Serbia

Serbia

Part 10 - Welcome!


I hope this page at least made you curious about Serbia and showed you its other side. The media often published the bad news about my country in the past, but don’t trust everything you see on television. I invite all Webskills participants to come and visit Serbia and I would be your personal tourist guide. It is not that expensive and you could have a nice holiday, taste some delicious food, meet interesting people and have fun.

Looking forward to seeing you all here in Serbia! And I mean it!

In order to make a balance to Oregon page, I decided to post a more energetic and lively video here. This video shows a festival which was held last year in my hometown and the next one is in two days. I was actually there and it was one of the best festivals I was at, especially since my favourite band Hladno Pivo was playing. I hope this video shows the energy of people and how much fun they had. You might even see me and my friend for a moment, but not very well.

 

Part 9 - Belgrade


Here's a taste of Belgrade's (Serbian capital) brilliant citylife, but if the hustle and bustle gets too much, the countryside is not too far away.

Part 8 - Kragujevac


It is about time to introduce you to my city – Kragujevac. Kragujevac is the fourth largest city in Serbia, founded in 1476. It is an authentic Serbian city which used to be the first capital of Modern Serbia. Kragujevac underwent a number of ordeals, the worst probably having been the October massacre during World War II when about 7,000 people, including students, were shot by Nazi soldiers between 19–21 October 1941. 50 people were killed if a German soldier was wounded, while 100 were slaughtered if a German soldier was killed. Today there is a memorial park located in Šumarice that commemorates this tragic event.

Kragujevac is known for its first Serbian theatre, first Serbian grammar school and for its automotive and weapon industry. Kragujevac has several twin towns, such as Springfield, Ohio and Mogilev, Belarus. I hope you will enjoy the video I posted, although the video is three years old and Kragujevac has developed a lot during the last three years.









Part 7 - Festivals in Serbia


Festivals are the important part of our culture and people just love them. There are music festivals, but food and drink festivals as well.

The two most popular events are EXIT music festival and Guča trumpet festival. The Exit festival draws thousands of young people from all over the Europe. The Exit lasts for four days; it is held in the 18th century fortress and gathers the most famous music stars at about 15 stages. The Main stage has a capacity of over 35,000 people and the Dance Arena a capacity of 25,000.

EXIT is rather urban festival while Guča is completely different. 600,000 visitors make their way to the town of 2,000 people every year, both from Serbia and abroad. The village of Guča has gained world fame owing to its Assembly of Trumpet Players, the largest trumpet event on the planet. During the festival the trumpet bands compete, people dance in the street, eat and drink a lot. Mostly beer and rakia (brandy), Serbian national drink. Guča has been taking place for more than 50 years.

Other popular festivals are Beer Fest, Cabbage festival, Kustendorf – a film festival organized by our famous director Emir Kusturica and it it is one of Johnny Depp's favourite destinations, jazz festivals, Bread festival, The Festival of Street Musicians, Cinema City Festival and many others.


Part 6 - Eurovision


The Eurovision Song Contest is the most popular song contest in Europe, since each country submits a song to be performed. Serbia was the winner at this contest in 2007 with its song ’Molitva’ (A Prayer) performed by Marija Serifovic. She has an amazing voice and she was actually born in my city. I hope you will enjoy her song and for some of you this may be the first time to hear some Serbian. I will post the lyrics below the video, so feel free to sing :) By the way, Serbian language has 30 letters and a unique rule: one sound-one letter, so we read exactly as it is written.

In 2008, The Eurovision Song Contest was held in Belgrade, Serbia and the winner was Dima Bilan from Russia. The Eurovision Song Contest 2012 will be the 57th annual Eurovision Song Contest. It will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan between 22 and 26 May.


Molitva - Marija Serifovic

Ni oka da sklopim

postelja prazna tera san

a život se topi i nestaje

brzo k'o dlanom o dlan

K'o razum da gubim

jer stvarnosti ne primećujem

još uvek te ljubim

još uvek ti slepo verujem

K'o luda ne znam kuda

ljubavi se nove bojim

a dane, žive rane

više ne brojim

Molitva, kao žar na mojim usnama je

molitva, mesto reči samo ime tvoje

nebo zna, kao ja koliko puta sam ponovila

to nebo zna, baš kao ja

da je ime tvoje moja jedina molitva

Al' Bogu ne mogu lagati

sve dok se molim

a lažem ako kažem

da te ne volim

(Note: š is sh;  ž is pronounced as in usually or vision;  ć and č are similar to ch)


Part 5 - Sport in Serbia


Team sports are the most popular ones in Serbia. We like playing football, volleyball, basketball, handball, waterpolo and tennis which has become the most popular one, mainly because of the No1 tennis player in the world - Novak Djokovic. Mr Novak Djokovic is currently ranked as world number one tennis player and he was also awarded as Best Sportsman of the Year 2011. He is one of six successful Serbian tennis players who lead to a popularisation of tennis in Serbia. In 2010, Serbia became the 13th nation to win the Davis Cup after completing a 3-2 victory over France in Belgrade. 

The two best known and the ones with the most trophies football clubs in Serbia are Red Star and Partizan. The matches between two rival clubs are known as "Eternal Derby”. When you step into class for the first time, the first thing students ask you is: 'Are you a Red Star or Partizan fan?' Needless to say, although, I don't care too much about neither of these two clubs, I say Partizan, because my father and my boyfriend are Partizan fans.

I have to admit, rather humbly, that Serbia is successful at most of the sports named. Our teams usually win a medal at European championships and sometimes even at World championships. The majority doesn’t know that Serbia is currently 2012 waterpolo European Champion, which is the 5th title for Serbia and also a European Volleyball Champion.

In the USA people are usually familiar with Vlade Divac, a former basketball player, who used to be very popular there.

Individual sports are present too, but somehow a team spirit in sport always prevails in Serbia.

Of course, people play almost all other sports for recreation. You can even ski in the winter because there are several great mountain resorts.

Some sports are still developing. For instance, in my city, Kragujevac, there is an American football club, one of few in Serbia, called Wild Boars, trained by an American.

Part 4 - Serbian Scientists


Our lives wouldn’t be the same if it weren’t for some great world scientists. One of the greatest is certainly a Serbian scientist Nikola Tesla, regarded as one of the most important inventors in history. Contemporary admirers of Tesla have deemed him "the man who invented the twentieth century”. I tend to think that we probably wouldn’t be at this stage of technological development if it wasn’t for him. Here’s a short story about Tesla.

Other important Serbian scientists are:

Milutin Milankovic a geophysicist, best known for his theory of ice ages, relating variations of the Earth's orbit and long-term climate change, now known as Milankovitch cycles.

____________________________________________________________

Mihajlo Idvorski Pupin, a physicist and physical chemist. Pupin is best known for his landmark theory of modern electrical filters as well as for his numerous patents, including a means of greatly extending the range of long-distance telephone communication .

_______________________________________________________________

MihailoPetrovic Alas, a mathematician, who contributed significantly to differential equations and phenomenology, as well as inventing one of the first prototypes of an analog computer.

___________________________________________________________

Mileva Maric, a Serbian mathematician, Albert Einstein's first wife and mother of his three children. Mileva entered Einstein's life in a crucial period of his scientific achievements and helped him in his endeavor. Einstein's marriage to Mileva was an intellectual partnership.

_____________________________________________________






Part 3 - Typically Serbian

Dancing is an important part of Serbian culture. Traditional dances usually take place at weddings. The most popular Serbian dance is performed in a circle and it’s called ‘kolo’. In the next video you will see is a mixture of several traditional dances and the traditional costumes are I believe from Eastern part of Serbia. What's interesting about this video is that most of the dancers are actually my ex students.

 In central part of Serbia, where I live, they used to wear something like this in the picture and the traditional dance typical for Sumadija, a central part of Serbia can be heard here with photos of Serbian traditional houses. I hope some of them will be preserved in the future, as well as other elements of tradition.

In addition to traditional dances, here are some typically Serbian things:

- Shaking hands, done using the right hand, is customary when being introduced or meeting somebody.

- Kissing is not a necessity when meeting somebody for the first time, but every time you meet from then on, if you have developed affection for the person, kissing three times on the cheeks is the order of the day in Serbia. Of course, nobody will object if you only kiss once or twice while giving a long and sincere hug.

-  Toasts are usually made with traditional rakija(brandy), often home-distilled. Toasts are made by clinking glasses, making direct eye contact and loudly proclaiming “Živeli!”

- Serbs enjoy rich and flavoursome food and normally have three meals a day, with lunch being the largest.

- Paying the bill in restaurants is a big part of the Serbian mentality. The host will almost never allow a guest to pay for lunch, dinner or drinks because it is customary for the host to take care of all expenses while a guest is staying with him or her.

- In contrast to the rest of Europe, there is no single day of the week in Serbia when you cannot have a night out and that holds true for all generations, for all lifestyles and musical tastes and for all available budgets. After a wild night out, somewhere around three or four o’clock in the morning, people continue onward in search of grilled meat.

Part 2 - Facts and history

Serbia is located in the Balkan Peninsula at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe. Serbia has about 8 million people and the capital city is Belgrade with population of about two million people. My city, Kragujevac, is considered to be the 4^th largest city with about 180 000 people.

      Some people around the world are more familiar with the name Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia was a famous country during the second half of the last century and Serbia was one of its six republics.

      Being at the crossroads, Serbia was often conquered and sometimes people have the wrong impression that it is not safe being here, which is certainly not true. You are all invited to come and visit our beautiful historic sites, rivers, mountains and festivals.

      The climate is moderately continental, with cold winters and very hot summers. The last winter was the coldest in my life. It was below - 20C for two weeks. I can’t wait for the summer and + 40C.The northern part of Serbia is predominately flat, the central part where I live is covered with hills and then the hills gradually give way to mountains on the south.

   The longest river to flow through Serbia is the Danube and the highest mountain peak is Đeravica, 2656 m.

Over 80% of people in Serbia are Orthodox Christians, the official language is Serbian and the official currency is the dinar.

I had wanted to show you some historical events,  so I decided to try one of the timelines. I have never used this tool before, so it took me a couple of hours experimenting with it. We will see if it works. You can move the timeline left or right, you can zoom in or zoom out and you can read more about a certain event by clicking on it. You may also choose to watch it as a flipbook, list or a map. Please be patient while this application is loading.

Serbian History on Dipity.

Part 1 - Food

By applying for this course I have decided to learn. I hope to learn more about the web tools and about Oregon. But as a teacher, my mission is to teach as well.

If you, by any chance, have a bit of spare time, feel free to have a look at this page and learn something about my country – Serbia.

Before introducing some facts about Serbia, its nature, culture, people, language and sights, let us all have a snack.

Note: I do not recommend watching this video if you are on a diet!