Dictators and Authoritarians

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Hello my fellow travellers!

After another great night's sleep at Nikola's place the two of us headed out together because he had to go to work today, Alex left us yesterday so it was just the two of us. I was planning on visiting the Museum of Yugoslavian History with the House of Flowers and then just spend the rest of the day walking around the pedestrian areas of Belgrade, trying to find something nice for Lisa.

I liked the museum quite a lot, especially the House of Flowers where Tito is buried. It was a calm and serene place, very beautiful. The museum was also very nice with friendly guards, good information and a great layout/planning. I ended up spending quite some hours here, enjoying the various artefacts on display. It was very interesting to visit the final resting place of such a controversial figure in human history.

It took a strong man to keep the nations of Yugoslavia together and that became evident when he died and the region began it's descent into turmoil. A turmoil that to some degree still exist, Nikola told me that tensions are rising again between Serbia and Kosovo and things might get very ugly again soon. The words he used was "we're getting ready for another ethnic cleansing". If that happends I fear that other parts of Europe might follow suit with all the tensions in the European Union.

Afterwards I took the bus back to central Belgrade and began to just walk around, enjoying the flow of the city while finding something nice for Lisa. It was nice to ease up a bit on the pace even though I don't exactly consider shopping to be relaxing.

After my shopping was done I met up with Nikola again and together we went to the Stadion Shopping Mall where we got some Asian food for dinner before we returned to Nikola's apartment to plan for the next step of my trip.

Originally I had planned on going to Pristina in Kosovo, but it seems that it's not all that easy to do from Serbia so the choice fell on Skopje in Macedonia instead. I knew that from there I could easily take a bus back and forth to Pristina in just a day.

Nikola was invaluable in all of this and helped me out a tonne to plan all of this. Not only did he help me sort out the travel plans but he also managed to fix me a couch in Veles in Macedonia, I really can't thank him enough for what he has done for me these days!

Well, once plans was set I took a taxi to the bus station which cost me 700 RSD and I ordered a ticket for the train. I told the cashier that I wanted a sleeper couchette, like three times, I really wanted to make that clear to avoid any trouble on the train!

Anyway, I got my ticket and it was 2700 RSD, I hop on the train and turns out I didn't get the sleeper couchette and first the guy on the train wants an additional 10 EUR, then 6 EUR and then 5 EUR for a couchette. Problem is that I was very low on cash after the taxi ride, that's why I had paid with my VISA card in the station! I think that counting up all of my remaining cash I had somewhere between 3 and 4 EUR so I only lacked 1 or 2 EUR from his lowest offer.

Unfortunately it wasn't possible to reason with the guy and he forcibly, yes, forcibly remove me from the couchette by pushing me. The most vile and horrible man I've ever met, I just can't stand being pushed around. Some people really enjoy their positions of relative power to much! I was kind of surprised that the other passengers, two German guys, didn't step in to offer the last couple of EUR needed. I know I would have done under the same circumstances had our positions been reversed.

Well, that didn't happen though so instead I tucker into a regular couch. But, at least the seats could be lowered and the company in there was very nice. I shared the ride with a guy from Poland, a guy from Serbia and a mother and daughter from Albania. Unfortunately the mother was a heavy smoker and she and the Serbian guy talked very much and very loudly through most of the night, so it was kind of a messy ride for me to be honest. But, eventually everyone fell asleep and I could finally breathe normally and begin to settle in for the night.

Tomorrow I will arrive in Skopje where I will just switch to a bus for Pristina to make a quick visit to Kosovo. It will be interesting to visit this small and budding nation which I know very little of! Let's just hope that this ethnic cleansing that Nikola talked about doesn't happen tomorrow! I will stay as long as possible in Pristina tomorrow before I return to Skopje and from there I will try and make my way to Veles to meet my next host Mihajlo. I will actually be his first guest and Nikola was his first host! It's always nice to meet new members of our ever growing global society of couchsurfers! I have a feeling that tomorrow will be a very good day!

Until tomorrow I wish you all peace and happy travels!

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