Witnessed Do’s and Dont’s in Belgrade

When driving in Belgrade, do look for police waiting for speeding cars especially on the bridge to Kotez.  Also do look for them in Splavovi at night on the weekends. Speeding and driving under the influence is not tolerated at all. 

When dining in restaurants do order a srpska salad or kupa salad or a soup as it seems that every meal is ordered with one of these and waiters will assume you know this.

Don't order wine before 5-6pm at sidewalk cafes because the waiters and cafe goers will assume you are a tourist and do not know how to order coffee at a cafe.  (Based on my own experience).

Do eat biscuits, proja or burek in the morning with coffee at a nearby cafe. People do not eat big breakfasts or proteins in the morning.  They do drink a lot of yummy yogurt drinks with fresh bread and mladi sir.  When you go to a cafe for breakfast you will most likely be eating a sandwich and salad, oh and did I mention coffee, coffee, and more coffee.

Ladies don’t drink beer from the bottle, actually they do not drink beer at all.  I have witnessed them drinking mainly wine and some popular cocktails like mojitos and fruity martinis.  And while we’re on the subject, most kafes, lounges and clubs do not supply the basic ingredients, (no cranberry juice to be found) to make many simple cocktails, like Vodka and Cranberry.  Cranberry juice is only found in pharmacies to boost immunity and physical health.  If you want to order a bottle of vodka at a club, all mixers are not complimentary and you must pay for tonic water, orange juice and soda water.

This may be a very weird do, but do appreciate and take someone's offer to give you slippers when you enter their home in the winter.  I grew up in a warm climate year-round so this idea of offering slippers in the wintertime may be common everywhere where climates change. I normally don't like to wear slippers but I quickly found them to be warm and valuable in December and Jan in Belgrade and I was so grateful for the hospitable families who did offer me warmth.

Jamaica = Happy Serb II

I think B's red former Yugoslavian t-shirt with a Communist logo which read, "srp icekic" really attracted the attention of our Jamaican hotel staff because for the remainder of our stay we were given great treatment and offered low activity prices.  They also requested his cuban fedora and paper boy cap in exchange for a Katamaran cruise or scuba diving.  It was great for me, I sat back and watched B perform his bargaining magic, saving me from purchasing over-priced wares because I was lingering a bit too long by vendor huts.

 At that point it became easier for B to bargain a decent price for our activities and souvenirs and it became entertaining for me to watch the consistent debate in action.  My favorite instance to witness occurred when B was approached by a cigar vendor on the outskirts of our hotel beach.  This Jamaican/Cuban was thoroughly impressed by G's bargaining strength as they offered him Cuban's for an excessive price and he bargained them down more than 50%.  This vendor instantly approached him with respect and struck up a conversation regarding their close ties with Cubans.  He told us about his Russian neighbor that use to live in Cuba but retreated to Jamaica for a relaxed lifestyle.  He explained to us how Cuban cigars and alcohol are smuggled across the border and sold in Jamaica tax free.  As a boat repairman, he worked closely with some Russians in Cuba building and repairing boat engines long enough that he fashioned his own for Jamaica.  He and B had a quick and long lasting friendship and I have a feeling when we do return to Jamaica, he will be one of the first guys we reunite with.

Well, luckily, we left Jamaica with B's Cuban fedora and Red Star jersey, but it has been requested upon our return that we bring back NY goods to exchange for great service :)

I genuinely like Jamaica and so does B.

Russia+Jamaica=Happy Serb

I just returned from Ocho Rios, Jamaica with B and wow what a wonderful time we spent on island time!  Jamaicans are really wonderful people with a great appreciation and respect for the quality of TIME.

The town of Ocho Rios is full of arts and crafts and great jerk stands!  And the beaches are serene, pure and full of expansive reefs to snorkel.  And I had little understanding of the Rastafarian movement, which is a way of life for a very wholesome, organic, crafty community.  Among our driving venture through Ocho Rios, we came across a wooden hut found in isolated patches of the town, decorated with gracefully carved wooden masks, statues and vases;  and one Rasta peacefully perched on the floor crafting wood sculptures and feeding off the vegetation grown solely on his land...truly one of the healthiest communities I have witnessed.  My perception of Rastas was such a stereotype conceived from many days spent on Venice Beach watching these long dreaded hippies sporting yellow and green polos and knit hats, playing hacky-sack bare foot on the dirty public sidewalk, smoking small joints, feasting on french fries from McDonalds as night  fell...clearly not True Rasta.

Another Jamaican stereotype of mine was crushed when I noticed that locals really don't wear excessively long dreads like most wold assume, in fact they don't wear dreads at all, except for the Rastas.  The mix of British and African genes are flowing beautifully through the island and I found their exoticism to be quite alluring...not to mention that the men have perfect bodies and they boast that their food is pure and organic. Organic it is, we ate 3 big meals a day and drank Rum Punch, Kiss from the Heart, and Tropical Poisons  consistently and we lost weight!  The seafood is amazing with mussels and clams the size of my hand.  My one and only complaint was that the white wine was never chilled and never seemed to arrive on time during dinner.

To our surprise Jamaicans get along very easily with Russians, Serbs, Croats, and more generally with East Europeans. There is a common respect for strong bargaining power and each country can hold it's own when it comes to negotiating a good business deal. Jamaicans will try to sell you any of their goods as tourism is the main source of income on the island, and if you don't have good negotiating skills, they will provoke you to spend past your limit.  Fortunately, B has unbelievable bargaining power and the Jamaican vendors respected him as a business comrade after they found out they could not push their high prices on him.  Jamaica has a high respect for Russians who live in Cuba and Jamaica.  A self-made community thriving in each of these countries brings them closer together,  and Jamaicans spotted B's will-power to bargain and spotted his respect for vendors who are ruthlessly trying to sell to survive.

Farewell Steady Voice

I would like to pay my respect to Patriarch Pavle, devoted in his mission to steady the hearts of all who suffered during the Balkan ethnic wars; who spoke against violence and peacefully led the Orthodox Christian Church through a post-communist era.

By demanding former President Milosevic's resignation, Pavle fought for justice and the freedom not just for his people but for all people to live as human beings in a war free region.  His faults are not extreme, he protected what he knew best, Serbian churches and monasteries.

Thanks France

Did you know:

The Statue of Liberty was delivered to NY in 214 packing crates from France?! I guess Ferdinand Lesseps really wanted us to roll up our sleeves and work hard for the glory of this gift!  But to pay respect, I never knew the inscription on the Statue reads:

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free"  (sigh....)

On my to do list before leaving NY:

 1)  Visit top of Statue of Liberty (and if too crowded, take ferry around Liberty Island.  Ok maybe ride that Shark boat around the island cruising like a stealth bomber up and down the Hudson, feel the sprinkle of dirty Hudson on my cheeks, fly by Ms. Lady Liberty herself to peer into her naked eyes and take on her massive, stone-graved stance.) 

Am I Here or There Part II

Wow, 5 years fly by like debris in the wind of a drastic storm, the internal scars I wear are proof of my time served in NY. Well, it's not that bad :), but I'm desperately seeking my way out and am anticipating my arrival to Belgrade with G Man. We have been carving out a plan to move to Serbia in the next year and I am still in my "I'm so excited and get me there already" phase. This plan has been growing into reality in the past 6 months and is now peaking at a point of crossroads in my life. To get bogged down by the daily grind, mundane corporate schedule, the droning office atmosphere with it's hypnotic white noise, I need an outlet into a new perspective and a refreshed sense of lifestyle, where I can free my mind to imagine, become inspired and strengthen my senses to create...invent...intrigue...entertain.

I would like to detour back to my initial post and complete my Serbian experience here in NY before moving on to the present. I met G Man in NY about 2 1/2 years after living here and after already being acquainted with the Serbian culture outside of Manhattan. Well once I met him, my perspective of Serbians drastically changed as he showed me a completely different Serbian community, an urban crowd..no apartment parties here. This community spent more time at sampling new, exotic cuisine at recently opened restaurants, loved Manhattan's nightlife and pumping house/techno beats. No beer, we were talking scotch, cigars, and sushi. This could just be purely a Manhattan lifestyle that sucks anyone into it's luring fingers regardless of their cultural background. Needless to say, I began to make friends with metropolitan Serbians, many of who came straight from Belgrade or Novi Sad. They did take me to one great Serbian restaurant in NY called Kafana, on the lower east side in Alphabet City. This restaurant is said to have the closest ambiance, food and liquor to what Belgrade's cafes offer. I was pleasantly pleased and surprised to find a huge community of Serbs from NY and the boroughs that frequent this place. Also, I discovered that 2 of NY's bustling bars, Employees Only and Macao, are co-owned by a famous Serbian bartender who has written books on adventurous, crafty cocktail creations. Shish, masterminds of food, drink and nightlife...can it get any better?!

Oh, and since I cannot forget my 2 years living in Astoria where I tasted my first Serbian food, I have to give a shout out to Djerdan on 31st Avenue between 34th and 35th streets (I think). They have the best burek and baklava this side of the Atlantic! Talk about comfort food, oh, and the cevapi is a perfect late night tamer!

Am I Here or There

To briefly introduce myself I have been living in NY for the last 5 years now and for the most part I lived among Serbians. I have lived in a primarily East European neighborhood a melting pot of Russian, Bosnian, Serbian and Romanian families all here to fight to the death to succeed in NY and bring back a decent life savings to their families and country. I really received first hand experiences witnessing and interacting with my fellow Serbian neighbors, roommates and roommates' friends. I tasted my first rakija in the cold winter of 05 in our apartment when my roommate's father was visiting from Kraguyavic and he brought us this highly intense, peach flavored alcohol. Now, I can tolerate a few more drinks than your average lightweight, but when it comes to this domestic brandy, I could have blown fire out of my mouth, nose and ears after one sip! Wow, what a party that night turned into. All I remember of that party is the endless rumbling of my roommate's father and brother debating (I think? or just talking...it's so hard to tell sometimes) going on in the background as a our small boom box in the living room was jumping off it's stand with a high pitched scweal of a gypsy orchestra ringing in my ears! I felt like if I closed my eyes and open them instantly, I would find myself sitting in the middle of a restaurant in Kraguyavic bustling with the warmth and passion...Serbian family love.

I also learned my first couple of Serbian words: zdravo, dobro utro, molim vas and hvala.

At the time, these words clumsily fell off my tongue as my hangover from the night before got the better of me. Damn that rakija....(In my blogs to come, you'll learn that I am now a devoted fan and quite a connoisseur of this brandy, in all it's flavors and from various regions.)

As I began to understand the culture and attended many apartment parties, which were a preferred favorite amongst my Serb friends, I really felt that I blended in nicely. At first glance Serbians that I met actually thought I was Serb, probably because my hair, skin and eyes and physical makeup are pretty similar to theirs, but I think I fit into their very cool, chic, politically-socially savvy apartment parties. It was great fun, and I also noticed how fashionably perfect both the guys and girls were. Wow, Americans need to learn from Serbs on how to make an outfit pop! I mean forget Gap and Banana Republic. The more perfectly tailored, the better.

Serb fashion comes just as close as French fashion, but it would be a shame to compare the 2 countries' fashion. I think French fashion is a bit more conservative and beautifully subtle, which really compliments the small hints of Parisian flare throughout the city, like the areas Le Marais, L'Avenue Montaigne, Les Halles. Serbian fashion is extreme with color, edginess and a confident indifference as to say, look at me now, look at me hard, cuz it will only last for a second before you can't look anymore. This purely reflects the zapping attitude of Belgrade, which I won't go into detail describing..I'll save for later blogs.