A day at the Venice Carnival

The magnificent island-city of Venice is just a short trip away from Istria. Since it’s carnival season, many bus companies are offering special day trips to the Venice Carnival. This seemed like a good way to experience a little bit of Venice’s famous carnival without having to spend the night in one of its famously expensive hotels, so I decided this was an opportunity I shouldn’t pass up. 

After booking the trip, I did a bit of reading up on the Venice Carnival on the Internet and didn’t like much of what I read… huge crowds, inflated prices, packed restaurants… What was I getting into? I would have to see for myself. 

It was pouring rain when we left Pazin at 5:30am. Not a good start! On the way we stopped for a coffee/bathroom break at a service station near Palmanova, Italy. The parking lot was full of buses from all over Croatia, Slovenia and Austria – and the line for the ladies’ restroom was ridiculously long. 

It was still raining when we arrived at Tronchetto, a huge parking area in Venice which was quickly filling up with buses from all over Europe. We had the option to take the vaporetto (waterbus) to St. Mark’s Square but decided to walk instead. The only way to get around Venice, a collection of over 100 tiny islands, is of course by boat or on foot. Along with its architectural splendour and old world charm, this is one of the unique things about Venice: no cars and water everywhere. 

From what I had read I was expecting to see crowds of people… and everyone wearing masks and dressed up in elaborate costumes. As we walked along, we did come across many tourists wearing masks, but very few people in costume. Maybe the rainy weather was keeping them away? But there was a tangible festive spirit in the air and a sense of excitement. Colourful masks were on display everywhere, small shops showcased the beautiful Murano glasswork Venice is famous for, and stalls offered fritelle, a sugar-sprinkled fritter made during carnival season (very similar to the fritule we have in Croatia). 

Once we arrived on St Mark’s Square, the atmosphere was very different. A large stage was set up at one end where a song-and-dance number was in progress featuring people dressed in animal costumes and tottering on stilts. Two huge screens on either side of the stage flashed advertisements, dominating the visualscape. 

Strolling along the square, there were also quite a few people dressed up in elaborate ‘period costumes’ – who were accosted at every step by a paparazzi of tourists wanting to capture the quintessential ‘Venice Carnival experience’ on their cameras. I was one of them. I noticed that most of the costume wearers spoke German or English and seemed to be tourists themselves. If you love to dress up and have your picture taken, come to Venice during the carnival, you’ll feel like a celebrity!

After taking in the beauty of St. Mark’s Square and snapping a few photographs, I just wanted to get away from the circus-like atmosphere and escape back to the charming little lanes of Venice and get lost in them.

Thankfully there was some respite from the rain and it wasn’t difficult to find a place to have lunch. I was also surprised to see that prices did not seem to be inflated but quite average for a tourist centre, and nowhere near the ridiculous 4 Euros it costs for a cup of tea in a city like Paris!

Would I recommend a trip to the Venice Carnival? 

My experience of it was only very limited, but my impression was that the Carnevale di Venezia is less a traditional celebration leading up to Lent, and more of a 'mass tourist event' to attract visitors during the low season. I later came across this article which seems to confirm this and reveals that the revival of Venice's carnival is fairly recent. 

For first-time visitors to Venice, carnival time does offer the unique experience (and photo opportunity!) of seeing beautiful masks and costumes, but the atmosphere seems quite artificial and put on, and lacks 'local flavour' somehow. Venice is definitely one of the most beautiful cities in the world and a 'must-see', but I don't think the Venice Carnival is a 'must-do'.

Of course, it’s carnival time in Croatia too, and this weekend I plan to go to Rijeka for the last day of celebrations of what is the best-known carnival in Croatia. I'm curious to see how it compares to Venice's (more) famous carnival, but I am expecting less put-on pomp and more local flavour!

Istrian olive oil – heaven in a bottle

One of the things I like about living in Istria is the quality of life. ‘Quality of life’ can mean many different things but what I mean here is basic things like the quality of the air, water and food. I guess after living many years in India, I’ve learned to appreciate these simple but essential things. Living in a rural environment, there is no air pollution here, the tap water does not have to be purified to be drunk (and it doesn’t have a bad taste!), and it’s easy to get good, natural produce.

Local people do not like to buy store-bought vegetables and try to grow as much of their own food as possible. Nor do they spray their produce with any type of pesticide but try to grow it chemical-free. They don’t even use the word ‘organic’ or ‘bio’ because they grow their food the same way they’ve been growing it for decades before those ‘modern’ words existed. Locals simply say “I don’t spray”, to mean that they don’t use chemical pesticides.

Many people here have olive groves and cultivate olives for their own olive oil production. Istrian olive oil is an absolute delight – pure heaven in a bottle! There are many different varieties of olives grown here, each of which produces an oil with its own subtle flavours. So far I’ve had the opportunity to taste the Leccino, Črnica and Bjelica varieties. Though I can distinguish the slight differences between them, I have a very hard time deciding which one is the best! What’s particular about Istrian olive oil is that it has a pleasant, slightly fruity taste. I don’t think I can ever have store-bought olive oil ever again!

Our 15 litres of Leccino

This winter we bought 15 litres of Leccino from a family who produces their own oil while my father bought 15 litres of Črnica (which has a ‘stronger’ taste than Leccino). We fill a bottle of each at a time so that we always have two varieties on hand. 

Then my uncle in Izola, in the Slovenian part of Istria, also gave us a few litres of his own olive oil, which is just as heavenly (but I don’t know what variety it is!). So we have three different types of pure Istrian extra virgin olive oil in our kitchen and alternate between them, depending on which taste we feel like having!

The olive harvest in Istria happens usually in October or November, depending on weather conditions. Like grape harvesting, olive picking is usually a big family affair, where friends join in too, since the olives are picked by hand. Once they’re picked they must be taken to the local oil mill within 24 hours. Freshly pressed olive oil has a beautiful greenish colour and not the golden yellow colour that store-bought olive oil has. The taste is divine.

For a charming description of an olive harvest by an Istrian family, read 'The olive harvest season in Istria has begun' on a gourmet food blog called 'Manjada'.

A small olive grove near Gračišće (seen on the hilltop)

Istrian olive oil is unique for many reasons:

• It’s produced by small family producers who make olive oil for their own consumption and then sell any excess oil to their friends and neighbours.
• It’s extracted by mechanical and not chemical means.
• It is not refined or industrially treated and is unadulterated, i.e. not mixed with other different types of lower grade oils (which is the case of store-bought oils).
• Since it’s cold-pressed only once, it has a high concentration of polyphenols, which are considered to be antioxidants and beneficial for health and longevity.
• It’s expensive! The olive oil you can buy from family producers costs two times more than store-bought extra virgin olive oil – but it is worth every single kuna because of all the above reasons.

Have you tried Istrian olive oil? Which variety is your favourite?

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A walk through Završje

In a previous post, I wrote about the charming hilltop town of Oprtalj. Just a short – and very scenic – drive from here over the hills is another picturesque Istrian ghost-town of times past… Završje. 

This little town perched on a hillside at an elevation of 240 metres, has a long and varied history similar to many other Istrian towns and villages, having been ruled by the Romans, the Habsburgs, the Venetians, Italian counts, and Napolean for a short time, before coming under Habsburg rule again during the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and then becoming part of Italy, Yugoslavia, and today Croatia.

The Austrians had built a narrow-gauged railway line which ran from Poreč to Trieste, called the Paranzana railway. It opened in 1902 and had 35 stations with one here in Završje, putting the town on this important commercial route. Today the station no longer stands and apparently when the railway stopped running in 1935, it had been completely dismantled and shipped off to Africa, never to arrive because the ship had sunk on the way!

During the period under Austria and Italy, the town had a post office, school, two shops, an oil mill and other trade shops. Once the railway stopped running, Završje (its Italian name is Piemonte) was no longer an important thoroughfare and its decline began. Today there are only 40 inhabitants living here and most of the town’s houses are abandoned.

More recently, Završje has been the beneficiary of an EU restoration project. Information boards provide some interesting background information in Croatian, Italian and English on the town’s history and its architectural highlights. This is how I learned that the town used to be fortified by a double ring of walls, and that the south gate dates back to the 12^th century. Also, the main church’s 15^th century silver chalice is on exhibit in the Louvre Museum, Paris.

This little quiet and scenic gem of a town is definitely worth a stop on the spectacular drive from Oprtalj to Grožnjan. 

Waiting for the Bura

In Istria, winds have names, just like in Italy, France, and other Mediterranean countries. So locals never refer to the ‘wind’, they always mention the name of the wind they’re talking about, which would be either the Bura or the Yugo.

So I’ve overheard people say things like:

“The Bura blew over all my flower pots!”

“Go close the window upstairs - the Yugo is banging it!”

Since these winds which blow over the Adriatic Sea have a very strong influence on the weather, the Bura and Yugo are always mentioned in weather reports.

I’m getting to know these two temperamental winds better. Before, wind was just wind for me, but now I know that each has its own very specific characteristics.

“Is this the Bura blowing today?” I would ask, only to be contradicted: “Noooo! This is the Yugo!”

So I’ve been asking people what the differences are and this is what I’ve been able to gather:

The Bura is cold and brings sunny weather and clear skies.

It comes from the North.

It blows in strong gusts.

The Bura makes a lot of noise and blows roof tiles off houses and uproots trees.

The Bura can be very dangerous on the seas.

The Bura (Bora in Italian) is very, very strong in Trieste.

It lasts for a few days only.

The Yugo is a warm wind which brings clouds and rain, and damp, humid air.

It blows from the South (jug means ‘South’).

It blows continuously.

The springtime floods in Venice are blamed on the Yugo (called Sirocco in Italian).

It can last for a week and even longer.

Lately we’ve had too much Yugo. Most of January has been cloudy and damp, but relatively warm, with many long spells of Yugo and rainy weather. As a result, I’ve been hearing a lot of complaints about the Yugo. The dampness brought by the Yugo has been blamed for all sorts of things... Our neighbour told me his knees hurt when there’s too much Yugo. My aunt complained that her cukerančići (a type of sugar-coated biscuit) are too soft because of the Yugo. The mold appearing around doorways is also blamed on – you guessed it – the Yugo. Winter is the season when locals cure meats like pršut – which won’t happen with the humid air of the Yugo. We’ve also been inconvenienced by the Yugo. The newly plastered walls of the house we’re waiting to move into are not drying!

As a result, everyone has been anxiously waiting for the Bura to blow through town so that all will be well again. So after an extended period of Yugo, the first strong gusts of the Bura finally arrived last night. I was sure this was the Bura – because I could hear its fury as it whistled past the windows and rattled the shutters. This morning we woke up to clear blue skies and a bright sunny day. The Bura had worked its magic and blew away the clouds and damp air, bringing a noticeably colder but crisp winter day.

Welcome Bura! May our neighbour get relief from his knee pain and the mold stop growing around doorways! My aunt’s cukerančići will turn out just perfect, and hopefully the plaster on our walls will dry quickly!

Memories of my first trip to Istria

The first time I visited Istria was in 1979.

My parents had been living in Canada for over ten years by then, had become Canadian citizens, and during that time my older brother and I were born.

This trip would be the first time my parents were going back home for a visit since they had left. They hadn’t seen their family members for many years and for my brother and me, it would be the very first trip to the place of our parents’ birth where we would meet our grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins for the first time. 

Before this trip, the only contact we had with family members in Istria was through letters, photographs and the rare telephone call. We had a collection of photographs my mother kept in a canvas bag of people I didn’t know. Many were black and white and the ones we received in letters were in colour. I remember picking out a wedding photo and asking my father whose wedding it was. “That’s my sister,” he told me, pointing to the bride. My father had a sister? This seemed strange to me. I studied the faces in the photograph with curiosity.

The closest contact I personally had with my faraway family members was through the gifts they would send to us, sometimes through the mail but more often in the suitcases of my parents’ friends and acquaintances. I had a set of children’s handkerchiefs my grandmother had sent me, decorated with hearts and cartoon-like drawings. I also had a purse an aunt had embroidered for me. These tokens were the only tangible things I had which revealed that there were people far away who cared about us.

My father with his family before my parents left for Canada

We travelled from Toronto to Zagreb on JAT Airlines. After a long and uncomfortable flight which seemed endless (for a child anyway) we arrived at Zagreb airport in the middle of the night. I remember a woman at the arrivals area calling out “Svi za Beograd!” (All for Belgrade) in a loud voice, over and over.

I next remember being on a train. When I woke up we had arrived in Pazin and it was still dark. My grandmother was at the door of the train as we disembarked. I knew her only from her photographs but even though it was the first time I was meeting her in person, somehow I already felt close to her.

Next we were at the house where my father was born (and at least four generations of his family before him). The whole family was there to greet us and I was meeting not only my grandparents, but also aunts, uncles and cousins who until then I had only known by name and from the photographs in my mother’s canvas bag.

Going back in time: the Zastava 750!

Istria was very different then. The roads were not paved and the cars were tiny. My grandparents did not have a phone, water was delivered by a truck and stored in a cistern, and there was a squat toilet in the barn. Though I came from a very different world, nothing seemed strange to me. As a child I accepted everything unconditionally and without question. I loved staying at my grandparents’ house and it would become the most idyllic place in the world for me. I loved being outdoors the whole day, feeding the chickens with my grandmother and accompanying my grandfather when he took the cows to the pond. I was delighted and fascinated by all the farm animals and enjoyed picking cherries, plums and figs from the many fruit trees. My grandfather carved tiny wooden toys for us: miniature farming tools like a sickle, a yoke, a basket, a rake, which we loved playing with.

We also spent a lot of time travelling all over Istria visiting my mother’s huge family. I remember the many emotional reunions, and travelling in buses with the doors wide open and the radio turned up loud, playing Rod Stewart's 'Do Ya Think I'm Sexy'.

We spent the whole summer in Istria and it was eventually time to go home and back to school. My grandmother started crying days before we were to leave. But she soon came to visit us in Canada, and four years after our first trip we returned to Istria for another long summer holiday. Then years later when I started travelling independently, I would visit my grandparents almost every year.

Since my first trip to Istria over 30 years ago, many things have changed, both political and economic, as well as social changes. The roads are now in excellent condition and the cars much bigger. There are fewer buses plying the roads though, and the train no longer runs from Zagreb to Pula via Pazin. My grandparents are no longer here. But my vivid childhood memories of my first trip to Istria remain.

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The last day of Christmas

Yesterday, the 6th of January, was Epiphany, the last day of Christmas. Also known as Three Kings Day, this is a national holiday in Croatia. I liked the fact that the Christmas holidays here extend to January 6th – I had always hated going back to work on January 2nd – here Christmas lasts for the full twelve days, which seems very civilized!

I remember my mother observing the Epiphany holiday and telling me that when she was a child they would call it ‘little Christmas’. In Belgium and Northern France, a special cake is eaten on this day called the galette des rois. Children love it because a small ceramic token is hidden in the cake, and the person who finds it gets to be ‘king’ for the day and wear the paper crown which comes with these cakes sold in bakeries for this occasion.

Here in Gračišće, the holiday was celebrated with a ‘live’ manger scene where the village’s residents dressed up and enacted the nativity story. This was a repeat of the same event which took place on December 26th but unfortunately had become a ‘non-event’ because of the bad weather. So everyone was hoping that the rain would stay away on Epiphany day, and indeed it did.

A stable had been built next to the church’s bell tower where the manger scene was set up (which included several sheep and donkeys!), and along the lanes leading from the village square to the church, there were small stands with people dressed up in period costumes - or as close to ‘Roman’ dress as their imaginations would take them!.

Some were enacting traditional trades and crafts – and many were skilled craftsmen who used to work at these traditional trades: there was a basket weaver, a blacksmith, a barrel-maker, as well as millers and carpenters. It was fun to see our neighbours dressed up in this way.

Scenes from the nativity story were sung by a small choir as a young couple (who had recently had a baby!) dressed as Mary and Joseph made their way through the village, looking for a place to spend the night but being turned away. Finally an innkeeper made some space for them in the stable. Baby Jesus was actually a baby girl, but this didn’t matter, and she managed to somehow sleep peacefully as people crowded into the stable to have a closer look at the live nativity scene. The Three Wise Men of course soon arrived bearing their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh, with the village mayor as Balthazar.

Now that the twelve days of Christmas are over, life goes back to normal. For many people today was the first working day of the year, and this morning I saw the Christmas lights being taken down. In keeping with tradition, I’m also taking down the decorations I had put up on this blog!

New Year's Day in Opatija

Over breakfast we decided to spend New Year’s Day at the seaside. 

Many friends have asked me if we live near the sea. Since Istria is a peninsula, it naturally has lots of seaside. And since we live right in the centre, if we want to go to the sea, we’re spoiled for choice. If we head east, west or south, we’re bound to hit the coast, which is only about 20 kilometres away at its closest point to us. 

So today we decided to head east towards Opatija. We could have taken the highway and the Učka tunnel to get there, but we decided to take the coastal road and we’re glad we did because the views of the Učka mountain range and island of Cres were breathtaking.

The weather was perfect for walking: relatively mild at 10 degrees, and no wind. We parked in the neighbouring coastal town of Ičići and strolled along the scenic seaside promenade to Opatija. Its official name is the ‘Franz Joseph I Promenade’ (after the Austrian emperor) but locals use its Italian appellation, the ‘Lungomare’.

This 12-kilometre long seaside promenade was built over 100 years ago when Opatija was a fashionable tourist destination during the days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It still seems to be popular with the Austrians; I heard many people speaking German with the distinctive Austrian accent today. And lots of Italian too.

As we approached Opatija, enjoying the fresh sea air and the views of the Bay of Kvarner on the way, we could hear singing... there was a traditional Klapa concert underway on the seafront in front of the well-known ‘Maiden with the Seagull’ statue. Enchanted by the strong male bass and baritone voices and the sounds of the mandolin, accordion, double bass and classical guitar, we stopped to listen to this group of five male musicians.

Many of the songs they sang were popular Croatian favourites and we liked the music so much that we approached them afterwards to ask if they had a CD. They did and we bought one! The group is called Klapa Nevera – to hear some traditional Croatian Klapa music, check out their YouTube page here.

During the concert, a group of men wearing Santa hats jumped in the water! This was not part of the show, but a few locals taking part in this New Year’s Day tradition of taking a ‘cold swim’.

After lunch we walked back to the car, admiring the many beautiful historic Austro-Hungarian and Italian-style villas.

A trip to Opatija, the music of Klapa Nevera, and a long walk along the Lungomare was a pleasant way to spend the first day of 2014.

Happy New Year!