Every Friday in the summer (ends in October), Ljubljana hosts an open kitchen (Odprta Kuhna) in a central square near the daily open market. Like a food fest though weekly with known chefs (so I’m told). I did lunch and dinner here and am sitting enjoying the scene. Today was my use-up-my-tourist-card at museums day. And also take the bus and a boat ride and whatever else I can do … though it didn’t have an auspicious beginning. I decided to start at a farther away museum so I could take the bus. But my hosts actually told me the wrong direction — I didn’t ask the driver until after using my card but fortunately I have unlimited bus use so it didn’t matter. Of course the bus driver couldn’t understand my English or my attempt to pronounce the name of the stop in Slovenian but a woman sitting in the front figured out that I was about to go the wrong way. Honestly not that I would’ve cared much. Joy has convinced me it’s not a bad way to see the local town — just get on a bus or tram and see what you can see no matter where you go.

But I switched sides and waited awhile for the other bus (another #20 went in the opposite direction while I was waiting) — about 15 minutes more so not bad but it was semi-rush hour still and it seemed like every other bus went by at least once before mine. Oh well. It came eventually and I found the ride interesting. It looks more like Italy to me as you go out to the suburbs. The walk was short to the museum. Which btw is called the Museum of Architecture and Design (MOA). It was in an old castle with a park on the side and a river and bridge nearby.

Very pretty though you can’t see much in the photo with the morning fog and this isn’t the building of course. They had a totally full small parking lot. So imagine my surprise when upon walking in I find there really isn’t much of anything there. It was an exhibit on water use and abuse (“Living with Water”) — and a “very small” (the receptionist’s words) exhibit on book jackets. So small I walked right past the room it was held in and when I was clearly wandering in the administrative area, a worker asked me what I was looking for and helped me find the small room.

I did find this map interesting (back in the water exhibit). If you can see it. It shows how many castles were all over the place here. It made me think of Scotland. I guess they also had a lot of clans jockeying for land and power? Anyway I asked the receptionist on the way out if this was in fact the museum of Architecture and Design and she looked a little apologetic and said “we’re changing” but I’m not sure if that means exhibits or the purpose of the museum?

I think I spent less time in the museum than waiting for the bus (considering I waited for two). Or for each of the bus rides I took to/from there. But since I’m a bit obsessed with public transportation, it was all fine. And the sun came out as I returned to Ljubljana center.

I actually took the infamous dragons bridge so here’s my obligatory shots.

And I had my aforementioned open kitchen lunch. I looked at every single booth and (sorry my non-pig eating friends), happily chose a pork dish that was literally being carved from the middle section of a fullly intact (small) pig — head, hooves and all. I asked for extra crispy skin! (The guy was surprised but loaded me up with pork belly and skin). Yum. People were taking photos but I forebore (oh no pun intended but tee hee). I figured this description would gross out enough of you without the photo.

I also tried a traditional Slovenian dessert (potica) although this had untraditional filling (it’s an egg dough rolled cake typically served on holidays and with a nut-butter and idk what else filling). But mine had coconut and something orange as the filling. Since I don’t like coconut I wasn’t thrilled but have to say it wasn’t terrible. The bread is good.

Anyway then I headed to the house/studio of Ljubljana’s favorite hometown architect, Joze Plecnik. Who I mentioned yesterday as the designer of many of the bridges and buildings here. He did this national library as well (the back building with weird stones popping out of the red brick?) Honestly I don’t like his style. He was trained in Vienna and had a practice there then was poached to be a professor of architecture in Prague and later again in Ljubljana when they started a university here. He won a ton of awards. But they had a timeline showing his life events against what was going on in the world and he was contemporary to Wright, Le Corbusier, Eames (and Mackintosh though they didn’t feature him in the timeline) — and I strongly preferred everyone else’s stuff to his. It’s heavy looking, very linear, and just not pretty. It’s functional looking. He likes to use concrete so it’ll last. And heavy dark woods. And straight lines I’d say. What I did like was when he took existing things (like the Prague castle, Triple Bridge, and Roman wall ruins here) and reinforced them/made them more useful and stronger and even prettier while not losing the original look. But his originals were pretty bleh to me.

His house on the other hand was interesting. He actually created a turret for himself since he always wanted to live in one (don’t know why we don’t see curves in his designs but maybe I’m missing something). And he designed the furniture/floors using leftover pieces of marble, granite, and concrete from other jobs (like even unused headstones) — gotta love his reuse! — or really cheap local lumber. He was an ascetic. He purposely took cold baths, made his bed too short and took cushions off his chairs so he wouldn’t be too comfortable. He wouldn’t have relationships with women (or men) because he didn’t want any distractions from his work. You can admire the passion even if I’m not crazy about his results.All I have is this photo of the garden and the back of the house. It was a working garden even back then. And the structure in the middle with the blue and yellow doors is for bees and honey, which is a big thing here.

Next was another boat ride. It was literally on my walk back toward the center and of course included with my card. This one was a nicer boat and captain — and the weather was better (as was my seat) though the ride is the same. This time I caught some of how the locals used the water — and maybe better shots of the Franciscan church with the triple bridge in the foreground. Plus of course the dragons bridge in silhouette.

Actually I also took some photos of how people really seem to enjoy being outside here. There are tables and umbrellas and pathways along both sides of the river.

Anyway you get the idea. It’s a really pretty city. But next I went to 3 (yes 3) museums. I feel like Slovenia’s approach to museums is exactly opposite to Scotland’s. Whereas Scotland had huge buildings with 10,000 mixed items in it, Slovenia seems to have an individual large building (though not large exhibit space) with just one main concept in each. They have three modern buildings on a square — their ethnographic, museum of Slovenia, and contemporary art; while the first two had signs posted in English, the supporting text was typically in Slovenian only. In the museum of Slovenia there was literally a gallery just on chairs and candlesticks. Or one on metalworks (including guns and armor). Or on children’s toys (which ended with an IBM PC that I’m still wondering about — hardly a child’s toy but not that I could read the sign?!). I’m not sure things were the highest quality either. It was sort of like being at a flea market with tons of stuff — but the buildings and displays were actually impressively modernized (lights turn on as you walk up to displays). Anyway, I may visit more museums tomorrow but I don’t have incredibly high expectations about them!

And that’s the end of day 2!