A
military museum is Bob’s idea of a good time, and there’s a big one at the
Fortress. We’re having another hot day, so we walk slowly down the avenue to
the fort and into the museum, which has no air conditioning. It’s a large, old
building and the exhibits are arranged in a maze of hallways through the whole
place. It starts with the city’s earliest history of Stone Age weapons and
moves through the years, one war after another. The last exhibit holds an
American pilot’s gear and bits of a Stealth fighter that was shot down during
the NATO bombings, or NATO Aggression, as it’s labeled.
Our
next goal is the Museum of Contemporary Art, a bit of a walk over a busy bridge
to a park across the river. We pass through an interesting part of the city, a
bit like lower Manhattan. The bridge is
full of traffic, but there’s a nice breeze across the water. There’s a river
walk on the other side, big trees, people biking and rollerblading, but not a
crowd at all. Along the water are the Barge bars, various derelict paddle
boats, tour cruisers, floating bunkers, made into discos and tiki bars for the
summer.
When
we find the museum, we’re stunned. It’s a modern, concrete structure, sitting
empty and closed on an unmowed, fenced-off lot. Oh well. Take this one off the
tourist maps. Perhaps it’s a recent closing. We head back to the riverwalk, and
decide to stop in one of the few bars open in the daytime, most of these bars
open at midnight. “sPLAY” is a swanky, gauzy, place with electronic music and
lounge beds. It’s a pleasant enough spot for a sparkling water break.
The
Tesla museum is not far from our apartment. The few blocks make an interesting
walk as we pass a number of Embassies and hostels, sharing the neighborhood, which
we think is sort of odd.
At
the museum, there’s a tour going on, and people are waiting for it to finish
before they can get their entry tickets. The rooms are arranged in a circle
around a center stairway, all open, with no waiting room. We walk around the
exhibits while we wait for the tour. The guide is an aggressive, loud young man
who takes his job very seriously. He stops the tour to come right over to tell
some people to please Keep Quiet He Is Giving A TOUR! We can actually see and
hear the whole thing. He fires up a giant Tesla core in the middle of the room,
sending sparks out and lighting up fluorescent lights. “No saber fighting,
please, they are not so durable!” Ha ha. The exhibit has some models and
documents, and a lot of photos and papers from Tesla’s death and funeral, and
the story of shipping his belongings back to Yugoslavia.
When
the tour is finally over, we ask if there are more exhibits, and when the next
tour is. We find out that the next tour is in Serbian, and the first floor is
the whole museum. Well, since we’ve seen and heard most of it, we consider this
museum done.
Back
on the Knez Mihailova, we pass a fancy building with a sign for the Zepter
Museum, so we take a look. We can’t tell what the original use of the building
was, perhaps offices, but it’s fairly opulent, lots of marble columns and carved
doorways. Now, it’s housing a Contemporary Art collection. It’s all very
interesting work, primarily regional artists. We spend an hour or so enjoying
the exhibition.
We
take a walk to see the City Fortress. It’s funny to see a clay tennis court
where the moat used to be, and also some basketball courts and something that
looks like an ax throwing arena. Near the entrance, there’s a small building
with a Gem display from the Natural History Museum. It costs us a full $0.75
each to see it. There are nice examples of crystals and minerals from a Kosovo
mine.
As
we walk into the Fortress, we drop 100 dinars into the box for a man playing
traditional songs on a guitar-like instrument, sitting under a big Sycamore
tree. Feels good to be so well-heeled.
The
Fortress is gigantic, taking up all of the property around the confluence of
the Sava and Danube Rivers. It’s all laid out like a park, with benches, snack
vendors, people selling traditional crafts, and then Roman monuments, Despot
tombs, memorial statues and historic excavations thrown in all around. The
views are outstanding.
One
of the turrets serves as a public observatory. We enter and start climbing a
creaky spiral staircase. A wild-haired mad scientist peeks out of his office,
which looks like the inside of a goat’s stomach, to ask us for the admission
fee, a whopping $0.50 each. At the top of the tower, there are some telescopes
for viewing and another contraption in a big metal case that might be a more
professional scope for the mad scientist man.
After
a couple of hours at the Fortress, we stroll back up the avenue, stopping at a
café for a relaxing mineral water break. As we continue on, we come upon what
looks like a former bank or department store, holding an extensive exhibition
of 15th Century icons. We just walk in, no admission. There’s very
little translation for us, but the icons speak for themselves, beautiful works.
The
artwork is a dramatic contrast to the street art we see, all of it looking
suspiciously similar. Even some that we really thought was original talent
shows up over and over again. There must be some big street art warehouse, or
website, where you can get printouts on canvas for selling on the street.
Bob
starts munching on some pretzel sticks as we walk along. Suddenly, a very
smiley woman runs up to us, followed by a guy with a big video camera, and
another with a giant fuzzy microphone.
“Excuse
me! May I ask! Where are you from?!!”
Somehow,
she’s got us pegged for tourists. I pull off my law-enforcement Oakleys and my
Jessica Simpson cowboy hat, revealing my crazy-lady hair in all its glory.
“We're
from America” says Bob.
“And
why are you in Beograd?!!”
“We're travelling around, visiting the cities..Prague, Vienna, Zagreb…also the sea coast..”
It’s
all become a blur.
“And
how do you like Beograd?!!”
“Oh
we like it a lot, we like it very much, yes..”
“And
what do you like about Beograd?!!”
“Oh…well,
we were at the Fort. We liked the Fort and park..”
“Oh
yes,” I pipe up, “We especially like the way the Fortress has been developed as
a public park, with the tennis courts, and basketball courts and benches, and
such, so that everyone in the community can enjoy it, it’s not just a museum
that only tourists would visit..”
Her
face tightens up. This is far more complexity than she wants.
“And…the
cafes! We like the cafes,” I add.
“Oh
yes!” She brightens, laughing with relief, “We have so many cafes! Thank you,
so long, have a nice journey!!”
They
hurry off before we can ask what it’s all about.
So,
then we decide to pick up a pizza to take home for dinner. There’s a shop on
the way, with people standing all around eating slices, others waiting in line
to order, a real popular spot, a little bit like a McDonald’s. We order a whole
pie, pointing to a picture on an overhead display. It’s ready in ten minutes,
and as we come to the counter, the guy asks if we want any toppings. That
usually comes before cooking, we think, when he says “Any ketchup or mayo?” As
he asks, he picks up his squeeze bottles and fixes up a couple slices for other
patrons, squooshing out a coating of ketchup over the slice, then zig-zagging a
stream of mayonnaise on top of that. IX-NAY! IX-NAY! Oh, the humanity!
“No!
No ketchup!!!” we say, grabbing our box and running for safety.
At
home, we find our pie topped with a fried egg. The yolk is intensely orange.
Under the cheese, we have a layer of ham, apparently a standard feature. We’re
thinking the translation of the name of the place might actually be “Ham
Pizza.” Fortunately, we didn’t order the Bacon Ham Pizza or the Pepperoni Ham Pizza.
And actually, ours is really, really good.
At
night, we hear thunder and rain. In the morning, the air is fresh and cool,
most of the heat has been blown away by the storm, leaving a very nice cool
morning for us. Bob walks back down to the bus station for our tickets to Macedonia next
week, while I stay at the apartment. He comes back happy. We have our tickets and the station isn’t far so an early morning walk to the bus is no problem.
That
afternoon, we walk about four blocks to the main pedestrian avenue. The city is
interesting, no Vienna for sure, but what is? It has an interesting mix of 19th
and 20th century architecture. The city does suffer from an overuse
of concrete, as do so many of these war zone European cities, giving everything
a grey tone. But the avenue is lined with upscale shops: Max Mara, Hugo Boss, Botticelli,
The Gap, Burberry, along with lots of boutiques, cafes and restaurants.
The
pedestrian avenue goes on for many blocks, then turns into a lovely park and
ends at the great City Fortress overlooking the confluence of the Sava and
Danube Rivers. We just walk down and back, and then find a small market where
we can get some provisions.
We
have a little dinner on our terrace. Below us, the park is getting pretty lively
as the evening sets in. Everyone brings their dogs out to play together, and
the teenagers congregate along the stone walls talking to each other and their
phones.
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.
We usually spend our Sundays getting
our stuff put together for travel. We’ll need to get up at 4:30am to get to our
bus tomorrow, so we want to be all packed to go. We just putz around for a
while, then go to the movies. The Heat.
We walk into the old city for dinner
out. The To Be or Not To Be café is definitely going to attract the tourists,
but it looks like such a cozy place, with a mom cooking and her daughter
waitressing. They have a nice menu as well.
We’re
going to explore some potential art museums and galleries today. Bob has
Google-mapped an itinerary from several guidebooks and tourist brochures. Just
as we enter the Old City, there’s a poster for an exhibit memorializing the
Srebrenica Massacre., so we decide to start there.
The
museum is on the fifth floor of a 19th century building. The
elevator opens to a modern, elegant space. The rooms are painted a somber
charcoal grey, and the walls are covered with a matrix of photos of the
victims. The exhibit contains some computer stations, large black and white
photos of scenes from the city and several video programs documenting the
massacre, featuring interviews with survivors, mostly women family members,
mothers and wives of the victims.
We
sit at a computer station to view an incredibly detailed program describing the
chronology of events leading to the days of killing, and the aftermath. It’s
almost an hour-by-hour story of the month of July, 1995. The city of Srebrenica
was declared a safe zone by the UN, and thousands of refugees came to
the remote mountain village for protection. After failing to act during weeks
of encroachment, the small UN security force was overrun by militants,
who went about the process of removing the population, permanently, with
a plan of action that has been classified as genocide. Women and children were
piled onto buses and taken to detention centers, prisons. Thousands of men and
boys took off on foot to try to escape to the city of Tuzla, some 50 miles
through the forests. More than 8,000 people, primarily these men and boys, were
executed over a three-day period, July 11-13th.
A
video documentary describes the efforts to locate and identify the mass graves
and the names of the victims. A DNA identification project is ongoing. This past
July 11th, just a couple weeks ago, a ceremony was held to rebury
some 400 remains from mass grave sites to the permanent memorial cemetery near
Srebrenica. This is all disturbing and informative, and also so important to
experience.
After
spending a few hours in the Srebrenica Museum, we walk over to the Hotel Europe
to see the E&A Gallery. It’s a very swanky Viennese style hotel, the
poshest place we’ve seen so far. The gallery is a small room, only about 10 x
12, on the mezzanine, showing the work of Mersad Berber, a modern artist, who
died just last year, working in a style evoking a combination of Klimt and Singer
Sergeant. The young woman working there gives a very enthusiastic overview of
the artist and shows us several books of his paintings.
We
move on to the National Gallery of Art, but are disappointed to find that it’s
closed on the weekend. Next, we walk through the streets, checking the maps,
looking for the Museum of Literature. We come to a portal into a garden, where
we peer in uncertainly. A group of people are having coffee inside, and get
quite excited to see us, calling a young woman to come talk with us.
She’s
the new director of this fledgling museum, hired just a month ago, and also
working on her PhD in Gender Studies at the University in Bucharest. She gives
us a personal tour of the two small finished rooms holding some of the
furnishings and papers of several important Bosnian writers. She’s excited and
determined to make the museum a success, despite having nearly no funding. In
the Dayton Agreement that ended the recent war, the government entity that
provided funding for several national museums was eliminated, with no future
provisions for the museums. She pulls out a B/H bill, showing how it’s
decorated with an image of an author. “All the money has the writers on it, but
there is no money for keeping the works” We’re very sympathetic to her mission,
so we offer a small donation as our tour fee. She won’t just take cash from us,
though; she wants to make an official receipt for the donation, which seems to
be the first one she’s received. We sit in the garden while she goes to her
office to prepare our receipt, which actually looks like a lot more work than
the little tour we’ve had. She happily returns with two copies of an official
paper showing our donation.
We have a couple more galleries on
our itinerary, but have no further luck. We go to a large college complex, but
it seems to be completely shut down for the summer. Another small photography
gallery is already closed, and a few more just aren’t findable. But we’re
pretty satisfied with the events of the day, so we head back home, picking up
our usual vegetables on the way. The crowds at the apartment have diminished; now
we’re down to just the two women from Denmark, who are out for the evening.
