Of course the boys haad missed their trip to the mountain. We returned to shore demi-frozen when dawn was deep upon us. And the next day painting was increasingley more diffcult to tolerate. The sun was blasting the courtyard. Mothers with prams and dogs kept passing by my works walking across the coners out to irritate me, whilst the bunch of toddlers that grandmothers sent to help me and be rid of them to gossip at peace, insisted to help me paint, and fought over it. Zrinka was behaving like a turbo fat fly today and I was too boiled to swat her. I needed lamb soup to soothe my tummy and brain.
Tuta came around 2 pm. He never arranges things ahead nor asks if anyone wants to, but uses the matter of course imperative “Lets go”. P brought his last week deceased fathers picture and begged me to take paints and paper to make a portrait of the once favoure member of Kastela crew, fishermen Krivi,before he returns to Spain. I obliged in taking a bag of paints.
The boat chugged southwards, same team aboard as yeasterday, we owed it to the rest as it was our fault they missed the mountain trip, this was not said but understood
Most of us groaned at the idea of Ciovo repeated, and swimming among children with blow up arms and whhels, and so we embarked upon a much longer distance for the slow boat Island Sholta. We where on Solta at sunset and starving. Tied the boat next to a restourant in a pretty cove. A wonderful piece of news came to us via boat people, that there was a fiesta in the town “olive” or Maslinica and that the party was supposed to be in fancy dress. Whilst Ivo cooked up a meat pasta and I was persuaded to paint the costumes on to everyone.
Using guache which started to peel off like old scales as it dried, inks and watercolours, I painted the bodies and faces of my comerades who of course had no other clothes but their swimsuits. Witchey mermaids, skeletons, pirates thus ate gaining a greasey mouth, and embarked as decentley clad as a tribe in the middle of Africa into the woods to search for the party. Yes we did come across the graweyard, and emerged out of it, and from now total darkness into the colourfully light town.
Not many more people where in fancy dress. How typically Croatian. They where wearing their Sunday best. Dresses and shirts trying not to look silly . Made us appear triple the freaks. Zombies coming out of the woods. Between the options of throwing ourselfs imidealtey into the sea and swimming with the tail between our legs all the way to Kastela or throwing our selfs at the wine in order to feel less naked you can guess which we opted for.
Music was playing before we came but only reaction to it was people staring at the stage. Temperatures where decreasing with the hours advancing, it was uncomfortable to be dressed in just in a bikini, thus naturally cheerleders from hell started the party dancing. On realising we where harmless decent citizens surrounded us with their hip groves. And soon the whole town was on their feet. As we started to pespire and rub against others, they became dirty zombies too, and our once half decent masks dripped and crumbeled to became more frightening all the while. To my shame I met people I knew from real life. By the time we where rubbed naked and costumles it was moring , the police puled out the plug from the sound system leaving Tuta, Pero and Ivo on stage trying to continue the party with their singing. Of course they failed.
We scampered into the woods, getting lost like the characters of Shakespares Midsummer nights dream not knowing the way back to the boat encountering different adventures on the way . I arrived at the boat first. It was tied badley near rocks and impossible to enter without swimming to it. There was a blow up toddler paddeling pool drying on the side of the restourant, and an Eureka klicked in my head that this would be the prerfect vessel to take me ower to the boat without getting wet.
I threw the padelling pool into the sea. Than my self into it. It started filling up with water. Squeal. Paddeling with hands I arrived at the boats rear and tried to clamber up but the plastic blow up backstabbed me and faked a shipwreck throwing me onto rocks covered with sea anmoe or hairy bastard yelly fish surface that covered my body with stinging pink tiger stripes which I discovered next morning. I re-tied the boat so that others could get in unharmed and un wet and cooconed the shiwering and wet body into a bed sheet and hung it in the cave of the cabin.
Annoyingley I woke up first. Eeryone was in the boat crashed all ower the place. Grumpy grandma dressed in black waited for me to wake up. “Where is the inflatable pool?” she asked her intuition knowing it was my fault it was gone. I looked for the inflatable all across the bay, and in the sea bed in case it had sunk, the bloodey padeling pool had used me to run away from the prison of squealing children and evil grandmas. “Here somewhere” I hoped. We haden’t encountered it any where in the huge bay, it had clearley set off for a better life. I did not know how to produce a new padedling pool out of bouble gum so when everyone woke up and had coffe at grandmas restourant we scampered, visible to her cruel heart , and did not escape her wrath and curse for that moring our home mountain which sits behind our home town, Kozjak, the source of many joys was buring.
The sun was blood red, the sky all the way to Solta was gray and heavy with ash but we where oblivious and carried on with our oddisay.
It would have been a shame not to visit Kasune. The group of little islands which frame a bay of perfectley tirquize colored shallow sand bottomed sea. It looks like Bora Bora. And is as full of fish as the sultans aquarium.
The bay was full of like thinkers and their boats annoyinley. We swam teased. And realised there was no decent food left on the boat. As I said the boat was ritch with fisher men. Pero son of the most famous Dalmatian fishermen grew up owning boats. Ivo the friend who always goes fisheing. Tuta who bought this boat to hobby fish and Mate who won awards for fishing. They where frustratingley useless. There we where starving and nobody moved an inch. Had I had a machine gun it would hae been tough for them . Seeing how outraged I am becoming Mate started to fish. He caught 10 fish the size of my thumb and as I was thinking of at least making a soup of it, when released them. Mate is bosninan. He likes the catching, but he only actually likes eating real meat as is the bosninan mans way.
I took to the last ingridents left on the boat booring musgrooms from the supermarket and eggs, and commenced on the miracle that would feed the mases. What frustrated me is the fact that scubadiing one can see millions of fishes and octopus in the sea, which we all love eating fresh, and every of the 5 times I have been to this bay I end up eathing rubbish. No one including my self expects a woman to be able to fish, and I am well aware of my lack of talent for it so my rage was soley directed at the men, who earned it more for having inspired in me a hope that they being the fishermen may actually catch something this time.
One summer M and her english boyfriend flew over, rented a boat.. The boyfriend grew up in Spain at sea, and apparantley knew to fish. They spent two weeks eating frozen seafood bags with those chinese fish sticks made of rats bought in a supermarket. We where in this bay beautiful bay ritch with sea life, and I was inspired to show them a lesson of how to do it the proper way. I promised I could catch a fish bare hands. So with them watching I dowe off the boat in to the sea. Scraped around the bottom a while and emerged with a big fat fish flapping in my mouth. Marina screamed shocked at what a savage I am. Of course I had found the fish neatley discarded in a big bag by some illegal hunters runnig from the police. It was my neck turning side to side that made the fish appear to be alive and flapping.
By the time dinner was cooked it was the third day in the row we all kind of hated one aonther for having looked at eachother for the last hundred hours.
Tuta insisted on making another stop at chiovo beaches. No one was really in the mood to swim or to drink or to anything. The mood was as rotten as in the state of denmark. Zrinka and I used the nearing of civilisation to swim with our raybans and prawl the beach for a decent expresso. Ended up having a glass of vine anyway along with the rest of the team.
It was forbidden to be in a boat in the Kastlea bay all that day because the firefighting planes where landing every few minutes to collect the seawater and throw it over the flames few kilometars away from our houses. We hadent tured on the radio to hear that. The sky was snowing dust ower us as we sailed in oblivious.
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