Belgrade: Only Abroad
A few days into my month in Belgrade I had a day that could probably only happen on a crazy trip like the one I'm on. It started with lunch. I had plans to meet up with a friend of a friend of a friend - an American citizen living in Belgrade. I wanted to find out how Belgrade living compared to living in the US. I knew we would be friends when within 45 minutes of meeting up he compared me to Hermione Granger. Although she is a fictional teenage witch I don't know if I've ever been so flattered by a comparison.
After lunch we went on an impromptu tea tour of Belgrade. I had my first turkish tea and the Serbian American told me all about how after living abroad he can no longer live in the US. He's tired of the blinders that many Americans have when it comes to the rest of the world. And I can't say I haven't felt the same.
After the tea tour he was going to meet an acquaintance for beers and invited me along. When we arrived my new best friend introduced me to his acquaintance and went to use the restroom. I ended up sitting down across from this guy I had just met and was immediately hit with the feeling of familiarity that I had certainly seen this guy before. It was a bizarre sensation considering I had not met anyone outside of my group and had only been in Serbia a few days.
My friend got back from the bathroom within minutes and right away mentioned this guy's youtube channel and my luckily my twilight zone moment was over since that's where I had seen him too. Apparently these two had only met one other time - when my friend recognized this guy from his youtube channel and accosted him on the bus. I had seen his videos when I googled Belgrade and started watching his videos as he had the only channel dedicated solely to Belgrade. It was nothing short of eerie still though to be sitting across from the one person in Belgrade who I would have recognized from the internet.
In the course of an hour, however, the eeriness turned to unease when we realized that this guy was just as intense as his videos and his unwavering eye contact was unsettling in person. So after an hour of this guy's direct questioning and even more direct gaze my friend messaged me while sitting right next to me to tell me that he needed to get out and I put into motion a quick extraction.
From there we met up with a good friend of my new friend at a wine bar - a Serbian woman about my age with better English than most native speakers. As we talked it was amazing how much we had in common coming from such different parts of the world. At one point she pulled crackers out of her purse and shared them with all of us. And another almost immediate friendship was born.
From there she invited me to a club opening. We ended up being some of the first to get there and some of the last to leave. The club was in a beautiful, large apartment with murals on all the walls and retro dance songs being played by the DJ (see photo above). At the club we ran into some of her friends by happenstance who joined our group.
After the club closed for the night I thought we would head home but my new friend lead us around the corner and had us wait outside while she entered an unmarked building. A few minutes later she emerged and led us into the building, down a corridor, and down several steps of stairs to a figurative and literal underground bar (see picture above). It was clearing out so they let us pick the music, which resulted in dramatic dance sequences including one where I was lifted and twirled. And what I thought would be a one-hour coffee meetup turned into me getting home 16 hours later.
After lunch we went on an impromptu tea tour of Belgrade. I had my first turkish tea and the Serbian American told me all about how after living abroad he can no longer live in the US. He's tired of the blinders that many Americans have when it comes to the rest of the world. And I can't say I haven't felt the same.
After the tea tour he was going to meet an acquaintance for beers and invited me along. When we arrived my new best friend introduced me to his acquaintance and went to use the restroom. I ended up sitting down across from this guy I had just met and was immediately hit with the feeling of familiarity that I had certainly seen this guy before. It was a bizarre sensation considering I had not met anyone outside of my group and had only been in Serbia a few days.
My friend got back from the bathroom within minutes and right away mentioned this guy's youtube channel and my luckily my twilight zone moment was over since that's where I had seen him too. Apparently these two had only met one other time - when my friend recognized this guy from his youtube channel and accosted him on the bus. I had seen his videos when I googled Belgrade and started watching his videos as he had the only channel dedicated solely to Belgrade. It was nothing short of eerie still though to be sitting across from the one person in Belgrade who I would have recognized from the internet.
In the course of an hour, however, the eeriness turned to unease when we realized that this guy was just as intense as his videos and his unwavering eye contact was unsettling in person. So after an hour of this guy's direct questioning and even more direct gaze my friend messaged me while sitting right next to me to tell me that he needed to get out and I put into motion a quick extraction.
From there we met up with a good friend of my new friend at a wine bar - a Serbian woman about my age with better English than most native speakers. As we talked it was amazing how much we had in common coming from such different parts of the world. At one point she pulled crackers out of her purse and shared them with all of us. And another almost immediate friendship was born.
From there she invited me to a club opening. We ended up being some of the first to get there and some of the last to leave. The club was in a beautiful, large apartment with murals on all the walls and retro dance songs being played by the DJ (see photo above). At the club we ran into some of her friends by happenstance who joined our group.
After the club closed for the night I thought we would head home but my new friend lead us around the corner and had us wait outside while she entered an unmarked building. A few minutes later she emerged and led us into the building, down a corridor, and down several steps of stairs to a figurative and literal underground bar (see picture above). It was clearing out so they let us pick the music, which resulted in dramatic dance sequences including one where I was lifted and twirled. And what I thought would be a one-hour coffee meetup turned into me getting home 16 hours later.
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