They warned us about the cabs in Belgrade – use the apps or find a Taxi stand, otherwise they’re likely mob-run and will charge you extra.
Two friends and I got in a cab home from the airport on our way back from a week in Dubrvonik. Our driver spoke zero English and the car had seen better days (so had the driver), but so it goes. We were moving along and our driver suddenly turned into a strip mall and parked the car. We started to worry and with concern ask, “What are we doing!?” The driver got out of the car and motioned to us, “one minute.” He walked into a tiny food stand and came out with a huge paper bag. When he got back in the car he took a big, white box out of the bag with “TAXI” written on it in permanent marker. He opened it and, casually, offered us some prosciutto. I swear – it was a 5 pound box of sliced, salty, yummy prosciutto. Yes – of course we tried it. We continued on our way, whilst driver tried offering us more prosciutto…we deferred so he would watch the road. When we got to my apartment, he helped us with our bags, hugged us, said something in Serbian and we went our separate ways.
Screw the taxi warnings! This is a perfect example of my experience in Belgrade and of Serbians in general.
There is a lot to learn about this area of the world – a lot I probably never would have learned. Bosnia, Croatia and Serbia (formerly Yugoslavia) have sad, war torn histories and are still in conflict, yet (much like Colombians) they are happy, generous, pleasant people – even to Americans as they tour us around their NATO bombed and dilapidated buildings and anti-Clinton propaganda. They are open and willing to tell us their stories.
This month was eye-opening and reflective for a lot of us. To have never have had to live through civil war or communism like people my age in Belgrade…I now count that as a blessing.
It also opened our eyes to some not so pleasant facts around diversity and acceptance in this part of the world. While a lot was (is) going on back home too, we were warned about racism and homophobia, which led a good friend of mine to opt out of the month and eventually drop the program because of diversity issues within Remote Year and the countries on our itinerary.
I shared this on Slack – but I’ll share it again, because I think it’s an issue we should all be aware of…as a company, as colleagues, as friends, as people.
Written by my friend, Lilly: “A Letter to the Black People in My Life. And A Letter to the Rest of You.”
I did get to Croatia and Bosnia this month and also spent a couple days at this innovative house out in the middle of no-where Serbia built for digital nomads, Mokrin House (I’ve concluded that this is the place where rich, techy entrepreneurs go to hide and work) – and even did a quick morning run to the Romanian border.
And I’ll end with some weird 80’s (or 70’s) flashbacks and Serbian house music typical of the clubs (or splavs) all along the Danube River, Serbian music from the Belgrade Beer Fest (which is AS big as Lolla, but FREE) and, of course, GOT.