I was afraid I’d be jet lagged
from my flight from India but felt pretty alright as I got out of bed at 8 AM.
I was really looking forward to enjoying my second day in Slovenia as the first
day went by so smoothly. But mostly, I was excited as Andrej was to compete at
the Slovenian National Championship and I would finally get to see him jump
(for the first time, that’s right!). Mrs. Poljanec was at the kitchen, being
her caring and considerate self and offered me some scrumptious breakfast. I
requested for some black coffee and she made a wonderfully rich and dark cup.
She informed me that the beans are homegrown. I was pleasantly surprised
because I wasn’t aware Slovenes produced coffee and might I add a very fine one
at that! I engaged in some conversations at the dining table with Mrs. Poljanec
as I waited for the sleepy brat of the house to wake up and come join me/us for
breakfast.
The Poljanec’s home is located in
a quiet, peaceful residential area. Unlike in New Delhi where it is so common
to hear the sound of traffic and the yelling of vendors in the trademark extremely
narrow lanes between apartment buildings or even private homes, here, the most
common sound that one can hear would be the faint barking of a dog or the
crying of the next door neighbor’s young child aside the engine sound of a car
passing by at irregular intervals. To complement the peacefulness of the area,
there are some hillocks that are easily viewable from the front porch. I
remember Andrej comparing them to a woman’s breast when we drove pass them from
the airport on the day of my arrival (that’s typical of his boyish
idiosyncrasy); whereas, Mr. Poljanec explained to me in a proper manner, and
like a gentleman, how far they ranged and their names (which I can’t recall
like most Slovenian words).
Apparently, for Andrej, life in a
day starts only after 9 AM. Therefore, he refuses to budge out of bed before
that ‘start line,’ unless absolutely necessary. After breakfast, I asked him to
go for a walk with me and check out the neighborhood. There was hardly any
traffic in the main roads and people walked their dogs or went on their walks
in a leisurely fashion. I remember thinking how nice it would be to live in a
place like this, so free of pestering crowd, noise and pollution. There was
obviously nothing I missed about a city like New Delhi. We came across a river
that passed through the neighborhood; it looked so clean and free of industrial
effluents. Again, something that is rare in my city, or in my country for that
matter, save some rivers in the north eastern states. We saw a man practicing
his rowing skills in the river. He seemed international with a Slovenian coach
as they communicated in English with each other. At least, that’s what Andrej
and I presumed.
I sat down with the family for
lunch that Mrs. Poljanec had prepared. This was my very first Slovenian meal in
a Slovenian household and I was excited for it to say the least. She prepared
baked chicken with classic Slovenian ingredients and some salad. They all
tasted really good. I fail to remember what exactly the stuffing was and my
friend here is of no help as he’s equally clueless about the Slovenian food he
eats. But his Mom’s specialty I reckon is with desserts and I was fortunate to
sample a couple of her delish cakes! I was also pleased to meet Andrej’s
brother for the first time and handed him a book I had got him about India authored
by a renowned Harvard scholar of Eastern religions. He seemed pleased and asked
me a few many questions about India and spirituality that seems synonymous with
Indians. Mrs. Poljanec urged me to eat more but as a person that eats small
portions per meal but with an out of control metabolism, I couldn’t stuff myself
further.
We left the house at about 3 PM for
the stadium in Celje where Andrej was to compete. The weather was about 35
degrees Celsius; the sultriness of which reminded me of India. It took about an
hour to reach the venue. I sat down in the stadium seats with Andrej’s parents
while he went to warm up for the big event. I told Mr. Poljanec, rather
timidly, that I was completely clueless about the rules of pole vaulting. He
was kind enough to explain the pros and cons of the game and also told me many
a thing about how unfair the Slovenian sports federation was being to Andrej
all these times. Andrej had already mentioned some really unnerving information
about how unreasonable and discriminatory the federation was to him, so I
wasn’t surprised to get a confirmation from Mr. Poljanec. What surprised me though
was the fact that a small and well developed country like Slovenia in the
European Union could be so immersed in corruption and foul play, arbitrary
means that I would associate with a chaotic and populous country like India
with lax laws and poor regard for most of its athletes! There were not many
spectators at the stadium but I got to feel that Slovenes do take sports very
seriously. I was impressed to see the many events taking place at the same time
in the stadium.
The pole vault competition
commenced at about 6 PM, it was still very sunny! As Andrej began to jump, his
parents and I watched on the sides and cheered him on, quietly. I managed to
take quite a few pictures of him jumping as I felt that was the best I could so
since I had no idea about the rules of pole vault. Andrej competed with five
other pole vaulters. He appeared so relaxed and nonchalant that at some point
his parents worried he wasn’t taking the competition seriously. In the end, the
closest competitor could not tide over Andrej’s “scores” and therefore Andrej
was declared the Slovenian champion for the third time! I was overjoyed for him
even though he seemed to have acclimatized himself to winning medals! We waited
a bit longer till the medal ceremony and moved on to our next destination.
We then went to Trojane for some
doughnuts and beer. Americans should really learn to make doughnuts from the
Slovenians because their doughnuts have nothing on the ones at Trojane. I’m not even particularly fond of doughnuts
but these were the best I’ve tried in my life thus far! And though I couldn’t
finish eating even one doughnut, I enjoyed whatever I had thoroughly and
brought home the leftover piece to munch on later.
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