Slovenia / Croatia

[Sylar_pf]

If you ever pass through Ljubljana next year, let me know. ^^

Ljubljana? :O

[Vesca]

It sounds more like lub-lyana. Although it is funny pronouncing it "lajub-lajonna" to the locals and seeing them facepalm. ^^

[Sylar_pf]

Pitam zato sto sam iz Zagreba

[Vesca]

Woohoo! I'm actually not fluent in Slovene yet. My husband is Slovene, lived there for a bit and moving back in a few months. Even though the job market is pretty desperate right now.

[Sylar_pf]

Well it's no better in Croatia :/
It's actually much worse. Where are you from originally?

[Vesca]

Figured it's better to create a new thread rather than hijack Adrasta's vacation thread. ^^

I would have thought Croatia would be better, with the tourism and the beaches and Dubrovnik and all that fun stuff?

I was born in the US, moved to the UK when I was 18, moved to Slovenia at 21, moved back to the US a bit later. It's been a hectic decade.

[Sylar_pf]

Yeah well I was to excited to thing about hijacking

Well at least you're not stuck at one place
How did your parents take the moving?

About Croatia. Tourism is probably the only good thing in our economy. Pretty much everything else sucks. Corruption killed all the potential we had. The sad part is that it's probably too late to make things better.
If you look geographically we have everything-mountains, sea, vallies... But people destroyed the potential. The outter debt is too big for us to make any progress.
Sure there are some positive examples but in my opinion not enough.
Maybe I'm wrong (I hope I am)

[Vesca]

Eh, I've always traveled alone.

I've heard the same thing about Slovenia too. Too many corrupt politicians, too many taxes not going where they ought to, and not enough jobs to go around. I won't lie, it's a scary move. ^^

[Sylar_pf]

How do you like the people? Is is much different than US?

[Vesca]

It is different from the US, but I'd say it's more similar to the US than the UK is to the US (if that makes sense). The thing is that the US is so diverse because of how expansive it is that I can only really speak to the region I've lived in. There are no mountains or sea where I live in the US though, so there's that...

Culture wise what strikes me the most is how family-oriented the people I've met in Slovenia are. Much more interested in taking care of their family, providing a home, good food, and living life (vacations, barbecues, etc...) than on trying to "get ahead" on the financial ladder. Although that may be not in small part due to the economy and job prospects in Slovenia, because "getting ahead" isn't really a thing no matter how smart or skilled you are.

I guess it's just a simpler, more straight-forward way of being and that's really what I'm looking for. Of course, I can only really compare it to my own personal experiences in other countries too and it may not be what other people who live in the US would think. ^^

[Sylar_pf]

Sorry I had a lot on my mind so I didn't come to the forum for a while.

I think we (our region) is more family oriented than the rest but that's also slowpy changing. People are having kids later in life in their 30s because it's hard to start a family here if you dont have a good financial foundation. Lots of young people are living with their parents till their 30s which is really sad and disturbing. Also a lot of people are moving to other countries such as Germay,Ireland and Canada.

We are a sad nation :/

[Vesca]

Aww. So what keeps you there, if I may ask?

[Sylar_pf]

I don't have a degree yet and I can't go out in the world with just highschool.
I don't wanna leave but I will have to.
I want to stay because of the way of living. We know how to enjoy life, how to enjoy food and drinks,spend a good time with friends. Hedonists
I love our nature our water, forests and landscape.

I don't like the politics and how certain people ruined every bit of potential.

People here are generous, would help you in a heartbeat. When we need to we unite like no other nation, but also there is big sadness that connect us the most.

[Vesca]

That's about what I hear from Slovenians too.

Does that mean you're in college now? What are you studying? ^^

[Sylar_pf]

I'm in law school
How about you, what are you doing currently?