Sunny Christmas in Zagreb, Croatia but everything’s closed

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Christmas Day on a long-term backpacking trip: nothing calls for improvisation more than that. I’m not a big Christmas celebrator in general but I thought it was exciting to spend a day in a city I don’t know well at all – Zagreb, Croatia, where Masayo and I arrived two days ago – where everything was closed and the few people outside were in a good mood. Although we didn’t exchange any presents, Santa brought me something: great after-dinner blood sugars.

Morning: no BG check

The day actually began early: not because I wanted to go check the tree for presents – we had neither – but because I was low. I didn’t even bother to check my blood sugar; it was one of those unmistakable, “eat quickly” ones. The chocolate cookies were tasty.

Later when we woke up for real and had breakfast, I assumed my BG was ok and again didn’t check. Masayo made eggs and bacon in our private kitchen at our full apartment room at Apartman Lilly, and again we had cereal and milk on the side.

Simple and delicious: my kind of meal.

In the spirit of doing little on Christmas Day, we hung around the apartment and didn’t go outside until about 1:00 pm, with a bag of sandwiches Masayo had made plus some fruit. Picnic time!

Xmas picnic in the park

Zagreb was again cold and sunny and clear, just like yesterday when half the things were closed for Christmas Eve and we went ice-skating. We went back to the same park as yesterday afternoon, but while the little stalls were still there they were now all closed. The guitar-playing Santa was gone too; just a few families with dogs were walking around in the bare, sunny afternoon.

For the first time today I checked my BG here – a little high at 218. Annoying. I took my Humalog and we had our picnic on a bench. It was just warm enough to sit and eat but not for too long.

With no plan and no desires we walked slowly at random around Zagreb, ending up at the outdoor skating rink again. Here on Christmas Day they were open but we didn’t go – I had nothing left to prove anyway after getting the hang of the basics (finally) yesterday.

And that was about it. We went back home, past fountains (still operational here in late December), Zagreb’s large old buildings, tumbledown but affectionately tended to sidewalks and wide, empty streets.

Christmas night at “home”

My blood sugar at 4:00 pm was 174 – only one reading over 200 today so far, and that one wasn’t high by much. Dinner later on was fried ham and cheese crepes plus instant soup and a biscuit. Glad we stocked up at the supermarket yesterday because it was closed today.

I started typing in the Croatian from the food package into Google Translate and it said we were eating “girl pancakes with ham and orphans”. Hey, always try the local cuisine at least once.

I tried to take enough Humalog at dinner, but was nervous because I’m nearly always high before bedtime no matter what I do. I shy away from really large doses, but maybe I do need to increase them somewhat.

Today I had some yuletide luck with my diabetes – at 9:00 pm I was 141. That boded well, but would it actually hold? I played an album called Little Drummer Boy on my MacBook and we just took it easy in a large, quiet city that was like a big winter pillow today.

I was a perfect 110 at 11:30 pm. That’s a bit too perfect for before bed, so I had a small cookie to bolster it a little. But that’s three nights in four days where my post-dinner BGs have been much better than the 300+ readings I was always having in the earlier parts of this trip.

Maybe I’ve really turned a corner.

Otherwise Christmas Day was really just a nice day off for Masayo and I; we listened to Christmas music and had a stroll around Zagreb and a mini-picnic. Everything being closed forced us to get into the spirit of being closed ourselves. We’ve been traveling around Europe at a speedy pace and it’s refreshing to have a complete and total day off. No shopping, no planning, no presents, no high blood sugars (nearly).

Actually, I’d wake up the next day with an awful and high blood sugar, but I didn’t know that tonight. So for now: Ho ho ho! Thanks Zagreb. Merry Christmas y’all, from a traveling diabetic in Croatia.

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