Why can I not escape butt sweat? AKA swass

We have arrived in Bulgaria! The first day we got up early because we had to be in the union to listen to the U.S. ambassador to Bulgaria. He was a little skeevy, but he was alright. He talked a little about how their economy isn't doing as badly as Greece and such, and how they are switching to the euro by 2014 hopefully. I think their money is actually really pretty though. Anyways, he also talked about human trafficking and what they are doing to stop it, and the prejudice towards Turkish people in the area. It was pretty interesting. After that, we had to go get our passports because they want to check each person individually which was annoying. Our first stop when we finally got off the ship was BUNGEE JUMPING! It took us about an hour to walk to Asparuhov bridge which is known for its bungee jumping enthusiasts. We stopped at an ATM to get out money but were really skeptical about which ATM to use because apparently some of the machines around town are fraudulent. We could only use ATMs connected to banks or an ATM that a local used right before us. Luckily, we all were fine and didn’t get our cards stolen which was good. We did see one local go up to a machine, look at it, and walk away. Needless to say, we never used that ATM.

We were pretty sweaty by the time we arrived at the bridge, but as soon as we got on the bridge, I got really nervous. The bridge is about 50 m high or 150 ft. We couldn't find the group that does the bungee jumping, so we just kept walking down the bridge. We finally run into this sketchy yellow tent, and there is this old motor thing  attached to the side of the bridge along with bungee cords. Right when we got there, this girl was about to jump, so we watched her. It was INSANE. Basically, how it works is they harness you in to body harnesses and then hook you up to the main rope. From there, they help you sit on the side of this SUPER HIGH bridge, spin you around, and help you stand on the side of it. Then, they pull you away from the handrail, and you jump. crazy.

So, we walked over to the tent to find about 5 people ahead of us. Megan was starting to freak out by this point because she just wanted to do it, and we had to wait for all these people. So, she went first, then me, Maggie, Isabelle, Amanda, and Juliette jumped, in that order. We had to sign our lives away on a form which he originally handed to us in Bulgarian. Luckily, he had an English version, but none of the guys spoke fluent English. Only very, very broken English which definitely made us feel safe! So, Megan and I get strapped in to our body harnesses, and I am just super excited at this point. We paid our 50 leva which is actually only about 35 bucks. Crazy huh? We also filled out the form which asked some random questions like what our favorite hobbies were, so I wrote down chess because I am a smart ass of course. The guys read it and laughed at it, so I thought it was pretty funny. So, the guys that work there are pretty interesting. The main guy has these crazy dreadlocks and smelled like poop. We had to watch a few more people jump, and one guy hit the water! We were all hoping that would not happen to us. So, after all those people jumped, Megan was up first! She walked over to the bridge with me following behind. They strapped her on to the main bungee cord and helped her to sit up on the side of the bridge. She was freaking out by this point. She stood up on the edge of the bridge, and almost started to cry. Oh, I forgot to mention that it was really windy because we were over the ocean, so that made it even worse. But after about three seconds, she screamed TRUSTFALL (so did I just for Brown) and jumped! It was insane. After watching her jump, I was super nervous since she was the first person I knew that had jumped. Nothing went wrong though, and they threw down the cord that you have to hook on to yourself to get hoisted back up. She got back up and was really excited about it.

So, this is when I started to freak out. Like I literally couldn't talk, I said a prayer, I was super nervous. But of course, before I knew it, the main cord was hooked on, my shoes were off, and I was sitting on the side of this ridiculous bridge. The guys helped me stand up and made me take a step away from the hand hold, but the guy was holding on to my harness. So, I was like "Can you just hold my hand for a second?" and stood on the edge of the bridge holding this grease, disgusting man's hand. Luckily, I didn't look down, I yelled trust fall, and I jumped. The free fall was by far the most intense adrenalin rush of my life. The next thing I knew I was popping out of the ocean into the first catch of the bungee cord. YUP! THATS RIGHT! I hit the ocean! I was the only one of my friends that did! I didn't realize what was going on until the first catch of the cord, and then I started screaming bloody murder. All the blood was rushing to my head, and I couldn't get a grasp on where I was facing because the wind was blowing me in circles. After I stopped moving up and down, the guys threw the cord down to me that I was supposed to hook on. Yet, because it was so windy, I could NOT grab it for the life of me. It kept blowing away. Don't forget that at this point, I am upside-down. My feet were starting to hurt because that is what I was hanging from. It took me about 5 minutes to grab the cord which was a really long time in comparison to everyone that grabbed it in like 10 seconds.

So, they motored me back up, and I watched the rest of my friend's jump. It was really exciting to see everyone do it, but I was pissed I was the only one who hit the water. So, after we were all done jumping, I went up to the dreadlocks man and asked why I hit the water. He asked me if I knew Russian which of course I didn't, so I played charades to show him my question. And you know what the response was? JOKE! He said Joke! They decided they wanted me to hit the water, probably because I put chess on my paper and played a joke on me. So. Not. Funny. But it was fine, and definitely a fun experience.

We went to get something to eat after that because I was seriously exhausted. We all were! All we did was jump off a bridge but for some reason that really takes it out of you. So, I got lamb skewers, rice, and a nice, cold beer. I really like the beer here. Even the cheapest kind. The beer made me feel better. Just all that adrenalin made me really sluggish. We struggled with the waiter at this restaurant because he didn’t speak English that well. He really didn’t like us, but what did he want us to do? He brought an extra cup of soup that we didn’t order, and he got pretty mad about it. They were also playing old 90’s music like the Macarena and Torn by Natalie Imbruglia. We were pretty excited about it because the tv screens were playing the videos too, so we got to see a bunch of old videos.

After lunch, we walked back to the ship to take a nap because we were all still really tired. On the walk back, we ran into this really cute outdoor flea market that was selling touristy stuff and some authentic Bulgarian things. It was really cool, so we decided to come back when we weren’t so exhausted. We got back to the ship, slept for about two hours, and ate dinner on the ship to save a little bit of money. I was still so tired when I woke up from my nap, but I felt better. I was honestly sore from bungee jumping for the next few days. I just don’t think I felt it when I jumped because of how afraid I was. The food on the ship is always better in port anyways because it is fresh. After dinner, we decided to go to this bar that was recommended in Maggie’s tourist book called Bapb. Good luck saying that because I still can’t. We got there, and it was the second floor of this old building. They had these cute little footsteps leading to the stairwell that led upstairs, and as soon as we walked in, I was in love. The door was squishy and stuffed like a couch, and the inside was all different colored walls with really eclectic furniture. The lights above the bar were teapots, shoes, and other weird objects. The place was just really cool looking. So, we sat down in these fancy dining room chairs and ordered some drinks. Mandice and I got mojitos with no ice because we were told not to drink the tap water here, and they were delicious. We were the only ones there except for two other people sitting at the bar because we Americans go out way too early for European standards.

We were relaxing, talking, and drinking our drinks when the guy sitting at the bar came over to talk to us. We quickly discovered he was American and from Texas! He and his girlfriend had been living in Bulgaria for the past two months. They had originally planned to travel around until they had to be in New Zealand in October which is where they were moving to for his new job. Yet, they had both gotten sick in Bulgaria, so they had to stay here until they were healthy again. They were actually headed to Croatia around the time we were leaving Bulgaria. The really interesting thing was that their names were Amanda and Gabriel Painter, and he had his own show on TLC! He is a carpenter and has a show called The Repair Man and some other show I can’t remember. But he was moving to New Zealand for his new show! How cool is that?

They ended up coming over and sitting with us and gave us a bunch of helpful tips about Bulgaria. Firstly, the reason they got sick was from drinking the tap water. Apparently, it is really chlorinated here which our bodies clearly aren’t used to, so they got sick. Also, they told us about the people here and how most people are really reserved and will not approach you because of the influences of Communism that are still present. We had noticed that, but I didn’t know it affect just about everyone in the city. Also, there is a really large imbalance of wealth because when Communism fell, older people joined the mob. So, the mob controls a lot of the clubs and businesses in the area. There is almost no crime around because of how reserved the people are and because if you rob the wrong person, the mob will come after you. For example, if some guy robbed me, and another Bulgarian witnessed it, they would tell the mob, and the mob would go after that person because I am tourist money. They want me to feel safe and comfortable here which would not be the case if I got robbed. Pretty interesting huh? You can tell where the mob bars and clubs are though because there are really expensive cars like BMWs and Range Rovers sitting outside of them.

They told us all these stories, and we told them all about Semester at Sea for a while. They said they had seen some other people from our voyage that were all in neon and wasted at like 4 in the afternoon. Pretty typical, but they told us that if they were disruptive in anyway, they might get handled by the mob which is not a good thing. Jail here is pretty much just getting the shit kicked out of you, so I hope no one got arrested.

We finished our drinks, said goodbye to our new friends, and headed down towards the beach. Maggie, Candice, and I decided we wanted to go to the beach bars, and everyone else went back to the ship to go to sleep. We walked down to this one really nice looking bar and ordered some drinks. There were couches that faced the ocean that we sat on which was nice, but the drinks were expensive, so we decided to walk back to the ship. On our way back though, we walked past this really cool looking tented beach bar and decided to check it out. They weren’t playing techno which was a relief, so we ordered a drink and were chilling over to the side. We saw two fellow SASers going at it while sitting at the bar which was pretty disgusting. It was funny though. After a few minutes, these two guys walked up to us and struck up a conversation. One was a local from Bulgaria, but he was fluent in English because his sister apparently lives in Chicago. The other guy was from Canada and a little creepy. Candice and I talked to the guy from Bulgaria for a while, and he told us more about the area which was interesting. He told us that the bar we were in was getting more and more popular with locals, and three days before we had arrived, the mob ad shut it down. We couldn’t believe it, but he said it was because they were mad they were stealing business away from their bars. It is just crazy to me that they have that kind of power. Candice and I were drinking beer that had like these weird pop tabs. I also had to go to the bathroom, so I walked in and realized it was a squatting bathroom. As in, there is a hole and footmarks, and you squat. That is it. I couldn’t do it because it was too disgusting, so I just held it until we got back to the ship. It was pretty late so we headed back to the ship after two drinks at the cool bar. All in all, it was a really good night and a nice introduction to Bulgaria.