Miss Representation

Last week I went to see a showing of Miss Representation, a documentary film shown courtesy of the American Corner here in Belgrade and followed by a panel/audience discussion. This film deals with how women are portrayed in the media....and readers, it's getting worse, not better. I highly recommend this documentary if it is shown in your area. If you click on the above link, you'll see that you can even arrange for a showing in your area.

ABC WEDNESDAY "I" is for "invitation"

Today is Yankee in Belgrade's fourth anniversary. Okay, here comes the cliché: "Seems like only yesterday..."

This blog post is an invitation for you to help yourself to these cupcakes from my former school's bake sale last spring. Go on--nothing gets stale in cyberspace.

See other i's at Mrs. Nesbitt's ABC WEDNESDAY.

ABC WEDNESDAY-'B' is for 'Belgrade bovines'

It's Belgrade's turn to do cows. I like this cloudy cow that matches the sky.

(If you visited me earlier today, you saw another photo....I'd forgotten it was Wednesday--that photo will be back tomorrow!)

See other B's on ABC WEDNESDAY

Rip 'em up!

If you are a new father celebrating your baby's birth in Serbia, please don't wear your best designer shirt to the party.... This is what it will look like, since it's customary for male guests to shred a new Dad's shirt. My son wisely wore an old t-shirt and brought along two other old shirts....to be ripped by friends who arrived a bit later.

See photos from Monday of this week about little Mila....

Don't you just love the guy's expression in the background?

ABC WEDNESDAY "A" is for 'angels"

Little Mila (see yesterday's photo) is in there somewhere.... Some things haven't changed here, and you can see that the babies are swaddled (but a couple seem to have their arms free) and stacked like little loaves of bread to be delivered to their mothers at feeding time. They did it like this when my kids were born, too. Mothers at home don't swaddle as a rule; I think this is just hospital efficiency!

Little angels.

See more A's on ABC WEDNESDAY.

A little sooner than we thought....

Baby Mila (MEE-la) arrived a bit sooner than we thought, weighing in at 2.8 kilos (6.2 lbs) and measuring 48 cm (19 inches). Isn't she cute?? And it you think it's cute how they write the baby's name on the diaper wrapping, wait until you see tomorrow's photo....

Back in Belgrade!

Back in Belgrade, just in time for a big event, which you can probably guess at from this photo of my daughter-in-law's belly. Sometime before the end of the month, our family will increase by 1. And we know what it will be, but I'll keep you guessing for a little while.....

"No more pencils, no more books....

.....no more teachers' dirty looks!" I remember saying that when I was a kid the moment school was out, which it is this week, in most places. Here's to the grads and to those who 'simply' made it through one more year. These little antennae decorations are happy!

The wedding dress race

Yesterday on Nikola Pasic square a wedding dress race was held. Although these three girls look like they could be off to the church, they were actually three of the 120 participants ready to compete in the what-will-probably-turn-out-to-be annual 'Wedding Dress Race." Wedding dresses were supplied by the race's organizers. The lucky first-prize winner won a trip for two to Slovenia and a subscription to
"Venčanje" (Wedding) magazine. The second-place winner won a trip for two to Serbia's mountain resort, Zlatibor, while the participant chosen at the end of the race as 'Miss Wedding Dress Race" won two tickets for last night's Bob Dylan concert at the Belgrade Arena. And by the way, did you know Bob Dylan wrote a song called "Wedding Song?" I didn't. You can read the lyrics right here.

Back after 65,000,000 years....

I fulfilled the wish of the child in me and went to see Walking with Dinosaurs at the Belgrade Arena. It was everything I thought it would be, and more. They walk, they roar, they 'breathe,' accompanied by sound/video effects; all so real. Read about it on the link above, and if they come to your town, do yourself a favor and go....it's for kids of all ages.

Here you see a pair of towering brachiosaurus (brachiosauri!). The very idea of transporting these babies is overwhelming. There were quite a few very large trucks in the Arena's parking lot.

They're coming......

It's been so nice recently that I took a trip down to the village to see my little traveling buddy, Radovan, who has traveled with me to Greece, the US, and India. He was all excited to show me this little 'lizard,' as he called it, that he found in his yard. He also complained that all his chickens are missing....

When I took this photo, I saw something that Radovan hadn't seen, so I whisked him off to Belgrade, leaving the baby 'lizard' to its mother. Radovan and I are off to Poland the day after tomorrow, where we will be visiting a friend of mine and we will try to buy him some more chickens.

Now I know why there are signs all over Belgrade advertising Walking with Dinosaurs, which I am going to see on April 9th at the Belgrade Arena.

I think I'll be seeing more of 'mama' and her baby.

SKYWATCH and Happy Birthday to my favorite tennis player!

Nope, guess again. My favorite tennis player is on the left. Today is my son's birthday; Novak Djokovic's is in May. This photo was taken at a cancer support group ceremony a while back and Novak was handing out the awards. See my son in action in the second photo on this post.
Happy Birthday, Champ!

And since there's a gorgeous sunset behind these two, check out SKYWATCH FRIDAY to see other skies around the world. And maybe another birthday, who knows?

The Berlin Wall in Belgrade, or 'Gone with the Wind'

Like many other cities in Europe aside from Berlin, 'Berlin Walls' were constructed to be torn down today, November 9th, on the 20th anniversary of the real wall's fall. In cooperation with the Goethe Institute here, German artist Frank Betler constructed a heavy cardboard 'brick' wall on Republic Square over two days' time. It was 40 meters long and three meters high. On this link you can see the artist at work, on a bright sunny day. Unfortunately, Mother Nature had other plans for the wall, and right here you can see the result of strong winds and snow that hit the city on November 3rd. At that point, the wall was not completely damaged, and would have stood until the 9th when the rest would have been knocked down, but (and this is unofficial, but reasonably reliable), there were reports of late-night hooliganism that involved leaping over the wall and knocking it down.

So here you see the wall all packed up. Under the plastic are the remaining flattened cardboard boxes, and the poster panels are lying beside them.

Addendum: I'm adding this after the 8th comment. This morning I saw that now instead of the collapsed wall will be a 'Berlin Museum' that will be opened this evening by the German Ambassador. In this small 'museum' will be photographs of the original Berlin Wall and other memorabilia. If you want to see it, go:here.

Would have been 32...

Today my husband and I would have been married 32 years. I had never taken off my wedding ring before this photo, and he had removed his only once too, after a wasp stung him while he was choosing grapes at the market. His finger swelled so badly he had to cut off his ring with wire cutters, and had to have it fixed. Last August, I posted a tribute to my husband here.

Ten years later....

Today (actually later tonight, my time) marks the 10th anniversary of the NATO bombing of Serbia. The top photo was one I took from my back porch after my husband and I had been awakened by several rolling, thunderous explosions that rocked our bedroom. This photo is only one of many I took either downtown or else from my front or rear porch as the bombing continued over 78 days.

In the bottom photo, you can see that much has changed. I no longer have a direct view on the entire plant, but now there are auto dealerships, an exposition hall, apartment buildings, and business headquarters across the way. How times have changed...

Remember this post of mine?

My One-year Blog Anniversary

Yes, it's been one year since I first posted my number one entry at Yankee-in-Belgrade. Many things have transpired in my life since then, good and bad, but among the good are you, my many cyberfriends I've met through this blog and visiting others. In your honor, I invite you to have a glass of (cyber) wine on me.

This is my very, very first photo I took way back in 1973 with a screw-mount Praktica SLR camera I bought while living in Paris. My former boss helped me choose it, after I kept bugging him by showing him photos in magazines and saying, "I want a camera that can do this!" I loved my little Praktica and miss it. I was a complete novice when I got it; I'd take a photo (film, remember?), jot down the aperture, speed, and distance, then compare the results when I got either the contact sheet (remember those?) or the photos. Would you believe I even snipped individual negatives, thinking it was easier than keeping them on the strip??

This photo was taken in my apartment in Montmartre the same afternoon I bought the camera. I only had bread and wine (Paris!), and quickly put together this still life. (You can see that I didn't "do windows" at the time...)

Here's to you!!

Happy Birthday to my Baby Boy

At 31, my son is hardly a baby anymore, but as all mothers who read this know, we always tend to think of them as "baby boy" and 'baby girl". Above is an arrangement I made for my son's birthday, similar to the one I made for my daughter last October. You can see his first bunny, tiny moccasins, a cat/fox (never could tell), his much-loved Curious George (original nose was chewed off), a soap carving, a carved owl, a dragster, a Swiss Army knife, and a little Serbian boy candle, all arranged on his first knitted blanket. Gosh, how time flies. Happy Birthday, "Baby Boy," and many, many more. Your sister and I love you, and I know your father is with us all today.

An upcoming celebration....

My daughter got engaged this past weekend to a great guy she's been seeing for some time now. Her brother and I are so happy for her, and we know her father is somehow watching over her, too. In this photo along with the champagne bottle and glasses is my husband's wedding ring, which I keep where I can see it every day. May she and her future husband have many, many happy years together, as her father and I did. Stay tuned for a wedding photo sometime this year. (Most Serbs celebrate a happy occasion with rakija (RAH-kee-yuh), a strong brandy made usually from plums, but I find it too strong, and prefer champagne.)

"Bibi" is older today than yesterday....

...but then, who isn't? Today though, I would have to add a new digit when writing my age. It's Groundhog's day, too. Behind this scrumptious chocolate cake I made (to be eaten later on with friends, plus a generous serving of vanilla ice cream), is me when I was one, and in front is a stuffed groundhog given to me by a friend.

I'd been tagged by Therese in Chandler and Soulbrush, so I am writing with some delay six random things about me:

1. I love to shop at thrift shops and garage sales;
2. I open books to smell the paper;
3. When I'm feeling under the weather, I eat plain spaghetti with lots of garlic and olive oil;
4. My favorite weather is autumn, cool and crisp, with the smell of burning leaves;
5. I can be a long time alone, but not lonely;
6. When I find a lost item, I go to great lengths to find its owner, much like Amelie Poulain.

So there you have it! Enjoy a piece of cybercake; wish you could really try some!

Saint Sava Day

Saint Archbishop Sava (1175 - 1235), originally born prince Rastko Nemanjić, son of the ruler and founder of the Serbian medieval state Stefan Nemanja and brother of the first Serbian king, was the first Archbishop of Serbia (1219-1233), the most important saint in the Serbian Orthodox Church, and an important cultural and political worker of his time. The temple stands on the site where the remains of Saint Sava were burned by the Turks in 1595.

Saint Sava is the founder of the independent Serbian Orthodox Church and is celebrated as the patron saint of education and medicine. Today, January 27th, schools all over Serbia celebrate Saint Sava's Day by singing songs and reciting poems in his honor.

In this photo, you can see part of the temple's dome and two crosses behind nearby houses' rooftops.

If you'd like to read more about this temple, see this site .