15 july 2005

The Hungarian exit stamp is standard for the EU: blue and clear with the tiny circle of European Community stars next to a tiny icon for the relevant means of transportation. Twenty meters away on the ground and two centimeters away on the passport, the Serbian entry stamp is black and the writing is Cyrillic. While the language of Serbia is essentially the same as that of Croatia - both brought from what became Poland by the South Slavs around 600 AD - the conquests of Charlemagne in 800, and the Latin alphabet that came with them, never made it to Serbia. During the long brutal fall of Yugoslavia, embracing the Cyrillic alphabet was one way of asserting Serb nationalism. So now Serbian street signs, shop windows and news dailies are a mix of both, with various political, historical, and social connotations.

Today I sang myself a new song. (The ongoing monologue in my head when I am traveling alone often comes in song form, so I don't get tired of myself.) My new song went something like this: "Jenn, Jenn, Jenn, Jenn, holy shit! You are in Serbia. What are you doing in Serbia?"