Relaxation is not one of the reasons I travel. I can relax just fine in my apartment. But, when you decide to go to a little Bulgarian beach town/fishing village in the off season, sometimes you have no choice. There is some interesting historical stuff here--there are ruins all over the place, with the rest of the city built around them. The museums are supposed to be open, but they're not; and it's a little town so walking around it making up stories about the ruins doesn't take very long. So I was forced--forced!--to have lots of coffee and a really long lunch and to sit for a long time on a bench watching men work on their boats (lots of sanding) while a Bulgarian radio station played oldish American music like Foreigner and Michael Jackson. I also amused (I think) some nice patient waiters with my butchering of the Bulgarian language. Getting by on my Russian is so far a huge disaster, partly because Russian and Bulgarian are not as similar as I want them to be, but mostly because I am a huge disaster at speaking Russian. I realized hours later that when I tried to order a small bottle of wine with dinner I actually used the Russian word for milk instead of small. I guess that's why he thought I wanted white wine.
On another note, I haven't said much about the harmonica lately, but I have been playing more or less according to schedule. It just hasn't generated good stories. Serbia was too damn cold to play outside. I didn't play at all in Turkey (only two days) and here in Sozopol I've been sitting on rocks and playing for the water and the seagulls. Not exactly playing in public like I'm supposed to be doing, but it's too pretty not to. Although if you're already self-conscious about your minimal talent, seagull noises (what do seagulls do? caw? cry?) sound a lot like people laughing at you.
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