In large part this photo is a lie. There's a lot of truth in it, but there's a lot going on under the surface.
It's the tail end of the 2011 Kultur Shock Balkan tour. This was taken somewhere in Slovenia while we were dropping off the trailer before heading on to Zrenjanin, Serbia and then ultimately, Burgas, Bulgaria.
While Saso was taking care of all the paperwork involved in dropping it off, Gino thought this was a good opportunity to take a group photo. The night before the band had a played a super late set at a giant festival in Vinica, Slovenia. That day we left Rijeka, Croatia after the band had played one of the smaller shows of the tour in a castle over looking the city's harbor.
I hurt my elbow really fucking badly helping unload the bass cabinet off the stage. Sandals and cobblestone are not a good mix!
Chris and Guy decide to skip the hotel and hang out with some friends from the town. I don't know all the details of their night, but I have a vague recollection of it involving a hospital visit for one of the locals.
Meanwhile, back at the van, Saso and Val and having an intense discussion about the location of the new hotel that had been forced on us. We couldn't find it. I'm sitting in the van with Amy, Paris, Nika and Gino. Luckily Amy had some painkillers in her personal pharmacy and I sat there trying to will away the pain until the meds kicked in.
Val and Saso are still having their discussion outside. From inside the van it looks super intense. Gino gets frustrated with how long this is taking and decides to go join the discussion. All I can think is, "This is going to end badly."
Gino exits the van and gets into the discussion. I can't hear anything that's going on, but it got heated quickly and lasts for what seems like an eternity.
Pain meds kicking in. Still can't move my right arm without pain, but if I don't move it, I'm ok.
The heated discussion outside ends. Everyone returns to the van. No one is talking. It turns out that the hotel is about 100 meters away from us behind the row of trees to our right.
We drive in. Everyone is exhausted. Val, Saso and Gino aren't really talking to one another. Val's explanation of the incident outside the van puts everything into much clearer perspective, so I'll leave that to him if feels like it in the comments.
From the outside, this place looks terrible. Just terrible. Saso then comments, "This hotel looks like where Croatian onion pickers go to die." Apt. Simply apt.
As we're checking in, there is still a lot of tension. It's late in the tour. The tension is understandable. Try spending 21 days in a comfortable, but fairly cramped van with a bunch of strong personalities 9-12 hours a day and you'll understand.
Tempers flare as we check in. Words are said. Strong words.
I'm rooming with Val this evening and as we're walking to our hotel room he says, "I'm not sure I have a band anymore."
We get to our room. It's terrible! I've stayed in some shitty hotels in my 47 years, but this one is exceptionally terrible. The door doesn't even lock!
Usually when I was rooming with Val, we'd shoot the shit for a bit before falling asleep. Not tonight. just fucking get to sleep as fast as possible. Hopefully the morning will be better.
Again, this fucking door doesn't fucking lock and we're in the sketchiest hotel I've ever been in. I sleep right next to the door with my feet hanging off the bed so if someone comes in, the door will hit my feet and wake me up and be prepared to smack someone with anything directly next to me.
Luckily this doesn't happen.
We get up in the morning. There's a shared bathroom and shower down the hall. Val and Gino cross paths and exchange brief morning pleasantries.
I pack my things in Val's absence and when he comes back, "Good. I think I still have a band."
We all meet in the lobby. Paris recounts that she spent a portion of the evening cutting blood stains out of her sheets!
We pack up the van and go to a restaurant down by the harbor for breakfast to reconnect with Guy and Chris. Things are civil. Moods have cooled down. The tour will continue!
At this point in the tour, I'm feeling a little homesick. I'm having the time of my life on this trip, but I'm longing for some little things from home. Despite the omnipresence of AMAZING ESPRESSO EVERYWHERE IN THE BALKANS, I'm missing a nice cup of black, drip coffee. And the food everywhere on this trip has been top notch. I really don't think I'd ever experienced food as good as this at any point in my life. The Balkans are not known for spicy food though. I'm a child of the Bay Area. Hot sauce and spicy flavor course through my veins.
At this breakfast, I'm chatting with Guy about the little things I'm missing from home... hot sauce in particular. I ordered a cheese omelet for breakfast. As we're waiting for it, I confess to Guy that I would kill a dude for a bottle of Tobasco to accompany my omelet.
Moments later, the server appears with my omelet... AND A FUCKING BOTTLE OF TOBASCO SAUCE! HOLY SHIT!
The lingering pain from my injury the previous night lessens somewhat, the stress from the previous evening fades away and the homesickness dissipates! All because of a bottle of Tobasco!
We finish our meal. Fences were mended. We load into the van to head to Vinica, Slovenia for Schengen Fest where Kultur Shock would close out the night.
It's not a long drive. Only an hour and a half or so. We pull up to the Croatia/Slovenia border. We can see the site of the festival just across the river! Looks like a really fun festival. It's sunny and warm. There's a gorgeous, flowing river. Tons of food and beverage tents.
However, the checkpoint we have to go through is not equipped to handle the customs control required for the van, trailer, gear, and merch with us. GAAAAAAAAH! So, we drive like 60 miles out of our way to another border crossing equipped to process the customs for this vehicle. We drive north to Metlika, Slovenia where our hotel is. Drop off our personal stuff and head back to the festival site.
As we're pulling in, we can see the fucking checkpoint that we were turned away from hours earlier. At least we're finally here!
It's still early afternoon and the band isn't playing until 11pm or midnight. Super late. Tea Šentjurc is there. Val had been telling me that I needed to meet Tea. She works in broadcast news in Ljubljana and that the two of us would totally hit it off. He's right! Instant friends with this fantastic person! Kasia and I would be back to Slovenia two years later on our honeymoon and we would spend one of the most memorable days of that trip traipsing around Slovenia with her!
I take in all the sights at this festival. hear some great music. Drink some pivo Karlovacko. Cevapi. Burek. More pivo. Follow the band members around with my camera.
The band Dubioza Kollektiv is playing before Kultur Shock and Gino rushes on stage to perform a song with them. Sooooo much fun!
It's the end of a holiday weekend, so the crowd thinned somewhat before Kultur Shock takes the stage. There are still thousands of people there, a very large crowd, but it had thinned as the night wore on and people headed back to their homes to get some sleep before their work weeks began the following day.
It's a great show on a huge stage with a great lighting setup. The crowd eats it up despite the lateness of the hour.
We head back to Metlika to sleep. I'm rooming with Gino tonight. Gino's a talker, an enthusiastic talker, so the nights I roomed with him went late with conversation. Not tonight though. He decides to go hang out with Amy leaving me to sleep.
We get up in the morning. Destination Zrenjanin. It's the usual cat herding to get everyone in the van and on the road.
We stop in Ljubljana to drop off some stuff at Metelkova and get some lunch at Trnovski Zvon, my new favorite pizza place in the world! After lunch, we drop off the trailer which had housed the band's equipment and much of our luggage for three weeks. I never thought it would be possible to get a little nostalgic about a trailer, but that thing had had some experiences with us.
It was in the parking lot of this rental place that I took this photo. Everyone is tired. There's some inevitable tension from weeks of close proximity and little privacy. I'm a little snappy because it's an overcast day and the light coming through the high clouds makes it nearly impossible to see through the viewfinder and I'm on my belly in a parking lot.
That no one in this photo is strangling someone else or lunging to attack me for taking so long is nothing short of miraculous.
The rest of the day will consist of crossing the border back into Croatia and then crossing another border into Serbia before arriving in Zrenjanin.
The Croatian border crossings on this trip had always been a pain in the ass. Saso is fed up with crossing that border.
"I'm not crossing the Croatian border again! I'll fucking shoot someone if we do! Hungary is in the EU and Schengen now and they have new highways. I say we cross into Serbia on the Hungarian side. It'll just cost us an hour or two. Well worth not crossing the fucking Croatian border again."
Famous last words.
To be continued....
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