Burgers and Movies

This weekend Anne and Mark nurtured their American roots a bit by ordering up some burgers and going to the movies.  And we're not talking those weird "Shot Food" burgers (see blog entry from last month), we're talking good, old-fashioned, artery-clogging, "Have It Your Way" goodness: McDonald's.  A colleague of ours knows someone who has some type of delivery route that runs from Sofia to Blago daily or nearly daily.  This colleague will, on occasion, order something from Sofia and have this delivery person bring it for a small fee.  Our colleague, let's call him "Burgmetheus" (from Greek mythology, the son of Titan who brought burgers to the humans) gave us the heads up that he was going to order some Micky Ds and asked if we wanted in. So, bim bang boom, Bob's your Uncle, Friday afternoon Burgmetheus delivers 8 luke warm double cheeseburgers.

Maybe you have in mind the best cheeseburger you ever had, and maybe you would not describe it as "luke warm." Or maybe you're going to tell us how terrible McDonald's food is or what not (yes, we saw the story about the 6 month old burger).  And maybe your idea of the best cheeseburger ever doesn't look like this.  Well, that may very well be.  But Anne and Mark have reached the conclusion that this cheeseburger (yes, the one pictured above) was the best food since manna fell from the sky.  Absence makes the heart grow fonder?  Um, well it certainly makes the stomach a bit more anxious to see an old friend.

After filling up on trans fats and other nastiness, Anne and Mark ventured out to the movies on Saturday afternoon.  This was our first movie at the theatre in Bulgaria.  The experience was not bad.  The theatre only has one screen and there are no previews, so you need to show up when your show is starting.  They do have 8 movies playing a day, though, so there is some variety.  Each gets one showing per day and they rotate showtimes, so you can go to the theatre at the same time every day for a week and not see the same film twice.

The seats were pre-assigned (the tickets had your row and seat printed on them).  The entire film was shown as produced, in English, with the only noticeable differences from how it would be in an American theatre being a high level of volume and Bulgarian subtitles.  Oh, and the theatre-going experience was much more affordable than in the US.  Two tickets cost 7 leva (about $5 - granted we went in the afternoon and paid matinee prices, but full price would have been 8 leva total).  The popcorn and drinks cost another 3-4 leva.

How is that the trademark of a popcorn company in Bulgaria?

Anyway, the film we chose was Social Network.  Quick review: Mark Zuckerberg (the guy who started Facebook) and Sean Parker (the guy who started Napster and worked on Facebook) are real jerks.  It's good that they know about computers and programming, because their social skills are quite suspect.  But I digress.  Anne and Mark both gave the movie a thumb's up (Go See It!).

Another movie currently playing, The Other Guys, is a comedy we saw before we left the U.S. last August.  So, some movies get here pretty quickly (a couple of weeks), while others can take a long while (months).  We are also told that American movies are generally popular, but comedies sometimes flop because the humor does not translate across the cultures.  Action movies do best.

And finally, today's adventure in parking:

We call this one "Jackknife in the Fog."  Notice the use of perpendicular angles and how the light is changing from day to dusk.  Notice how the driver has left the vehicle just slightly on the sidewalk and just slightly in the lane of traffic, effectively annoying both pedestrians and drivers, but not truly impeding either.  We have concluded that this driver is an artist and this is performance art, obviously symbolic of the inner struggle that this artist is enduring.  Or he's a jerk (maybe it's the Facebook guys).

Ill Communication

It's been a few weeks, now, and we're starting to get acclimated to life in Bulgaria.  Combined, Anne and Mark have probably learned about 10 words of Bulgarian (this language is HARD), which is not very impressive.  However, many people here speak English, which makes it much easier for us to get along.  That being said, the communication here (even in English) takes a little getting used to.  For example, in the United States, we might enjoy some delicious Nacho Cheese or Cool Ranch Doritos.  Here, we have "Hot Corn" flavor.

"Corn chip with hot pepper flavor."

So that's a difference that is pretty easy to deal with. There are others of this nature.  For example, instead of creamy peanut butter we have "Smoothy" and instead of "Mr. Clean" we have "Mr. Proper."



















Ok, we're citizens of the world, we can figure this out.  So far, so good.  But it hasn't all been smooth sailing.  There are some things that have been a little more difficult to decipher.  For example:

Don Draper not allowed?

This sign is actually hanging in the building in which we work.  As far as we can figure, it bans fedoras or KGB agents (or both).

Then we have this one, which was outside of a convenience store

Clearly, the bottom one is no smoking.  The top one appears to ban "Spuds Mackenzie" (the Bud Light spokesdog of the 1980s - yeah, I'll go that far back for a reference, so what?) but that middle one.... looks like a croissant.  I'm guessing this store does not serve the French?

And finally, we have this.  I think it's coffee, but... come on.

Heh, heh.

Dexter

One of the hardest things that we have encountered in our move has been a house with no pets.  We decided that our dog was too old to make the flight over as checked baggage.  We were lucky enough to find a great home for him.  He is probably happier now and has nightmares about us coming back to get him.  We messed up the paperwork for the cat and he is with Anne's parents until January.  

There are a lot of stray dogs and cats around Blagoevgrad.  The city catches dogs, fixes them, places a tag on their ear, and lets them go.  We don't think they do anything about cats and there are more and more every time you look.  We started purchasing dog and cat food to feed all of them.  When we went to Greece a few weeks ago, we noticed that stray cats were also prevalent there.  Anne always made an effort to purchase more food than she needed so she could feed them.  

Stray dog in Blagoevgrad.  If you look closely you can see a tag in his ear.  

Anne feeding the cats in Greece.  

One of the professors noticed that she really needed a cat.  News came from the dormitory that there was a cat that had zero survival skills and was begging for food from the students.  The dorm manager was also concerned that cat would be living in the dorms as soon as it got cold.  The cat was very friendly and was constantly trying to sneak himself inside.  As a result, the dorm manager started to look for a home for this cat.  He learned there was a couple that were in the market.  

That is how we got Dexter.  

He drinks a lot and it makes his eyes sensitive to the light.

He doesn't like noise when he is hung over

He also passes out a lot.  

What he lacks in brains (which is a lot), he makes up for with his personality.