Belgrade Београд
September, 2023
Victoria is as restless as me; a drifter even before the Russian army obliterates her homeland in Donetsk and she flees, at first to Kyiv, then to Berlin, then Amsterdam––where we meet serving trust fund kids Aperol Spritz paddling in a lopsided blow-up pool. She floats through life, seemingly stoned to everyone she meets, but really very switched on; bravely facing a world that is not her own, and offers her but the dregs it doesn’t want itself, as if she should be so grateful doing their dirty work.
When I have settled into the mountains of Bulgaria and am gently nursing with thunderstorms and quenching rain my shattered heart; after the brutal, relentless heat and cicadas of Kalkan, Kaş and Gelemis have subsided; the fallout from an explosion, stumbling around picking up your own limbs and trying to stick them on again with whatever adhesive you can find––when I succeed in surviving the worst of that, Victoria comes to the Balkans, and we snake our way in a stuffy bus full of Slavs, Bulgarians and stragglers of no place like us up to Belgrade––the proverbial capital of this vivid, unplaceable peninsula.
I have been working out to tame the demon and my body looks good. I wear a singlet, black jeans and Ukrainian made hiking boots, everywhere; Victoria floats by my side in beat-up 90s dad runners and white socks underneath a sheer dress and knitted top, layer upon layer, crowned with a handkerchief tied around her head humouring her Eastern European roots. We clasp arms, scrubbed and showered, and cross the road into pounding neon night.
Berlin Monroe is a club in Stari Grad, filled with hipsters, queers and alt-gen of all ages, shapes and sizes. Valerie by Amy Winehouse comes on, and I can’t help but vent on the dance floor while Victoria chats to a middle-aged couple at a plastic table on a terrace spilling out into the cul-de-sac. I groove with a few dykes, flirt with the ambiguously gendered, soak up some city attention after almost three months as an outlier in Turkish and Bulgarian hinterlands.
At the table, the lady shakes my hand while Victoria talks to her husband.
‘Branka. What brings you to Serbia?’
‘I’ve been living in Europe for seven years, mainly in Holland.’
‘Oh’
‘I’ve been traveling since the beginning of this year though. Full-time.’
‘Are you alone?’
It pains me to say it, still believing.
‘Yes. I am.’
She has had some to drink; the smell of wine, the slur of words.
‘I was traveling with someone. But they left.’
‘Were you in love?’
‘Very much. I still am.’
‘Then why don’t you go find them?’
‘Because they don’t want to see me.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘Because i’ve tried. I’ve tried every way. I’ve been blocked every way!’
She pauses. Takes stock, swooning slightly, staring me directly, unabashedly, straight in the eyes.
‘I was married. He’s the father of my two children––one son, older, one daughter, younger. Both soooo smart! I love them so much. We had everything together. We had a total….life together. Children, money, house. Everything.’
She swigs from her glass. Continues.
‘Do you know what that motherfucker did? He cheated on me. I caught him red-handed. Do you know how?’
She laughs.
‘How?’
‘I created a dating profile in a chat room. I know what kind of women he likes. Blonde girls. The kind that have a sign on their forehead that says ‘I suck cock’. So I setup a meeting with him, like i’m her. And he goes to me, ‘I’m just going for a walk’, and I say ‘Sure honey’. And i’m standing there you know in our kitchen, baking bread, flour all over my….apron. Like a fucking good little housewife!’
We laugh together. She slows down. Pulling up the memory from a deep chasm she has often been lost in.
‘As soon as he leaves the door, I throw off the apron and I run to the car and I drive there to that lake so fast…but a different way, so he can’t recognise my car. And i’m waiting there for him. And he walks up to me and he looks totally shocked, you know. And I say to him…‘I know what you’re doing here.’
Our faces are very close now. All other sound and people fade into oblivion.
‘He acts all shocked, angry, denying. I say again ‘I know’.
‘What happened?’
‘He’s my best friend. I still love him. I love him…so much. I can’t even tell you. Do you know how much that hurt me?
Miming…
‘It was like a dagger in my heart. It totally destroyed me. But I still love him…can you believe that? And I always will. He’s the father of my children. He’s a stupid idiot for what he did.’
I sit back in my chair. She presses on.
‘Do you still love your partner?’
‘Yes. Of course I do.’
‘Then go and find them! Tell them you love them!’
‘But I have!’
‘They don’t believe you! Make them believe you! Where are they right now!?’
‘I don’t know.’
That hurts too.
‘Maybe Slovakia…’
‘Then go to Slovakia!’
Every time I tell myself the wound is starting to heal, it isn’t. This tears the flimsy layer of skin that Bulgaria has salved right off again.
She leans in closer..
Berlin Monroe is a club in Stari Grad, filled with hipsters, queers and alt-gen of all ages, shapes and sizes. Valerie by Amy Winehouse comes on, and I can’t help but vent on the dance floor while Victoria chats to a middle-aged couple at a plastic table on a terrace spilling out into the cul-de-sac. I groove with a few dykes, flirt with the ambiguously gendered, soak up some city attention after almost three months as an outlier in Turkish and Bulgarian hinterlands.
At the table, the lady shakes my hand while Victoria talks to her husband.
‘Branka. What brings you to Serbia?’
‘I’ve been living in Europe for seven years, mainly in Holland.’
‘Oh’
‘I’ve been traveling since the beginning of this year though. Full-time.’
‘Are you alone?’
It pains me to say it, still believing.
‘Yes. I am.’
She has had some to drink; the smell of wine, the slur of words.
‘I was traveling with someone. But they left.’
‘Were you in love?’
‘Very much. I still am.’
‘Then why don’t you go find them?’
‘Because they don’t want to see me.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘Because i’ve tried. I’ve tried every way. I’ve been blocked every way!’
She pauses. Takes stock, swooning slightly, staring me directly, unabashedly, straight in the eyes.
‘I was married. He’s the father of my two children––one son, older, one daughter, younger. Both soooo smart! I love them so much. We had everything together. We had a total….life together. Children, money, house. Everything.’
She swigs from her glass. Continues.
‘Do you know what that motherfucker did? He cheated on me. I caught him red-handed. Do you know how?’
She laughs.
‘How?’
‘I created a dating profile in a chat room. I know what kind of women he likes. Blonde girls. The kind that have a sign on their forehead that says ‘I suck cock’. So I setup a meeting with him, like i’m her. And he goes to me, ‘I’m just going for a walk’, and I say ‘Sure honey’. And i’m standing there you know in our kitchen, baking bread, flour all over my….apron. Like a fucking good little housewife!’
We laugh together. She slows down. Pulling up the memory from a deep chasm she has often been lost in.
‘As soon as he leaves the door, I throw off the apron and I run to the car and I drive there to that lake so fast…but a different way, so he can’t recognise my car. And i’m waiting there for him. And he walks up to me and he looks totally shocked, you know. And I say to him…‘I know what you’re doing here.’
Our faces are very close now. All other sound and people fade into oblivion.
‘He acts all shocked, angry, denying. I say again ‘I know’.
‘What happened?’
‘He’s my best friend. I still love him. I love him…so much. I can’t even tell you. Do you know how much that hurt me?
Miming…
‘It was like a dagger in my heart. It totally destroyed me. But I still love him…can you believe that? And I always will. He’s the father of my children. He’s a stupid idiot for what he did.’
I sit back in my chair. She presses on.
‘Do you still love your partner?’
‘Yes. Of course I do.’
‘Then go and find them! Tell them you love them!’
‘But I have!’
‘They don’t believe you! Make them believe you! Where are they right now!?’
‘I don’t know.’
That hurts too.
‘Maybe Slovakia…’
‘Then go to Slovakia!’
Every time I tell myself the wound is starting to heal, it isn’t. This tears the flimsy layer of skin that Bulgaria has salved right off again.
She leans in closer..
‘I love you. Do you know that? I love life. I love being alive. I love my ex-husband. I love my children. I love everybody. Life is so beautiful. One day we will all die.’
Victoria wants a date, and to move on from this table, where I have forgotten all time, or even where I am. She later tells me that she was kicking me under the table, though I felt nothing. She abruptly gets up, that temperamental birthday girl––I have forgotten that too; she turns 27 in 6 minutes! We thank our company; Branka and I hug and then hug again, and exchange emails, so I can tell her what happens in Slovakia. Almost a year later, I email her telling her that I did not go to Slovakia after all; that a choice was made to part ways in Turkey, to cease being together….
And that true love is letting someone go, no matter the burden that will always come in waves on some random day of the week, and pass again the next…
A heady strange, bittersweet feeling between grief, homesickness, nostalgia and the infinite freedom of release. I never hear from Branka again, though our meeting remains a vital piece of the puzzle.
We barhop next door; she has found a date for the night on an app, a gentle, slightly chubby Serb, who likes what he sees but can barely hold a conversation, despite speaking English well. While they get acquainted I go to the toilet and on the way out, Heroes by Bowie smashes out of the speakers of the empty, dilapidated music hall with no one inside because of the suffocating heat; I dance with myself, miming all the words. I want to explode. I want to catch the next bus to Slovakia. My head is full, swimming. Victoria doesn’t come home that night. I’m worried at first; I stay up meditating, then collapse into a deep, blackout-hotel-room-sleep.
︎
‘I’m coming to pick you up in the car with this guy. We’re gonna’ go get a bikini so we can all go to the Danube for swimming.’
15 minutes later I am a passenger in a beat-up jalopy; windows down all the way, the hot, dry wind of midday whipping my face. It’s a mid-September Gypsy Summer in Serbia, the hottest on record, before being beaten again the following year in 2024. A concrete jungle of grand derelict Habsburg façades; the brutal utilitarianism of former Yugoslavia apartment blocks; the glistening sexless steel of cheap capitalism; heaving breasts adorned with Orthodox crosses, musclemen like 90s MTV stars––the world rushes past, horns honking, helicopters whirring, madmen screaming at pigeons on Republic Square. Road blocks and diversions mar the flow of traffic. Policemen at every turn sit on the trays of open-top army jeeps in full riot gear. Vans and cars pack the roads full of strategising lieutenants barking commands into walkie talkies.
‘We have to take detours, they’re shutting down the city for Gay Pride today’, our driver informs us.
One tangerine bikini bottom later, we are unceremoniously dumped at the entrance to the Tašmajdan Outdoor Swimming Pool. Her Serbian lover won’t be joining us after all she tells me standing in line for the cashier, but he gives me a pair of old swimming trunks to wear and keep.
‘I don’t know…it’s like this guy’s just scared of real intimacy or something. He made me full Turkish breakfast, so delicious with sujuk, but then acts like he doesn’t know me suddenly. So strange.’
We’re a few dinars too short for the cash entry into the pools.
‘Please!’, I beg. ‘It’s her birthday!’
The stern young blonde rolls her eyes and nods us through the barriers.
‘God bless you!’
She turns to her friend and they both laugh. We go and find a spot on the rafters and bake for a few hours, dipping off when heatstroke beckons.
︎
We have been chasing the mythical unicorn for several hours now. Whatever refreshment the water has offered is lost again in the pounding heat of late afternoon. There are people everywhere, but no one knows where the gays are. We know they must be around here somewhere; we’ve been following the police barricades like Hansel & Gretel’s breadcrumbs, yet they have not brought us any closer to the prize. We have however found more than enough of the counter-demonstrations assembled on the perimeters of endless kilometres of erected fencing––especially around St. Mark’s Church. The demonstrators hold placards:
PARADE OF PROVOCATION
NO NATO. NO PRIDE
It’s a mixed crowd of young families, neatly-dressed older women in pretty Summer dresses, bearded death metal enthusiasts, Vietnam War-era hippies only brandishing wooden crucifixes and messages of hate. Enormous icons of Orthodox Patriarchs and Jesus Christ printed on fine cloth lead the charge: in the far background mounted atop an unrelated building, a sign of a single word: HONOR.
Victoria is getting antsy. Our pace quickens and we intensify our search. There’s supposed to be some kind of crowd gathered for festivities at Tašmajdan Square. We approach a young, alternative-looking couple and ask in English.
‘Excuse us. Do you know where the Gay Pride is?’
They eye us like we’ve got snot dripping down our faces.
‘No.’
Another corner, another barricade; the counter-demonstrators begin craning their necks to see something, far off in the distance, past the enormous policemen standing guard; slowly, but surely, yes…the sound of music pumping from a speaker: Strong Enough by Cher.
And like a mirage appearing on the steaming bitumen covering the earth of downtown Belgrade, a march of LGBTQI+ people waving rainbow flags and placards––not dancing on floats like in Los Angeles and Amsterdam, but walking….just walking, somber, like a funeral procession.
The police presence, the gawking faces of those standing on the sidelines come to watch the freak show––Cher, the scorching sun––it is truly one of the most hallucinogenic, tragic, courageous, ridiculous, insane acid trip spectacles I have ever seen with my own eyes. It’s too much for Victoria; the sheer hatred coming from those jeering on one side of that suddenly flimsy railing, reminds her of the needless hatred her own people are enduring at this very moment.
‘Oh this is so disgusting. I can’t watch this. I’m gonna’ be sick.’
She looks like she’s about to double over. We leave the crowd and go sit on a terrace in the shade.
Over an iced latte she says:
‘I’m sorry. It’s just so triggering for me. I don’t understand how they can be so hateful for no reason?’
I laugh––my own way of dealing with unpleasantness like this.
‘It’s really not funny!’
‘I know it’s not! I hear you. It’s about power Vic. It’s about who controls the world. Western free market capitalism embraces the rainbow flag because it has no religious dogma––any money is good money. It expands in subtle ways. Those people remember NATO bombing Serbia, they see Western governments and corporations waving the flag…they conflate the two. Really it’s the gays who are scapegoats for all of them.’
This doesn’t seem to help. So I shut up and get buzzed on coffee, smiling at her while she breathes deeply, slowly calming down.
‘We should go to the bus station soon. I think we’ve seen enough.’
There is always a deep, dangerous sense of irony when one persecuted group begins the persecution of another. Whether you are a Croat sawing off the heads of Serbs, a Serb executing Bosniak fathers and sons together, a Bosniak throwing Serbs into a pit of death, or any of the above hating on gays for no other reason than fear for your own identity––cutting up the kaleidoscopic quilt of humanity into pieces leaves everyone out in the freezing cold to die.
A persistent lesson I learn when travelling is that one-on-one, everyone is beautiful, kind, curious and very, very generous––face-to-face there is no Chinese or Ukrainian or Filipino! There is only a human being looking at your with their eyes, trying to understand you. How we behave together, as clans, is our downfall as a species.
One vision should never seek to overthrow another, this only causes the other to dig its heels in and fight for its own illusory version of reality. It falls to the individual to live outside this backwards dualism. It is my practice to stop seeing these damned distinctions that shutter the mind so miserably and so pointlessly! I am fucking sick of them! Where have they got us!? A constant effort is required to deconstruct this powerful programming. I seek friendship everywhere, with everyone. I love you too. Please forgive me.
