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Grigory Gurevich/Ãðèãîðèé Ãóðåâè÷
Summer 2005

Grigory Gurevich

 Alex, 12 years old this summer, my son is a great traveler. Since he was born he was flying, traveling by bus and car. When he was 3-6 years old I even took him with my car to my art classes. In Somerset Art Association he played in the playground, in Bayonne he drew together with his friend Arabelle. He went with me to Ridgewood, (town in New Jersey) where I teach drawing and painting and other classes. It is easy with Alex because he always finds something to do. When he was sitting in his child seat, strapped, as he was supposed to be, I always had for him fruits, nuts, vegetables, drinks and a book of mazes. He loves fresh greenery and it makes him easy to please with good
food.

 Every year I make my time free for two months so I can spend time with him, and introduce him to variety of countries, friends and relatives, living in Europe. Not many fathers can take off and let themselves go for two months away, but lucky me, I’m an artist, which I consider the best profession in the whole world. I can manage my own schedule and be without a salary for five to six months. I think that 99 percent of the United States population will feel dizzy without receiving their weekly check.

In his 12 years Alex went with me to Russia, Denmark, Sweden, Croatia, Slovakia, Hungary, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Bahamas and Mexico. I went with Alex to Florida, Berkshire Mountains and he passed Canada, France, England, Holland, Italy, Austria, Czech Republic.

Alex is close to being 13 years old and I wanted to introduce Alex to a half-wild trip to Croatia, a place we’ve been many times and my favorite place there on the Adriatic Sea – Volosko.

Volosko is a tiny village located 12 km from the Croatian port Rijeka. I discovered Volosko by pure luck, traveling, as usual, with my good Russian friend Valery, and once, when we split, I put my tent in camp Preluk on the Adriatic Sea 12 km from Rijeka. I took a swim from the small beach in the camp through the bay and landed in, what looked like a fisherman’s village. After more careful observation I discovered a beautiful village with Italian unusual architecture of the 16th century.

In the bay were parked many boats for fishing and yachts.  Along romantic 15 kilometers walk way of Adriatic blue see and above all beaches were old Italian architecture houses, sport clubs, art studios, and shower stations with cold unsolted water.
It was a beautiful place, where I could paint endlessly.
Since my discovery of this village I went to Volosko for many years with some interruptions.

Bratislava, where we stayed with Alex in the house of his grandparents this summer,  canceled buses to Opatia years ago, which makes it complicated to go there now. Actually, there is a bus from Bratislava to Zagreb at 6 pm, but it comes to Zagreb at 11pm. Banks to change money are closed at this late time, but even if we had local money, there would be no bus to Opatia – two and a half hours away at that time.
We have to wait until 5am at the station. There is no place to sleep there, except to sit and wait for the morning, standing on feet. There is another way to go to Opatia, to take a bus to Brno, Czech Republic; only two hours from Bratislava, but opposite direction, and than at 6pm to go through Vienna to Opatia.
Agan, it is meaningless trip, because bus will pass Bratislave on the way to Wienna, but won't stop in Bratislava. Is it smart?  The bus would be in Opatia, Croatia, at 8am. Than we would need to go to back to Volosko, which is only one and the half kilometers away.

The bus from Bratislava to Brno and back is $12 and from Brno to Opatia and back-$55. The total cost for both of us would be $134. This trip requires patience, the ability to carry backpacks and having plenty of time on hands. There is no way to travel with someone with fancy attitude.

This summer we borrowed from our neighbor in Biskupice (part of Bratislava where mostly Hungarian population has their houses) a tent for two people, than I purchased a sleeping bag for $12, and Alex had one from Irenka, his grandmother. I also purchased a small traveling stove, enameled metal tea cup for two, and a pot for soup. We also got foam floors from Kathy, a family friend. One was fold-able and went in the backpack towards my back and the other, rolled tightly, was tied to the top of Alex's backpack. In the big one I fit a stove, cup, sweater, jeans, a light jacket, my sandals,
Alex’s sneakers, and on the two front pockets I had one small towel, socks, and swimming things for me and Alex. I always have another backpack for immediate necessities and painting stuff, plus a camera.

Counting on beginning of teenagers needs to be without parents, I took big notebooks to write my stories.
Alex had his backpack with two pairs of jeans–one short and one long, and a
heavy jacket with a hood for cold weather.

The bus from Bratislava to Brno was one hour late and I went to a sales person, asking her to call Brno bus station and to ask driver to wait for our late appearance. She was kind enough to call dispatcher to Brno bus station. The other way we would have to wait in Brno one more week until bus will go to Opatia again. Besides, we will lose our money without a refund, even it is not our fault for being late. This is not like in United States once, when previous year we got two $500 refund tickets only because line to the plain to Vienna was closed right in front of us.

Bus was full and our place numbers 55 and 56 had no chairs. Connecting bus from Brno must lieve immediately after late bus from Bratislava will arrive to Brno. Situation was critical, nothing we could do about it.

Bus was so full that I had no seat and stayed all the way to Brno for two hours, but to Alex's luck, next to him was very cute little eight years old girl from the United States, whom her mother took on her lap giving her seat to Alex, so his time passed very quickly, having exciting conversation during this trip.

Our bus arrived to Brno bus terminal at 18:10. I was sure that we have to find another solution how to come to Opatia.

We run to our bus station finding that bus to Opatia was late as well, besides, drivers were waiting for us, because of call from dispatcher in Bus Station in Braislava.

Drivers passed questioners to fill up. One question was if you would like to have silence or watch the movie while on the bus. All previous years we watched two movies at night time, but now it was none. I guess people did not want movies. TV screen was dark.

We passed clouds and rain and it was question what weather will be in Croatia. Bus was comfortable and bus had about four stops on the way, not counting borders. We had something to eat and Alex fall a sleep immediately after that. He is a great slipper, even he says that he hates to sleep. Lately he developed habit to sleep until 1 or 2pm, going to sleep at 12 or 2am. It is normal for his age boys.

At 8am we are in Opatia. Previous years I could ask driver to stop the bus right in Volosko, but these drivers refused to stop, claiming that other people will ask to stop at other different locations as well. It was all right. Extra exercise is not bad at all for both of as.

I took on my shoulders pretty heavy big back pack and my smaller black, and Alex–his. We went right away to the beach walk.We new this road very well. It is not once we went by this road back and forth all previous years walking 15 miles in all directions. I had

no chance to arrange place to stay in apartment. Elderly people I had a friendship with for many years died and I had no close relationship with nobody in Volosko, even I knew many people there.

We decided to find place for the tent, and in the meantime to take place on the beach, relax, swim and place all our staff next to as. Weather was hot, sky was clear. We changed to our swimming suites. Bluish-green clear as a tear water at the beginning felt cold but then it felt warmer after several deeps. About at ten in the morning people start to show up. Mostly who took place next to as on the concrete extension were local mothers with children: one young couple, few elderly couples, relaxing there and swimming.
Alex put his long towel and fall a sleep face to the sun. He slept so deep with his face up and open arms that I had to stay above him, blocking sun for two hours so he won’t be burned. He did not take his sun cream and I did know that. Around 6pm people were leaving beach.

I made soup and we had Hungarian salami I purchased in Bratislava, bread with tomatoes and sweets. I knew one abandoned property right above our spot where many years before Willa on this property was beautiful. There were some Greek sculptures under the roof were still in good condition, but all windows and doors were broken or missing and smell in all building was unbearable. Big property, fenced from steep side walk was structured by grassy plates, angled towards the side walk on the sea side and connected by several steps. Six or seven Greek sculptures deteriorated, lying on the ground with broken arms, legs and beheaded. Property was filled with toilet papers, plastic and glass bottles. During the day beach attendees parked their cars on the edge of this property.

“John” was placed close to the edge of this property so people will use it instead of grass and bushes.

“We won’t stay here”, says Alex, not being sure if I will be unhappy with his decision.
“I respect your opinion and I think the same” – responded I. “I know other place, close to that one. Let’s go there. I will show you. You will like it”.
We went up the narrow alley to what calls the highway, where only two cars could go in opposite directions and proceeded about hundred meters towards Opatia.
“Here it is”- I pointed on small space down, below concrete border we were sitting on. Border separated someone’s private property from the highway. Iron decorative gate was chained and silver Honda was parked on higher level of this property.
Narrow path was going down towards the Adriatic Sea, about 200 meters below.
Path was curved, narrow and surrounded with bushes. “I have to take a look at the property” – said Alex, now looking like a professional burglar. I look at him with curiosity.
“There is better spot right in bamboo”- said Alex quite. I want Alex to make his own decision so he will be responsible for his own choice. “Let’s go. It’s getting very dark. I had newer put tent of this kind in my life” – said I.
“I know how to assemble this kind of tent. I did it with my friends when we went camping”, said Alex. I put my hands in praying position. We dropped our back packs from shoulders on the parapet we were sitting on and jumped on the grass below, grabbed our staff and proceeded down the path through the bushes to the next grassy Plato below upper level.
“Here on the right”- directed Alex. We went through pile of dry branches, deeper in to property. Forest of bamboo grew so tight we hardly could go through it.
“We need flash lights” – mentioned I. Directing his flash light down, Alex showed a spot where we could just hardly to feed a floor of our small tent. It took for as about one hour to figure out principal of setting up this tent. Alex’s flash light went down and I pulled mine, with fresh batteries. Finally tent was ready. Alex went deeper in to bamboo to do his things and I went in other direction, towards stone wall, above which the owner parked his car. In darkness I still could see light objects and I discovered ceramic toilet, lying upside down. Around it were some kind of boxes, metal cans and plastic bottles. It looks like no one was there for a long time. I washed toilet seat with wet big leaves of young trees and from that time reserved my private bathroom. There is only one problem - there is no running water and there’s no button to press to clean the toilet. Actually, we forget, we are on nature.

We assembled our sleeping bags and I put jeans and shorts under my sleeping back to iron it. I learned this trick long time ago.Alex was not hungry and we went to sleep right away. Actually, not “we”. Alex went to sleep. I discovered that about five stems of bamboo are sticking right under my back and roots of bay leave trees are coming out of the ground between them. I tried all night to lye on the side, curving my body between roots and stems, but was not successful.
Early in the morning, Alex still slept when I took my wallet and went to Opatia’s market.

Big half of watermelon was so attractive, huge, ripe, slightly crocked, means sweet, oranges, cucumbers, bananas, cold natural butter, sugar and fresh, warm bread; all that went in a big local strong plastic bag. I hardly could carry it, it was so heavy. I thought I will cut my fingers with so narrow plastic holders. When I came to our tent, Alex still slept. I prepared our traveling stove in case Alex wants some tee and started to collect bay leaves. Every year I collect bay leaves in Volosko. Here, plenty
of baby bay trees were bursting from this juicy ground. Sun was not penetrating crowded bamboo here. When Alex got up he had real pleasure to have bananas, bread with butter, sausage, oranges and watermelon.

We went on the path, which was going from the gate on the property yo a house below our tent, to see how we can camouflage our hidden place. From the path we went through the grass and through bamboo to our tent. On the way there were piles of dry branches and half dry long ones. We assembled all that in zigzag pattern, so our path will be not too easy noticed. Through piles of these constructions we stick detached from the ground bamboo sticks and other long branches with leaves. Now someone could see as only if will come one meter from the tent, but we could see anyone. I and Alex found thin spread of dry grass and placed it on path steps to see if anyone is passing through. If our grass is gone, that means someone is
passing through the path.

We had only small plastic bottle for water and Alex went several times to fill it up from fountain near local City Hall.
“Alex, I know many people here. We will go to a restaurant and I will make a
watercolor for the owner and you will have some juice and I will have some coffee, and possibly we can live our back packs there. I also know one artist here. He is very famous on all Adriatic coast, you know him as well. His name is Claudio Frank”, trying to remind Alex this artist, mentioned I.
“I remember him”, Alex replied.

We collected our tent, put things in order. I took big back pack and my black one, smaller, and Alex took his.
“Papa, I can take your back pack. You know, when we walked from the bus I was not able to carry my back pack even 200 meters and have to rest, but now I feel much stronger”- said Alex. “OK, you can carry it for a short time. You will be even stronger by carrying it”, replied I. When we stepped on narrow highway, we noticed black police car and two young policemen were placing tree bums with hand coves on the arms behind their back.
”They are homeless people and police is taking them, possibly for placement in some housing. I do not know rules here”, answer I on Alex’s look. I’ve seen that Alex is thinking about something.

It was 11:30 when we came to a restaurant.
“Ah, Grigory and Alex! Stigli! (Came over!) Keda stigli? (When did you come?)
Alex uzh velky. (Alex is a big already). Sadete. (Sit down). Alex, sok? (Alex, Juice?).
Grigory, schto hochete? Vino, Kava, Juce? (What do you want? Vine, Coffee, Juice,)
Juice will be good, responded I in Croatian. We placed our back packs on the floor and rested on comfortable chairs. Place was almost empty. Only one person was drinking beer next to our table.

“I came to make you a gift. I will make a watercolor of your choice. If you remember, last year I promised you to give you a watercolor. Besides, I have for you a catalog of Volosko. It will be yours as well. I need only one thing – chair to seat on and one chair to put my watercolors”- asked I.
“No problema, Grigory”.
We got a cold multivitamin Juice and I took two chairs and placed them across the street on the sun. I had no choice. It was only a spot I could see perspective of his restaurant well.
“Just wait, my wife will come and she will decide what to paint. Grigory, where do you stay? You can live your back packs in my storage, if you wish.” - said Jaro – owner of this restaurant.

“This year we are going wild. We stay where we can. Last night we slept in the tent on some property. We are OK.”- said I.
“Keda kisha bude padat, morete spat tuta na polu” (If we have rain, you can sleep right here on the floor”– said Jaro.

“Here is my wife – Ksenia”.
Bright looking woman, close to forty five entered open space of a restaurant. After introducing to a subject of conversation, Ksenia was clear
in her choice.
”I want this corner, part of this perspective and those tables on the veranda”.
I opened my watercolors and paper. Jaro gave me plastic cup for water
and I started to paint, sitting at the same place at the table. I was in the shadow and it was very comfortable to do my painting. I do not mark with the pencil and went straight to composition with paint. I felt I have to spend about 8 hours on this art work.

In the mean time Alex went to swim. Day was hot. Sun heated Volosko well.
Close to 7:30 Alex came to a restaurant where I hardly could see my painting
subject. My work progresses very well, but I need some time tomorrow to finish it.

It was dark and we went to our “private property” to put tent again and to go to sleep.

“Grigory, shto hochesh? Fishe?, Shpaghetty? Maso?, Kavu? (What would you like?
Fish, Spaghetti. Meet, Coffee?”, asked Jaro.

I looked at Alex. He looked hungry. “Fish and juice will be good. Thank you”.
In the few minutes another waiter, politely placed two huge trays with green
spaghetti and variety of sea products. It smelled very tasty.
“Dober tek”, says Jaro and his helper.

It was so much food on the metal tray, that Alex and I couldn’t finish all we had. Juice was absolutely fresh, cold and tasty. Alex finished it in one gulp.
When we arrived to our spot, we put new batteries in Alex’s flash light and used two for mine.

This time we assembled our tent much faster. I understood principle of it and suggested simpler way to do easier. We also moved the floor of tent slightly different that I will have some space for my back. Night was cold in my cheap sleeping back. Next day I promised myself to put leaves under the floor. Abut at 1am rain started. It continued all night until 10 am. Finally we’ve seen from our hidden place the owner of the car passing up the path to his car. We've heard that gate's chain was unlinked, car left parking spot, chain linked again back and then-silence. He left. If he just would want to look down from his driver seat on his property to bamboo area, he could easily see as, because the top of our tent was bright orange.


I made tea and collected more bay leaves to take with me to Jersey City. After the breakfast we went to a restaurant again and left our luggage, except my back pack with watercolors, pencils and jacket, in case of rain. I went with Alex to swim and started to paint again. I almost finished my watercolor, when Ksenia came to help her husband.

“Kako lepo!!!” (“so beautiful!!!”- exclaimed Ksenia several times. “Hvala, Hvala lepo”.
"Thank you. Thank you very much”, I replied.

While Alex was on the beach in save place, I visited doctor physician Ivan Vodopia.
He was a first person in Volosko, who purchased watercolor from me for his doter Dorota as a gift twenty years ago. He worked in Hospital in Zagreb, spoke English fluently and purchased second house in Volosko  for himself and his wife. Every summer he rested in Volosko.

When I found his house, approached a window located much above my head, where I have seen him, watching a television. He was covered with big, wool blanket and looked pretty pail.

“Ivan”, whispered I. He turned his face towards the window very slow, as if he did know if he have heard his name or it was just some strange sound. He looked at me for a while. I realized that I had changed since I’ve seen him last year.

“Grisha!, when did you come?”, asked Ivan. I noticed happy notes in his quite voice.
“I came with Alex two days ago. How are you. I was worried about you, because I mailed to you my Volosko catalogand you had newer responded”, I said.
“I have this wonderful catalog. I was ill. I have prostate cancer. You know, when people reach certain age, they are getting problems of this sort. I’m OK now, but when I had an operation, I got an infection and they can’t get reed of it, unfortunately”- said Ivan with very week voice. I have two my friends who are doctors and they have infection as well. This is a big problem in the Hospitals. Sometimes they can’t clean tools so well as they must.”
“I’m so sorry to hear it”- replied I.
“I would like to know if your doter is here. Alex is coming to Volosko for all his life and he still doesn’t have any friends here. I know that your doter has children and I think someone is Alex’s age”, trying to make our conversation shorter, asked I.

“Grisha, you know where she lives, but they just came from Krk (Island in Croatia). You possibly will see her and her doter and husband on the beach. I will tell her about your request and about Alex. Is he a big boy?”

“Oh he is already very tall. On August 24th he will turn 14 years old.
Talking about a catalog, possibly some administration of Volosko would like to make it more professional way. Perhaps administration would like to publish it? I make copies now and it is pretty expensive” –said I.

“Major of Voloslo is a doctor and my friend. I will talk to him. He still listens to me. I hope to see you before you will go to United States”.

I went to a board walk to see Alex there and right away have met Dorota's husband. Finally Alex was introduced to their doter and the rest of our
presence in Volosko had a great time, socializing with her, her girlfriend and three boys from Italy, slightly older then him.
I painted another watercolor. Children and local people were coming out to watch how I paint. Some recognized me from previous years.
“Look! at this painting. It is so good”, exclaimed they.

 Rain started again. Alex found me easily. Volosko is so small place,it is difficult to miss someone there. Jaro prepared for as a huge dishes with fried potatoes, meat, sausages and some other tasty staff, plus again, multivitamin juice and cold water. Alex  could not finish his meal again.
I executed it easily.
Again tent, again bamboo. Now we collected a lot of bamboo leaves and covered all roots and stems. It took only 20 minutes now to put a tent. We are getting better. It was my best night. I slept in jeans and sweater, like a baby. Alex always sleeps great.

In the morning we were watching people, non-stop trespassing from car to the house back and forth. Additional construction van was parked next to the owner’s car. They did not see us, but Alex, with his eyes, was all there.

“Papa, what will happen if they will discover that we stay here? This is private property and we are not allowed to stay here, right?” - asked Alex with nervous notes in his voice.

“We are not allowed to stay on the private property. If someone will discover, they can call police and in the best way, police will ask as to live, possibly can give as fine, but in worse case can take as to police station and keep as for a while, but I do not think it can happened. At first, I believe that no one will see as and I have a good argument, why we stay here. Alex immediately created the version why we are here:
“We are here to see Markow, who’s villa is in Volosko. We arrived late with the bus or private car from Italy and had no time to go to a camp and to rent a place”.
I accepted this version.
“But we won’t sleep here, on this property any more”- concluded Alex. I was
disappointed, but did not say a word. I want Alex to be happy.
 
“Papa, we are going to a camp “Preluk”. We were passing this camp by our bus and it looked very interesting. There are many people there.” – said Alex confident, so I won’t argue.

“Alex, I’m not against it, but we have very good spot right here, in Volosko. No one sees as, and in camp we have to pay, it is crowded there, and we have to carry our back packs back and forth every time we want to go to Volosko. Besides, beach there is very small. It is like a city with tents and wagons. Some people stay there all summer” – I tried to discourage Alex, but with no success.

This, third day of being in Croatia, we took from the restaurant our 3 back packs and started to walk to camp “Preluk”-2,5 or 3 km from Volosko. First we went to a highway by steps around local church. That was already very tiring way. Under the weight of my very heavy back pack and another one, I almost was touching marble of these steps. We stopped about two times before we’ve reached the highway. I knew that we could take a bus and it was only 3 stops to reach our destination, but I wanted Alex to be stronger and to experience traveling difficulties in full amount. I also wanted to see
his behavior.
“Papa, I will take your black pack. I became much stronger now”, he
says suddenly as if he could read my mind.
“OK, that will be fare. But I will take it from you right away, when you will be tired. Just tell me immediately”. I was very happy to hear that Alex offered his help.

It was already dark. The road was going up and down and by curves. Cars were
passing as sometimes so close so I and Alex must stop and see if they will not hit as.

Croatian and Italian drivers drive like crazy. In some places narrow side walk was missing, this how narrow was this highway. We stopped several times and exchanged my black back pack.
“It squeezes my chest and I can’t breath”, complained Alex sometime, but I was amazed with his patience and positive attitude.

“Do not talk, save your energy”, suggested I.

In full darkness we arrived to the reception window of camp Preluk. The price for the night was not like before: only $6.
“To place tent for two people cost $20. You can put your tent across the highway or here if you find the space. You pay at the end, when you will live, but now I will only take your passports” –friendly instructed young receptionist, interruptive personal conversation with two good looking Italian teenagers.
When she recognized that passports are American, her smile became even more
friendly and she opened her cliff with light movement of her hand.
Split of tanned from the sun breasts opened up a little wider so from my upper view I could see how her attractive young breasts curve in her short. She looked at me again and caught my look, smiling even more. “She is pretty board here to seat from the morning until late", thought I.
We continued, going deeper in to the camp. From right to left narrow road, where only one car could pass one way, tents and trailers with chairs and tables, sometimes surrounded with amateur fences and people were sitting at the tables with light, enjoying their vacation at the sea. Visitors from variety of countries of the world, especially from northern part of the globe occupied all property of this camp.
To find empty piece of land for our tent was not easy. Finally, we spotted small place filled  stones, surrounded with cars, tents and one trailer with light wooden fence was right near our small property.
It took for as almost two hours to stretch strings of the tent. One Hungarian family gave as the hummer. We used bigger stones as well to drive our metal sticks in order to stretch the tent.

“Alex, go and talk to this family, use your wonderful language to communicate”, I suggested.
“Keszonom seipan” (“Thank you”), Alex was thanking, giving hummer back.
“That’s all?”,  I asked.
Possibly he was tired and did not want to talk. I made a tee and we were happy to close out tent and to relax. Night was pleasant  and quiet. As usual, I put my snickers, covered with jeans and short under my head on sleeping bag as a pillow, and was going to fall asleep. This is my habit, to fall a sleep right
away, when I touch a pillow. Finally I could relax without bamboo roots and stems.

Night finally was warm again. Now I can meditate and think about movie plot, which came to my mind while we were standing in bamboo “forest”. Silence, good. I can fall a sleep. Alex already slept. Suddenly I hear somewhere somebody was listening to the music on the the radio. “I will not pay attention to it. I can focus on my thoughts and it will help me to fall a sleep.  Now,

I must turn on the right shoulder, so I won’t put weight on the heart. My grandmother taught me this trick. My right shoulder in slight pain already for one and the half year, but it is getting slowly better and better. I always give my body chance and time for the recovery. Our bodies designed by nature to recover if we are able to give it a chance. I strongly believe in it.

“We have a great time and I’m so happy to be with my son”,  I was thinking. “I’m a lucky man”. I did not have time to finish my thought, as I’ve heard very loud sound in my tent. I looked at Alex. He was here and he slept peacefully and quite. I took my flashlight and turned it on. No one was in our tent. Sound became louder. I started to listen more careful. Sound was not in the tent, but  next to tent. I realized, that our neighbor was snoring, but how? This kind of snoring I did not hear in my entire life. Vibrating sound was starting at first quite and little-by-little grew to a sound of a big ship with amazing variations. I was so  sorry that I couldn’t record it. It was impression that twenty boats do it in unison.
Instead of falling a sleep, I was listening this highly artistic and unusual performance. I was glad that Alex was a sleep. I did not closed my eyes full night.

In the morning our neighbors, young tourists, collected their staff, looking at me strangely. I immediately thought that they suspected me as a night snorer. A little later my snoring neighbor got up. It was big, fat Italian man. His children and two of his brothers were as big as he.

When Alex finished his breakfast, I asked him: “Do you think we have to pay next twenty dollars for this kind of entertainment?”
“No, papa, we won’t stay here any longer, but we are not going to bamboos as well”.
“Alex, I know another place. If you remember, few years ago bus from Bratislava dropped as in mountains and we just came down the hill straight to Volosko? I remember a grassy spot which doesn’t belong to anyone. From Volosco we have to go up the hill. Do you want to go there?” – suggested I. Alex agreed.
Passing narrow main Street towards a restaurant, we’ve met Ksenia.
“Ya zatvorila restoran. Jaro ne tamo”. (I locked the restaurant and Jaro is not there).

We were passing studio of Claudio Frank, famous artist of this Regine, which is on the lowest curve of this street. His doors ware wide open. His studio is filled with canvases. He, himself is sitting by his back to door painting. On the right side of his canvas are references. Deeper in the studio stands his helper Edo, who was not successful abstract artist and now makes stretchers and stretches canvases for successful Claudio. I know Claudio for all 20 years, but he was very unfriendly to me for many years until he realized that I do not try to create competition for his carrier on Croatian cost of Adriatic Sea.
Actually, last year he asked me if I want to give him my paintings so he can auction it, but I was going away and did not have time to give him my work. His paintings were hanging in all public places: Volosco, Lovran, Medvea, Rieka, Opatia, Ichichi and others. He remarried 9 times and had many children in variety of towns, every time marrying younger and younger wife.

“Claudio!” exclaimed I. He turned his body with great difficulty. His right leg was wrapped in cheese cloth and was blue and swollen.
“A, Grigory, Alex! Dichko velki! (Your son is already big! Keda stigli? Ya imam nogu zlomlenu. Auto. Gde spavae?” (Grigory, Alex, He is already big. When did you come? I have broken leg. Car. Where do you stay?”
“We travel wild. I’m sorry about your leg”.
He introduced me to another man walking back and forth in his studio. “This is my doctor. He doesn’t do anything to make me feel better. Just waists his time here, in my studio. Do you have any of your
watercolors? Show me what you have. I want to buy from you what you have.”
“I do not have many. Only few, but I will show you my catalog of Volosko”, I said.

He looked briefly at the catalog: “Mozhe predat mne nechto? Ya potrebue na nechto pozirat”. (“Can you sell it for me? I need reference”).
“Unfortunately I can’t sell it, but I can mail it to you from The United States. I promised this catalog to Jaro in Restaurant. This is my last one.”
He passed catalog to his doctor. Doctor started to read text in English.
“Wonderful”- replied doctor in English. “May I make a copies in Opatia? It will take only few hours. I will send Edo, my helper. Edo! Go to Opatia and make copies of a catalog now!” - directed Claudio.

 Pretty heavy Edo took a catalog and with no saying a word walked out. It is one and a half kilometer to Opatia and a little more distance to copy shop. Color copiesi n Opatia are 3 dollars each, comparing to Copies in New York – a dollar, but on sale it could cost even 59 cents.

“Claudio, can we live our back packs here, in the corner?”,  I asked.
 “Make a painting of my house. I will buy it from you. I’ll see you tomorrow at 12, but do not forget your luggage before dark” – replayed Claudio.
I took my painting staff from back pack and went to paint what I thought is Claudio’s house, and Alex went to swim. Time passed quickly, but before stores could be closed, I wanted to buy a propolis and visit Sonia, ceramic artist who had her small gallery in the center of Volosko. She was complaining about slow business. Her porcelain pieces were beautiful. She decorated it with flower and vegetable ornament, sometimes including real gold en paint for ceramic products.. I liked specifically one piece. I pulled $40 from my pocket, but Sonia told me that for me it will be $20, because we knew each other already for many years. I was grateful and gave her one copy of my watercolour. We parted with Sonia, wishing each other success. I had little time to run to a local drug store to get propolis, which has unusual natural antibiotic properties. I always buy it in Croatia, and always in the same Apteka (Drug store).
Rain drizzled, but I ignored it, relying on fate. I put plastic back on the stone not to be wet and opened in my painting pad available 140 lb piece of acid free paper. I painted until dark. Alex came over.
“Let’s take our back packs before Claudio will go home”, I suggested.

Claudio still was there, ready to live. One young attractive women rested in a soft arm chair near his unfinished painting.

“This is Russian women. She also speaks Croatian. She will help as to communicate”, says Claudio without mentioning her name. She was reclining in a deep, soft low arm chair, with wide open cliff, so her attractive breasts were visible up to her nipples, definitely admiring Claudio’s Art.

“Here I have watercolor of your house”, I pulled out two pieces of paper from my back pack.
Here I noticed something very strange. One piece of paper had two watercolors. One on one side, and the other one on the other side, but they both were up side down relating to each other.
 
I was shocked.

I had no choice and showed paintings to Claudio.
“Bravo!!!” – exclaimed he and flipped the paper on the other side.
“What is this? You painted on the other side? How I can separate it now?”  he tried to split corner with two fingers.

“I made a mistake, you can’t separate them”, I admitted.

“They are twins now”, she said.
His guest became interested and started to turn painting around, trying to figure out how someone can look at two paintings at once.

“Da, Grigory, ty imash problema s mozgami. Skolko za dve papiry? Pamiatui, ya slikar e ty slicar e my drugi.” (Yes, Grigory, You have a problem with your brain. How much do you want for this paper and one more watercolor? Don’t forget that I’m and artist and you are an artist. We are colleges”), said Claudio.

“Claudio, for you will be two hundred fifty dollars for all of that. Only I have to make a copies.

Fare?” – asked I. “ Dvesta”. (“I will give you two hundred”) – was bargaining Claudio.

Claudio got up from his chair and pulled roll of money from his pants.” Here you have two thousand kunas. Ah you need dollars”, he unrolled tight roll from his right pocket and took out two papers, hundred each. He liked watercolor of water side of Volosko, I painted earlier.

It was again dark and we still did not know where we will sleep with Alex, but I was sure we will find something. Volosko is so small so for hundreds of years all small spots were taken and were purchased by citizens.

We took our luggage and went up the hill. Alex became so strong that did not want me to carry two back packs. I insisted that we will share time.
“Papa, why did you tell Claudio that you will mail him catalog for free, if he offered you to pay for
that?”,  asked Alex.
“Because I know him for a long time and I want to stay friends with him. Not all things must be for sale. Sometimes you have to make a sacrifice for keeping or establishing friendship”, I replied.

Road was steep and we stopped several times going up the hill.. I darkness of a sky it was difficult to fallow dirt of road, but grass was even darker. Lighter part of road was going on the

right and we decided to turn there. After we passed huge empty parking lot for buses, road narrowed down and then split, like a fork. One went towards a gated villa and one part, on the left to another villa, covered with thick bushes. On the right side of split area was a small space before the cliff filled with trees. “Papa, this is a good spot. Just for our tent”.
Alex was excited.
Ground was very soft and it took for as exactly 13 minutes to put our tent. Evening was warm and cloudy and it was already dark, so we fall a slip right away. I‘m sensitive sleeper and I’ve heard some movement of leaves around the tent.
“It is so good to hear sound of nature. It puts you a sleep” – I was thinking about movie plot – my new idea. Whisper of trees was getting louder and louder. I realized the sound of trees transformed to a sound of rain and wind. Now wind started to hit tent stronger and stronger and rain was hitting our roof top with amazing power.
Suddenly it was huge explosion right near our tent. Alex immediately woke up as if he did not sleep at all.
“Papa it hit right here, right near our tent, possibly in one mile from as, possibly even much closer. I‘m so sorry we do not have a video camera! Can you imagine to shut lightning so close! No one, I think did it on such a short distance! I’m so sorry we do not have it!” – he started to listen to the pounding rain, wind and lightening and fall asleep again. Car from a villa passed close by on the road. I did not see it, but I’ve heard it. About at 5:30am rain stopped and I went out. As I stepped from the tent I realized that we put our tent on mad. It was red clay. It stalk to my snickers as a thick red layer. I went to clean it on the wet grass, but it was so sticky that I have to scrape it with the branch and to stand in to the paddle many times, before I thought I was ready to go back to tent. Snickers gave up. All fancy soul of sometimes ago fashionable snickers unglued and water from a puddle filled it up completely. That was the end of my snickers. Now I will ware only sandals.  Lucky me that I took sandals with me. The other way, I have to go bear feet until I can get something, but shoes in Yugoslavia are very expensive.
“No, I can’t go back. I will step again to the mad and will bring red dirt on the floor and all our things will be dirty and painted in red-brown color”, I was thinking.

I started to collect flat plastic bottles, foam, paper, cans, branches, and created narrow path from hard ground to our tent. I came back to sleep and have heard rain started again. Inside all our staff was not affected by rain. Car passed again back to  the villa. I fall a sleep again.

Alex walked up and was resting, listening to the rain. I found comfortable time to tell Alex my story -movie plot.. I was curious if he will appreciate it. Story was inspired by bamboo experience, based on our bamboo situation.

“Alex, listen to this, I have a plot for the film”, I said, already laughing. I just couldn’t hold my laugh somehow. I value Alex for his ability to listen, to imagine and to respond. We had so many creative moments and many were ended with movie concepts.
After I finished my story, we had very long laugh and my and his stomach were so painful, that I need to stop it somehow very badly.

Heavy rain continued until 3pm and had some break. We did not even noticed how time passed so quickly. In the break of rain, we  folded our tent, washed a bottom of it with a small sponge and water from clay, packed the rest in back packs and headed to visit Jaro. All our possessions we left in a back room and Alex went to swim, to meet his new friends and I started to paint. Clouds were braking, but did not let sun to go through.
I was painting chimneys behind new fish house–small restaurant, just opened first year here. Local attractive woman and two children came to see how I will start my art work. They already have seen me doing another, previous painting and were curious about the beginning. Unusually tall chimneys with the strange shape of old bakery house were renovated and re-painted long time ago and patina from air, paint rain and salt created beautiful  texture and inspired me to paint with fingers only. I had no chair and decided to paint standing against stone border, where I put my watercolors and pad. Beautiful, young women, as I figured out, mother of a child who played with his friends, was absolutely amazed.
“Look! He is painting only with fingers! He even doesn’t touch his brushes!” - shared she her emotions with her son, not realizing that I understand what she said. Another little boy was looking at me with admiration.
I used to paint without marking paper with the pencil, saving some time.
“You newer know when rain will start again”, I was thinking.

I introduced myself to my audiences and little boy told me that he knows me. His grandfather is Ivan Vodopija and his name is Ivan as well. Beautiful women ‘s name was Klaudia and his older boy was her son.

“You newer know who is looking at you here. People in Volosko and generally in Europe are not only very educated, curious observant and respectful to artists, but simple in good sense of it, honest, without an artificial make up. It looks like they blend with the nature. It is easy to start conversation with any age and on any level.

“I know a friend who lives in this house. I will call her. She will be happy to meet you and to see your paintings”, suggested Klaudia. She quickly disappeared and in the minute returned with another women.
 “Bravo, Bravo! Ya zhive tamo!”. (“I live right in that house!”) , exclaimed my new admirer. We introduced each other and she told me that she has many paintings, done by Claudio Frank and, if I would like to see them, I can fallow her in to her apartment. I left all staff right outside, feeling that it will be safe with children, who know me, and fallowed her inside the house. It was such a great contrast between the very old, gray, pile from weather front of this building, and worm, cozy and the same time pretty big apartment inside. Everywhere on the walls were hanging beautiful work of Claudio Frank. They looked like a symphony of colors.

“Dobro” (Beautiful)” – commented I after studying all Claudio's paintings. We exchanged addresses, in case I will visit Volosko next  time.
Alex found me exactly when I finished my new watercolor. He was so hungry, so I was glad to treat him and myself with fish from new fish restaurant.  It was already dark. Only light from some businesses spread deem light on narrow streets of a town. We have to hurry up to take our things from another restaurant.
“Papa, we are going back to our bamboo place”, said Alex confidently.
In the morning, while Alex slept, I went to make copies of my watercolors, before I will give them to Claudio. 3 copies cost $10. It was very expensive and I mentioned it to the owner of copy shop. ”I do not make the rules”, he replied.

Day was beautiful. At 12 noon Claudio was not in his studio. I went to swim. Alex was on the upper level with his new Italian friends and two girls, one of them was grand doter of Ivan Vodopija. Couple of times Alex passed me with his friends, but pretended that did not see me and did not even blinked his eyes, letting me know that he sees me. I felt very insulted by this behavior at this moment, but I distanced myself at this point from this negative thought.
“He is getting his puberty and wanted to look independent” – thought I. “When he will grow older. I guess he will understand, that must be not ashamed of father, but introduce him to his friends and invite, to be together, no matter how much his father looks older, than suppose to look.”, thought I.

Claudio was at his studio only at 6pm. I brought my paintings and he showed me big size of copies he made from my small catalog.
“Claudio, koliko koshta copia?” (“How much did you pay for copies?”) I decided to ask him.
“Scupo”, he answered not mentioning price. (Expensive).

I took from him my catalog and had last friendly handshake, saying good buy.

“Zdravo” (“Take care”) – said Claudio and hugged Alex.

We left. I brought my catalog to Jaro, as I promised .

“Grigory, Alex, sadi, shto hzete est? Kavu, Sok?” (Sit down, what would you like,

coffee, juice?”), said he, running around and serving his customers.
Restaurant was very full. His helper was running  non stop around serving many customers.. We decided not to create extra problem. Jaro was very nice all the times we visited him. But we prefer  to visit fish restaurant and again were late for putting tent during the day light. It was 11pm when we just started to stretch our tent.

“Next morning we are getting at five in the morning, and bus is at 8am.“, I reminded to Alex.

“Papa, you know that I can get up any time when we need to go?”,

I knew it. Alex is a great traveler and doesn’t get upset when I wake him up if we need to go. At 5 am we were up, collected all our staff and went by upper road, so we can go to a bakery where we used to buy fresh goodies. I put my sneakers on the border, so if someone in need, can take it and use it to very end or will through out it away.
All sweets and bread was so fresh that Alex momentarily started to eat saltines and strudel. We also went to buy fruits and juice for the road.

Alex wanted to take my black back pack, but I said I will carry it. I noticed that his back was in pain from heavy load and did not want him to injure himself. Finally we came to our bus station. I newer know if bus will come, because information in Opatia has no information about buses from Brno or Bratislava. No one around was waiting for the bus.
It's already 8am – there is no bus; 8:20 am – there is no bus. I started to worry.
“Papa, take a look at our tickets!”, suggested Alex.
I pulled out our tickets. Now I see, I made big mistake: “Bus will come in the evening, much later, at 8:40 pm. Look, Alex, am I right?, I asked, showing him our tickets, where hand writing was not easy to read. I wanted to be sore I see it correctly. That was big disappointment. I always make mistakes of this sort. I felt ashamed.
“Of course! Now we have all day and I can see my friends one more time!! Let’s go to Volosko!” – happy exclaimed Alex sarcastically.
“Now is 8:30. Your friends will come to swim only at ten. We will go half way only, and you will go to see your friends after we will wash all our dirty close and tent and we will dry all that. The weather is  fantastic, hot, our staff will dry before we will live. You will see your friends only after that”, I suggested. Alex did not mind. We went back two kilometers in hot morning, fallowing  beach trail, exactly the way we came here.  We stopped near the wider stony beach area, which looked like a small bay, where we had plenty of fresh, cold water from the spout, washed our dirty pants, sax, towels, shorts, winced all that in the stone bath below the spout and hanged to dry on the fence of freshly painted house.
It was no people on the beach at that time. Later, around ten in the morning, many children with parents will come here to enjoy shallow water.
Some years ago I photographed two children, looking from the window of this house. Now it had different appearance.
WE had plenty of time before departure of our bus and I started new watercolor,  and Alex went to meet his friends. At 6 pm he came back. I exactly finished finished my painting.
We ate, again collected our staff and ten to 8pm were at the bus stop. Now some people were waiting for the same bus.
It took for the bus close to 12 hours to arrive to Brno, Czech Republic.  We arrived to Brno at 7 in the morning.
To buy tickets for the bus I have to change money to Czech crowns but exchange office was closed until 9 am. I went to information window (I was lucky someone was there) and found out that I have to buy tickets right in the bus if there will be place for two. One bus left just in front of us. Now we have to wait for two and a half hours for the next next one.
When next bus arrived two hours later, I’ve seen that driver took some people who told him some kind of story. We were not lucky. Next bus will come again in two hours. Obviously some corruption was going on. I already forgot, living in United States, how face of corruption looks like. Here it came back to my memory.
Suddenly, Alex pointed to the sky. We observed a huge orange air balloon, flying through the sky. Obviously, it is going to land soon. Bursts of huge flame was warming up this huge animal. It was moving slowly and confident to a certain place. I pulled my digital camera and started to shut. Alex and I were moving to the place of landing. Finally we came to a fence and could see lending much clearer.
We observed all process of drawing air out of it.

“Your bus is here” – called as one young girl who was not lucky with earlier bus as we are, and she, somehow remembered as. ”Dzenkue bardzo” (“Thank you”), I replied. This time bus took all, who was going to Bratislava.

“We practically did not spend any money“, said Alex, counting our expense.
“We spend $28 for all 8 days on trip to Croatia. You earned two hundred dollars and we spend all together $228; $150 for bus and $78 for food and camping. Now, papa I can write a book about this trip as well. It was so easy, but if we go to hotel, like other people do, it will be nothing to write about. This kind of trip we will remember for a long time”.
 
Alex was tired, but very happy.

 ”Not only we had good time, spend little amount of money, made new friends, gave gifts to older friends, but our experience gave an idea about new movie plot”, mentioned I.

“Papa, you do not have to worry about money, when I will grow up. I orient myself on creativity and business. I will have enough money for you, mama and myself”, said Alex.

Few days after we came home to the United States I visited my good friend, artist, Volodia Grigorovich. I told the story about our trip to other friends, who were at the table, and mentioned

that we spend only $28 for all 8 days on trip to Adriatic Sea. They also had a trip to Italy for six days. They exclaimed:
“You see, and we go only for 6 days and wasted $6000! And we even can’t remember what we did!”
We all laughed.

Grigory Gurevich.

Copyright Aug. 3, 2005

 Movie plot:

Elderly poor man, about 60 years old and his, slightly younger wife lived in old wooden country house on the cliff of the narrow river, which was connected with the Ocean about 10 miles away.

All their property, where their grandfather built his house about 100 years ago, was huge and man and his wife had newer, since they were young, footed their property, especially lately. They recalled that they could go up to the Ocean and it still was their land. Going up and down to the river, getting water from a whale, fixing old roof and keeping dirt road graded, took so much beating on their body, so they learn how to save energy to do what it takes to survive. The main source of food was fish, but in his back yard, behind the house they had chicken, few pigs, few goats and one horse, which was getting already old, like their house. Their third dog was still barking, but lately was more resting, then running. They had a small garden and a little farm where they had potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, onion and some berries. All that gave them food for the winter. Huge forest was located behind the farm and took the rest of their property, was going up to the Ocean, this how big it was.
Their only one son left them when he was 15 years old to a Big City or vanished, and they even did know if he was alive. For a long time they could not forget what a beautiful child he was, smiling non stop, running on the property, chasing chicken, shooting birds with his home made boa an arrow and playing with the dog. They had newer brought him to the Big Ocean, being afraid that sharks will eat him one day and they will newer see him again.

The two of them, already not young, continued their life together, sharing difficulties of winter and sickness.


Man and his girlfriend, late thirty, traveling from abroad, roughing it, camping out in the countryside with the tent and sleeping bags, discovered beautiful beach on the coast of the Big Ocean and dropped their things there, enjoying their vacation. They could be alone, enjoying sunset, swimming naked catching a fish in shallow water and reading their books or doing nothing.

“Why we do not open camping on this beautiful land? So many our friends will be happy to come over here?”, suggested John, this was the name of this man.

“This is a great idea”, said Mary , this was the name of beautiful women, who traveled with him.

Next year they invited their friends and all of them enjoyed their new vacation place. In appreciation, friends gave Mary and John beautiful birthday gift and few thousand dollars.

John was good businessman, and invested this money to build a fence in a  beach, to clean it up and to put few cabana's, similar to Indian or Mexican.

From year to year they advertised this place and build bathroom, stronger structures and cafeteria, where Mary could prepare some food, they were bringing from their home land. It was time to put new road so it will be easier to come by car.

After that, more people arrived to their new resort area and it was getting better and better every year. John and Mary invested a lot of money in their advertising and started to sell one piece of their land after another.

Soon it became New Village, that they called “Mary – John Village”, but it did not stop here. Some people liked the idea of living on the Big Ocean so much, that they developed shops, restaurants, galleries and other businesses.

Little-by-little city grew bigger and bigger and John and Mary became very wealthy.

Television, radio and local newspapers gave fantastic review and advertisements to “Mary - Johns” City.
Soon City was reaching poor man and his poor wife and John took a lawyer to decide what to do with these poor people. Lawyer opened case and started negotiations. When old man and his wife discovered that someone moved to their property, behind their small farm, they were very upset, but did not have money to protect themselves even they had all documents hidden somewhere in the adek.

It was a show “Missing links” and John was invited to appear on this show.

“I’m ambitious and passionate person and I want people to enjoy creation of my mind. I have a big ego, big dreams and big imagination. This property is a market place. It is a time to bring modern life to our society. We need to bring casinos, golf curses, fancy restaurants and hotels. I’m excited to build and I love to create, I love the process and I like to be rich and to make other people rich. Once I had a family, my father and my mother, but I was young and ambitious and rebel against the life stile of my parents and left them. Time came for me to reconnect with my parents and to share with them my success”. Here John concluded his speech.

“We have a surprise for you, John and Mary. We found your parents. It was not easy, and we did huge job to select two people who are here, from many, who pretended to be your parents. You, John Winner, understand, that you are a billionaire and everyone wants a piece of you.” – says Master of Ceremony.

“Now this door will opened up and you will meet your parents” - with this words He gave a signal to open huge, beautifully decorated door in bright lightened studio.

John stared at the door, not daring to blink for fear of missing them. Through the door he sees entering two old people dressed modestly.
John jumped from his seat and run to hug and kiss his mother and father. Mary fallowed him and gently hugged both of them.

All in the audience had tears in their eyes.
“Now I have one more surprise for you”, says Master of Ceremony:

“Do you have a lawyer?” John nodded “Yes”. “Do you want to kick out people who live on outskirts of your property?”

“Yes” – nodded John again.

“This people are your parents”.  John almost fainted. Tears were pouring from his eyes.

“Now we are one family” says John and hugged his parents and Mary.

 Audiences couldn’t stop applauding.

 GRIGORY GUREVICH

Written and copy righted in Aug. 2005
Published in Proza.ru in English on Aug 30, 2015