Let's Fly, Let's Fly Away to Skopje

I couldn't sleep the night before the trip (as usual), so it was no wonder that I woke up pretty sleepy and with a headache. I worked half the day and said my Goodbyes to my colleagues, before I packed all my stuff and dropped Aluna off at Marv's. She turned from being super tired from the hot weather to very agile when sensing I'd leave her there. She hates being separated from her just as much as I hate it. But I can't take her with me everywhere, not when traveling by plane anyway.
Everything worked out amazingly smooth, I caught my train, and it was on time, even 1 min early. Unbelievable, I know.
Flying with Lufthansa from Frankfurt is the easiest thing, honestly. When you enter the airport, you can just drop off your baggage on the right hand side where every wall is plastered with a huge yellow Lufthansa sign. It took me two minutes to get rid of the luggage and then I was free to roam the Terminal. So that just means that I went straight to the security check, and rightly so. It took me nearly an hour because I was queuing at a machine that was claimed to be broken when there were only two people left in front of me. So I had to re-queue, what threw me back at least twenty people. And just when there were again two people left in front of me, the old machine was working again and everyone behind me quickly re-queued yet again. It's really laughable tbh. I didn't mind too much, as I still had plenty of time. The last step before settling down was done in yet another minute, as I just had to scan my European passport and could go right through. No long queue there. I love the EU for that, honestly.
With nearly 2 hrs left before boarding, I watched the newest Polcevita video (finally a good show again that she's commenting on) and scrolled on Instagram until I saw all the latest shit about F1.
Boarding time came and went and nobody announced boarding. Half and hour later - 8 pm, when my flight should have taken off - they finally called out our flight. I'm way too German with such things. Really, I need the flight to be on time, I need to get my rental car today!
On the plane, I had the luck that the daughter of a Macedonian wanted to sit at the window, so that she and her dad switched to sit next to her sister and the mother sat next to me - with the middle seat free between us hehe.
In front of me sat another little girl that couldn't be older than six. I was admiring her beautiful thick, black lashes when I realized she was wearing mascara. And her nails were professionally made! She gets better treatment than me! Good for her, though. I'll do my nails again when I get back home. Or maybe it's so hot all the time that I'll flee in the air-conditioned realms of a nail studio and treat myself. Who knows.
After my ears hurt for at least 30 min, we finally landed in Skopje. The luggage took forever, and I was just constantly checking my watch, because the rental station would close in less than 10 min. Finally, I got my luggage and hurried out to the entrance hall. The voucher said I'd be picked up there. But nobody was there. Did they leave already? Shit. I got quite nervous and asked multiple people about someone with an AutoUnion sign, but nobody has seen anything. I finally decided to call the number that was on the voucher but it didn't work. I couldn't hear anything. I was about to give up and get myself a taxi when the number called me back. Yesss, they'd pick me up in 5. Awesome.
I quickly made a U-turn back to the rental car guy inside the airport whom I've just asked about the AutoUnion, and asked him whether he'd recommend changing money here. He just scoffed and shook his head. "They take 20% more than usual. Don't do it when you don't need to." That was definitely a very good piece of advice that I followed blindly.
Back outside, a car with a huge AutoUnion written across it arrived. The driver was nice and we chatted on the way to the rental station. I asked what I should definitely eat around here and he suggested Ajvar (already know that pretty well due to my dad liking it very much because of his childhood holidays in Croatia), and Tavce Gravce (speak Tavsche Gravsche). That is a vegan baked beans dish. I don't fancy baked beans that much, and especially not when it's like 40°C outside, but maybe I'd try it.
At the rental station, two absolutely adorable little puppys brought tears to my eyes in an instant, when I realized they were stray dogs. I didn't think that would be a problem here, bjt then again I didn't really prepare at all before coming here, so who am I to say that? I hate seeing stray dogs. I shortly played with the thought of just throwing the two dogs into my rental car, but I figured that wasn't going to end well. I'd never ever get my security deposit back if there were multiplying fleas in the seats, and the doggos would miss the street. And also...I couldn't take them back with me just like that. Instead, I settled to just pet them a bit. They were so friendly and cautious but yet very curious and sniffed my luggage for food immediately. The lighter one reminded me so much of Aluna (and Mila, the puppy in Egypt I adopted for the time being there), that my heart was crying rivers. I focused and went through the whole contract stuff for the car before jumping into the Opel Corsa. I love rental cars. They are always so new and fancy. This one connected to my phone immediately and I had my GPS and Spotify on the big display. That luxury I'll never have with my own car, but I most certainly appreciate it being on holidays.
The way to my first apartment, I had to tackle a few challenges. First of all, I had to pay Maut and didn't know and went through too far. So I had to reverse with this rather unfamiliar car the first time not in a wide open space - no. Rather in a very narrow space, another car behind me. Lovely.
But it was all good and the Maut only cost 65 cents.
The next challenge was that Google somehow brought me to the wrong address and so I had to reverse yet another time. This time though, it was not only narrow, but there was a cliff I could easily go down. In the middle of nowhere. Great.
These two challenges tackled, I finally arrived at the apartment. It was huge, but the air was stuffed. I immediately opened all windows, before I saw the air conditioning in the living room. My saviour. That on, I showered away the traveling of my body and then decided to sleep on the couch in the living room so I didn't need to sleep in the bedroom that was still way too warm. That was fine as well.Okumaya devam et