Balti City Day

Monday was Balti's City Day, reportedly the largest City Day in Balti history as it was celebrating the city's 585th anniversary. City Day, or hram, is celebrated in each city on the day that the town's church was established. Christened? I dunno. In any case I'd been to Ialoveni's city day back when I lived there during training but this one blew it away.

Somehow over the weekend when I was doing language lessons in the capital they set up a huge concert stage and food and beer booths; the center square of town was packed with people from Balti and all the surrounding villages. Bands and artists from all over Eastern Europe were here competing for prizes. By the time I arrived Monday the prizes had already been awarded, but many of the artists were doing repeat performances. Nic and I joined up with Ari, Anna and Adam (I'm opposed to hanging out with people whose names don't start with "A") and went to get shashlik to steel ourselves for some very cheap and awful vodka. They have these plastic foil-topped cups of it, you see, a nice 100 ml for the bargain price of 3 lei, or about 40 cents. They look just like the ones you would get filled with orange juice as part of a school lunch, and taste approximately like hairspray. You know it's quality stuff when both the saleswoman and two teenagers in the store try to dissuade you and your friends from buying several cups of it.

So we drank those. And then ate ice cream cones to buffer the toxic liquor. Then drank some more. Then pushed our way into the crowd for a look at the performers. Our night's viewing began with a 50-something man, big belly, white hair, doing quite a rendition of Tom Jones. Sex bomb, sex bomb, you're my sex bomb! You can turn me on! The best was when he threw in some improv English tidbits. You're all sex bombs, baby!

Soon we got a text from Alina, our local friend. She was volunteering at the concert that night and after meeting up with us suggested we go watch the concert "a little closer"...then proceeded to bust out a VIP pass and take us to the fenced area directly in front of the stage. Where all the artists were!

We made quite a scene, dancing around and singing along while the locals sat primly in their chairs. I only recognized one group, Assorti, but it was fun running up to various artists and asking for their autographs anyway. Assorti actually has a hit on the radio right now ("Krasivaya Lubov"), and it turns out that one of their 6 statuesque singers is actually from Balti. Upon learning this, Ari became a one-man welcoming committee. "Come home!"