Long time no write

Hey,
Sorry about the delay but weve been in small town Slovenia for 2 weeks with my family and the interent is quite a ways away. Slovenia is such a beautiful country, it reminds me of the Okanagan. Ross and I were staying in the house where my papa(my moms dad) was born and raised with 13 of his brothers and sisters. My grandfather passed away over 10 years ago, so to see where he was from will be something Ill never forget. Most of the brothers moved to Canada while the 5 girls have stayed in Slovenia, in the same town they grew up to help my great grandmother raise the younger kids. We were spoiled and we were being taken care of every second of the day. Ive developed such a close relationship to my aunts in such a short amount of time that it was very hard for me to leave, I will have to come back to Slovenia again very soon. In the two weeks and a bit Ross and I were very busy with only about 2 days of down time. Weve been to Ljubljana (capital of Slovenia), Bled, Postojna (a 20km cave), Nova Gorica (the city right beside Italy), Koper and many more. It felt like we saw every inch of Slovenia but we didnt even see Eastern Slovenia. Its a small country but there are so many beautiful things to see that we didnt have near enough time to see it all. Weve learnt alot about World War 1 and 2 and how much it effected this small group of people. When my grandfather was 14 or 15 he was in church when the Germans took him and was told to fight for them. My grandfather fought for the Germans for about 2 weeks until he was able to escape. He then fought for Yugoslavia until the end of war and when the war ended there was no work so he fled the country into Italy. At the Italian border you had to show your passport to get into the country but my papa didnt have one so when he got up to the Italian police officer he ran past him into Italy and they werent able to catch him. From there he moved to Ontario, Canada and from there its history. He was always scared to come back to Slovenia to see his family because he thought someone would find out he fought for the Germans so it took him quite a few years to return home to his family. I was young when he died and I never knew his story so to find out after so many years it makes me appreciate who he was even more.
Ross and I were in jail. We were in Ljubljana and we were sent to prison......it was actually a jail turned into a hostel. There was still the jail cell doors to our room, quite interesting.

I was visited by an unexpected creature at 4 in the morning the other day. I felt something run across my forehead and I thought it was a spider. I was in such a deep sleep that I just went back to bed without thinking about it any further. Not even an hour later I felt it again run across my head. I was swatting at it and then I heard something hit the nightstand and then thump to the floor. THIS WAS NO SPIDER I THOUGHT!! I woke Ross up with vigerous poking to the back to tell him that something was in our room. Ross turns the light on and grabs a sandal and goes searching. Next thing I see is a mouse running across the room! A MOUSE RAN ACROSS MY FOREHEAD!! I named him Richard and once we chased it out of our room we didnt see him again. We automatically thought of our dads because they are both terrified of mice, so there you go Chris and Elmer. Were in Croatia at the moment and were going down to Dubrovnik on Friday so well try and write then. Thanks for reading and again sorry for taking so damn long! Love Amanda

Ross :

I know you guys have been pacing around your house, re-reading newspapers, and watching both evening news(es) in anticipation of a blog update from us - We have to apoligize, but the access to internet where we were staying wasnt very good. I guess you guys inadvertenly experienced a bit of rural slovenian life along with us. I think the best way to describe Slovenians is to picture a bunch of Russians that got plopped down in Italy, and who have an odd disease of ˝Italian turrets˝. Youll hear the this slavic sounding language with the odd exclamation (and twitch?) of ˝Mama-mia˝ or ˝Perfecto!!!˝. They enjoy their pasta...wine, and olives. Theyre a warm people, but still with the no-bullshit eastern european attitude - a good combination in my opinion. In the country itself, where we were staying, was a combination of Vineyards, mountains, and ocean, not very far away from each other. The question of ˝Should we go to Italy..or Croatia...or Austria˝ is fairly common place - its a tiny country. We were fed non-stop with fresh food straight from the garden, and constantly told (rightly so...i believe this now) that our coffee was crap compared to theirs - ˝Who would drink that watered down stuff anyway? Sit down, get your pinky out, and drink our stuff.˝

We covered a whole lot of ground, saw mountains, the ocean, lots of vineyards, wine cellars and castles. I would suggest a trip to slovenia for every one. Its like Italy without the drama queens. Speaking of Italy: our trip to Venice got mixed reviews. Picture an island that you cant get off of, with a bunch of people who know that you cant leave, who subsequently charge you outrageous prices for everything. Got 8 bucks canadian for two cans of pop? Maybe a 1.60$ canadian to relieve yourself. Now, I know that some people are going to turn around to me and say....˝But...its Venice...you have to spend some money!˝ To this, I would agree, but then I would also ask them if since it was venice they would spend 120Euro (190$CND) for a one hour gondola ride? I cant deny that venice is a magical city, but you wont find the magic with 50,000 of your closest tourist friends. You need to search out the back alleys, find the hole-in-the-wall places, and then youll truly be able to enjoy it. A day there was sufficient.

Now we find ourselves in Croatia, surround by roman ruins and the sea. Who can complain? I think were going to strech out on the rocks with a couple of beers and a good book after looking at the ampitheater thats right beside this internet cafe. Tough life? I think not.

Cheers.

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