Long Weekend (Sept. 28 - 30)

I went to Ljubljana! The plan for the long weekend (Fri. 28-Sun. 30) was to go camping in the nearby Karso Forest, however, in light of the heavy rain for the last 3 days, we had a backup. We traveled to Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, on Friday, mid-day, and stayed at Urska’s grandparents’ house.

The group was: (Myself) Diana, Urska and Lucy.






We took a bus from Duino to Trieste, and from Trieste to Sezana (a town just over the border). In Sezana, we got on a train, accidentally sat in first class, got kicked out into second class, and spent a lovely hour and a half or so traveling across the Slovenian Country sie (quite near Urska’s home).

When we arrived in Ljubljana around 18:00, we walked around the city for a while, and took a bus to Urska’s grandparents’ house. My first impressions of Ljubljana were, I think, that it was quite quiet, that it felt very Eastern-European, and that it is really very pretty (both in terms of the architecture and that mountains and hills surrounding it). Urska’s grandparents couldn’t have been nicer or more hospitable. Neither of them spoke any English (or if they did they didn’t learn it) but I think that made the experience even more fun. I started learning words (and trying to learn phrases) in Slovenian, and I really want to continue. I really like the language.

Anyway, the entire trip was really really really fun! Urska’s grandma is an exceptional cook and made us wonderful, healthy, vegetarian, homemade meals, and was very nice. I felt bad that I couldn’t say anything more than “Hvala” (thank you) to express how nice it was to be there. It really felt like a grandparents house; it was warm and cozy and smelled like very good food all the time. The food was especially nice compared to the rather repetitive, deep fried food at the college.


(It was Cold)


Anyway, we arrived at Urska’s grandparents home, ate a wonderful meal (something with broccoli and spinach and mozzarella), played a French card game I taught them, and watched a movie. We went to bed oddly early, and got up around 8:30-9:00 the next morning – most sleep I’ve gotten since I got to UWCAD!

As a result of said excess sleep, the day seemed very relaxed and was really great. We ate more great food (courtesy of Urska’s grandma), walked around the Ljubljana city center, walked up onto a really beautiful hill with a castle (Castle Hill?) near the city center, and enjoyed the beautiful autumn afternoon. I remember thinking sincerely that I didn’t want to be anywhere else in the world at the moment. It was really great.

(Lucy, Diana, Urska, Urska's Grandmother)

Urska’s grandma offered to drive us home (about 1 hr. 15 min. from Ljubljana to Duino by car – 6 hrs. traveling by bus and train!) and we stopped at some very cool caves on the way. We also had the pleasure of meeting Urska’s mother briefly, on the way down to the caves from Ljubljana (near Urska’s home). She was very nice, speak wonderful English, and invited us to come visit this winter some time. I would really love to; I’ve loved all of Urska’s family that I’ve had the pleasure of meeting!

The caves were very cool, although quite developed (as usual). They were, none the less, really pretty and I enjoyed seeing them.



(at the caves)




We got back to school around 20:00 and hung out in Diana’s room and had a mini dinner with some cheese and bread and such…
Slovenia was really wonderful, I hope to go back soon, and I am sincerely considering trying to learn Slovenian. It’s a language that is not even remotely similar to any I have ever studied at all, but I really like it!


Here are some of the words I learned that I can think of:
(these are all spelled phonetically, so I’m sure they’re way off – sorry Urska!)

ena – one
dva – two
tri – three
sditti – four
bet – five
hvala - thank you
dio – good bye
dan – hello
iti – to be
yus sum – I am
govoriti – to speak
yus ne govorim slovensko – I don’t speak Slovenian
govoris slovensko? – do you speak Slovenian?
fajn – fine?
prossimo – your welcome
kie yie – where is…. (I’m positive I severely massacred the spelling)
morati – ? (this is the one I was trying to learn…but accidentally said the next one)
morit – to massacre
mi premo – we go
midva – us two
mitri – us three
ti - you
srcek - darling

That is all my vocabulary after one day of asking Urska to repeat and sound out words over and over, I’m sure I got very annoying! (Hvala srcek!)

Now it’s 2:00 on Sunday, and I need to go to sleep, but the weekend turned out better than I could have imagined! I can’t even go into highlights, everything was wonderful…



Dio
Ciao