I don’t get much mail of the traditional postal variety, apart from bills, bills and yet more bills, and it is rare indeed that a letter with a hand-written address will find its way to my letter box.
But such a rarity awaited after our return from a VERY pleasant ten days in Zagreb (is it me, or is the capital finally turning into a cool city?). The letter was stamped from Zagreb, and the address made me smile – PB, The Main Square, Jelsa. Good job the square was Jelsa’s pjaca and not Tiananmen.
My first thought of course what that it was a letter from Bozo, Tim and Tomi offering me the job as the new Minister of Tourism, or at least to invite me to a six month negotiation. But no! A Christmas card. And what a lovely message inside.
The rough translation appears to be:
“Hello. You have an English ‘mentality’ and you will never be Dalmatian. A female from Jelsa.”
Well thank the Lord for that. Think how much blitva I would have to eat if I was a Dalmatian. And bakalar on Badnjak (Christmas Eve).
Apart from taking it as a compliment that someone would take the trouble to send me an anonymous Christmas card, the next step was to figure out if the message contained inside was positive or negative. I suspected the latter.
One of the things about language, I have come to realise, is that not every nuance is understood – check out my favourite guide to speaking British above. I took the card from my admirer down for morning cold ones and enlisted the opinions of several regulars, including the Mayor and other movers and shakers in town.
The final score?
Positive 2 Negative 6.
Thanks for sending the card, Jelsanka. It genuinely did make my day. I will check the mailbox tomorrow for my invitation from Bozo, Tomi and Tim.
