"Adio" to Dubrovnik A tale of two refugees Full Monty Parlor Games Share My Fire Car - the relationship-saving device Going Straight West A year to expirience, a lifetime to understand Meeting Vuk Cultural insensitivity Sex in Serbia Buvljak experience What's news in Yugoslavia? part II What's news in Yugoslavia? Trust issues: Yugoslav Banks Hosting, Serbian style Flat-hunting Staying legally in Yugoslavia Welcome to Belgrade Border crossings The Paper Chase: Single - entry visas

Foreigners living abroad are usually the least likely to purchase cars since it requires too much commitment for an unpredictable situation. We are also easy to impress with the European concept of public transportation. For the first time in our lives, we can act like the environmentalists we have been recently indoctrinated to be.

Besides, there's the price factor. Paying twice for petrol in Europe seems, well, a bit luxurious --almost an admittance that one can't live without their biggest addiction.

Cruising the streets of Belgrade put my idealism of public transportation to the test. The clunky red buses and teetering trams do not bring about liberation from crass materialism and the burning of fossil fuels. It brings out the worst instincts in people and drives huge wedges between citizens. We compete like animals for minuscule packets of space, only to be nudged by a sharp elbow by a bystander or called something untranslatable.

Not a good way to start one's day, is it?

Things might be different if buses were treated not as a social right, but as service. But just how often do people actually pay for their rides? Probably just about as often as a ticket checker appears on the scene. The equation doesn't add up to much for the public transportation company and the coffers remain too low to improve the situation. One ticket checker had a brilliant moneymaking scheme worked out for himself. When he presented the fine to two ticketless foreigners, he did them a favor and wrote up only one fine, rather than two. Then he offered to sell them fake monthly passes at a discounted rate. At this point, who would say no?

One American friend of mine finally admitted defeat after too many hour-long waits at the bus stop, missing appointments and relying on the unreliable. He has decided to buy a car.

But the rules of the road in Belgrade are even more cutthroat than the rules of bus riding. Traffic gets stopped up easily, people get impatient. Horns are honked...without hesitation and accidents do happen. In this environment, the car has become an elevated status symbol, perhaps a symbol of one's vitality, or mortality.

In Montenegro, I hear that death by auto is the second most honorable way to die (after fighting for one's country). And let's not forget that cars have sex appeal. Forget who is driving the size of the engine and the bass levels on your car stereo can be the necessary ingredients for those seeking to score. Especially for those couples who are living with their parents, the car is the relationship-saving device - that is- if the seat goes back far enough.

For men, having a car means you have an easier time getting women to like you, or at least, rely on your sometimes for rides. If you are a woman with a car, you don't have to rely on those kind of guys anymore and risk offending them because you believe in the life-saving power of seat belts. But be smart. Learn to be a crazy, aggressive driver because if you are slightly cautious, male drivers will take the opportunity to make you feel that you'd be better off walking.

But then again, you probably are.

by Jennifer C. Brown    

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Your previous talk back on the subject above:
article on Belgrade - Randall C.
Excellent Article - Vladimir Cuk
cute article - vladimir mirkovich
echo comment - miro jeber
how you came to be in Yu - Nadja R.
do you hate Belgrade or you like it? - Zigman Wainer
hello --this is last time - igor igor