Croatia: Days 3 and 4, possibly 5...

Blunder and Lightening

So the weather took a turn for the worse as some storm came over from Italy. It was pretty impressive thunder and lightening, with torrential rain ruining any sort of outdoor plans. It's been bucketing down for the past two or three days. I've had a few technical problems with the tournament, which has resulted in me being a bit of a narky git. I'm doing a FIDE chess trainer course which involves a lot of speaking and a lot of sitting down.

I just re-read my last post. I take it all back. After spending four or five days with the children I can confirm anyone under the age of sixteen is crazy. They'll get super hyper sometimes and spur each other on, until eventually someone takes it too far and breaks something / hurts themselves. They'll be sad sometimes and tell each other their woes with sincere faces and watery eyes. Sometimes they'll be in a mixed bi-polar state, sleeping on the couches for a few minutes before popping up and knocking a balloon around whilst laughing hysterically. It's actually a load of work, but its great fun.

I'm limited on the funny stories front as I cant really write about much on this trip. I sat for about 15 minutes trying to make one up that only involved me, but then a crazy child dived over the back of the couch and tried to make me consume a Knight, whilst cackling uncontrollably and asking if I'd had my five a day.

Croatia: Day 1 and Day 2.

Croatia

Its mental to think we only got here two days ago. The accommodation is totally great. The rooms and spacious, the beds are comfy, and all rooms have a cheeky balcony. The food is pretty good too - there's a wide variety of well prepared foods to cater for even the fussiest of teeth. 

I'm just coaching this tournament (As opposed to playing in it.) so I thought it would be more relaxing and allow me to focus on having a bit of fun with the kids and showing them some tricky sidelines so they can bewilder their opponents into something they don't know. It turns out most of the enemy kids know absolutely everything, and if they don't know it they can make up something good enough to deal with the cheap tricks.

The responsibility aspect is incredible - I've been trying to work it out from a psychological point of view - I used to think parenting / being responsible for kids was really tough work in which adults kindly donate a large portion of their effort and time (Time they would rather spent on themselves.) to nurture the kids into hard working, positive adults. Instead, it feels more like some kind of weird hedonistic reassurance. If the kid makes a mistake I can point the mistake out, and I get a little mental kick thinking "Yeah, He'll learn from that and I already know that.". If the kid acts or says something daft, I can giggle with the other parental bystanders and reply with a witty answer, whilst giving the "Ahh, To be young and silly!" rolling of the eyeballs.

Now that I've got two hours to myself, I feel like I've earned it. I feel like its my time, because I've given the morning, some afternoon and probably most of the evening helping the kids with chess and making sure their OK. Reading these paragraphs back, I sound well old. I'm not even sure if it makes any sense. I'm not sure if its offensive to parents / adults responsible for kids either. Two days looking after a trio of children and I think I'm the next Marie Curie.

I cant end this post with such serious, mature patter - So instead I'll write about the swimming pool adventures from yesterday. Their was one non-bloggable event which was awkwardly funny (You'll have to ask for the story.), but we had some great time's throwing three small inflatable balls around the pool. Some older, either drunk or slightly crazy Croatian man jumped in and started joining in, throwing the balls around in a circle. The pace was picking up with every lap, until eventually people were launching the balls full force at each other and much laughter ensued. The game ended after the potentially insane Croatian man whalloped the ball off one of the children's faces, whilst hysterically laughing. We checked they were ok, gave each other looks like "You've taken that too far.", "Hes taken that too far right?" and "Yeah, hes ruined it.", then climbed out the pool and dried off in the thirty degree sun. 

Moldavia Continued

With or without olives

We went out for food last night and to watch the champions league game. Football is such a shit sport, but the other boys like it so I tagged along once they mentioned they serve a litre of beer for only two euros. The football was shit, but we ordered some food and drank some beer. Vlad ordered me a pizza, stating twice "Without olives". I hate the salty little drupes with a vengeance, so was a little surprised and disgruntled when the guy brought my pizza over with them on it. Alex alerted the waiter to the mistake, and his reaction was hilarious. He looked at me, then back to the pizza, shrugged his shoulders and said, "She's new and young. (Referring to the chef)" and walked off without a care in the world. Imagine if that happened in Britain?! It would cause a shit storm. I ate the olives and pretended to be happy, but I'll make sure we don't go back to that place in a hurry.

We streamed our show for the first time last night, and it was absolutely amazing fun. We peaked at 52 viewers, with 30 of them clicking the follow button to be notified when we stream again. Considering we did nothing really in terms of advertising, we were both really happy with the result and we're busy planning how to increase the numbers and make the stream even more wild!

This morning Vlad and Alex invited me to go to the gym with them. I asked how much it would cost, but Vlad said he was good friends with the owner and flashed a cheeky smile at Alex. The gym turned out to be the remains of a play park 200m from their house, with alot of metal bars at various heights to do different exercises on. I asked what had happened to the park, and why doesn't somebody fix it? Turns out this was one of the better play area's, since the table tennis table (A slab of concrete with no net) was still in one piece.

The days been generally lazy - even though it was 25 degree's outside, we've mainly been inside trying to plan new ideas for the stream. Its just too exciting and fun!

Tomorrow I think we're going to rent some bikes and ride around the city. Hopefully my arms will still function after doing ten push-ups at a time. (You do it Mikey! I know you do it!)

Moldova

Malderavie

Finally got to Moldova after quite a hectic twenty hours, with all three planes being delayed. This place is fantastic - It's like someone took Edinburgh zoo and let all the animals go, then broke some of the enclosures and graffiti'ed others, then put all the animals back. All the buildings are tall, square blocks of similar looking flats, and we've yet to come across a park which has play equipment that's still functional.

I've been here for two or three days, and already we've done so much. The wine and food is cheap as chips here, and is really tasty. Walking about the city is awesome - There's homeless people everywhere drinking on benches, starring you out as you walk by - Yet the roads are full of rich people driving ferrari's and porsche's. Water is scarce here - nah its not really, but you have to run the hot tap for twenty minutes until you get any sort of heat, which makes showering and washing the dishes a bit of fun. Vlad tells me that since we're at the top of the building, that's why it takes so long, and we're actually helping everyone else in the building to get their h2o flowing. Sure enough a few trips down the stairs saw a few cleaner than usual oldies coming out their flat and greeting us with a spasebas (Thanks in Russian) and a smile.

Vladimir's pad consists of one bed room and a living room. His flat mate (Ogre) sleeps in the bed room, meaning we get a couch each in the living room.

The bottom of each tree is painted white, to reflect the car's headlights in the dark. (When they asked me why I thought this was, I queried it was some rebellious young Moldovan street gang trying to make a statement.)

The roads are madness. If you cross anywhere other than a zebra crossing or traffics lights showing green, you will die. However if your on a zebra crossing, cars will stop faster than MC Hammer.

The language is tough as hell - I've been trying to pick up words when other people speak, but progress is slow. They speak so fast, and everyone seems to shout angrily at each other.

One of the main reasons for coming out here was to stream a bit of chess online with Vladimir. We've decided on the name ChessBS for our stream, and today we're going to buy a webcam and an orange squeezer. (Vladimir is adament we cant stream without freshly squeezed orange juice.)

After proofreading this post (Yeah I proofread...) I realized I make Moldova sound shite. It's actually really great - All the little quirks like the hot water and painted tree's just make this place so real - You really enjoy a shower when you have to wait twenty minutes for it, and after a few wines walking home your extremely grateful to the tree-painter.

Ogre has a car, so the plan is in a few days to go to Transnistria, a country that isn't really a country and if you go to jail your own country cant help you get out. We're also planing a trip to Romania.

**Edit: Added some pictures of the fun we had at the market place. And our successful trip to the second hand shop.

Plzen, Czech Republic - Day 3 and 4

Plzen - Day 3

Yesterday was a tough day - Andy tried to wake me before 12 o'clock. I told him I'd meet him downstairs, then went back to sleep. Counts as a win in itself! I was playing against the Greek legend, Epaminondas Korousis. It was an interesting game that went to the end of the time control - The position was about equal, but he made some complications and I messed it up a bit. He won, but it should have been drawn. I'm sure there was more I wanted to add yesterday - But I was so tired I fell asleep as soon I got back to the accommodation (I was that tired I even forgot to clean my teeth!).

Plzen - Day 4 

The past few days haven't really been that exciting, so I'm trying to make something up just now to make this text a bit more fanciful. My game today was against one of the Russian team, Mr. Simkin. It was a really interesting game, we both made mistakes, but I managed to win it overall. So at the end of four rounds I'm on three points, sitting joint second, and Andy is on three and half, making him joint first. Its only a seven round tournament, so three big matches over the next few days! Tune in tomorrow for more exciting blogging...

End of Brno - Start of Plzen

End of Brno

The last few days have been pretty hetic, hence no blog updates. I'll try to pick up where I left off, but to be honest it feels like weeks ago!

Our final days at Brno were fruitful. On the last day, as we were getting on the bus to go to the venue, I noticed two Czech people dressed as elves. They both wore long green cloaks, and had crafted replica swords out of household items. They must have been traveling to some role playing event via public transport. I was giggling behind them the whole way, envious of their courage to ride the local bus dressed like a homosexual Legolas. I won my last game after a tough fight. We had a while to wait for the train, so we hung around for the prize giving ceremony. Turns out I won a grading prize of 500 Kc, which converts to about 18 pounds. And to think my teachers at school said I wouldn't amount to anything...

We travelled to Plzen with Mondus and the Russians. Mondus (Epiminmondus Kourosis) is a Greek FM, and a really cool guy. The Russians consisted of Grandmaster Ivanov, and an older guy who seemed fragile to begin with, but out ran all of us to the train by atleast a good three seconds. Peter C left the team at this point to head back to Luton, so it was onwards and upwards to Plzen.

Start of Plzen

We arrived here about half past ten a night or two ago - Then headed for our accommodation. We got a lift with Anze and Maja (Lovely people that we usually spend evening meals with.) to our accommodation - We drove about fifteen minutes out of the city and into what can only be described as the "Plzen Bronx". I recon not even J Lo would stand a chance it was that shite. We pulled up to our hostel alongside an ambulance and a police car with their sirens flashing. The reception area wasn't that bad to be fair, but once we actually got into the room we both just wanted to die. The place was miserable - It was like the Haunted Shack from Harry Potter mixed with thirteen dying kittens. We somehow managed to stay one night there, woke up early the next day and managed to sort different premises for the following night (Tonight). The first round was tonight and me and Andy both won. We met some of the other players of the tournament after the game, and some are staying at the horrible hostel. I'm not religious, but ill say a wee prayer for them as I lay down in my cozy, clean bed tonight.

Brno, Czech - Day 5

Day 5 - Double games with un-rhymable names.

Today was the double round day so I'm absolutely knackered. Last night was rather exciting - We got back to the drugs den around ten o'clock, and started preparing for today. Five minutes in the electricity went off, causing widespread panic and fear.

We woke this morning and headed for the playing hall still watt-less. I won this mornings game, playing some dodgy line that made for an interesting game. After my game an old Czech man tapped me on the shoulder, so I followed him over to a board where he proceeded to show me a line in the opening I had played. I didn't really understand the point of the whole exercise, but after the final move he smiled at me, laughed a little, then patted me on the back. Peter C lost this morning and Andrew drew.

This afternoon was interesting - I messed my game up big style but managed to hold a draw somehow. Peter C won and Andrew drew. I'm pretty tired and cant really be boogered typing any more. And to top it all off I've got Andrew and Peter C lecturing me that I cant make up and use words after asking them how to spell boogered. Maybe they should booger off.