Serbian Funk in the Garden

Last night, I went out and partied my body for the first time since early May and have now proven definitively that I am healed! The back is BACK! Rich Bitch, the Serbian funk band that I've been touting since I got hold of them at the radio station here, was playing an outdoor bar near Old Town, the Garden Caffe. (Did anyone ever download their album from my blog when it was up there for 3 weeks?) God, they were great live! My friends and I didn't sit down ONCE after the band's first song. A lot of good funk covers and then a number of Serbian hits from decades past. They brought on a woman lead singer who was the Yugoslavian Tina Turner in the 80's and were doing a lot of her songs from back in the day. She has a GREAT voice! Deep and strong, which I love in chicks!

We danced under towering trees on a stone deck in the balmy night air with a yellow-gold moon shining down on us: me, my boss at the radio station, Vukan, 20-year-old Aussie Stu with the indomitable energy, 2 cute, blond girls from Finland, American Brian, 2 Brits, and sundry other folks from the Hippo. I stood maybe 3 feet away from the horn section boogying down like it was nobody's business. They rocked the house (rocked the open air?)! And I finally remembered why it is that I came here to Budva for these 6 months. Because, it wasn't for the herniated disc in my back and 2 months of bedrest. It wasn't for the sweltering humid heat or the city-wide water shortage that makes cleaning the hostel and washing my hair a particular challenge. And it wasn't for the countless inconveniences that a language barrier, not having a car, and 50,000 tourists on the beaches here tend to cause. I came to meet and talk to and party down with interesting people. And the added bonus was working up a sweat dancing in the streets and then schmoozing with the Rich Bitch saxophonist all night.

There's good music here in the Balkans if you know where to look. It's not all just techno club crap and bad turbo folk, ex-Yu style. Mario, the above mentioned saxophonist told me that the band is releasing their 2nd album next year. It'll be the first to go stateside. I want to see the music videos that come out with the new album. (No joke! I've been promised a DVD.) Good times last night! Good times seeing live music again.

Accidentally Drunk

And, in the category of Don't-Drink-It-Unless-You-Smell-It-First, I've committed just about the stupidest transgression I've perhaps done so far here in a foreign country just now. I've accidentally drank a shot of vodka. (Seriously, ACCIDENTALLY!) I mean, I think it was vodka. It was something alcoholic. And it was clear. And it was in an unmarked water bottle in the freezer. And the water bottle looked exactly like MY water bottle, which I also keep in the freezer. And anyone who knows me knows that I can't hold my liquor. Not even a few drops of it. So now, I'm 20 shades of pink all over, my head is throbbing, my heart is pumping like a jackrabbit, and I pretty much can't breathe because my throat is closing up. How pleasant.

All this because my people (and by that, I mean, members of my family AS WELL AS my race in general) lack an enzyme called alcohol dehydrogenase, which turns alcohol into sugar in your body so that you can metabolize it and not be poisoned by it. (Read the bit on "in humans" and not "in yeast and bacteria".)

I can't believe I did this! I can't believe I went into the freezer here at the hostel, took out what I thought was my innocent little water bottle, and swallowed a swig of it without registering what it was first. And, I can't believe I'm blogging about it while under the influence! God, the misadventures I can have just sitting around a quiet hostel on an idle Thursday night.

But now, for the ironic part of this story: Nadya is leading an excursion tonight for all our guests here at the Hippo. I was supposed to join her in it shortly after I grabbed my water bottle to head out. The excursion is a pub crawl through Budva's Old Town. And, I was tagging along with the intention of drinking nothing more than some carbonated mineral water with a slice of lime floating in it. Never mind. I guess I'm not going after all. I've already had my pub crawl, thanks!

Hi, I'm Still Here

I don't know if it's just because I had a REALLY quiet day cut off from just about everyone on the planet, or all of the Hippo staff went out to dinner tonight while I worked a busy hostel shift alone, or my days off are spent on my own all the time, or the heat and mosquitoes are getting to me in general, or WHAT, but I felt a little lonely tonight, and am getting kind of tired of my own company. Usually, I'm quite fond of my own company, because, let's face it, I'm a laugh-riot to be around (!), but after 2 weeks in seclusion at the back rehab spot, and then all of my days off since I've been back spent by myself, I'm getting a little fed up with just the company of my iPod, the short, two-word conversations I have with local sales clerks around here, my witty little observations on the fashion sense of some of the more scantily-clad young women around, and similar alone-activities. And, I don't know if it's my imagination, but I seem to have hit a dry-spell on comments to my blog, emails from peeps in my inbox, and letters from home. Have you guys forsaken me for more witty and interesting friends? Friends who aren't living so far away in such a tiresome place that most of you have zero interest in? Or, am I just being over-sensitive to the neglect? Don't answer that. I don't have a therapist here should I get the wrong response.

So, anyway, after a solid week back into the fray here at the hostel and at the radio station, I've got these few tidbits of news to share:

1. The high season is off to a staggeringly busy start as of July 1st. The Hippo is at full capacity almost every single night, which makes accepting walk-up guests who don't have reservations, or extending the stays of guests who do but like us so much they want to add a few nights to their total time here, a really tough juggling act. But, since I earn more money when we have more guests in-house, this is a good thing, and now, I can fund that trip to Italy after all.

2. My back is fine these days. I never pick up anything from the ground without going into a full squat and working my quads and glutes, but I'm fully-functional again now. I'm also taking fish food as a supplement 3 times a day too. Or, at least the container LOOKS like a bottle of fish food, and the contents SMELL like a bottle of fish food. But, really, it's brown colored capsules, and not multi-colored flakes, so I shouldn't joke. Those crazy Germans and their Vitaminkapseln mit Muschel-Extrakt!

3. Fire season began here this past weekend with a grassfire on the hill over part of the Budva Riviera just south of where we live. The blaze took more than 2 days to contain, and all last night, you could still see it lighting up a huge swath of the hillside while firefighters tried to get it under control. Budva is already suffering a water shortage, which tends to happen every summer when the population of the town jumps from 17,000 (local, normal population) to 70,000 (tourists and tourism industry staff added), but 2-day long grassfires that need water for putting out must really add to the challenge. I guess I should seriously consider taking fewer showers from now on. Those who have to live with me probably won't appreciate it, given how hot it is here these days.

And, finally, 4. Ponta Planet has been going strong these past few weeks and we've hit our stride as far as content and production values at last. I don't want to brag, but last night, when Nino, my engineer, was directing my voice-tracks, he made some sort of comment about it sounding good now that we're 10 shows in. What?!? We're 13 shows in, Buddy, and I thought we were sounding good 6 shows ago! Jeez, everyone's a critic!

If you guys get the chance, send up some smoke signals to tell me how you're going, or listen to a Ponta Planet show archived here on this blog (links to download episodes appear to the left of these ramblings). Prove to me that these feelings of neglect are all part of the lack of breast-feeding I had as a baby and nothing more.

Gathering No Moss

The Rolling Stones are here in Budva playing a concert date on Jaz beach tonight. (Yes, here in Budva!) Everyone from the hostel and the radio station went to the show except me. I get to do the Cinderella routine because I have a bad back that wouldn't support me walking, standing, jumping around, dancing with the hordes, or getting jostled by rabid Stones fans, for hours at a time, with no place to sit down should my back need a break from it all. Anyway, you know, those old rockers just aren't my thing, and neither are these big, giant stadium concerts. I just don't do crowds. Though, I had originally wanted to go, just so I could say I saw the Rolling Stones perform -- in BUDVA! And, that would've been a laugh. But, I guess I'm keeping my €50.

So, I'm minding the store tonight here at the Hippo. And, blogging my way through the peace and quiet. It's rare to get peace and quiet right now at the hostel, given that the summer rush is fully upon us, and we're at max capacity every single night, pretty much. It's been a crazy couple of days since I've been back to work here and at Ponta Radio. Ridiculous amounts of non-stoppedness. I'm going to WANT my days off when I get them now!

In fact, this Wednesday, for my first full day off from work now that I'm back *at* work, I'm taking a day trip to Dubrovnik -- the pretty, clean, more cosmopolitan, waaaaay over-touristed big sister of Budva, located on the Croatian coast. I signed myself up for a bus tour for the day. Why, oh, why, you might be asking me? Since, I've already been there, seen plenty of it, and don't like it all that much, etc. etc. I'm going because I've got to cross an international border before July 18th, to legitimize my stay here in Montenegro, and a bus tour to Dubrovnik is the cheapest way I can do that. Them's the rules, since I don't have a work visa to stay here for longer stretches of time. It's been just about 90 days since I was out of the country last. Which means that it's been 3 months since I've been here in Montenegro! I can't believe how the time flies. Though, I feel like I've been here for ages. I can't believe what HAPPENS to you as the time is flying, is more like it.

It's been 3 months! I've been in and out of home-sickness, in and out of back injury, in and out of fights with David, in and out of photo albums, and in and out of epic friendships with our hostel guests. And, there are 3 months left to go. Crazy! This stone continues to gather no moss.

You Made Me Love You. I Didn’t Want to Do It, Didn’t Want to Do It.

ABOVE: Lights of the town across the bay from my room in Igalo. I went arty with the camera and made the lights run.


D A T E L I N E : Thursday, 5 July 2007
Penultimate Day at the Institute
Igalo, Montenegro

You know a couple of weeks ago, I waxed melodramatic about how clingy I can be about things? Well, it’s true, even here in the weirdest back rehab spa I’ll ever visit in Eastern Europe. (Because there are so many others in Eastern Europe for me to judge against, right?) But, sitting here on the spacious private balcony of my room overlooking the blue-green waters of the Boka Kotorska and the surrounding hills, I’m getting a little sad that I’m checking out and leaving for Budva tomorrow, to go back to what used to be my normal life – life before the back injury, when I didn’t lay around all day trying not to move my back, when I worked more, cleaned bathrooms, hung laundry, and led walks up to the monastery 12 minutes from the hostel. When I went to the beach on my days off, took daytrips, walked around Old Time taking pictures, and could go to a bar at night with friends if I was off shift. I’m going back to the hustle and bustle of lots of strangers invading my space constantly and no chance to run around naked after a shower air-drying if I want to. I’m going back to what was supposed to be the 6-month adventure in Montenegro I was having, if my back hadn’t gotten hurt. I guess my adventure took a detour.

It’s funny, when this whole thing happened in the middle of May, I was so pissed off that my plans for the summer were being hijacked by the bad luck and clumsiness of a slip and fall accident. I had already gotten used to a month and a half of life in Budva with all new favorite things to do. And, I hated the even newer routine of lying around all day alone, trying to remain conscious when all there was for me was eating, sleeping, reading, watching DVD’s, and hanging out online. It was so frustrating not to be part of the Budva that I had gotten used to.

And now, over a month and a half later, I’m about to be discharged from the Igalo Institute with pretty much a clean bill of back health and I’m a little sad to be re-entering hostel society with all the activity and responsibilities that it carries with it. I’m a little sad to be leaving behind the slovenliness of laying around all day, every day, with no expectations on me except that I not move too much. And, I’m actually a little sad to leave behind these last 2 weeks of weird Igalo Institute routines that I’ve been developing sharply. God, maybe I’m just sad about losing yet another routine!

After tomorrow, I’ll probably never again wake up before 8:00am and be happy about going off to any sort of group activity. I’ll miss all the nice, pretty therapists who wrap me up in mud, point hoses of water at strategic parts of my body while I’m immersed in warm water, and demonstrate walking on tiptoes around the swimming pool for me. I’ll miss the cute waitress who calls me “my dear” and has a fresh, hot cup of black tea brewing at my table as soon as I arrive for dinner in the restaurant. I’ll miss being done with my day by 12:noon and having nothing else I have to do except lounge around on my balcony keeping myself entertained counting how many colors of blue I can see in the water below me. I’ll miss being so close to the promenade at Herceg Novi, which I can get to after a short, 50¢ bus ride, where there’s a great little movie theater that thinks it’s an art house, the best gelato café on the boardwalk anywhere, and a lovely cliffside walkway right next to the water which has even better people-watching than anything in Budva.

It’s interesting to me how much I dreaded coming here all this time, and now that I’m having to leave, I’m sad to go. That means I liked it here, I guess, which is the most surprising bit. Igalo turned out to be more than just good material to blog about in my snarky little way. It turned out to be a good experience that I’m not sorry I had.

We're Gonna Drink Bacardi Like It's My Birthday

It was my birthday yesterday. For the very special occasion, I got to leave the institute and spend the night back in Budva. It was so I could see friends at the hostel, eat barbecue, collect a slew of presents, including what had come in the mail from peeps at home, generally be lavished with attention and love, which strangely, I’m not getting at the institute, and connect to the internet for the only time this entire week. (Gasp!) And, I had the most spectacular day! It wasn’t enough that Matt and his girlfriend came from London with gifts of Sue Townsend (book), Tom McRae (CD), The Tea House in Covent Garden (3 different kinds of tea), and The Body Shop (smell goods), and carried around all of my heavy bags so that my old-lady back wouldn’t get further injured, but the best presents they gave me was company in a strange place like Igalo, and a ride to Budva.

How can one of my best birthdays possibly be one that I spent several thousand miles away from 90% of my friends and loved ones, in a country where I don’t speak the language, and oh, yeah, my back got injured and I’m walking around like a gimp all the time? Well, it was.

My cup runneth over. It really does. It runneth big time.

Bloggie Goes to Igalo

D A T E L I N E : Tuesday, 26 June 2007
Day 2 at the Institute
Igalo, Montenegro

There’s no internet connectivity here at all, and I’d have to walk 2 km into town to get online at an internet café, so guess I’m going to send this out late, whenever I can connect this laptop to a signal. Here I am at the Igalo Mediterranean Health Centre for my back treatment. I have to stay here for 10 days after all. The doctor who assessed me yesterday was saying that this treatment is supposed to take 3 weeks, but I wasn’t down with all that. She was wearing a form-fitting, black knit dress with white polka dots on it and a ruffle at the hem of the skirt when she met with me for my official clinical evaluation, so how am I supposed to take that seriously??? I need at least a white lab coat, if not a stethoscope draped over the shoulders, for me to buy into anything a doctor has to say. I’m giving it 10 days and then I’ve got to get on with my life.

Things here are going to be quiet and slow, something I can only appreciate up to a point. If I only had to take all this down time for 2-3 days at a stretch, I’d be much more into it. But, 10 days is going to be rough! There’s nobody here for me to talk to! Virtually no Americans come here, or even other English-speaking nationalities, I’m told. And, I’m a complete anomaly, being “Chinese” and all. The other stats to share: About 80% of the patients, or clients, as I’m sure the PR people here at Igalo would prefer that I say, are 55 or older, and of the larger, rounder body type. And, the facility itself? Think: 1980’s corporate hotel, with all of its old, dark wood décor and by now, broken-downness, that’s sort of funny and sort of depressing at the same time. In fact, all the things here, the staff, the clients, the services, the food, all of it, is pretty sad. On the funny spectrum, it would weigh in at the pathetic end, not so much the clown end.

But, on a positive note, my room is just huge, and has a lovely view of the Boka Kotorska, the biggest fjord outside of Scandinavia. (Maybe that’s why all these Norwegians like to come here for treatment all the time!) I have a nice, big balcony with decent furnishings, a full-sized bed (I miss full beds like you wouldn’t believe. It’s been months since I’ve slept in one!), and some chirpy crickets in the ventilation ducts in my room, which I presume are part of the nature-sounds therapy that this place offers but doesn’t seem to list on the brochures. And I’ve got a lot of time to hang out, work on my tan, read my books, make more mix tapes in iTunes, watch DVD’s that I’ve borrowed from various sources, and write things. And, oh yeah, there’s the therapy bit that I’m also here for. That stuff is interesting, to say the least! Day 1 of my treatments was a mass of confusion, seeing as how there’s NO orientation offered here in the least, except for the unsmiling person who gave me a card with some strange code words noted on it in a foreign language yesterday. Excuse me, I don’t mean to be a Princess, but I need a little bit more hand-holding here. Please?

Anyway, after a very frustrating day of running around like it’s the first day of school at a new junior high and I’m trying to figure out my class schedule during passing period, I’ve found out the therapy routine. I’ve got 20 minutes of group exercise at 8:00 am for core strengthening with an instructor who speaks about 5 words of English and the rest of it is Serbian and Norwegian or German or something, I think. There’s only one person my age in the class, and he’s pretty decent-looking, but says all the funny things he says that makes the rest of the class laugh in some language other than my own, so I can’t partake in the amusement. Then, I have one-on-one “lessons in movement now that your back is broke”, which is boring, so is thankfully not every single day. After that, I get breakfast, which is taken in the sad version of a Las Vegas buffet-style restaurant, only with inferior food quality and not everything is buffet-style quantities. Then, onto: underwater massage (a hose pointed at various sections of your back and legs while you lay in a big, warm tub, for all of 11 minutes), group pool exercises (with all old, overweight people, thankfully, while the instructor is some scorchin’ hot mama!), and then my mud wrap for 15 minutes (which lots of my lady-friends who like to go to day spas would enjoy, but I find too gooey to appreciate). And then, I’m done for the day pretty much by 11:30 am.

Like I’ve been saying all along, this is part of the experience of this particular adventure. So, I’m just going to sit back, relax, and put up with whatever they hurl my way for the next 9 days. Go ahead. Do your best to break my spirit, people! I’ve got bloggie on my side to vent into. And, there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. It’s 9 days away, but it’s there.