BULGARIA - BALKANS, BABES & BOOBIES.... OH MY!

Every year for the past 5 years, my Mom and Dad have rented a cottage on Lake Huron near the town of Bayfield, Ontario and invited us to join them for a week. Their motto is, "If you pay for it, they will come." And so we did. Year after year, we got a week at the beach with some great family time. This year however, Bayfield wasn't going to happen for us. So about 4 months ago my Mom and Dad asked me if they rented a Villa on the Black Sea coast, would we be able to have a family reunion there. ABSOLUTELY! The search was on. The Villa was found on this great site called www.ownersdirect.co.uk. Essentially it's wealthy English people who own places all over Europe and rent them to others while they are not using it.
It was a great place and was easily going to sleep all of us. It was in Varna, Bulgaria, right on the coast of the Black Sea with an awe inspiring view.

We arrived early in the afternoon and were not expecting my parents and brother until after 9 pm. So we decided to take a drive around, go food shopping and go out for supper. We've lived in a foreign, post-communist country for some time now, this should be easy.

Not at all. Romanian is a Latin based language and uses the Latin alphabet, so due to my French language background I am able to figure out what is being communicated. Bulgarian, on the other hand, is very close to Russian and uses the Cyrilic alphabet. We couldn't read one bloody sign. Menus were all gibberish. This was going to be a lot harder than we had thought! So after having a huge fight in the car over where we were going, what and where we were going to eat, we ended up at friggin' McDonalds' of all places. At least we knew the menu had pictures and we could just point to what we wanted. Not a great start! Hopefully it gets better.

That night David went to pick up my family from the Airport while the kids and I waited impatiently to see them back at the villa. The kids tried to stay awake but eventually succomed to their fatigue from a busy day.

It was so great to see them. They had just arrived from Turkey and Greece where they had toured together before meeting us. This is the longest time I have ever spent apart from my mother and father and as juvenile as it sounds, it was great to have them near me again. My brother looked great as usual, he has such a travel bug! He just radiates happiness when he travels. He couldn't wait to see the girls which warmed my heart.

The next 5 days were an adventure in itself. We tried 4 different beaches on 4 different days and were pleasantly pleased with all of them. The water was beautiful and warm. It was clear enough that you could see your legs under the water. The sun was blistering hot day after day. A walk on the beach without sandals was like walking on the surface of the sun. The sting of burning stayed in your feet even after jumping on to a towel or chair. Sunscreen was a must as well as head cover up. Evelyn didn't wear her special Ozone suit the first day and ended up with sun stroke. Ozone suits were worn everyday from that point on. Most of us were good about all the above but some were not. It seems that even though you don't tend to burn in Canada, you will burn to a crisp in Bulgaria! Can you find the person who may have forgone the sunscreen?

You can't go to Bulgaria or any Balkan Country without mentioning the Balkan babes! Wow! Most of these young women are blessed with tiny little bone structures. This is made even more evident due to the fact that they are all (generalizing... sorry) on the Cigarette Diet. Along with the barely clothed look to which many of them subscribe. What is most astonishing though is the set of completely natural, full and round breasts these young women posess. These are naturally thin women with natural huge boobs who live all over the region. It really is no wonder Eastern Europe is the porn capital of the world. Or so I'm told.... You can understand the draw for these young women. They are raised in the families shabby 1 bedroom apartment where they live until they are like 30 because on the wages these people are paid, it takes ages to save up enough for a down payment to buy your own shitty little apartment. Then some guy comes up to them and says,
"Helllloooo sweety. You have natural talent! You can make lots of money by laying on your back. Are you interested?" Can't say I wouldn't think twice about it in their shoes. Thank god I'm Canadian.

Trouble is, after popping a kid or 2 and years of hard living and the cigarette diet, these women don't age very well. At all. The wrinkles around their lips make it look like they are permanently sucking on a smoke. Their skin so tough like leather with deep lines from over exposure to the sun. At middle age where even a cigarette diet can't help, their rear end widens just like any North American. And their boobs! Never stop growing! We are talking stretched out, hanging at the waist, unbelievably huge boobs. Many of whom don't have enough money to buy the F cup size bra they would fit so they don't wear a bra at all.

Just like in the rest of Europe, women are found to be typically topless on the beach. So with a mix of porn stars and cow udders on the beach the entertainment was endless.

"Oh my god, look at her!'
"Yikes, look at those!"
"Heavens sakes are those real?"
"Man he's a lucky guy!"
"God those look heavy!"
"That's what we call Bologna Nipples in Emerg."
"This is like soft porn on the beach!" My mother and father were a little more embarrassed about the nudity thing than we were. Partly because they are square and partly because we were all there together.
As it was bloody hotter than Hates, sunscreen was a must. As we were all slathering ourselves I heard my Dad grunt uncomfortably. I looked up and saw David and my Dad observing a young man rub sunscreen all over his girlfriends breasts. Now I can understanding having your partener rub sunscreen on your back due to the hinge like joint of your elbows, you are not able to reach most areas of your back. But as far as I know and in my experience, the hinge joint allows you to rub the sunscreen on your own chest and onto your breasts if you should decide to go topless. Humm! I looked back at my Dad so I could witness his discomfort in order to make fun of him later and he said,

"Geez, he's not stopping!"

"Would you?" David said laughing barely able to take his eyes off this site. I have to admit, it was kind of hypnotic the way this guy just kept going around and around from one breast to the next. Definately gross, for me, standing right beside my father. For David on the other hand, I think it was one of his most favorite vacations ever.

The next day the view was not so palatable as we couldn't rip our eyes away from watching two young children cover their enormous and topless mother in sand. She lay on her back, laughing as the children shovelled the sand onto her barrel shaped chest and gut. We gasped at the site of her huge breast falling into each armpit making it impossible to put her arms down. Then we were transfixed as she erupted from sand, waddled into the water to rinse off then laid down on the beach on her belly resembling very closely a beached whale.

"You told me there weren't whales in this water Mommy!" my nervous little Evelyn hollerd to me while digging in the sand. I reassured her that there weren't anymore. Good thing she's too young to understand everything but I do have to be more careful.

The men in this section of the world are, for me, nothing special. Now that's not to say that every once in a while a fellow might catch my eye but, for the most part... blah. They are of average height if not short and are also subscribers to the cigarette diet keeping them thin and weak looking when I prefer a big, strong man. There is nothing that turns me off more than to see a guy haul on a cigarette like it's his last breath. Ick! On the 3rd day at the beach we had a young couple sitting to the right of us. She was petite, cute and wore a barely there bikini. He was also petite, not so cute and wore a barely there speedo! They both sat there on the sand playing cards and chain smoking for hours. I glanced over at one point to witness this guy adjust himself in what had to have been a very uncomfortable bathing suit. Got the shock of my life! I approached my Mom and whispered to her so that the children couldn't hear this time,

"Look at him Mom! He's got his legs spread out and his package on display!"

This small speedo left absolutely nothing to the imagination. It clung to every bit of him. With his legs spread out as if he were in stirrups in his semi-recumbent position, it was clear that this small man... was not in proportion!

I watched my Moms reaction, again to document it and make fun later. Her eyes bulged (pardon the pun), and she let out a series of, "Oh, My, Well, Humph, Geez." Then she surprised me with
"...and WHAT a package it is!" Laughter erupted as all the guys looked on. They observed the site but for one reason or another, had no comment this time!

The girls had a great time and spent a lot of it in the water. The temperature was bathlike yet refreshing at the same time. The waves were not too high to create an undercurrent but high enough to have fun. Evelyn had watched a man pluck a huge crab from the water (far out mind you) so for the longest time refused to touch the bottom. Everytime she would get into shallow water she would nervously repeat, "Crabs! Crabs!Crabs! Crabs!" Just like the supportive parents we are, we bugged her until she finally touched bottom. Gabrielle was incredibly brave and ended up jumping some waves on her own! We had loads of fun and even Ruby came in the water for a while.

The city of Varna was not unlike most large post Communist cities leaving much to be desired. The sea of Russian style Communist apartment buildings is visible from every angle of the city. Luckily we didn't spend much time in the city, only on it's beaches which were beautiful. My brother, who had just finished weeks and weeks of 14 to 16 hour days dealing with GM bankruptcy relaxed happily and soaked up some special time with his nieces. They just adore him! I had asked everyone to bring an all white outfit so that we could do some family pictures together on the beach. It was fairly successful and I was happy I had suggested. These are keepers.

Our last day was spent doing some shopping and watching a dolphin show at a beach side aquarium. The girls loved that and thought they were at Marineland! We left that evening bound for Bucharest and Roman the next day. It was sad saying goodbye to my brother as I wouldn't see him now until Christmas. I don't even get to see him on Skype because he does have a PC. I think it's time Jeff! What's it gonna be Mac or PC?

The great part was my parents were going to be meeting us at our house in Roman and staying for 18 days! I was so excited to show them our new life and how well we had settled in. This was my chance to prove to my parents that I was doing okay on my own, even if we did live in the middle of a crappy little town that is swimming in Gypsies. I wanted to prove to them that together, David and I have given the children a safe and happy environment to learn and grow. Mostly though I was excited just to hang out with them during the day and have some adult conversation! Adult conversation in this country is hard to come by when my husband works 12 hour days and on weekends and I have only 2 English speaking friends.

That story will be saved for next time!

Alison xxxxx