The decision has been made. It is time I make it the right one. I watch the bus cruise into its designated gate. It is already quite full. I use memory, not knowledge, to translate the ticket instructions and information, to reassure myself that I am on the correct bus. Having boarded the first bus departing from Doboj, Republika Serbska, I reach Zagreb in five hours, after we are made to alight, interview, and re-board the bus thrice during the journey. Four officers thumb through my passport and ask me questions I can answer without batting an eyelid. The one who hands me my passport back looks me square in the eye and says softly, but firmly “Enjoy your time in our land. Welcome.”
The only available seat on the bus is in the last row next to the window. I feel safe, bouncing to the cheery rhythm of the vehicle. On my left is a lady wearing a pink skirt. She could be my grandmother. Next to her is a man with the countenance of Robert De Niro. His animated gestures and hearty laughter compensate for the sparse English words he gargles up from time to time. To my right, I see the sun spilled into an orange sky, while I check for two BAM (Bosnian Marks) to pay for my luggage transport.
This is a journey I have not prepared for, and it must certainly show, whether in my mannerisms or my halting speech. I look away when a man seated diagonally opposite leers at me, his right hand outstretched to caress the seat. With no empty seats I can move to, I feel a slight tremor of fear that only a woman knows, one that begins in the throat and plunges deep into the stomach and beyond, like a dagger grazing the insides. Almost immediately, the lady in the pink skirt squeezes herself tighter next to me, and begins to make conversation in Croatian, much to the chagrin of the leering man, who shrivels back into his seat. She flashes a toothy smile at me. Her hands have fed and clothed several children, wiped away tears, rolled dough, and poured love into hearts. She shares herb-flavoured breadsticks with me and claps excitedly when the bus pulls into the city centre, as if to encourage enthusiasm by osmosis.
Zagreb is shrouded in a rainy mist when I begin walking towards the hostel, and I intend to make the fifteen minute walk a memorable one. The receptionist who checks me in offers fruit and water, and uses a red marker to squiggle notes on three maps of the city. I’ve booked a free city tour while on the bus to Zagreb, and so from the hostel, I make my way into the city centre to check the precise location where I should be at 4:30pm. This exercise, some might call futile, but it will not bring harm, even if it brings a migraine. I am famished post the tour, which is wonderfully done. The soup is nothing to write home about, but the Kuhani štrukli certainly is, awakening my taste buds to the pleasures of Croatian gastronomy. My companions on the tour concur with this.
Life here is tempered with just the right dose of optimism and tantrum. There are challenges of course, revealed only if I care to scratch the surface. I feel good, happy even, in the middle of the Ban Jelačić Square where I watch everything and everyone, as if attempting to imprint it all upon memory. I then walk up a series of winding steps with my ice cream and park myself on a broad stone wall. From this viewpoint, Zagreb seems to be a Rapska Torta, pink, yellow, golden, and cherry pink roofs glistening under the glaze of dusk spread smooth like Maraschino Liqueur. That night, I read sixteen pages and then watch clips from a movie that was released in 2011. It is only today that I understand why and how these clips have been instrumental to my journey so far.
I am pleasantly surprised the next morning, when a lady on the tram politely asks, and that too for the first time on my travels, whether I am from Australia.
“You look like you might be,” she smiles. “I am a proud Croat. We lived for seventeen years on the Sunshine Coast. Brisbane also was lovely, but we are happy to be home now. Home is a calling one shouldn’t refuse.”
Her comment makes me think of the things I have refused, consciously, knowingly, and with quiet resignation. This keep me busy on the three hour bus ride to Plitvice Lakes National Park, one of the largest and oldest national parks in Central Croatia. The tufa formations connected by lakes and caves, and complemented by a series of mesmerising waterfalls have earned Plitvice a spot on the UNESCO World Heritage List, and rightly so. If there exists such a thing as heaven, a chunk of it certainly resides at Plitvice. Sunlight throws its weight upon the lake waters, which then range from olivine, grey, green, azure, turquoise, or sky blue. It takes us a day to cover twelve Upper Lakes (Gornja jezera) and four Lower Lakes (Donja jezera). The day is beautiful and my heart is full, as I dine with fellow travellers, many of whom tell me about the riveting aspects of their otherwise stale and tiresome lives. Biting into tender pieces of mushroom with sour cream, we shoo away flies with full mouths. My companions advise me to visit New York City; I do not tell them that to me, it is a place as uninspiring as Neptune or Pluto. I am one of the few who return to Zagreb, while others hop onto the bus to Split for the remainder of the tour.
The day’s events wash over me. ‘Home is a calling one shouldn’t refuse.’ A calling alright, but how does one recognise it? All my life I have attempted to make homes out of people and with no effect. People change and with them, homes too, crumble, their debris only mine to bear. Like a game of snakes and ladders, I think. Much gained, much more lost, but all with reason, in its own time, and for a purpose greater than what mortals might understand. No notes recorded today. I have no inclination of doing so, at least not in the bus.
At my room, I make a meal of Ajvar and rice cakes, and for dessert, overripe bananas with raisins I’ve clumsily pressed within. Taking stock of my scattered notes, I begin writing them up neatly. That night I watch stand-up comedy and read the magazine hidden in the only functional drawer of the nightstand.
‘Ljiepa naša Hvratska‘
‘Hvratski Recepti‘
‘Jednodnevni izlet u Zadar‘
If I trace my fingers over the letters and wait for ten seconds, I tell myself, the letters will magically transform into meaningful Croatian words. That does not happen, and I end up sleeping late. With a heavy head at breakfast, I take an extra pair of biscuits from the breakfast table and doze off in the bus to Zadar, between images of rolling clouds, grainy mountains, and lush green fields dotted with a dozen dollhouses. Zadar is a delightful city of medieval churches, Roman ruins, and with a lively culinary scene. Even as the oldest continually inhabited city on Croatia’s Adriatic coast, it is easy to navigate without a map. I pass by waves of shops all selling trinkets made of shell, stone, and colourful beads. Most tourists oblige me with photos at Pozdrav suncu (Monument to the Sun) and Morske orgulje (Sea Organ), both architectural marvels paying homage to nature. The former symbolises communication with light, whereas the latter communicates with sound, whereby waves interact with a polyethylene tube system and a resonating cavity such that sound emerges from the holes all along the white marble steps. It is a creative spin on reconstructing the new city coast (Nova riva), lending Zadar a polished touch after the devastation imposed by the Second World War. With three hours to spare until my departure, I meander with throbbing feet through cheerily painted yellow brick lanes and manicured gardens. On my way to the bus stand, I quickly duck into a shopping centre to stand under vents of cool air at the entrance. I must make a quizzical sight indeed. The extra pair of biscuits has by now turned to powder, which I will sprinkle over my soup at dinner.
Back to my room in Zagreb after five hours on the stuffy bus, I manage to relieve myself and sit in silence for another twenty minutes until I realise the rain has soiled my laundry that was hung out to dry in the day’s heat. This is enough for me to know that the decision I’ve made will lead on to further eventful adventures, experiments, and encounters.
©Devika Pandit 2023. In this travel diary, I have retraced and attempted to recreate the series of journeys that I undertook in 2023. Events, experiences, and characters have been fictionalised for effect.
AT THE FRONTIERS 