7/29 Monday
We get up at 4am, grab our gear and
go out in the cool, dark morning air. The taxi stand is empty, but a passing
cab stops when for us. At the bus station, there’s nothing going on yet, but
one café is open so we can have a coffee. A group of young people, some
sounding Australian, come in acting like they’ve been up all night to avoid
having to get up so early.
The bus is sitting in its station,
and we’re all waiting for something to happen so we can start boarding. At five
minutes to 6, the drivers emerge from sleeping on the bus and start taking
tickets. The bus is fully booked.
It’s a smaller, older bus than we’ve
had before, but still ok. The kids are all acting up, telling awful jokes,
mocking the bus, over-laughing, hysterically tired. They make a lot of noise
for about twenty minutes, but then they’re all draped over the sides of their
seats, heads lolling, mouths open, crashed asleep.
The ride is very slow going as the
bus labors mightily to get over the steep mountains on narrow, twisty roads. It
reminds us of the forests of Oregon or Washington, a little. As precarious as
the road seems, our driver isn’t much excited by it, in fact, he appears to be
falling asleep. Fortunately, the smarter co-driver has him make an unscheduled
pit stop, and takes over while the first guy passes out in his seat.
We get through the customs check out
of Bosnia-H, and then into Serbia, where the roads are considerably more chewed
up. We continue along a rural route, stopping at a restaurant where, once
again, the drivers have a nice lunch while we wait.
As we get closer to Beograd, the
terrain flattens out to show acres of cornfield, and then, praise God, an
actual highway. We arrive at the bus station after our 7 hour rattle-bucket
ride. We're greeted by one of Belgrade's hottest days on record this year.
Fortunately, Novak, our host, comes
quickly to take us to the apartment. He’s a nice young man, very polite. At
first glance, the apartment is a little scary, think South Bronx, Soviet style.
An unfair characterization on our part, of course, but truthfully, the city we've seen so far suffers from an overuse of concrete. Our apartment is on the fifth floor,
with a balcony overlooking a park. It’s recently renovated, all white and blue,
very modern and clean. When we ask Novak about the washing machine, he refers
us to a You-Tube video site with step-by-step instructions for our model. “My
mother does my wash, I know nothing of this machine, you see.” This is fairly
typical of the young men who usually host these apartments. It’s obvious that
they spend very little time in a kitchen, or using any appliances.
1 Video Included
Bus Sarajevo to Belgrade
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