Well I am sure you will all join me in my sadness for Liverpool's unbeaten record going at Reading this past week... (expect the Man Utd fans I'm sure), let’s hope Saturday's game against Manchester united will make us all feel better (except for those same Man Utd fans!)
So on to more Romanian matters, as I have often stated, life here can catch you out at a moments notice, here I was having another relatively quiet week then came the weekend!!!
Pig's ears: Well Friday was just the beginning, on the way to work I noticed some activity in one of the neighbour's gardens... I could see several men standing over what I assumed was an attempt to grow the world's largest yellow vegetable. I persuaded Karen and Helen to join me in going to have a closer look... this big huge yellow thing was a dead pig. A huge dead (yellow pig!) and please remember both Helen and Karen are vegetarians... the pig was placed on some large wooden pallet, and looked to be being cooked form underneath (hence the yellow colour...) two of the neighbour's children were stood next to the pig eating its tail.... honestly!! The men invited us in to the garden to photograph their handy work... and looked pleased for the photo opportunity! after Karen and Helen began to think enough was enough, we began continued our journey to work... but as we were leaving one of the men came running over to us, and very proudly presented a smallish yellow triangle to me... he seemed very pleased with himself, and stood smiling at me gesturing to his mouth.....we stood looking at this yellow triangle, and quickly came to realise it was the pig's ear!!!! Oh my lord, the man was now watching me, insisting I eat it.... (I later was i
nformed this is the greatest honour you can be given.. ) I must admit I was very close to shouting, "I'm a celebrity, get me out of here" (sorry TV joke for those of you who don't know the programme).. I slowly took a bite, and smiled widely to prevent any swallowing action... the man returned to his amateur butchery whilst I went round the corner and almost choked to death! I appreciated the honour, but it was not nice on the pallet...I spent the next 15 minutes walking to work, placing the ear on Helen's hat... to lighten the mood, much to Helen's protest, I gave the ear to a patient who was far more appreciative for this delicacy!Nativity plays (the update)- we have selected the main cast of our Xmas production... and have decided to scrap the part of the shepherd's due to technical difficulties... one of the patients was disappointed in his appointed role of the 'star', and insisted on playing the role of Jesus, despite our protests that this would make a very difficult birth scene for Mary... still, a weekly rehearsal session is underway... of sorts!!!
Men in Ditches- after a very eventful day yesterday in Turges Mures with Sari & Judith (Hungarian neighbours of mine), which included visiting two shopping malls (very new thing here!), having white hot chocolate in a posh hotel, and going to the cinema, of which Judith and Sari had never been before (the things we take for granted eh!), we ventured home on the 1030pm bus.... Actually let me just mention the cinema, I let the girls choose the film as it was their first time and there were only two choices... they chose a foreign film... so I ended up watching what seemed like a great film, trying to read Romanian subtitles, whilst listening to the actors speaking French... quite the experience for me, but I did get the gist.... ha ha...So the way home... at about 1130pm we were walking home and saw a man in a ditch, it's pretty cold here at night and he seemed unconscious... but we decided we must try and wake him... he roused slightly, and was middle aged and had some blood coming from his nose... he was speaking rubbish, mixed with some English words and mostly Hungarian (lucky for me I had the girls with me).... he seemed really drunk but I could not smell any alcohol on him... we called the police who basically told us to take him to the hospital!!! yeah right......this is a typical response here... the guy couldn’t even walk... anyway, we called the police back, and they eventually turned up, but didn’t even go and look at the poor guy, who could have been dying for all they knew... next thing an ambulance arrives and they just pick him up and frog-march him to the ambulance.. (no patient care here!!!) Crazy stuff.... (below is some creative work the patients have done within the hospital club room)
...and finally flying coffee!!! I have had a tough day at work today, Karen is away with her boyfriend, Helen is sick so it was just me and my Dutch colleague today... with a particularly difficult group of four 1:1 patients this morning... one was new to the group, and oh my god, almost caused a riot... the new patient just caused an existing patient to begin screaming like a banshee and the two of them began grabbing each other aggressively.... after having to try and separate them, by physically man-handling them, one of them decided she would throw a cup of coffee randomly in protest, unfortunately for me.. I was standing in that particular random spot... and was covered from head to toe in coffee, (no harm done), I at least did manage to save our 'volunteer advent calendar' from taking most of the hit... some consolation at least!!!
So all in all, life has been very interesting here the last few days.... and I am looking forward to going home after this email, and having a nice beer... and hope that Helen doesn’t give me her D&V... (For those of you that know what this abbreviation means)
Regards from Romania!!!
Dan
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