Maniacal Drive Through Belgrade’s Rush Hour

by Viktor on March 12, 2010

From Bezanijska Kosa to city center it usually takes around 20 minutes, if you’re lucky with the traffic. This guy, however, managed to get there in under 8 minutes during one of many Belgrade’s rush hours:

Of course, the only way to achieve this is by riding a motorcycle through 5 red lights, passing around cars on places where it’s forbidden, riding between the cars, driving in opposite lanes, and on sidewalk. All in all, enough traffic violations to ban him from the streets for life.
And who knows, maybe he is already arrested since this is his one and only video on youtube, posted six months ago.

As for the rush hour in Belgrade, it can get pretty messy and heavy sometimes, especially in the morning around 8, in the afternoon around 16h and once more in the evening around 19h, and of course, whenever it rains or snows. But the traffic makes a great scenery for a video clip, like this one, made by Davor Bosankic found via Karl Haudbourg. Enjoy:

Hit the full screen button for best effect!
Belgrade: Symphony of a Great City from Davor Bosankic on Vimeo.

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The Last Tree

by Viktor on March 5, 2010

It’s sad when a city tree dies. Usually we, the city dwellers, don’t even notice city trees when we walk past them, they are simply part of the street, just like buildings on one side and the pavement under our feet. But once they are removed, we realize how important they are for the scenery.

In one of the longest streets in Europe, Bulevar Revolucije (aka Bulevar Kralja Aleksandra) a row of some 500 platanus trees (plane trees) were planted somewhere in the 1920s, at the very beginnings of serious urban planning in Belgrade. Most of them somehow survived World War II and every major reconstruction of the boulevard in the past 80+ years. Inevitably, in that period, a number of them got sick and began to rot from the inside. Surprisingly, new city authorities decided, after one study by the Belgrade’s Forestry Faculty to cut down almost 329 (three hundred and twenty nine) plane trees and in their place plant young new trees. Many claim that it’s not possible for 329 trees to have gotten sick, and that even those that were could have been cured. The reason for this hugely unpopular move by the city authorities remains unknown, there are many theories and most of them include corruption, incompetence and general neglect towards ecology, as poor as it might be in some Belgrade’s parts.

This is what remained after the trees were cut down. Let it serve as a warning – it can happen in your city as well. Hopefully you’ll be better prepared and organized to stop it.

This is the last platanus remaining in the naked part of the boulevard now. It was saved by a fellow who put a fence around it and defended the tree around the clock:
the last platanus
photo: Vucko @ Beobuild

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Turbo-folk TNG

by Viktor on February 23, 2010

Couple of hilarious video-montages by Lecktor at youtube.

Video 1
And another one, this time from the horror-flick Horizon:

Video 2
via @Beogradoholik

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Love letter from Yingo

by Viktor on February 21, 2010

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Crouching Priest, Hidden Monk

by Viktor on February 15, 2010

When two groups of priests/monks enter a fistfight, several questions emerge: In the brawl, how do you tell who is on your side if everyone looks the same? Also, how come they are not flying through the air or showing some fancy martial-arts moves?

Let’s see that from a different angle and with curse words bleeped out:

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Innocence Unprotected

February 12, 2010

Dusan Makavejev’s documentary Innocence Unprotected (Serbian: Nevinost bez zaštite) is a movie inside a movie – an interview made in 1968 with actors from the 1942 movie Innocence Unprotected, intertwined with footage from the actual movie and some news footage from that time. What is interesting about the original movie is the year and the [...]

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Berlusconi’s Photoshop trick: using Milosevic’s methods?

February 12, 2010

Way to go Silvio! Learning from the best. Or is it the worst?

When this photoshopped photo of Berlusconi came out couple of days ago, there were many here who immediately thought of another dictator – one who had much bigger influence on their lives, of course.

click the pic for slightly bigger view
Just before falling off [...]

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Dejan Stojadinovic vs Velja Ilic: Is it ok to punch a politician on sight?

February 9, 2010

So—is it? But what if we’re not talking about a theoretical politician but about an ultraconservative right-wing chauvinistic tycoon-politician who kicks journalists and threatens people?

Velimir Velja Ilic, the beaten party in the video is perhaps the best known representative of its kind in Serbia, but among the politicians and the political parties here, the difference [...]

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Documentary about Drazen Petrovic and Vlade Divac in production

February 2, 2010

Vlade Divac and Drazen Petrovic were two of the greatest European basketball players of all time. Vlade retired recently, and Drazen, sadly, died back in 1993 in a car crash. Had he lived, he would probably be a household name by now, just like Divac is. After the war broke out in former Yugoslavia, however, [...]

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Tihana from Ergo and other sci-fi

January 31, 2010

Just when James Cameron thought he will get away with plagiarism, he’s caught! Yugoslavian author Predrag Urosevic claims that his novel from 1984, Tihana iz Erga (Eng: Tihana from Ergo) served as a plot for Cameron’s Avatar. There are at least three similarities with Avatar’s plot, says Urosevic. The man comes to another forest-like planet [...]

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Irinej Gavrilovic elected for new patriarch and other news

January 22, 2010

This just in: new Serbian Patriarch has been elected – it’s Irinej Gavrilovic of Nis, most moderate of all three final candidates. I guess we should feel lucky.
In other news…
Like most European countries, Serbia is preparing for the most important event of the year, the Eurovision. Instead of national competition this year, the deciders said the best thing [...]

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Serbia in NATO – Yes or No?

January 14, 2010

News making rounds in Serbian blogosphere these days: group of 200 intellectuals wrote a letter to the government where they ask for a referendum on whether or not Serbia should join NATO. They believe Serbia should maintain to be “militarily neutral [Serbia], true to herself and her own traditions”. There are couple of interesting elements [...]

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Antimatter factory in Belgrade

January 3, 2010

comic by xkcd

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Merry Christmas and a Belgraded New Year

December 31, 2009

There’s something about the Belgrade public bus transportation that makes a guy wanna sing – is it acoustics or the fact that the audience can’ get away that easily? Anyway, here we go: same song, same bus performer, two different GSP lines:
Bus nr 16 (line from Karaburma to Pohorska street)

Bus nr 65: (from Zvezdara to [...]

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Honorary citizens of Belgrade through history

December 15, 2009

Following the proclamation of this year’s honorary citizen of Belgrade, “24 hours” brings an interesting list of all the previous winners of this prestigious award. So let’s see who do we have here:
1947. Josip Broz Tito, president of Yugoslavia
1947. Peko Dapčević, commander of the 1st Partisan army
1954. Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia
1955. [...]

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iPod the law and the law won

December 14, 2009

The new Road safety and traffic law is already proving to be a positive thing. Here are some of the life-saving changes:

No cell phones while driving, unless it’s hands-free.
Lights must be on always, even during the day when it’s bright.
Bicyclists and motorist must always wear a helmet.
And so on, there are too many changes to [...]

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It’s funny cos it’s true

December 8, 2009

Judge: Good afternoon! Please, introduce yourself.
Accused: Boris Tadić.
Judge: Your occupation?
Accused: Psychologist.
Judge: Where is your work located?
Accused: My work address is Andrićev venac 1.
Judge: Is that a psychological institution?
Accused: That’s the institution of the President of the Republic.
Yes, this is the real transcript of President Tadić’s conversation with the [...]

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Debunking some visa-free travel myths

November 30, 2009

I’ve been writing about the visa-free travel for some time now, but today it’s official – since December 19th there will be no more visa requirement for Serbian, Montenegrin and Macedonian citizens if they want to travel to the Schengen territory. There are several popular myths circling around in the comments regarding this news, as [...]

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Belgrade hostels map

November 30, 2009

Belgrade hostels map:

Since Google decided to finally chart Belgrade streets on their maps, I thought it may be a nice opportunity to finally make maps of various useful things in Belgrade. We’ll start with Belgrade hostels, always useful for a low budget traveler. It is interesting to note that there are around fifty hostels in [...]

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Good Mourning, Serbia

November 19, 2009

Or should that be – good grief?
The late Patriarch Pavle was a modest man, often using the public transportation to move about.

His church colleagues, however, are not that modest. Being a priest in Serbia often means one enjoys life more than one’s profession recommends. Street reporters have managed to snap this photo of couple [...]

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