Me in a Cafe in Vienna
I received a copy of Ernest Hemingway’s “A Moveable Feast” for Christmas this year. I started reading it in Vienna, continued reading it in Budapest and finished it on the airplane back to Sofia. The book was published first in 1936 in Great Britain. It’s short only 125 pages and set in Paris in the 1920’s. Hemingway is writing about his experience after World War I being a poor, hungry and often cold struggling writer.
While reading, I was struck by how lucky I am to be here in Eastern Europe on a Fulbright. I am neither poor nor hungry. But I’ve found myself cold–not outside walking around cold but fingers and toes cold inside my own apartment cold. This is I think the worst kind of cold.
Hemingway escapes this cold by writing in cafes. I read about Hemingway’s experience in Paris cafes and found myself amazed at the great American and British writers who showed up in these cafes and in Hemingway’s life. Sure most of it I knew but this time I was reading about it in Europe and found myself actually thinking about what it meant to be a writer traipsing through the Paris streets. The allure of Paris was clear and I think it still exists. There is still a mystery about Paris for lovers, writers and travelers. I haven’t been to Paris but I understand what Hemingway is writing about. It’s about leaving the old behind and seeking yourself within something new.
He writes about how cold Paris was in winter. I am not surprised by this–he doesn’t have much money and they don’t rent very nice apartments. Also it’s Paris in the 1920’s, I can’t imagine that central heating existed yet. Hemingway explains, “when there were the three of us instead of just the two, it was the cold weather that finally drove us out of Paris in the winter time.” Before the baby, Hemingway could go to a cafe and write and his wife could play piano with a couple of extra sweaters but after the baby Hemingway can no longer do this; in fact, he writes, “our Paris was too cold for him.” Instead they go to Austria to learn to ski at the Alpine Ski School.
Really?! Austria was better than Paris. I find this hard to believe. After Christmas, I thought that Vienna became very cold. We’d bundle ourselves up head out to a museum or take a short walk and then find ourselves in a cafe drinking coffee. Luckily Vienna is a city of museums.
Much the same can be said for my time in Budapest. It was just as cold if not colder in Vienna. We even got a few days of snow flurries. Robyn recommended buying a pair of black leggings that can double as tights or as a second layer under jeans. I bought a pair without hesitation. They are great. The weather in Budapest was cold and dry but the good thing was that the city was ours to explore. And man, there is a lot to see in this city.
When I got home to Sofia I was met with more snow. Apparently it’s winter in Eastern Europe. The temperature yesterday was about 28 degrees fahrenheit. My apartment was much colder. I ran out to buy some food and then tried to start heating up my apartment.
I felt like Hemingway. (It should be noted, that this is a sentence I never ever imagined that I would write.) I was freezing cold. Unlike Hemingway however, I don’t have anyone to keep a bed warm with me. So when I crawled into bed last night, I was wearing yoga pants and a hooded sweatshirt and I had had the space heater going for an hour and the room was only warmish. Shivering between cold sheets, I set my alarm clock for an hour before I wanted to get up so that I could turn on the heater, get back in bed and get out of bed when it was warm. This it turned out was a pretty good plan. Such a good plan that I got up made tea and then read in bed for an hour while my living room heated up!
The one thing I can’t figure out is the bathroom. There’s no heat source in there so when you have to go it feels like you are peeing in an outhouse. I guess the good thing is, if this cold weather keeps up, I am going to learn to be really quick in the bathroom.
Okay, this is just a quick post to get back into the swing of things after no blogging for nearly eight days. I’ll be writing more about my travels over this next week.
Oh and after writing this whole post, I thought I’d check up on the NYT and saw this awesome headline: Gas Dispute Spreads to Bulgaria. It looks like Russia has been reducing gas flow to Bulgaria after cutting off Ukraine altogether on January 1st. I can only hope things don’t get worse here in Bulgaria. What a mess that would be.
This is not to say that I think the cold in my apartment is related to this reduced gas flow–far from it. I think that it’s due to the fact that my apartment used be on the communisit centeral heat: parno and now is not. This is probably good for my heating bill but the alternative is just okay not outstanding. Good thing it’s easy to double up on socks.
Karolinka, I miss you already! I am glad you are enjoying the Hemmingway — feeling him myself here. It is SOOOOO cold. My face might have frozen off this morning at the Esceri market!
Love you!
Ha, Ha! Thanks for the book.
They did have central heating in the twenties. It consisted of a furnace in the basement located below a three foot grill in the first floor of the house and connected to the furnace top by a pipe of the same dimensions.
The expectation was that the heat would then rise throughout the house and rise to the second and third floors if such existed. Your icy cold bathroom is reminiscent of one I remember from the late twenties and early thirties.
Hope these data are useful.
Love GD
Your icy cold bathroom in Sofia is only marginally colder than the one upstairs in our house next to your “sunset glow” bedroom. The upstairs radiators are not delivering much heat except into Char’s bedroom and heat doesn’t rise up the stairwell as readily as you would think.
Love,
MoM