Once upon a 9 hour Serbian bus ride, Alyssa, Lindsay, Cassidy, AnnaKate, Allison, Bethany, Cassandra, and Team Kairos rode from Belgrade, Serbia to Podgorica, Montenegro. With no clue what the future held. We had but little water and full bladders. We could not afford the 50,000 dinar to use the bathroom or the 120,000 dinar for a bottle of water. We smelled of 48 hours of planes, buses, and scratchy Hawkthorne antiperspirant.
We had but 3 hours left of a bumpy windy road of inclines and declines. Alyssa felt the heat ensue her proceeding an energy drink called Guarana that her new Serbian friend Petzke gave her. The can was inscribed with “NO SLEEP NO SLEEP NO SLEEP NO SLEEP.” We believe her acceptance of the many gifts from Petzke may have been agreement to a marriage proposal. Petzke spoke zero English. Alyssa was forced to sit next to the stranger when the rest of the teammates were paired off in the other seats. All of our broken English Serbian hand motion conversations came to a halt when Alyssa asks the Serbian man sitting to her left, Markos, “do you speak English?” He said “yes.” We laughed so hard. She said, “so you mean to tell me you’ve been watching us struggle to talk for hours?” We all cracked up. He’d heard our Gilligan’s Island conversations, climax or kleenex or foxy? The language barrier was hysterical. Markos said, “he thinks you’re nuns..” (Hence our new Team Nani hashtag #naninuns). We died laughing again. Alyssa said in her Wisconsin accent, “close enough!” “We signed a contract. we’re not allowed to date.”
We Will Rock You came on the radio and alas we were reminded of home.
We don’t know if it was the Guarana “NO SLEEP” drink, Petzke’s alcohol breath from the shots he took at the rest stop, the bus heater blasting on high, or 48 hours of traveling, but Alyssa got carsick. She grabbed a bag and sat in the stairwell of the bus puking until someone turned on the lights. All we heard was a gasp. She was left a deer in headlights. She went back to her seat and we crossed the border in to Montenegro.
Thus begins part one of our European journey to Podgorica.
Markos turned out to be a 20something musician. He makes house music and travels between Serbia and Montenegro to play shows. He was obviously embarrassed by us, yet entertained at the same time. We were like the embarrassing little sisters he never had. I’m pretty sure if he saw us in public today, he’d duck and run. Funnily enough, we’ve met two other DJ’s that know him this week.
Petzke was in his 50’s and turned out to be a police officer who recently retired. He showed us his badge. That was the joke of the day.
