Obscure Journey

Please think twice before adopting a pet!

Publié le 25 Mars 2017 par Charly Cross

Catégories : #advice, #animals, #cat adoption, #cats, #customs, #life experience, #life lesson, #people, #pets, #romanian tradition, #tips, #traditions

This is not a sad story, but rather one that might make your blood boil to the point where you want to smash something. But let's start with the beginning.

Back in November I was coming back from buying some groceries. As I was opening the door to the apartment building where I live, this little [mostly black] cat dashed right in with me. I have no idea where it came from, but it sure wasn't shy. This little fellow simply followed me home. So I took her in... Lucky that my two 7 and 6 year old male cats didn't try to kill her, but she wasn't happy with their presence either.

In the end, it all worked out just fine. see below:

Please think twice before adopting a pet!

This black furry thing wasn't shy nor scared of being touched or even handled. I quickly discovered this was a female cat. "Sweet! I never had a female cat before" I thought to myself. Of course, I talked to my friend about it, and we decided to keep her for a while, until we find a more suitable furrever home. The little cat went in heat in about 2 - 3 weeks after finding her. Her screaming sounded as if someone was torturing her to death. I waited till it passed, and then got her spayed. Quietness returned.

sleepy Milky <3

There are more reasons I need a new home for Milky - this is what I named her. Ironic given her color, right? but it's mostly because she likes to nurse on tshirts and pants of a certain texture. She also LOVES milk, so now the name seems more fitting.. The most important reason is that we will be leaving the country this year [hopefully soon], and there is no way to accommodate 3 cat at the new place [with some relatives until we find a job, and a place of our own].

So we posted a few "up for adoption ads" for Milky. A few nights ago I received this phone call from an older lady showing interest in Milky [the female cat]. We decided to meet the next day, with me bringing the cat to her place. Said and done.

I wrapped the cat in a blanket as there was no need for a cat carrier, and off we went to meet the lady. Luckily, she lived some 3 bus stops away, and this means easily reachable by foot as well. As soon as the lady saw the cat, she melted -"a good sign" I thought to myself.

She led us to her place - some 5 minutes by foot away from the bus stop, on a quiet street. When we entered, I was requested to take off my shoes. She had a good point for it: that place was SO clean and everything nicely arranged. [I will most likely address etiquette rules regarding wearing shoes indoors, in the next post. Let's just say it is not really polite to ask your quests to remove them.]

I told the lady everything she needed to know about the cat, I showed the cat where the litter was, and I was ready to leave. Right before leaving, the lady informed me it is customary to give a little something in exchange for the cat, so she had prepared some bananas and a box of chocolates. I took that, my blanket, and I returned home.

Later in the evening, she called however I couldn't pick up the phone. I called her back the next morning... The lady informed me she wanted to return the cat! Yes, you read that right - to return the cat after she promised she would take good care of her and all! She complained that Milky cried, that she went on the opened window, and that the cat wanted to suck her pajamas at night. Apparently she couldn't sleep because of all these! Other than the clothes sucking, all the cats go on open windows and cry in a new house!

1. if you're going to adopt a cat, expect her to cry at least the first night if she's sociable, or to hide if she's less sociable. dogs and puppies also cry the first night or two.

2. your new cat or dog is an ALIVE CREATURE! it is definitely NOT a toy, piece of clothing or some other thing you can just return the next day because you changed your mind!

3. having a pet is NEARLY identical to having a human baby! it requires your attention and it needs you!

Do expect your new companion to give you some headaches, but seriously, children are no different.

Milky literally LOVES knocking things over because they stand in her way... or in what he thinks is HER place.

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Poundcake with oranges

Publié le 18 Mars 2017 par Charly C.

Catégories : #Cooking, #dessert, #food, #sweets, #baking, #fruits, #recipe

My friend had this recipe for a cake made with natural orange juice and orange slices on top. The recipe is in Romanian, and I will try my best to translate it for you. Because you should try it the next time you want something different.

The recipe was recently found at the bottom of a drawer - it was being kept VERY safe as you can tell [aka we had no idea where it was]. I was cleaning that closet and the recipe resurfaced. yay! I don't have much to say at this point, so let's see what this cake is all about!

INGREDIENTS

For the batter:

175 grams [real] butter
175 grams [caster] sugar
2 eggs [beaten]
225 grams all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 oranges [peel and juice] - see below

175 grams almonds [grounded] - I substituted with some almond essence
a pinch of salt

For the syrup:

9 oranges
100 grams [caster] sugar
150 ml water

METHOD

Making the batter:

[disclaimer] the recipe said to mix all the ingredients at once. i didn't do that, because i know the consistency differs depending on how you mix them. so i will tell you how i mixed my ingredients. please use a mixer, and not a hand beater like i did [the cake turned out fine, just look at the pictures, but i don't think the ingredients ere mixed as they should have been.

1. Preheat the oven, prepare your baking tray, and make sure to have your butter at room temperature - it ill work faster this way.

2. Beat your butter and sugar together until you have a creamy looking mixture. My hand beater didn't manage to get the right consistency, luckily this didn't matter much in the end.

3. Add your beaten eggs, salt, baking powder, and orange juice and mix. Mine looked like this:

4. Add your flour, orange peel, and almonds and mix. This is what I had in my bowl at the end:

5. Throw in the oven on medium heat till it's well done. Mine took about 40 minutes. I use a gas stove and oven, and this means I cook and bake with fire. I have 8 heat settings, from 1 [lowest] to 8 [highest] - I can make pizza on settings 6 to 7. I usually cook [in the oven] using the setting 3 or 2, even 1 - I feel the heat is too strong at 3. I baked this cake at setting 2.

Making the syrup!

1. Use a small pot. Place the sugar, water and the juice from 6 oranges in it, and on a small fire [low heat].

2. Mix until the sugar dissolves.

3. Leave it on the fire for 10-15 min, WITHOUT stirring. When it's done, you'll have less juice [syrup] left in the pot.

Assembling!

Peel your remaining 3 oranges and slice them.
Place your cake on something to cool down, for some 10 min. [I left mine in the tray, you'll see why]
Take a fork and pierce the surface of the cake a few times, in different places.
Pour your syrup over the cake [if the cake is in the tray, this step is less messy]
Place your orange slices on top of the cake.

Now, you can devour it! :D

Check out this close up!

My friend can testify this was moist, flavored, and out of ordinary delicious! Much better than any other cake I baked before. I must admit, this time I too liked the texture - I'm picky in this regard.

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Snowy January in Bucharest

Publié le 18 Mars 2017 par Charly Cross

Catégories : #adventures, #bucharest, #snow, #winter

It is March already, oops. wanted to post this at least in February, but if you read back my posts, you know why this didn't happen.

So, December, as you might already know, was super cold. But we had no snow. Snow came in January..

I took this picture at night and the only edits I used was cropping and the writing on it. I can use the #nofilter hashtag too. That night we were watching a Korean horror movie. I must say the movie was pretty good. However, at a certain moment I was wondering why is there so much light, even though it was about 3 am.. The answer was rather shocking for me: it was snowing like crazy. The snowstorm continued for a day or two, I believe. In any case, this wasn't the first snow of the year, but the first snow wasn't as ferocious, so to say.

Here are some pictures I randomly found on my computer. They are taken last year, still in January. There isn't much difference if you ask me.

badly cropped picture :( but I like the sky

I really wanted to build a snowman. this year. I never got around to. Somebody else build the one you see below. Too bad the wind blew its hat off, as you'd better see the mop as hair. Like thi, we see the hairstyle is specific to the 1990s era (any Backstreet Boys fans out there?).

In any case, the snow didn't last very long. The video below will show you what the snow looked like after a few days. The worst part was the ice that formed like magic, as if hoping we would fall and break our feet. Luckily this didn't happen to anyone I know. I recorded the last part of the video at night, and it seems the light was worse than I thought.

[disclaimer] I didn't record these videos after the same snowfall. We had about 3 in total, this year. I just edited them in the same video to make it easier on myself. I also don't remember which of my smartphones I used to record.

I recorded this video in January 2016. I always wanted to post it on my blog, but I don't think I did. In any case, this is what it looks like to walk in snow, in Bucharest. because the mayor of the city doesn't care to send people in the streets to remove the snow.

At a certain moment in January [of this year], me and my friend were walking downtown. I forgot why I decided to do that. Perhaps I just felt the need to move, to feel more active. In any case at a certain moment we came across this stand with bikes for rent. I didn't go too close to have a better look, to see how the system works, however I thought it was pretty neat to have this in Bucharest. You can also see the snow, and the lights from the bike stand and bikes themselves looked quite nice as well.

On a different evening, I asked my friend to go out somewhere. We went in the Old Town area - it's filled with cafés, restaurants, and bars. I have no idea how we stumbled across a sorta steampunk looking café, that seemed to want to take us back in time.

Sadly, the lights weren't too good, and we couldn't take much or better pictures. I had a hot tea and my friend had a café latte. Or this is what I remember it being. We weren't impressed much with the drinks, but we promised we would go again. We have yet to go again. I believe the owner of the place was the bartender there (for now at least).

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