Varna, Bulgaria: Days 3 and 4

On our third day in Varna, I awoke to thunder, lighting, and rain Oh My! It cleared up around noon, and Jill, Steph, and I set out with three other girls to find a place to go horseback riding. We left for Golden Sands (Varna’s sort of downtown) and spent a great deal of time walking, hiking, climbing, and sweating while we looked for the spot that they had heard of. Jill, Steph, and I gave up to go shopping, but the other girls kept looking and from what I know, they found it after a few more tries (I hope it was expensive so I don’t have to kick myself for not going!). We walked Golden Sands for a bit, and I bought some sandals to soothe my sweating sneaker-feet as well as a ring to replace the one James accidentally dropped down an elevator shaft. The new one is not quite so awesome, but it was not very expensive so no biggie if he doesn’t like it.

Jill grew tired and asked us to head back, so we climbed into a cab that charged us far too much and left for the ship. Because of police detours, the cab driver left us about a kilometer (ha! I speak in meters now) from our ship, and we stopped in a few stores on our hot hot hot walk back. When we got back, Steph and I decided to go back to one of the beach bars while Jill napped. We went to the same bar that I had been at with Tom and his roommate on the first night, though I had a better experience. We went back to the ship after about an hour and two drinks each to shower.

We left with Tom and Alexine (fellow outspoken topshop admirer) to find a bar along the beach and settled into a small and nearly empty place next to the water slides. After a few minutes we noticed a small boy oogling us, face unchanging. We tried to feed him potato chips and speak to him (obviously without success), but he remained unflinching! His (slightly intoxicated) mother finally came to reclaim him, and would not take no for an answer when we said we could not speak Bulgarian. When she asked if any of us spoke Spanish, however, all fingers pointed to me and I was stuck in a deadend conversation for about thirty minutes. I believe she spoke even less Spanish than I did, and the conversation basically consisted of her asking where we were from, how we got here, and why we spoke only English. I had no answer for the last one besides the self-absorption of one entire country whose disregard for the importance of bilingualism trickles down to most. After she left, with her child and “friend,” we spent a short while longer there until they closed, and then headed further down the beach to a bigger, louder, more crowded bar. Several Semester-at-Sea-ers enjoyed our company there, including Corey (where had he been since Capri?). At this point, time was likely entering into the next day, when Tom requested that we visit a casino. I obliged and helped gather the rest of our entourage before we set out.

The casino was rather dead, and I attempted to play some sort of game that I did not really understand, losing 10 leva in the process (6 dollars). Only the one table was open and so we left shortly after, but I am now a proud card-carrying member of some casino group…thing. We set out for food as some of us were hungry, but when we stopped at McDonald’s—of all places—I opted to go without. Tom took leave of us then, as he had an FDP the next morning (surprise surprise: it was a trip for his business class that took him to the very same McDonald’s!), and we cabbed to a bar Alexine suggested called Copacabana. There was a 5 leva cover charge that Steph was very unhappy about, and her frown worsened still when we were told we had to pay to use the restroom and then for toilet paper (at about 30 cents each, it was more a nuisance of trying to find coins that small than about the loss of money). We spent the rest of the night and early morning sitting at the bar, where both Steph and Jill made new manly friends while I wallflowered a bit. Alexine was lost to us for awhile, but as the bar only increased in Semester at Sea population, we were not worried. We again saw Corey and friends, and did not leave the bar until around 4:30 AM. We began walking back to the ship, which took about a half an hour, skipping over a kabob stand not because we weren’t hungry, but because they were ignoring us. We arrive back to the ship and I requested that we stay up to see the sunrise; Steph promptly asked who I was and why I wanted to stay up later than she does, as she is our resident party monkey. I suppose that once I get past a certain point, tired is nothing and I will karate chop it! We stayed up until six, watching the first half of the sunrise, and then went to bed. I would have liked to stay up until breakfast (7 AM), but what was I going to do for an hour? The ship can be rather boring at 6 AM.

The next morning (afternoon), we returned to the ship-restaurant for French fries and Diet Cokes (and more olive tapenade!) before deciding that Steph and I would rather find a way to spend our remaining thirty leva than lay on the beach. We left Jill to her tanning and headed to the Varna mall, where we left most of the rest of our money before heading back to the ship to nap before we left Varna. In two days we will be in Alexandria, and I will be on my way to Cairo with Steph for a four-day nonstop journey to all the major and amazing points of ancient Egypt.