This
morning, the Belarus/Montenegro choir was made whole again. The three
students from Istanbul through Belgrade, Serbia arrived at our Best
Western hotel prior to 9:00 a.m. Although this sounds like a familiar
story, none of their bags arrived with them from Serbia, on a Serbian
airlines flight to Podgorica. The three were happy to connect with the
group again and share their adventures, take a shower, and enjoy a
quality breakfast. All were hoping that the luggage again would be
quickly identified and sent to the sight of our next venue, Mojkovac.
Many
of you must be thinking, what happened to our concert schedule where we
where to perform almost everyday on this tour, including today's runout
concert to Mojkovac. Given that exactly half of the singing group was
not here to sing due to our Austrian Air flight cancellation, the
Embassy postponed our concert on Monday in Zabljak to Thursday.
Thursday was the one planned free day that we had this week, prior to
Friday, our final day in Montenegro with the performance at the US
Montenegro Ambassador's residence. This moved our free day to
yesterday, which allowed us to go to the beach and allow time for
everyone in the group to get to Montenegro. Unfortunately, this meant
that during the remaining days of the tour we would stay at a different
hotel every night this week until we left Montenegro. That fact was OK,
if we all had our luggage.
We left the hotel
at 11 a.m. to drive to Mojkovac. We had a very beautiful drive up a
mountain to get to Mojkovac. Along the way we stopped at stand to take a
photo and purchase fresh figs as well as a dried-figs (see photos
attached). We also made a stop at a Montenegrin monastery. After the
stops we drove directly to our hotel, which was about 40 minutes before
Mojkovac. The hotel, Bianca Resort and Spa, was an elite ski-resort in
the town of Kolasin, Montenegro, see http://www.biancaresort.com/bianca/ .
This was certainly the nicest hotel that we would have on the trip,
and perhaps one of the nicest that many will ever stay in. The hotel
had amenities like 24 hour room service, a award-winning spa, heated
towel racks, a 2nd nozzle below the shower to wash one's feet directly,
slippers, towels, cedar closets, and of course the almighty bidet!
Most of the choir members spent the afternoon at the Olympic-sized (25
meters) pool. Many of you know that I am an avid swimmer, but I have
never swam in an Olympic-sized pool. What an experience! I swam a half
mile - 16 laps before we left for our concert.
We
left at 6PM for our 7:30 PM concert in Mojkovac. We were on pins and
needles as several choir members did not have their suitcases and
materials for the concert. Once again due to a stellar effort from the
local Embassy, and prayers from you back home, a truck went to the
airport to personally drive the luggage that was separated from the
owners to Mojkovac. The drivers arrived minutes before we began to
sing. Absolutely everyone in the group had their luggage! Thank God for
small miracles!
As stated earlier, many of our
concerts in Montenegro were in underserved communities. Mojkovac was
one such community, although you would never know this by speaking with
them. Our concert was the first concert ever sponsored by the Embassy
in this community. The top Cultural Affairs Embassy representative,
Sunshine, was there to offer greetings from the Embassy. We had another
successful concert. After the concert, one of the local businessmen in
the audience, wanted to take us out to his restaurant to buy drinks for
the group. As tired as we were after all the travel, with the
encouragement of the Sunshine, we did not want to offend to local person
who offered this nicety to us, so we accepted the invitation.
After
the concert and reception afterwards, we had a 45 minute drive back to
our resort hotel. Typically in hotels, breakfasts are included,
however, atypically a buffet meal was included in the price of the room.
The dining room typically closed at 10 AM, but Sunshine called ahead
and asked if the restaurant could stay open for the group. They agreed,
and we had an exquisite meal.
The few who
got a chance to take a nap this afternoon, said that the bed was one of
the best mattresses that they had ever slept on, although I believed it
was more just being tired than an exceptional mattress, but I will find
out this evening.
The choir was in an
extraordinary resort & hotel. In a way we earned this wonderful
accommodation. I fully believe that everyone will be refreshed and
ready go to Bar, Montenegro for our next concert tomorrow on the
Montenegrin coast.
Eric
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