My Balkan Holiday: Crna Gora Edition
Recollections of a trip more than two decades ago in a very different Montenegro
In 2002, I backpacked through former Yugoslavia for 3 weeks. It wasn’t so long after the war and many things were different than they are today. (Some are the same.) I was also different. (And somewhat the same.) In any event, I wrote quite a lot about it, but the only bit that was ever published concentrated on my time in Sarajevo. Here it is. What follows was written long ago…
Headbangers and Pool Sharks
We were still inside Croatia when the bus came to a stop. I looked around confused as everyone, together with their gear, made to disembark; packs, sacks, and suitcases pulled out of the underbelly and thrown into line. I grabbed my baggage and followed the rest of the travelers about a hundred yards down a hill to where the Croatian border guards had set up shop. They took my passport, seemingly bitter about my decision to leave their country in favor of Montenegro, and stamped it roughly before handing it back.
There was another walk through a sort of buffer zone composed of prefab buildings and trailers. Shady men milled in the doorways, unmarked, unable to be officially identified. Walking further still, old women tottering under multiple suitcases, up to a table set in the middle of the street. There was a sign taped to the front that said, in a bubbly multicolored font, “Welcome to Montenegro!”