Tuesday, February 3, 2009
1:19 PM | 
Posted by
Ryś |
As they said in my favorite show from childhood: "Sesame Street is brought to you by", then I am saying.. “The great weekend is brought to you by letter B as Belgrade and number 10”. Yes we went to Belgrade – we means: Rys, Rambo and Tomek. The journey – not so short, but cheap – Miskolc (19:30)-Budapest(22:00)-Belgrade(6:40) – the roundtrip ticket costs about 38 Euro. But new stamps in passports are worth this price ;)
We came to Belgrade in the early morning – and although there was a possibility to sleep in the train – because just few people were going then – always when I fell asleep, either border control or ticket officer was waking me up and plucked me out from dreams… What I must admit now, to be consequent in further relation, although the night was very warm, the wagons had heating on.. many trials of turning that off came to naught.
We had this advantage, that weekend before Pieter and Johan went to the capital of Serbia, so we already knew the hostel where to spend the night. Actually this one (Green Studio Hostel –Karađorđeva str. 69) was excellent for a weekend trip. Located just near the train station, with nice rooms, free access to internet and friendly hosts for just €10 . As we came.. we went to recover in beds.
At about 11 am we went to the city. The first impression and memory from Belgrade was... the high temperature- relatively high to that what we got used to in colder Miskolc. 26 Celsius degrees and the blue sky... Perfect! We moved to the city centre – and here the first “obstacle” – the Marathon! All the capital full of runners, posters, spectators… it’s hard to believe that this city not so much time ago had tanks on the streets and citizens had to hide in cellars because of NATO attacks. The city is living! It is colorful, loud, crowded, but not like western plastic capitals, Belgrade has an atmosphere.. Slavic, Balkan.. unique.
Maybe one of the reasons, that my impression about Serbia is so good was that finally after 3 weeks of fighting with Hungarian language I could hear Slavic language and what’s more.. to understand that! :) People are very open and enthusiastic our Slavic roots make them more friendly. Of course you can notice that Balkan blood is more hot than relatively cold Polish or Lithuanian, but also that is kind of a myth.
What I would like to specially recommend to visit is : the Zemun district, the fortress and obligatory few churches – mainly Orthodox in the city. That Saturday in Orthodox church is analogue to Catholic Palms’ Sunday. Everywhere we looked, we were surrounded by people with small bells and wreaths. Unfortunately we didn’t manage to get to know what’s the origin of that symbols.
The evening brought me an unwanted surprise – the earache.. the result of opening windows in hot train. I got some dews in chemistry, but the pain was so unpleasant that after 2am I came back to the hostel, while Rambo and Tomek had good time in one of Belgrade’s crowded clubs.
Sunday – the recovery day.. almost without any pain (the Serbian mixtures make miracles :P ) but already with otitis… That day we went to Zemun - small, nice district on North - perfect for Sunday’s walk, jogging, rest… whatever you like. Sunday was hotter than yesterday so without any doubts we spend half of the day enjoying the sunshine, I mean - lying on bench or grass and watching... nature :) Late afternoon when our mind convinced the will to do something more, we moved back to the centre, to see skipped day before the “Belgrade’s Montmartre” . Skadarlija makes for bohemian quarter of Belgrade. Although short and curved, the street includes well-known restaurants, a hotel, of course art and antique galleries, and souvenir shops... Honestly speaking - sipping coffee in one of local gardens, listening to Serbian or gypsy music.. that’s one of the most remarkable attractions of Belgrade.
Food – of course you can look for something in one of many expensive restaurants ( It’s not a surprise that the prices in Belgrade are similar to these which you can find in other European capitals), but the food which for sure you have to taste is Pljeskavica (probably I made several mistakes writing this word) but also lots of other grilled types of meat. Pljeskavica - it’s a kind of – here I don’t want to use this ugly word, but – hamburger. However well-known hamburger in comparison to pljeskavica is like comparing Daewoo to Maybach… Both can move, just you never know how far you can go with the first one. Different types of meat… but real meat – not some artificial stuff sold in the E.U. - fresh bread or kind of cake, fresh vegetables and unforgettable Balkan spices ! I really advice to visit one of such “kiosks” with grilled meat – the Miki’s place – on Brankova street. The big Pljeskavica costs there 120 dinars and if you would like to have fun, you can take few steps more and enter McDonalds, where for tiny plastic hamburger you pay about 150 dinars.
It was very convenient to come to Serbia on weekend – the train from Wien (Budapest) comes early on Saturday, and train back leaves at 10pm on Sunday. It was a good weekend.
Hvala Srbija! :)
**the whole article find at: bartekrys.yoyo.pl
Labels:
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Subscribe To
Posts
Comments
Recommended
0 comments:
Post a Comment