2012-04-03 Belgrade, day 3

Today I was ready to brave the weather with my usual sweater and a coat on top, but I was quite surprised to come out of my hostel, it was so hot! So I went back inside and left only with a t-shirt instead. I don't know how the weather is back in Canada but I bet you it's warmer here :)

I went to what became my daily Pekara trip. Since I tried burek yesterday I decided to try something else today and I took a picture of it but I have to apologize because I can't remember how it's called. I'm not sure this is typical but it looked good!

Yesterday with Jelena and her friend, we walked on Knez Milhailova which is a pedestrian street full of life at any time of day. We walked there at night so I didn't really take pictures, so I wanted to go again in order to document this part of my trip, I'll show you the pictures for that at the end of the message.

I walked around and took pictures for a little while then I wasn't so sure what to do because I didn't do much planning yesterday, I was busy writing on my blog haha (bad me). My colleague told me that her favorite view of Belgrade was on the other side of the Sava river, so I thought it might be good to check that out. Unfortunately when I finally decided to go it was already around 1:30 and I was meeting someone else from sharedtalk (Adrijana) at 4 PM so I realized after crossing the bridge that I didn't really have enough time to get to my destination so I decided to turn around, therefore that time was pretty much wasted. Dear readers, when you travel, plan ahead better than I do! However I did get a chance to glance at Novi Beograd (new Belrgade), which is, from the quick look of it that I had, pretty much just like any other big north american cities. So far I'm definitely enjoying myself much better in the older part of the city.

I don't understand Serbian meal times. I would like to explain to you but I forgot I'll have to ask again, but one thing I noticed is that supper seems to be optional. Or very late, I'm not too sure. All I know is that yesterday when I was with Jelena, I almost starved to death so they made a change to their usual schedule so that I could go grab a bite. I wasn't going to make the same mistake today so I went (and I apologize in advance for what I'm going to say...), I went to eat in a Mexican restaurant! How horrible of me haha, being in Belgrade and eating Mexican food :) You can laugh if you want, but it was sooooo smart of me because I met with Adrijana and one of her friends at 4 PM and we stayed together until 7 but never had dinner. Without my afternoon meal I would have been dead by now.

So once again I had a wonderful time with two Serbian people! I'm being so efficient, meeting people two days in a row! And this time we spoke in English so I also didn't need to use my brain too much. Yesterday my message was already quite long so I didn't spend much time telling you how much I enjoyed myself with my two Belgrader friends, but today I can expand on that a little bit more (by the way, can someone let me know if Belgrader is really a word?) I consider myself extremely lucky that I was able to talk with locals and learn more about their lives and the differences with mine. I would never know as much about life in this country if I had been only looking at things from the outside, so it is quite a privilege for me. I hope that all the people I met so far and that I will meet later on will read my blog and that they will know how they are making me enjoy this trip much more than if I had not met them.

We walked around Kalemegdan which is a fortress within the city, very close to where my hostel is. If you have some time, go read about it on wikipedia the history is quite interesting. And then you'll know more about it than me so it'll be funny haha. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgrade_Fortress). I didn't take that many pictures of the fortress while I was with Adrijana and her friend because I was busy enjoying their company but I'm thinking of going again tomorrow to visit the whole thing from top to bottom, it's quite a big place and so I should be able to document the fortress better tomorrow, but here is a sample.

We had a drink in a place called "La folie Beograd", it's a little place on the fortress and the view is superb! I don't think my pictures can show properly how nice it looked, I swear it was splendid! From where we were sitting we were able to see the river Dunav, you probably know it under the name Danube :) For me, seeing the Danube is something very special because it is mentioned in so many old French song as being a very romantic river, and I must say I agree with the old French singers about that!

Adrijana ordered an espresso which is apparently typical for Serbian people, but I don't really like coffee so we decided to take a picture of me with the coffee and pretend I drank it myself.

I actually ordered lemonade... And I can tell you that this is my second lemonade and Serbian people really know how to make those! The lemon taste is super strong so it tastes extremely sour, I love it! I'm thinking of adding "drinking a lemonade" to my daily things to do! While we enjoyed our drink, we witnessed a wedding taking place by the fortress, so cute!

Unfortunately my two new friends had to leave early but Adrijana and I made plans to go bike around Ada Ciganlija on Thursday so you will hear about her again soon. We split around 7 PM, and I was hungry so I decided to go try a restaurant which was recommended by the hostel as serving typical Serbian food. Wow! I wasn't expecting that but everything about the restaurant ("Šta je tu je") was awesome. The waitress was super friendly, the food delicious, the ambiance was perfect with old Serbian songs playing (finally a restaurant that doesn't play English music!) I can't wait to go again to try another dish!

And finally here I am, back at my hostel and writing about my day instead of going to bed :)

Here are few more pictures from today!

Waldo's name is Gile in Serbian!!