You Don’t Need to Wait Until You Have the So-Called “Perfect Life” to Enjoy Yourself

Lessons from a sausage festival in deepest Croatia

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I love to observe people. It makes for interesting stories and tidbits to squeeze into articles like this one.

I spent this weekend observing a lot of people in deepest Croatia - central Istria to be precise - at a local sausage festival. I was there to help make a 333-meter-long sausage. There me and my friends were with a rabble of burly butchers from the village, buckets of sausage meat, and a small sausage machine. Around us were hundreds of people watching the spectacle.

Image credit: Jose Alfonso Cussianovich

Friends, I won’t lie, it was the most fun I’ve had in ages. Some would say it was the most fun you can have with a sausage (yes, the puns were plentiful and they got dirtier as the night wore on).

The festival was huge. Hundreds of people flooded to this tiny village - and to the monastery where we were making said sausage - to eat, drink and enjoy themselves like only Croatians can.

There was beer. There was Rakija, the Croatian national spirit. Cheese. Sausage. And singing. Lots and lots of singing. The festival went on until 4 am (although I only managed until midnight).

I watched everyone, from the butchers to the Croatian grandmas to the kids who came to watch the live band late into the evening to the local farmers. And in Europe, you can people-watch with abandon because, unlike in my UK homeland, no one cares if you stare at them for minutes at a time.

After watching people partake in this incredible show of hospitality, generosity, and fun in the tiny village of Sveti Petar u Šumi, one thought rumbled around my noggin again and again.

You don’t need to wait until you have the so-called “perfect life” to enjoy yourself.

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What does our society tell us the perfect life looks like? In my experience, much of it looks like the OG American Dream, regardless of if you live in the. US or elsewhere.