Ovo Je Balkan

Well. What a week. I had a fantabulous time on my holidays until they took a somewhat dramatic twist towards the end (if you just want the twist feel free to skip to the end right now but I'll warn you now that there are VAGINAS AND HAEMOGOBLINS APLENTY). In fact you might just want to skip this post altogether, it's just me gloating about all the mountains I've seen and all these unmentionable things that have been happening to my body.

Anyway. Let's talk about the nice stuff first. My journey started in BELGRADE, here I am posing by the fortress. This was taken by some random Serbian girls I got talking to, in fact I think I got talking to most people in the entirety of Serbia, it's the most ridiculously friendly nation in the universe. Belgrade is amazing. Apart from when I followed a strange old German man into the basement of a really posh hotel, that was just bizarre. He wanted to take me to Switzerland. I wasn't quite so enthusiastic.

And here I am on top of Zemun tower in the suburbs. I had to get on a packed bus to get here but luckily the over enthusiastic bus driver took care of me and gave me excellent directions that meant I didn't have to walk up a hill. AND WE ALL KNOW HOW MUCH I HATE HILLS!!! And he refused to let me pay. Yesss. More dinars to spend on CAKE AND GRILLED MEAT. Which is all they eat in the Balkans as far as I can ascertain...

Then it was off to Montenegro for a little rest by the sea. I went on a sleeper train and shared a (very small) compartment with 5 middle aged women who fed me homemade cakes and plums and nuts for the whole journey which was very enjoyable but I am also now obese. And I mean obese. That was a lot of cake. I no longer have arteries. They all laughed at me because I was too scared to sleep on the top bunk without the special security belts. When I got there there I explored Stari Bar which is completely stunning as well as going for a nice paddle in the sea and being licked to death by a dog. And I trod on a tape measure and may have ruined some poor university student's coursework. SORRY IF THAT WAS YOU.

Third on the list was Kosovo. A train from Bar to Podgorica, a bus to Pec then another bus to Pristina. After being stared at very inquisitively at the border by the Kosovan guards I was finally let in AND we didn't drive over any landmines!!! I gave a little girl on the bus a lollypop and as she got off she blew me a kiss and it was the CUTEST THING EVER... I think I may have had my first ever maternal feeling. There is love in this cold heart of mine!

When I got to Pristina I made a beeline for all the museums and I was the only person in all of them. In the Kosovan history museum I got talking to one of the security guards who insisted that I go behind the ropes for this photo with my fave piece of religious art, much to my protestation. YOU DON'T GO BEHIND THE ROPE. That breaks every rule I've ever been taught! But if a motherfucking Kosovan security guard tells you to get behind the rope you GET BEHIND THE ROPE understood?

I must admit it was a little weird for me being in Kosovo. Mainly because of how much people stared at me, I had to go back to my hotel at one point because I just couldn't bear it! I think it was a strange combination of me looking weird anyway, being a foreign tourist and having a Cyrillic tattoo that made them look so much but I couldn't really handle it. I still loved the place though. A lot of people talked about politics to me though, telling me all about the Serbs. And how much they love James Blunt. I'm not kidding, I had three different conversations about how bloody James Blunt is a national hero over there (he apparently served in the Kosovan war) which is totally bizarre as he's a complete joke in England. Oh well.

I also visited a monastery in a Serbian enclave which is supposedly really dangerous but I had no trouble at all. One of the nuns could speak English perfectly and it was lovely to talk to her. It was like talking to my complete opposite!

Then there was one last bus over the border into Macedonia. Another beautiful country but jesus christ it was hot. And I mean HOT. And of course it's another one of those countries where all the women look perfect and I'm just there sweating and panting like a perv in a bush. I spent a lot of time in the Ottoman old town (see below photo) looking at old stuff with a friend. And being at the top of a big hill. I seem to have spent a lot of the past week up hills and tall things. I like tall things. HAPPYSTANZE.

And then I went on a plane and I was back on beautiful English soil. BUT. I have yet to tell you the underlying story beneath all of these tales...

(I will do another warning here: there is a lot more lady talk here than ever before. LADY THINGS BEWARE)

It's about three weeks ago. As we all know I have a somewhat compromised immune system (plus I take HRT) so I am a thrush case waiting to happen. Until now I have managed to avoid the dreaded thrush of my nightmares but my poor little vagina was taken over. So, you know, I ignored it for a little while in the hope my body would man up and fight the evil Mr Thrush but to no avail. Eventually I went to the doctors and got the appropriate treatment and all was well again in the land of my vagina. Happy sexy vagina.

But not for long. As you know I was overjoyed when my periods stopped after my transplant (I can have sex ALL MONTH, woohoo) and had pretty much forgotten what they were like. But the day before I went on holiday I started bleeding quite heavily. WHAAA? HOW? WHY? My reproductive side is supposed to be as dead as a doorknob. Of course, I was in the holiday mood so I thought I'd sort it when I got home but then when I was out there I started getting nosebleeds too. So basically bleeding from most of my orifices (jeez, I am so attractive) which doesn't sound like much but for someone with my medical history it's actually quite worrying. Silly blood.

I phoned up hospital from Skopje (at a TOTALLY REASONABLE price of £2 a minute, thanks 3) who were very concerned and told me to go to A&E and find an English speaking doctor immediately and get some blood taken to make sure I wasn't actually dying. But of course, I was in Macedonia and the thought of going to a Macedonian hospital really wasn't very tempting, the main reason being that scam they pull where they see a foreigner with insurance and keep them in hospital for as long as possible to make a fortune out of them. Plus it was very vague as to whether I was insured/ok to go, I mean, I wasn't really ill (I know my body, as we all know) so I wasn't in any danger but in Macedonia emergency care is free but I wasn't sure if I was an emergency and also didn't feel like gambling that. So I was a cancer rebel and talked them into letting me go straight to A&E when I got back to England. Mysteriously though the bleeding stopped very abruptly yesterday, just all of a sudden. It's all very weird!

But yeah, off to A&E I trotted, the nearest hospital was the University College Hospital near Euston station in London. A whole new hospital, how exciting! They said they could tell I'd been in hospital a lot because I'd brought lunch. It was a bit odd because the lady in the bay next to me appeared to be dying of kidney failure and I'm sat next door scoffing beef rolls and reading Things Fall Apart. Which my very handsome young blood doctor complimented me on. I was in there for quite a while as all these various medical folk scratched their heads, it's all a bit mysterious really. My HB was obviously a little down because of all the blood I've lost but no one seems to know why. But the basic message was good, there were no dramatic changes in my bloods.

Ergh. Here I am in my ever sexy hospital gown doing my grumpy face again:

So now I have to wait until tomorrow morning and phone up my normal hospital and probably go there to see if they can shed any light on the situation. The general feeling is that it's nothing to do with the thrush treatment and probably nothing to do with my HRT either. It's kind of confusing because it could be nothing but it could also be quite serious. Probably nothing though. I don't even need my womb, why must it be such a pain? As long as I have a fanny and a stomach, that's all I need. The rest is superfluous.

Plus you can imagine how awkward it was trying to explain this to my boss on the phone. Yes, I have been in hospital with... blood problems. Very vague blood problems. Please don't ask questions. I really don't want to talk to a middle aged man about my lady parts.

But yeah, that's everything. Sorry for all the talk of less than pleasant things. That's just how the cancer rolls!

Constanze :) xXxXx

P.s You'll also be pleased to know that I had to sit a test to see if my hospital visit was related to excessive alcohol consumption and I am definitely not heading for rehab. I scored 3/25, mainly on the question about whether my drinking hurts other people because I do sometimes throw soft furnishings at friends when I'm a little inebriated. Oh dear.

P.p.s I think I may have very briefly been on some form of Serbian TV. Something was happening about a mayor and I was wandering around with my map in the background then I noticed a lot of cameras pointed at me. I can't be left anywhere unsupervised!

P.p.p.s I've been awake since 1AM. Whywhywhy.

P.p.p.p.s I'm sure I'll think of more things that happened and write about them later but right now I am hungry and tired and confused.

P.p.p.p.p.s I've also caught a bit cold and I am making a lot of snot. It seems my innards really do want to become outards!

P.p.p.p.p.p.s I also had a couple of inverted T waves on my variuous ECGs which is odd. As my heart is healthy they're not going to investigate but it's just so very odd. Oh, me and my mental body!