2012-04-07 Belgrade, day 7

Finally I managed to take a picture of my Pekara!!

As you can see it's nothing special haha but the lady there recognizes me and today when I asked for my burek she said "would you like some milk too?" She knows my habits now :) I forgot to tell her that I won't see her again, I don't think I'll eat there tomorrow morning since I'm going to the bus terminal as early as possible to head to Novi Sad! Oh well, I will see her again in May, hopefully she'll remember me!

Today I took the bus again, I love taking the bus here. It's so convenient because the bus stops at every single stop and the doors always open, so you don't have to stress about when to ring or when not to ring. I love it! Today the bus took me to the "Museum of Yugoslav History"

I really wanted to see a museum that would explain to me the whole history of how Yugoslavia was created and how the countries all separated, I've been told bits and pieces of the story many times but I know I don't understand everything yet. There are so many things to remember and so many things that happened so I was really looking forward to that museum. Unfortunately, even though it is called Musem of Yugoslav History, it was not about the history of Yugoslavia :(

The museum is separated into 3 buildings. The first one contains art of different types, such as this:

This is not exactly my type, sorry to say. This one I liked a lot but that was pretty much the only one worth taking a picture of:

The second part is called the house of flower where Josep Broz "Tito" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tito) is burried.

There is also some minimal explanation of his accomplishments while he was the leader of Yugoslavia but not much.

The last building contained a bunch of different gifts from all over the world that Tito received during his reign. I saw many beautiful objects, but they are from all over the world and they did not inform me at all about the history of Yugoslavia! But it's ok, I saw someting that made me think of my mother, I think she would have liked them:

The museum was interesting but not really what I was expecting, hopefully there is a museum somewhere in another of the cities I will see that will inform me a bit better, if not I always have the Internet :)

After the museum I was going to have lunch but I had a phone call from Raša! Raša is the nephew of my Serbian colleague in Ottawa, I had met him before when he came to visit his aunt and uncle a few months ago, and he was suggesting we get together in the afternoon. When he heard I was about to eat, he ordered me to wait for him so that he could bring me to a nice Serbian restaurant. I was really happy to see him again! We had lunch together on Skadarska street, yahoo :)

We had a very good time together although a little bit short, but it was very very nice of him to come to meet me because he was actually going to work later today.

While I was with Raša, Adrijana sent me a text to invite me for lunch at her place at 5 o'clock with Miljan. How "lunch" can be at 5 o'clock is a mystery to me haha but I gladly accepted the invitation, I was so happy to get together with her and Miljan one more time before leaving!! A few minutes after I was done making decisions for the evening with Adrijana, my cell phone rang again. This time it was from the nephew of a Serbian lady that I met in Ottawa, I was going to see him tomorrow in Novi Sad but he told me that he was not available after all. Poor Raša had to wait for me while I was dealing with all these people, I felt bad for being so impolite haha! Luckily he didn't seem to mind too much :)

Adrijana gave me instructions on how to go to her place by bus so I met her at the bus station near her house at 5 o'clock. She prepared bolognese pasta that were soooo delicious!! I told her that if she wants to become my cook in Ottawa I will hire her!

We had a very good "lunch" together (dinner for me) and we then moved to the living room where we chatted. Adrijana and Miljan spent a good amount of time informing me about life in Belgrade, it was very interesting but I know that I cannot repeat it, not because it's extremely horrible haha but because I will not be able to remember everything perfectly. Maybe I would tell you something wrong by mistake and I wouldn't want to misinform my readers!

Eventually, Adrijana's boyfriend (Igor) arrived and we chatted a little bit more.

Then they had to leave for a party but they  very nicely offered to give me a car ride to my hostel even though it was not on their way. I got inside the car and out of habit, the first thing I did was to buckle up. They all started laughing :) Apparently buckling up is not something you do when you're riding in the back seat. Oh well, I'm not going to follow every single one of the Serbian ways, my life is important too :) I was so impressed with Igor, the streets are so narrow here, I would be driving 10 km/hour and still hitting something, but he was going so fast and smoothly avoiding pedestrian without killing any of them!

Tomorrow I'm leaving Belgrade, so my heart is breaking a little bit :( I can't wait to come here again! Once again, I want to emphasize on how lucky I was to meet Jelena, Saša, Adrijana, Milijan and Raša. All of them have been extremely generous, funny, friendly and made a great impression on me. I will never forget you guys, thank you for everything!!

And now, a few more pictures to finish this message.

I don't know how this game is called in English, in French it's "Des mots et des lettres", apparently every single country in the world have their version haha. I was able to make the word "opet" which means "again" :)

Sponge Bob Square Pants is also a tourist in Belgrade!! Here he is on Knez Milhailova street!

Finally a fountain that works!! Everyday I see fountains everywhere that are not working, today I saw plenty of them that were working!! Maybe Belgrade is trying to save on the water and turning them on only on the weekend...