Fresh off the boat!

The new Nelly Furtado album has been playing on repeat in my car, hence every morning  Iwake up to one of her tunes. Hey, at least it's better then most of the FR radio stations! 'Sky Rock' & some other Racaille FM keep on playing the EXACT same music, as do 'Energie' & 'Fun FM' AND 'Kiss FM' & 'RFM', finally leaving me depressed w/ 'Nostalgie' (the music of my parents' era) and 'Riviera', where they play nothing but U2, Dido and Norah Jones...lovely, innit? :)
 
In either case, whats been new in MartaWorld? Lots and lots, but i'll have to think of a way to organize my thoughts coherently, before puzzling everyone. Afterall, i did hate Virginia Woolf for that exact reason. Gosh, when i remember reading "A Room of One's Own", I cringe.
 
Ok, so on July 1st my dad, sister & I took off from France in the direction of Croatia, so that he could finally take us on a trip he had planned for years now; except up until now there was usually a war taking place in the region, or the situation wasn't safe for the Skundrics. The trip took about 6 days in which we drove through Opatija, the mountains of Lika (where my dad's family is from), the stunning coast of Istra and Dalmatia; including passing through or stopping in Rijeka (close to Opatija- right on the border w/ Slovenia/Italy), Sibenik (where my dad grew up), Split (where he moved to for work, right before Iraq), Dubrovnik (the most famous tourist destination; worthwhile seeing), Cavtat (probably the most beautiful place in Europe for a peaceful holiday; i have no words to describe it, but should i ever disappear due to stress, i'll almost certainly be there) and Trogir (where we own land, but didn't build anything because of the war). I am quite serious when i say that very few words can describe what i experienced while driving down the coast of Croatia. See, in normal circumstances you could say that i'm being biassed because it's "my" country, but given that i have never lived there and the last time i was there at all was 13 years ago, this cannot be said. All in all, it's a place to be seen before goddamn a****cans tear it apart.There are already too many tourists in certain places (like dubrovnik), but if ure visiting with a "local" it's fine. :)

After spending a great week in Croatia, we crossed the boarder into Montenegro... oh la la! I won't go into the details of how/why/what/where, but it's enough to say that the imporession it made on us was enough for us to drive back into Croatia THE VERY SAME NITE!! So, whatver you do, do NOT venture that part of Eastern Europe. It's safe for me to say that i'm embarassed Serbia shares it's name w/ "& Montenegro". Perhaps even worse then "& Tobago"... :)

Belgrade was, is and will remain as great as ever. The city that never sleeps and has an unlimited supply of things/people to be "wow-ed" by. If anything, it's the first place in Europe (apart from Barcelona) where i've had proper coctails made from scratch, where the barmen knew exactly what they were doing and where prices were reasonable (and beyond). The atmosphere back home is something to long for, where people don't go out purely "to be seen", but have a good time wherever ,whenever. Even when no one has even a dime to spare, there is always a fiesta to be found in someone's backyard. One drawback though: 42°c is a bit of an extreme for a non-tropical country. The city seems to acquire a Pamplona-like atmosphere, with the exception of bulls being replaced by the heat beneath everyone's heels. Who can, escapes to one of the river boats, known as "splav", where the temperature is a more moderate 35°C. At night these are the "in" places to go out....sooo, if you're ever in Belgrade during the summer & want to surprise me, just look around for a splav w/ chilled out music & nice comfy sofas, & u'll be close.

So long for now, i need to find a way to get to Barcelona.... missing you all lots. :-)