Post # 6: Ljubljana

It's now Monday the 19th and tomorrow will be 2 weeks since I left NYC. I'm back at my Slovenia apartment/hotel to pack up and move on. To clear up some confusion (mom), I only stayed at that 6 bedroom suite one night. I had made reservations at Vila Minka (one of the 3 places recommended by that email I posted earlier) for Friday - Tuesday. Since the World championship for Belgian Shepherds were held here last week, everyone was booked, thus the hostel (not hostile) situation. Vila Minka is run by a very hospitable, wonderful family who took care of me like I was their own son. They have a daughter who is studying hospitality management in Fort Lauderdale...when I mentioned that I grew up in Florida the mother had so much to talk about it was great. I assured her she was safe there and if she needed anything, to please get in touch with me and I'd send a Florida friend to help out. Ok, with that out of the way, my second night out in town. I ran into several of my 6-beds-in-a-suite mates down by the river and we had a few drinks while discussing our travels. One guy's from Jersey City, the other Canada, and the third was a girl from Finland. They were quite younger and thus on a very serious budget...when I recommended we go to another spot, they went bargain hunting. We ended up in a scene right out of the Lost Boys...punk rock city in a dead end street. That wasn't my bag, so I feigned sickness and made a beeline back to planet earth. On my way back I went into a karaoke bar...the highlight of the evening...



and there's this one:



As for the rest of the trip, it rained today and most of yesterday, so I took advantage and actually started to plan out the rest of my trip. The internet connection here at Vila Minka is great, so I've been taking care of some things that I didn't finish before I left. But to summarize my 5 days here in Ljubljana...Slovenians are a very friendly, hard working bunch. I notice that their office day starts pretty early, 7:30 or 8 am I think. Everyone under the age of say 40 speaks English fluently, and most of them speak at least 3 languages. It was quite impressive to have the Ipod store guy speak Slovenian on the phone, assist me in English, help the next guy in French, and I'm sure he speaks Italian as well. Due to their proximity to Italy, ice cream or gelato is HUGE here and a lot of locals speak Italian.


Slovenian food was significantly better than Spanish cuisine; the only issue I had was their confusion of some English phrases. Most evident was actually the best tasting dish I had since I left the states. It was sea bass, served with some kind of potato and either broccoli or spinach mixture. It was amazing but its name...wait for it...."Pretty Fishy". I tried to explain to the waiter that they probably meant to name it Pretty Fish because when something is "fishy", well, it's usually not so good. Needless to say, this was not fishy at all, and actually quite pretty since they braided the sea bass fillets into a pie-like formation. I ended up speaking to another solo traveler who was seated next to me, a brown-haired, librarian-type Swedish girl who was in Slovenia for a conference. She's essentially the equivalent of a PHD student who's working on a project (ex-swedes who moved away and are working abroad). I told her I knew such a person in the states (hi Angelica) and I'd get the two of them in touch.



And finally, the dollar-euro thing again. Your euro goes significantly further here (all comparisons I'm using 1.5:1 euro to dollar even though it's a few pennies more):


A local beer: 1.50 euro = $2.25

vodka soda: 3.00 euro = $4.50

pasta dinner: 7.00 euro = $10.50

a cappuccino, an ice cream, or bus ride: 1.00 euro = $1.50

ham and cheese sandwich: 3.00 euro = $4.50


Basically, I saved a fortune by being here instead of NYC this week. If you are planning on coming to Slovenia, I highly recommend staying at Vila Minka and I also recommend renting a car.


Now for what will surely be the least expensive leg of the trip; Odessa, Ukraine. I was headed to Italy this week, but it's supposed to rain there and most of central europe all week long...crap. I have a friend going to Italy for 2 weeks so if the rain clears up, I'll be there. After another quick check of the weather forecast, the only clear skies were Bucharest or Odessa...so that's where I'm headed. I'll make it back to Italy next week when the weather clears up or possibly hit Bucharest and Budapest first.

Also, the emails I have received are great. The more I receive, the more inspired I am to keep posting and it's nice to know people are actually reading this thing. Feel free to email me some thoughts or just a simple hello! Oh, and Mom, I have a hotel booked, a ride picking me up at the airport, and a local guide for the first 2 days to show me around...so no more "you're too old to be staying in a hostel" texts!
;-)