Where Am I? Part I

Sunrise

I was far enough away that the sounds of the seagulls and the waves sweeping in were audible over the pumping electronic beats behind me. I was sitting next to an Indian guy who I met from a South African guy who I met because his girlfriend was the son of a Bulgarian-American who I met on the plane. The Indian was telling me something about the waves and the music that, after a night of partying, sounded pretty metaphysical. As I sat in the sand watching the sunrise over the Black Sea and listening to this guy, I took the last pull of my beer and the question drifted into my head.

It had been a great night, if you could call it that. I got off the plane 18 hours before. I met this dual citizen because we struck up a conversation after he overheard me speaking English in the Amsterdam Airport. He offered to help get me on my feet when we got to Sofia. Apparently what that means in Bulgarian is get a taxi for us to the train station, show me the best place to change currency, treat me to one of the best meals I’ve eaten in my entire life, tell me about a party on the Black Sea, set me up with a bus ticket and give me a sightseeing tour of old Communist Sofia from the eyes of a former rebellious punk teenager.

This guy is the epitome of cool. After I rode an overnight bus across the Bulgaria to Sunny Beach on the Black Sea, I arrived at 2 am. I met up with him, his daughter and her boyfriend and we partied and danced to the music of an internationally renowned Dutch DJ until the sun came up. It’s easy to put the sequence together now but at that time the question was as potent as the beats.

Ferry Corstien at Cacao Beach

Sunset

The sun behind the hills left an orange glaze on the warm evening air. I stared out over a field of sunflowers weighed down heavily and ready for harvest.  The train rumbled west and the breeze was refreshing after peeling myself off the seat after a much needed nap.

It was a long trip.

I finally had the energy to address the questions swirling in my. If I was this rested at the beginning of the day, chances are I would not be here right now. I could still be partying in Sunny Beach or driving to Istanbul with the Indian guy. As I have found, when traveling in a sleep deprived hungover stupor, luck largely outweighs reason as the explanation to for most consequences.

It was luck that walked me by the small Sunny Beach bus station the night before while searching for a cheap hotel. It was luck that woke me up at 11:34 to get out of my hotel before noon checkout. Luck got me on a bus whose last stop happened to be the Burgas train station.  Really dumb luck justified buying the train ticket two a city I had never heard of and who’s name, among other things, I could not even read thanks to the Cyrillic writing on the ticket. But most of all luck taught the lady in my train car enough Spanish for her to: help me buy tickets on the train, tell me how to meet my connecting train and allow me to use her cell phone. Her destination was even only one stop before mine on the connecting train! As the British woman I planned to and actually did end up meeting here told me last night, “Sometimes life depends on the turn of a lucky card.” Sometimes it depends on a whole deck.