Redheads on the wall

Spied these two young redheads the other day on a beautiful early fall afternoon on a wall in Kalemegdan Park. The weather is changing ever so slightly.... Now there will be Indian Summer to look forward to.

"The Struggle"

Browsing the portal the other day I did a double-take when I saw that this same statue called The Struggle (Borba) by Simeon Roksandric (1874-1943) is in Zagreb. Roksandric had made one statue for the great Balkan exhibition in London in 1907. During the transport to or from London, Roskandic got word that the ship carrying the sculpture had sunk. So he made another statue from the same cast.

It turned out that this was untrue and he ended up with two identical statues. The Belgrade City Council decided to buy one in 1912, and Zagreb bought the other.

Like my fellow blogger in Zagreb, I was unable to find any information as to exactly what this statue represents, other than the obvious fisherman strangling a snake. Tried Googling in several languages, nothing!

Anybody know?

Sunday Bridges: the new bridge

A new bridge that will pass over the Sava River to connect New Belgrade with one of its communities, Banovo Brdo, is currently well under way. It is to be a state-of-the-art bridge, and you can read all about it right here.

See more bridges at Louis La Vache's Sunday Bridges.

Reflections Weekend--Boop-boop-a-doop!

My mother loves Betty Boop, I love Betty Boop, and my daughter loves Betty Boop. When will it end? Never, I hope, since Betty Boop is the epitome of feminism, even if feminists might denounce her. This Serbian Betty stands in a window of a fashionable store downtown.

Check out other reflections at Newtown Daily Photo.

SKYWATCH--a man and his dog

A man and his dog enjoy a fall afternoon atop an embankment in Kalemegdan Park.

See other skies at SKYWATCH.

School days...

This street scene reminds me of school days. The paper airplane, the fall leaves, the lines on the street echoing the lines on the paper....

ABC Wednesday "I" is for "information"

The above is called the Little Pyramid, and it stands in the center of Belgrade's pedestrian street, Knez Mihailova, right in front of the Academy of Arts and Sciences. The pyramid bears an inscription saying that Belgrade’s geographic center is situated at 44 degrees 49 minutes and 14 seconds of the northern geographic latitude and at 20 degrees 27 minutes and 44 seconds of the eastern geographic longitude, at an altitude of 116 meters.

So there's your information for today! See how others have interpreted the letter 'I' on ABC WEDNESDAY.

At the Chinese Market

I thoroughly enjoyed taking my new Chinese friend Lixiu (LEE-hyoo) whom I met yesterday (see last post) to Belgrade's Chinese Market. The market consists of three large pavilions crammed with sellers of just about everything, even the proverbial kitchen sink. "He's speaking a southeastern Chinese dialect; she's speaking Mandarin Chinese," remarked Lixiu, as we wandered through the market. Lixiu remarked that the clothing is designed for export and western tastes, and many items you wouldn't find in China. She treated herself to a western-style sweater. In the above photo, Lixiu is buying some vegetables and noodles from the produce sellers between the pavilions. (She's staying in a company apartment with a kitchen.) I bought some, too, and some moon cakes, a sweet typically eaten, so says Lixiu, on the Moon Festival coming up on September 23rd.

An encounter

Went for a walk on Saturday in Kalemegdan Park. I stopped to take a few photos from this vantage point overlooking New Belgrade in the distance and the confluence of the Danube and Sava Rivers when this young woman approached me and asked me to take her photo. I obliged, we got into a conversation, whereupon she complimented me on my English (smile) and was amused by the irony of running across the only person nearby who was a native speaker. Her name is Lixiu, and she's from China. Lixiu (LEE-hyoo) is here on a business trip, and loves to walk. She walked all the way over from New Belgrade from near the tower you can see in the distance. We walked on, and since she was so keen on seeing more of Belgrade, I promised to take her tomorrow to see the...Chinese Market! Stay tuned!

Sunday Bridges--

Another view of one of the bridges leading into the fortress at Kalemegdan, over what used to be a moat.

See more bridges at Louis La Vache's Sunday Bridges.

Reflections Weekend--no visits...

The things you notice when you look up. I never realized there was an embassy for the Most Serene Republic of San Marino here in Belgrade. San Marino is a tiny place, just about 61 square kilometers, with a population of about 30,000. Intrigued, I checked my Neocounter...nobody in San Marino has visited...hmmm...maybe I should pay the embassy a visit!

Those are some buildings on Knez Mihailova, Belgrade's pedestrian street, that you see reflected in the window.

Check out James' Reflections Weekend.