Spomenik Knezu Mihailu

This saga all came about because I made a decision when I was annoyed, made a decision on the spot and had other people's opinions influencing my decisions. Three things that I try never ever do. And it has literally came back to bite me on the arse L

When I arrived in Belgrade I came to my hostel, which to be fair was a good hostel. It is located right in the city, it was very modern, clean, open, but it just didn’t have an character or feel to it. Maybe because I’d spent almost 10 days with the same people in Macedonia, in hostels that had a homey feel, and I was missing it.

But the door on our dorm wasn’t shutting and it let light in and people who wanted to drink had nowhere to sit and be loud, so it was all inside and the noise radiated. Very annoying!

I made the decision when I arrived in Belgrade to cancel my trip to Slovenia as it was much cheaper here, not being on the Euro and I wanted more time out of the schengen Visa.

But where to stay, where to stay. Having had a number of conversations in Macedonia with different people bragging that they didn’t stay in hostels because they wanted the local feel and generally made me feel like I was missing out, I decided to look into Airbnb. I’d had a great experience when I was in Lyon and thought it might be similar.

And I’d only selected that hostel because guys in Macedonia recommended it to me, so I didn’t look too hard as it appeared that all of Belgrade was pretty booked out anyway. Wrong decision. Always do you own research and then make your decision.

I found someone who had great reviews and decided that it would be ok to pay a little bit more to have my own room and bathroom. It was cheaper then what I would’ve paid for a 3 bed dorm in Slovenia.

But then the hostel started to warm on me, the people weren’t that bad, I got used to the kitchen and made some good friends on the walking tour and pub crawl. But I couldn’t get out of the Airbnb booking, so I packed up my belongings on Thursday morning and headed to the suburbs.

It was not a 10 min bus ride as per the listing it was 30 mins and I had to pay for public transport, something I’d over looked as in my booking. I wasn’t paying for when I stayed right in the city, so this was an additional cost I hadn’t accounted for.

When I got to the place and lugged my bag up 3 flights of stairs. The house was modern and clean, the owners smoked in the house – a point I didn’t notice properly in my haste to book – and my room was up another flight of stairs.

There wasn’t a welcoming feel that I’d had in Lyon. It was weird. And for two days all the owners did was sit on the couch, smoke and watch TV. These people were young, why they didn’t have jobs or a social life was beyond me.

So I sooked most of the day regretting my decision to come out to the suburbs and watched back to back episodes of season 4 of The Great British Bake Off – fav new show!!

I bought some groceries to prevent additional money spending, and cooked up a storm in the kitchen. All the while the owners sat behind me smoking and watching TV. Not very social at all.

On Friday morning I woke up with renewed energy. I was going to see the Tesla Museum today and head into the city to look for a few cool bars I had looked up. But then I started to itch and I realised that I had lots of little welts over my legs, and as the day progressed they got bigger and more appeared and they were more itchy.

I raised it with the owner who said it was mosquitos because of the heat. Mozzies don’t come out at the heat mate, they come out when it’s rained and it’s muggy and they have all these little waterholes to live in. And I hadn’t seen one mozzie here at all. It hadn’t rained and it wasn’t even muggy!

Unconvinced I decided to sleep on the couch in my room, but no longer had I had 2 hours sleep and I was awake with more bites. So at 2am I packed up my bags and watched Bake Off whilst sitting on the floor and I eventually slept on the floor.

I had breakfast in the morning, wrote a response to the host – who wasn’t even in the country at the time – that I was leaving because of the bites and could I have a refund for the night I wasn’t staying there and left.

Having found a hostel at 2 in the morning for E7 I headed there. It was near my first hostel and I was immediately very happy to be back in the centre. I got a message from the host apologising and assuring me it wasn’t bedbugs, even though I saw a chemist the day before who said it probably was.

She agreed to give me a refund for the Friday night, so I had to go back to the house and get the money, which was fine.

My hostel on the other hand was not that fine. The bathrooms was soaking, the doors were so waterlogged on the shower that you couldn’t shut the door properly, which is not helpful when guys and girls all share the same shower room. There wasn’t enough lockers in my room for all the people, 12 beds, 10 lockers and the kitchen was just a microwave with a very cool kettle that was dirty as.

On top of all that I feel like I have now wasted my time in Belgrade. Even though I probably would’ve been bored by the Saturday if I’d stayed in the city and spent the time wishing I’d done the Airbnb.

So now, I’m itchy, I’ve a cream that isn’t really working and my ankle feels like it’s swelling. And I’m worried that because I haven’t had time to wash my clothes that the bugs might be in my bag.

The irony of the whole thing is that I decided to stay in Serbia because it was cheaper. But between the Airbnb room, public transport, and creams for my leg I’ve probably spent the same amount if I’d gone to Slovenia as planned. So much for a cheap stay.

Lesson of the day, don’t listen to other people, don’t make decisions when you’re annoyed and don’t make them on the spot. If I have to, draw up a very comprehensive pros and cons list – argh!!!!!

The other thing I learnt is that if you don’t have a good host, it ends up being nothing more then a room to rent. All my questions about transport, things to see, what to do that I throw at all the hostels didn’t appear to be appropriate, which in the end is the whole point of staying with a local to get that inside knowledge. Sigh.Read more