Year in Croatia: living life to the fullest

It was a little over year ago when we drove across Europe to the Adriatic Sea. We became emigrants, expatriates and immigrants.

The past 12 months has given us tremendously, so many new things and experiences. I just watched the pictures I have taken over the year and they made me smile several times when remembering all those moments. There are sunny walks on the new trails by the beach in Murter, our Christmas atmosphere a year ago, the festive atmosphere of the February carnival, wild asparagus last spring, collecting sea shells from the beach, a great sailing trip in the spring winds, trips to the nearby islands and southern coast all the way to Montenegro, the visits of the loved ones here, the concert road trip to Pula, wonderful evenings on the terrace under the vine, turquoise sea, ancient fortresses, all the wonderful flavours. Most recently, our visit to Zagreb to celebrate the 100th anniversary of independent Finland at the Embassy party. And much more.

It hasn´t been just moments of smile. I've chopped rock hard firewood with nearly handleless ax, encountered several meters of poisonous worms, trembled in freezing temperatures in the chilling embrace of bura wind. I have been afraid of losing our home and even for my own safety while the summer forest fires raged, cleaned the terrace due to the ash that came from the sky after the forest fires. I have got out of bed well before six in the morning in order to be able go out for the walk with the dog before the sun appears to the sky during the worst heat wave.

I have encountered people. People who have met us with open arms and sometimes welcomed us into their lives as well. Sometimes even in astonishing ways. Helpfulness and genuine warm harted attitude have impressed me, over and over again. When a neighbor's old man waits for us on his driveway in the darkening night as we return from our two hour walk just to give me a bag full of mandarin and pomegranate or when our landlady pops in with the bowl of hot freshly cooked shrimps. Or when the fishermen on the beach are greeting me happily and smiling at a funny little dog who is so excited about the fishing. Or when our local friend comes from her home village with vegetables grown by her mother and with a big chunk of cheese. Or when in a small Austrian village one night we are creating friendships that will make us return again and again. Or when the small hence close-knit Finnish community here understands the joy of getting some liver casserole as a present from Finland and also confirmed that the Croatian word really is one and the same for both cranberries and lingonberries.

The year has taught, demanded and rewarded. It has made me laugh and cry.

Day after tomorrow we will begin our road trip to Finland, it´s going to be our longest visit there so far: one and a half months with travel. What are we waiting for? Getting to sauna for sure, seeing the people we love, both family and friends. Hopefully a bit of fun in winter wonderland. Of course some of the good tastes we have not been getting here at least so often. Campfire in the forest with some good things to eat and drink, the atmosphere of the traditional outdoor sauna and from sauna to have a break from the gentle heat to chilly outside under the starry sky. Visiting Vuokatti area in the more northern part of Finland. After all that it is good to return home, back here on the Adriatic coast. Cause here our home is. At least for now.

When you got to go, you got to go. Even if you are a bit scared.

The image attached to this post is unrelated to the text itself. It is from Finland few years ago. Today 78 years have passed since the Winter War (against former Soviet Union) broke out. The image should be a symbol and a tribute to the determination and courage that the Finns at that time had when facing an overwhelming enemy and protecting our blue-and-white colors. As a result of that attitude, we Finns can today concentrate on totally different kinds of acts of courage. Like the one the actual text is telling about and which compared to the aforementioned event is absolutely insignificant.

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I had postponed it way too long, but now it was time. No way to avoid it anymore, regardless how distressed it made me feel. No, I do not mean buying a new bra even though I can not deny it, that is something I probably also have to force myself doing sooner or later. Now it was about going to a hairdresser. Every woman knows the amount of pain caused by the idea of going to a new hairdresser. You give the big part of yourself to the hands of someone and that someone has scissors in his/her hands.

One challenge for communication is that often the other party don´t quite understand the message you have been given. That may happen unintentionally and due to earlier experiments related to the same kind of situations with different factors. Or they may understand it totally the other way around. Especially if there is no earlier background for your mutual communication, which usually gives shelter from bigger misunderstandings in long lasting customer relationships. What to another is a shade of warm brown might be some kind of rusty shade of copper to someone else. Situation gets even more trickier if either of the parties can use their native tongue. Then you really might be on thin ice, sometimes you can almost hear the cracking... And there I was, about to start communicating with Croatian hairdresser about what to do with my hair. 

I had never been to hairdresser here in Croatia. My visits to Finland had included some little trimming of the dry ends but nothing more. The last coloring was fairly a year ago before our wedding so the roots were about ten centimeters long. During the summer the sun, that delightful creator of positive mind and vitamin D had pretty much blonded the upper layer of my hair, especially the previously colored part of it. So mixed blonde on the surface, brunette with the roots below that. That was my haircut. Looked as bad as it sounds. So it definitely was time.

My hubby had been at one salon several times so I knew at least some of the staff spoke English in there. Luckily this housewife timetable of mine is so flexible so I got to the place outside the busy peak hours, at one o'clock. No customers were present, five members of staff did. I asked if they had time to do the coloring and light cutting for me. After that we began to explore the desired color. I wanted toffee brown, the main thing was that all the hair would be more or less same color. My hair was inspected by three different experts. Obviously the mixed condition also worried them. Finally the samples of the color map were reviewed and then they went behind the curtain to mix the paste. Saying I was a little bit nervous would be an understatement.

Two hours later I sighed out of relief. The result was exactly what I was after. All the three ladies who previously helped in creating this new look were again messing with my hair and they were also quite positively surprised at how well it turned out. I also proved the best blowdryer straightening so far. After it my naturally curvy hair was completely straight and smooth all the way to the ends and just with the round brush and the dryer. So we were all happy. I also liked the total price for this, 369 kuna so less than 50 euros. Perhaps this is the beginning of a beautiful and long relationship under which the ice is strong and without any sound of cracking. 

Something good out of olives and lemon but how?

There have been same hustle and bustle among the olive trees in recent weeks and it seems to be continuing still. It is the time of harvesting, the green and dark olives are collected in baskets and sacks to be delivered to oil presses or to oil-producing factories as they maybe should be called nowadays. Croatia is a big producer of olive oil, though trees grow mostly only here on the Adriatic coast and on the islands, as well as on the Istrian peninsula up north. From here you can get some excellent quality oil on a world scale, in fact some Istrian oil just got a new award in some oil quality competition. I heard from somewhere that this year should be qualitatively quite good, only summer drought has left its mark and in some places olives are smaller than usual. There are differences between years in wine and also in oil.

Couple of weeks ago I got the opportunity to visit one small oil producing factory with our landlord, actually just few hundred meters from our home. I got to see how the olives were poured into a small silo from witch they went through the water wash and then to crushing machine that turned those little juicy balls into a thick mass. Finally as a result the greenish oil was separated from this mass and it was slowly running from the metal pipe. 

Olives or crushed pulp, however, were not pressed. Modern technology has slightly altered this ancient process, and nowadays more and more oil is produced by separating oil from a mass with a kind of centrifuge using centrifugal force. So the term cold-pressed olive oil in the label of the bottle in the market may be little misleading. Should it be maybe called cold-swirled, where can I suggest the new term?

Of course, there are also many traditional presses in operation, in witch crushed olives actually release the oil due to compression force. Certainly there are many who think that it is still the one and only way to make olive oil and surely these two methods of production will both continue exist also in the future. The main thing is that nothing is added to the pulp or oil when it is produced and only mechanical actions are been used instead of for example some chemical dissolution. As strange as it sounds, olive oil is one of the world's forged products. The demand for high quality oil exceeds supply and so the temptation to use some cheap tricks is increasing. For example, determining the origin of oil can be challenging, it is a completely different matter where olives have grown and the oil is made compared to where it is bottled. So be careful with the labels if it matters to you.

But lets go back to my visit. The olive growers of the neighborhood bring their olives to the oil mill as soon as possible, as the quality of the olives begins to deteriorate fairly quickly after they are picked. Around here in Podstrana the olive groves are generally quite small and there are no machines used in the harvest. Instead the families spend quality time together while harvesting olives. The amount of that quality time depends on the number of trees, some farmers have them enough to produce oil only for their own use and some have a few more so they can sell the oil also for others. In that case of course there may be a need for some extra workers in addition to those doing it just because of the same family name. But manual work it is. Sometimes the olive grower either don´t want or can not afford to pay for the oil mill. In that case they will leave some of the oil as payment in the spirit of a exchange economy. By selling this oil the mill will then make the money and people like me without our own olives will also be able to get fresh local oil for our kitchens. I also left the place with a five-liter jug.

Due to the high amount of chlorophyll, fresh high quality olive oil is greenish and has a strong scent of cutted grass. There is still a bit sharp, bitter taste that you can feel in the throat. This bitter throat feeling is due to oleocanthal, anti-flammatory antioxidant can be found in big doses in good fresh virgin olive oil. All in all, freshly made olive oil has the highest concentrations of good ingredients that will gradually deteriorate with storage. The green color begins to turn yellow as the chlorophyll becomes carotene and the oil's acids are also getting yellow over time. At the same time, the taste becomes softer and the bitterness disappears. To keep my oil better for longer time I also store it in green glass bottles that protect the oil from light better than the plastic jug I got it in. What a wonderful excuse to enjoy a few bottles of wine ...

Even though our own olive tree still did not give anything to harvest, our citrus tree did so. We have a hybrid tree that is mainly a lemon tree, but it has been associated with one tangerine branch. That part of the tree beared one gigantic mandarin that we ate with a hubby a while ago. It was really tasty, hopefully next year there would be more to pick from that branch.

The rest of the tree, the lemon compartment managed to produce four maturing fruits one of which we lost due to a storm earlier. But the three were spared, and now the first one had matured to be picked up. Yesterday I got that magical moment when I got to snap it off the tree. I have been quite childishly excited about this citrus tree and I have cared it with a lot of love. So it was absolutely wonderful to have the first self-grown yellow fruit in my hand, oozing with its exquisite smell that I just kept on sniffing.

But what would I do with the lemon? How would I use that precious treasure? After thinking about it, I ended up baking lemon buns, which contained a lemon-juice-flavored pudding inside a normal Finnish style bun dough. On top of them, I made the eyes of sugar, butter, grated lemon bark and a hint of fresh rosemary.

I have to say that at least to my taste they were just wonderful. So wonderful that I decided to give them away so I would not end up eating too many. So my landlady's family and my husband's co-workers were also able to enjoy these creations of my kitchen and seemed to be quite happy. Now I have to think about what am I doing with the remaining two lemons after they have matured...

Waiting for the snow and breaking the cold chain while doing that

The sun shines from the blue sky and it still has a bit of heating power left but long gone are the hot days of summer and soft warm nights. Autumn is a reality and winter is coming too, forecast just said we might even see snow here in Split next week. That would be a humorous happening for sure. And rare, the previous case of snow was several years ago, but it is still often mentioned and the pictures of those wonders of snow are been showed from the phones to anyone more or less interested. 

While the weather is getting chilly it is once again time to dig long sleeves and trousers out of the cupboards. And thick woolen stocks. Cause together with this start of cooler season floors are starting to feel particularly cold under your feet. Our apartment has largely tile floors and they already start to cool off quite badly. The locals use the shoes also inside, but I do not find myself local enough to do that. In our home the shoes are left in the hallway when entering inside just like in any other Finnish home. However, I also found some kind of indoor slippers quite comfortable cause even the thick socks don't really have what it takes to break the cold chain from the floor to the bottom of your feet. Last winter, our apartment in Murter had wooden floors which were slightly warmer but in the coldest days of winter there was a great need for slippers in there too. Now that season has already started here.

Getting and staying warm is, however, a topical issue just now. In this apartment, the only solid heating system is those two air-to-air heat pumps: one downstairs in the master bedroom and the other one upstairs. For example, neither of the bathrooms has any heat source. And when talking about the whole house there are no isolation of any kind which is very typical for houses here. So it is getting rather chilly when night temperatures drop to less than 10 degrees and during daylight it does not get too much over that 10 degrees especially when the bura wind is howling around the corners. When I returned from a long weekend trip on Monday evening, the indoor thermometer in upstairs had 18.5 degrees in its screen and the downstairs was clearly even cooler. So it was time to start up the machines to blow some warm air. That blowing is, however, not a good thing as the air moves a little too much and becomes unpleasant. For the same reason, I didn´t use the air con so much during summer, mostly only so much that Tiuku was more comfortable. Well ok, when the thermometer screamed continuously over forty degrees the cool air did feel good to myself too.

Yesterday we went on to get a relief from the hardware store: a couple of radiators and one small fan to the downstairs bathroom. In the bathroom the fan is convenient not only for heating the room, but most importantly it makes it easier to ventilate the moisture out of the window after showering. The only ventilation system in this house are the windows and it is especially challenging to extract the dampness out. With quick cross-draught it´s easy to get the air inside freshened but after two warm showers there is so much moisture in the bathroom that it does not go out of the small window so quickly. When you have a fan blowing warm air from the floor level, it will help a lot as we already figured out last winter when struggling with this same matter. Our landlord himself suggested this shopping trip to buy heaters, I will just deduct the costs from the next rent. They have some old heaters, but those are consuming so much electricity that getting new ones is more reasonable. 

And how wonderful it was to wake up in the nicely warm bedroom this morning and then come to upstairs to cook the breakfast without the draft. Slippers are still needed, but that´s ok.

From the fortress to the treasures of wine cellars

In my previous post I mentioned the redo of the junction next to our house and I was wondering when the actual work would start. No need to wonder that anymore, it has started this week. The crossing is closed for traffic from all three directions and detours are in use. Now we are listening the noises of construction site coming from both machines and people. There has been some great drama already as the locals do express themselves quite vividly when they feel like it. From our balcony we have a great view for site monitoring and in the morning I was having a coffee cup in my hand watching one of these drama situations. Despite the roadblock drivers just tried to go through as they have used to. There they were trying to move those barricades and at the same time the workmen were trying to prevent this activity both physically and verbally. As long as the road is even somehow accessible, it is guaranteed that every night after the workers are gone, the obstacles will be pushed aside and people will be driving through. This happened last night and certainly will happen today. So now we're just waiting to see when the first car has gone to the bottom of the pit in the dark.

During the weekend, we did a bit of domestic tourism with my hubby. On Saturday, we headed for a car ride towards inland and the town of Knin, less than 100 kilometers away from Split when taking those nice small roads. There we were interested in the fortress of Knin on the side of the actual town. It is actually Europe's second largest military fortress site or at least that has been said in several sources, although I do not know what is the largest. There seem to be quite many categories when listing these castles and fortresses in the world. After a little survey, I found a number of "second largest" fortresses and then even the biggest ones started to emerge from many directions. Let's just say that the Knin fortress is big. And old, at least since the 9th century the site has been classified as a fortress.

The fortress consists of a total of five parts that have had a different use at different times by varying amount of people living inside the its walls. It has been a actual city once, easy to defense against the enemy. Close by is the highest mountain in Croatia, Dinara (1831 meters), and the view to all directions is quite amazing. The fortress was a really great place for a history lover like me. You can wonder around in your own pace, take a peek from the loopholes of the walls and climb to higher levels to see the mountains and valleys around the fortress. I could not stop imagine how was it to live here in the Middle Ages?

View from the loophole down to the riversite.

After the fortress adventure, our journey continued towards Skradin. This small town located seemingly inland is in fact a nice active harbor. Skradin is the last place where even quite big boats can get along upstream the Krka River offering a very sheltered port for example during storms. From Skradin you can easily reach the most famous part of the Krka National Park, the Skradinski Buk area. At the price of a park ticket, you can take a half-hour boat ride from the harbor directly to the National Park. I strongly recommend this to anyone who is heading to the park. Another option is to rent bikes from the town and ride to the park via small road on a riverbed where cars are not allowed. This time however, we did not go to see the waterfalls as they have been seen few times already although they are just as wonderful every time. Instead we focused on getting some lunch. Due to the harbor and the influence of the park, Skradin is a rather vivid and idyllic place. Even when the season is already low, there still are several restaurants open. We ended up in Konoba Dalmatino, located just a few steps from the waterfront on the narrow streets of the town. The terrace was in the shade so we joined the other guests inside the restaurants. The shrimp pasta was tasty and a special mention must be given to the restaurant's own baked olive bread.

With full stomachs we headed to the nearby Bibich vineyard. From the small shop we picked up a few bottles of red wine named R6, already familiar to us. In addition, we asked to taste white wine named PS and is was able to get a smile on both of our faces. Bottle of that was also added to our bags. Bibich seems to like those short code-like titles for their wines, but there were also some labels with a bit more letters on them. Place is absolutely worth a visit, especially if the wines are of interest. Compared with the local price level, wines are a bit high priced, but also of high quality. Funny how I already think that if the wine costs more than 10 euros, it is expensive even though in Finland I could easily by bottles priced way more than that. Here in Croatia you can get a decent bottle with 5 euros or even less, makes you think twice paying 30 - 40 euros for one.  

The winery also organizes tasting events, a nice activity for a small group. Of course this must be booked in advance. There is also an exquisite restaurant on the vineyard which you have to pre-book. What a great idea for any special occasion for a small group to book a dinner and start with a wine tasting session. Based on what I have heard the risk of disappointment is very low.

Car trips through countryside are nice. We saw again many amazing, cool and even weird things made by both nature and man. After a full day when finally at home, it was time to open one of those red wine bottles that we just bought and continue spending quality time with a hubby. It was a rare treat that he had two days off right in a row. So there was no hurry in the next morning either.

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Season is still on, another season is just beginning.

October on the way, September left behind. I visited Finland for couple of weeks, enjoyed autumn colors in Lapland and hiking in the fells for one week. Almost 90km of hiking in the amazing wilderness, also my little Tiuku managed that with the help of activating smells of reindeer from time to time. Pretty good from that 13-year-old grannydog. It was nice to recover from all the traveling on the nearby beach after returning back home. Even though the weather is no longer summer hot, 23 degrees and the sun shining from the blue sky makes it quite nice. Even so nice and warm that time to time one needed a splash in the cooling sea. The dog I mean, the owner merely watered the toes and then focused on reading the book on dry land. After the refreshing dip, she was again happy to enjoy the lovely heat of the sun. Especially when there was nice and peaceful at the beach, gone were the towel camps and colorful sunshades.

Here on the Adriatic coast October means that the summer season will inevitably get closer to an end. The first restaurants and beach bars have already closed their doors and fallen into the winter hibernation for the coming months. Yesterday we went to have dinner to our nearby beach restaurant and almost all tables were taken. When the options are reduced, there are enough customers for those who still keep their doors open. It looks also that this year the season is stretching to bit further than usual. More and more people have figured out how brilliant time this is to come here: there are not too many people around, the weather is superb for everything more active than just lying on the beach and the nature has woken out of the coma caused by heat and dryness after getting some rain. Friend of mine who arranges tourist activities said that they have reservation books almost full until November, and that has not been the case before. This is a perfect time to visit national parks and other cool places here, also still it´s nice to take a boat trip to visit the nearby islands like Brač or Hvar. 

One activity I can now highly recommend is a zip line in Omiš. A total of over two kilometers of airborne trails in eight individual slides. Around and below you such a spectacular scenery. At some point you find yourself quite high above the ground but at least I was not feeling afraid even though I´m definitely not an adrenaline junkie. Skillful guides, clear instructions and trustworthy looking equipment provided a sense of security. I was well able to concentrate on enjoying the amazing views provided by nature while gliding up in the air, head turning from side to side and the mental camera taking images to be remembered later. 

Omiš is about twenty kilometers south of Split and you can easily reach it by the coastal road. In the absence of your own car the bus number 60 takes you there from Split or you can book an organized excursion with the transport. The zip line itself is then a few kilometers from the center of Omiš and the guides will take you there from their office. Whole excursion will take about three hours and after it´s over you can enjoy lunch on some of the narrow streets of old Omiš and revise the great glides you just experienced.

There we glided, to the opposite side over the river. What an amazing view!

If the touristic season starts to slow down, the construction sites are just coming back to alive. The construction projects that were suspended due to the summer season have again been authorized to proceed and number of sites that looked totally abandoned are again full of activity. In just a few days, the large brick walled house-to-be nearby has got a green insulation cover. Even here people are gradually starting to understand the benefits of house insulation. Let's see what kind of surface that house will get at the end. Another project that I´m quite forced to closely follow is the one just next to our apartment. There is an intersection that they partially modified in the spring already but now it is intended to carry out a bit bigger reformation. The surveyors were already measuring the site and they marked the street how much to lift there and to lower at the other mark. Now we just have to wait and see when the actual work begins. It may be tomorrow, may be the coming spring or just as well this time next year. At that case though, the markings on the street may have slightly faded.

One bag at the time. Or even two.

It started little by little. I picked up a plastic wrap from the beach and tossed it into the bin near by. When swimming past some floating trash I brought it to the shore and to the trash bin. Then came the morning when on my dog walk on the beach I noticed an empty plastic bag and ended up filling it with other trash before throwing it into a large waste bin. I started wondering how trashy the seemingly clean beaches are. A small stone gravel hides quite well the bottle caps, plastic coffee spoons and all that little rubbish. Not to mention the cigarette butts. I started to take fruit bags or other bags with me every morning and pick up the trash as I walked along. My walks slowed down considerably due to this new squat exercise of mine, but I ended up happier. The best moments are when some passing joggers or other people enjoying the morning by the beach give positive comments and sometimes even pick up a thing or two into my bag. I've been spotted by the guys who are taking care of the trash bins of the beach and they are greeting me happily when we meet. Sure, these guys also pick up the biggest stuff along their route, but they do not have time to squat because of every little piece of plastic while other jobs are waiting. But I have that time.

Quite soon I started to run out of the plastic bags at home due to this new hobby of mine. It seemed a little insane to buy plastic bags separately so that I could collect plastic rubbish into them. Fortunately, our latest visit to Finland hit the spot and I came back with a couple of rolls of biodegradable 20-liter bags. I haven´t spotted these here, not sure if there are any available. Now at least my trash collecting bags are disappearing without any traces. For same reason the dog poop bags we use are also still imported, so I can use rapidly biodegradable versions for that use also. Big thanks for my cousin who got me 10 rolls of them from Finland while on holiday here since I forgot those myself. 

While the tourist season starting to end little by little, the beaches will hopefully be cleaner. So far I have filled one bag easily every morning and the length of the beach I walk by is not even that long. But there is still work to do elsewhere. The more closely I look, the more trashy the rest of my morning walk route appears to be. So I'm going to continue this one-woman's Bag at a Time -project and expand it from the beach to the upper slopes of Podstrana. The Bioska's bags will be on my standard list of things to bring from Finland, at least until I find the same kind of product from here. (Note, I have not received any compensation or reward from Bioska / Plasti Roll company for this product visibility and I have paid for all the bags myself. For more info on the products, check out the web page in english)

There are some things even I can do nothing about. What do you think of the final disposal place of this mattress or toilet seat? Unfortunately here too, some people think the waste can be thrown almost anywhere. Along the same road there is a tractor tire, a lot of some kind of cable, mixed construction waste and of course a lot of that small litter suited to my capacity. And the road doesn´t seem to be passing through any landfill, it goes by olive trees and next to the pine forest. I like the route because it gives you the feeling of being on the countryside. Only when one goes by daily and starts to really look around, the trashy truth is revealed.

Recycling here in Croatia only takes little baby steps. In Finland I had already become accustomed to such an amazing system that the shock when coming here was quite strong. I still feel bad putting bio waste into mixed waste. Fortunately here at our neighborhood there are separate collecting bins for plastic, paper and glass in addition to mixed waste. At least I can recycle something here. The bottle recycling system is so confusing that I do not even start to go through that now. That is why especially glass bottles still often end up on the roadsides or other wrong places. But things are going ahead here, slowly but still. I remember from my early childhood more than 30 years ago how the garbage bags were taken to a pit dug into the woods. Then at some point that pit was covered and new one was dug. That small village in the middle of the forest was not on the route of the garbage truck at that time. However I could swear that there was quite a small amount of waste produced by our family at that time compared to the present day. Long way have we come from that time. Nowadays even the traditional dumps are beginning to be history due to the fine energy-producing waste incineration plants and other waste management. It would definitely be a time in Finland to work more globally with this matter, to bring that knowledge and enviromental thinking forward. There really is a need for it.

However, everything is not ideal in Finland either, although in many areas environmental issues are in a very good shape. In the spring with my mother, we cleaned her normal morning walking route from litter before the hays grew to cover them. Several bags were collected from a few kilometers length of roadside. It felt so bad to pick up the take-away coffee cups with a plastic covers from the ditch, next to the cigarette packs and candy bags. For me it feels totally irrational to just throw litter out of the car window or toss it into the roadside while walking. But clearly for some it´s not an issue. People's attitudes surely are the biggest obstacle to promoting environmental issues.

But I do what I can do here. One bag at a time. And sometimes when I happen to find an empty plastic bag, then two bags at a time. Perhaps after seeing me doing this people will think at least a little next time they hold that empty pack in their hands. And if one of them ends up putting it to the nearest bin, I am very happy.

Travelling to Croatia with the dog

Our whole gang visited Finland for a week. The biggest result of the trip was the hubby´s knee operation, now there are two small arthroscopy holes waiting for the removal of the stitches and the man around them is learning to walk again with that leg. It´s getting better day by day and the recovery has gone well.

The second result of the trip actually came before we even left and was actually related to our return back to Croatia. Since it is perhaps more commonly relevant to someone than reporting on hubby's knee, I will take it for a more detailed observation in this piece of writing. It is about travelling to Croatia with the dog and more specifically, the role of rabies vaccination in it.

Tiuku at our summer cottage in Finland enjoying the peaceful evening by the lake.

For her whole life, 13 years, Tiuku has been given all the shots of the Finnish vaccination program. That includes also the rabies vaccine first yearly and now a couple of times every three years after Finland introduced three-year vaccines. The latest vaccination was a year ago just before we moved here and according to passport entries it is valid until 21 August 2019. In Croatia, however, dogs are obligated to be vaccinated against rabies every year instead of the three-year cycle that has already been widely implemented elsewhere. Until now, we have always entered the country  with vaccination less than a year ago, but now that we returned from Finland two days ago it was a little over a year since last rabies shot. I was in any case going to visit the local vet to get the echinococcosis treatment required on arrival to Finland, so should I take that rabies also?

I spent many hours surfing the web looking for clear information about whether Tiuku is ok with her valid vaccination given in Finland or should we get a new one. I could have done something more productive with that time since I did not get any wiser on the matter, but rather frustrated. I found a recent document published by the Croatian Ministry of Agriculture, where it was understood that the country accepts a long-term vaccination as long as its validity is clearly marked in the passport, but then in the same text it was referred back to the period of that one year. The matter could have been justified in both directions on the basis of that document. The same thing happened in all official texts, especially the more recent they were. Finally I ended up thinking that we will take the the vaccine just to be sure. It would be better than being stopped at the airport by customs officer upon our return.

So we went to see the vet. There I explained the situation and a really nice doctor immediately stated that he would not be happy to put the vaccine on a dog that clearly has it in force and the chemicals are already in her system. Since even he did not know for sure how this country really deals with this matter, a new hunt for information started. I mean, how hard it would be to have some clear instructions regarding this matter? Surely I´m not the only one getting frustrated with this? More and more often tourists are accompanied by four-legged family members and there are also big international dog shows in Croatia. And yet there we where all marvelling this confusing local system.

After several phone calls (the ministry and also a professor who was familiar with this matter) the result was that when talking about another EU country Croatia accepts vaccinations made according the vaccination program of the country of origin. Vaccinations must be clearly marked in the dog's passport, including the name of the vaccine and the batch number (those are in that small sticker that vet sticks to passport), the date of vaccination and the last date it is valid. This means the three-year rabies is ok. 

According to the vet, Croatia is heading towards a three-year cycle too and apparently these requirements for the dogs coming to the country have eased a bit cause of that. Therefore, there is a wide variety of information available on the web as well, and indeed the latest instructions are in no way unambiguous. But the good thing for us is that Tiuku is not in need for a rabies shot until August 2019. I thanked the vet and his team for a very thorough clarification and that echinococcus pill. With the blue-white wings of Finnair we traveled to Finland to enjoy the quite fresh air (about 15 degrees at the most) and experienced, among other things, such an exotic natural phenomenon as rain. That is something we haven´t seen here in Split since the end of May ...

What then is the ultimate truth? What was the customs officer's view of this confusing matter? Hard to say. No one in either country was interested in our little white traveller nor her passport or the markings in it. Let's see it again in couple of weeks time when we take the next trip with Tiuku. Then no knees will be operated (hopefully at least), but we will be heading to enjoy the autumn colors of Lapland and hiking as we have done for 15 years. Until then, we will enjoy this time at home in the nice late summer heat again. And dream about those rains.

Figs in three different way

In May came cherries, followed by strawberries. In June matured velvety soft apricots, peaches and nectarines, July brought grapes and watermelons. Now in August dark purple plums are glowing and sweet figs falling from the trees. Next we wait for yellow lemons, mandarins and oranges. The fruit season in Croatia is glowingly colorful, fragrant and super tasty.

Today I got eight kilos of figs delivered on my doorstep. They came from the brother of our landlady, picked today, organic and so ripe as possible. There went my plan to clean the apartment, instead it was going to be a sweet fig day. Fortunately, I had washed laundry yesterday, so the drying rack was free and no reservations for the next few days. So, figs are pierced by the wooden skewers and on they go to the drying rack. I had came up with this plan as a drying method when I ordered those eight kilos few days ago. It is airy and I can move the whole batch on the balcony as needed. The result should be sun-dried, easy to store yummy bites. Just have to remember to wipe the wires on the drying rack, there may be some stickiness at the end of this project ...

About a third of the whole pile of these goodies ended up into the kettle, the most ripe and soft ones. Added just a little sugar and of we go. After about one hour of cooking and the quick mixing with the blender, I had a smooth super good jam ready for the jars. I so much see myself enjoying this heavenly stuff with some cheese and red wine later on when the evenings get chilly. At his point, the word of warning: a boiling bubbly jam shoots dangerous darts that are quite uncomfortable when bumping into your skin. Hard mixing prevents the worst attacks, goggles are almost recommended.

Need to test this output also as a tasty sweetener in my oatmeal porridge breakfast, probably healthier than emptying all the jars with cheeses and wine. Couple of jars may also end up in Finland as we pop in there next week. 

I think the best way to enjoy figs is just to eat them while they are fresh and juicy. The most commonly found variety here produces yellowish green fruits that are reddish brown inside. They do look a bit different that those green and violet ones you mostly see in the shops elsewhere. I have seen some trees with those dark ones hanging in them but they make a minority of all the figs here. Some sources claim that fig is the sweetest fruit in the world, with as much as 70% of its dry weight being sugar. No wonder that the fresh ones dribble this glossy liquid that makes sure the eater ends up with sticky fingers. And keyboard.

Start of something blueberryish

It´s time to go international. And this is it now. I have been writing a blog called Kaikuja ja kiekuja in Finnish for one year, ever since this moving to abroad actually started to become reality instead of a dream. I will continue to do that, but since there seems to be some kind of demand from my non-Finnish friends to serve them and the rest of the world better, I´m starting this English version as well.

So welcome, may this be the beginning of something big and beautiful. As a toast for that, here is some blueberries for you. They are hand picked by me from the Finnish forest. You can almost taste the juicy flavor right?

To make the extra long story shorter, here is a little roundup about what´s up: 

So we (me, my hubby and our jack russell terrier Tiuku) used to live in Finland. By looking at the map, you may find that little piece of land from northern part of the Europe, between Sweden and Russia. Yep, that´s where we are coming from. To be more exact, we come from the capital of Finland, Helsinki. Anyway, my hubby was offered a job from Croatia in March 2016. We decided to crab for it and first he came here alone to check it out. By the late summer we had come to the point where I quit my job and put our home in Helsinki out for rent market. In last November we drove to Croatia with the little stuff we could squeeze into our car. We spent the winter on the little island called Murter and now since April our home has been here in Podstrana. Never heard of it? You may have heard about city called Split here in Croatia? Well, this is just next to Split, about 10km to the south by the cost line. 

My tittle nowadays is housewife. During summer my hubby is away quite a lot cause of his job, at the moment also. So maybe from time to time I´m also desparate. You know, from the tv-series...? Anyways, this means that our "normal life" at the moment is pretty much about me and Tiuku at home, doing this and that. Let´s see when the "normal life" is including hubby again, at least next few weeks he is still more like a visiting star in it. 

This is not going to be a diary of my everyday life. That might be boring even though I don´t feel bored but still reading about it could be a different thing. This is going to be me wondering what I come across, telling something I see worth telling for and there will be some stuff related to Finland also cause I do watch this world through blue&white Finnish eyes (those are the colors of our flag, my eyes are really just blue). I suppose most times I will write my Finnish blog and then more or less translate it here. But there maybe occasions when the original text is going to be here and then perhaps translated to Finnish page. Let´s wait and see. 

Feel free to comment, ask questions, maybe put a smiling emoji. Or just read and enjoy the ride. 

There will be pictures here, more in Instagram @kaikukieku so check that out too and push the Follow-button.

Until next time then. Bye or bok as we say here in Croatia.