On Thursday, we had another Mladen lecture at BOS, bringing his crash course in Balkans history from World War 1, through the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (later Kingdom of Yugoslavia), and going to the end of World War Two. It was during this time that the split between the ethnic groups became more polarized, with Serbs and Croats on opposite sides during WW1, with Serbs sustaining massive losses. Croats have never really been fully behind the idea of a unified state in the Balkans (what Serbs pushed for, to avoid foreign influence), as they have an ideal of independent state right. This created a dysfunctional political system in the postwar KoSCS, renamed the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. It eventually became a dictatorship after political infighting and ethnic terrorism.
Mladen explained that a modern-day questioning of Yugoslavia's involvement in WWII has emerged. In 1941, the Nazis offered the KofY non-aggression if they could pass through to the Middle East to get oil for the invasion of Russia. The king agreed, but the people and the officer corps staged a coup, and were dragged into the war. The Croat population of the army surrendered quickly, with many collaborating, and the Serbs again sustained incredible losses, mostly at the hands of fascist Croats. The war crimes at this time were unbelievable. Mladen explained how cutting a throat is obviously hard work, so Croats developed special gloves to ease it up. They would have throat-cutting competitions, with one winner finishing at 1,200...in one night. Eventually, Yugoslav communist partisans under Tito were able to liberate themselves from occupation, which is where the lectures will pick up again next week. The suffering of the war has caused modern Serbs to question whether it might have been better to just have let the Nazis go through...
After the lecture, our group visited the Zoran Djindjic Fund, a group that offers internships across Europe. They are founded on the ideals of Djindjic, who was an opposition leader in Milosevic's regime, became Prime Minister, and sent him to the Hague. He represented a bright future for Serbia. He was assassinated in 2003 by organized crime figures closely connected to the Serbian special forces.
For dinner, we went to an excellent restaurant across the Sava river in Zemun (on the dime of the university). The delicious food kept coming: salads, fish, potatoes, fried olives, chicken, sausage, and desserts. Whenever we thought the meal was over, there was more. It was incredible to say the least.
So far, I have not blogged about our night time activities, but this night's story I feel like I need to shout from the top of a mountain. A lot of Belgrade's night life takes place in boats along the Sava river, and that was our plan for tonight. We walked for a while from Zemun, trying to find a place good enough for us Huskies. We were turned away from one that was a private party, and passed on some crappy barges. We were close to giving up. That's when we saw a brilliantly illuminated boat across from the Kalemegdan, heavily decorated and blasting music. We tested to see if there was a list (by strolling right in), and walked into a dream world. Now, Serbian women are the most beautiful women I have seen in my 22 years, and they all apparently were on this boat. Whispering to ourselves around the massive crate in the middle of the boat filled with top shelf booze, we initially guessed it was a wedding we were crashing, and assumed we would get kicked out sooner or later. Then we realized it wasn't a wedding: it was the after party for the Miss Serbia 2011 pageant. Out of the most beautiful women in the world, we were in the same space as fifty of the cream of the crop. It was difficult to drink with our jaws hanging open, but we made it work. I ventured into some black label whiskey, and asked the bartender for just a finger. He slapped me on the back, said "This is Serbia!" and topped me off. There was great dancing and pictures with the contestants. The winner was not the one I would have picked (she must have a great personality, there was a lot of other talent there), but it was still our greatest night out so far, and surely set the bar high. It was definitely a great advertisement for Belgrade's tourism industry!
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