel in Timișoara, at a cost of 540 lei (£90 or NZ$210). In the longer term I’ll have to think about what to do. Kitty’s lovely and everything, but if I want to be spending a month in New Zealand and stuff, I’m sad to say she might not be worth the hassle and expense.
I got a surprise letter in the post from the Romanian equivalent of the IRD, saying that I hadn’t declared my foreign income for 2019. What the hell? That’s six years ago. Did you mean my NZ rental income (which I’d already paid tax on) or what? I went to the office yesterday but the queue was a mile long. This morning I got there much earlier and they told me it was to do with the £51 of interest I’d apparently received on my Barclays account that year. When I get back from Poland I’ll have to make another trip there – it sounds like I’ll have to do something on a self-service kiosk. Some of the stuff you get in Romania is laughable.
On Monday morning after my Romanian lesson I got a call from Mum and Dad. Sunday was a stinker (we topped out at 38) and it didn’t drop below 22 that night, so I slept terribly. Talking to them was a struggle. I can’t wait to escape that.
