Ellis and Jodie's Bulgarian Adventure

In mid December, our offices moved to The Mall, the fourth and biggest mall in Sofia. This mall is also known as Carrefour, as that is the main store there. Carrefour is a huge supermarket, clothing goods store, electronics shop, and more, all rolled into one. And that is just one of the stores in The Mall. Our offices were in one of the buildings alongside The Mall. I (Ellis) was no longer able to walk to work, as getting there was a 20 minute taxi ride at best, and a burden that could be more than an hour in the evening traffic. The new offices were very nice. Jodie's company was on the 8th floor, while my company was on the 5th floor. We tried out the many different restaurants in the fast food court during our lunch breaks. Our Carrefour days are over now, as Thursday was our last day of work and we begin our preparations for our upcoming return to Israel.

Another restaurant on our list of must-try dining experiences in Sofia was finally visited this past Sunday. JJ Murphy's is a very authentic Irish pub in the center of the city and we had lunch there. Jodie had the Leprauchan Burger and I had the Steak Sandwich. We had a side order of Onion Rings which topped off the good food. To drink, Jodie had a Guinness while I went for a half pint of Murphys Stout. (And, by the way, the sign pictured in the previous post is in the building entrance just across the street).

A Bulgarian traffic policeman pulls over a car for speeding. "You were driving with 60 km/h, and there is 50-km/h limit here!" the officer tells the driver. "No, I was driving 40 km/h," the driver starts arguing. "I can show you what the radar detected!" retorts the officer, already getting upset. The driver's wife speaks from the back seat, "There is no point, officer - when my husband is drunk it is really no use arguing with him!" From the Sofia News Agency .

The special Christmas tram on Vitosha:

Despite the -5 degrees Celsius on Sunday, we took a long walk with the successful goal of buying me jeans. After completing this purchase at a shop below the NDK plaza, Jodie agreed to continue walking towards the center of the city. Eventually we found ourselves on Angel Kunchev Street and this time we were able to try out Annette , Sofia's Morrocan restaurant. We were the only lunchtime diners and enjoyed the ambience that was, well, very Moroccan in style. We found so many tasty dishes listed on the menu, attributed to the owner's mother's original Moroccan recipes. But as we were there for lunch, we selected sandwiches. I had a pita meatball sandwich; the pita was also filled with aubergines, carrots and a tomato paste. Jodie chose the pita with falafel, tahina, and aubergines. Our sandwiches were served with a very tasty green salad. We drank homemade lemonade. The food was very good and we may end up returning to try Annette's main courses.

As I mentioned last week, we were having problems with our televeision reception, and had to have the cable guys out here twice last weekend to fix the problem. Although they restored most of the channels, they still left us with poor reception on a few, since it was "raining". We had good reception on all of the channels for a couple days, but as the weather became more unpredictable, so did the reception - until we lost all reception on any channel above 28. This, by the way, was true only in the evening, when we're actually home and want to watch TV - during the day, the reception was just fine. After another call to the cable guys, they promised to contact us on Friday, which they finally did at around 5:00 pm - promising to come out the next morning at 11:00. Of course, at this point, we had perfect reception on all the channels, as the weather was clear and crisp outside. The two technicians showed up the next day at 10:40, turned on our TV, and then went to find th...

Since our arrival in Sofia, Ellis and I have been working in the Mandarin Office Center. This constitutes 2 very modern glass buildings which house quite a number of businesses, including a few connected Israeli businesses. We have enjoyed working at Mandarin. Aside from the modern offices, the building is fairly close to where we live - a 7 min. taxi ride for me (if there isn't too much traffic) and a 25 min. walk for Ellis. In a desire to have all the connected companies closer to each other, and with more office space than is currently available (companies are split between different floors and buildings), it was decided to move all the companies to new offices. The new offices are next to the third largest mall in Sofia, and near the airport. This will mean a much longer trip to and from work each day, and Ellis will have to come with me in the taxi, as it is too far to walk. My company is moving out this weekend, and we will all meet at the new offices on Monday morning. Ellis...

This evening, members from Bulgaria's Chabad Jewish Community Center came to our office building for a Hanukkah candlelighting ceremony. They knew that there are many Israelis working in our building and this was their way of ensuring that as many Jews as possible observed the mitzvah of lighting the Hanukkah candles. Many curious Bulgarians from the various companies in our building also joined the ceremony and heard an explanation about Hanukkah. The blessings were recited and the candles on the Hanukkiah were lit. Traditional Sufganiyot doughnuts were given out to all (very small and with no traces of jam inside). Happy Hanukkah!

Recently, we've had problems with some of our channels on TV, with poor or no signal, which comes and goes at will. This, of course, always happens at the most tense moment of the show that you happen to be watching. After extremely strong winds last week, we lost all of our channels totally. I called the satellite company, and managed to find someone who spoke English. She very nicely listened to the problem, and asked me to hold while she put me through to the service dept. I was connected to someone who also spoke some English, and who walked me through a series of steps and menus on the TV to restore our signal. This worked for channels 1-12, but all the channels above that still had no signal. After trying a few more things, I was told that someone would contact us in the next 3 days, and come and realign the satellite. On the third day, after still no word from the company, I called again, and got the same, pleasant speaking English speaker that I spoke to a few nights earli...

On the occasion of my birthday, Jodie and I made reservations at Egur, Egur, an Armenian restaurant in Sofia. We didn't know what to expect but we had heard good reviews of the place. Egur means "come" in Armenian, so we felt we were being invited to try something new. A taxi navigated the narrow one-way streets in the center of the city and dropped us off in front of the restaurant. We felt like we were walking into someone's home, as the dining areas were separate rooms and we had a table reserved in the non-smoking area. There was a piano along one wall and everywhere there were framed sheets of music. The waiter brought us the English language menus as well as some "welcome bread" (similar to pita) and small bowls of cheese. Everything on the menu sounded so interesting, and different from what we were used to eating, however Jodie's plan to start with Olive Soup met with an apology from the waiter. Soups were only served at lunchtime. Jodie started ...

According to media reports both here and in Israel, the Bulgarian Interior Ministry announced late on Thursday that some 90 Bulgarian firefighters will fly to Israel at the order of Prime Minister Boyko Borisov to help combat the fire on the Carmel. Later, the Ministry said the operation was called off but the firemen did leave for Israel eventually. This morning the Israeli media reported that the firefighters had arrived in Israel. Our thoughts and prayers go out to Israel and to those affected by this horrific fire.

On the eve of the first night of Chanukah, a new Jewish preschool was dedicated in Sofia. Gan Balagan is a collaborative project of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) and Shalom, Bulgarian Jewry's social and cultural organization. Gan Balagan is the first Jewish preschool to open its doors in the city in the more than half a century since the "Anna Ventura" school property was confiscated from the Jewish community by the government in 1958. Gan Balagan is located in the Beit Shalom Jewish Community Center across from the Sofia synagogue and caters to more than 20 children, ages 2-5 years. The preschool provides the children with kosher meals, Hebrew and Jewish education, and Jewish-themed toys. More information can be found on the JDC website .

A Bulgarian woman is talking to her fiance. "Honey, my eyes are blue like the pretty sky, right?" "Umm, yeah...," said her beloved man. "And my lips are like the blossom of a rose, right?" "Aha..." "Oh, dear, how much I love it when you say such romantic, poetic things to me." From the Sofia News Agency .