Socializing

Most conversations are had over coffee. You'll either meet somewhere in the city or "skuhati kavu" at someone else's home (cook coffee). You can bring a little present when you visit someone at home, but if it's a close friend who you see frequently, a gift isn't really necessary.

When you arrive at someone's home after being invited, they will always offer you slippers. People will also anticipate that you'll have spare slippers for them if they come into your home, even though you're not required to wear them (although they'll be confused if you don't). In most cases, there are several various sizes of "guest slippers" in every home!

You can escape the slipper problem if you meet for coffee at a café, but there will usually be a "battle" over who gets to pay at the end of the meeting. When your gathering is over, someone will grab the receipt, and usually, the one who grabs the receipt first wins (and get to pay). The other person begs the winner to let him pay instead after the winner accepts the receipt, but the winner refuses. People enjoy treating their friends when they get together for coffee or a drink, so it's funny to observe this "receipt fight" every time.

However, it's important to note that you have the advantage of being able to cover the cost if you were the one who specifically organized the gathering and invited the other person. Another point is that making plans to meet up with friends is not too difficult in Croatia. A gathering need not be planned weeks in advance. Usually a day or two will do (and occasionally, gasp!, you can even make plans for later that day). If it's too far in advance, most people won't even firmly commit to anything. In the near future, they enjoy setting up coffee dates to see what else is going on in each other's life.