The female class is now unofficially called KČS (klapa časnih sestara, clique of nuns) or officially the monastery. The gimnazija was first founded, 124 years ago, by some catholic body, as a school for civilians but within the church's system, owned and run by the church. Now this is separate, the school belongs to the state's ministry of education, but the church has kept some part of the building, on the corner. And there was just a wall between them and this female department.
On 8th I already gave up on Duca, it seems I missed my chance. Didn't see it when it was passing by. But I let it go, and while I haven't quite given up, I'm not seriously waiting for something to happen.
Heard the news meanwhile - Miljka is with Džok. I didn't know him much, but the whole week the weather was nice and he seemed to be walking back, by Dom and ruža, same time as I, plus a classmate of his. So I got to know him better this week. Good guy and somewhat fitting for her. That path, BTW, is not the shortest as the crow flies, but with the bridge being rebuilt, this is just as good a detour as the other detour. More interesting - nice old bridge, park.
On 11th Met Z. and specially V. somewhere and said I'll drop by Zmaj in the afternoon, to mock the kids, just like the prevous students came to mock us. Tradition or something. When I got there, met Vasa by the gate, so I stood with him a while, and there comes V. and that guitar player. Spoke just a little and they went off to Lesnina (they both live in the adjacent buildings), and a while later so did we. At some point I noticed V. entering the passage in the middle, so I made a maneuver and accidentally met her on the other side. She'd stay to talk, and invited me to drop by again, just that she was awfully hungry at the moment... and off she went.
On 12th, Dragana: "what would you do if you were the only guy in a female division?" - "hmm... I guess I'd go by some order, and eventually give up on all of them and go out in the world to look for uglies... I guess you had this class in mind, you're all beauties".
Today, some guests during the day, sneezing often most of the day, "Vampire ball" (aka "Fearless vampire killers") by Polanski. Whole gang went to watch. It's basically a comedy, but there were many scary scenes, made so by ominous music or sudden sounds. I spent the time half anticipating the next shock and half being annoyed for falling for such stupid tricks. The best moment was the long scene when Polanski and professor are climbing along a winding staircase (spiral has no height!) in total dark and almost no sound but their own. That's when I couldn't help myself and sneezed thunderously. The whole theatre exhaled one brief "ah!" and then there was a second of silence, and then they collectively exhaled. That was hilarious.
Also, the scene on the way back, when someone broke a long thorn off an accacia bush, and poked Čeda in the nape. He convulsed momentarily, with a loud "aaa!", and then turned around, saw who it was and said "aah just go away!".
Around the time I shot another roll of film and finally began developing them in my own laboratory. That is, in what of a laboratory I had. Because then when dad bought me the equipment, that was just the machinery - it takes a lot of other stuff, trays, clips, red light, print dryer, rubber roller to squeeze the paper tightly to that nickeled sheet metal. Dad got that all in Timişoara, including the developing tanks - one for 35mm, one for 2x8 (which I never did at home, too complicated and lasts too long). The 35mm, for negatives, didn't have the grooves, instead in parallel with the film you spooled a plastic tape, which had bumps against the perforations, to keep the distance. Which is good as an idea, but the plastic was too strong, and would at times cause the film to slip up or down, and these bumps would then leave undeveloped spots where they touched the emulsion. I preferred to develop them rewinding the film from hand to hand, submerged in the developer. True, my fingers would be yellowish later, and had a bit of a smell for some half day after, but the results were smooth. Several years later I gave up on that and acquired a genuine Paterson tank.
I did the negatives in the bathroom, which we could darken properly, we'd stick a towel in the little window, though then the window couldn't close, so I did that at night. We solved this a couple of years later, by covering the glass with a dark blue self-adhesive sheet, which is stuck there to this day.
For positives I'd take the kitchen and living room; my folks would go to my room and watch teevee. Few years later, when uncle Staja made a cabinet where I'd pack my lab, the teevee was moved onto it, and then it turned out that the curtain separating the kitchen from the living room is enough, the screen doesn't shine that much, the paper wouldn't get lit. I'd leave the prints in the sink to, ahem, wash (didn't change the water), and would dry them the next day, or dad would do that.
Putting things back included pouring the developer and fixer back into the bottles, so I had to have a funnel as well, not to soil anything used in the kitchen. Over time I acquired the skill to pour straight into the bottle, and not from just ordinary trays, but the big ones, something 50x75cm. But, that was about five years later.
The red light wasn't red at all. It had two filters, one I'd say dark green for the negatives and this yellowgreen for the prints. Inside there was an ordinary 15 watt bulb, the same kind as mom had in her sewing machine. These would last for years, I think that until the end, some 20 years later, I replaced it only once.
The clips were interesting. We had actual clips in Zmaj, which meant two pieces of plastic bound by a common axle in the middle, and a spring to keep them closed. The ones I got were steel, more like tweezers, with a piece of rubber where its sticks connect, and rubber padding at the business end. A miracle of design, who'd ever say that the Romanians would make such a thing, most of their stuff was roughshod. Though, that light being from Deedyar (DDR, aka GDR), maybe the rest was too.
21-XI-2020 - 10-XI-2025