The Kitchen With No Counter (At All)

So there I am standing in a stan that we found in the private for-sale listings at Halo Oglasi. It's already feeling much smaller than the advertised 80 meters because (a) it's a very old building so all the walls between rooms are like a foot thick* (b) there are many small rooms, and (c) the stan-owner, his adult children, and my own entourage are all there as well.

But the kitchen feels unusually small. In fact, it's really more of a closet with the door taken off. When I stand still in the middle, my winter coat is grazing all of the three remaining walls. And something seems to be missing. Can't put my finger on it.... Sink, check. Fridge, check. Stove, check. Wait a minute, where's the counter? I spin around in a circle looking. No, no counter whatsoever. Not even an itsy bitsy one.

The stan owner sees me looking confused and volunteers the information that the kitchen used to be much bigger in its original position where a large round table now sits outside the closet. But he decided to renovate to make things better.

A while later I ask seemingly apropos of nothing, is he married? Why no. He has no wife. How ever did I know?

*Footnote: My husband does the math and figures out later that those thick walls took a solid 10-14 meters of space from the inside of the stan. Something to consider when you are paying per square meter!