Day 58 Monday 18 July 2016

A lazy 7.30am start & after another nice breakfast Katica is off for a walk to the hospital for an 8.30am appointment for more therapy on her arm. I collect a couple of large 6 litre plastic bottles & went for a walk to get some fresh drinking water from the community fresh water faucets. The reticulated water from the taps is artesian bore water & looks, smells & tastes bad, although it is safe to drink we have been assured. Having a shower & cleaning teeth is an interesting experience. The fresh water faucets provide filtered & clean non-smelling drinking water & I have noticed a couple of these outlets around the city centre where most of the population is in multi-story buildings, built in the communist era. There is a steady procession of people carrying large plastic bottles to & from the faucets. There are 5 outlets at the water faucets & it is only a steady trickle that drops into the bottles, the more people using, the slower the water drips. I get the 5^th faucet, the less productive one & stand for ages, it takes around 20 minutes to fill 6 litres. The 2^nd bottle takes slightly less as by the time it gets around ¾ full I am the only one left & the water trickles out a lot faster. People are collecting water all day & well into the night, mostly on bicycles & others walking. I don’t notice anyone pulling up in a car, not that there are too many places to park close by. It really gives me a better appreciation of the fresh clean water out of the taps in Canberra.

The fresh water needs done, we go for a walk around the shops & try for some free WiFi again to try & catch up on emails, bills, Facebook, etc & manage to find a spot with reasonable reception from Serb Telecom that gives 15 minutes free. After the phone runs out of time I use the tablet until it too runs out of time. We do also manage to use Viber & WhatsApp to talk to cousin Bela for a little to arrange our Budapest arrival on Thursday. Then an ice-cream treat, for a change.

Lunch is a delicious feast of bean soup with paprika, garlic chicken breast, cucumber salad & fresh bread from Itabej, interesting that the baker in Itabej sells bread in Kikinda. Siesta time again after such a big lunch, I am getting used to this. A longer walk to Evike’s house this afternoon for the chook check, this time through a large park full of mature trees & people running around a jogging track & kids playing. Another ice-cream along the way, this time 70 Dinar for a double scoop, around 50 cents Australian.

Tereza & Katica spend all night (not all night only half of the night) talking about family & writing notes about family trees & end up exhausted around 11.30pm. Another great day.