Tuesday, April 10, 2007

National Bank and Serbian Mexican Food

Apr 2

We keep getting to do the coolest things as a group while we are here. Today we were given a tour of the National Bank of Serbia. We started out by getting a lecture about Serbia’s economic status from Radovan Jelasic, the governor of the bank. He talked about Serbia’s chances of getting into the EU in the near future. He had a ton of economic graphs and statistics that I didn’t even half understand, but it was really cool because he is a hugely influential man in Serbia right now. After Jelasic’s lecture we were given a tour of the National Bank premise. It is a huge beautiful building. Our tour guide also took us to their museum of money. Serbia had one of the biggest inflation problems in world in the 1990s. They had the 500 billion dinar bills on display that they were using at the time. That’s some pretty bad inflation. We also got to get a 1 dinar note with our face on it which was pretty silly, but still fun! After the Bank we went to Que Pasa?, one of Serbia’s few Mexican food restaurants. It turned out there was only three Mexican food options on the menu, but I got some pretty delicious pasta. There wasn’t enough room for everyone at one table, so Bryan and I sat at our own table. It felt kind of like a weird date, but we had a really great conversation so it was ok. After Que Pasa? Matt, Levi and I bought some postcards from a street vendor (if you’re lucky you might get one!), and then headed back to their dorm. Matt went to the post office, and I fell asleep trying to read. I woke up with a start when Levi left the room. I thought that I was late for class, and was stressed out that I wasn’t in my own room, but then I realized it was four in the afternoon. It was a pretty unpleasant way to wake up. When Matt got back we all went over to the Speak Easy, our new favorite internet cafĂ© and played cards. When we got hungry we decided to go over to a restaurant we walked by often, but never actually went into. The menu turned out not to be in English, and our waiter didn’t speak any English at all. Bryan and Levi ended up getting a kilo of lamb between the two of them, it was SO much food! It was a really great time. After that we tried to go back to their dorm to hang out, but the doorman wouldn’t let me go upstairs to hang out, so I just grabbed a bus home and went to sleep.

Aliche

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