#AND HELLO HER OBSESSION WITH CREEPY ANIMALS AHHH

[aajjks]

i had to add a concept of what the family wears:

🩷: https://pin.it/4ztHygfVn

🩵: https://pin.it/7sE9wepXi

TC!dad!JK

“make way for the prince and princesses of goryeo!!” announces the guard.

“h-honor to the prince and princesses” says a salesman and bows to gives respect to the future king and queen of the nation of corea.

“honor to you too mr. salesman” ayra replies and proceeds to bow the older man. “no ayra, you don’t-never mind” sighs ae-cha as she takes her little sister’s hand and walks with her through the busy streets with jinseoul trailing behind them.

“let’s seeee~ where’s the pet stand?” ae-cha thinks out loud while ayra just happily waves to everyone with a big smile on her face.

“aw, she’s so cute” says an older lady.

“hi jinseoul! hi ae-cha!”

“is that the king’s daughter? i thought he had twin boys?”

“she looks so much like the queen”

“wow, the king and queen make have beautiful children”

immediately, ayra became the talk of the town. it’s not often that jungkook’s children leave the palace. some were beginning to believe the king had no kids and that his seven children were all just myths and fabled stories.

they knew of ae-cha, jinseoul, and areum and since ae-cha and jinseoul actually leave the palace walls, the people of the town are familiar with their presence but didn’t the king and queen bare seven?

“hello mr. minjun” ae-cha smiles.

“‘ello princess ae-cha. honor to the—“

“no need to be so formal, mr. minjun”

“jinseoul?! is that you? what-what happened?”

“got stabbed but i’m okay now”

gon minjun, the sweet salesman that told the young prince and princess the ins and outs of goryeo AND is a friend of yours thanks to your mother. minjun had known you since you were just a little baby and you took it upon yourself to introduce him to your kids and since then, he’s kept a keen eye on them just for you.

“stabbed? what—“ before minjun could finish his sentence, he’s interrupted by an adorable small 5 year old who he’s never seen before but judging from her eyes, round face, and nose, this child is yours and king jungkook’s.

“hello mister!!”

“why, hello young lady. what’s your name?”

“my name is jeon ayra. princess jeon ayra. my mom and dad is queen jeon y/n and king jeon jungkook!”

“well it’s nice to meet you, princess jeon ayra. my name is mr. minjun. i’m a close friend of your mother’s”

“nuh uh, only my daddy is mommy’s best friend”

“oh, really?” he laughs. “well, who is my best friend?”

“uhhh…you can be the baby in mommy’s belly friend”

“what? your mother is pregnant again?”

“dammit ayra” curses jinseoul “yeah but don’t tell anyone please?”

“of course. but what can i interest you two today? looking for someone? any sightseeing today?” asks minjun.

“uhhh..we’re actually looking for a pet this time” ae-cha replies.

“a pet? oh, we’ve got plenty! cats, dogs, tortoises, which one do you want?”

“THIS!!! I WANT THIS ONE!!!” yells ayra.

“noo, mommy said cat ayra” jinseoul scolds.

“no, she said as long as it’s not a snake or tarantula”

“i’m sure she said lizard too”

“but seoul” whines ayra “please sir? can i have it?”

“this isn’t just any lizard, princess ayra. it’s a gecko (https://pin.it/7fDrMWIVu)”

“can i please have the gecko?”

“no, ayra” ae-cha jumps in “mom said cat or dog. no spiders, no snakes, and no geckos either”

“but he’s tiny and cute and green. pleaseee? please please please please pleaseeeee”

“if you let her have that gecko, mom is going to kill us”

“but she won’t shut up about it on our way home”

ae-cha sighs.

“we’ll take the gecko”

“YAAAAAYYYYY!!!!!!!”

“how much mr. minjun?”

“oh no, princess ae-cha, it’s free” smile minjun as he takes the gecko out of the cage and puts it in ayra’s hands. “what will you name princess ayra?”

“his name is….DRAGON!! see? because he looks like one”

meanwhile with jungkook and y/n…

~🫧

ball is in your court alina!! what’s your favorite couple doing right now? 😏

The water is so calming, you’re sitting between jungkooks legs with your back hitting his naked chest, as he touches your bare wet skin once again, you’ve been like for this the past hour, with him in the bath, the warm water must be helping you with your aches.

It’s so nice like this, doing nothing but just being so close like this, skin to skin, and he’s doing his best to massage your shoulders and your lower back.

You’re still a little grumpy because he is not fulfilling your needs, he’s got his robe off but not his pants, “yn does this feel good?” He says as his hands sneakily go towards your belly and he lovingly runs his hands all over it.

Your children are safe and it’s so peaceful, you groan as he presses some pressure onto your lower back, he’s having fun.

“Oh yn I didn’t know you had this much tension in your body.” He remarks, pressing a kiss on your neck, now he’s suddenly horny because two minutes he’s near you? His hormones go insane.

“Yn.. tell me, do you want me to touch you?” His tone changes from soft to seductive, he licks the exact same place on your neck where he pressed a kiss at and your broken breathing is a sign that you want him.

Jungkook smirks before taking his hands away from your neck so he can touch you where it really hurts, just like you told him before.

His warm wet fingers travel down to your thighs, your heartbeat is so strong, he’s not saying anything and you’re not saying anything either, the atmosphere between you two feels really hot despite the cold weather.

Maybe it’s the desire burning.

He’s holding you firm and soon his fingers find your heat, he closes his eyes before getting to work and as soon as he sinks his fingers in, you’re already an eager moaning mess, he loves the reaction you’re giving him and he just wants to make you feel really good.

You deserve it.

And you always react to him so swell because your body knows who it belongs to.

Jungkooks left hand settles on your breast and he squeezes it lightly, teasing you with his hands and mouth because he knows how much you love them, his digits feel so hot inside you because you’re eagerly welcoming them in.

You’re so needy aren’t you? He’s so hard now, fuck you’ve got him, he wants to be inside you now. Your moans and shaky breaths echo throughout as you begin to grind on him and he groans at the contact.

His pace increases so do your moans, you’re definitely loud and he is loving it.

That is until before he can kick off his pants, you both hear a knock interrupting you.

[gibelwho]

Top 5: Nostalgia Movies

This Top 5 is taking a trip down childhood memory lane to choose the best Nostalgia Movies - films that I loved as a kid and continue to love to this day. The film must have been watched multiple times during my youth and continue to be associated with a memory or tradition that was an important marker of growing up. Therefore, any film produced past 2004, when I graduated high school, has not been considered - and, to even make the cut, the film must be associated with more than just constant re-watches in our downstairs rec room (arranged with a HUGE - well, big for the ‘90s - screen with actual surround sound that my dad installed); rather, these films must be an essential part of my childhood progression into adult-hood and laid the groundwork for a future of loving cinema.

Gibelwho Productions Presents Nostalgia Movies:

5. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

4. X-Men

3. The Little Mermaid

2. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

1. Newsies

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986): As my high school career began to wrap up and I was looking ahead to college (where I had already committed to attending film school), my mother informed me of a proclamation - I was not allowed to leave her household without watching Ferris Bueller. Perhaps she knew that she needed to instill a little bit of rule-breaking encouragement into her straight A / type A child before I was to head out into the unruly world of college, but nonetheless, this film left a mark with it’s delightful adventures of Ferris, Cameron, and Sloane. Years later, I attended an LA rooftop screening where the audience all danced during the Twist and Shout parade, bringing me straight back to the joy of discovering this film with my mom. In the same tradition, I will be sure to make my kids watch this film before they leave our household for the wide world so they can learn to cause a little innocent rule-breaking. Save Ferris!

X-Men (2000): I had a secret obsession when I was a kid - I LOVED Marvel Comics. I had read all of my dad’s comic book collection from when he was a kid, I started my own collection, and had even started tracking the value of each issue. But I was a girl, and did not share this particular passion with my fellow elementary school friends (ahhh, the fear of being judged by your peers). So when I entered a movie theater as a freshman in high school (with my secret still intact) to see an X-Men film and the place was PACKED, I couldn’t contain my excitement that maybe, just maybe, more people would be into these characters and storylines. Then, when I went into my summer theatre program and my friends used X-Men characters as improv inspiration, I thought...this is going mainstream! I still didn’t confide my true colors until the MCU began and my college friends discovered that I knew a...lot more about Iron Man’s backstory than should be possible and I was officially outed. So, fully embracing my nerdom, I traveled to San Diego to the sacred ground that was Comic Con, truly cementing my love of Marvel. And now the rest of the world has caught up to why these characters are so special. That first inkling of a wider world loving what I loved started when I watched X-Men in theaters - seeing my heroes on the big screen, fighting their super villains, and the packed crowd around me was digging it!

The Little Mermaid (1989): One of my earliest memories of opening presents was from my 6th birthday, sitting in the living room and ripping open the wrapping paper to discover the VHS for The Little Mermaid - a film I had seen at school and LOVED - and now it was mine to watch at any time! Truly a special Disney moment, which is also matched with many other memories of Disney animated films (the momentous opening to Lion King and the cut to black that took my breath away in the theater, playing the Mulan soundtrack on cassette over and over singing Reflection, and identifying with Belle’s obsession with reading). I was very much the target audience for the Disney Renaissance, and I ate up all the music, the (slightly) stronger portrayal of women, and our VHS collection only grew to include all of these modern classics. The Little Mermaid kicked off a golden age for Disney Animation and little Katie grew up on the Alan Menken soundtrack.

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989): Our family had three fancy VHS boxed sets for three different franchises and we watched these flicks on repeat - Star Trek movies (TOS with Kirk and Spock), the Star Wars trilogy, and the Indiana Jones films. Literally any one of the movies from these collections could make this slot, but since both of the Star franchises have already gotten love in these Top 5 lists, I’m going to pick representation from our resident archaeological professor / international adventurer. My favorite of the bunch is the third - from the thrilling opening of young Indy, to the dynamic between father and son, and the epic ending of selecting the correct Grail (“you have chosen...wisely”). Watching any one of these films is just comfort food for my soul, taking me back to the family settling in to watch in our downstairs rec room, setting the foundation for the nerdom that my parents instilled into me at a young age and that has continued to guide my interests and movie-watching to this day.

Newsies (1992): Growing up, my family had Friday movie nights, where we ordered from the Pizza Hut that was right next to a Blockbuster; my brother and I were allowed to each choose a movie to rent for the weekend. I went through a phase where I just rented Newsies on repeat. It was as though this film was made just for me - a musical, set in a historical time period, with cute boys singing and dancing, music by the magical Alan Menken - what is not to love?!? I was so obsessed with this movie that in the pre-Internet age, I wrote down the lyrics by meticulously listening, pausing, writing down, rewinding, and repeating - which was an onerous process when one was working with manual VHS tapes. I eventually got a copy of my own, the DVD when it came out, the CD of the soundtrack, and also the piano sheet music. I knew all the lines to the songs, and could probably to this day quote the majority of the movie. Years later, imagine my delight when Disney produced a Broadway musical of the movie - we took a special trip to New York on my birthday to see the show (which of course, doesn’t match up to my love for the film, the true effect of a nostalgic love for a piece of your childhood). Living in LA affords us the opportunity for magical movie-going experiences, and my husband and I scored tickets to a special showing of Newsies at the Disney El Capitan theater - and then the traveling Broadway company of Newsies the musical that was in town and performing just up the street at the Pantages theater made an appearance and performed for the audience after the movie wrapped. This film has held a special place in my heart and is the epitome of nostalgia love for a movie from childhood.

Honorable Mentions:

The Music Man (1962): The two music genres we listened to growing up were 90s country (Garth, Reba, Trisha, Wynonna!) and also musicals. Our family was very much into theater and starting at the age of twelve, I started acting in musicals at our local performing arts program for youths. Our family also watched many of the classic musicals that were filmed in the 1950s and 60s, such as Hello, Dolly, Oklahoma, and Music Man. This last film stands in as a proxy for all those classics, but was also selected in particular because I performed in a production during a summer in junior high, where I was in the background chorus (and featured in the Wells Fargo song!). The music and lyrics of this story, written by Meredith Wilson, are of such cleverness and variety - from the 4-part harmony barbershop quartet to the love song ballads, the pre-hip hop rhythmic talking song to the genius opening number of the salesmen on the train. The translation to film is serviceable and very much in the style of the musicals brought from stage to screen in the 1960s - nothing too clever and some blocking that sought to recreate a theater stage on the film set, but these series of musical films cemented my love for the genre in an accessible way just as I was starting myself to perform on stage.

Jurassic Park (1993): Oh, the raptor in the kitchen stalking the two kids stills brings me chills thinking about it. Watching that scene as a kid, I (more than once) fled the room because it was so scary! This film had it all - creepy dinosaurs, a smart teenage girl and an even smarter heroine that was a scientist, great music (whose theme I diligently learned how to play on the piano), and plenty of action! My family definitely had this on repeat in the VHS player, but I loved the movie so much that I ended up reading Michael Crichton’s novel to experience the source material - and became more aware of how a film is an adaption of a novel’s storytelling, translating from the page to the screen. I do fall in favor of reading the novel before seeing the movie, but if a film helps you discover an incredible book, it can be like diving into an extension of the world beyond what the screen can fit.

[dxmagedrose]

GET TO KNOW THE BLOGGER!

Tagged by: my lover @hammurabicomplex​ I’m tagging: anyone and everyone who wants to pick this one up! share with the class if you feel like it! tag me in it!!

PRESENTING. RANDOM DEEP DIVE WITH INDIGO-MUN AT 2AM ;

FIRST NAME Good fucking question… It’s (sort-of) currently Dylann! I was Kieran before that, though; it’s still used as one of my first names and I’m not used to Dylann quite yet bc I’ve just started using it. 

Indigo is one of my middle names though, and I’ve used it as an online handle elsewhere forever so I use it here now!  [ Fun etymology facts: Dylan(n) is a mythology name generally meaning “born of the wave” (aspiring diver & a water witch at heart). Kieran means “little dark one” bc of my love for horror, && I chose Indigo bc as a kid to be it was neither boy (blue) or purple (girl) and was both and neither as well as my absolute favorite color as this vibrant ass mystical color. ]

STRANGE FACT ABOUT YOURSELF hmmmmm…. I’m a horror lover at heart, so as a child (I wanna say 12), I was walking through an antique store (I have a few cool finds, I considered putting my other one as the fact tbh) and I turned the corner and I saw these two dolls staring back at me at the foot of the stairs of this antique building. my blood froze, and i felt my stomach drop. i got actual, physical goosebumps stumbling across these two creepy dolls staring back at me in the corner, and i couldn’t leave the store without them. perhaps the little painted porcelain boy would be somewhat spooky by himself if it wasn’t for the terrifying lidded gaze of the porcelain girl with the hairline fractures and slightly open lips. i cant look at her. i dont really find dolls scary, I like to find the spookier ones ones, and she makes me paranoid as hell. i keep her face covered and her up in my closet except for when i bring her out to show her off proudly as the spookiest thing I have but……. i dont really collect dolls anymore.  even thinking about her brings a fearful tear to my eye.  i don’t like to think about her for very long, but that’s why I’m so fucking proud to own her. ( YES — I’m THAT white person in the horror film )

TOP THREE PHYSICAL THINGS YOU FIND ATTRACTIVE ON A PERSON hhhhh a beardy jawline, high cheekbones, crooked canine teeth >:3c

A FOOD YOU COULD EAT FOREVER AND NOT GET BORED OF b.l.t.’s with avocado. ahhhh. my mouth is watering just thinking about it, oh my god. just a bit of salt and pepper???

A FOOD YOU HATE barbecue anything, i hate the taste of bbq sauce, you keep your nasty black goo to yourselves at the grill. twice in my life i have presented with barbecue pizza and both times i cried literal tears. why would you do such a horrible thing to a person? what kind of a monster are you? how do you sleep at night?!

GUILTY PLEASURE the sims. constantly. always. i’ve sunk thousands of hours into my households. oh also uhhhhhh i run two 80s horror blogs, one being a shitpost blog with occasional art of mine and one gremlin fanfic ship blog for horrible, terrible self indulgent fanfics i’ll get the courage to finish writing & post so i can be cancelled on tumblr for at some point. NO, i won’t link them. as i pretend they’re even all that hard to find, within a day i was found on both by someone i admire here a lot :’) ilu bby thnk u eternally for supporting ur local horrifying dumbass wtf

WHAT DO YOU SLEEP IN the same clothes i’ve been wearing all day usually, my sweats & long sleeve raglans or my hoodies. i like being cozy day & and out. and ugh. efoort. just throw me in a blanket in a cool room and im out.

SERIOUS RELATIONSHIPS OR FLINGS serious relationships with some openness or poly. i wish i could fling! just not exactly easy for demisexual autistics lmao.

IF YOU COULD GO BACK IN THE PAST AND CHANGE ONE THING ABOUT YOUR LIFE, WOULD YOU AND WHAT WOULD IT BE I think I would be adopted by my grandma as a kid. It would save me some trauma but mostly I think it would get my autism diagnosed way earlier and save me angsting all these years of wondering why & thinking it’s my fault I’m struggling so much and so loud and affectionate and different in a world that i didnt fit in the same way. 

ARE YOU AN AFFECTIONATE PERSON when i get drunk i text people how much they mean to me in my life. does that answer your question? ahhh. i’m sometimes a cuddle monster with friends, i message people with long texts about how much they mean to me, but I sometimes really don’t like to be touched at all. 

A MOVIE YOU COULD WATCH OVER AND OVER AGAIN FLYPAPER.  F L Y P A P E R.  FLYPAPER.  FLY, and, I can’t stress this enough, fucking PAPER. ( Though also Whole Nine Yards and both Re-Animator & Bride ). I have watched Flypaper already like, 5 times this week and I’m still not done, and the other movies have been on repeat for days in this household within the last year. In the past it has also been Donnie Darko & the new Nightmare on Elm Street.  roast me.

FAVORITE BOOK White Fang by Jack London. Have I actually ever finished it? No. Do I still own a copy I’ve had since childhood thru multiple dogs eating it, taking it to and from school, and highlighting and circling all the best parts of chapter one ever since I was a kid and it was too hard of a book for me to read? You bet your ass. If I ever need inspiration I just reread chapter 1. Although one of my other favorites was Broken Monsters by Lauren Beukes. But White Fang is like, a weirdly personal text. We stan London’s writing in this household.

YOU HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO KEEP ANY ANIMAL AS A PET, WHAT DO YOU CHOOSE FENNEC FOX!! I used to daydream about having my own named Shiloh when I was a lil kid. they’re adorable little things and i am obsessed. i mean, gimme any fox and im happy, marble foxes, red foxes… but I was obsessed with fennec foxes. Also tbh ferrets. I want a ferret.

TOP FIVE FICTIONAL SHIPS [IF YOU ARE AN RP BLOG, YOU CAN USE YOUR OWN SHIPS AS WELL] Rosa & @ninetyscnds‘s Luke, Rosa & @iimpulsivity is already screaming my name, Rosa & Constantine, Jesse & Andrea from Breaking Bad, and the joker and harley of 80s sci-fi Dan & Herbert from Re-Ani.  I am but a simple opossum. 

PIE OR CAKE Pie! I’ll take both pumpkin & melty apple over cake. also, cheesecake is more pie than cake soooo, pie wins.

FAVORITE SCENT my dogs / my blanket. :’)  It’s the most grounding smell in the world. 

CELEBRITY CRUSH oliver jackson-cohen, i’m fucking GAY and im angry about it. there i was, minding my own business, and i saw that asshole in a certain SHIRTLESS GIF and it AWOKE SOMETHING IN ME. dont talk to me about it, holy shit im obsessed with beardy men now god fuckkdafjaask i hate him why did he make me this gay i was perfectly fine being into girls but NOOOOOO him and his dumb hairy chest and sweet rugged face and I——  I also am obsessed with the archaeologist & television personality Josh Gates and may or may not be considering making a fan blog for him bc idk if my anthropology docuseries host is Dad or Daddy but i love him lots

IF YOU COULD TRAVEL ANYWHERE, WHERE WOULD YOU GO I would go on a dive with anthropologists and archaeologists doing fieldwork research in the ancient cenotes of the Yucatán Peninsula. My actual dream job, catch me crying & fantasizing about being underwater documenting Mayan skulls given as offerings. Fuckkkk, I love anthropology so much!!  take me anywhere in the world to immerse myself into culture & archaeology.

INTROVERT OR EXTROVERT Introvert. I have a real life friend I see roughly once a month, and that’s it. Plenty of online relationships, I’m chatty, message me all day every day. but i dont do people well.

DO YOU SCARE EASILY I used to! Really bad. I don’t as much anymore. I do get paranoia a lot still. Having therapists telling you that the FBI could be outside your house watching you through your windows will kind of nervous. ( no google results for: yes hello fbi i am a writer please dont put me on watchlists i just have research i need to do for this idea im working on, would you like to try again? ) I have nightmares nightly but not they never make me afraid, they just make me feel like crap. jumpscares and loud noises and seeing people reaching into their pockets dont set off as many brain alarms anymore tho!! progress haha.

IPHONE OR ANDROID I like my android better bc of capabilities but meh

DO YOU PLAY ANY VIDEO GAMES My mom, her husband & I play COD for family game night, and Silent Hill is my life’s blood. I’ve sunken hours into Sims & Skyrim, and Norman Jayden from Heavy Rain is my #1 fictional character in existence, why do i love the druggie babies

DREAM JOB Oh… You’re asking me to pick? I’d love to be an anthropologist doing work out in the field. Underwater archaeology is peak, but I’m also heavily considering being a body recovery diver or police diver. I’d love to see myself in uniform someday, if possible. Just the thought makes me teary eyed & proud.

WHAT WOULD YOU DO WITH A MILLION DOLLARS fund my person creative & educational endeavors. get myself a spooky ass abandoned house to make my own home to create in, and travel to the world’s best dive sites. just live a mild life of education, creation & exploration. that’s the dream TM.

FICTIONAL CHARACTER YOU HATE dr. hill is a gross and whiny lil bitch this post brought to u by the miskatonic crew, how is everyone here an even worse bad guy than herbert west precious dan excluded talk shit get hit tho john winchester from spn and both walter white & todd from breaking bad are all in my crew of hated characters. i jusT…   the reani novel is difficult to read because i have to deal with this old sack of shit.

FANDOM THAT YOU WERE ONCE A PART OF BUT AREN’T ANY LONGER Supernatural :-)

… AND THIS CONCLUDES A DEEP DIVE WITH INDIGO!! //

[thebackroadtourist]

How Do You Say Ljubljana?

Ahhh the city of Ljubljana. (lube-lee-aun-a). The land of mystical dragons, beautiful hills and delicious potica. I chose this destination before I learned how to pronounce it. Why? Because curiosity hasn’t killed me yet! Where the hell is Ljubljana? In the country of Slovenia, of course! Not Slovakia. Not Scandinavia. Slovenia. Formerly part of Yugoslavia along with Serbia, Croatia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Albania. With Slovenia’s population just a quarter of New York City it boosts a rich history filled with castles and World War II bombs sunken beneath the surface….seriously. There’s a story of a man who found a large bomb in his backyard with a metal detector. Slovenia borders Eastern Italy and is just a hop and a skip from Venice, though a place where most tourists don’t consider going. To make matters more interesting for myself I decided to spend two weeks here with a host family…from the internet. www.workaway.info, a site I used in Central America where I spent two weeks living in a small wooden yoga hut with three foreigners and a lot of creepy crawly’s. That story is for another day.

“This could go one of two ways” I thought to myself as I exited the bus and walked into the McDonalds down the street, the meeting place where I would meet my host family for the next two weeks. The mother and her 11 year old daughter waved enthusiastically at me as I scanned the circumference of the fast-food joint, noticing how pretty the working women were behind the counter. My first impression of Ljubljana was “Damn it’s hot.” I was greeted by a scorching 41 degrees celsius, global warming was saying hello to the land of Melania Trump (not joking, she’s from this town).

I was greeted by the broad chested father upon pulling into the dirt driveway located 30 minutes outside Ljubljana’s city center in an agricultural development surrounded by green hills and the faint smell of cow manure. The father, a banker, was big dude - standing 6′6″ weighing in around 220 lbs a former truck driver in the Yugoslavian army in the early 1990′s. Intimidated at first I learned quickly that love and laughter was his default state. His goofy, silly outlook on life and his gift of telling jokes and poking fun at those around him lit the room and made me feel at ease. The caring and animated mother, the blonde-hair and olive oil skinned daughter and the 15 year old amatuer kayaker son took me in as one of their own; a warm welcoming that felt as if I truly belonged there. They fed me delicious home-made bio-dynamic food which often consisted of a meat and a starch; they took me hiking, swimming, kayaking and showed me historical sites and look-out points with stunning views of the countryside. We drank local beer, picked blackberries from their yard each day and stayed up late on their patio to talk - just talk, about anything and everything. They grilled me with questions on the social-political state of America and shared their insights and cultural knowledge on Slovenia and Central Europe as a whole, educating me on things I never knew existed. Their curiosity for my points of view was impressive to me considering Slovenia is a bubble consisting of mostly all white people in one of the safest towns in Europe.

Speaking of living in a bubble. Let me tell you first and foremost - Slovenia is LIT. Free healthcare for all. Free college tuition for all (#debtwho?). Where 33 days of paid vacation is the norm and where nobody works past 40 hours a week. Slovenia is the #1 country in all of Europe to be a child - which was proven by the daughter’s math skills and her fluency in Slovene, French, and English. Slovenia is also the greenest and most environmentally conscious country in the continent. Slovenia - WHAT! I was blown away. So much so that I think I subconsciously had to see for myself. In other words, I was struck by a nasty virus half way through my stay. I think the excess accumulation of sugar, alcohol, dairy and gluten (4 things I rarely consume in the States) had caught up to me, plus having previously been in Spain and Italy where gelato and pasta made up 80% of my daily consumption. *watch for my next blog post about eating foreign foods* By the second day of my sickness the mother became concerned with the pain in my ears so she took me in to see a doctor. What I experienced was something quite unfamiliar: immediate attention, no waiting lines, personal care plus an on-the-spot blood analysis including a full physical, pathological and nuerological examination. 1 hour later I was out of there with my diagnosis and a peace-of-mind. And guess how much I paid. 18 Euros. That’s right, 18. For something that would have cost $150 in the States.

I also got the dentist experience. I had lost my night denture in Barcelona weeks prior so I needed something to protect my teeth against my fierce nighttime grinding. I was just as impressed with the dentist as I had been with the doctor: greeted by warm smiles, immediate care, no waiting lines, and get this….they gave me a second night guard for FREE. Two for the price of one. And the price of 1 was about $100 less than what I would have paid in the states.

The parent’s worked during the day and the older brother had daily kayak practice so each day I hung with the daughter. The parent’s didn’t even vet me - leaving me alone with their daughter in their house less than 24 hours after meeting me in person. Each day was a different activity, funded by her parents. One day we walked to the bus stop and journeyed to the pool, the next day we took the bus to the city center and ate lunch at a local food fair, the next was an indoor waterpark. We even went to an escape room. Other days we stayed in the house and sheltered ourselves from the heat while keeping busy with Yugoslavian monopoly, chess, bridge rummy canasta and tarocks (a confusing German card game). We instantly bonded as if we’d known each other for years. By the end of my stay we had our own inside jokes and even our own dialect. Everything was so easy with this family. They put their full trust in me and treated me as their son. They served me first at the dinner table and covered every meal we ate out with no exceptions. Did I mention the food here? They took me to the best spots, the hole in the wall places that food network lovers would obsess over. My first night there we went to a pizza joint in their local village where the waitress taught me how to say thank-you “Hvala” and please “”Prosim”. Another night was an authentic Serbian spot outside of town unreachable by tourists. The owner was a friend of the family, we took shots of “Qunice” an alcohol that’s apparently illegal in Slovenia, and ate our weight in Serbian bread and sausage. We woke up early one Saturday to eat pogača, a traditional buckwheat pizza with smoked ham. They also fed me the finest of sweets: kremšnita, flancat, apple strudel, potica and pumpkin oil ice cream all traditional in Slovenia.

I often thought of the slogan “Pura Vida” used in Costa Rica, a place I’ve explored twice and love dearly. I can say with confidence that Slovenia can also have that same slogan. Besides, Slovenia has the word “love” in it’s name. From the amount of play and laughter the family shared on a daily basis, to the pesticide-free food, to the local villagers up in the Kranska Gora mountains who cooked us a traditional Slovene meal of buckwheat polenta topped with pork fat, sour milk from their cows and pine-butt water from their trees. It was a magical place, as the father and I scaled up the rocks to the reach a gorgeous waterfall as I drank the crystal clean water from it’s stream. From the beautiful lake of Bled where we swam with the fish to the kayaking trip down the warm transparent stream of a Balkan lake.

To conclude, Slovenia has it all - the scenery, the people, and the food. If you come here do not skip out of what nature has to offer. And bring your own vegetables ;)