😡

So excited! Our stuff is coming on Monday! Yes, it’s not a great day for it to be delivered - lots of rescheduling to do, husband has an evening event, babysitter has to move her schedule around to help with the kids. But we’ve been living out of suitcases for over two months - since the end of June for the kids and me since we were traveling to Grandparents immediately after the end of the school year. It’ll be here after lunch.Time to recycle all the yogurt containers I’ve been using as tupperwares.

2pm. No stuff. Nada. No communication either ... We track down the shipper’s dircet line ...

What do you mean you’re not coming ....

😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😢

What a shirt show. Which brings me to some thoughts about why this feels like they cancelled Christmas.

In our previous moves we did not have to wait this long. Through a combination of factors that I won’t comment on, this is the longest we’ve had to wait before we can setttle in. And since packout this time was very difficult, we did not use up our UAB allowance. We have been living in a minimalist fashion for a while now. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but I want to set up my house.

Ya see, when you move every 2-3 years, you don’t have time to waste in making your new location “home.” Say yes to everything social, hit the ground running exploring, be patient and trust that one day soon grocery shopping won’t be a four hour ordeal. But it wears you down.

And getting the HHE, especially with kids, is essential to this process. It’s essential to morale. I have a friend who just moved from one city in China to another. She said “seven years ago we arrived with four bags, today we are leaving with two kids” and a boatload of stuff. She got her stuff quickly so wasn’t as happy to see it - absence makes the heart grow fonder. I have another friend who in her youth was a great traveler. Originally fromTurkey, she met her American husband in Germany, had a baby, and immediately moved to the DC area permanently. Since having a child she says, “I don’t want to go anywhere.”

Everyone’s different, but stability is key. Thank goodness this is a three year assignment. Now how can I make that longer ....

Neighborhood crusin’

Baby dragons and a 800 year old castle

We are quickly discovering one of the best things about life in Ljubljana: all those amazing Slovenian destinations I’ve been stalking on instagram for the past year are day trips!

 An hour’s drive brings you to beautiful and fascinating places. We can see a whole bunch of stuff before Kyle can deploy his “are we there yet” song.

Predjama Castle is 800 years old and the “largest cave castle in the world.” For this visit we only visited the outside, but if you buy a ticket for a tour you get to explore inside the cave network behind the castle.

Apparently one of the knights who owned this castle “died on the toilet after being betrayed by a servant.” I have to find out what that means.

On this visit to the park we spent most of our time in the Postonja Caves, searching for baby dragons.

There is a train that takes you deep inside the cave network, which is the largest in Europe. I’ve been in caves before and I’ve never seen anything like this. The train moves pretty quickly, so hang on to your hats, or in this case, your Ben.

We did find a baby dragon - in an aquarium. We weren’t allowed to take pictures of them but you can see what they look like here: https://www.postojnska-jama.eu/en/wonderland-stories/baby-dragons-secret-stories/.

Tivoli City Park

Ljubljana prides itself on being the “greenest European capital,” and no wonder. If you live in one of the beautiful places you of course want to preserve it. Why do you think Oregonians get so excited about the environment? Slovenians, however, take environmentalalism to a whole new level. Recycling bins are larger and more prevalent than garbage cans, and apparently there aren’t very many rules as to what you can’t recycle. Anything goes! We even have city compost bins on the residential streets. At first I was super excited about this, but then I realized that they only pick up the organic waste once a week. There’s a science behind composting, and that’s not it. 

Like Tirana (and NYC) Ljubljana has a central green space inside the city limits. This park is huge, and has urban sections with playgrounds and cafes and duck ponds as well as forests with hiking trails. The first picture was taken about a ten minute walk from our house.

There’s also a modern art museum, where you can take printmaking classes. Follow the paintings!

There’s something  especially calming about city buildings you can see from inside a big park.

First Impressions

And, after three years in Arlington, we’re back overseas! Leaving DC was by far the most difficult PCS we’ve ever done. For one thing, our car and HHE are still not here. We parted with our car on July 12 and packed out about a week later, and apparently our stuff is taking the scenic tour around the Horn of Africa. As far as we can tell it’s currently vacationing in Greece. Thanks, JK Moving Company. Meanwhile, we shall continue to ration our four spoons and three plates (yes, we broke a welcome kit plate). Although we are all going to be doing a happy dance around the Mazda, I’m sure I’ll be overwhelmed by our stuff whenever it does decide to join us. In the meantime, I’ll continue to stew and keep the kids away from the coffee cups we borrowed from our neighbors.

This is our third overseas tour, and we are very happy with our housing assingment. It is light and spacious and comfortable, and in a great location. This is the first time we have lived out in the community instead of on a compound, and while at first that felt very different I’m already used to it. Other than apparently rampant bike theft, crime is rare in Ljubljana, and Slovenia in general. And our bikes are in Greece so we have no worries.

Which brings me to my first impression of our home for th next three years: this place is insanely calm. The drivers are moderately aggressive and cyclists are EVERYWHERE, but laws are enforced and the infrastructure is as good as any other developed country. Compared to my other experiences of moving to Manila and Albania (and even DC), the calmness has been something I have had to get used to. Now that it’s September and everyone is back from vacation, life is picking up a bit, but in general Ljubljana feels like a “big city” with a small town attitude.

Now that’s not to say that I’M calm. I am of course constantly overwhelmed, mostly by the language. It took me more than a month to figure out how to say “hello” dobra dan and “thank you” hvala. The boys started school a couple of weeks ago, and they have a full schedule of classes all day followed by after school activities, half of which are even inlcuded in our tuition fees. Kyle is of course enrolled in ALL the sports as well as robotics, and Ben is taking yoga (and I will join him!). My first impression of the school and the kids’ teachers is very positive. There are a few adjustments to adapt to, but the most difficult problem so far as that Ben is napping at school and then won’t go to sleep  at his normal bedtime. And yet is somehow still overtired. TBD how that’s going to work itself out.

I have been hired as a rover admin at the embassy, but my security clearance is still 3-6 months out. While it would be nice to have the income to offset Ben’s private school tuition, not working is at least giving me plenty of time to do important things like write this blog and stare at Julie. I could probably do with a little more mental stimulation (which, btw, was not a problem in either of our 20% hardship tours - just an observation of hardship vs non-hardship tours). Having written that, I feel motivated to get off my bum and go join YogaAnytime.com. First 30 days are free with the code ANNIE.