There was one particular street, who’s name very helpfully I cannot remember, but if you are ever in town I do suggest you go. Think it begins with C, but that could be their C, so an S between you and me. Then again it might not. Think it ends in ’ska’, which again narrows it down considerably for Belgrade. Cobbles leading down a gentle slope; al fresco dining; lots of Serbians playing their little folk ditties, and good fodder to boot. Actually now I describe it, it sounds like the perfect tourist trap, well maybe it is and maybe we were tourist-trapped but it was nice, really it was. I couldn’t grasp any distinct Serbian food out there but then as a Brit we haven’t got a lot to make our mark about, other than roast beef I guess, and roast chicken, and roast pork, and roast lamb. I do like a bit of lamb, me. Never been massive on mint sauce though.

One thing I found clever was how the main road comes sweeping over a bridge directly into town. Like the M4 going in as far as Hyde Park Corner. The place was a lot moreWestern, a bit more with it than Sofia. Not saying this as being better or worse (it’s better), merely an observation.

Look, the truth of the matter is that I haven’t got a great deal to say about the place as it was mostly either work or the hotel. Seems I just have some compulsion now to annotate wherever I go. Timewaster.

Serbian road maintenance

Right baby, things have rushed along all too fast. May! where did that come from? “No time, no time.” I now find myself on my third trip away. The current contract I had wanted for about three years; that I started eight months ago, is now in full swing. This means I’m working abroad a lot so I didn’t see you for the majority of your 18th month, in fact so far it’s averaging that I’m away for three weeks then back for just one. So you and I have spent far less time than we should together. This is not cool, but it’s just the way the old cookie doth crumbulate, being torn between wanting to spend as much time as possible with VIPs (that’s you and the rest of our family and friends by the way), getting on in a career of some description, and other things that are important to me such as travel. I did start this letter during my four weeks in Sofia then subsequently spent ten days in Belgrade and now it’s a month overdue.

So this is all far too many days to to be away from both you and your PREGNANT MUMMY. We’ve attempted explaining to you that there’s a little brother or sister cooking away inside Mumma’s tummy but obviously you haven’t got a clue wtf we’re on about.

On picking me up from airport when I got back from Sofia the recognition was immediate, you cuddled in but then held back to analyze me for a moment as I was sporting the classic disguise of a full-on beard and my increasingly weak specs. Mumma did her best to drive us home and you began this kind of chat, which I think is some kind of reassurance device. Or insolence:

You: “Dadda?”
Me: “Yes baby?”
You: “Dadda?”
Me: “Yes Frankie?”
You: “Dadda?”
Me: “Yes beautiful?”
You: “Dadda?”
Me: “How can I help?”
You: “Dadda?”
Me: “What can I do for you?”
You: “Dadda?”
Me: “Yes Frankie Spratty?”
You: “Dadda?”

etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum.

Tanzania
Our holiday in east Africa seems a long time ago already. I’m glad you got to spend a bit of time with your uncle Charlie, he seems to have spent his time out there as headmaster wisely so no longer treats you or other young children as infected, which is a real bonus. Most of the trip was spent beaching it on Zanzibar though, loverly. Which reminds me that we must somehow get to beaching it again somewhere this summer.

Month 18 phot (shot by Mumma, so you’ll notice the photographic improvement)

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Snippets

• In a bar in Dar Es Salaam you’d go up to randoms, playing the ‘name that body part game’, pointing and touching, then letting them know which part of their face it was. Endearing.
• You went through a stint of fiddling with the old fandango whenever your nappy was off. And then putting your finger in your mouth! And then getting in a huff when I’d go to cover you up again.
• You’ll often reverse into us in order to sit down or be cuddled.
• You really have to stop playing with your eyeball. It’s a habit you picked up quite a while back now and you’ll do it mostly when your tired. You make the area below your right eye swell up a tad and I’m sure you’ll do damage if you keep at it. Stop it you nutter.
• First sentence: Mumma sit please.
• First four word command: Mumma gone, Dadda come.

Vocabulary
Explaining the difference between a seagull and a duck or say a donkey and a horse to a one and a half year old is a challenge. I’m pretty inarticulate at the best of times, you try it one day. Your language otherwise is coming on well. I was going to list your vocab here but it’s already pretty much too many to keep track of. Sometimes we’ll say a word and you’ll come straight back with it. So what we definitely did not do whilst lying out in the garden in Maidenhead after work one day was take advantage of this by encouraging you to say THE C WORD then high five each other when you did. Nosireebob we did not do that.

Chats
Whilst I’ve been away, Mumma and I have been chatting online quite a bit but neither of us is particularly good at distance comms. Some transcripts though:

Kate: …Loving rolling around in the grass. When eventually she came in this evening she demanded we go upstairs but not before she walked into the lounge, kissed my computer, waved and said bye bye… She quite often points at it and says “Dadda?”

Sent at 22:03 on Wednesday
Kate: …she asks for a drink and then i have to show her a variety of cups until i have the one she wants. Then she gives a very definite nod. I then hold ribena in one hand and squash in the other and she points at the one she wants.

Sent at 22:05 on Wednesday
Kate: it is similar at bed time. I hold up a book one at a time. She is empathic in her no’s and when she gets to one she thinks she ones she tilts her head to one side raises her eyebrows then nods like a lunatic.

Stuff like that melts me bleeding ‘eart.

Of an evening you’ll now decide when’s a suitable time to retire (regularly earlier than what we had in mind) with one of these commands: “Teeth” or “Bubbles”. Then early mornings you’ll summon one of us like so:

Mumma, come?
Mumma, come.
Mumma, come!

Right now am about to hit the sack for the night here in Port of Spain, Trinidad. Can’t wait to see you in 3 weeks. Really wish you were here.

Love,

Dadda x

Happy chappie

Was due to fly home on Frankie’s year and a half birthday but stayed out there an extra 5 days whilst the project continues to behave erratically. It went a little groundhog day for us, only without the fun of telling people what you think of them and there being no comeback.

A couple of things worth mentioning though:

Between the hotel and the embassy we’d walk through a leafy park where chess is a massive spectator sport. Maybe up to 25 old boys gathered around one little table, with maybe 10 tables thoughout the park, all wearing concentrated frowns and giving it large on the strokey-beardy action. I’d say that a more worthwhile spectator sport is spectating the spectating.

Eastern Block

Said park has a resident moustachioed accordion player, even at 8am. No rest for the wicked.

And if you ever find yourself in need of a meal in Sofia, food will always be served in the order it’s cooked so that as you start to eat, your mate’s just finishing up. And don’t expect any food to be delivered hot, you get luke at best.

Although I can’t really comment on the rest of Bulgaria and it was a shame I didn’t get to see any more than Sofia, I won’t be rushing back there.