A Newcomer to Bucharest

Although I have only reached the grand age of two and half weeks I feel it is long enough to give some first impressions about life in Bucharest in my capacity as a dual nationality, semi-expat, semi-Romanian.

My first surprise was upon my arrival in Bucharest courtesy of Dr. Petrache at the Euroclinic on Floreasca. From what I had heard from inside Mummy”s tummy Bucharest was supposed to be a rather dirty place with rubbish bins over-flowing, bad pavement holes in the road and dust everywhere.

In fact my first hours were spent wheeling around the rubbish and dust free smooth surfaces of Euroclinic without so much as a stray dog in sight, not at all what I was lead to believe from Mummy”s conversations with her friends that I had been eavesdropping on for the last few months.

At the same time I had also heard many great things about Romanian food and the wide selection of international restaurants available to all newcomers to Bucharest so I was somewhat disappointed to be put on a diet of milk. I had heard that Mummy was supposed to drink more milk to look after her teeth but as I don”t have any right now I”m not sure why I have to be fed on the stuff constantly.

I thought this rather boring diet would stop after a left hospital but its still the same everyday. In protest I have decided that instead of going on hunger strike I will do the opposite, eat constantly. Any time of day or night all I need to do is open up my lungs, make a loud noise and a grumpy parent comes running in to my new bedroom at home.

Unfortunately this plan to exhaust my parents into agreeing to vary my diet and start me on ciorbas, mici and a cheesecake dessert from Uptown restaurant Mummy used to talk about so much is having totally the opposite effect. Its just milk and more milk.

Aside from my diet, other parts of life in Bucharest are far more varied. I now enjoy taking a stroll every day in one of the parks, although I am far too lazy to walk so I let Mummy or Daddy put me into my little pram and take the strain of pushing me through the paths whilst I eye up the other kids and get stroked and kissed by passing strangers. My little pram is great. It comes from a place called Mothercare. I”m not sure where or what this is but Daddy keeps saying “How much!” every time something arrives in bags from there so perhaps they keep delivering too many of the same thing.

Apart from one trip in Daddy”s big pram back from the hospital I am not yet an expert in moving around in these big looking machines although I did notice that they make lots of noise at traffic lights and there were lots of big prams with “Taxi” written on their sides that had men leaning out of them waving their arms around and shouting. I can definitely see that these Romanians are not a quiet lot, although all of the noise never seemed to resolve anything, which I found a little confusing.

Another noise I am getting used to is barking from all of the dogs that live near our house. When I go outside for a sunbath I can often hear them barking at anything that moves. I heard Daddy say that people have them for security but as they bark all the time this seems like a total waste of time and instead they just seem to ruin the peace and quiet of my sunbathing. Perhaps I am too young to understand.

Even the humans that I meet keep making strange noises in different voices. Mummy speaks to me using one set of noises and Daddy in another. It seems very confusing but I did hear Mummy once say that Daddy was a bit stupid and couldn”t speak in the same language as Mummy. I”m not sure I understand what she meant but he definitely makes different noises to those Taxi pram people I saw on my trip back from the hospital. I think this has something to do with the fact that I have a birth certificate in one colour and a passport in another.

I wasn”t allowed to go with Mummy and Daddy to collect the birth certificate but I think they must have enjoyed the experience too much to spoil themselves going again there soon as Daddy kept repeating “one trip to the City Hall is enough for a lifetime” when he came back.

I am looking forward to exploring Bucharest more in the coming weeks and apparently I will be going swimming soon in a big pool as soon as I have had a small swim in a small pool with the help of some men with big beards who hold things that smoke a lot. This all sounds very confusing but apparently it has something to do with being Orthodox. I did hear Mummy say that Orthodox was best and that Daddy was anyway something to do with the Church of England, which she said doesn”t count anyway. What does she mean?

Daddy then said something about a big party afterwards, which sounds to be like I will be stroked and kissed by a gang of strangers who have a funny smell on their breath just like Daddy does when he comes back to the house very late and Mummy tells him off for being in the pub. What can she mean?

All this typing is tiring me out and I”ve only slept 5 times today so I think I need another nap. Bye for now.

Harry

* iHarry Meister is planning on going to Oxford University and being super successful if his parents have anything to do about it and he will play for Manchester United if his Grandfather gets his way.