Who would have ever suspected that the Bulgarian mafia operates out of a Mexican restaurant in Sofia? Not I, but my friend Sheeja was convinced. As we descended the dark, narrow staircase and passed through the swinging Wild West-style doors into Eddy's Tex Mex Diner, her eyebrows shot up and she gave me a worried look.
The room we had walked into was part Hard Rock Cafe, part belly of an oversized pinata, with a dash of Sicily. The lights were low, candles were lit and a man was hunched over a pile of paperwork at a corner table. ("He's doing the books," Sheeja whispered excitedly.) A Tom Cruise look-alike who stood behind the bar drying glasses winked at us while he summoned our waitress - a tiny blond girl wearing a sombrero and what appeared to be brightly-woven blanket draped over her shoulders.
She escorted us to a table in the center of the room. Sheeja sat facing the door and the bar, where most of the activity later took place, while I had a good view of the only other customers - a mismatched couple comprised of a very large Italian-looking man in an expensive suit and a tiny, off-the-catwalk beautiful woman. I was also facing a wall covered with autographed pictures of well-known jazz and blues musicians who had apparently all appeared at Eddy's Tex Mex.
"Why in the world would a famous blues musician come to Bulgaria and play at Eddy's Tex Mex Diner?" I wondered aloud.
"'Cause this place is run by the mafia!" Sheeja whispered.
At first I dismissed Sheeja's theory. We hadn't eaten in two days and I thought maybe she was a little delusional. Plus, we had endured quite a lot during our trip to Bulgaria. In fact, it had become some sort of Gilligan's Island adventure. Our five-hour train ride from Greece turned into a 14-hour kidnapping ordeal. Fifty young Romanian prisoners took over our train at the border, and they were determined to whisk Sheeja and I away to their tiny Romanian village and make us their wives. They were almost successful, but we narrowly escaped, only to become stranded in an empty train station at midnight.
Luckily, we were rescued by a German woman and her Turkish boyfriend. Between the two of them they had enough English to convince us to stay at their "private hotel," which ended up being a room in the sixth-floor apartment of some strange old woman. All our cash had been collected at the border, and the next morning we wandered for three hours, desperately trying to find a place that would cash traveler's checks. We finally ended up exchanging tears with some woman in the back room of a closed travel agency, and walked out with 267,000 lena ($100).
I figured Sheeja was either suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome or had entered starvation mode, so I passed her some garlic bread and told her to relax. While we were stuffing our faces, however, we heard heels clicking as someone walked down the stairs and approached the swinging doors. Sheeja said she saw just a pair of fine leather shoes and half a leg of tweed pants before "Eddy" appeared out of nowhere and screamed, "Leave motherf***er or I'll kill you!"
I froze and Sheeja's eyes bulged the size of watermelons. We both looked down and pretended to be really interested in the criss-cross pattern of melted cheese on our garlic bread. The restaurant was silent for what seemed like an eternity, but was in all likelihood 30 seconds. Then Eddy, clad entirely in black leather - with tall cowboy boots and sunglasses - approached our table and pulled up a chair.
"Hello girls," he said with only a slight accent. "I'm very, very sorry you had to hear that. I forgot there were two English girls here who would understand the full meaning of... what I said. I'm sorry." We just smiled sweetly and nodded, terrified. "Where are you girls from? England?"
"Er... no actually," Sheeja stammered. "We're Americans." "Really! Omigoodness! That's fantastic!" he exclaimed.
He looked at the bartender and rattled something off quickly in Bulgarian. The bartender nodded his head slowly and smiled. "You must tell me where. Las Vegas?"
"Um... no. I'm from New Orleans, she's from Boston," Sheeja said.
"Awww... that's too bad. I lived in Las Vegas for 10 years. That's where I got my Harley. I liked it very much. But my father died and my uncle was no longer with us, so I had to come back to take care of the family business. Now I live with my mother and take care of this," he said, motioning to the restaurant. "How do you like the food? It is good? It is just like Mexico?"
Actually, the food tasted more Indian than Mexican, but we both nodded and smiled.
"Good! Nowhere else in Bulgaria can you eat such food! I import it straight from Mexico. All the real ingredients!" he stopped and smiled at me. "What's that you're looking at? Oh, I see, that T-shirt on the wall there. I'll give it to you for $7! And that includes a badge and a shot of whiskey with me. You like whiskey, don't you? I can tell. How's that sound?"
"Ummm... great?"
"Great!" he was interrupted by the sound of his beeper. "Excuse me girls, I'll be right back - with the whiskey, eh?"
As soon as he left, Sheeja and I looked at each other and nodded gravely. I no longer had any doubts. "The family business," eh? Yet the only one left in his family was his mother. And what exactly did he mean "my uncle is no longer with us?" As we were quietly reviewing the evidence, he returned with his jacket and an apology.
"I'm sorry ladies, but I must go take care of some business. Here's my business card, with my beeper number on it. If you have any problems, if you ever need anything while you're in Sofia, give me a call. I'll help you out. And come back tonight! It's blues night. I get the best in the business to play here and it's the place to be. Everyone would be really excited to have two young American girls there."
Needless to say, we did not return for blues night. In fact, we got out of there as quickly as possible. I suppose, in retrospect, it made perfect sense that a Mexican restaurant in Sofia would be a mafia operation. Although the food was dirt cheap for us, it was rather expensive for Bulgarians. (This was a country that kept bread locked up in glass cases.) The only people who would eat at Eddy's were tourists, who wouldn't suspect anything, or rich Bulgarian mafia members. Also, Sheeja pointed out, how else would they be able to import all that food? And one can only imagine what else they import with the food.
Eddy's Tex Mex Diner was the climax of our Eastern European adventure. Although we later laughed it off, the trip to Bulgaria was the craziest, scariest trip I have ever made. We barely survived! But I also realized that sometimes the most horrible times of your life are also the times when you feel the most alive - when you are forced to react to crises and make life or death decisions. Eastern Europe seems to be the hip new travel destination.
I have a few recommendations for anyone planning to travel to Bulgaria. Bring American cash, bring American cash, bring American cash. Do not travel alone, especially if you are female. Even if you travel in a group of girls have a back-up plan in case you are put in a situation where marriage proposals are imminent and kidnapping plots are plausible. Do not take the train. Do not follow anyone to their "private hotel" unless you are absolutely desperate. Bring a map.
If you ever end up at Eddy's (the $0.50 garlic bread is a treat) be prepared for some mafioso-type deals going on around you. And don't forget to buy a T-shirt as a trophy of your survival.
