First Encounters

As some of my friends expressed the interest in following my traveling adventures across Europe, along with my own desire to document it, I have decided to start a simple and mostly random blog to capture the insights, events, occurrences of all kinds.  Beforehand, please forgive me for any typos, grammatical errors or confusing sentences because I would like to keep it as genuine as possible; told in my own broken English.

So, I have reached my first destination which is Zagreb, Croatia.  After a quite entertaining flight to London, where I had a layover, I landed in what used to be a part of my former Yugoslavia.  If you wonder what kind of entertainment can possibly happen on the plane, well let me tell you it is quite possible especially when you travel with French.  From my own attempt to decipher the situation, I think that some passengers where arguing over the seats.  Throughout the entire flight, the echo of occasional screams and angry remarks kept being exchanged.  Finally, the crew separated them which allowed me to continue in subtle observation of people around me.
It finally hit me, I was not in America anymore.  The superficial politeness and mutual appreciation goes out of the window in this back of the woods.

Zagreb's International airport is rather small with a comfortable and safe feel because there is no way in hell you could get lost.  Also, the familiarity with the language helps, well maybe in to easily communicate but definitely does not result in a pleasant reception.  So, as a "foreigner" I entered my former country of Croatia as a Bosnian but it gets worse.  A Bosnian with an American passport is a source of a lot of contempt and mean looks.  Customs check went relatively smooth.  However, when I got to the Money Exchange window, the authentic Balkan customer service surfaced.  Well, she got aggravated with the money I gave her.  We all know that the quality of bills in the US does not really matter.  People write on it, tear it and still use it.  Well, here it is apparently offensive to present ugly looking US dollars with drawings on it.  I always thought it gives money a character.  The crisp European money slides easily and it is a sign that maybe they should stop printing so much money. Hint!  With my Bosnian "dialect" and an American passport, I survived my first encounter with rudeness and rolling of the eyes of some angry woman who hates diaspora.

The circumstances had me to rent a room near the airport which I did through a booking.com.  I should have known better, that the internet age has not fooled people in the Balkan because they like to over advertise and false advertise.  Well, either way I ended up in somebody's house which is quite normal lodging but now when you expect a regular hotel and for the price I paid.  Personally, I didn't care because I'd rather give it to some honest, hardworking individual who tries to do it small than to some profiteer.  The room ended up being clean and quite cosy.  Well, I am writing this from the mentioned room at 3 am local time because I am jet lagged and can't sleep.  One of the other reasons why I started this blog is to kill the night while everyone else is asleep.

Tomorrow  morning we are picking up my mom from the airport and continue our journey to my hometown.  I expect a lot of emotions from my mom since she hasn't been home in almost 20 years.  Border crossings were never our favorite, I still get goose bumps every time someone needs to check my identity.  But this is more symbolic for us because of the war and all that jazz.  I will write about it as we cross it tomorrow.  The crossing will entail a lot of contemplation and soul searching, I am sure.  Hopefully, I will get to write about it tomorrow.  I am positive I will because it will take awhile for my sleeping habits to go back to normal.

One thing before I go...As all of you know I like to blabber a lot, which transfers into my writing.  So,   if you skip a paragraph or two, no big loss!!


My first meal!! The best bread in the world with ABC cheese spread and yogurt! Can't wait to have some real, heavy unprocessed milk!!

The accidental lodging