Bucharest, Romania - Polarsteps

Monday morning, my favourite! I wake up drunk, and ellis wakes up moaning and groaning. We could’ve gotten the train at 10, it was possible, physically. Getting Ellis out of bed, was not. I retrieve some basic breakfast materials for him and leave him to his pathetic yelping. I go out for breakfast, with a truly repulsive American guy. He represented everything I hate about someone, everything I find disgusting and dislikeable, but he was so intensely all of these things, I felt I had to make friends. We had been out the night before, he hadn’t drunk anything but he did preoccupy himself talking to the women at the bar, exclusively actually he didn’t want to talk to anyone else. They didn’t seem to comfortable, but not uncomfortable enough to warrant intervention, looking back, better they got his conversation than me. We walk and talk and get coffee and the conversation quickly turns to romance. His perspective on women was jaded. He explained to me that feminism had ruined American women, and they were more interested in making money and having careers than having children. Now, the former is obviously a crock of it, the second certainly has a degree of truth to it, more women are indeed career focused than in the past - but what appalled me was his absolutist vitriol to the young, female professional demographic. “A bunch of dumb sluts that won’t settle down”, “They’ll regret it when their 35”, “Especially the Democratic ones, you can’t have reasonable rational conversation with any of them!” The last section comment really got me. I had to ask what his dates with democrats had been like, turns out they were largely similar to our breakfast! Except I enjoy spending time with people I find out of this world repulsive and endeared him to go on and fully explain his worldviews and positions. Tyrannically preaching the necessity of reduced taxes (he kindly informed me his precise income, stock options, tax codes, tax benefits, how he got them etc), of rapid expansion in oil, gas and coal mining. Cutting diplomatic ties with China, and naturally, COVID… We retire and part ways, I needed to attend to some business, he had to make his own way. I find myself on a walking tour of Bucharest, and holy shit this city has a history and a half