Today is a big travelling day with Bulgarian airline Balkan Airways flying from Athens to Sofia in Bulgaria. Two very recent crashes are in the news. One a Pan Am crash and the other an Ozark Airlines crash in St. Louis. Woke up at 8 a.m. and could have slept in but that would have meant missing breakfast. Had a good hot shower wondering what the hot water situation in Bulgaria will be. I carefully put my ponytail behind my collar and put on the most decent clothes I brought. Cold toast and some cake for breakfast and I managed to get some more cake from an English couple who were not eating it. Taxi to airport and the flight was delayed for two hours so passengers got a voucher for a free beverage. After a two hour delay we boarded the plane full of seedy looking men in poor quality suits. On a Russian TU-134 which looks like a DC-9. The interior of the lane was a dull gray and the tables a slab of grey metal. The seats were small and the stewardesses very dour. Take-off was smooth and I must admit I was nervous given the two plane crashes. Lunch was amusing; a salami sandwich and a thick plastic cup they filled with mineral water. They didn’t announce the landing so when the engines suddenly switched power I thought this is it! But we landed on a bumpy tarmac. Everything is so green here like Canada. Customs was a breeze and they, unlike the paranoid East Germans didn’t bother to look at the luggage. I felt like a Martian with so many people staring at me and my long shoulder length hair liberated from its ponytail. I took an 84 bus into Sofia and then a number 10 tram. I managed to find a state tourist office which had a poster for a student dormitory and in the rain caught a #14 tram out in the suburbs. Loads of Iraqis and Turks around. Holding my money tight. I shared my room with an Italian student and popped out went to bed after listening to some opera as that was the only clear station the radio could pick up.
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