July 20th - I don't go sightseeing

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July 20th:
A procession of trams/cable cars and inconsiderate people led to not much sleep… but for once I won’t prattle on with the details.
I got up and went to meet my friend Antonija, another “I’ve talked to her on the net but we’ve never met” situations. She is just as funny and lovely in person.
We went for a coffee, she gave me a few tips on things to check out and we had a general catch-up on what had been going on since we’d last written… which was quite a bit since she hadn’t written in a while because she’d been promoted and had tons more work to do! So many people came up to us begging for money while we were sat there, which as always made things slightly awkward.



After coffee we went for a walk so that Antonija could show me the way to uptown where I’ll head later on today. I stopped in at the train station and got my ticket to Subotica, which was pretty cheap… I was able to pay for it with the cash I’d got out yesterday and still have plenty left for food and touristy stuff.



~Later~



Well I’d planned to get back to the hostel for half an hour and then go out and explore again, but while I was back there Andy and Asra (from the UK and US respectively) came back followed by Carlo and Richard (reception guy and an Aussie) and then the two Belgian girls who I think were called Michelle and Jo (pronounced Yo or something close to that). So we sat and talked for a while and the conversation ended up stretching out and eating up most of the day… mind you, I think a lively conversation can be a good part of travelling, it’s so easy to get obsessed with “I’m here, I must see EVERYTHING and fill my day with touristy stuff” sometimes it’s nice just to hang out, hear about people’s travels and talk about your own.



After a while the others left, Richard and I stayed behind, it turned out we were pretty similar as far as sense of humour and some of the things we wanted out of our travels. He had to go to another hostel that night so we walked around there so he could check in and dump his bag, and then we went to have a look around the city.



Checking out Zagreb by night ended up almost being the better option, it was nice and warm (as opposed to scorching hot), less panhandlers, and the city looks gorgeous in that light! After being touristy and taking pictures we wandered past the square and into the café/restaurant district. We went to a restaurant that had been recommended by the hostel (and by several of the people staying there).
We ordered a big Greek salad between us and a big meat heavy Cro dish each and plenty more conversation. I found Richie to be a cultured and on-to-it guy; he was Australian from Greek & Italian heritage so he spoke bits of those languages, and he’d been married to a Croatian woman so he spoke some of that too!



We wandered off and had a bit more of a chat before heading back to the hostel and parting company.

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Photos

Mindbait and Tonka
With the lovely Antonija

Folk Dancing
man when I was in school we just did the 'bird dance'

Zagreb turns into a Van Gogh painting
and it looks lovely