--Wednesday, 25 October 00--
In the evening I often walk up Mother Theresa street on my way home. At a particular point near the Government building a young lady stands behind a small metal topped table and for one DM she sells French fries that she cooks in an ordinary home deep fat fryer.

Fresh out of the boiler they are quite tasty and constitute an enjoyable snack that you can eat with the toothpick she gives you as a utensil. I have even gotten the vendor trained to prepare my fries just the way I like them. She puts a small bunch of fries in a paper cone stapled together from cut up computer paper and salts them, puts a small bunch in the cone and salts them and continues this until the cone is full and fully salted. For me salt really sets off the flavor of food and I can rarely get enough of it.

Midwood Salt Bagels
I remember when I lived in Midwood, adjacent to Flatbush, in Brooklyn. Local stores had the best bagels in Brooklyn (and that means the world) and the best of the best was a salt bagel. It was encrusted with large, white salt crystals. When I took a bite it tasted like an ocean of salt in my mouth, like a large shaker of salt poured onto my tongue all at once. My mind would tell me that it was more salt than I could handle but I kept chewing and enjoying the totally excessive experience. A salt experience never to be forgotten.

A day so crazed that I have trouble recalling all the details. I received a memo requesting payments without CPOs (the necessary forms) yesterday but with the promise of CPOs today. But the staff person sudden had a migraine that sent her home early and the problem was left to an uninformed staffer and me.

And on and on it went.


--Friday, 27 October 00--
Gary told me that he was organizing a dinner party for tomorrow night at Renaissance and I was invited.

Alistair emailed me that his article about the Kukri Bar would appear in the Friday edition of the New Castle Journal. I searched for it but couldn't find it.

I brought my completed ballot to Jan and asked when the next DHL would go to the States. I displayed the envelope addressed to the Election Commission in Chicago and said to her and Tony that this was my ultimate right as a citizen. She said that it would go this PM.

I went to the Kukri directly after work and did not get a tanning session in. Gary was there since he had told me that Tony had called to say that he would be at the Kukri at 5:31 but he wasn't. Later Tony and Jan arrived along with Kate, the new COP. As the seating worked out I was between Mary and Jan with the COP on Jan's right.

Their discussion centered around the marriage ceremony that Jan (and Mary?) had attended. Apparently the festivities extended over week with the ceremony merely the culmination . The bride's family lives in a vast sprawling house of perhaps five stories. They talked about frequently changes of gowns and the gifts of gold jewelry (because personal effects were the only thing that a divorced wife could keep). It sounded to me that attending a wedding here would be very interesting experience.

The Koran allows Moslems to have four wives and the father of the bride has two. Such second mothers are sometimes called "step mom." Ram told me about it. He knew because his brother was the groom.

I said to Jan that I assumed that the DHL had gone out on schedule. She told me that she had forgotten about my ballot and a second ballot to boot but that the net result was that it would arrive on Wednesday rather than Tuesday in DC. I said that I hoped that my ballot would be over-nighted to Chicago and she thought that would happen. I wasn't so sure so I emailed Steve in the main office and asked him to see that my ballot got to its destination by an overnight.

Kimeta's boss and her boss' brother-in-law.

As the CFA crew left, Smile & Kimeta and the British crew working on the power plant pushed past them and into the freed seats. Kimeta's boss's brother-in-law was interested in talking about the United States, so interested that while there was initially a person sitting between us, after a while, he arranged for a reorganization that had us sitting side by side. He knew what he was talking about and was genuinely interested in talking about American history.

I have no idea how or when I got home but everything worked out well enough.

--Saturday, 28 October 00--
Between the Aussies and the Brits last night, I didn't get up until 8:30 this morning and was an hour late for work.

Kosovars patiently stand in line to cast a historic vote.

As I left my building, I noticed the lines waiting to vote at the school across the street. It was the first free election in over a half century. I even went over and took a few pictures. Those standing in line to vote who noticed seemed proud to be photographed exercising a right they had been denied for decades, denied perhaps for all their lives, denied perhaps for all their history.

Finally completed my reconciliation of Contingency and gave the results to Maureen and Petraq.

Went to dinner with the crew at Renaissance. Mike, Colin, Eric (who spoke nearly exclusively to Colin), Peter, Tim, Mary, Gary, and Thuy. Given the origins of most of the participants, it was like a meeting of representatives of the former British Empire. (Being from the States, I felt that I represented an ex-former Empire member.) It was a pleasant meal and the conversation was good.


Ram told me that he had gone to Bulgaria to apply for a visa to visit England. He had taken a bus from Skopje to Istanbul via Sofia. He had to pay the price for a ticket to Istanbul even though he was only going to Sofia . The explanation was that he was taking up a seat going to Istanbul but the bus was not full so he was not displacing anyone.

At the border some official had tried to claim that he had to pay 500 DM for some vague reason. Ram said that he flashed his UNMIK picture ID and they were so impressed they dropped the demand for what was in reality a bribe to someone to do what he was paid to do.

Ram told me that once he was in Sofia it was late at night and he had to pay 150 DM to stay in a hotel. This boy does not plan! Later he told me that his brother knew all sorts of places to stay for a fraction of what he paid. Why hadn't he asked?

Tim enjoying the generous Kukri burger "with everything" on a Friday night.

Tim Terrell continues to fascinate me. He arrives with a flashlight (a "torch" as he calls it) which he leaves on the table, usually in the ashtray we don't use.

His conversation is organized and highly coherent. He knows what he knows and can express himself clearly and isn't afraid to ask difficult questions.

He seems well past the usual retirement age but he has the intellectual vigor of a much younger person combined with the sageness produced only by experience.

Joe