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Hello. Have I really been gone so long? The last entry on this thing was a week and six days ago, which was the last time I logged on to the net and, you know what, I haven’t missed it at all.

So, what’s happened in the interim? Well, last week started in Paris for Apple Expo. You can read about it in the magazine. From there I flew to Athens where it turns out most ‘rules’ are optional. Red lights mean stop only if there is some oncoming traffic. Green crossing signs mean cross if there are no crazy motorbikes zooming through the crossing. Those motorbikes are frighteningly common. About one for every fifth car, I reckon, and only about a quarter of the riders seem to wear crash helmets. Even on the plane the no mobiles rule was flaunted by the guy who tested ALL of his ring-tones while dinner was being served, even when the cabin crew were asking if he’d like coffee.
Anyhow, it was all very nice and sunny, the Parthenon was interesting, the island I boated out to was hot and idyllic, the food was great (although I don’t know whether I could face feta ever again) and I generally had a lovely time.

Yesterday morning, very early, I left, and took the train to Bulgaria where I am now. It’s a fascinating place. The most common sign on bar doors isn’t ‘no smoking’ but leave your gun at the door. It’s a very camera shy place, too; you mustn’t take pictures of government buildings, train stations, tunnels or bridges as they could be seen as being of strategic importance. Beyond that, though, and the very pushy people on the streets looking to buy euros, it seems friendly enough.

There’s a lot of poverty, though, and I have seen old people sitting by the side of the road with battered old bathroom scales offering to weigh you in return for a few small coins. The average annual salary is about 8500 pounds (can’t find that sign on this Cyrillic keyboard). The minimum wage is about 1200 pounds a year.

So, I’m here for another couple of days, which I reckon should be long enough, before I hear north to an old hill-top fortress town for a couple of nights and, from there, to Romania, which I should reach by Sunday.

If nothing else, it’s turning out to be a very instructive trip. Full details when I get back home.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 20th, 2006 at 9:06 am and is filed under Europe, Journal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.