It Never Gets Old!!!

Random and Out of Place

Yes. It's over a month late, but I thought we should upload at least a few pictures from Paris...

updating the scrapbook by the river

singing Serbian music with a couple of Slovenians from our hostel

Dylan, you should recognize yourself in this dance!

Brodie, this one is a sister of your jump!

Kris, your booty dance!

Brodie, again!

We got lost in the city on a rainy day and found a hookah bar

Sacre Coeur

Museum... one of many, many, many...

This one speaks for itself

Snow Day

It is cooooooooold over here! And, it has been snowing for about 36 hours non-stop now. Just last night, we got about a foot of snow. Natavid has been tramping around wide-eyed and giddy, with snow-angels, snowmen, and snowball fights gleaming in our collective mind's eye (that's right, we've achieved full telepathic communicative abilities with some help from a Serbian mystic). So, all you Texans who feel like hot stuff 'cause you got a measley couple inches, feast your eyes on our Winter Wonderland!!!!

Backyard. Pictured: Apricot Tree

Front yard, looking right

Front yard, looking left

Front yard, looking straight

David, Nata, Dijana, Iva and Mirko outside I Tako Dalje, a coffee shop owned by "Uncle John," the American who moved here from Philly about 30 years ago (they make delicious apple cider).

Here, you can see on the roof about how much snow has fallen in Surcin (some places, it's much more).

Nata, in front of her beloved kajsija tree.

And here is David's beloved rastan, covered in snow, again.

Natavid, in the snow.

Snesko Belic

November-December Mash-Up

Things have slowed down a bit here, partially because of winter weather, and partially because people are getting tired of us calling them up to hang out all day every day. Accordingly, we have snapped a lot fewer photos lately. Here is a brief recap of some things that we did these past few weeks though.

So we went to the "Etno Selo" park just across the border in Bosnia. Basically, it is like a really idealized version of what old Serbian villages used to look like. You got some water wheels, a church, a really pretty pond with swans and ducks, an ampitheatre, etc. It was a fun trip and a whole big group of us went for the day. Now, bask in the pastoral magnificence that is Etno Selo...

Top Row L-R: Olgica, Srki, Ceca, Nata, Iva, Mirko
Bottom Row: Ana, David, Sandra

This is apparently a five star hotel...

Church-on-a-Hill

Swan-on-the-Grass

In a picture right before this, Mirko and Srki were hugging... Then they struck this pose as soon as someone said anything!

C'mon, kids! All aboard the Uncle Mirko Express!!


Helloooo, Etnooooo Seloooooo!!!

Ana and Sasa, on a bridge

Ana, Nata, Sasa... not on a bridge

Iva, also not on a bridge

On our FIFTH anniversary, we went out to the only place that serves anything even closely related to legit Mexican food in Beograd. It's called Zapata. While it wasn't all bad (in fact, some was quite good), this was what an "enchilada" looked like (it was basically a pita) :

But, here is me looking very happy and somewhat not quite like me because I was just beside myself over the enormous flautas sitting in front of me:

Also, here is our Christmas tree. We just decorated this about an hour, hour and a half ago, while drinking a little champaigne (sp?) with Vesna...

Baba loves bananas (she eats at least four or five in one sitting) and hates having her picture taken. Hence, this interesting pose:

Moving On

Ok. Forget about Paris. You'll see those pictures someday, but for now, there are just too many and the task of picking which ones to load and then loading them has proved far too daunting. Instead, meet our friend Stuart. See when we were in Hvar, Croatia a few months back, we met this Aussie. He was all, "How you goin'?" and Nata was all like, "Huh? I don't understand you!" (See "Croatian Vacation Pt. 2" if you have a short memory...)

Anywho, we wound up camping with this guy and since he was traveling all around the world, we invited him to come hang in Beograd if he gets the chance. So yeah, here are the pics from that adventure.

Our Australian, Stuart.

This is a jazz bar we went to one night. That bigger guy on the left is the owner and he could play a comb just like a saxophone!

The cat that lived at Stuart's aptly named hostel, Three Black Cats

Triumphant in the rain.

Bizarre things were happening at this place...

It was nice to get some guy time (and what I really mean by that is time with someone whose native language is English...)

Dancin' crazy like at Borence.

Our nightcap of choice was pizza...

...While Stuart preferred a sweet palacinka

He saw this in Novi Sad and we put it up just to dig at all you "Facers" out there.

And so we bid Stuart safe travels on his way to the Middle East. First major stop for him: Iran! Be safe, friend. And good luck with a month of sobriety in the dessert!!

We interrupt this blog....

To bring you an important weather update: The first snow has fallen in Belgrade!!! It snowed all day and is still going strong at 6:30 in the evening. Here, take a look:

A snow covered garden...

..."Kad padne prvi sneg"...

Those are collard greens, or rastan, there below the tree. Vesna says it's better after it freezes and then thaws again.

Speaking of Vesna, she just celebrated her birthday last night. Srecan rodjendan, Vesna!!

And Nata and David just sat by the heater (there on the right) all day and drank coffee of the Turkish variety!

Paris to Beograd...

... in only twenty four hours! Yes, we have safely returned, albeit dog tired the both of us. Pictures will come soon, but if your imagination is lazy (you know who you are!) we probably looked something like this.
Enjoy and check in for pictures again soon.

--Natavid

Oui!!!!

We are in Paris. We are safe. We are enjoying ourselves a great deal. We are taking lots of pictures. That is all...


--Natavid

Tidbits....

So, these are just a few tidbits from the last two or three days... In response to some complaints that have been made*, we will make sure that each and every picture is accompanied by a hand-crafted, humorous/informative/expository comment of its own. Geez, you people are demanding!

Also, we are leaving on Monday to go to Paris for about a week. Needless to say, we are very excited and trembling with anticipation! If we aren't responding to various forms of communication, please be patient; we are just enjoying ourselves too much to find the internet!


*See comments from the Oct. 11 post...

Mirko, Sasa, David and Dijana at Dzakarta

Ina does not really look like that! She also does not smoke!
Mirko does look like that! Perhaps a little less confused!
They are our good friends,
Ina and Mirko!

Sasa has a booooyfriend!!!! (His name is Vlada and he's on the left there)

The table was segregated between the people who needed to learn more of a certain language (pictured here)...

... and those who think they're so freakin' cool because they already speak two languages and want to "catch up" with eachother!!! (--David) PS- that's Nikola.

Take a look at those cool pink pants!

... and that green thumb!

Look at him. What do you even need to say? I mean, c'mon, that is CUTE!!!!

And so is that?

Mirko and Dusan

Nata and Dusan