[Un leu, un leu... Ch. 3] Cat Food in Romania
This is a continuation of the online publication of "Un leu, un leu", a book written by my godfather and uncle Bill Edwards, and published by Evenimentul, a now defunct Romanian publishing company. I've decided to skip chapter 2 for now, as there isn't an English transcript, and it will take some time to tweak the translation to sound more like Bill.
While assigned to the US Embassy in Bucharest, I was press attache and United States Information Agency (USIA) Information Officer with the Press and Cultural Section of its United States Information Service (USIS). I also held the diplomatic rank of second secretary in the embassy. Along with normal press, informational, public affairs, and cultural duties, went the corollary duty of socializing and attending various diplomatic receptions, parties, and similar functions - official, and unofficial. Through a friend at the West German Embassy, and some other factors I am still sorting out, I had gotten to know the Deputy Chief of their Embassy and his wife. They were very active socially and seemed to enjoy having me attend their functions. The wife was also a cat lover (as I am), and had several Romanian cats that she'd picked up or had left with her by departing personnel from their embassy (I picked up a cat named "Feldwebel" from a departing German friend).
The first time I attended a function at the Bensch's, it turned out to be a really wild and hilarious evening. And the after-effects were even more so. It was Autumn and the Bensch's, Peter and his wife, Dorte, a comical and very funny red-headed woman, were celebrating "Oktoberfest." As was normally the case, there were diplomats and their wives from various embassies in Bucharest there, including those from the West, 3rd world, and Eastern Bloc countries. I remember one East German who had had some drinks before I arrived, introducing himself with what he thought was an amusing and intimidating line, "Hello, my name is Colonel Blank, and you had better be careful of me, because I am the military attache from the East German Embassy." He would then burst into peals of laughter. When this colonel finally got around to me, I had drank several beers. I suppose he thought that I was an African or Arab diplomat (I was constantly being asked by Europeans if I was from Egypt, Sudan, or Libya). After his opening line I extended my hand and paraphrased his line "Hello, my name is Bill Edwards, and you had better be careful of me because I am the press attache at the American Embassy." The Colonel stopped laughing, looked at me very strangely, frightened actually, and walked away. He never again spoke to me during our overlapping time in Bucharest.
At this same party, after we had moved to the Bensch's "keller" to sit around and eat wurst and drink beer, typical German fare, the mood was very upbeat. I was sitting at a table with several cultural contacts of the West German Embassy, including a Romanian official from the Ministry of Culture who dealt with theater. I am not lightweight, and at the time I tipped the scale at around two hundred and forty pounds. But this official weighed close to three hundred pounds. He and his wife were sitting at the end of the table to my immediate right. Frau Bensch was sitting diagonally across from me to the left. I had noticed that some of the seats were pretty rickety and I was playing it cosy and careful on my seat because of this and my weight. But the theater man to my left was full of himself and good German beer - a special treat for all of us, and during one expansive gesture his rickety bench in the Bensch's cellar went crashing down. Everyone at first was mortified, close to sixty people. Then the comedy of the event took hold and some people began to laugh. I immediately helped the man's wife up and gave her my seat and tried to help her husband up. Then, to make things right and even, Frau Bensch pretended to fall off her bench. After all had settled down again and the fat man regained his composure and dignity, I sat there and was overcome with an almost uncontrollable desire to laugh. Of course I didn't, and holding it in made tears come to my eyes and I was almost sick, thinking "Diplomat incident" if I were to laugh.
