In her defense, there are people in Turkey who live in caves.

[osprey_archer]

My roommate, Veni, is Bulgarian.

Now, I recognize that Bulgaria is only a small country in Eastern Europe, famous chiefly for losing the Quidditch World Cup. (Although Veni tells me that Viktor Krum could not possibly be a Bulgarian name.) One would not expect Midwestern American college students to have buckets of Bulgarian trivia at their fingertips.

But one would hope that they could guess that the country has progressed somewhat beyond Clan of the Cave Bear. Alas—

Classmate: Do you have electricity in Bulgaria?
Veni: (nonplussed) ….yes?
Classmate: (disappointed) Really?
Veni: Um. No. No we don’t, actually.
Classmate: Wow! What’s that like?
Veni: Well, you know. Dark.
(beat)
Veni: We live in caves.
Classmate: (awestruck) Really?
Veni: We have an incredible history of cave-painting.
Classmate: Wow.
Veni: Also smoke signals. One puff for invasion, two puffs for plague, three puffs for “Hey, we’ve caught a wooly mammoth! Let's have a party!”…

At which point the young lady realized, finally, that Veni was perhaps pulling her leg.

At least this technologically impoverished upbringing gives Veni an excuse for her ongoing war with her computer. The dratted thing just does NOT appreciate smoke signals.

Comments

[visualthinker11.livejournal.com]

geez. it's a good thing veni has a sense of humor. ; )

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

Oh I know.

Fortunately most people are aware that Bulgaria is not longer suffering through the Stone Age.