When we came on our mission we were determined to learn the language. It isn't required, and in fact, we get along OK speaking only English. But we want to. Well, we have struggled to make it happen, so I was thinking about how could I get myself motivated to learn new words? Then we were walking in Osijek one day and we noticed a book store and went inside. It was small. The lady asked me what we were looking for, and on a whim, I said Harry Potter. It occurred to me that it would be a fun read, with simple wording. Perfect for learning the language. She went to her shelf and had one copy. A hardcover copy of book 6. So, I bought it.
The sad thing is that even that is too complex for the little I've learned so far. But it got me thinking about Harry Potter and I brought Book 1 up on my Kindle and started reading. It's been nice.
Well, the other day I discovered a genuine Harry Potter house.
Amazing!
Actually, what it is, is a failure of a panoramic shot. Here is what I was trying to capture:
This is an amazing building with some sort of government department in it. It goes the entire length of the block of buildings where the mission office is located. It looks like it is curved, but that's only because I'm not very good at taking panoramic shots.
We took this photo on the way to the Posta (Post Office) on official business. The other side of the street is a nice park full of flowers, trees, and benches. The park is at street level, but it is the roof of a shopping mall. The mall has two floors, plus a parking garage of two floors, all under the park. Very nice.
Over by the Posta I discovered an old train. Back when I was a young lad I'd have gone gaga over a train locomotive like this one. I'd have definitely been in it fiddling with all the levers and doors.
We are trying to maintain our social distancing, but our responsibilities do require us to get out sometimes to do things like going to the Posta. We do enjoy being outside on those occasions, and sometimes we also slip out for a little exercise. People here are pretty good about keeping their distance, even when there isn't a threat of COVID-19, so we feel OK with that. The other day we took a stroll around the block where the mission home is, and we stumbled across a little lilac bush. Liz, of course, loves lilacs, so she had to stop and give it a sniff.
Pretty flowers!
Then, on Easter Sunday we ventured to a big city park. It is an immense park on the scale of Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. Most of it is heavily wooded, but there are lots of trails, improved and rough, and there are open meadows, statues, and lakes. We walked all around a lake. The is no fishing, no swimming, disturbing the ducks, etc. and people must abide with the rules, because we found the wildlife amazingly tolerant of people. The lake is full of fish and turtles.
The tree branches in the water were covered with turtles. That's Liz's arm taking a photo and she got a better shot than me. There are turtles covering the tree branches in the water, packed tightly against each other. There are a few places where there is a log out in the lake and those spots had the biggest turtles. But along the banks like this, there were places where the turtles were within a foot or two of kids and they just weren't that alarmed. Their heads were up, so they were certainly aware of the people, but we didn't see a single one jump off its log to escape. In Texas, the turtles dive as soon as you get in sight of them, even if it's a long ways off.
It was very pleasant that day, and we thoroughly enjoyed our escape. as we strolled leisurely around the lake. On the far side from the turtle-mania, we got closer to the solitary swan. No wonder people love swans so much!
They are eye-candy if there ever was such a thing. What a beautiful day!
The last stop was a monument erected by the hawking society of Croatia. It is kind of a Rockie staircase going up to a statue of a hawk in flight. Too many steps for an olde man like me.
The sign said the center of the pyramid is filled with dirt from 137 locations, representing all the hawking zones in Croatia. Sounds like a lot of work for a symbolic thing, but I can't judge because I've never been a hawker.
And, finally, I took a photo from the top floor of the mission home, looking across the little valley behind it.
This was Monday morning, just after a snow flurry. Sunday it was nearly 80 degrees F., and Monday morning it snowed. Of course it didn't stick, because the ground was still warm. But it made things smell clean, the birds were singing, and it was just a delightful day.
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