2022 in Serbia (Belgrade)

On October 2, 2022, the Balkan bus tour began from Sofia, Bulgaria, and headed westward into Serbia for my 22nd country (22 in '22!):

This made it my:

• 1st time in former Yugoslavia
• 1st former Yugoslavian constituent country (out of 6)
  • note: Bulgaria was never a part of Yugoslavia
• 3rd Slavic-speaking country
  • after Poland + Bulgaria
• 2nd country using the Cyrillic alphabet
  • after Bulgaria
  • however, Serbia uses Cyrillic very infrequently "in public"
• 1st Serbo-Croatian speaking country

Visit

Belgrade (Serbian: Beograd) sits where the rivers of the Sava and Danube meet. The name means "white city" in reference to the white walls of the medieval fortress. Our bus tour guide came from Belgrade and took us to the following "must-sees":

• Kalemegdan (fortress) Park
  • where we could see the two rivers meet
  • the park also had a "victory column" (Pobednik)
  • a lot of cannons and military equipment around the fortress
• Ulica Kneza Milhaila (Prince Michael street)
  • the main shopping street
• Trg Republike (Republic Square)
  • the main city square

We stayed overnight in a neighbourhood called Šumice. I had dinner at a decent restaurant called Ustanička. After dinner, I took a walk along the streets and saw a lot of "Kosovo is Serbia" graffiti - par for the course! I also noticed many murals tagged with the letters "RSRD".

The next morning, we went westward into "New Belgrade" towards Bosnia, but not before passing by the:

• Belgrade Waterfront
  • a recent attempt to gentrify the east side of the Sava River
• Sava Centar
  • a large stadium and concert venue
• Western City Gate (Geneks Tower)
  • a brutalist concrete skyscraper built in 1977
  • a condominium consisting of two towers joined at the top

At 9:30 am that Monday morning, I saw a group of 6-8 old farmers cheerfully drinking bottles of Jelen (deer brand) beer. I wish I had taken a picture of that!