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What's up everybody? Welcome back to the All Things Croatia podcast. I'm your host,
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Stanko Zovak, and I'm bringing you the best of Croatia from around the globe.
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This episode is brought to you by Adriatic Tours, the best place since 1974 to book
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information, go to www.adriatictours.com or click the link in the description. Now,
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eat a modalia and let's get started. Alright, welcome back to the podcast everybody. Today
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we have a special guest, Alex Schmidt. Alex is an American with Croatian heritage from
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Minnesota who decided to study abroad in Croatia back in 2015 and eventually moved back to Dubrovnik
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permanently in 2017. Along with working remotely as a digital marketing strategist,
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she also has a travel blog called the Mindful Mermaid where she talks about mindful and
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responsible travel tips, specifically in Croatia. Her and her fiance also launched Mindful Travel
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Croatia to help travelers escape the crowds and discover authentic Croatia. In this episode,
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we're going to learn about her decision to move to Croatia and some of her best travel advice.
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Alex, thanks for coming on the podcast. Yeah, thanks so much for having me. I'm super excited
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to be here. Yeah, we're just talking about how my power is going out. So I appreciate you working
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through that with me. I've had that happen to me on a couple of Zoom calls with clients from the
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US and I'm just like, yep, I don't know, they decided they're doing some work today. They're
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turning out the power. I just found out that's kind of how it goes here sometimes. Well, yeah,
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we're not too far away. I'm in Makarska right now. You're over in Dubrovnik. Yep. But originally,
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you're from Minnesota, from the US. You know, talk a little about your background. You know,
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you have Croatian heritage. You know, talk a little bit about that. Yeah. Yeah. So I grew up
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in the Twin Cities of Minnesota. My great grandparents were Croatian. So my grandpa was
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100%. And that makes me like a quarter, you know, us Americans always talking percentages. But my
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grandpa was always still quite connected to his heritage. He grew up in Chicago and grew up in a
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neighborhood where it was a lot of, you know, people from the Balkan region and, you know,
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Croatian roots. So he grew up and he, you know, was using phrases here and there. And like,
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I would just hear his stories about his family. And then my family that lives in Chicago, they're
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still, you know, Croatian pride somewhat. But yeah, I didn't really reconnect to my Croatian
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heritage until college. So I grew up in the Twin Cities. And then I went to Chicago for college,
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Loyola University. And through meeting a little bit more of my extended relatives and saw that
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there was a really big Croatian population there. I was kind of becoming more intrigued with the
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idea of potentially going back to visit. So I had found a study abroad program. I was studying
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political science. And it was a study abroad program in Dubrovnik with diplomacy and international
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business for a semester. So yeah, I kind of decided to come for a semester and had a really good
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time. Met my now fiancee in school. And at the time, I wasn't thinking it was going to be this big
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thing that I would end up moving back here. But I eventually did. And kind of through me, actually,
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like my mom has now become more interested in our heritage. And even my grandpa, like he, you know,
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pulled out all of these old documents about like where his family's from. And my mom and I actually
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went and like met distant relatives that are like, I don't know, or like third or fourth cousins or
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something around Rieka. So it's kind of interesting that like generations later, I came and rediscovered
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my heritage. And it's also kind of inspired my whole family to reconnect some way as well.
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Yeah, that's very cool. And is your mom now out here as well? Or back in Chicago?
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No, she's back in the Twin Cities of Minnesota, but she comes and visits quite a bit. She actually
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got remarried and had her wedding here in 2017. So she really loves it here. I think eventually,
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her and my stepdad will probably end up being here for part of the year as well. So,
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and of course, when she got married here, like all of our family came and some of our
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distant relatives that we hadn't talked to for so long, but had reconnected through creation
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heritage. So yeah, it's been kind of cool. Like it all started with me coming here to study abroad,
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and it's kind of expanded beyond just me. It's like now my whole family is reconnecting to roots.
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Yeah, it's pretty cool. You got the whole family involved now. Yeah. You said,
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um, actually, my little sister is also going to Loyola, Chicago right now and studying political
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science there. Wow. So maybe I'll have to connect. Yeah, small world after connect you guys maybe,
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and you can give her some tips on being over there and the Croatian community over there. I
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know she's been trying to, you know, I guess there's two churches in the area. She's been trying to,
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you know, get involved a little bit over there. So yeah, definitely, I can connect with her. Although
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I went a totally different route than than political science. I'm not doing any politics here in
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Croatia. But I originally was like pre law. My mom is a criminal defense lawyer, and it was kind of
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the thought that I would go that route as well. So I was like really trying to get the best grades
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and get into a good law school. But it was really kind of my semester abroad here that solidified,
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okay, I don't think I'm going to do law school for right now. I really want to do something a
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little bit more creative and travel. And then now I do digital marketing and working tourism. But
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funny how life kind of turns out. I wouldn't have imagined myself here 10 years ago. Yeah.
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Yeah, even for me, the same way even two years ago, I would have said, wow, you know, I'm living in
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Croatia and I'll be living in Croatia in two years. It's kind of crazy. So when you studied abroad
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in Dubrovnik, had you ever, was that your first time in Croatia? That was my first time. I literally
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didn't know anyone. I know this sounds maybe cheesy, but I just felt like I had this really strong
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pull to come back here. I was actually considering either a program here in Dubrovnik or Prague.
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But I was like, no, like I just feel like I should go to Croatia. And yeah, I came here and it just
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felt very like serendipitous. Like I kind of just felt like I was coming home for the first time.
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Like I had been here before. And yeah, it's kind of interesting how it worked out that way. I mean,
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it sounds like crazy. Like I didn't know anyone. I wasn't even going with a friend. And it was also
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kind of like not a well known program in my university. So I had to even like petition them to
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you know, give me the college credit. So I really worked hard and saved up, you know, money to come
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here. And little did I know that it would be kind of the catalyst for this whole new life.
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What was that experience like for you when you when you finally came?
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I loved it. Yeah, it was it was like 20 of us Americans here. And then we were in a local
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school here called Libertas. So we were like mixed with creations as well. And I liked that
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aspect of it. So we weren't you know, just with all like Americans. And it was great, like,
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since it's a small school in general, we all kind of got to know each other quite well. And
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that's how I ended up meeting Domenico, my now fiance. And you know, we came at the beginning
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of the year. So we came at the end of January early February. And we had like the entire old
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town to ourself, there was like two, three bars open. So it was just kind of like we had this,
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you know, UNESCO World, you know, protected heritage site as our is our backyard. And
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yeah, it was it was a really great experience. Was that a big transition from January into
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sort of the start of the summer? We'd be like, wow, such a quiet town. And, you know,
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yeah, over here. Yeah, I mean, back then it was still quite busy. It's gotten that was 2015.
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It's gotten way busier since. But yeah, it was quite a transition. I feel like that's also why
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I have like a soft spot for the winter and the off season here, why I'm telling people, you know,
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you should consider coming here when it's not summer. Obviously, winter is not for everyone,
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because some people want to come here and, you know, have access to all the places. But I've
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talked to a lot of people that are like, I want to see the sites when no one else is here. And
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that's like the perfect time to come. Because it's it's really surreal to be like walking through the
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old town and really the only, you know, tourists there is maybe a couple here and there, but then
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it's just kids playing football or soccer, like on the Stratun, you know, so that's really magical.
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Yeah, it's definitely something different to see sort of the the local life rather than, you know,
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the life with the tourists. For sure. But in my opinion, I mean, both you should
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see both, you know, at some point, just so you're able to get both those experiences and compare them.
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Absolutely. Well, Alex, tell me a little about what happened after, you know, your study abroad
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ended, you go back to the States, how did you end up moving back to Croatia after that?
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Yeah, so that really wasn't my plan. So I was a junior when I studied abroad, I went back my
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senior year and, you know, finish up school, I was working, kind of living the typical like city life.
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And I had thought I would stay on a little bit longer. But I was just really burned out after
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my senior year and I was doing long distance. So after I graduated, my present from my mom was
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a one way ticket back to Croatia. So I went back and I was here for the summer. During that time,
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I launched my travel blog, the Mindful Mermaid. And I pretty much started it as more of like a
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hobby blog of just talking about, you know, my life, or my summer rather, like being in Croatia
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and travels around Europe. Yeah, and then it kind of just turned into my blog picked up a little bit
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more publicity, I guess, because I wrote a couple of like experiences, my first creation wedding
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experience, like what it's like living in the Croatian village. And it got picked up in like
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a couple of local newspapers and translated to Croatian. So it started to gating more momentum.
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I started writing some like cultural columns and a newspaper here, an English speaking newspaper.
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So yeah, that's when I first started that. But unfortunately, this was back in 2016, there
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wasn't as many foreigners here in Dubrovnik that were my age, first of all. And second of all,
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I could not figure out the job situation. So Domenico and I actually moved to Ireland for one
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year. And I worked in we lived in Cork and I worked as an international study abroad advisor.
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And that was really good experience. Now, when I was there, I was actually like running a summer
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study abroad program. And during that time, there was a lot of like group organization where I was
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like organizing like outings for them and group tours and all that. That kind of planted some
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seeds where I was like, Hey, you know, I could be doing this in Croatia, which is which spoilers
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what I am doing now. But also during that time, I was really building my blog and turning it more
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from a hobby blog to kind of like monetizing it a little bit more, I kind of shifted away from just
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like Croatian culture, you know, pieces where I was talking about living here where it was just
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more general travel guides and focusing on like the mindful and responsible travel aspect. So
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yeah, as my year in Croatia in Ireland started to come to an end, I really just wanted to experiment
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with coming back to Croatia, seeing if I could build out my travel blog and monetize it. I was
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also doing some freelance stuff, digital marketing. So I thought, okay, maybe I could do that full
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time to support myself. So I ended up leaving Ireland and you know, it was difficult at first,
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but I was able to build my blog to monetize it through ads, affiliate links, all that was also
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freelancing. And then within about a year and a half, we started getting a lot of inquiries,
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mainly through my blog. People were asking about you know, how to travel to Croatia and all that.
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So I started doing a little bit more travel stuff as well. We organized a couple group tours.
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This was in 2019 couple group tours, a destination wedding, started doing more like custom itineraries
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and stuff and then launched our travel business, Mindful Travel Croatia, which is you know, kind of
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a branch off of the Mindful Mermaid. Yeah, and then we also had an opportunity to build our
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apartment and build a second one that we would rent out. So it all just kind of came together
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like that, but it's definitely not been all sunshine and rainbows. It's been a lot of hard
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work and I feel like when I first came here, I saw so much potential in building a life here.
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And it just has taken some time to finally get that all together. And especially with the pandemic,
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too, it was like for two years, two plus years, kind of having to just be patient for things to
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go back to normal. And luckily now it's been quite busy with tourism and they would have
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made this summer that starting to see yeah, the light at the end of the tunnel and all the
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seeds that I planted kind of coming and blooming. So I wanted to go in a little more detail about
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you know, living here because you know, back in the US, we talk a lot about the American dream.
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Right. Can you sort of compare and contrast that to now your experience here living in Croatia?
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I mean, is there similarities? Is it completely different? I think it's completely different.
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And that's honestly something that I have struggled with somewhat. I think you know,
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the American dream is really that you know, if there's like a if there's a will, there's a way
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whether or not that's true, but that just that you can build yourself up and it's all about
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a lot of it is very focused on like the career sense. And I think that growing up in the US,
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I kind of really attached my own personal identity with my career and you know, how much money I was
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making. Whereas in Croatia, I mean, yeah, people do work hard and people have careers and all that,
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but there's just not so much of an emphasis on that being like your entire personality.
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I have friends where it's like, it wasn't until the third or fourth time we were hanging out that
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I even found out what they do. That's just not people's entire, you know, conversation and their
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entire identity. So I think that the Croatian dream is a little bit more relaxed and having
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more of a work life balance. It's not about having absolutely everything, it's just having
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enough to be comfortable. Whereas I think in the US, it's like, you know, it's just kind of sometimes
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an emphasis on like infinite growth, infinite, like always, you know, looking for the next best thing.
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And in Croatia, I think it's about kind of just appreciating what you have and you don't need
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to have everything as long as you, you know, have enough and you're happy and that your identity is
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not just based on what you do for work. Yeah, I agree. But are those sort of differences something
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that you, you know, you're on board with here in Croatia or do you miss some of those so-called
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American ideals or, I mean, are you really accustomed now to the Croatian lifestyle?
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Yeah, I would say for the most part I am. I mean, I think subconscious, no, and subconsciously,
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I definitely still have some things about the US that it's like, it's been really hard for me to
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kind of change. But I 100% think that Croatia has a way more healthy approach to lifestyle. And I do
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think that the Croatian dream is, is healthier in a lot of ways than the American dream and to not be
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just so focused on like having your entire identity around what you do for a living.
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Yeah, that's definitely, I think, a big difference between here and over there.
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You know, while you were living in Dubrovnik during the study abroad,
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you know, did you sort of have any expectations about, you know, if you were thinking back then,
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oh, I could see myself living here. I don't know, did you, did you have any sort of expectations
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about living in Croatia, that when you actually came here and lived here, you know, it sort of
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changed your perspective or you thought, wow, that's not how I was expecting?
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Yeah. To be honest, when I studied abroad here, I mean, it was great, it was so magical, but it was
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very different than actually living here. So I did have a bit of a shock when I went from, you know,
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I was living in around the old town, in my own apartment, or had a couple of roommates,
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to then living in like the Croatian village with my boyfriend at the time, now a fiance,
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and his family. I was like, I mean, I literally came from like living in Chicago to living in
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this smaller, and I'm like, what did I sign up for? No, I mean, I've learned to appreciate it,
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but it was still very different. And I definitely think I was a little naive in some ways,
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but it would be so easy for me to like find a job when I first came here. It came back here,
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and then, you know, we left for Ireland, but it's gotten a lot better. I personally, I don't work
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now for a Croatian company, I work for myself, but I know I have other, you know, friends that
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are living here that are expats and stuff, and they're now working for a Croatian company,
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or they're working remotely for a company from Zagreb, like there's a lot more opportunities
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especially since things have gone remote. That has opened a lot of doors, but back in 2016,
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it was, and especially here in Dubrovnik, yeah, there was a lot more limited options.
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Yeah, well, it's definitely easier to work remotely now for sure. And I know with the digital nomad
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visas, I mean, a lot of people are coming to Croatia and, you know, living here and then working
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remotely for, you know, companies in other countries as well. So that's something that's
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gotten easier over the years. Right. Well, and I remember when I came back in 2017, and people
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were like, what do you do for work? And I'm like, well, I have my blog and I'm, you know, freelancing
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for a couple of companies out of the US, and they're like, what? Like, I don't get it. Like, I was like,
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one of the first digital nomads here in Dubrovnik, and like local people did not understand it.
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And now it's become more normalized where there's more digital nomads and stuff coming.
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But yeah, it's kind of interesting because it's like working remotely in creation culture is not
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really as much of a thing because they're so like community based, which I love. But it was really
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only that period of time in the pandemic that a lot of people were working remotely. A lot of
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people, it's like they, you know, they want everyone in the office to kind of meet each other. But
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yeah, I think that's kind of interesting that a lot of digital nomads are coming here. But I wouldn't
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say it's that common for creations to be like working remotely. I don't know. Yeah, I think that's
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still, I mean, one of the aspects of sort of working and maybe also with the technological
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infrastructure here. I mean, that's still, of course, compared to the US a little behind.
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You mentioned Alex, the Mindful Mermaid, you know, you're sort of your blog and, you know,
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you're also running a travel, I don't know if I can call it travel agency or a travel agency.
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What sort of content are you posting specifically on Mindful Mermaid and your blog? Because I know
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you have a TikTok and Instagram, and you talk a little about, you know, Croatian cultural
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content. What sort of things are you posting on there? Yeah, so the blog and my social media kind
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of have different purposes. So my blog has all sorts of like in-depth travel guides, some in-depth
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information about responsible and mindful travel. And just as an aside for people that aren't familiar
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with responsible travel, that's basically travel, you know, you know, you can do a lot of
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aside for people that aren't familiar with responsible travel. That's basically travel that
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minimizes negative social, economic, and environmental impacts and basically benefit
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locals as much as possible. So the whole content and content of Mindful Mermaid is like teaching
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people to be more responsible travelers and also focus a lot on like the immersive cultural aspect.
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So that's kind of where my blog is at. That's like in-depth people wanting to plan itineraries.
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And not just in Croatia, I have content across Europe and the US. Whereas my Instagram and TikTok,
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I primarily focus on Croatia travel and lifestyle. I used to have more of a general
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travel specifically like responsible travel. But in the pandemic, specifically when I couldn't travel
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much outside of Croatia, I started posting more content about Croatia and posted a couple kind
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of funny cultural comparisons. And they really took off on TikTok right now. It's really popular
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for like expats. There's like a huge need for like expats Americans living abroad talking about
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the different countries or cities that they live in. So I was like, okay, well, I should talk a
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little bit about living in Croatia, living in Dubrovnik. So I started making more content
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surrounding that and that kind of took off. So yeah, my social media is a little bit more like
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kind of through, you know, seeing Croatia through my eyes, but also, you know, a lot of tidbits of,
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you know, Croatia travel as well. But yeah, the blog and the social media have kind of,
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they have slightly different purposes. What's sort of your most viral video on social media or
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piece of content? Yeah, so a couple of them have blown up. One of them was basically my fiance
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was dressed as like Baba, like the Croatian like grandmas that are, you know, around and basically,
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let's say like every little neighborhood or village has one and she's like over on the
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balcony like looking so it was like Croatian security cameras. And it was like a little song
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and it was like what's popping and she's like, don't mind me just watching. And then I don't know if
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you saw the Netflix show inventing Anna, where she's like pretending that she has money or whatever,
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but there's like a little clip from there where she's saying, what are you wearing? Why are you
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dressed like that? Like you look poor. So I did a video where it was like, when I first showed up
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in Croatia in like my American athleisure wear. So it was like me dressed in my athleisure wear
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and then another one like me dressed up and it was like, basically, people saying that like I
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shouldn't be wearing that out because that is kind of a thing here like, okay, yes, you can wear your
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athleisure wear if you're going for walks, but in general Croatian dress, a lot nicer, I would say
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than the average American, it's just a cultural thing. Yeah, so sometimes I just make these like
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little 10 seconds videos and some of them have taken off. But I also have a lot of content too
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that it's just like tips on visiting Dubrovnik, just made one today like how to avoid the crowds
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in Croatia. Yeah, and just in general, trying to help people be a little bit more informed and
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responsible travelers in Croatia and informed as well culturally. Well, speaking of being informed
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as part of, you know, responsible tourism and responsible travel, I want to talk a little about
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your agency, Mindful Travel Croatia. You know, what's sort of the mission of that and how can you
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become a more responsible tourist? What are some of those ways? Yeah, yeah, so our mission is
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essentially, as you said, we want to help travelers escape the crowds and discover authentic Croatia.
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We offer group tours, custom itineraries, travel concierge services, consultation services, all
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that. Essentially, you know, Croatia doesn't necessarily need more tourists, right? But we do
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need, we need to focus more on quality as opposed to quantity. And that's something that I've seen
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a lot here in Dubrovnik specifically. And I do think that majority of tourists that come, they do
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want to leave a positive impact behind. So I think if we can inform them a little bit more, people
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can make better choices. So a couple of ways that I would say to be a more responsible
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traveler here in Croatia is one, the biggest thing is traveling outside of the main tourist season,
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which is, you know, end of June to end of August. And then also, you know, people can stay a bit
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outside of the city center as an example. So many tourists, they come here in Dubrovnik,
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don't do a lot of research, and they don't really understand that you can stay really anywhere
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between Dubrovnik to Savta and even beyond that. They just want to stay concentrated in the old
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town. So that causes a lot of just crowds in the old town traffic, all that. But also, there are so
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many nicer, not nicer, I should say, but nice villages and other parts of town that you can
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stay and you can take a boat ride into Dubrovnik. So that kind of helps spread out the crowds,
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obviously staying in locally owned accommodation. If you're going to stay in a hotel, maybe a
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boutique hotel that's locally owned, you can also, you know, visit some of these agrotourism
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experiences that's a little bit more immersive where they have like Pekka or something and
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there it's farmed a table. And then also, I think just doing some research about the history and
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the culture. I sometimes have people come here to Dubrovnik and, you know, they're asking questions of
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how long has Dubrovnik had the walls up? And I had one person ask me, when do they take the walls
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down for the Game of Thrones filming? I mean, they had no idea that there's this really extensive
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history where Dubrovnik was like a republic. So I think, yeah, some of it goes to, we have to inform
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travelers better, but also travelers do need to take some responsibility and do some, learn
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some history, learn more about the culture. So we kind of try to bridge that gap. And we're finding
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especially this year, I would say that a lot of our clients are really interested in those things.
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And I don't know if there's been some sort of shift after the pandemic, but a lot of
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travelers, they do want to meet locals and they do want to have a more immersive experience,
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as opposed to just checking things off of the bucket list. So that's something that I try to
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provide through my blog and then now also through our travel business. And it's cool to see that
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shift. And I hope that, you know, maybe if some airlines can extend their flight paths to various
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creation cities, that could, you know, have help us extend the tourist season, especially with,
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you know, I know you live in Zagreb, like Zagreb has amazing advent, you know, Christmas
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festival and in the winter and so many other creation cities do too. It would be really cool
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if we could see, you know, some of the people that are more interested in the cultural aspect come
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in the winter. I do think Zagreb sort of does the best job of promoting itself as a sort of year
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round city, which I mean, of course, is the capital city. That's a lot easier to do. I wanted to
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backtrack for a second. Were you saying people, tourists were thinking the walls in Dubrovnik
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were only put up for the Game of Thrones? I did have someone say that to me. Yeah. Wow. Yeah.
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That's crazy. Oh, yeah. There's a few of those too.
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Wow. Yeah. I mean, I'm definitely supporting being a mindful tourist. And if those are some of the,
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I mean, I guess if you go to a place you've never been before, you don't know anything.
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Yeah. I mean, I guess that's it. You don't know anything. But yeah, it makes sense to sort of,
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I mean, you should know something or have it based knowledge of things that you're able to,
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you know, learn the more in-depth details or, you know, have questions based around the knowledge
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that you already know. Right. Of course, you can't expect people to like know everything in the
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whole history. But I think it's important that people take maybe a walking tour of some sort,
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or maybe go to a museum or do something to learn about the history. I think that's important
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when traveling to Croatia that has so much extensive history, but just anywhere in general.
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And I would say a majority of people, you know, aren't asking those type of questions, but there
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are definitely, definitely some that they, yeah, they just haven't heard of anything
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prior to coming. You mentioned thinning out the crowds. I know that's a big problem in,
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you know, a lot of most of the coastal, you know, tourist-oriented cities over here.
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I'm in Mokavskala, like I said, right now, and I know that locals can't even park overnight.
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There's no space for parking over here. And I know parking, you know, all across the coast is
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extremely difficult in the summer. So yeah, definitely, I mean, moving away from
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even just from the city center, even staying a little bit outside the city center, you know,
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I'm sure can help with that. Right. Oh, it's the same thing here. Like we, in the summer,
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I don't even go into the old town and most locals don't either because there's nowhere to park.
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I mean, this is a problem with the city itself, but the prices for parking like double.
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And then in our little area that we live, there's a lot of nice beaches and it's great that people
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come over here, but they'll just kind of make up parking spots on like the actual road and then
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driving down that road in itself kind of becomes a challenge. So yeah, there's a lot of makeshift
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parking, that's for sure. Oh, definitely. It's just wherever there's sort of room to fit,
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you can park there. Yeah. Even in Zagreb, I noticed it's funny, not so much for parking,
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you know, like overnight and staying at long periods of time, but there's almost like,
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it's like an express lane check out for parking. You just sort of pull over on the side of the road
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with the hazards on and you can go to the store and or a pekka to grab a couple things and then
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get back in the car and enjoy the ride. Yeah, literally. That's so funny you mentioned that
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because that's actually been one of my biggest, I would say like challenges other than the language,
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but it's like driving here, especially in coastal Croatia. I mean, I've been driving now,
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I got my license over 10 years ago when I was 16 in the US, but like it took me a couple years to
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get used to driving here. Like you really just have to be like move it or lose it people. And
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you really have to be confident about just like parking somewhere. And I'm like in my head, I'm
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like, I don't know, this isn't quite proper. And then the creation show, like, no, you're only
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going to be for like five minutes, just do it. Like you really have to like gain this new creation
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confidence, if you will. Yeah. Yeah, especially with driving, everyone is so like you have to be
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confident, you know, everyone just makes up their mind what they're going to do when they do it.
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You know, you can't hesitate, you can't. Exactly. It's just it's hard to describe. But yeah, it's
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you have to have a certain mindset, I guess, to drive over here. You mentioned the language I saw
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on I think it was a Facebook post from you that you had started to learn corrosion.
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Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's it's going. Creation is very difficult. It was actually listed as the
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top five hardest languages for native English speakers. So of course, I knew like, you know,
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the swear words and some other basic phrases before I came. But it really hasn't been until
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like the last two years that I've been taking like language classes. Yeah, I mean, I, my goal is
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obviously to be fluent at some point, but I'm not quite there yet. With all the potage, which is
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like the creation grammar, that can be quite difficult. Because then I get in my head, like
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if I'm using the ending properly or not. But yeah, I mean, it's it's a work in progress. And I do get
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so like I would say I'm a pretty confident person, but I get really like self conscious with speaking
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creation. And it's hard too, because obviously creations don't mean anything by it. But when
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you have people be like, Oh, that was so cute, like you said this, and you messed up, and it's
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like you're in your head a little too much. But it's one of those things you just have to
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like accept it and also like driving just like be confident. And if you're going to make a mistake,
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like make it loudly. And yeah, hmm, now I don't know if we mentioned that before, but is that part
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of being a mindful tourist? Or do you do involve that at all in, you know, sort of mindful traveling,
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learning the local language? Or so I say with Croatia that I mean, obviously English is widely
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spoken. But I do think it's really important that whenever you're traveling somewhere, you should
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learn like some basic phrases, don't be done, follow, you know, just basic, please. Thank you,
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Mollin. So yeah, I mean, I don't think it's necessary to be like, fluently speaking when
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you come to Croatia. But I do think that's important that travelers don't like expect that
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everyone is going to speak English, you know, I mean, yeah, English is creations have one of the
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highest English language proficiencies, but of course, you can't expect everyone. So you should
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know some basic phrases. Alex, sort of as we're winding down here with the episode, I want to
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ask what sort of future plans do you have, both, you know, for yourself and for your blog and your
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travel agency? Well, I'm planning on expand, sorry, if you can hear my dog in the background,
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just creation village things. We have a tourniac, it's like a creation Bosnian shepherding dog,
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and she's just whining at something outside. So future plans, plan on expanding with more
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Croatia travel guides and content over the next six months on the blog, we'll continue to be posting
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more culture and travel tips on Instagram, the mindful mermaid, and TikTok as well. And then in
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2023, we are going to be expanding our business mindful travel Croatia a bit more. And then,
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yeah, I mean, I think we're hoping to be doing some travel a bit more around Croatia. We're also
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planning a Croatian wet Croatian American wedding right now, which I'll just add, which is interesting
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because we're kind of blending the the different cultural aspects from from both cultures.
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Wow, how's that going to work? I'm interested. Yeah, well, for those of you that don't know,
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Croatian weddings are like a marathon where they go from like noon or sometime in the afternoon,
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you start at like the grooms, they all go to the brides, and then you all go to the church and then
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waving the flags, reception. So and then it goes to like, you know, three, four in the morning,
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at least. So I'm like, okay, well, I will not be able to do all that. So let's just start at the
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church. Yeah, we're getting married in the old town, and then taking a like a boat over to a
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venue where we're having the reception. And then yeah, the reception will probably go later, but
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we were cutting down that first portion of it. And yeah, just we're kind of coming up with like
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what type of music we want, because we want it to be kind of a combination of both. And I think
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we'll probably do the flags with like a American flag and a Croatian flag. But yeah, it's been
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interesting like planning it when I'm like, oh, like the groom's dinner, and then my fiance is
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like, Oh, what's that? Like, we don't have that we have like the Thursday where they come and they
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like bring the presents, which is another thing too, you know, people usually give,
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have like a wedding registry, we're like here, they just give cash. So yeah, lots of interesting
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cultural differences there. Yeah, I'm sure that puts even more work on setting all that up.
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00:40:04,280 --> 00:40:09,640
Yeah, yeah, for sure. But sorry to interrupt you, you can go ahead and plug in, you know,
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sort of where people can follow along people that want to, you know, follow your content or,
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you know, travel to Croatia, you know, your website, your social media, you know, what's your
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business information, where can people find you? Yeah. So you can if you're interested in coming
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to Croatia, and you need help planning your itinerary or, you know, anything of that sort,
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you can email us at hello at mindful travel Croatia.com. Our website is mindful travel
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Croatia.com. If you're looking for some free Croatia travel guides and other travel guides
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00:40:47,880 --> 00:40:54,120
throughout Europe in the US mindful mermaid.com want to follow me on social media, it's on Instagram,
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the mindful mermaid separated by underscores on tick tock I'm the mindful mermaid as well. And
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yeah, that's pretty much it. Great. Well, also I'll put those in the episode description so people,
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you know, listening, you can click and find those links down below or wherever they end up on the
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page. Sure. Thank you so much. Yeah, I wanted to thank you for taking the time working with me
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through my power outage. Also, we're getting a nice summer rain over here. I don't know if you
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were hearing the thunder at all. Hopefully, no, I couldn't but that sounds nice. It's been so hot in
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Dubrovnik. Yeah, those occasional summer rains are always welcome. Yeah, these June, July, August
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months. Yeah, seriously. Yeah, thank you so much. It's been a pleasure.
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That's it for today's episode of the All Things Croatia podcast. Thanks for tuning in and I hope
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you all enjoyed it. You can subscribe to the Patreon and check out the All Things Croatia
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Instagram page to stay updated. Feel free to reach out to me with any questions, tips, or ideas,
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and make sure to tune back into the next episode. Thanks again and vidimos!