Friday Column - Croatia, The Week In Review 9

Apologies for the lack of a Thursday column this week – lifestyle temporarily on hold during a busy week in the UK!

News this week comes from London.

1. Learning Croatian

As regular readers are aware, there is a great Croatian language school in West London, for those that need lessons. Click on the link at the top of this page for more information. If self study is more your style then you may be interested to know that there is a new publication by Routledge called Colloquial Croatian. The pack consists of a book, cd’s and tapes and is written by Celia Hawkesworth, who published a similar book a few years ago. It aims to give you a good grasp of conversational Croatian by the time you’ve finished. Compared with the book I have, published by the Croatian Centre for Foreign Languages, it proceeds at a rapid pace but it’s bang up to date. I found just one copy, at a central London Waterstones, priced at £26.53, but it’s been published in England, USA and Canada.

2. Croatians in London

I picked up a free magazine at Northfields tube station called Fusion, the magazine for Central and Eastern Europeans in London, and was surprised to find that although Slovenia was in, Croatia wasn’t. Maybe the border between the two countries is where South East Europe starts and Central and Eastern Europe finishes. Still, I’ve asked the question.

3. Croatian Visitors to London

It's good news that the visa requirement was recently dropped for Croatian visitors to London. Not such good news that it seems at some airports (Luton was mentioned) Croatian arrivals seem to be being singled out for extra searches and questions. I would imagine that Croatian visitors to England would be amongst the best behaved of all global visitors and it doesn’t do entente cordiale any good at all if they are discriminated against in this way, so please let Croatians pass through entry requirements like any other “non visa” citizens.

4. Croatia Airlines in London

We’ve commented before about the relatively high cost of flying to London with Croatia Airlines. What I didn’t know was that the airline has, for some time, been singled out for a significantly higher rate of tax to land at Heathrow than most other European countries. It appears that persistent lobbying, over many years, has now been successful and the rate will be reduced to the “normal” level, though not till the end of the year.

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Today's photo is of a street light in Pučisca on Brac Island, made of the local white stone. I'm still waiting for an answer from the New York Times as to why they believe that, contrary to so many other reports, the White House was built from stone from Maryland and Virginia, rather than Brac, Croatia. For more details see April 1st posting - yes that part of it was true!

I’ll be back in Croatia on Saturday though I hear the weather forecast is not good so, if you spend a wet Bank Holiday Weekend in England, take comfort that you've probably not missed better weather elsewhere.

Wednesday Column - Croatia Business 9: Business on The Web

As a visitor to Croatia, not fully familiar with the workings of the entire media and information systems, I have had to do much of my research on the web. As a freelance writer this can be very frustrating when sometimes what you really want to do is pick up the phone, talk to a human being and get some straight answers. Again, not speaking the language fluently is an obstacle, although I must applaud the Croatian Nation for its tolerance for those who automatically assume that the Croatian at the end of the phone is bound to speak English like a native. I try not to do that but it’s easy to take the Croatian propensity for languages for granted

Earning a living from the written word and spending three years only scratching the communication surface in Croatia has made me realise just how difficult it must be for a small country with a language that is not widely spoken outside the country. The Dutch appreciated this a long time ago and became masters of foreign languages, whilst retaining the integrity of their own. Croatia is getting there fast but the web has to be one of the best tools for marketing to foreigners and it’s still surprising to see that there are a number of large and/or government sites that do not have English pages yet. This means that searches on most things Croatian will normally take you to a UK site.

There are some notable exceptions to this, for example the Croatian Chamber of Commerce, the National Statistical office, some of the Ministries and certain Croatian News Organisations. However it’s still difficult to source anything a little out of the ordinary and although Croatia Telecoms has a Telephone Directory service on the web in English, it’s not comprehensive and the categories are hard to identify. So, for the time being, the locals have the advantage in knowing where the specialist shops are tucked away and hearing about sale opportunities on the grapevine.

Tuesday Column - Croatia Tourism 9: Marketing Policy?

As of this week, I’ve made it one of my immediate goals to find out what Croatian policy is on marketing its Tourism industry. It’s a big mistake, as a visitor in any foreign country, to think that your country automatically does it better. Certainly England hasn’t had to cope with all the upheavals and changes that Croatia has in the past decade or so, but “could do better” might go on the school report.

What struck me most, on my arrival at Gatwick on Saturday, was the feast of advertising and literature available as you walk through the airport. Even as a native of London, arriving at any of its International airports revitalises you. It’s a public show that says “you won’t be bored or disappointed here”. Contrast that with cosy Split Airport where there’s very little on display.

Zagreb has long since started to flaunt its wares but Dalmatia seems to be a little laid back. Yes the water is crystal clear and the islands are lovely but the tourism industry is so competitive that effective marketing and market research must be the key.

Time Out’s Magazine for Visitors to Croatia, in the newsagents worldwide in May, must surely be helping in many respects. We may be a little biased, having worked with Time Out over the last couple of months, but their approach and organisation are like a breath of fresh air. There were a few enlightened players that seized the Time Out opportunity very quickly and should do well with the new audience they will gain, but what about the rest of the industry and where is the government leading it? Who’s going to galvanise the troops in the right direction to ensure Croatia capitalises on its natural assets and moves with the times? We’re trying to find out!

Monday Column - Croatia Destinations 9: Split Airport

Ok, I know that Split Airport is not where you want to spend a week's holiday but if it's your first time in Croatia, the arrival airport will create some lasting first impressions and may set the tone for the rest of your holiday. It's also indicative of what you might expect from the rest of the region.

There are several good points about the airport:

1. It's in the centre of things - a 15 minute drive north west will get you to the beautiful Unesco town of Trogir and a 20 minute drive in the opposite direction will get you into Split.

2. The airport is small and cosy. If you've parked a car there, you can walk straight to it and it won't cost an arm an a leg to park it safely for a few days. The small size has its disadvantages however, particularly in the high season.

3. It has an adequate restaurant and bar on the first floor and also has a newsagent, bank, information desk, a few car hire kiosks, some cash points and a post office.

4. If you have to wait there for a bit you can take a fifteen minute walk to a lovely beach.

5. The duty free in international departures is good, especially for local products, but smokers be aware that there are no official smoking corners once you get to departures.

6. Checking in and getting through security normally takes about 10 minutes so you never need more than an hour except perhaps in July and August. You will need to make allowances for the traffic though, getting to the airport in the high season

On the downside

1. When it's busy, it can be a nightmare to try and park or even drive through the airport amongst all the coaches.

2. The information desk is very helpful but there's not much literature generally available.

3. Coaches into Split are based around Croatian Airlines timetables so if you are reliant on public transport you will have to get a local bus, into Split or Trogir, just outside the airport. Airport side of the road for Trogir, sea side of the road for Split. The buses have a lot of stops to make so it can take a while and the buses may be jammed if your arrival coincides with school starting or finishing.

4. If you arrive very early or late, all the car hire desks and almost everything else may be closed.

5. It can take an age to get through passport control.

6. The national departures lounge is too small for a whole plane load so go through security early if you want a seat while you're waiting.

7. If there's a delay, the ground staff are not really geared up to deal with the logistics. I had a 23 hour delay on a BA flight last year and the ground staff told the passengers to find their own overnight accomodation as everywhere was fully booked!

Split Airport reminds me very much of Malaga airport 25 years ago. It will surely have to undertake some major development to cope with the increasing traffic and it's difficult to see how it can expand much on its present site so it may well have to relocate. Selfishly, I rather hope that they take a few more flights to the more remote Zadar airport, two hours drive away.

For more information on Split Airport, visit www.split-airport.hr

Friday Column - Croatia, The Week In Review 8

Apologies for a fairly minimalistic week of news and views on Croatia Online this week. The Easter break has taken its toll! Next week we should be back to full strength.

Tourism

There’s been no sign of an influx of Easter tourists down here in Split though I suppose that’s because the new low cost flights don’t start until early May. It will be interesting to see if the infrastructure can cope with a large number of early independent travellers, rather than the more normal huge influx of peak season package holiday makers.

External Debt

In the first two months of 2006, Croatia's external debt has increased by 700 million euros to reach a total of just over 26 billion. The central bank maintains that the situation is still under control but if the trend was to continue, there could be a debt crisis as debt would reach 86% of GDP against a tolerance figure of 80%. The Finance Minister, Ivan Suker suggested that the rise was only of concern if it was not a result of the introduction of new technologies. It was reported that the latest measure of a 55 percent tax on new foreign loans seems to have slowed down the trend!

Next week we will be in the UK, looking at the Croatian perspective from that angle, and trying to catch up with the aftermath of the Croatia Exclusive Exhibition.

Thursday Column - Croatia Lifestyle 8: Croatian Language - Months of the Year

I’ve been putting off learning the months of the year in Croatian for a while now, mostly because the words are quite difficult for an English speaker to remember. However I have now finally cracked it with the help of constant repetition and the most bizarre hybrid mnemonic that you could imagine. I felt I should share it with you, for what it’s worth, but if anyone has a better one please let me know.

My mnemonic is SVOT SLS KORULIS STUD PRO – almost as difficult to remember as the month’s themselves! This is how it works:

Siječanj
Veljača
Ožujak
Travanj
Svibanj
Lipanj
Serpanj
KOlovoz
RUjan
LIStopad
STUDeni
PROsinac

Sounds complicated and my Croatian teacher told me this evening that, in her teaching courses, she learnt that it was easy to remember with mnemonics but easy to forget as well. Still, at least I passed the test!!

I also learnt that the words for the months were very descriptive and will be expanding further on this in a future posting.

Wednesday Column - Croatia Business 8: Business Environment in Perspective

Recent research carried out by the UK Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), ranks Croatia 47th out of 82 listed countries for the attractiveness of its business environment and its appeal to foreign investors. Factors included political and economic stability, transparency, tax system, labour market and financial infrastructure. Denmark was 1st, followed by Finland, Canada, Singapore, Netherlands, Ireland, Great Britain and the USA. Neighbours Slovenia took 31st place, with Serbia and Montenegro in 61st place. Bosnia and Herzegovina didn't make the "top" 82. The full report will be out next month.