According to Stefan’s mother, last Tuesday was the hottest day ever in Serbia. The high in Belgrade was 46 degrees Celsius — about 115 degrees Fahrenheit. We had an excursion that night, and when we left our apartment for the bus, this awful hot wind was blowing. It was like nothing else I’ve ever felt. Our bus ended up stopping at Trg Slavija — one of the major streets in town was closed due to a bike race. So we ended up walking through the heat.

We had a nice walk, despite the high temperatures. We ended up getting a little bit lost, and found ourselves by the Church of St. Marko. It’s older than the Church of Sveti Sava, and made of bricks. Behind the church, on Thursday, we found RTV Belgrade and the “Zasto” monument. The studios of RTV Belgrade were destroyed during the NATO bombings of the 1990s. Apparently, people still had to work during the hostilities — the state wouldn’t allow workers to go home while Belgrade was being bombed. The monument had at least fifteen names on it.

It’s been almost ten years since the NATO bombings, and there are still shells of buildings standing all over the city. I’m not sure why they’re still standing. Are they monuments? And if so, what do they symbolize? When I was in Bosnia and Croatia last year, I noticed some bombed-out buildings (mostly in Sarajevo and Vukovar), but in other areas, there had been a lot of progress. You can hardly tell that Dubrovnik, Croatia was heavily shelled. Yet here in Belgrade, famous buildings such as the former JNA headquarters are still standing, empty and ruined. I wonder if the Serbian government will ever take steps to remove them.

I’ve begun to notice some of the graffiti around Belgrade. At a corner near the coffee shop where we go during the break between classes, there are dueling messages about Kosovo. On one corner, the graffiti reads “Ne u NATO. Kosovo je Srbija.” (No to NATO. Kosovo is Serbia.) On the other corner, the graffiti reads “Kosovo je Bugarska.” (Kosovo is Bulgaria.) Interesting, isn’t it?

I have one more week here in Serbia. I have a feeling that, when I leave, I’ll immediately start trying to figure out a way to get back here. I have a theory that you leave a part of your heart in the places that become important to you. I’ve definitely left a big piece of me in Serbia.

“Larry” asked me earlier what I’d miss the most. I think I will miss walking around Belgrade at night. I will miss sidewalk cafes. I will miss finding neat buildings or hidden monuments when lost.

There have been some big changes in my life lately. My boyfriend back home and I decided to break up. It felt a little funny, since we haven’t seen each other since June, but it also felt right. Because of this trip, the direction of my life is changing. Had you asked me two years ago if I ever thought I was going to spend a summer in Serbia, I probably would have laughed. Now, I’m seriously considering spending a couple of years here, working and/or studying. Serbia is starting to feel like my second home.

I told one of my teachers yesterday “Mislim da moj život će biti velika aventura.” (I think that my life will be one big adventure.) I want to climb mountains. I want to sing in a choir again. I want to fill the Balkans with my love of this place. I want to travel. I am independent, and I am happy. It’s funny, I honestly thought I was going to work as a college professor. I thought I was going to live a more, well, sedentary life. But now? I see myself living in Serbia. I see myself doing a lot of traveling. I’ve realized that I’m nowhere near ready to settle down. I am twenty-five, and I feel like an infinite number of doors have opened for me. And I sense I am becoming the woman I always wanted to be — confident, fearless, grounded but a dreamer, holding onto a compass to get her through the confusion of life’s adventures, full of joy at the wonder and the beauty of it all.

Good night from Belgrade.

Hello from Central Europe. We’ve been cooking here in Belgrade. Daytime temperatures have been at or above 40 degrees Celsius (about 100 degrees Fahrenheit) for the past week. It looks like it’s going to cool off some around Wednesday, but before that, it’s going to get worse. The BBC weather center is predicting a high of 107 degrees Fahrenheit tomorrow. Yuk.

My flatmate Stefan arrived on Sunday. He told me that, before leaving Belgium, his father did a Google search for our language school and stumbled across this blog! Stefan had read my first post from Novi Sad before meeting me here in Belgrade. Small world, isn’t it? (Zdravo Stefan, i zdravo Stefanov otac!)

Our flat is really cool. It’s kind of like a museum. Our landlady is on vacation, so we have full reign of the place. The flat is on the 3rd floor (really the 4th, as here they don’t count the ground floor as the 1st floor) of an old building in one of the oldest parts of Belgrade. From our back window, we have a great view of Hram Svetog Sava (Saint Sava’s Church), supposedly the largest Serbian Orthodox Church in the world. It’s huge. Today, while inside the apartment hiding from the heat (and reading Harry Potter), I could hear the church bells quite clearly.

It’s been so hot that we haven’t really been able to do much exploring of Belgrade. Basically, we go to school in the morning, go out somewhere for lunch, and then return to the flat to rest until it cools off. We are only able to explore Belgrade in the evening, when the temperature is more fit for human habitation. On Tuesday evening, Stefan and I walked through the Kalmegdan fortress, which sits atop the confluence of the Danube and the Sava rivers. We wandered through the outdoor (free) portion of the military museum, looking at the old tanks. Somewhere in the military museum, there’s an “undetectable” American spy plane from the 1990s conflict. We didn’t find it — next trip to the Kalmegdan perhaps.

I find that here in Belgrade, people are just as friendly as I found them to be in Novi Sad. After getting our class and outing schedule last week, I decided to take a couple of days and go to Montenegro during the last weekend in July. So I walked into the JAT Airlines office next to the Hotel Slavija. The office is behind the hotel, in kind of a funny spot. When I walked in, I was the only customer there. Three sixty-something Serbian men stood behind the counter. One of them had a huge, Rasputin-like beard, and he beckoned me over. I started asking questions in Serbian, and he looked at me and said “You are not a Serb! Where are you from?”

I told him that I was from Seattle, and that I’m here studying Serbian. His balding friend came over, and the two of them began peppering me with questions. “Why are you studying Serbian? What do you think of Belgrade? Did you go to Belgrade? Do you have a boyfriend?” (I also was asked this question when in Novi Sad. Like my host family, the JAT airlines employees told me that they thought I should have a Serbian boyfriend in addition to my boyfriend in the US. “That way, you can have one in both places!”)

The man with the beard declared himself “a philosopher” after I said I study sociology. He told me to have a good trip to Montenegro, and to come back soon to talk with them. Perhaps I will.

On Wednesday, I had coffee with my Serbian professor from the University of Washington. In the 100 degree heat, we wandered around the University of Belgrade. He took a picture of me standing next to the “Sociology” department sign, written in Cyrillic. We had a nice chat, mostly in Serbian, about my experiences here in Serbia. I find that I’m understanding people now when they talk quickly, although sometimes I still have to ask people to slow down. One more year, and perhaps then I can take a proficiency test!

I hope the weather cools off enough for me to explore Belgrade more. There are a couple of museums I want to go to (museums, along with the kiosks where we buy bus tickets, have been closing in the afternoons due to the heat), and some statues I want to see. One confusing thing about Belgrade is that many of the streets have been recently renamed. After Tito’s death, the Milosevic government renamed many of the streets. After he descended from power, the new government renamed the streets again. It makes getting around really hard. Some of the streets still bear their communist names, with new street signs right below. The street my language school is on has a sign listing the seven former names of the street. All of the street signs are in Cyrillic, which is great practice for me.

Tomorrow, we are going to the island of Ada Ciglanija — Belgrade’s beach! I am looking forward to swimming in the lake and cooling off. Next weekend, I will fly to Montenegro for a few days exploring the coast. I am really looking forward to it — found a hostel in Budva, and will use that resort town as my base for explorations.

Larry — thanks for the questions. All different types of music were played on the stages. Larger acts played on the main stage — Beastie Boys, Robert Plant, Snoop Dawg, etc. Techno and electronica were on the dance stage, and Serbian bands were on another large stage. The smaller stages had “world” music (mostly bands from Europe), and there was one Latin stage, too. Latin music seems to be pretty big here.

And yes, I will really miss Serbia. I return home on August 29th. Hopefully I’ll be able to get back to Serbia sometime soon — perhaps during my spring break. I’ve really enjoyed living here, and hope to get the chance to do so again. People are so friendly and welcoming. The nightlife is awesome, too. There’s so much to see, and so much to do!

Hello from Belgrade. I arrived yesterday, right before the Rolling Stones hit town for a concert. My friend Bruno and I thought about trying to get tickets, but 50 euros each seemed a bit much to go and see them.

The EXIT Festival was awesome. The first night, I saw Robert Plant, formerly of Led Zeppelin. Wow. He’s at least sixty or seventy, and his voice still sounds like it does on Led Zeppelin records. He put on an amazing concert, and I was quite pleased by the number of Led Zeppelin songs he performed. He did all of my favorites — Whole Lotta Love, Going to California, Gallows Pole. It was fantastic.

On Friday, I saw the Beastie Boys. My friends and I managed to find a place near the front — pretty incredible, seeing that 50,000 people were at the concert. If you’re a fan, try to go catch the Beastie Boys live. They’re one of the best live bands I have ever seen. They jumped around all over the stage, and really got the crowd into it. My friends and I found it funny that Mike D. kinda looks like a 40-something suburban dad. Mixmaster Mike is an absolute genius, too. By the end of the concert, my voice was completely shot from shouting, and I was exhausted from all the jumping.

The EXIT festival is held each year in Novi Sad, Serbia, at the Petrovaradin Fortress. The stages are in rather interesting locations — crammed into little nooks and crannies in the outdoor fortress. This year, there were over 16 stages, and hundreds of live acts. For those Seattle residents reading this blog, the EXIT festival is a lot like Bumbershoot, only bigger.

People from all over Europe travel to Novi Sad for EXIT. Some do get out and spend time in the city and the surrounding monasteries, but for most, EXIT is the main and only stop. I’m not sure how I feel about this. It definitely felt like Novi Sad was being invaded by foreign tourists. It was strange hearing so much English when I’d gotten used to hearing and speaking Serbian. One day downtown, I was eating dinner at a cafe, and a young British male jumped on one of the cattle statues in town and pretended to ride it. The cafe’s waiter and I looked at each other and shook our heads at the same time. He asked me if I spoke English, and when I responded in Serbian, he gave me a free cup of coffee, saying “you are like us.”

I think people ought to be responsible when they travel. They should try to leave a positive impression of themselves, thereby also leaving a positive impression about their country (to some). Getting drunk every night and getting into fights in campgrounds is not the way to make friends in Serbia, and in my opinion, isn’t the best way to experience the country. It’s great that so many tourists come to EXIT and spend money, but I wonder how many actually encounter the people in Serbia? I wonder how many will get outside of Novi Sad and see all that this country has to offer?

To chchrist — thanks for the question. I’m not sure if I’m the most qualified to answer this, though — I don’t know very much about Asian mythology. If I were to guess, I’d think that most of the mythology is Slavic in origin, like the language. If I learn a little more about this, I will let you know.

Well, the Exit Festival begins tomorrow. And the British have invaded Novi Sad. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many British tourists in one place. Yesterday, at the coffee shop we students always go to during our break, there were a ton of young Brits drinking beer and being very loud. Our waiter, whom we’ve gotten to know a little during our time here, pointed to the Brits and said “Strangers,” implying that we Serbian language students are no longer strangers in Serbia.

In my last post, Rastko commented that many Serbs do not like Noel Malcolm’s book about Kosovo, as they find it biased. I’ve heard this before, and I’m really curious about this. How is Malcolm’s book biased? Could you point out some specific examples within the text? Thanks.

Rastko, if you are in any way affiliated with Project Rastko, I want you to know that your website is incredible. Blog readers, on this site you can find quite a bit of information regarding Serbian history and culture. Just in case you have trouble reading Cyrillic, here is the link for the history section. Scroll down to find some works in English. This is a great online resource.

That’s all for now. My next update will probably be from Belgrade, post EXIT. Woo hoo! Beastie Boys!

First off, hello to those of you who found this blog through Geoff Baker’s excellent blog at the Seattle Times website! Go Mariners! Isn’t it nice to have a good season? It’s great to have a good team in Seattle again. May we have exciting baseball for the rest of the summer.

Also, a note — I didn’t mean to put a shameless plug for the blog on Geoff’s site. Hope it didn’t come across that way. Geoff keeps mentioning my travels in Serbia, so I figured I’d let y’all know of a way to follow them.

Thanks for sending me a couple of questions. I’ll do my best to answer them. First, to Jon, I’m doing a Serbian language program in Novi Sad and Belgrade. I’m a graduate student in sociology at the University of Washington. For my master’s thesis, I’ve chosen to write about the 14th century Battle of Kosovo and how it was used in Serbian nationalism at two different points in time — during the late 19th century in spurring Serbian state-building, and in the late 20th century during the breakup of Yugoslavia. Shortly after the battle (which has been interpreted as a loss for the Serbs, but really ended up being a draw), myths emerged about Knez Lazar, the so-called “hero” of the Battle of Kosovo. In one epic poem, Lazar makes a choice between the Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of Earth, forever cementing Kosovo as something akin to the Serbian Jerusalem. (Noel Malcolm’s “Kosovo, a Short History” has a lot of information about how the myths were creating, if you’re interested in reading more.) To make a long story short, I’m here in Serbia learning the language so I can read some of the works of Serbian nationalists. After the program ends in Belgrade, I’ll be travelling around Austria, Germany, the Czech Republic, and Croatia.

To Larry — hello and thank you for your comment. I agree with you — I see similar societal fracturing beginning to occur in the US. In my opinion, the nationalist rhetoric has died down somewhat in the US, although not among the ruling political circles. It’s interesting — many people here are really cynical about the government. For example, my host mother’s friend yesterday told me that the Serbian mafia basically runs the government. When I was in Bosnia and Croatia last year, I heard much of the same. Another viewpoint that I’ve encountered frequently among young people is the following — there’s some resentment of older politicians for putting the country in such a mess. Due to the economy and visa restrictions in many countries, it’s difficult for young Serbs to travel. I’m 25, and have been a teaching assistant for quite a few sociology classes now — among college students at the UW, the mood is quite similar. There seems to be a lot of resentment among (more liberal) college students, because we feel like those in their twenties will be indebted for a while as a result of the Bush administration’s wars and policies. Just a year ago, the dollar-to-dinar exchange rate was 1 to 70. Today, it’s 1 to 59 or 60 — still good, but not nearly as good as it was.

To Chchrist — great question about the language. Serbian is considered a Slavic language, although because of its location, many of the words here are influenced by Latin. (For example, the word for “information” is “informacija.” Serbian borrows quite a bit from other languages.

The story of the language’s creation is, I think, an interesting one. In the early part of the 19th century, Vuk Karadzic, a traveller and a linguist, noticed that the language spoken in Serbia was similar to that spoken in Bosnia and Slovenia. However, the language used in the Serbian Orthodox Church was Old Church Slavonic, far from what was spoken. In the interest of building literacy among the Serbs, Vuk Karadzic published the first Serbian grammar and dictionary. He chose to use Cyrillic in writing the language, following the principle of “one symbol, one sound.” Karadzic met with linguists in Croatia, and together, they essentially created the standardized language known as Serbo-Croat. Karadzic chose the “ijekavian” dialect, which was different from what had been used in the literature of the Dalmatian Coast and in Zagreb. (For example, in Serbian, the word for “river” is “reka.” In Croatian, the word is “rijeka.” That’s an illustration of the difference between the “ekavian” dialect and the “ijekavian.”

There are some differences between Serbian and Croatian, although most linguists categorize them as variants of the same language (so much so that at the UW, I take classes in Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian). For example, the word for bread in Serbian is “hleb,” and in Croatian, it’s “kruh.” However, the languages are diverging. After the Civil Wars in Yugoslavia, Croatian linguists met and started removing some of the “Serbian” words from the standard language. They went back to the so-called “original” Croatian language to create some of these words. In Serbian, the word for airplane is “avion,” and in Croatian, it’s “zrakoplov.” I believe my professor at the UW said that this was a word introduced after the Civil Wars, but I’m not so sure about that.

If you have other questions, let me know, and I will do my best to answer them. Welcome to the blog!

My “host sister” wanted to use the computer at the house. I hurried the last post a little bit. Also, and I feel I shouldn’t have to remind y’all of this — keep the debate civil in the comments, please. I had to edit a comment due to foul language and inappropriate insinuations. I don’t really like doing that, but I will if I have to. Thanks.

To “John” — here’s why I think Kosovo’s economy could get worse should the province gain its independence. Kosovo was one of the poorest regions of the former Yugoslavia, and with the recent unrest, it is one of the poorer parts of Europe. Economic sanctions and poor economic policies contributed to this during the 1990s. According to this article, which seems fairly accurate for Wikipedia, Kosovo is basically being supported by the EU right now. It’s become dependent on the EU, and from the little I know of economics, I do know that this is not an ideal situation. There was a recent article, I think it was on the BBC’s website, but I’m not quite sure — that stated that Kosovo is entirely dependent on Belgrade for electricity. Independent states do not want to be dependent on others for basic public goods.

For independence to work in Kosovo, I think that the monasteries and Serbian cultural sites there need to be protected. I don’t know the future of Kosovo, but I do know that both the UN plan (managed independence) and the major alternative (Kosovo remains part of Serbia) have their difficulties. There won’t be a perfect plan or a magic solution that pleases everyone. I wish that were the case.

I want to note first that I cleaned up my previous post a little, to make it more obvious what words are mine and what words are the Serbian professor’s. I didn’t change much — just added punctuation and a couple of explanatory sentences. Sometimes things sound better in my head than they do on the printed page.

Hello to Laura! Glad you found the website. Good luck on the bar exam!

And now for today’s observation — taxi drivers. Taxi drivers in Serbia are some of the most interesting people I’ve met. Basically, their job is to drive around all day and talk to people. Yesterday, my taxi driver, Jovan, asked me if I was having a good time in Serbia. I spoke in Serbian, and he spoke to me in English. I think we understood each other pretty well.

“Yes,” I replied. “People are very friendly here.”

“I am glad to hear that. Serbia has a negative reputation in the news, and I am especially glad to hear a Westerner saying that she is enjoying her stay.”

I found this interesting, so I admitted something. The timing of President Bush’s visit to Albania had worried me somewhat. Right before I left for Serbia, President Bush visited Tirana. There, he publicly announced that he supports independence for Kosovo, the southern Serbian state that is currently the subject of much international debate. (For a good description of this, go to the Radio B92 website. On that website is a link to B92’s articles about Kosovo and Serbia. B92 is an independent Serbian radio station. Also, I have found good articles in the past on the BBC’s website . Predictably, US media does not do such a good job in its coverage of the Balkans.) Anyway, right before I left, Bush announced his support of Kosovo’s independence. This is a hot topic in Serbia (Serbia sees Kosovo as part of its territory,) and I didn’t want people to react negatively towards me because of the words of my country’s president.

So I told this to the taxi driver. He responded “Don’t worry. I have learned never to judge people based on what their countrymen think. Besides, in my opinion, and in the opinion of many Serbs, the U.S president seems a little clueless when it comes to foreign policy.”

I’ve been struck by a few things since this conversation. Many people I’ve spoken with really want me to have a good time. They want to change the impression that many people in the West have about Serbia (and about the Balkans in general) as a dangerous place. This region’s reputation was really tarnished during the recent civil wars, and some people here want to repair the image that people have about Serbia. Jackie said the other day that it’s strange to her — NATO (really the US) bombed Serbia in 1999. Americans bombed this country, and yet, not even ten years later, people in Serbia welcome me and my classmates. It’s interesting. Perhaps it’s a testament to the power of forgiveness. I don’t know.

One of my professors at Azbukum is going to help me go through Serbian websites tomorrow, so I can get more of the Serb perspective on Kosovo. This came out of a suggestion Marko gave me on my last post. My professor is also going to put me in touch with a man working in Holland. He is researching the Serb side of the conflict in Kosovo, and will probably be a good resource for me. My professor also wants to know what I think about Kosovo and the Balkans. She said she’s really interested in what people think about the issue.

Well, I think it’s complicated. During medieval times, Kosovo was part of the Serbian state. From what I have read, there were Albanians in Kosovo during the middle ages, but not as many as now. The 19th century independent Serbian state did not include Kosovo — that was part of the Ottoman Empire. Serbia recaptured Kosovo in 1912, to the disgruntlement of many Albanians living there. After WWII, under the Tito years, two things happened to shift the balance from majority Serb to majority Albanian — Serbs left for other places in Yugoslavia due to poor economic conditions in Kosovo, and the Albanian birth rate was significantly higher than that of Serbs. (A little demography lesson for you — Albanians primarily lived in rural areas. Serbs lived in the cities during the Tito area. Residents of rural areas tend to have higher birth rates than those in the cities, as people in the cities tend to be more educated. One of the primary determinants of number of children is whether or not a mother is educated. With more education come fewer kids. Read a demography textbook if you don’t believe me.)

By the 1980s, Kosovo’s population was approximately 80% Albanian and 20% Serbian. (Note: this information comes from Tim Judah’s book “The Serbs,” and is corraborated by other news sources, such as BBC reports.) Today, Kosovo’s population is 90% Albanian and 10% Serbian — many Serbs moved out after the civil war due to unrest in the province. (This information comes from Wikipedia. Wikipedia cites the Survey of the Statistical Office of Kosovo. Interestingly, in that survey, the percentage of Serbs in the province is listed as only 5%. This seems a little low to me. Most news accounts use the 90-10 figure.)

So basically what you have is a mess — an Albanian population that doesn’t want to be a part of Serbia, and Serbs who want to protect their cultural heritage. Many Serbian Orthodox monasteries in Kosovo were destroyed during the civil war, and in my opinion, what’s left needs to be protected.

So what to do about it? The UN supports a Bosnia-type plan. Kosovo is currently considered part of the Serbian state, but is under international administration. As I understand it, the UN would administer Kosovo while the province prepares for independence. Kosovo would not be permitted to join Albania. Serbian cultural sites within Kosovo would be under international protection. I remember reading somewhere that both Albanian and Serbian would be considered national languages in Kosovo, and that the state’s symbols and flags would have to recognize both Albanians and Serbians.

Serbs, and Russia, do not support this plan. Basically, this plan is built on that old Wilsonian adage — the self-determination of peoples. Leaders in Republika Srpska (Serbian part of Bosnia) have asserted that they, too, should have the right to declare themselves an independent state or to rejoin Serbia if Albanians in Kosovo get to do so. Russia is worried about its own minorities breaking away from its state. Allowing Kosovo independence would set a worrisome precedent. I should point out that Kosovo was never one of the constituent republics (Bosnia and Hercegovina, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia) of Yugoslavia. So far, only the constituent republics have gained independence.

Also, what would Kosovo’s economy be like? It’s a landlocked region. It has mines and natural resources, but not much else. Kosovo already is one of the poorest places in Europe. That may get worse with independence.

With every solution, it seems, some group will be unhappy. In my opinion, this is a difficult issue. Albanians don’t want to be part of Serbia, and Serbians want to protect their cultural heritage.

I’m just amazed by how friendly people are here. On Thursday, my friend Jackie and I went to the Wine Festival in Novi Sad’s Old Town. Approximately fifty vineyards and wine distributors were represented at this festival. Jackie and I stopped at the table of a Bačka Palanka (pronounced “Bahtchka”) vineyard. As we were talking about what wine we should try first, an older man grabbed my elbow. I turned, and he poured me a glass of a red wine called Vermet. I’m not sure if this wine is available in the U.S., but if it is, you really must try it. Vermet is a sweet red wine made with cloves. It’s kind of like mulled wine, except tastier. Jackie and I talked with Koŝta (pronounced Kohshta) for a while. He didn’t have any Vermet for sale at the festival, so I asked him where one could purchase it. “Bačka Palanka isn’t far from here. Just give me a call and I’ll drop the wine off at your door.”

Wow. I doubt winesellers in the U.S. are willing to do this. Bačka Palanka is 45 minutes from Novi Sad.

Jackie wanted to try a wine called Francuska (we spent most of the festival looking for wines we’d never heard of), but Koŝta didn’t have it available for tasting. So he just gave her a free bottle! We tried to give him some money for it, but he refused. We promised to come visit his winery next weekend, so I could purchase Vermet, and so we could speak with him further.

This kind of friendliness and hospitality is not something that I’m used to. In the United States, it seems like everything has its cost. Strangers never offer other strangers free bottles of wine. One thing I’ve noticed about people in Serbia is that they seem to really want to make sure that visitors to the country are having a good time. And, if allowed to talk on the subject, will attempt to explain the events of the late 1990s in a manner that doesn’t paint Serbia in such a negative light.

I’ll write more on this a little later.

We packed our bags on Friday and went on a weekend excursion to Bukovac, a village (selo) near Valjevo. On the way, we stopped in Brankovima, to visit an old church and see the grave of Serbian poet Desna Marković. We also stopped in Valjevo, at the national museum. I found quite a bit of rich “primary source data” at this second stop. The museum showcases an exhibition of Serbian history and culture — from prehistory to the WWII era. I found their descriptions of the events of the 19th century pretty interesting. For those of you who aren’t history geeks, the 19th century was the time period when nationalist movements were beginning to flower in Central and Eastern Europe. Serbia gained its independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1878, and had a major role in the Balkan Wars of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and in World War I. (The man who shot Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo was a Bosnian Serb.) I took special note of any “nationalist” language in the museum, of which there was a lot. Most telling, the 1912 Balkan War was referred to as “Revenged Kosovo.” During this war, Serbia marched into Kosovo (which was still under the Ottoman Empire), and took it as Serbian territory. This angered many (Slavic and non-Slavic) people living in Kosovo at the time — they didn’t really want to live under Serbia, according to historian Noel Malcolm.” I found the title “Revenged Kosovo” pretty interesting — good source data for my master’s thesis.

After that, we drove into the mountains, to Bukovac. Bukovac is a traditional Serbian village. Inhabitants subsist via farming the land. The village is a collection of five ranch-type houses. The “house” in which we stayed actually consisted of five structures — two sleeping houses, one cookhouse, one dining hall, and a barn. The house’s owners, Vlada, Marina, and their two children Slavko and Natasa, met us at the gate with rakija. It is a tradition in Serbia to be welcomed into the home with something warm (bread), something hot (rakija — strong Serbian brandy), and something sweet (honey or jam). After taking our rakija shots, we went into the dining house for “lunch.”

This is not what we in the U.S. typically think of as “lunch.” In Serbia, lunch is served at three or four in the afternoon. And lunch is a four-course meal. We ate bread with kajmak (a cross between cheese and butter), a tomato-cucumber salad, soup, sarma (cabbage rolls), and a sweet cake for dessert. Needless to say, I was stuffed.

The family spoke nothing but Serbian. After dinner, Slavko and Natasa took us into the hills for a sunset walk. They chattered the whole way, teaching us the names for fruits, vegetables, animals — and the Serbian word for cow poop. I started calling the kids “little professors,” a nickname which they really seemed to like. We picked plums from trees and ate them. At the top of the hill, we paused for pictures and sunset.

The Valjevo region in Serbia is quite lovely — pastoral, hilly, and green. When I thought of rural Serbia, that landscape was exactly what I pictured. I didn’t realize Serbia is so hilly, and so beautiful. Again, I promise pictures.

We relaxed the entire weekend. On Saturday, we drove to a church in the hills. Vlado told us that the Serbs had hidden the church so well that the Turks couldn’t find it. The church was small, with very interesting paintings and woodcarvings in the tower. A professor from Belgrade (and member of the Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences) came with us, telling us Serbian myths and folktales about water and water creatures. Apparently, in Serbian folk culture, demons live near the water.

Later that night, Natasa took a couple of kids, Elizabeth (one of the other students) and I on a walk with the sheep. This ended up being quite the adventure. On the way up, our group of sheep ran into another group of sheep. And when two groups of sheep collide…well, they act like sheep. They all stood together in the center of the road, one big mass of sheep. We had no idea what to do. Natasa managed to get half the sheep to go up the hill, but she was missing one of them. The older woman leading the other set of sheep grabbed one of her sheep by the leg, forcibly separating it from the group. But the poor sheep didn’t want to go with our sheep. When the woman let go, the sheep ran back to the woman’s herd. I guess sheep don’t go places by themselves, and our sheep were too far away for this sheep to join up with them. Natasa drove the sheep back down the hill. Together, the two children, Elizabeth, and I blocked the exit points for the sheep. The only place the woman’s sheep could run was with us. Eventually, we gathered all of our rightful sheep up and led them to pasture.

While at the pasture, while we were sitting and talking, the sheep wandered up. After thirty minutes or so, Natasa stands up and asks “Where are the sheep?” We had lost the sheep!!! She, Elizabeth, and one of the kids hiked up the hill after the sheep. The other kid and I waited at the bottom of the hill, guarding the potato patch. Eventually, the sheep wandered down the hill, grazing. Natasa and Elizabeth were pretty far behind them. They’d left word with us not to let the sheep eat the potatoes. Slavko came into the pasture, saw that I had my camera out, and immediately ran over to take some pictures. (He played with our cameras all weekend.) While Slavko was taking pictures, the sheep mozied into the potato patch. I saw this, and went running, yelling “Hajde sheep! Hajde!” (This means go away.) Elizabeth said that I looked pretty funny, running into the potato patch with my hands over my head, yelling at the top of my lungs at the sheep. When they got down the hill, Natasa looked at me and said “Good job, Anna!” We started back down the hill towards home.

Moral of the story — herding sheep is harder than it looks.

On Sunday, I managed to get some time with the Belgrade professor. I asked him to tell the story of Prince Lazar, the so-called “hero” of the Kosovo battle. (Lazar was beheaded, the Serbs basically lost the battle, and interpret this as the beginning of 500 years of Ottoman domination.) After telling the story of Lazar, unprompted, the professor gave me what I interpret as the Serbian nationalist version of the history of Kosovo. He said that we shouldn’t blame what happened in Kosovo solely on Milosevic — there had been uprisings in the region for at least twenty years prior to the 1980s. He said that, during WWII, Kosovo had been under Albanian facists. (This isn’t quite true — Kosovo was ruled by Italian facists during WWII. However, I do think Albania was heavily involved. I need to go back to my history books to double-check this.) He said that one of the reasons why so many Serbs had left Kosovo was due to the differential treatment of Albanians and Serbs during the Age of Enlightenment. Apparently crimes like rape were punished differently. (Again, I question this.)

Essentially, this professor was a Milosevic apologist. He said that the Croats started arming first, and this caused fear among Serbs living in Croatia. (Both sides started arming roughly around the same time.) Croatia was a facist state during WWII, and many Serbs died in concentration camps — not a lot of people outside of the region study this in their history textbooks. When Croatia declared its independence, Tudjman picked symbols of the Croatian facist state as the new country’s nationalist symbols. (These symbols remain on the Croatian flag.) So, according to the professor, Serbs in Croatia were “merely reacting to save their homes in Croatia.”

He said that Milosevic and Tudjman tried to negotiate to prevent conflict in Bosnia. These negotiations tried to define the ethnic surroundings in the former Yugoslavia, including the territory of Bosnia. The professor said “The agreement would have been successful had Serbs in Croatia not been afraid to live under Croat rule and if Western countries had accepted Tudjman and Milosevic’s division of Bosnia.” He didn’t say anything about the Bosnian Muslims, and whether or not they had a right to their own state. It was as though Serbs and Croats were the only constituent peoples in Bosnia, and therefore Milosevic and Tudjman had a right to divide that country between the two of them.

Later, someone asked the professor how long he’d been a member of the Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he responded “over twenty years.” This means that he was a member of the academy when the 1986 memorandum — considered the first statement of 1980s Serbian nationalism — was released. And he didn’t resign. That shows you his views right there.

I appreciate getting the Serbian perspective on the events, but in my opinion, people in the former Yugoslavia need to acknowledge what happened in order to move on. Croats need to acknowledge their (state supported) deeds against Serbs. (Jackie, one of my classmates, ended up talking to a Croatian Serb for a while. She said that in the 1990s, at the beginning of the Balkan Wars, Serbs in Croata just started disappearing. And nobody knows where they went. Members of families just vanished, never to be seen again.) Serbs need to acknowledge their state-supported violence towards Croats and Muslims, and particularly the massacre at Srebrenica. And Bosnian Muslims need to acknowledge that their army, too, is not blameless. Everyone did horrible things. Everyone shares in the blame. And only in this way can forgiveness occur.