I have been awarded this year's Mike Ockrent Fellowship through the SSDC (Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers). The fellowship is giving me the opportunity to assist and observe director/choreographer Casey Nicholaw on a new Broadway musical called Minsky's. Casey is someone I really admire- he choreographed Spamalot and directed/choreographed The Drowsy Chaperone. I am REALLY excited about this. The whole application process for the job went on while I was traveling through Europe, and by the time I had returned home and not heard anything, I assumed that I hadn't gotten the job. But then two days ago, I got a call about an interview. And yesterday, after about ten minutes of chatting on the phone with Casey, he said "Well, alright Elissa, let's consider it done." I said, "Wait, what?" And he said, "Yup, consider it done."
So excited. And even better: now that I've gotten the job, I know what I'm doing for the next few months. Which was a big fat question mark until 4:30 pm yesterday. Here's my plan: I'll be in LA until mid-November. I'll probably stay through the Ovation Awards on the 17th, and then leave town on the 18th to drive up to my parents house and drop off my car. Then I'll fly to New York City, and from Nov. 24 through the holidays we'll be rehearsing in NY. BUT, the show is doing its pre-Broadway run here in Los Angeles. So on Jan. 4, we'll transfer the whole company out here to LA, and I'll be back here working on the show in January and February. And then I'll have to figure out what I'm doing after that. (Get a job and make some money....???) But hey, I'm 23. Please don't force me to live more than a couple months ahead at a time, ok? And please- let me stay broke if I want to. I like being a poor starving artist. Living the dream.
SO that's that. And now onto...or rather, back to the Balkans (doo-doo-doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-doo):
Montenegro
So, after a lovely one-day stay in Ohrid, Kristen and I climbed onto our overnight bus that was going to take us through Albania and up to Montenegro. Now, of all the journeys that we were going to undertake during our vacation, this was that one that we had been most cautioned about. Online message boards, travel agents, and the Greek guys had all told us to beware of traveling through Albania. So we expected the worst. We walked up onto the bus with our money belts strapped around our waists, our ipods and cameras buried deep in our backpacks, and our bladders drained of all fluid (these overnight buses don't have bathrooms, and you never know when they're going to stop). But I am sad to report, that aside from the smelly men sitting behind me, and the anticipatory mild panic attack that I suffered during the first half hour on the bus (I quickly squelched it with a Dramamine), the bus ride was entirely without event. And in the morning, we wound down off the steep cliffs of Montenegro and were greeted with the most spectacular view of the Bay of Kotor.
We had no hostel reservations, because we figured that we would be greeted by people offering sobe, rooms in their home. But, when we stepped off the bus, there were no such people around. So Kristen and I decided to walk towards the city in search of accomodations. We had gone about 10 feet when a man stepped out from behind a taxi and said with a very thick accent, "You need a room?" We replied yes, and within a minute we were in his car and he was telling us that his daughter Mirella was a travel agent. He said something about "Free" and kept repeating the phrase "Excellent tourist destination." Over and over and over. Kristen and I weren't exactly at our sprightliest, having just stepped off an overnight bus, so this man was a little much to handle. But if we thought he was intense....
Well, Mirella took the cake. This was the loudest, brashest woman I've ever met. No American could possibly be like her. As her father stood at the stove making us coffee, she was thrusting shiny brochures into our faces, and making a list of all the things we needed to do during our ONE DAY in Kotor. She asked me my name and proceeded to address a whole speech to me, completely ignoring the fact that Kristen was sitting right next to me. "Well, Ah-lee-sah, there are many beautiful things to see in Montenegro, and Ah-lee-sah, we are in Prcanj, and you need to see these islands Ah-lee-sah...." Ah! It was just too much to handle, especially when she plopped her guest book onto the table and started telling us all the wonderful things people had said about staying in the apartment next to her house. She also wrote out directions for us to everywhere we needed to go, and told us that we should take the 8:30 am bus to Dubrovnik the next morning..."There is an 8:30 am bus and a 2:45 pm bus, but Ah-lee-sah, you should take the 8:30 bus, because if you stay longer here you must pay more." Speaking of which....not free. Of course not free, I figured that much. But she wanted to charge us 15 euros each for the room, and when she realized we were about to stand up and leave she said "Ok, ok. 10 euro each. Very good price." And her father added "Excellent tourist destination."
So we went to our room, took a nap, and then spent the afternoon climbing the ancient city of Kotor. Now, why Kotor, you ask? How did you even hear of it? Well the answer to that is, I read about Kotor a couple of months before we left on the trip in Conde Nast magazine. Yup. There was a Conde Nast sitting on top of my roommate's toilet, and as I settled in I said to myself, I wonder if there's anything good in here? And that's when I read that the ancient city of Kotor is topped by a fortress, and the whole thing is built on a steep hill. The pictures were stunning so I decided we should make a stop in Kotor. I swear, some of the best discoveries in life are made on the toilet.
So, I digress. The hike was stunning. I can't really describe the Balkan coastline. It would take at least a thousand words. So here's a photo to do the job:
Kotor rocks. It's amazing. You can see that. What doesn't rock is Mirella, and I'll tell you why. The next morning, when we woke up to catch our bus, her father offered to give us a ride around the bay back to the bus station. But as we were pulling out of his driveway, the man in the little shop next door stopped him and pointed to his tire. It turns out we had a flat tire. However, rather than going back up the driveway to get one of his three other cars, Mirella's father tried to keep driving. "Five minutes, it will be ok." But about 100 yards later, he pulled off the road to fix the tire. Not ok I guess. So this man is running around the car grabbing the jack and then wrenching the spare out from the bottom of his trunk, and rushing to get all of this done because our bus is leaving in 15 minutes. It was ridiculous. And when he finally got it done, we still had to stop on the way because he owed us change from our 50 euro bill for paying for the room. So he pulls over next to a little hut, goes running out, comes back and hands Kristen 25 euros. She looked down and then up again and said "But, you owe us 30." And he replied "Taxi ride. 5 euro. Very good price."
A 5 euro taxi ride so we could watch his ass bob up and down as he changed his tire? I'm sorry, WTF?? But we looked at each other and thought fuck it, we need to catch this bus. So a minute later he drops us at the bus station, and we run inside to buy our tickets.
"Hello, we'd like two tickets for the 8:30 am bus to Dubrovnik."
"No bus at 8:30. Only at 2:45."
"Wait, what? Our host told us 8:30."
No response. And then the chick looks down, writes something on a piece of paper, and holds it up in our face. It said:
"2:45."
Thanks.
MIRELLA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Agh!!!!!!!!!!! We hate you!!!!!!
Now see, this created a problem. In a fit of madness the night before, Kristen and I had purchased standing room tickets to the Madonna concert in Budva, a Montenegrin town about 20 minutes away. Ever since we had gotten into the vicinity, locals kept asking us if we were here to see Madonna. We kept saying no. I can see her anytime at the Kabbalah Center on Robertson anyway. But finally one tzochke seller in Kotor told us that tickets were only 35 euro, and they weren't sold out. And we decided it would be AMAZING to see a Madonna concert in Montenegro. But now we had a problem. Today was Wednesday, and we needed to be in Italy no later than Saturday morning to see my brother. But we also wanted-needed-had come all this way to go to Croatia. So our plan was that we would go up to Dubrovnik Wednesday morning, spend all day, rent a car and drive back down to Budva on Thursday, see the Madonna concert, and then drive up to Split, Croatia on Friday in time to catch an afternoon train to Zagreb which would connect with an overnight train to Venice. Complicated?
Yes. So much so that this little adjustment threw a big wrench into our plans. We sat in the car rental place trying to figure out other options. I even have a page in my journal entitled "The Madonna Question" with four different possible scenarios. But when it came down to it, it was just too expensive to make it both to Croatia and back down to the concert. And there wasn't enough time.
I went back to the bank where we bought our tickets, and tried to sell them back. I was able to sell mine, but Kristen's was ripped so she was out of luck, they wouldn't take it. Who could we sell this ticket to? We hoisted our heavy backpacks up and walked across the square to an internet cafe.
It was our luck that we happened to sit down next to a Serbian high stakes poker player. Milos, as he is called, was playing online Hold Em, but was nonchalant enough that he could engage us in a chat. When we asked him if he wanted our ticket, to our delight and surprise he said yes! Subsequently, we had an awkward drink with Milos and his thug Serbian friends out in the square.
But then, luckily, it was time to go. So we said goodbye. Goodbye to Milos, goodbye to Kotor, goodbye to fucking Mirella and her father, and goodbye to the Madonna concert. We boarded our bus to Dubrovnik and were on our way.
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