These Americans are still here!
Author: Brandon (Dad)
As we sit just hours from kickoff of the biggest game in Croatia's sporting history, I thought I'd give a recap on our last few days. After a long post yesterday, I'll see what I can do to make this short and sweet.
Sunday was a day of highs and lows for the Bronzan Family. It started out with a low. I haven't talked too much about Pepe on the blog, but he (she?) was a short-term member of the family. Pepe is an Opel Astra Station Wagon that we rented to get us around. The first day we picked it up, we noticed a bizarre smell that reminded me of transmission fluid. (Pepe is named after Pepe Le Pew, the skunk from those old cartoons). I checked on the smell, but after it went away I chalked it up to rough shifting on my part when we first got the car. You see, Pepe is a bit stubborn. He's not above rolling a bit, even when you have the parking brake on....things like that.
Well, on our way down to Cavtat on Sunday, we hear a clunk and Pepe becomes un-driveable. Little brat. We had to have the rental folks pick us up and take us back to the house. Turns out the clutch was burned out. I'm pretty sure they think it was me, the American who can't drive a manual transmission, even though I assured them, I've driven manuals on and off for over 20 years. Oh well.
Thankfully we got a new car the other day, a much nicer Chevrolet Orlando that we have named, well, Orlando.
I won't talk too much about the Croatia/Russia soccer game other than to mention the fantastic party hosted by the Pavlovic family. Ivan, the oldest child, who was in Russia following the World Cup, returned earlier in the week and had all of his friends and their families over. This time there were tons of kids and Luke and Livi (Luke especially) had a great time playing with them.
Luke was really dying to engage them at one point and with the encouragement of Tiffany, he was able to ask them, in broken Croatian, if they'd "like to play football". They were up for it. Turned out one of the older kids knew how to speak English. We asked where he learned and he said, "YouTube".
On Sunday, we had another amazing lunch made by Marija, then went down to Cavtat for the afternoon/evening. Turns out it was the night of the annual Cavtat Kid's Carnival. Starting at 8:30 and lasting until fireworks went off after 11:00, the kid's carnival was quite an event. It kicked off with a parade mainly featuring kids wearing Croatia soccer jerseys and a brass band playing Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water". It was AMAZING.
The rest of the evening was filled with parents finding tables at the outside bars and having drinks while the kids ran around and participated in the "kid's concert", which featured kids doing karaoke (one kid did the My Little Pony theme song in Croatian). It was a lot of fun.
On Monday we drove in to Dubrovnik and had a very nice day. It wasn't very hot, so we walked the walls, which is always a treat. We also found a Mexican-ish restaurant for lunch. Five years ago when we were here, we found a restaurant that featured a burrito. My brother Aaron ordered it and it was, not surprisingly, terrible. It's become something of a running joke in our family. This time the burrito I ordered was surprisingly adequate. I've certainly had worse burritos in Sonoma County.
In addition to the walls, we also visited Rector's Palace, which was a great, historical break from the throngs of people walking the streets.
That night we had dinner with a cousin, Lili Bronzan Radović and her husband, Niko. We had a really good dinner and even better conversation. Niko is a firefighter and spent some time in Watsonville as a kid when the war was really raging.
Yesterday (Tuesday), saw us go on a hunt for family history. We were told there were some Bronzans buried in the cemetery at "St. Luke's". I found it on the map, but was a little surprised it was way up in the hills in a little village called Brotnice. It wasn't terribly far, so we drove up, only to see the roads get cut off before we could reach the church. We circled for a while, looking for a passage, before giving up and heading back down to the valley floor.
Our next stop was the villages of Komaji and Vignje, just south of Čilipi. As soon as we turned off the highway, we see a sign for St. Luke. That made a lot more sense to me. Turns out, this was the right cemetery all along. We found a couple of Bronzans buried there, but many of the older gravestones were weathered and unreadable.
There is a complex history that I have not quite gotten to the bottom of surrounding the family home in Vignje. A fair amount of bad blood exists between the people who live there now and the other Bronzans in the area, so I'm treading lightly.
The night concluded with dinner in Cavtat and a viewing of the Belgium/France semifinal game.
Big Croatia match tonight. Hope you're all pulling for the Vatreni!
I hope all is well in the States and that it is getting by without us. I have a feeling it is.
Until next time...
As we sit just hours from kickoff of the biggest game in Croatia's sporting history, I thought I'd give a recap on our last few days. After a long post yesterday, I'll see what I can do to make this short and sweet.
Sunday was a day of highs and lows for the Bronzan Family. It started out with a low. I haven't talked too much about Pepe on the blog, but he (she?) was a short-term member of the family. Pepe is an Opel Astra Station Wagon that we rented to get us around. The first day we picked it up, we noticed a bizarre smell that reminded me of transmission fluid. (Pepe is named after Pepe Le Pew, the skunk from those old cartoons). I checked on the smell, but after it went away I chalked it up to rough shifting on my part when we first got the car. You see, Pepe is a bit stubborn. He's not above rolling a bit, even when you have the parking brake on....things like that.
Well, on our way down to Cavtat on Sunday, we hear a clunk and Pepe becomes un-driveable. Little brat. We had to have the rental folks pick us up and take us back to the house. Turns out the clutch was burned out. I'm pretty sure they think it was me, the American who can't drive a manual transmission, even though I assured them, I've driven manuals on and off for over 20 years. Oh well.
Thankfully we got a new car the other day, a much nicer Chevrolet Orlando that we have named, well, Orlando.
I won't talk too much about the Croatia/Russia soccer game other than to mention the fantastic party hosted by the Pavlovic family. Ivan, the oldest child, who was in Russia following the World Cup, returned earlier in the week and had all of his friends and their families over. This time there were tons of kids and Luke and Livi (Luke especially) had a great time playing with them.
Luke was really dying to engage them at one point and with the encouragement of Tiffany, he was able to ask them, in broken Croatian, if they'd "like to play football". They were up for it. Turned out one of the older kids knew how to speak English. We asked where he learned and he said, "YouTube".
On Sunday, we had another amazing lunch made by Marija, then went down to Cavtat for the afternoon/evening. Turns out it was the night of the annual Cavtat Kid's Carnival. Starting at 8:30 and lasting until fireworks went off after 11:00, the kid's carnival was quite an event. It kicked off with a parade mainly featuring kids wearing Croatia soccer jerseys and a brass band playing Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water". It was AMAZING.
 |
| The parade of Croatian soccer jerseys. |
The rest of the evening was filled with parents finding tables at the outside bars and having drinks while the kids ran around and participated in the "kid's concert", which featured kids doing karaoke (one kid did the My Little Pony theme song in Croatian). It was a lot of fun.
 |
| Will you look at that handsome couple? |
On Monday we drove in to Dubrovnik and had a very nice day. It wasn't very hot, so we walked the walls, which is always a treat. We also found a Mexican-ish restaurant for lunch. Five years ago when we were here, we found a restaurant that featured a burrito. My brother Aaron ordered it and it was, not surprisingly, terrible. It's become something of a running joke in our family. This time the burrito I ordered was surprisingly adequate. I've certainly had worse burritos in Sonoma County.
 |
| I tried to recreate Aaron's expression from the 2013 Dubrovnik Burrito Festival. |
In addition to the walls, we also visited Rector's Palace, which was a great, historical break from the throngs of people walking the streets.
That night we had dinner with a cousin, Lili Bronzan Radović and her husband, Niko. We had a really good dinner and even better conversation. Niko is a firefighter and spent some time in Watsonville as a kid when the war was really raging.
Yesterday (Tuesday), saw us go on a hunt for family history. We were told there were some Bronzans buried in the cemetery at "St. Luke's". I found it on the map, but was a little surprised it was way up in the hills in a little village called Brotnice. It wasn't terribly far, so we drove up, only to see the roads get cut off before we could reach the church. We circled for a while, looking for a passage, before giving up and heading back down to the valley floor.
Our next stop was the villages of Komaji and Vignje, just south of Čilipi. As soon as we turned off the highway, we see a sign for St. Luke. That made a lot more sense to me. Turns out, this was the right cemetery all along. We found a couple of Bronzans buried there, but many of the older gravestones were weathered and unreadable.
 |
| St. Luke's in Komaji. |
There is a complex history that I have not quite gotten to the bottom of surrounding the family home in Vignje. A fair amount of bad blood exists between the people who live there now and the other Bronzans in the area, so I'm treading lightly.
The night concluded with dinner in Cavtat and a viewing of the Belgium/France semifinal game.
Big Croatia match tonight. Hope you're all pulling for the Vatreni!
I hope all is well in the States and that it is getting by without us. I have a feeling it is.
Until next time...
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