Zagreb, February 2024

2024

16 February, Friday

My taxi driver from the airport was a bit like an older Peter Sellers. We got on well and soon he showed me a selfie video in which he introduced a passenger he didn’t meet every day. The camera turned to an amused Luka Modrić. 

From Hotel Dubrovnik I went and got something quick to eat, before moving on to Krolo until half past ten. At the counter I was next to three good-looking ladies who got quite a lot of drinks bought for them for being nice scenery. Eventually the dark one (very pretty) started glancing over, as if shots goggles were sharpening her vision. I too bought them a round, before I left, but I’d also given them a couple of bar stools earlier. They had to be persuaded to take them. The dark girl was willing to stand. She had an exquisite smile and a tasteful grey-green jacket. Nail extensions suggested hairdresser from among the caring professions. 

Of the familiar faces among the male patrons, the man with the rug adjusted it at one point. He was only on water. The old lad with glasses who gave me back my bar stool (2023) turned up on my left and I had a chat with him and got him a drink, as I did for the distinguished man with the shaved head at the end of the counter, beyond the girls. The gent of the joint. He was on white wine and looked important, as he had free access to the back of the bar. Some of these characters are visible in a photo I took on my first visit. 

The man of distinction bought the babes two rounds and laughed when, on my way to the gents, I said to him, U Irskoj, daju nešto malo natrag. Despite the little joke about reciprocity, the girls weren’t bothering anyone. They were just out to enjoy the night. Krolo isn’t a place for noses in the air. Their chief benefactor and I later exchanged a round. It’s a great pub. It sits next door to an undertaker’s.

17 February, Saturday

It turned out I was very tired, and I slept long, even though, after half seven, a wan burst in on me when I was spread-eagled under nothing but a t-shirt. Unfortunately, she wasn’t the entertainment. It must have been a cleaning lady making a mistake.

In the middle of the day, I went up to Grič. The sun was shining. I went up via Mesnička and soon got away from the crowds of the lower town. In Pod Starim Krovovima I had three ‘small’ ones. A grey-beard poetry session ended while I was there, and then, near the bar, a young man in glasses in his thirties started tipping away on guitar and vocals. I gave him a tenner as I left. He seemed genuinely surprised that I funded his jam.

I could have stayed up there longer but hadn’t eaten since breakfast, so it seemed wise to do that. Around four I headed down Radićeva and crossed Krvavi Most, where I spotted wedding snaps in progress.

I was on my way to Leonardo’s on Skalinska, which runs up from Tkalčićeva ulica, the Zagreb entertainment strip. The odrezak wasn’t crisp like the first time there (2022) but it was quick, and I got it into me without side effects.

Tonight, by accident, I came across the sheltered Pingvin kiosk on Teslina in the lower town and a non-greasy kebab meal there (with a drink and a small bag of chips/fries) did the trick once more. The big Croat inside with the two little Chinese women (there for the cooking) asked me for a euro to make the change easier (i.e. for a tenner back out of twenty) but I didn’t have any sitan novac, so I went, OK, pet natrag, je dosta, and I got a fiver back with a beam of success. But it was worth it. When I told him that before I left, he gave me the same knowing smile. I’d say he’d seen it all from in there.

18 February, Sunday 

At eight this morning, a man opened my door, again without even a knock. I guessed technician. I’m back from breakfast now at ten and, as I left the lift, a young Indian fella seemed to have just emerged from my room, again. Wtf is going on with them? Multiple intruders.

On a bench in the city centre park called Zrinjevac, killing time before heading to the airport, I overheard nearby three young people with a camera conducting an interview in Irish. The interviewee was a girl with her arm in a sling, an injury she got from Brazilian jujitsu. She had an American accent. When I spoke to them (“Maith sibh, agallamh thar barr…”), they were even more amazed at an Irish speaker turning up than I was.

Trnava 24 Sept 2023

Slovakia

It was the ecclesiastical capital for the Hungarians back in the Turkish time (roughly 1541-1686) and now Trnava is like a beautiful old mouth that, here and there, has lost a tooth to a cheap replacement. The house of culture on the south side of the main square is the worst example but, across from that, there’s also a post office block, of which I heard a Dutchman observe online that it had at least got a lick of paint (unlike, he said, in Bulgaria). Furthermore, the St. Nicholas bell towers always remind me of candle snuffers but there’s a lot of scaffolding up that end at the time of writing.

Apart from the Baroque legacy, the Ostsiedlung is still visible in Trnava too. The same story as elsewhere in western Slovakia, the Germans were brought in by a Hungarian king in the wake of the Mongol invasion (1241).

I’m glad I went. It’s just more texturally impressive onsite than online, even underfoot, with the rectangular paving stones, known now to me as setts, and the neat, smooth cobbles. All the notable buildings seemed a bit bigger too.

On the Sunday, Trnava was quiet. On the way back to the station we stopped at a café near the bottom of Hlavná, the main street that leads up to the tower on the square. Neither was impressed by the four euro per modest, if tasty, slice of cake. No Slovak is going to pay that for a couple of mouthfuls of cake but at any rate the cheaper beer and coffee were just as tasty and, overall, this country is inexpensive.

On the train back to Bratislava, the only people making noise in the carriage (with their inane conversation about past jobs abroad) were four young Englishmen dressed like well-fed Americans, in shorts and baseball caps. 

The Back Streets of Sopron

Quicker than walking … the tour route (see below) lies beyond the Várkerület that rings the well-known Belváros / Altstadt / Old Town, as seen in the distance at the beginning and end here. Sopron’s German name is Ödenburg and many street signs are bilingual. By train, Sopron lies an hour and a quarter south of Vienna (Wien Hbf). As he was born nearby, Liszt’s first public performance took place in Ödenburg in November 1820, when he was nine. Hence the music in the video.

P.S. the Belváros

Sopron May 2019

Old Town Bratislava

Bratislava lacks the attitude of perhaps most capitals, probably because it’s a relatively new one, politically if not historically. Of course, if you get into a taxi at the airport rank or at Petržalka station – the major one (of two) that lies south of the Danube – you’ll probably get chiselled in some way but the odds remain that you’ll be done for a lot less than you would be in Prague.

The first time I was here, in the Staré Mesto (2016), I got some novädzi gúlaš at a place where a young-ish American with long hair slicked back behind his ears was wearing sunglasses. On a rainy night. At an unlit table. He ignored both waiters who thanked him as he departed. On the way back to the hotel I passed a lone English stag party near Michael’s Gate. The trams beyond the gate made an eerie, whistling sound in the wet. The wheels were whining in the night.

When I came back (2019) the bright morning after arrival meant a sweaty climb to the Castle. At least the shop there had a couch. At least I bought some postcards to justify the seat. (It’s worth knowing that hotovost’ and s kartou denote ‘cash’ and ‘with a card’ in both Czech and Slovak.)

Upon descending we stopped at a place beside St. Martin’s cathedral. The woman smilingly corrected my chléb (Czech) to chlieb (Slovak) after one of my companions nudged me to ask for sliced bread to go with the toast on his platter.

It was the afternoon when I got most of my photos that time and spotted another lone, harmless, English stag party in town. This meandering, photo-taking, was an essay in relaxation. Happily (2023) the old town hasn’t lost the kind of calm humanity it shares with, for example, Zagreb.

Zagreb 28 March 2023

2023

28 March, Tuesday 

AM 

The eight o’clock flight didn’t take off until half past nine so flying faster and shaving half an hour in the air didn’t achieve a whole lot. The taxi man was older and bigger than me and when I stuck out my hand, he squeezed it like a Balkan bear. A man of few words, he drove up to the hotel door, ignoring the pedestrian zone at the late hour. He only smiled when I gave him a tenner. Having given the docket to the night porter, he did it again when saying good night. I wonder how many inhuman fares give these guys nothing, given the damage goes on the hotel bill. In the airport car park, I’d asked him could I sit in front, and he said, no, no, but it was only on the empty road that I copped that the front passenger seat was where he stored all his sh*t. Between the seats I could see a cable and what not. I’m glad I chose a bit of comfort here at the Hotel Dubrovnik. The room has two doubles and a minibar. I’m not sure which of the beds I’ll sleep in.

4 PM 

Got lunch (goulash) at Mali Medo after walking the parks horseshoe; then had a nap. The waiter smiled at the nationality (iz Irske) of the tipper. I was gladly paying extra for any practice. I’d made it to the hotel breakfast before ten but then briefly gone back to bed. A waitress had told me at the coffee machine that I was a good boy to have learnt some Croatian, unlike most visitors. I think I’ll go up the hill to Grič now for a while, though I’m not thirsty. There is pleasant sunshine, though the morning was a little cold. The Croats are not loud. They look human as they pass. They don’t have alien expressions on their faces. 

11 PM 

The lad behind the counter in Pod Starim Krovovima had a beard and a shaved head. He said he thought my accent or way of speaking was Slovenian. Did he give me the one on the house just because I was the first in? I didn’t quite catch that bit. The bog-of happened when I ordered a second drink. He put up two pints for the price of one. I left before dark and down the hill ducked into Krolo, which was dark and busy, though I got a counter stool and soaked up the scene. I left there before nine, thinking I’d get some grub at the Submarine, but by then Croatia was playing on TV and I was reduced to crisps from a kiosk and the minibar. Now I’ve been here twice, I’m a veteran, so to speak. I’ll be back again, with better flight times. 

Prague Scams

2022

25 October, Tuesday 

The taxi driver was waiting in the airport as arranged. No hassle. A presentable lad in a good car, he smiled and shook my hand in response to a decent tip. Once checked in, I had two pints downstairs in U Medvídků. No more orders taken after half past ten put a stop to unwinding. I walked then to the Old Town Square and back. An awful lot of foreign youngsters roamed the cobbled streets.

This truly is the smallest hotel room I’ve ever had (€104 per night, out of season). I’ve walked into bigger wardrobes.

26 October, Wednesday 

In Prague, the chiselling is official. The country’s largest bank (Česká spořitelna) forces conversion charges on cash withdrawals by foreign cards at its ATMs. It’s a completely legal scam. The dreary rain came as I crossed the Charles Bridge and headed uphill. I stopped off in the Church of St. Nicholas to film the ceiling.

The minor tourist mob at the metal detectors kept me out of the Castle. Up there I instead went to find the Black Ox (U Černého vola). The lovely waitress looked very like someone I used to know but this one was a little bit shorter, a little bit curvier and a little bit prettier. It was a long afternoon but I got out of it by six, having paid no more than €25 (equivalent) for a simple lunch plate and a load of pints to pass the time. The Czechs are an unsmiling bunch in the main but this was the only place I heard anyone laugh. The waitress, the man at the taps, a couple of regulars, it was a pleasant sound, in the otherwise general absence of charm. 

27 October, Thursday 

I got scammed by the driver of a taxi the hotel called at my request this morning. The swarthy greaseball didn’t even step out of the car to check for any baggage but I was tired and my antennae weren’t up. Lesson to self: don’t be too tired to deal with the unexpected. This wasn’t going to be as smooth as my arrival but I’d naturally presumed the hotel would use a reputable taxi firm, with or without prior arrangement. “The cab company with the best reputation is AAA Taxi,” says the Pocket Rough Guide to Prague. Evidently the very rough guide.   

For example, the thousand crown note that I had for the fare (an ample amount) disappeared after I handed it over and turned to reach for my bag on the back seat. He insisted I’d handed him a hundred. For another example, he then loudly and falsely insisted 900 crowns were worth €70. By then I was too tired and confused to go, “What?? No it’s f***ing not!” Given I had no more Czech currency, I paid him off in euros to be rid of him. That’s somewhere crossed off. I did Prague and Prague did me. The poster in the hotel breakfast room had already explained what was expected of tourists.

Hitching in the Eighties

Dr. John Flynn

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A Sardinian Sunset

Alghero, September 2022

In the evenings, beneath our windows, a crowd gathered to watch the sun go down over Capo Caccia.

The compact old town’s ‘cobbles’ could be more comfortable underfoot instead of being just pebbles on edge, set in concrete. Wear appropriate footwear. You will see also one or two lines of flagstones on many of the narrow streets but the people and bikes coming against you will prefer to use them too.

The nicest cafe I saw (and sat at more than once) was the Girasol at the southwest corner of the old town.

Here’s a short Italian lesson from the rush of our last morning, when we had to be out at ten. A busy tout (delatore = informer) hailed a cop car to tell the lads I was putting a supermarket sacchetto (plastic bag) of rubbish in a street bin, all of which usually had glass bottles and pizza wreckage filling them by nightfall anyway. I talked my way out of it by explaining the nationality (always advisable) and the circumstance (see above). The polizia just told me to bring the few plastic bottles I had left back to the apartment. That retired couple of ficcanesi (busybodies) had to be out on patrol early for the likes of me. 

Phrase Books

Lanzarote, May 2022

The Brno Train

2022

24 April, Sunday

There was hassle on the mid-morning train from Vienna to Brno when an Italian near me lost his ticket. Maybe he was a Slovene, as I’d thought there was a woman speaking a Slavic tongue to him on the platform when I boarded. Maybe he was a junkie, he was looking rough and bewildered, and smelling of smoke. He had no English or Czech and, on getting no satisfaction out of a stereotypically indifferent Spanish couple across the aisle (he had earlier offered them sweets), he turned back to me for help. He’d already required considerable reassurance about where he was going, which meant I’d actually seen his ticket, whatever he did with it. I looked over him to the window side of his seat but only saw two or three crushed beer cans. 

The mature lady conductor quickly invoked the police. A bit too quickly, to be fair. He hadn’t even emptied all his pockets but, given he kept looking back at me, as if for a miracle, I remembered enough survival Czech to assure her that he and I were strangers.  

Pointing at him and going, “Neznám” (‘I don’t know [him]’) aimed to allay any suspicion that we were working a scam. Nevertheless, I added that he did have a ticket, at the outset, and did have cash (“Má hotovost”) for another, and that he was only going to Brno. In the end she took very little money off him and gave him another ticket. 

When we disembarked, he stuck to me and asked for help to find cambio in the station. By then my rusty Italian was showing signs of life but he stopped two sceptical yet business-like security guards for information. That’s how I had to think of some more Czech to explain he only wanted to exchange his euros, while making a rollover motion with my hands.  

“Má euro. Chce vyměnit. Eh, cambio.” 

Once we were shown to a willing hatch, the two beefy guards in black rolled their eyes and walked away, and I too said a quick ciao to my new friend (“Max, Massimo”) as my work there was done. I wasn’t going to let him buy me a drink at any rate, and I too vanished when the lady behind the glass distracted him. 

This incident and the one in The Good Soldier Švejk where the fictional Czech hero pulls a train handbrake both recall a story told to me by a Jewish Englishman in a Belfast pub on a snowy day in 1987. In 1969, G. was on a train somewhere in Czechoslovakia, enjoying the luxury of a Cuban cigar, when a representative of state security slid back the door to tell him to put it out. The railways minister was in the next compartment and didn’t like the smell. After attempting to engage the minister in a fraternal socialist debate about the cigar, G. got thrown off the train at the next station. As the translator Cecil Parrott described Švejk’s creator Jaroslav Hašek, he (H.) was a very untypical Czech. 

Even the paving stones of Brno are bigger than I’d imagined and I hadn’t expected the sloping, undulating aspect of the main square, Svobody. The city centre does have vulgar touches, like the two monument cocks (clock and horse), and the KB and Omega blocks on Svobody are more bad teeth, but there’s quite a number of strikingly good-looking buildings, in colour and texture. The dark cathedral stands on Petrov, an enticing little hill above a corner of the cabbage market square (Zelný trh). 

From Vienna one can, by train, in less than an hour and a half, reach Brno to the north, Bratislava to the east, Sopron to the south and Linz to the west. Brno, the capital of Moravia, is the second city of the Czechs and home to 380,000 people. I just went to have a look, just because it was there. The striking theme from Czech YouTube videos about Ireland is that our mentality is alien to them. The same theme hardly features at all among similar videos made by Croats.