Nervous

Twice this week I needed the word for ‘nervous’ in Croatian. Twice the dictionary was not at my side.

First on Tuesday morning as trener pushed me away from the edge of the landing bay, wobbling slightly, it felt as if it was the first time I had been in a single –trener obviously thought so too. He asked if I could swim and then said “just go 100 metres and back”. Which I did (sort of, a bit further) and saw that the boys were going further. I must have passed scrutiny - Trener said “you go with boys, is ok”. And I did. Straight out into the Adriatic Sea. Imagine that Nanette – no steering required, no checking behind, just rowing! And then back and then out again. “Faster hands away” called trener as I passed the Klub the second time. And I did as trener said (of course).

And the process is the same – hose the boats (but then towel dry), boys chattering (there were three boys rowing) and then lift the boats away. Perfect. Perfect boat, perfect water, perfect morning.
(Aside - I can't even begin to describe how clear and clean (cisto i bistro) and blue the water is...the photos just don't do it justice).
I was hankering for the standard After Rowing Coffee but had diligently brought no money with me so that I wouldn’t be tempted to do coffee in my rowing clothes.

Second Nervous Incident - Later in the morning I thought I would go and find out the cost of a haircut and see whether I needed to make a booking, thinking a haircut in a fortnight would be timely. The assistant in the salon quickly called Bruno (he was out doing coffee) and misunderstanding slightly, thought I meant a haircut this week (Thursday) but social thing that I am, I already had a coffee date in Tucepi- so zasto? Why not now then? And now it was then.

I said malo, a little bit only, not too much, goodness, it’s only three weeks since the last one, but Bruno Scissorhands was on a roll. Snip¸snip, fast as a fast thing. “You want shorter here (my fringe?) Your face¸ like Sharon Stone (really?)..” Ten minutes later ¸a smallish pile of hair on the floor and a big smile from Bruno. Dobro! This man knows how to wield his tools of trade - dried, sprayed and laquered! And then posed for a photo (ha, they think I’m someone!).

I’ll be back there in four of five weeks – cost of a haircut – 100 kuna - (to calculate NZ $ divide by about 3.85)
Just another wee history lesson - in medieval Slavonia, land use by peasants was subject to a tax payable to the land owners. This tax was originally payable in marten pelts (like a weasel) - the Croatian word for marten is kuna. So there you have it!