Yesterday was my birthday, the first one that I've ever spent outside of the U.S. I was a little apprehensive of the combination of marking another year of age with distance from family and friends leading to a bleak and unenjoyable day, but I needn't have worried. (That is, while I would obviously prefer to be close to my loved ones, my day was better than anticipated!)
I came to work in the morning at 9, as usual. My colleagues greeted me with coffee and a copy of Ivo Andric's 'The Bridge on the Drina'. This critically acclaimed novel won the Nobel Prize in 1961. I had always heard of it (I suspect both because it is supposed to be an excellent piece of literature, and also because there are not very many challengers to rival its excellence -- at least, I have not seen very many Serbian works, nor many works from any of the former Yugoslav republics, it seems that instead, books that make the best-seller lists in the U.S., including Nicholas Sparks' 'The Notebook', Candace Bushnell's 'Sex and the City', and various books by Danielle Steel, are translated from English and then sold on the side of the street at stalls that I pass each morning en route to the office), but had never gotten around to reading it. It is a hard-bound volume, with a new book smell; the pages crackle as I turn them. It was the perfect gift for several reasons; it is a book that I have intended to read for some time, it is a book in English, which I always appreciate here, and it is a book, and somehow I am always especially touched to receive books as gifts, particularly books that mean something to the giver.
Another of my colleagues arrived a bit later in the morning and gave me a single rose, one side of which had been dipped in gold glitter and which may or may not have been sprayed with perfume.
Near the end of the workday, after I conducted an interview, we took a taxi to a restaurant in a village about fifteen or twenty minutes from this city for lunch; 'lunch' appearing to mean any meal consumed between the early morning and late evening. The restaurant had a small garden, with a fountain, and trellises wound with grapevines. A few strips of flypaper moved in the breeze, but did little to reduce the numbers of the winged insects buzzing through the air. The place was known for its lamb, roasted on a mechanized spit in a large outdoor oven. It smelled glorious. We sat at a table near the garden and were soon brought baskets of bread, both Serbian flatbread and the Serbian rendition of a corn muffin. Much less yellow in color than those in the U.S., Serbian corn muffins remind me of hominy, and cry to be coupled with molasses. Trays of vegetables, cucumbers, shredded cabbage, peppers, and tomatoes, were also brought. The Serbian word for 'tomato' is 'paradajz'; these were red, but the insides and the seeds were green, and a taste indicated that while the word (pronounced like 'paradise') may have different definitions in our languages, the meanings of that word have much in common. They were much more subtly and distinctively flavored than the typical beefsteak tomatoes usually sold in stores in the U.S., rather similar to a bag of heirloom tomatoes that was purchased at a New Jersey farmstand last summer and that reconfigured my concept, expectation, of the fruit.
The lamb, when it came, appeared in large chunks on two platters, glistened with fat, proved that meat, too, can aptly be described as 'succulent'. Too tender to be cut, it fell from tiny translucent bones and clung, lingering, to my tongue. It was barely seasoned, and seemingly only with salt; the slow-roasting had allowed the fat to melt and disperse throughout the flesh. The flavor was pure, almost sweet, but neither weak, nor strong -- lacking entirely the liverish overtones that are often present in the appendages purchased for Easter dinners and drowned in phosphorent green jellies.
I had previously understood that spit-roasting lambs and pigs was an integral part of Serbian cuisine. I first learned this when confronted with two roasted, impaled lambs cooling outside of a restaurant in Belgrade. This impression has only been confirmed by the enthusiastic reactions of several people with whom I have spoken since coming here on this visit. While on the monastery tour, we passed by a military base and even saw two soldiers with a stick, on which was tied a dead skinned lamb, slung between them. I had, however, never understood why spit-roasting whole animals should be so prominent. I am now inclined to think that a much-heralded element of a national cuisine has seldom been so appropriately paid heed. (Reportedly, one of the many reasons of some Serbians for greeting the possibility of EU membership with skepticism, is the fact that entire spit-roasted animals can no longer be sold for consumption, that people will either have to roast their own or to go without.)
After this meal drew to a close, we returned to the city. Later in the evening, I met my friend Sanja to get some ice cream; there is one cafe that makes an especially good banana ice cream, the texture of which more closely resembles the ice cream to which I am accustomed than the gelato predominately available in most of the cafes in the city. We stayed at the cafe for much of the night, talking, and were joined at intervals by about five other friends, including my friend Natasha. Natasha's brother has been in the United States, without a green card, for five years. His current girlfriend, an erstwhile Bosnian war refugee, has a green card, and Natasha is hopeful that they will soon marry, if only so that her brother can come back to Serbia to visit his family and then legally re-enter the States. Meanwhile, she says, 'My mother cries almost every day.' Natasha wants to visit the U.S., but worries that her mother will not be able to handle both of her children being so far away. My friend Misko also stopped by, with roses. Misko is very tall (I barely graze his shoulder), and perhaps around thirty years of age, but occasionally the intense demeanor of a seven-year-old peeps out, most evidently when we met at a work event after-party and were standing in a group of four people, and he became very excited at the prospect of practicing English and started tapping my shoulder or, more accurately, the tendon between my shoulder and clavicle, to get my attention or to emphasize his words.
[This happened as I was still becoming reacquainted with the amount of physical contact that social conversations inevitably contain, here. People often reach out and grasp my hand, or my forearm, or put a hand on my shoulder, while talking in any range of conversations at the office or at cafes. It is very natural and entirely without the various innuendoes that would be attributed to such behavior in the States, although I do think that it tends to happen more when people try to practice English with me, and cannot think of all of the right words, and reach out for my arm with a smile to pause the conversation until they remember what they are trying to say. Although some people air-kiss 'hello' once, most do it three times -- sometimes on the same cheek, sometimes alternating, as my colleagues did yesterday to wish me a happy birthday, and while I have not entirely figured out how 'goodbyes' work, they often seem to involve clinging the hand, progressively down to the fingertips of the person in question, as one slowly moves away.]
So, it was a pleasant, enjoyable, and peaceful birthday -- even if, as one American friend pointed out, it did not involve cake!
I came to work in the morning at 9, as usual. My colleagues greeted me with coffee and a copy of Ivo Andric's 'The Bridge on the Drina'. This critically acclaimed novel won the Nobel Prize in 1961. I had always heard of it (I suspect both because it is supposed to be an excellent piece of literature, and also because there are not very many challengers to rival its excellence -- at least, I have not seen very many Serbian works, nor many works from any of the former Yugoslav republics, it seems that instead, books that make the best-seller lists in the U.S., including Nicholas Sparks' 'The Notebook', Candace Bushnell's 'Sex and the City', and various books by Danielle Steel, are translated from English and then sold on the side of the street at stalls that I pass each morning en route to the office), but had never gotten around to reading it. It is a hard-bound volume, with a new book smell; the pages crackle as I turn them. It was the perfect gift for several reasons; it is a book that I have intended to read for some time, it is a book in English, which I always appreciate here, and it is a book, and somehow I am always especially touched to receive books as gifts, particularly books that mean something to the giver.
Another of my colleagues arrived a bit later in the morning and gave me a single rose, one side of which had been dipped in gold glitter and which may or may not have been sprayed with perfume.
Near the end of the workday, after I conducted an interview, we took a taxi to a restaurant in a village about fifteen or twenty minutes from this city for lunch; 'lunch' appearing to mean any meal consumed between the early morning and late evening. The restaurant had a small garden, with a fountain, and trellises wound with grapevines. A few strips of flypaper moved in the breeze, but did little to reduce the numbers of the winged insects buzzing through the air. The place was known for its lamb, roasted on a mechanized spit in a large outdoor oven. It smelled glorious. We sat at a table near the garden and were soon brought baskets of bread, both Serbian flatbread and the Serbian rendition of a corn muffin. Much less yellow in color than those in the U.S., Serbian corn muffins remind me of hominy, and cry to be coupled with molasses. Trays of vegetables, cucumbers, shredded cabbage, peppers, and tomatoes, were also brought. The Serbian word for 'tomato' is 'paradajz'; these were red, but the insides and the seeds were green, and a taste indicated that while the word (pronounced like 'paradise') may have different definitions in our languages, the meanings of that word have much in common. They were much more subtly and distinctively flavored than the typical beefsteak tomatoes usually sold in stores in the U.S., rather similar to a bag of heirloom tomatoes that was purchased at a New Jersey farmstand last summer and that reconfigured my concept, expectation, of the fruit.
The lamb, when it came, appeared in large chunks on two platters, glistened with fat, proved that meat, too, can aptly be described as 'succulent'. Too tender to be cut, it fell from tiny translucent bones and clung, lingering, to my tongue. It was barely seasoned, and seemingly only with salt; the slow-roasting had allowed the fat to melt and disperse throughout the flesh. The flavor was pure, almost sweet, but neither weak, nor strong -- lacking entirely the liverish overtones that are often present in the appendages purchased for Easter dinners and drowned in phosphorent green jellies.
I had previously understood that spit-roasting lambs and pigs was an integral part of Serbian cuisine. I first learned this when confronted with two roasted, impaled lambs cooling outside of a restaurant in Belgrade. This impression has only been confirmed by the enthusiastic reactions of several people with whom I have spoken since coming here on this visit. While on the monastery tour, we passed by a military base and even saw two soldiers with a stick, on which was tied a dead skinned lamb, slung between them. I had, however, never understood why spit-roasting whole animals should be so prominent. I am now inclined to think that a much-heralded element of a national cuisine has seldom been so appropriately paid heed. (Reportedly, one of the many reasons of some Serbians for greeting the possibility of EU membership with skepticism, is the fact that entire spit-roasted animals can no longer be sold for consumption, that people will either have to roast their own or to go without.)
After this meal drew to a close, we returned to the city. Later in the evening, I met my friend Sanja to get some ice cream; there is one cafe that makes an especially good banana ice cream, the texture of which more closely resembles the ice cream to which I am accustomed than the gelato predominately available in most of the cafes in the city. We stayed at the cafe for much of the night, talking, and were joined at intervals by about five other friends, including my friend Natasha. Natasha's brother has been in the United States, without a green card, for five years. His current girlfriend, an erstwhile Bosnian war refugee, has a green card, and Natasha is hopeful that they will soon marry, if only so that her brother can come back to Serbia to visit his family and then legally re-enter the States. Meanwhile, she says, 'My mother cries almost every day.' Natasha wants to visit the U.S., but worries that her mother will not be able to handle both of her children being so far away. My friend Misko also stopped by, with roses. Misko is very tall (I barely graze his shoulder), and perhaps around thirty years of age, but occasionally the intense demeanor of a seven-year-old peeps out, most evidently when we met at a work event after-party and were standing in a group of four people, and he became very excited at the prospect of practicing English and started tapping my shoulder or, more accurately, the tendon between my shoulder and clavicle, to get my attention or to emphasize his words.
[This happened as I was still becoming reacquainted with the amount of physical contact that social conversations inevitably contain, here. People often reach out and grasp my hand, or my forearm, or put a hand on my shoulder, while talking in any range of conversations at the office or at cafes. It is very natural and entirely without the various innuendoes that would be attributed to such behavior in the States, although I do think that it tends to happen more when people try to practice English with me, and cannot think of all of the right words, and reach out for my arm with a smile to pause the conversation until they remember what they are trying to say. Although some people air-kiss 'hello' once, most do it three times -- sometimes on the same cheek, sometimes alternating, as my colleagues did yesterday to wish me a happy birthday, and while I have not entirely figured out how 'goodbyes' work, they often seem to involve clinging the hand, progressively down to the fingertips of the person in question, as one slowly moves away.]
So, it was a pleasant, enjoyable, and peaceful birthday -- even if, as one American friend pointed out, it did not involve cake!
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