London

Last weekend Bee, David, and I spent three wonderful nights in London.

Upon arriving, I experienced a bit of reverse culture shock. Everything there was so organized and clean in comparison to my current Eastern European residence. I stood captivated in the produce section of the "to go" food Marks and Spencer store, marveling at the perfect imported fruit: weighed, wrapped, and unblemished. Yeah, it was definitely time for a vacation.'

D and I were a bit nervous about how Miss Bee would handle the trip. Some people might say that traveling with a two and a half year old is asking for disaster, but we are blessed to have a mostly easy going little girl. In preparation, we spent several weeks talking about going on the airplane, staying in a hotel and eating out at restaurants (one of Bee's favorite things that we seldom do here; she is fascinated with the concept of ordering food).

I decided that this trip would involve a little more organization that usual. That meant deciding in advance on some activities that we would all enjoy. We settled on one "event" per day, leaving plenty of time for eating, shopping (oh can we say Waterstone's bookstore!), and visiting every available playground in a three mile radius of our hotel.

We booked a hotel in a very central location, right behind Buckingham palace, called Rubens at the Palace. The rooms were nice, reasonably priced for London (and that means less than $300 USD, per night, unfortunately) and included a full English breakast. Breakfast, to my surprise, ended up being, for me, the best part of the hotel (although D might tell you that it was Guiness on tap at the hotel bar, yes he took my daughter there and she had a chocolate milk while he drank his beer).

Saturday: We had a mid morning flight but gosh, three hours is a long time on the plane with a little one. Bee loved the in flight meal service, although the only thing she wanted to do with it was practice smearing butter on her roll. Those little butter packets, who knew that they would captivate a two year old? We planned on taking the metro (the tube) from the airport to our hotel, and we did, but this was not a smart choice. The tube in London is cheap and very efficient, but it does not typically have elevators in the stations and we were dragging our luggage and Bee and her stroller up multiple flights of stairs. After checking in, we splurged on a taxi to the London Eye. The Eye is essentially an enormous Ferris wheel, taking 30 minutes to rotate each car 360 degrees. We had bought tickets and assumed that would mean that we would have a short wait, but ended up waiting almost a hour. It was that crowded. Bee was reasonably well behaved, but we were relieved to finally board our flight. The views were lovely. We were lucky to have a clear and sunny day in which to view all of London.


Sunday: Our trip to the London zoo was probably the highlight of the trip for me. We arrived early, the weather was perfect, the animals perky, and Bee was absolutely in her element. This is a modern zoo, full of interesting exhibits, a focus on conservation, and a wonderful children's section (which had a whole play fountain section for the kids, and yes, the European kids were just getting naked and jumping right in; us prudish Americans steered Bee on to the next exhibit, although she was very interested in joining the others). There was even a special section where the kids could pet sheep and goats. In the center of the zoo was a carousel, cafe, and moon bounce (which prompted the one meltdown of the day; Bee wouldn't get off when her five minutes were up). We spent the rest of the day going to the playground and walking around until it was time to meet a dear friend for dinner. London's Chinatown, while small, more than met my craving for "real" (as in, American style) Chinese food. I cannot remember the last time I ate that much food, but I can tell you I will be dreaming about the crispy duck with plum sauce for quite some time.


Monday: our last full day in London. D made reservations for us to have tea at the Ritz hotel, to belatedly celebrate my birthday. It was wonderful, although I spent most of it on edge that Bee would break something or otherwise misbehave. Fortunately, she was very well behaved. I ate a lot of scones. Bee danced to the piano music in the lobby. However, as we ducked out of there, I couldn't help but feeling that we had escaped some kind of embarrassing disaster; I would not recommend bringing a toddler to tea. Monday also meant shopping at Fortnum and Mason and Harrods. Bee actually fell asleep in her stroller and slept through all of Harrods, giving D and I a quiet hour of browsing. You could spend an entire day at Harrods. The upper floors contain a coffee shop, a children's bookstore, even an American style diner. Monday night was the best meal of our entire stay, dinner at Quilon, an Indian restaurant a few blocks from our hotel. Our concierge recommended it, and I was skeptical, as he claimed it was the best Indian restaurant in all of London. However, it ranks as one of the top ten meals I have had. . . in my life. Their crab cakes were crisp perfect. The jumbo prawns were enormous and served with an onion chutney. The service was warm yet impeccable. The cook prepared a special dinner for Bee, since they didn't have a children's menu. We were served an amuse bouche of tomato soup that still haunts me. It was a wonderful way to end a very relaxing and happy family vacation.

Tuesday: We headed to the airport after breakfast, torn on whether to take a taxi or brave the subway again. We settled on the bus. This would have worked great, except that the bus station was a lot further away than we anticipated and arrived just as it was ready to pull away. We needn't have rushed though; our flight was delayed an hour, but this meant that we actually had time for a nice lunch at an pizza restaurant in the terminal. Even the airport food in London is good! (Or maybe I am just really deprived. . . ) But it was worth it to see just how much pizza Bee can eat when she puts her mind to it. And psst, don't tell anyone, but after the long flight and late arrival in Bucharest, we went to McDonalds for dinner.

Sweetness

My husband came home from the market today with a kilo of cherries, strawberries, ripe peaches and apples. We had strawberry milkshakes for dessert and tomorrow I am contemplating making a cherry pie. If only to sing "can she make a cherry pie Billy boy, Billy boy?" while I pit the cherries and roll the dough.

I also have plans to make lemon bread to thank our neighbors who took Bee the other night when I had to make an unscheduled trip to the doctor. No questions asked, they took Bee in, fed her dinner, and put her to bed with their own daughter (who is Bee's best playground friend) until we were able to come back and bring her home.

But we shall see, because I am supposed to be taking it easy. I am not a good patient. I do not like being sick. I feel nothing but guilty when I cannot run and play with my daughter and my poor husband is forced to managed all the cooking, cleaning, dog-walking, and child care. He already does so much. Despite his weekend of drudgery, my hubby made our favorite Friday night pizzas and the aforementioned strawberry milkshakes for dessert. Bee drank hers with three straws.

In every bitter hand we are dealt, there is some undeniable sweetness to discover.

If

"If" is such a little word full of unpleasant possibilities. "If" casts a looming shadow over any conversation: If I weren't so tired I would be blogging more, vacuuming the house on a regular basis, reading more than 5 pages per night, writing letters, knitting, putting together crafts for Bee to do with her nanny.

If only I didn't have to work and could stay home for a just a while attending to my family and my home. If only it were possible to have it both ways--career and a fulfilling home life. Sometimes I think I have the balance right and it is possible to do both. Other times I feel pushed from one extreme to the other. Home eats work; work eats home. The result: girl on the couch in a stupor watching YouTube.

The thing about the word "if" is that is usually leads nowhere productive. "If" usually starts a whine "if only . . ." a complaint "if you hadn't. . ." or bribery "if you eat all your vegetables, then you can have dessert." It's a dead end word.

So instead of "if" I am going to choose "now." At least for right now. So right now, I am going to take the dog for a nice quiet evening walk and enjoy the warm summer night.

Monastery windmill

Celestial

Inside Saon Monastery's main church (Romanian Orthodox). The entirety of the lovingly maintained church is painted in colorful frescoes. I remembered to bring a head covering, as that is still the tradition.

Fixer upper

Two weekends ago, we took a trip to the Danube Delta, which comprises the vast wetlands where the Danube river meets the Black Sea. We had planned a weekend of boating and birdwatching, but unfortunately unseasonably cold temperatures and intermittent rain called for a change of plans.

Instead of going out into the nature preserve, we drove and visited some of the monasteries in the region. We happened by the above church on our way from one monastery to the other and I had to stop and take a picture; It looked like something from a horror movie. The windows were boarded up, the towers disintegrating into crumbled masonry, the walls supported by ancient scaffolding--I have never seen a church in such disrepair.

Ancient villas, mouldering mansions, and vine covered manor houses still manage to have a sense of dignity. An abandoned church, however, is a complete tragedy.

What I love about May:

Besides the mild weather, later sunsets, blooming flowers, and return of the honeybees, May is all about two important holidays--Mother's Day AND my birthday. Two very important holidays!

My husband has my birthday covered this year, though. Instead of presents, he is taking Miss Bee and I to London over Memorial day weekend. Once there, in glorious Western Europe, we plan to shop at Fortnum and Mason, visit half a dozen English language bookstores, and, best of all, we have a reservation for tea at the Ritz. Just Bee, hubby, and me, all dressed up and (hopefully) on our very best behavior.

Now, all I have to do is get through a stressful language test this Friday and it's smooth sailing to the end of the month. With that, I am off to study Romanian.

Stray dogs in my neighborhood:

Bucharest is plagued by stray dogs, a problem that only worsens as the weather becomes warmer.


This little guy has a tag in his ear. It means that he has been picked up by the city authorities and then released. I heard that sometimes they spay/neuter the dogs before casting them back out onto the streets. Sometimes not. There are no real animal rescue facilities. Euthanasia is not permitted. The dog that bit my husband last year had been tagged and released.


This pup is living across the street from my apartment. He looks like a miniature German Shepherd, and finds a nice nest of grass to sleep in each night.


This is my "dirty puppy" having a snooze. She lives right outside my office. She was the cutest, fuzziest little puppy and very affectionate. The problem with puppies is that they grow up into big, not so cute, dogs. She still has a few months before food from pitying passers-by grows few and far between. I really wanted to adopt her, but David, rightly so, forbade it.


This pup lives right across from the entrance to the metro. He is always in almost the exact same spot, morning or night. I suspect that someone dumped him there and then left via metro. He is waiting, in vain, for his owner to come back.


Here is a pack of three dogs having a frolic right next to the playground. You would think that people would be more concerned about the potential risk to the children, but on the contrary. . . Bee's favorite park has its own group of three stray dogs that have taken up permanent residence next to the swings.

The problem of stray dogs will not go away until people stop feeding them and the city starts euthanizing ones that cannot be adopted. Unfortunately, I don't see either option happening any time soon.