We proceeded to wait around for almost three hours, because our train (and about six of the other eight trains due to board around 6pm) was delayed because of fire on one of the rails in another part of Croatia. It's almost 9pm when we finally get on our train, and I'm getting anxious because the train ride is about three hours long and public trans in Ljubljana stops running at midnight. I didn't want to take a taxi, and I certainly didn't want to walk two kilometers in the middle of the night to the hostel we were staying at.
The time comes for us to disembark the train and we come to find out that yes, yes we do have to walk to the hostel because the buses have stopped running and there is not a taxi in sight. So we walk a little ways from the train station and we get to this river. The Ljubljanica river. And it is beautiful. It is fairly small, with gondolas parked alongside it, and beautiful stone bridges, and cafes lit with colored lights and the soft murmurs of the people around drift to my ears in a way that calms me down. Really, how can I stay irritated at such a sight? It may be late but there are still things to do, food to eat, people to meet, and a beautiful little river with the light of streetlamps dancing upon it. As we walk we pass by a bench with two older drunk guys, who tell us "Make your life great! It's too short not to!" and really, is anything more true than that? Is there any reason to not make your life the best it can possibly be?
We make it to the hostel and settle into our private room, decorated in black and white, with caricatures of famous jazz musicians adorning the walls. We are both in good moods by now, happy that our long and treacherous walk to the hostel turned out to be something pleasant, and we decide to head out for a drink. We sit at a riverside cafe and each have a glass of Slovenian wine while listening to a local girl sing covers of famous American songs like Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On." By bedtime, I am half in love with this city and I have hardly seen any of it.
In the morning we go on a free walking tour, and I spend the entire time with a deep sense of longing, heartbroken already just knowing I have to leave this city in a few days.
Slovenia for a long time was a part of Yugoslavia, and whilst part of a bigger nation, they always retained their own identity. They were the first country to declare independence from the republic of Yugoslavia and have since flourished as a nation. Ljubljana is known as the City of Dragon - a green dragon is the city's symbol, and its origin stems from the Greek myth of Jason and the Argonauts. In Jason's quest to obtain the Golden Fleece, he and the Argonauts went through a swamp that supposedly was present-day Ljubljana. In that swamp was a dragon, which Jason allegedly defeated and Ljubljana was free. There are dragons everywhere in this city, most notably on the Dragon Bridge.
There are bridges all over the city, and beautiful architechture, almost exclusively done by the same architect, Jože Plečnik. There are trees everywhere and students from the university's music program playing a variety of instruments on the streets to earn money. Only about 780,000 people live in Ljubljana, but the city seems even smaller than that.
I don't know what it is about Ljubljana. But I love it here. I have never wanted to live anywhere more than I want to live in Ljubljana. I can't pinpoint any one thing. Is it the culture? The friendliness of the people? The art that is in every bridge, every building we pass? Is it the food and the wine? Is it the small town feel of a major city in Europe? I just don't know. All I know is that for the entire day, I alternated between a feeling of completely uplifting joy at being able to discover and cherish and spend time in a place like this, and a feeling of gutwrenching despair at knowing that not only will I have to leave this place in a mere few days, but it is unlikely that I will be able to live here for good. Have you ever loved someone (or something) so much, and had your heart broken into millions of pieces because realistically you knew you could never have it? But at the same time, you wouldn't give back any second of those memories for anything? It doesn't matter if it is a place you wanted to stay in forever, like me and Ljubljana, or if it was a person you loved but had to let go of, or a feeling of accomplishment that you knew wouldn't last forever - that is how it feels for me in Ljubljana. I want to spend all my energies into seeing what this place has to offer me, to experience everything I can from so inexplicably wonderful a place. I have never so enthusiastically tried to learn a language (albeit in so short an amount of time) nor have I ever wanted to explore eery inch of a place as much as I want to do here. It is such an intense feeling of longing. I feel drawn to this place for reasons I can't explain. I don't ever want to leave here. I want to come back, I want to find a job here, I want to raise my children here, I want to live here forever.
But in all likelihood, that dream is not going to be realized, and as I've said before, that knowledge is heartbreaking.
But that saying "It's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all" can not be any more true than it is for me, right here, right now, in Ljubljana.
Slovenia, I will come back to you, one day.
On a less emotionally-invested, serious note, Steve and I ate horseburgers today! Billy was not too happy with us. I don't think he likes this place very much because of that.
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