"An Afternoon in Budva" a Budva Travel Page by karenincalifornia

Budva is one of the most popular summer tourist spots for Serbs residing in other parts of Serbia and Montenegro. It has the right combination to be a coastal tourist destination - pleasant weather, seaside location, an old town, a beach - exactly the kind of place where you can expect to see wall to wall sun worshippers packed in like sardines on lounge chairs on the beach.

Our stay was brief. We passed through Budva on our way from Herceg-Novi down to Bar to catch the ferry that evening over to Bari, Italy. We wanted to spend some time in the old town, but we had a much more important mission, and that was to find more Serbian relatives.

We had the address of our relative in Budva and we knew he was expecting us because our Serbian speaking family members in the US called ahead to let him know of our arrival. We found the street without too much difficulty, but the numbering of the apartment buildings was a bit confusing.

A man roaming about the street noticed our confusion and came to our immediate aid. I thought, "Isn't this nice. The people of Budva are so helpful." We gave him the address and he took us right to our relative's home, and a woman answered the door.

To our chagrin, the woman was cordial but didn't seem overly welcoming. She showed us to a table on the patio, invited us to take a seat and offered us water -- a nice gesture, but we had bragged to our kids about all the food our Serb relatives lavished upon us in 1986, so they were expecting a bit more, who can blame them? We're not fluent in Serbian - ok, I'll be honest, we can hardly speak it. But, we did know that this woman, whom we thought was our relative, repeatedly shook her head firmly at the man and said "Nyeh, nyeh" ("No, no").

We were a bit bewildered at the cool reception and were beginning to think we were at the wrong address -- either that or we were intruding. My husband tried to intervene. He said in English to the woman, "We are Angelica's kumovi."

At that point, the woman threw up her hands, looked heavenward and cried "Angelica!" She disappeared and then returned with tray after tray of food, bottles of water, wine and lemonade, and relative after relative in tow (husband, daughter, son, daughter-in-law, cousin, more cousins, etc.)

After the man who brought us to the house was thanked and sent on his way. An English speaking relative cleared up the confusion.

The man who showed us the house was the Budvan version of a real estate broker who roams the streets looking for clients who are seeking apartments. He assumed we were looking for an apartment and told our relatives we were inquiring about a room at their place.

Our relatives, thinking we were mere apartment hunters kept telling the broker that essentially there was no room at the inn. As we learned, "Angelica" was the magic word, that told our relatives we were their long lost relatives who had come from the US to see them.

We thought it was funny how we got a glass of water when we were apartment hunters, but when we became relatives from the US, tray after tray of food appeared on the patio.

Moral of the story - if you are in Budva and are hungry, say the word "Angelica".