Sunday, sunny Sunday

So the travel alert I mentioned earlier has turned into a travel warning. The US embassy took out non-necessary personnel and dependents. But there's no need to panic - so stop panicking! Seems to be a bit more overcautious than needed, also sends political message? Again, my personal safety isn't in danger so I'm staying put.

Yesterday turned out to be a fine one. I have a new student starting next weekend, meeting with another one tomorrow (huzzah), so work appears to be picking up (knock wood). Had an excellent evening at Casa Garica with sangria and a good group of people - it was funny when Miha came because we had the Slovene, the American, and a crew of Serbs. Later on met some Brazilians... oh, the international mixing. Lots of laughter, decompressing and silliness in Serbian and English. One of my favorites was when Miha prepared to tell a joke saying it was funny in Czech, Serbian, Slovene, but not English - which was why he was telling it in English? Wordplay is a good time...

Today talked with the girls who live next door - I really like their family - as we sat on the terrace in the last of the sun and warmth of the day. It was an unexpected language lesson as we went from work/school doings to their reactions to the protests, news coverage, why Kosovo is Serbia. They pretty much felt that idiots shouldn't be destroying stuff and that it was a pity even more since all the protest/rally doings were peaceful. They'd gone down by the Parliament and said they couldn't move it was so crowded.

I find myself with not much more to say - been a quiet day, everything seems normal and that feels extremely good. You can only live with constant tension for so long after all. I'm supposed to go meet a friend here soon, so I'll post later when have more to say.

Why not legged force? Or charming force?

I've decided that in an attempt to balance out the media that keeps focusing on negative actions, let's look at some more positive things. Like the fact that most of the protests were peaceful last night, tons of people DIDN'T burn things or destroy anything.

Today walking down the street saw little kids going to or from school on their own. Things are mostly peaceful, it was a gorgeous sunny day. I'm amused by the "Serbia is Kosovo" signs in most shop windows - suspect that some of them might be there as accident insurance (which if that's the case it worked). I'll put out there too that no one is attacking people in the streets; the hooligans are going after police and buildings. I feel a strange echo of my words during the Paris car burnings/riots - I'm still not a police officer OR a building. So I'll be alright.

Meanwhile I'll keep making jokes about being "zlo" (evil); perhaps they're tasteless but gotta keep laughing. Thanks to those who have been checking in to see if I'm ok - I'm resisting the potential existential crisis of the question "Are you ok?" (Because then I start wondering "Am I ok?"). I am and have lots of class tomorrow, meeting with a new student, and then going for drinks with a motley crew (ok, my crews are always motley, but still) - life continues as normal. And that's important

Still safe...

As CNN and the rest of the world media have announced, a body was found in the US embassy (although it's not an embassy member). The news keeps replaying the same coverage, I've been getting calls and texts and emails/chats all evening as folks make sure I'm ok, both locally and in US. One pointed out that only "the greatest enemies of Serbia" could have planned such measures with the embassy attacks (rioters went after Croatian, British and some others). He has a point - none of this is helping Serbians or anyone else for that matter, at least that I can see. There's even a travel alert now for Serbia.

But I'm home. I'm safe. And I have yummy banana bread to munch on.

I'm still confused about why Kosovo invokes so much emotion, is so important. Been told it's a long story but I wish that someone would just tell it already. Although I think that I need to get some sleep before that happens - that's been yet one more thing that's hard to come by here recently. But tomorrow, as always, is another day.

Burning...

US Embassy was breached. Twitter is a decent blog, although take a grain of salt and verify things. Also Belgrade 2.0, (although not updating). Saw images of fire (like this one above), it's now been picked up by CNN and others.

The crowds were big (200-300,000) at the protest, pretty calm although some instances of kids throwing things, burning trash cans, etc. in side streets. There was rally at Parliament at 5 (photo), then service at St. Sava at 7 - things were quiet there, peaceful and beautiful in a way with candles and folks of all ages gathering. Someone said today that Serbia needs to mourn its loss of Kosovo - I'm fine with mourning but not destructive pyres.

Going to make banana bread. Watch the news some more. Was told this afternoon that there's no reason that I should need to leave in a hurry. Here's hoping that still holds tomorrow.