Nor did he cure tuberculosis, invent the wheel, pave the Information Superhighway, or single-handedly create the heavens and the earth in six days. To my knowledge (and I could be wrong), Mr. Djokovic was not responsible for the breaking down of Apartheid, the lifting of the Iron Curtain, or the forging of lasting peace in the Middle East.

He may, of course, have assassinated Bin Laden. No one knows quite WHAT happened there...

And then along comes the Tourist Organization of Serbia.

All around Belgrade this summer, billboards and posters have sprung up. They have pictures of enticing foods, they have catchy slogans luring the idle passer by to dream about voyages to exotic places. When you look closer, you see that (Hey!) it is the food you had for lunch, and (Wait!) this is advertising for Serbia!

I think, as a courtesy, this may have been somewhat over the top, but I am not a diplomat, I suppose.

Contrary to what you are already setting your surmisers to surmise, this is NOT going to be a litany of complaints about the fact that our already traffic-impaired City on the Danube has literally been closed down today, forcing people to either a) take extraordinary measures to come to work or b) stay home in their pyjamas and watch Oprah. In fact, it is quite the opposite.

We mourn the sad tragedy of the passing of Michael Jackson at ago 50. We celebrate the man who was a star from early childhood, an icon in the 1980s, the King of Pop, and we kindly and gently pass over the child molester, the depraved sociopath, the one who dangled his child out of a London hotel window, the one who attempted to surgically alter his skin color making him look like more like a live-action cartoon character than a human being.

 Man walks up to pay station at Sava Centar to pay for his parking. He puts in a folded 100 dinar note.

"Currency not accepted"

The notice says in English. Man unfolds the bill and smoothes it on his hand. Drops it. Damn. Picks it up, smoothes it out, and tries again.

"BELGRADE, B92  -- A delegation of the Environment Ministry will be heading to Bali to attend the UN Ministerial Council forum program for environmental protection.
The delegation will be headed by Minister Oliver Dulić.  The delegation's trip will cost RSD 2mn, but Dulić said that every member of the delegation is needed, because Serbia is currently presiding over the UN Environmental Protection (UNEP) program...."

I am seriously considering getting into this environment racket.

The passing of Patriarch Pavle, for whom all the respect paid to his memory was and is well deserved, allowed for some rather questionable decisions on the side of the government and media in Serbia.

   1. Government imagines lots of income for the year
   2. Government creates spending budget
   3. Government spends it.

The following is a true story...

"I want to change from Telenor to VIP."
"Can I have your licna karta?"
I give my ID card.
"Wait just a moment," he said, and he went to the back of the shop.

15 minutes later.

The ugly truth is that I have been here for nearly a decade and communicate like a Balinese coconut-picker landed suddenly in the middle of a Parisian dinner party. In the court of Louis XVI.

Of a Tuesday afternoon.