When you say that you are going to live for almost one year in Slovenia, everyone back home sees this as an opportunity to set foot on a country they never thought of visiting before.
So, by the time April comes, you already had four visits and you are expecting to have at least one more. Having people over is like mixing two different lives: your life back home and your life here, in Slovenia. I learned to think about these two realities as two things totally separated. When suddenly you have people from your life in Spain involved in your routine in Slovenia, it feels like two worlds colliding.
At the beginning it can be weird, even shocking. But, after the first days, I found myself being really excited about showing my family and my friends around: the sea, the village and the places where I live and work. It’s like they are getting to know this part of me that they have never seen before, the person I have become here, this slightly different version of me.
Of course, sometimes it can be overwhelming. For them the trip is a holiday, but normally you have to combine working in the morning with being a free tourist guide in the afternoon. Also, when your four friends stay at your flat, you become a mum, a cleaning lady and a landlord. Your house literally transforms into an airbnb with so many people sleeping in the living room and in your roomate’s bed. It’s a mess, but, in a way, it’s an enjoyable mess.
During the firsts visits you accompany your friends to Trieste or Ljubljana. Yes, again. However, at some point you just cannot take any more of those places and your mind-set changes: your guests can survive on their own while you mind your own business. At first I thought it was going to be too much for me, that I was going to get sick of so many guests coming and going. But once they got here, I discovered that time flies and that one week can feel like one single day. After they left Slovenia, I found myself ready for more and wondering: so, when is the next one coming?
