Yugoslavia – January 1983
My first flight took place at the age of 22 while I was studying for my degree at North Staffs. Polytechnic (now Staffordshire University) in Stafford. I was studying politics and sociology as part of a degree in Modern Studies, and part of the course involved studying political systems in different parts of the world. Now at the time, Yugoslavia, under Josep Tito, had a unique socialist system where factories were worker cooperatives and decision-making less centralised than in other socialist countries. Our lecturer, George P, had contacts in the country and organised a field trip for his students to visit the country and see first-hand how theory translated into practice.
Our flight out took place on the 15th of January 1983, and everything went well until, somewhere over France, we were informed that bad weather at Zagreb airport would mean that we would have to land in Belgrade and make our way overland from there. A bus took us from the airport to Belgrade railway station. Now, this was an experience! It felt like I had been transported back into a scene from an old black and white film like Casablanca! There were boxes of chickens piled high in one corner and typically dressed peasant families forming the majority of the passengers. We had a long wait before our train to Zagreb, so to help us pass the time, George suggested that we try some of the local hooch. It was a plum brandy called ‘Slivovitz’ and I went to a small shop in the station and bought a bottle. I shared some slugs* with my colleagues, but most of the bottle descended down my throat very easily. We boarded the train after it had got dark, and by then I was very drunk! I remember stripping down to my underwear in the train carriage so that I could get into my sleeping bag, then waking up early the next morning with the mother of all hangovers!
There was a bus waiting to take us from Zagreb to Dubrovnik, where we got settled in to a comfortable hotel by the sea just outside the walls of the old city. When I had recovered sufficiently from my bottle of Slivovitz (pronounced /SLI VUH VITCH/) I set out to explore the city. Wow! Dubrovnik is one of the most beautiful historic cities I have been to, and in my opinion rates alongside Rhodes and Florence. Inside the medieval city walls was a vibrant town with commerce during the day and music at night. The views from the city walls were spectacular, especially overlooking the Adriatic and the harbour. I remember walking down to the rocky coast near the hotel, and just soaking up the view of the sea glittering in the warm winter sunshine. I felt a feeling of complete contentment, which perhaps was the slow start to a realisation that warmer climates were more comfortable to live in than the biting winds, rain and sleet faced by people in a British winter!
Now, I had first tried cigarettes when I was at secondary school, and after careful evaluation, decided that I wouldn’t smoke. However, the price of cigarettes in Dubrovnik was so cheap that I decided to re-evaluate the experience. Big mistake! I got a taste for the strong Croatian cigarettes on sale in the old town and bought several cartons to take home with me. It would be thirty years later, and with a monumental feat of willpower, that I would finally be able to break the habit of smoking tobacco. By then, my teeth and nails had become discoloured a horrible brown and I had spent ten of thousands of dollars maintaining my addiction. Please, if you are reading this and haven’t smoked cigarettes or vaped nicotine, take my advice, if you need to smoke something, make it marijuana; if this drug creates any dependency at all, it’s nothing like as addictive as tobacco.
We had arrived in Yugoslavia on the 15th of January and left on the 21st, but the trip involved a visit to a factory with a presentation on the cooperative functioned in practice, and we were able to ask questions to clarify any doubts. We also went on a day trip by coach to Montenegro, taking in the wonderful scenery and visiting a mosque for the first time in my life. I believe it was the Mustafa Pasha mosque in Skopje. On the last day, which was warm and sunny, students and lecturer went on a fifteen-minute boat trip to the island of Lokrum, just off the coast from Dubrovnik. We found a rocky beach and had a giant water fight, I had a photo of myself with a Doc Martens in my hand filled with sea water, ready to hurl water at my fellow students, who were also trying to do the same thing! Unfortunately, this photo seems to have been lost along with the photos taken on my first trip to Rome. The album was stolen at some time during the time I spent in Oman, or on route back from there.
Never mind. I was lucky enough to experience this magic city in the 80s, before the cruise liners and age of mass tourist invasions had dulled some of the brilliance.
* Noun and verb entry 1 meaning 6
