Last night, I hosted a small dinner party for some friends. Things managed to come together more-or-less according to plan. Or, at least, it seemed to be that way for a while.

Ron, an American reader of this blog, had come on his third visit to Romania — birthplace of his wonderful wife Maria — and managed to smuggle in some very rare beer from New England.

Lucky sort that I am, the beer was destined specifically for me. Very cool.

Although the first speculation was I might go to see him in Sebeş, we ended up settling on a plan for him to come visit Braşov instead. They arrived earlier than expected and had some trouble with the hotel (who had cancelled their reservation in an apparent attempt to hike the price up belatedly). But they found another place and managed to do a little shopping along Republicii.

Bunissima was with me when Ron called late in the afternoon to verify my address before arriving by taxi around 18:00. After bringing the couple up the elevator in order to secure my precious (and delicious) beer, we headed out on foot for the nearby Carrefour.

He’s thinking about moving to Romania and I wanted to expose him to the megamart offerings he’ll find upon relocating. Of course, he’d already been to the fine Kaufland store in Alba Iulia which has a wide selection, but ultimately pales in comparison to Carrefour.

While we were browsing through the electronics, alcohol, and fresh produce, he tried to convince me that Braşov had a Kaufland store as well. Of course, I know my town and that’s a load of hogwash. He had the nerve to actually claim the Kaufland store was nearby.

So, after some push and shove, I bet him a dollar.

Loaded up with a varied selection of beers and wines, plus the ingredients for the night’s meal, we stood in line for half an eternity in order to check out from one of the dozens of cashiers working the evening shift. Once we had escaped, it was a short trek back to the apartment.

On the way, he pointed out that across the street from Carrefour (and closer to the McDonald’s) was a brand new Kaufland sign that had just been erected in the last day or two.

Only days before, I had walked the same length and do not recall seeing it. And it didn’t matter that Kaufland isn’t opened for business yet, he was technically correct-ish.

He insisted on American money. I coughed it up.

Now, the proper plan had been for Romer!can to do his kitchen magic for the evening. I had planned a veritable feast of fajitas, a dish at which I excel, in amounts large enough to feed eight adults. It must be clarified that Bunissima is a master at making tortillas from scratch, so she got things started while I attempted to entertain our guests.

By the time Mara, the always fun friend of a friend, and the fiendishly humorous Bradutz arrived near 20:00, I found myself making conversation and idling away the time… while poor Bunissima discovered herself abandoned in the bucatarie.

Fortunately, over the course of severals dinners past, I can at least lay feeble claim to the cop-out that I’d trained her well in the fine art form of mexican food.

Rareş, the oft-mentioned Griviţei Ambassador de Gara, showed up in the company of an independently-minded Teo around 22:00. He’s a constant spectacle and she was a riot herself.

Rareş and I have talked about Ubuntu before, off and on. Since my living room had essentially been turned into an internet cafe with multiple seats, I slipped very comfortably into the role of show-off by loudly demonstrating for everyone just how flippin’ impressive my new Beryl-on-Ubuntu is (thanks to C. Ovidiu for the prompting).

With eight of us packed into a single apartment, the noise got a little loud between the streaming music, the several conversations, all the beer, all the wine, and the sound of Bunissima gloriously man-handling the kitchen in front of a revolving audience of curious inquisitors.

I’m not precisely sure what happened with the time. We could measure it in alcohol consumption, but I don’t remember anyone paying too much attention to that. My best guess is the huge, nearly single-handed effort to cook food for everyone, despite the comical interruptions of almost everyone distracting our chef heroine, resulted in a massive dinner served up near the midnight hour.

The guests paraded through the kitchen one after another.

Grab a plate, find a fresh tortilla handmade from scratch, place a portion of branza cedar down a center stripe, scoop some spicey chicken fajitas on top, doctor it up with the secret recipe for Romex!can fasole de boabe, balance the enzymes with a sumptuous Spanish rice, cover it all with shredded lettuce, and top with patent-pending homemade Romex!can habanero salsa.

The fun part is watching people use three hands to try rolling the whole beast up into a giant-size fajita burrito they can wrap their mouths around.

Repeat as necessary until clothes no longer fit comfortably. Between the copious amount of adult beverages which had been consumed and magic post-ingestion expansion of Bunissimexican food, the crowd was on the verge of becoming intolerably leneş.

I wisely opened up the bottle of ţuica to help finish off any survivors.

In the ensuing madness, the plasticky table cloth was discarded and a frenzied game of Quarters broke out as we flooded the neighbors with the growling opera of Rammstein.

“Drink!”

With only two Americans pitted against a vicious cabal of Romanians, it wasn’t long until the homeland was secured from foreign invasion. Several repeated tinks in a cup was all it took for some new legislation to be handed down concerning the abolition of limba straine.

“Bea!”

I feel safe in assuming that while some folks may have passed out in the back of 2am taxis during their voyage home, they probably had a fun night by the time it was all said and done. You might even be tempted to think the whole shebang went off without a hitch.

Nu. During the evening, the bathroom door broke.

And by that, I mean it broke again. You see, friends, about a month or two ago, there was panic in the Romer!can household when an unnamed individual became trapped inside the bathroom because the handle refused to open the bolt.

After one attempt at using a screw driving to take it apart failed, a hammer was applied to force it open. But the magic lock stayed effective and kept one person out and another person in. Surrender came with the removal of a glass pane to allow the trapped party to climb out to safety.

The landlord’s elderly father came the next day to fix the door. I thought for sure we’d end up with a new handle, latch, bolt and all. The original pieces were bent and smashed from a hammer and strewn about haphazardly after meeting with a screwdriver.

You have to understand the mindset. Not only does a landlord naturally not want to spend a single bani to fix anything in their rented-out apartments, but the old man fancies himself something of an engineer. It took him a bit of work, but he slapped the apparatus back together and bluntly announced it was guaranteed to never break again.

Try explaining that story to your dinner guests several weeks later.

One minute, you’re all having fun. The next moment, you hear someone knocking from inside the bathroom door. Jiggling the handle does nothing, fidgeting with power strokes yields nimic. The person is trapped inside!

The immediate solution is to devolve back to what worked last time. Remove the glass and invite all your friends to squeeze in and out of an empty pane in order to use the bathroom. Spread a robe across the hooks inside to act something like a shower curtain for the slightest illusion of privacy.

So, cheers to all the people who survived last night! For me, it was gravely embarrassing. For you, it became a laughing matter. Our spirits never dampened, except from additional libations.

The old man has been called. He says he’ll be here in 10 minutes…

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 15th, 2007 at 5:05 pm and is filed under Living. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.