Marta and I have been here almost a week and time flies. Already we’ve had several dinners with her parents, coffee at countless sidewalk cafes, and enjoyed the lovely May weather. We’ve also had our friend Plamena from FSU visiting Burgas while she does her fieldwork (in ethnomusicology) south of the city. (She is from Plovdiv.) Tomorrow we will join her on a trip into the mountains to visit a village that has it’s annual spring celebration scheduled for Sunday. We are hoping to catch some fire-walking and just soak up the “folk culture” in general. I’m sure that the trip will generate some commentary, so I’m looking forward to sharing with anyone who bothers to read.

I commented to Marta the other day about the fact that when you travel abroad, you see both the good and bad things about American so much more clearly. I’m afraid I don’t have my thoughts formulated to the extent that I’m ready to publish my opinion for just anyone to read, but it is certainly a theme that comes up every summer when I’m abroad. All I will say at this point is that the general attitude towards America is so much worse than it was just 5 years ago and that if you hear the propagandists from Fox News claim that it’s not because of “Dubble-U” you should take a moment to let out a hearty belly laugh.

This picture is one of the more humorous moments I’ve seen from our apartment window this past week. This man was using this yellow tape to warn pedestrians that there was work going on in an apartment above street level, and that there was falling glass. As each person passed, he would try to convince them to walk around the area, and some would actually listen. Others were convinced only when another piece of glass crashed to the sidewalk at their feet. No one was hurt, and no one was really in any serious danger, aside from this guy of course.