Last night we visited Lido Beach in Zemun. It is located on the northern tip of “Great War Island” (Veliko – big Ratno – war Ostrvo – island). The island is situated at the spot where the Danube River (Dunav in Serbian) splits into its tributary, the Sava River. The island gets its name from the numerous armies that use the island as a launching pad for attacks on the city. The Turks, Serbs, and Austro-Hungarians all used it and the Serbian Army still has a presence on the island today.
In the summer, the city of Belgrade, with the help from the Serbian army, they make a pontoon bridge from the island to the suburb of Zemun. I wanted to check it out so we took the family over last night. There is a small beach on the northern point of the island, called “Lido Beach,” named after the Lido sandbar in Venice, Italy. Of course it was a body of water, so I had to jump in. The kids took off their shoes and splashed in the water a bit. Ocean loved the sand. We will probably head back there sometime. It is much like Ada Ciganlija, but the currents are a bit faster. The island is also a big bird sanctuary so I should try to do some birdwatching.
The View from Lido Beach at Sunset
There have been numerous attempts to develop the island. The Danube occasionally floods it in the spring, which is good for stopping people from putting hotels on it! It is a large green area in the city as you can see from the ariel view. It is supposed to be quite popular swimming beach and they do have a life guard, a couple of restaurants, and two volleyball nets.
Earlier this week Belgrade experienced a heat wave. We headed down to “Sport Island,” or Ada Ciganlija as it is named to go for a bike ride and swim. Oliver made the 8 kilometer+ loop around the lake. There were lots of other people there, too. The heat wave broke on Tuesday and today, Wednesday, it was just perfect!
I’ve been busy with getting ready for the upcoming school year. The New Teacher Orientation begins at the school tomorrow. Nadia and the kids are keeping busy with heading over to the Kosutnjak Pool, playing tennis, and enjoying our garden.
Very cool that the bridge under construction made the Discovery Channel. The single support column is massive and can be seen all around the city. According to the builders, it is 80% completed and should be done before the end of the year. It will certainly help traffic across the other bridges.
The above video was taken earlier this week before the start of the Partizan versus Genk (Belgium) soccer game. We live in Dedinje and strangely, the two big soccer clubs in Belgrade, Partizan and Red Star, both have their stadiums in the neighborhood, very close to one another. We can hear the singing and chanting of the fans. Last week there were two European Club Championship games. The first was Partizan in a qualifying match for the Champions League. They outplayed the visiting Genk team, but because a defender barely touched the ball with his forearm in the penalty box, Genk got a penalty to tie the game and they won on aggregate goals. The touch didn’t affect play, but the result of the penalty was Partizan was knocked out of the Champions League. That is what I dislike about soccer. Despite being the better team, because of a bad luck, Partizan lost on a penalty that was so slight, but the penalty for it was a goal for the other team.
In the second match of the week. my club Red Star defeated Ventspils of Latvia, 7-1. Red Star moved on to the next round of the Europa League, which is the level just below the Champions League. Both games were completely sold out here in Belgrade. This would not have happened in either Belgium or Latvia and it shows the passion and dedication of the Belgrade fans for sports.
I am still annoyed that the Serbian League doesn’t get its act together and form a regional league like they do for basketball. The current league has the two big clubs, Partizan and Red Star, and one other team from Novi Sad that have a chance to win the league. With Croatia, Macedonia, Slovenia, and Bosnia having two teams each, it would be so much more competitive.
Red Star now plays Rennais from the French League in the next round. They have to fight through several rounds even to get to the start of the competition, so I don’t have my hopes up. We’ll see how they do against the French side. They looked great against the Latvian side and i am hoping with the Russian gas company (Gazprom) sponsoring the team and new coach, that Red Star can finally overtake Partizan in the league and continue through the Europa Cup.
We are now almost adjusted to the jet lag here in Belgrade and I wanted to wrap up our holiday in Bolivia with one last blog post. Above are my three “angels” in last week’s family photo shoot.
It was great to see family and friends again. I would like to thank Popa, Aunt Silvia, Modesta, Horacio, and Alejandra for their hospitality for making our time in Santa Cruz so nice.
For example, Nadia is shown below getting measured for clothes. It is nice to have a relative who is a fashion designer! We both got tailored clothes for this year with Silvia’s label. It was like the tropical Savoy Road in London.
Bolivia is always an interesting place. The amazing growth (city doubles in population since we last lived there 10 years ago) and President Morales’s reign have certainly changed the city. I came to the conclusion that Santa Cruz is better off within Bolivia for the long run rather than going independent. I know that the Andean immigrants cause resentment, but it helps the Crucenos to have a bigger market to sell to and the diversity offered by the Andes, makes Bolivia a better nation. I don’t like the influence of the drug trafficking and I foresee more crime and violence coming to the city. Santa Cruz is a bit of a intellectual wasteland, but it has a beautiful countryside. Unfortunately, the way it looks, there is no planning with the development of Urubo across the river and what could have been a Coral Gables tropical bucolic paradise, will turn into a developing world garbage dump.
Despite the challenges, I still want to have retirement roots in the area however. Living is easy in Bolivia and it will serve our later years well to have a place there to call our own. Right now there is a “narco housing bubble” as I call it and we’ll have to wait to find a piece of land.
Last week our good friend Davicho of Foto Releive, took some family portraits. We did one session out in the new section of town, Urubo. It was a beautiful afternoon in Santa Cruz, Bolivia and the pictures came out great. We printed out a bunch for family. We are packing up today for the big trip back to Serbia.
We are in the final few days of our Bolivian holiday. The boys are pictured above digging into an ice cream. It is one of the many new restaurants here in Santa Cruz. The city has gained around 1 million people since we lived here, doubling in size. Amazing growth that the city is dealing with.
We’ve spent this week visiting friends. In the international teaching world, it is rare to see old friends, so it was good to see my former colleague Hudson T. He still teaches at the school here in Santa Cruz where I worked from 1997 to 1999. Hudson is doing very well with a nice family and beautiful home.
We also had a family photo shoot with our good friend David G. He is a professional photographer and owns three photo stores in the city. We went out to Urubo and took some outdoor shots. He wants to do more of these and is using us as a test case. I’ll be posting the photos and update the “About this blog” page with the updated family photo. “Davicho” also showed us his home in construction out there. Breathtakingly beautiful gated community and a stunning home! He has two children and is happily married and it is good to see him happy and successful. We had many good times together. We also went out last night with Nadia’s high school friend Gabriela and her husband and daughter for pasta.
That is a nice thing about Santa Cruz is that we have many friends and family here. I am mad that the narcotrafficking money in the city has raised real estate prices so much. It is not a good time to look for a retirement property, as I feel there is a huge market bubble. For example, I inquired about a new community out by David’s place in Urubo. For half an acre property, the land alone cost $132,000, which is totally out of whack in this developing nation. I think that with a change in government policy the flow of dollars will subside or there will be an economic crisis that will bring real estate prices back down to realistic levels. Prices for land and homes has doubled in the past few years.
One thing that hasn’t changed are the Mennonites are still in Bolivia. The photo above shows a Mennonite man with two women walking behind him on the far right of the picture. The Mennonites are a religious sect like the Amish, that believe in shunning modern technology and conveniences in order to concentrate on working on the farm and living according to the Bible. The Mennonites are originally Germans from coastal Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands. They follow the teachings of Menno Simmons, whose big departure from the Catholic and Protestant Churches in the 1500’s was to believe in an adult baptism instead of child baptism. He believed that one should be able to choose his/her church when they reach an age of consent. There are about 1.5 million Mennonites worldwide and they have a wide range of living styles, but the colonies of up to 60,000 here in Bolivia live as “plain people” like the more famous Amish. The group originally came from Mexico via Canada and settled the fertile farmlands of the northern Santa Cruz Department. My father-in-law buys eggs from one of them. He speaks fluent Spanish as well as Old German. He was saying that the girls in the colony only get education up to grade 8 and the boys through to high school. I take the Christopher Hitchen’s approach to religion and feel sorry for them being brought up like that. If they are happy great, and I don’t know enough about their lifestyle to make a strong comment, but to have to walk around like that and not take advantage of humanity’s advances is so bad. I feel sorry for their limited life opportunities. They are fascinating however and I would love to get to learn more about them.
I’m loving the extra time I have to catch up on my pleasure reading. I love books and have been devouring them on my iPad. The iBook feature on my iPad is great. All of the NY Times list at my fingertips. I also love highlighting and adding notes to books. It has a nice feature of putting them all together at the end and it helps me reflect and consolidate my learning or opinions formed from my reading.
I really enjoy tennis – it is a great workout and good stress relief, plus it is a game I haven’t mastered yet. I enjoy the challenge of learning something new and hopefully with the new courts at our school, I play more next year. I read Patrick McEnroe’s book, “Hardcourt Confidential.” I won’t go into the details of the book. My big take-aways are a better appreciation for the Davis Cup and some thoughts on pushing my children into tennis. McEnroe was the Captain of the US Davis Cup team for a long time and Nadia and I saw him when the US played Serbia. For a long time I wanted the Davis Cup to change to a Major or World Cup format by making it a two-week tourney with all teams coming together every other year for the World Championship of Tennis. It could be hosted by rotating countries and have a variety of surfaces each round. Because I live in Serbia, home of the defending champions, I prefer the current format because we get games in Serbia. I can’t wait for the semifinals against Argentina in September. McEnroe gives a good description of what is good about the Davis Cup.
The second item was his thoughts on what it takes to make it big in tennis. The game has changed to award physical athleticism instead of technique.Most professionals today are incredibly strong, quick, and can hit the ball with huge force. Many are big and I also learned one must hit with a top spin to attain the top speeds like Nadal and Nole.
My taller doppleganger - Former Czech Tennis Player Daniel Vacek
He also referred his famous brother’s best season when John went 82-3 for the season, the best winning percentage (96%) ever. Roger Federer came close in 2005 with an 81-4 record (95%). Novak Djokovic is on pace with a 48-1 record this year to beat it. (98%). Also in the book he mentioned playing against my “twin” Daniel Vacek. I remember looking at the guy, especially from the side, and he was a dead ringer for me. Strange watching someone who looks very similar to oneself playing on TV. He is much taller than me, but the resemblance is striking.
In preparation for going to Vermont, I read Bill McKibben’s book, “Wandering Home.” He accurately described the lovely town of Burlington and the great state of Vermont. He highlighted all of the sustainable ways of living going on there. He is funny in observing that it is a “land of Saab-driving, goat-cheese eating Democrats.” My kind of place!
McKibben and also Deer Hunting With Jesus which I’ll blog about later, got me thinking about my choices and how we live. McKibben defined “hyperindividualism that thinks nothing of ruining everyone else’s view with a house four times too large for any conceivable purpose.”
He also thinks outside the box, like the idea of “why does my floor have to be all one type of wood. Why can’t it be like the forest that surrounds us, which is roughly equal parts birch, beech, and maple?”
“Instead of working to afford certain pleasures, many maintained, they would find their pleasure in their work.”
He referred to two great environmental organizations, Earth First! and the Foundation For Deep Ecology. My beliefs fit in quite well with the mission and philosophy of these groups.
“A world where we could take our pleasure more in the woods than in the mall.”
Saturday night Nadia and I went out with her father and aunt to the Chaplin Show here in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. The Chaplin Show is a live comedy theater. This weekend the “Chulupis del Caribe” (Cockroaches of the Caribbean) was playing. I was hoping for some smart, political and cultural satire, but what I got, was a show of inane, shallow, humor. The jokes were stale and vulgar. For example, “What makes a man happy? His four mistresses don’t meet each other.” The humor was definitely stupid, but the crowd was loving it. We left at the intermission. It was a fun night nonetheless, as we got to joke about how bad the comedy was. I would not recommend going to the Chaplin Show.
I had heard that some shows had a biting political satire. It would have been great to have a parody of the Morales government and the struggle of Bolivia to keep the Andean and Media Luna departments together. Instead, we got some old, tired, jokes about plastic surgery, infidelity, and sex. The show was named after their opening number. It was a video of end-of-the-world news coverage and the only survivors were the cockroaches. They did a couple of lame dance routines and then went to several skits. The skits were a nun and priest giving sex education class, a couple in a hotel room, etc. Dumb… The only good thing was it was great for my Spanish.
Friday night we went out to dinner at Michaelangelo’s Restaurant here in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. We had dinner here 14 years ago! It was the site of our first date in September of 1997. The restaurant is pretty much the same and Nadia is as beautiful as she was that night 14 years ago. I am a very lucky guy! I love her as much as I did then. The food was average but I didn’t care, it was fun to relive our courtship.
We also had a nice visit from our good friend, Dr. Kim Winter. She was living in Bolivia when we were here in 1997-1999 and we had many good times together. Kim was completing her doctoral biologcial research in a small village in the Bolivian Amazaon and she would come to the city for some R&R. She was also here for the birth of Owen and we also stayed at her house in Washington when I was taking a course there in 2005. She is doing very well with a new marriage and job with US Department of Forestry. Her husband Ronald is from Cochabomba (far left) and lives in Washington DC area. There is a big population of Bolivians in the DC area.
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