Dear John

I will wake you up by walking on your face.
Dear John,

How are you, my dear chap? I was sorry that I could not invite you to come to Bulgaria this summer, as we were off to Zakynthos in Greece and then some friends of ours from Qatar were supposed to be coming. Anyway, Irena put her pretty foot down when I mentioned your name as well!



J.C. in Kalotina, looking down the valley
The good news is that next summer she is off to the Crimea again (probably early in July) and that will be for about a month or so. Therefore I am planning a Grand Reunion of the Gang of Three – except that actually it is going to be the Gang of Four, as there will be an important addition to the likes of Peter Adams, John Cann and Simon Hill.
Tina is a very naughty little Jack Russell and we love her very much. Her main interests are food, eating, and finding something to scoff. In some ways, she does look a bit like dear Zoika. Her speciality is waking me up in the morning by walking on my face.

Last week we were staying at our country house in Kalotina. Irena and I went for a lovely walk beside the River Nishava. I saw some trout in the river and thought to myself, “I must send an e-mail to John Cann!”



J.C. in the Ladies' Market
Anyway, my dear chap, I very much hope that you will visit us in Bulgaria once again. This time, I will not have to bother with rental cars, as our Nissan X-Trail has now been repaired and goes very well. (It blooming well ought to, as the repairs cost me a fortune). The car did splendidly well in the summer, when we drove from Sofia to the Greek border, down to Thessaloniki and then west to Kalini, for the ferry to Zakynthos. It was our first trip to Greece and we absolutely loved it.

You can read about Greece and just about everything else by going to my blog bulgariawithnoodles.blogspot.com My blog has now had more than 40,000 “hits” and that means that one person has read it 40,000 times. Or maybe 20,000 people have read it twice.

Well, I am quite enjoying my new job at St. George’s School in Sofia. Yes, I am teaching again. Living in Kalotina is wonderful in the summer, of course, but somehow it is not quite so much fun in the winter. In fact, it got a bit boring and I was spending too much time eating, playing computer games and watching TV, so my dear lady wife said, “You might as well get a job!” Irena likes living in Sofia and the school is pretty good. The salary is a bit less than what I was getting in China, but we do have a big two-bedroomed flat next to a huge park, about fifteen minutes' walk from the school. And the school lunch at St. George's is much better than the dreadful Chinese food at Green Oasis.
The additional reason for teaching a bit longer is simple: money. Yes, the TPS did pay me what they promised (quite a good pile of cash for my lump sum and then so much each month). However, the collapse in the value of the pound against the euro has meant that my TPS pension really is worth a lot less. Maybe the pound will recover, once Brexit is finally over, but one wonders if this ghastly Brexit will ever be over. 

Keep me posted. I do want to read about all of latest crazy adventures.

Simon



J.C. during his most recent visit to Kalotina
 

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