Day: May 9, 2009

Kralovec Family To Attend Serbia Open

billkralovec

Nadia, Owen and I are excited for our first ATP Finals tomorrow. We will be attending the Novak Djokovic, err, excuse me, Serbia Open. I joke that it should be called the Novak Open as he bought the rights to the Dutch Open tourney and moved it to his hometown of Belgrade. Thankfully, he didn’t disappoint his family and the home crowd and made it to the finals. Unfortunately, all the Serb players ended up in the same side of the draw and Djokovic cruised through defeating two Serbs, including the second highest ranked Serb, Victor Trocki (#40 in the world). It was almost like a Davis Cup practice. Tonight he got by the Italian, Andreas Seppi, but lost one set. 

He will be taking on a “Lucky Loser” named Lukasz Kubot, from Poland. He is the first Polish player in an ATP final in 27 years. The term lucky loser means that Kubot lost in the qualifying rounds to get into the tourney, but due to an injury, was the alternate and got to enter the main singles draw. Only 5 lucky losers have won ATP events in the last 30 years. Lukasz is a decent doubles player, with one ATP doubles title, and he is currently ranked #22 in doubles, but #179 on the singles tour. After catching a lucky break to get into the tourney, he got another one when #25 ranked Russian Igor Andreev, withdrew in the first set of their second round match. This afternoon he defeated world #24, Ivo Karlovic, the 6 foot 10 inch big server from Croatia. For Kubot, with a career singles record of 15-16, this was the biggest win of his career. The 26 year old will have the biggest match of his career tomorrow.

 

Kubot from todays win in the semifinals. (photo courtesy of the Serbia Open)
Kubot from today's win in the semifinals. (photo courtesy of the Serbia Open)

 

 

Does Kubot have a chance tomorrow? His only hope is that Djokovic played late tonight and played three sets, and he might be tired tomorrow afternoon. Will Novak be over confident? Kubot has to be happy already with getting this far and the guaranteed 40,000 Euros. Will his luck continue? 

I predict a straight sets victory for Djokovic, and if Kubot wins 6 games in the two sets, he should still consider himself lucky. 

With our finals tickets, we also have access to the doubles final. I see that tonight, Kubot won again and he will be playing in the doubles final as well with partner Oliver Marach.

Leaded Gasoline In Serbia

billkralovec

Types of Gasoline In Serbia, originally uploaded by bill kralovec.

There are many little challenges in living in a country other than your own. When we bought a car this year, we needed to fill it up with gasoline. I pull up to a gas station and see these choices of fuel. Which one is for my car?

I immediately eliminated the two choices with “dizel” which is a cognate of diesel. My car is a 1996 Honda Odyssey and requires unleaded gasoline. So what is the difference between the two premium choices? I usually trusted the attendant, as in Serbia, there is no self-service.

I did a bit a research on line and found out that the “BMB” is unleaded fuel and “MB” is leaded fuel. I am surprised that Serbia still uses leaded gasoline. This was phased out in the US in the 1970’s and across much of the world. Leaded gasoline is still used in less developed nations like Afghanistan, Fiji, Iraq, etc. There are three of the former Yugoslavia nations (Bosnia, Macedonia, and Serbia) still using leaded fuel.

Expats to Serbia always complain about people smoking, but rarely do I hear them complain about leaded gasoline. I wonder what the health effects are, especially with my children. We live in relatively traffic free area, but we must still be exposed to lead in the air.

I’ll definitely do some more research on the topic. If any readers of my blog have any thing to add to the discussion, please do so.

I must remember then, to put “BMB” in my car as that is the Unleaded Gasoline. A mnemonic to use is “un” is one extra syllable and “B” is one extra letter. “B” is good, no “B” bad.

This from the “United Nations Partnership for Clean Fuels and Vehicles” report.

Serbia – deadline of 2015 – 2020

The Clearing-House together with the REC country office supported a one-day national round table
discussion 8 May 2006 that included the phase-out of leaded gasoline. The Clearing-House plans to carry out an
awareness campaign that will include blood lead level testing, in cooperation with REC and the Institute of
Public Health of Belgrade.  A ban for phase-out is not clearly defined; according to the National Environmental
Action Program, an optimistic forecast is given as 2015, whereas a ‘business as usual’ deadline would be 2020.
As of 2006, 58% of fuel used was leaded, with no price difference between leaded and unleaded.  Serbia is in the
process of privatizing its refineries, and there is currently no political interest in improving fuel quality in the
country.  The PCFV Clearing-House, together with the US EPA and the REC, plans to participate in the
upcoming UNECE Environment for Europe ministerial conference, Belgrade October 2007 to bring more
attention to the issue.