Chapter 3 – Prince Michael’s

The plan was to spend a few days with his family in Chapelton, and then without telling them, spend a few more days in Belgrade. Browder never got to know the city of Belgrade, as every time he visited back as an adolescent, he was dragged into the province to visit various relatives. This time, he figured that he would extend his grand European vacation to that city too. However, upon landing on the Nikola Tesla International Airport, he realized that he forgot his American driver’s license, so renting a car to drive to Chapelton was out of the question. He would stay in Belgrade at least for the night and take a bus to Chapelton at some later time.

Walking through the airport hallways Browder easily noticed that globalization was going strong in Serbia too. This was always odd to a person like him, whose last extended experience of the country was as an isolated, communistic pariah state. There were people in the airport of various races, internationally branded stores, and the latest fashions in food, electronics, and clothing. Being in the denial stage of grieving for the forgotten driver’s licence, he walked up to an international car rental kiosk and asked the two associates if it was possible to rent a car with only a picture of one’s driver’s license. To his surprise, they replied in the affirmative after only a short call to their manager. However, he then contacted his aunt in Chapelton, who told him that he should not do that: if pulled over by the police, he can get into a lot of trouble, and besides, there was no chance they would let him cross the border between Serbia and Bosnia in a car driven illegally.

Thus, Belgrade it was. He opened up his MacBook Pro at the airport bar, wi-fi equipped, and bought a courtesy beer. He found many options for hotels in the centre of the city, called one of them up, and quickly arranged to check in that very Sunday night, and check out on Wednesday. He’d then stay in Chapelton until Friday night, and spend the last few days in Belgrade. He would lie to his family that he went back to the US on Saturday, and he texted Laura to get her in on the lie, in case anyone contacts her about it.

His cab driver was a handsome, athletic youth with a vape. As they drove to the city, Belgrade looked similar to any other major city. Standard highway signs and ramps. First came New Belgrade, the part of the city built by the communists across the river Sava from the center. Sure, there were many plain concrete high rises, but Browder saw much harsher architecture when he lived in China. The old center rose proudly on hills above the river, with classical buildings and a baroque spire and dome of the two major churches dominating here and there. It was Europe indeed, though one could apply an endearing American term and call it gritty Europe. Americans use grit as a euphemism for dilapidated poverty, but Belgrade wasn’t dilapidated and Browder applied the term here in its best meaning.

The cab driver introduced his city in a series of clichés. The nightlife was voted one of the best in the world by some Western magazine a while back, there is something for everyone when it comes to entertainment, people are warm and welcoming, women are beautiful. He took exception at one cliché, that of Belgrade being affordable.

-       Well it’s not affordable at all. Serbia as a whole is affordable, but Belgrade is its own ecosystem and you’ll find that prices here are similar to those of rest of Europe.

The topic then switched to sports, and it turned out that they shared a passion for boxing, both having an amateur record. The driver was younger and more accomplished, having trained in Red Star’s youth camp. He had to give it up as there was no money in it; the program was essentially government sponsored, but even the most promising prospects were given barely enough of a stipend to cover their spending on gear. They had both met a few champions here and there. Browder became interested in visiting a gym in the city and checking out how they do it here; after all, the country has an impressive track record of exporting athletes. Domestic clubs and leagues were internationally irrelevant, however; they were not much more than incubators for potential international stars; thus at least thought Browder.

The hotel was really an apartment rental outfit, which Browder knew and didn’t mind, as long as it wasn’t a hostel. An associate from a remote office showed up at the door and ushered Browder to his room and answered basic questions. After they electronically signed the documents and exchanged receipts, the receptionist handed over the key cards for the room and the street entrance. The suit was pretty, converted from a stylish classical apartment on the 3rd floor, right next to the main pedestrian street, Prince Michael’s. The windows looked onto a charming cobble-stoned side street, and slightly to the side there was a pretty shopping mall half encased inside old buildings, and half jutting out and covered in glass. The ceiling of his room was high; there was water and coffee and tea and a well-equipped bathroom, and the large flat-screen TV offered dozens of options of both local and international entertainment.

Browder showered and changed, and at about ten o’clock went out to stroll along Prince Michael’s. There were still bright holiday decorations hanging above the streets, and a river of people strolling down in groups, with shopping bags, and people sitting and socializing on the many patios lining the street. Looks like any of the other cities he just visited, though the central shopping street was much shorter. People on the whole were decidedly white, mostly of the Slavic type, but they did have unique features. Men were generally tall, and many had sunken eyes, and a noticeably large proportion had short cropped hair and a certain Balkan mob style of dressing: leather jackets, running shoes, track pants. However, all of it was self-conscious, and they looked fashionable; the track pants looked expensive. Wearing track pants in public in the US signals that you have basically given up on life, but not here.

The women were indeed attractive. Many were slender and tall as well, with large eyes and brown hair.  They made Browder think of orthodox icons, which often featured elongated human figures staring at you with expressive, moist eyes. The major difference was that icons evoke a sort of sweet pious melancholy, whereas the women radiated sex appeal. Could those two things somehow be related?

Anyhow, there were many women here in Belgrade that offered a unique proposition; these were tall white girls with slim Asian figures. That said, he wouldn’t place Serbian women in a league of their own, as some of his American friends who visited Serbia did, and neither would he men; it was only another trendy European city with a unique beauty, which in fact also made it a typical European city.

After strolling up and down Prince Michael’s twice Browder though it would be stupid if one of the seated people-watches noticed him for a third time. He missed having Laura at his side. He walked into a café advertising a traditional menu, but alas did not have outdoor seating. He immediately noticed that indoor smoking was permitted, so he took a seat by the window and pulled onto the table his Marlborough pack and lighter, eager to have an indoor smoking experience after so many years. He’s never been to an Amsterdam weed café, but this was close enough. He ordered a craft beer and a plate of kebabs, texted a bunch of friends on his phone and sent a picture or two to some of them. After eating what seemed to be a pound of kebabs, smeared with kajmak, and also a generous pile of crispy French fries, he paid and went back to his room. In fact, the prices were very affordable.

In the room, nursing a tallboy of Czech beer, he flipped through the Serbian channels. He watched a lot of Serbian hip-hop videos. They had all the trappings of their American counterparts: 4K drone shots, mansions, scantily clad women, hard currency, tattoos, Italian fashion. A large proportion of the videos was shot in foreign locations that included Thailand, the Emirates, the Caribbean, and various Western European locations. It was amusing to Browder to watch hip-hop done exclusively by white men, though. The artists did a very admirable job of “trans-creating” all of the American hip-hop tropes into Balkan street culture; their understanding of hip-hop was flawless. One might object to the whole process as some sort of plagiarism, but really, if you are going to do hip-hop anywhere in the world, you are essentially going to have to plagiarise American blacks. Rather, Browder, who had always listened to hip-hop, though the process of adapting the culture locally was creative and admirable, putting aside of course the typical cultural critique of hip-hop, to wit the complaints about its flagrant greed, misogyny, and violence. Immodesty, foul language.

The next day Browder woke up around nine and checked up on any messages on his phone. His relatives in Chapelton, including his mother, accepted his stay in Belgrade and told him to enjoy himself. His Belgrade cousin, technically an aunt, who is in her mid-forties, and her college aged son, postponed meeting until he is back from Chapelton. Then there was Stefan, his former MBA classmate and Belgrade entrepreneur. He replied with excitement saying that they absolutely have to meet, but he is preoccupied with work the next three days. It would be better to meet after Browder returns, next week. Thus, it looked Browder was going to spend his two days in Belgrade alone.

On the first day he managed to stave off boredom. He could see the city in sunny daylight and observe the habit of the locals. It was more of the same as last night: trendy people strolling down a pretty street. Adjacent to the street was the Kalemegdan Park, the central park of the city that includes a large fortress. It ends on a cliff rising directly above the confluence of Sava and Danube rivers, and opens up a sweeping view on the rest of the city and the vast plain behind it. The park itself was decorated to celebrate the Chinese New Year, with glowing plastic figurines of traditional Chinese scenes and a series of photos of famous natural and urban sites of traditional China. This was another sign that Belgrade is following global trends. After impulsively snapping some photos on his smartphone, Browder walked back to the city and looked for a meal.

He opted for a street food stand right on Prince Michael’s and ordered a pljeskavica, a Serbian take on a hamburger served in a large dry bun and a richly seasoned patty. He chatted up the seller about his other offerings, and the fat gentleman cut him off a piece from a large slab of smoked bacon. The smokiness brought out the essence of the dish, and as the vendor fried it a bit before serving it, Browder could taste the temperature gradients and the different textures of meat and of melted and solid fat. This was bacon at its most bacony. Serbs truly understand bacon.

He felt good, and the weather warmed up. He strolled looking for a good table to drink a beer and people watch. Prior to seating himself at one elegant patio, he approached the newsstands to see what the local press is talking about. The most prominently displayed newspapers were tabloids touting pictures of domestic music divas, which were, it was curious to observe, plastered in makeup and generally uglier than the average young woman on Prince Michael’s. They had ambiguous foreign names such as Mirabela and Solaria. The headlines covered scandals concerning their lovers or children, as tabloids do anywhere else in the world. The tone was significantly trashier than American tabloids though, no small feat; perhaps it was roughly on the level of tabloids in Latin America. Indeed, Browder noted while watching television in his hotel last night that telenovelas took up a large bandwidth of Serbian television, as did some soapy period dramas in American English completely unknown to Browder. There were also a few political papers on the stand, but he wasn’t going to delve into that at this point.

Passing on the printed media, Browder sat down at a nearby table and ordered a cold Stella. He had had a domestic beer at the airport, and it had given him an uncomfortable boost in energy, jitters really; he suspected the beer was spiked with sugar and decided to avoid domestic brands until someone can remove his doubts. As there was no one to talk to, Browder lit up a cigarette and began people watching and ruminating.

He wasn’t sure if Serbian popular culture is trashy or it just appeared trashy to him, because as a Serbian immigrant to the US he associated the Serbian thing with mom and pops, and all the general degeneracy of today’s world with the English language. Serb celebrities are probably trashy though, and this is mainly because they make less money than American celebrities, and money by any means makes you less trashy. In light of the limited market though, the Serbian pop musicians probably punch above their weight. Music produced in Belgrade is consumed across the countries of former Yugoslavia, and to some extent also in Bulgaria and Greece.

Observing the young and old walking up and down the street, he remembered his old impressions of the urban culture in this part of Europe. Here the word “hedonistic” has a positive connotation; it describes someone who knows how to enjoy life, a bon-vivant. In the US of course, the term implies moral degeneracy. Last night, Browder heard someone on a TV show recommend a local nightclub as an experience of “true hedonism”, and he couldn’t help thinking of one of those swinger’s bar where old couples participate in orgies. Or perhaps some law-forsaken drug den. What was meant on Serbian TV was simply a place where one may have a jolly good time.

Hedonism thus defined, and the capacity to partake in it, was admirable in Belgrade society, and it had been for several generations. The old dogs from the communist Yugoslav era were hedonists, too. Except then the main term bohemians, a term still somewhat popular today. Their government’s socialist ideology had pretty much encouraged irresponsible spending of money, which ultimately contributed to the catastrophic collapse of Yugoslav society in the 1990s. While today these ex-bohemians walk around with crumpled faces, heaving lungs and gouts, their children and grandchildren continue on as “hedonists”.

It is true that the Serbs in a way party much more than Americans. As the taxi driver had said, the parties here start around midnight, not counting the pregame, and end between four and eight in the morning, depending on the day of the week. This is certainly far beyond the hours Americans put in. Furthermore, while Americans have to wake up early the next day and go back to work, the young Serbian party goers are generally sponsored by their parents.

On the other hand, it could be argued that Americans party harder than Serbs, doing way more drugs and being way sluttier. Serbs are for the most part traditionalists who stick to alcohol and cigarettes, and lots of them. Now, the recreational drugs that Americans so famously consume are certainly bad for your physical as well as mental health, putting the consumer at an increased risk of mental disorders. But looking at the impressive depth of wrinkles in the over-forty Serbs, Browder was not sure if smoking a pack of cigarettes to your face from midnight until dawn is healthier than doing a few lines of coke.

As for sex, Browder stumbled on his iPhone onto a web forum for pick-up artists, where a disgruntled young foreigner discredited Belgrade’s nightlife as a “social circle game”. Browder, despite his aversion to the art of pick-up, agreed with that specific point. Girls in Serbia go out to be seen by their established social circle, and thus boost their social status, and their interest in meeting a stranger, while it probably does exist, is not exactly top-of-mind. Unless of course we are talking about hookers or escorts. These factors constitute the difference between the Western work-hard-play-hard attitude and the “boems”, that is to say bohemians, and that is to say – thought Browder – “bums”.

The rest of the day Browder spent in a similar vein, alone and alternating between patio tables and some rather pointless shopping. Content, he walked to his room and fell into a nap on his bed. He was awakened around eleven o’clock by thumping noise of music below his window.