It is HOT! After venturing out to explore the parks and track down the grocery stores a few times, Mom, Neva and I retreat into the relative cool of the apartment. Neva gets an early birthday present of Barbie rollerblades, which of course necessitates the purchase of Disney Princess pads and a helmet. When she gets all geared up, we can hardly see Neva through the pink. We have been venturing out to the sidewalk in the relative cool of the evening for her to practice and she is starting to get the hang of the movements and can really take off now. Our daily forays into the great outdoors usually involve the purchase of yet another 5 liter bottle of water (did I mention it was hot?), and a popsicle break on one of the many park benches lined up on the sidewalk under the trees that line our street. We have noticed that she is the only person (of any age) with safety gear, but we’re not ready to adapt to that cultural norm yet. In general, Romanians are very concerned about getting sick and try to stay out of a draft, yet are reluctant to avoid major bodily injury by using protective gear on bikes, rollerblades, and skateboards or by wearing seatbelts in cars.

We have explored several of the parks nearby and even picked up a few Geocaches along the way. The parks are the most amazing I have seen anywhere in the world, with plenty of trees, flowers, grass, ponds, playgrounds, skate parks and walking paths. Even the streets are lined with trees and benches so there is usually plenty of shade and places to rest as we walk around the city. Everyone takes advantage of the outdoor spaces and there are always people out and about enjoying the weather. It is not uncommon to be able to see 3 or 4 different playgrounds from any part of a park and we usually cruise from one to the next and the next on any outing. We have been bringing our PB&Js and having picnics on the benches, but have noticed that we are the only ones doing that. As much as they enjoy their parks, we don't see people having real picnics, either on benches or with a blanket spread on the grass. I'm not exactly sure why, and there's probably some unspoken rule about eating in public that we are breaking causing extreme offense to everyone who sees us and also marking us a foreigners. There are also plenty of port-a-potties around and if you're really lucky, you may chance upon one of the state-of-the-art, magic self-cleaning toilet booths. They are free and clean, although usually a bit damp from the most recent shower cleaning and a much better choice than the alternative. They are also not averse to letting their children use a bush in the corner of the playground for a toilet either, although the adults seem to refrain from this practice. They are definitely on a later schedule than we are used to as we see families out with small children until 10 or 11 at night. I'm assuming these children take naps, as I know it wouldn't work for Neva to go to bed at 11 and get up for school at 7 every day. Our child, however, does not nap, and so we try to get her to bed by 9 or 10. Fortunately, she has taken to sleeping in a bit later in the morning and seems to be getting enough sleep overall, so we're going with the flow. When in Bucharest...

Chris and I dive into the practical issues of finding more permanent lodgings and find an agent that was recommended by one of his coworkers. After looking at about 7 apartments in a few different areas of the city, the clear winner is the large 3-bedroom apartment in a building with a pool. It is unfurnished, however, as it was also listed for sale, but our agent works it out with the owner to supply basic furniture and a washer/dryer at no extra cost to us. It is not as convenient to public transportation with a 10-minute walk to the bus and about 15 minutes to the metro, but we are across the street from the north side of Parcul Herastrau, which is home to several brand-new playgrounds, a ferris wheel, a peacock pen (with several varieties of peacocks), a skate park, a bungee/trampoline jumper, trampolines, and lots of walking paths. All that remains is to figure out the business of international wire transfers. Grammie and Neva spend a few quality days of playing computer games in the air-conditioned apartment while I figure out how to get our money from one bank to another, and then transferred to our landlord and agent. Of course, the transactions are flagged as suspicious activity, so I have to call the banks several times to assure them that I really did authorize the transfers. Not such an easy task given the time difference and the cost of international calls. I burn through the 20 Euros I have on my cell phone and end up running out of money and being disconnected (for the second time) before getting the issue resolved…Grrrr. We finally work it all out and are ready to move in.