July | 2017 | Ivar the Salacious

I was dancing with this gorgeous girl until… Bam!

Are you OK?

Yes, I’m OK… she said. Are you?

I’m fine. I’m fine. It’s fine. Don’t worry about it, happens all the time… I tried to reassure her. This was followed by an awkward pause as I looked at my hand after touching my face… I think I’m bleeding.

Oh, I was definitely bleeding. It’s hard to miss that fact if most of your hand is covered in red. However, nothing was hurting. I awkwardly walked towards the toilets to investigate the damage and clean myself up.

Nadya was a bit panicky as she walked beside me asking if I needed ice or something. I got to the restroom to have a look at the injury. There was an inch-wide streak of blood from my eye down my left cheek. I quickly commenced my washing operations. A chap next to me saw what I was doing and judging by his face which was best described as someone suppressing his gag-reflex, it looked bad. He was nice enough to offer to get some ice for me though. Another guy also had a look at the cut and rather authoritatively said “put ice on it NOW!”.

I’m not exactly sure what happened but I managed to do a spin right into Russia’s elbow. It happened within the first hour or two whilst out dancing. Her elbow hit right against the bone above my eye where the skin is really thin. It still puzzles me how a 20-something year old girl fits into the scene, but it happened.

Later as Nadya nurtured me – and she was absolutely stunning at it – I found out that she hurt her elbow too.

She was probably feeling very bad about the whole thing as she kept talking to me for at least 2 hours. Or at least it seemed that long. She actually made the experience quite pleasant – I guess every cloud DOES have a silver lining. As I was being pampered my friends got hold of the situation but didn’t exactly rush in to replace Russia… this was probably because of my big smile when my nurse held a piece of cloth soaked in rum to my beautiful face in attempt to disinfect. Anywho, she was wife material. 😀

Traveling back in time a few days… I landed in Barcelona around 8 PM on Thursday and had to get to Mataro for the ZoukDevils festival. I was very excited as I had an amazing experience there last year.

The kids were texting me as they wanted me to bring them warm clothes. They said the wind was cold at the beach bar. I found that hard to believe. This was Spain in July!!! All I packed were t-shirts and shorts… I had to improvise to find warm clothes. I took the big towels from the hotel and a jacket from Covanova’s suitcase after I had checked in to the hotel. I found the kids chillaxing at a restaurant near the beach party. We exchanged pleasantries and I managed to drink the worlds smallest cup of coffee.

The beach party was in full swing and we were able to dance a fair bit of zouk. The festival started on Friday with classes from 4 PM. I was fashionably late and did the last three hours of classes. I learned a few new moves and dancing concepts. After a bit of dinner, we danced the night away until 6:30 AM. I got to my hotel feeling as if I had just run a marathon… only to realize I had another 2 nights like that ahead of me. Bring it, I thought!!!

The next day I got fucked up by a Russian as you already know. I woke up with more than a cut near my eyebrow. My face was sore and it hurt to blink. The area under my eye was dark brown, almost black. I think the medical peeps would call it a bruise.

I felt quite sorry for myself and decided to go to Barcelona to suffer in solitude. I felt a bit shitty about it all. I didn’t need other people’s pity and wanted some alone time in a dark, cold and wet hole in the ground. To save my friends from me I decided to head out to Barcelona to do some sightseeing and soul searching.

I thought that I didn’t handle the previous night that well. Russia probably felt really bad and maybe it would’ve been better for her had I left immediately after the smashing incident. We will never know.

Anyway, I had a wander in Barcelona. There was no particular place I wanted to see. The city was just as beautiful as a year ago. I visited Sagrada Familia and Park Güell again. Everything was really nice and pleasant… I couldn’t help but to fantasize about moving to Barcelona. Maybe one day when I grow up…

My friends invited me to grab some dinner but I was too far away and declined… I don’t think I would’ve been very social anyway.

However, sooner or later I had to face reality. I got back to my hotel and made myself half decent to face the last night of dancing. I didn’t feel like going but decided to do it anyway.

I was watching the people dancing and prancing for a bit until The Savage One asked me for a dance. Otherwise, I would’ve been there standing for ages. My confidence was a bit low. I must admit I was a bit paranoid during the next couple of dances and was always on the lookout for elbows. Luckily I was able to dodge any further injuries.

I actually thought that the eye and bruise looked so bad that a lot of people would avoid me. However, that was not the case at all. Instead, girls were coming up to me for a dance – I’m that good. 😀 They didn’t exactly form a queue but walked up expectantly to get a dance out of me. The chicas were so nice! Faith in humanity restored! Not long after that I was the usual lean mean dancing machine again. It was epic!

I left Mataro and Spain with a big smile: the chicas, the music, the dancing was spectacular and I was there with an amazing bunch of friends. This was the best holiday I’ve ever had.

Besos,

Ivar the Salacious

A big ball of heat hit me in the face when I got off the plane as 33 degrees of Celsius welcomed me to Split, Croatia. I made my way to the airport to wait for the rest of my mates who were traveling from Tallinn, Estonia.

I quickly found out that the airport was one of the smallest I’ve ever been to. I had 1.5 hours to kill, so I headed to the only restaurant on the premises. I noticed that hardly anything was in English and that the locals don’t speak English. However, I am a master communicator. Words are overrated. I said “Heineken!” and pointed my finger at the bottle. The lady had no trouble interpreting my foreign accent, delivered the beverage and charged me a fee. Success! I had made contact with the local tribe.

I was sipping my cold beer and browsed the internet on my phone. I quite like that now I can use my 5GB of data anywhere in the EU no questions asked without any extra charges – this has been a wet dream of mine for many years. Gone are the days of buying expensive Airport WiFi with a lousy dial-up connection. What a time to be alive!!!

I happened to find an article about the smallest countries in the world and discovered Sealand. It is an old oil rig/platform off the coast of England. It declared itself a country a few decades ago and it was possible to buy a variety of noble titles on a website. I of course have held Sealand in my heart of hearts for many years and jumped at the opportunity to become a Lord. In no time whatsover I ascended into the realm of nobility with a new title – Lord of Sealand.

They also posted me a nice official certificate with my newly acquired credentials. I’m sure many royal families world over will invite me for dinner and visits in the near term to discuss all kind of matters of nobility. Stay tuned!

Mah mates arrived and we headed out to collect our car from a dodgy rental place. We were staying in a “villa” which was a villa only in name. Our place was a flat on the fifth floor in a building which did not have an elevator. I look back fondly going up and down those stairs. I surely have a bubble butt now.

Fun fact: you can use a British 10p coin in the coin slot to get your shopping trolley unchained from the other trolleys at supermarkets.

Off to the beach we went!!! I made sure to cover myself in adequate amounts of sunscreen before leaving my air-conditioned temporary home. The beach was covered in rocks but that didn’t stop us from chillaxing.

Despacito was playing non-stop everywhere we went. The beat was so good it took old grumpy men back to an earlier time… A simpler time of their teen years where they were much more concerned about getting inside you than being effective when they’re there.

A quick swim in the beautiful clear water was in order followed by a short moment of sunbathing and repeat. After a while this got old. Luckily, I saw a big floating bag in the distance. Upon investigating the matter I found out its called a blob. It’s one of those things you can jump off into the water from. I could not say no:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BWP6fNpl4lC/

The jump was way better than I expected. It cost approximately €5 and was worth every penny. I loved it!

It wasn’t just a “beach and relax” holiday. We went to see the waterfalls at the KRKN National Park as well. This was nice and quite pleasant as you get to be in the shade a lot whilst you take in the beauty of the land.

Once we had enough of Split, we visited Makarska, which is a much smaller city down the coast. This place was surrounded by massive mountains on one side and beautiful sea views on the other. Postcard material I tell you.

I couldn’t help but notice that a lot of people were smoking in public. The lack of consideration to the health of non-smokers became painfully obvious when we visited the Deep Blue club which is inside a cave. So many kids were smoking inside and the deeper I went the heavier the smoke became. I’m certain half of the people developed lung cancer in that establishment. I think they should change the name of the place to Cave Emphysema – much more fitting. I’m sure if the Croatians got their way, they’d be blowing smoke into babies’ faces on every street corner.

Towards the end of the holiday we decided to check out Sveti Jure – the local mountain top. We did zero research beforehand because we’re gangsta like that. As we ascended, we discovered how dangerous that road to the top was within the first 15 minutes. It was very narrow, windy and unforgiving – one mistake could easily lead us to fall down the sharp cliff edge towards certain death. I figured my travel insurance only pays out £10,000 in the event of death and there was nobody to claim it if I wasn’t around. As my life flashed past my eyes I realized I also had to get myself to a wedding in September and change all my correspondence to address me as Lord – the mountain was not worth the risk. We turned the car around at once and left Makarska for good.

The road took us back to Split. We enjoyed our last day in the Old Town embracing our inner tourist. Lots of photos were taken and we now feel like we had a proper holiday.

Lord Salacious of Sealand