Infected Mushroom.

Today is the day of that live concert that has kept me in the area and (i dont know it yet) will keep me around for some time. I leave Nis in the morning, this time i m hitchhiking back and it should not be a problem to get over the 200 kilometers to Skopje. I get out of the city after a minimal breakfast and a long struggle at the post office to get a package sent to Switzerland, a freaking long customs paper to fill which is fortunately in Serbian and French unlike the other paper for the post office which is only in Serbian, written in Cyrillic. The women at the desk is just as nice as in most French post offices, she is disgusting. Anyway, the guard is nice, we chat and laugh.
The first men who picks me up in the outskirts of Nis is young, he works for the family business and he takes me a couple kilometers, a good spot to get south, not by the highway but the normal local road. Soon an truck comes up, and i get the best ride of the day. A man in his 50s, he is driving his truck all over the place and has been to most European countries. he is keen to talk and with such people my Serbian is good enough to talk about almost anything. Of course we speak about the usual topic, the beautiful Serbian country. Its food, it girls, its music, culture and beautiful natural landscape. Serbia, he says, is a country with such great land that it was never hungry, always had plenty to eat and plenty of the best since it all comes from the neighboring fields and farms. It is true, you can see food growing everywhere and what you buy at the market (unless you are in Belgrade or buying bananas) rarely was driven around for hundreds of kilometers. You get fresh, local, seasonal and delicious fruits and vegetables. For proof of that he points at his belly, big and round like always in the Balkan, shows a great smile and drives on. We then also talk about his job, he tells me he has driven this Mercedes i am sitting in for 800 000 kilometers without maintenance, just the normal oil change. And it keeps going! he has driven over 3.5 millions kilometers in his lifetime!
H drops me in a tow some 40 kilometers south, Leskovac. A short but pleasant ride. As I walk to the right spot to continue my journey, a men on a tractor passes slowly, turns around on his seat and gives m the finger with a bad grin on his face. I realize how fast I can change moods, not that he scared me but he switched my thoughts from very positive ones inspired by my ride to darker ones about human nature. I then have to wait quite long before i get a ride with Vladimir to Bujanovac, he drives to visit his girlfriend or the weekend. We talk about rock, watch a live concert on the small screen sitting next to the driving wheel. He drops me in a familiar place, i have waited her on my less successful ride north a couple days ago...He started his journey this morning in Trieste, he is in a bit of a hurry and quite tired. Understandable, he has been driving for over 10 hours straight...
We pull up at the Macedonian side boarder, big queue 15 minutes of waiting, far to much for my stressed driver. He sakes little, we converse in a mix of languages, Italian, English and Macedonian. While we wait we watch the dogs begging for food at each car and make jokes. We pull over at the cafe just across the boarder, it seems my driver needs one more awaking drink to make it the last 70 kilometers. After the boarder i get to see the industrial zone bordering Skopje, on my way out, i was sitting on a bus reading the small book by Suskind i was offered by a German on the ferry in Albania. At first it is a real nice sight, some of the hilly fields have just been worked on and are brown other are yellow, between them rare trees and houses stand to complete the landscape. There is something about this view that made me think it is beautiful and i think it is the round shape of the fields laying on a hill side. Nothing is straight or flat. The dark brown color adding to the impression of relief.
We arrive in Skopje, i get of in Autokomanda, the area Aurelie lives in. she is not home so i take a little time and sit at the internet cafe where i wait for her and Totor. As they arrive, we head for her home and drink the bottle of beer that was waiting for us in the fridge. impossible to buy more, the stores stop selling alcohol in Macedonia at 7 pm. So we start the bottle of Raki i was offered on my first ride into Skopje. It is strong. I show em how to prepare a cafe bucheron. Make coffee, add a lot of sugar, dont stir, drink the coffee, leave the sugar, add the raki. Then comes the funny part, us a metal spoon to stir and as you stir put the raki on fire and mix until all the sugar is melted in. Nazdravie.
A friend of Aurelie who will get her in for free joins us and we head for the Skopje fair where the concert takes place. We catch a cab and i discover once again how cheap they are. About a euro, maximum two fro a ride trough the city. The crowd is pretty young and excited, so are we. guy at the wardrobe is a fucking asshole, i give him 100 and as i don't see my 50 change, i understand that he has no change and i need to wait, i give him an other 50 but never get my 100 back. Motherfucker. oups sorry did i just write that?? The The next lesson about Skopje is that it is a drug city. It is a trance night so of course there are drugs but I did not expect this many. Almost everybody takes something: mdma, ecstasy, amphetamine, speed, lsd... but it seems cocaine is to expensive. Tonight I am a little drunk and very excited to see Infected mushroom, the only trance band i really like, so i don't need any of this and off course you all know that it is not my type of drug. A bit later, i find Nicolas and Alberik who came from Pristina for the night. Nice to see them again!
Soon the show starts, distorted guitars, electric keyboard, crazy light show and the singers modified voice singing the classics of infected mushroom. Remembers me of the times i was biking over the hills of Sydney listening to my ipod. “I m the supervisor”. The crowd goes crazy, people dancing everywhere, jumping, turning, running... It is all over much to fast, but a good dj takes over and makes us dance for a couple more hours. As the show ends, we are all still up for more and try to find an after party. Impossible, so we head for a place Enes knows. We all expect an apartment and are surprised as we get into a strange internet cafe after a long taxi drive. The place smells like cigarettes and is pretty crowded (remember it is about 5 am) with people sitting in front of their screens. There are also a couple girls, young, maybe 19 sitting in the chairs, laid back. Unreal moment. What are we doing here?? Enes tells us there are rooms and we can go sit there... Hu?? we can rent a private room and site there... this just gets stranger. We don't real want this so we head to Aurelie's place. There i am confirmed what i know about Skopje. As Aurelie is sleeping next door, her young Macedonian friends (about 20) take an acid trip at 7 in the morning... Me and Nicola watch this unreal scene laughing and not really believing it. Soon i to go to sleep.

More trumpets and meat at Guca

Train to Guca!!!

Early wake to catch the bus to Podgorica in Montenegro where we take the train back into Serbia to join our friends in Guca! The bus ride is hot and uncomfortable, the night was short and we are a bit tired. In Podgorica i see the man who rented my his room back then. He is quite surprise to see me again :)

We get train tickets, 15 euro for some 400 km, it is the cheapest way to get around in the Balkans, but we soon find out why... it is also the slowest and the most unreliable. The train is one and a half hour late and when it finally comes in we are really happy to have made reservations. It is packed with people. Most of them only go the Bielo Luka, the most northern town of Montenegro. I leave my seat to an older man, to dig a bit the view and the people on the corridor. Two young boys are yelling songs and banging on the windows. By the way all windows are big opened and everyone smokes there. Big changes from silent air conditioned swiss trains. Soon two police officers come around to apprehend them and take them out for interrogation and god knows hat else...



Despite the slow rhythm, I am happy we chose the train, the track is the most beautiful train ride I had so far, trough mountains, tunnels, bridges along magnificent cliffs and gorges. This old track from the seaside to Belgrade is probably full of history and its construction most have cost lots of lives and mens sweat. We stop in the middle of nowhere numerous times for different reasons. Mostly because the trains from the two directions can only cross in given places the rest being single tracked. the other reason is the waiting at the boarder.


We arrive a Pozeda with about 4 hours delay, they also had to change the locomotive... In the general wondering during the one hour stop in Uzice i meet a French couple going to Guca, they are traveling the Balkans, mostly by bike. Since the night is falling, they cannot get there by bike anymore and will organize a taxi together with their Serban friend met on the train.
In Pozeda we struggle with a serial bullshiter promising us a cheap taxi... We finally stop counting on his help and get a ride with a conventional taxi, skipping on the drunk bunch of youngsters i met on the tracks and who are taking the bus with a local. Anyhow... off to Guca!!! Finally!
there we are slowly taken over by the drums all over the plac and meet Niko at their improvised camp. On the car park, in a field, they build up their two tents and a shade area between them. We quickly drink a beer, buy a couple more and get into the festival area. No entry fee, no security check, we walk in with our cheap beers.





I am sooooo please to meet Lorin, Pj and Marcel again!! I really missed that crazy band! The music is going, blowing and bangng, the people are crazy, you can smell roasted meet everywhere and the beer and Rakija is flowing in great amounts. But the real madness starts as Boban Markovic comes on the scene and everybody is once again dancing like mad and singing to all the songs! We get to sing a bit as well as him and his brass band plays some of the most famous Balkan songs. The trumpets blow on late into the night and we get to hear them as we exit the festival ground and go into the town where they are playing requests and walking around the place. Soon i loose my friends in this craziness and meet a Serbian bunch. Later i am tired of searching for everybody and pretty tired i head for the tents. I am quite happy to get there as it starts raining right away... good night. Lucky i have nice friend how think abut bringing tents :)

Kotor, Budva and Bregovic

We head to Kotor first, getting an easy ride with a delivery man. Delivering beer and soft drinks to beers along the bay is his summer job, in winter this job disappears, low season, no tourists, less bars... This is the life in the Kotor bay. Kotor is still as nice as two month ago when i was her but it is noticeably hotter. The walk up to the castle is not easy under this sun. We regularly feel like in an oven, the heat coming from above and hitting back up from the stone ground. The view is beautiful, the old castle impressive. Reminds me of last time, funny to be twice in the same place with two month interval. Major difference, under the sun, the 1300 stairs are not so easy than at 6 am...






After a slice of pizza, we head for Budva where Bregovic is playing tonight. This is the last hitchhiking ride with Judith since we will take the train to Guca and then the bus back to Belgrade. For this ride, her wish is realized, we get a ride with a truck driver.


Fun guy, driving his empty truck like a madman through the mountains roads. He drops us close beach which turns out to be the ugliest, most dirty and frequented beach in the Balkans so far. Also as i noticed two month ago, the city is horrible, hotels everywhere, all concrete... Like we say in French c est plein de beauf. I was warned not to stay in Budva... but hey! Bregovic is playing! So after resting a bit, we look for a room and find nothing but a 40 euro room with no towels, no hot water, no kitchen and no toilet paper... Of to Jaz, the beach where the concert is held. It is not really on the beach but just behind on a big empty area of stone and concrete. The drive there in an overcrowded 1.5 euro bus is worth a couple words, we stand right into the door way and as we slowly progress trough the car jam we get plenty fresh air from the opened doors. Beers are tuborg only, a bit like at the police concert. Disgusting beer, and at 3.5 euro for 0.4L it is also the most expensive in the Balkans... Poor barman is paid 25 euros for the night. And I cant imagine how people coming here with their 300 euro monthly pay can afford to buy beers...The concert however is long and great, the whole crowd sings along and the show goes on for hours.



Back to Budva, we are starving and very surprised as it is impossible to find hot food, no Pleskavica! how is this possible in the Balkans?? this looks more like overwhelmed, fancy European coast... we content ourselves with self made sandwiches from the last opened market.

Lombardi beach and Dalmatian concert

Despite being up and ready pretty early, we don't manage to get away soon, the check out is closed until 10 am... aah Zlatko i don't think i will be coming back in your backpacker or recommend it any one... We sort out a couple things, post, food, money and finally leave the place after paying for the night. It was as expensive as our nice apartment with space, kitchen and balcony...

Morning coffee...

Hitchhiking out of this tourisms mecca is not easy and when a car stops after 2 hours of patience, it so hot we accept to take it even though it does not take us the right direction at all. We find ourselves in a nice quiet village with a rocky beach and not many people around. Judith plays with crabs while i swim across the bay, a bit of exercise is more than welcome. After sitting in the sun for a while, reading and writing we have to deserve our dinner by walking an hour by the road in the sun to the next market...

On our way to Vela Luka, on the other side of the island, we meet an other couple of hitchhikers, they also want to get there to see tonights concert, a famous singer is performing. We decide to join in. I will be brief, there is nothing unusual here, nice ride with a French/Italian/English speaking Serb woman from Croatia, nice ice cream and quiet seated concert. There was an other concert and i think we did not go the the same as the Croatian couple. But we got to hear some very nice chorus and traditional music.



Writing all this i m afraid nobody except my parents and Judith will read this. It all seems so boring. Especially now with all the shit happening around me in Macedonia, it seems like only futile details of a privileged traveler...

Last day at Exit

Time flies and it is allready our last day here. One more afternoon wondering around this city turend upside down for a couple days, chilling the overcrowded beach, meeting my friend Stevan from Belgrad again. One more night of crazy concerts, Drum n Bass and electronic music...

Found this old school car wondering around.

After bumbing into Mina and Natasa unexpectedly again, in the streets of Novi Sad this time, they recomend us a good Kafana. Me and Jeremie, always up for a good big fat meat plate head to the Duck (in Serbian, forgot how it is called) and have our hudge plate! We get into the forteress a bit late, but in time for Yougoslavian Punk ledgend Pekinska Patka. Good music, probably excelent lyrics (i only understood the one in english) but the lifted like, fake teeth smiling face of the band leader leaves a wierd impression for me.
I am suposed to meet the crew again before begining of the Sex Pistols concert but instead, i find a very wasted girl who keeps speaking to me in Norvegian and look pretty damn wasted. She is serbian, lost her friend and obviously took some acid or other psychadelic drug. During the Sex pistols concert we watched toghether, she looked at me with eyes full of tears at the end of numerous songs, loosing complete control of her emotions. "I m sorry, it is too strong" she kept saying, followed by incomprehensible mumble in Serbian or Norvegian, could not tell... Surprising encounter :) The concert itself was quite pleasant to me at least, Jonny Rotten looked very much like a distroyed clown, wierd black and white long shirt, his disformed face with missing teeth, the shoes, the pant wich made him look like a disarticulated pantin and of course his numerous strange moves and faces.

The best electronic performance at Exit 08 to my taste, DatA wich we saw right after the Sex Pistols.

After ending the night listening to the massive drum and bass of Shy FX and Dillinga (even better than yesterdays Roni Size), we head to find Nicolas and Anna and go catch a train home to belgrade. They have to catch a plan home to europe and are in a bit of a rush.

Waiting for the train, no sleep, still in the buzz from the festival and thinking we might never get on the train with all these people. Finaly the train arrived everybody got on, it was packed no more space until all the english got of realising the train was bound to Belgrade and not Bratislava... We get to belgrade confortably seated but quite sweaty and of course exhausted. Me and Nicolas have a couple of those unstopable giggles.

Third day at Exit

This is the very awaited day of Gogol Bordelo, Manu Chao, Afrika bambaataa, Kruder and Dorfmeister, Kiril and more!! Unfortunatly i had no time to think about making some pictures let alone make them something correct... So i have few and not so good pictures of that day.

From here the the scene there is quite a distance and some 30.000 people...

The crowd was hudge and quite amazingly, after meeting Jeremies friends, we are joined, in the middle of this hudge crowd by Stephanie and later by Nicolas and his girlfriend Anna. The Gogol bordelo concert is scheduled a bit early but the crowd is allready warmed up and the concert is explosiv. Since me and Jeremie have absolutely no will to see Juliette and the licks, we leave the group, promise to meet around here, next to the projector for Manu Chao. We go wondering around and find some quit brutal metal concerts (i used to love this music but now except for bands like Nine inch nails, it only rarely makes an impression on me) and a couple stage changes. We stop at one of the and wait for the begining of Besh o Drom ... sounded a bit like Bezodrom and the amount of instruments on scene woke our couriosity :) It s a good surprise but after a few songs it all sounds the same.


We head for Manu Chao. Incredibly, we imidiatly find the 3 friends of Jeremie, Stephanie, Nicholas and Anna and making our way further to the front we come across Mina and Natasa!! We have tried to meet them all nighte yesterday and now we stop searching, we finaly find them!! in the middle of some 30.000 people! The concert is great, jumping around for 2 h, finaly get some real dancing action in this festival. Like always the crowd is too dense in the begining but looses up with time.

Tonight, for change, we get tired of the electronic music, Kruder and Dorfmeister are very disapointing to me but the little we saw from Kiril was fantastic! . We will get a little more sleep this night since it is "only" 5. This is the night were we are happy to sleep by the danube and not in the official camping where a tree branch will colaps due to that nights storm and kill a young macedonian.

Second day at Exit

After chilling the afternoon on the beach, refreshing ourselves and talking about music with my new fanzine journalist friend. I meet Jeremie, Nicolas and Stephanie for a bit a food (junk food of course, bureks, pljeskavicas, pizzas will be on the menu all week end with an occasional asia wok...) and a nice cold draught Jellen Pivo of course.
We slowly head over the bridge and along the streets to the festival. Making our way through the maze of fetival-goers and all kinds of vendors, i get an other sharper idea of this daily pilgrinage into the froteress. What you could walk in mear 10 minits, is done in more then half an hour, stopping to buy cigaretts, beers, hats, t-shirts, home made sandwiches, industrial hot-dogs, ice creams, noisy toys or wistles. Everything is Exit branded and it seems like everybody in Novi Sad turned into a short time vendor to get a little money out of this. It is realy pleasant to see this self organisation, the lack of regulation (or maybe i am simply not aware of the rules or mafia governing this) resulting in you beeing able to get fresh beer from a simple citizen using a big plastic basin filled with ice to chill the beer and energy drinks under the burning sun. And this at any time of the day or night...
The begining of the night is quiet, we sit and listen to a bit of reggae befor heading for the first concerts : Smoke and soul, great discovery followed by great (and expected) disapointment of Gentelman.

Gentelman at the third bigest scene, its all about wawing your hand during the 36th and 93rd second of each song....

An other view from further back. Full of people, we moved some 200 m further to find Serbian music and dance to Mesecina :)

End of the night, begining of the day, the sun is rising, people moved to the electronic scene were the party goes on every morning until 8... It is now time for sunglasses and styled looks.

The night will be short tonight again, only a couple hours by the refreshing danube before the sun makes it imposible to sleep.

First day in the Exit madness

I happily and easily arrived in Novi Sad were the streets are allready full of live and activity, people playing guitar and drums on the streets and in the parks and drunk englishmen all over. Mmm i will hear lots of Serbs complaining about them to a very drunk me but have to admidt englishmen are loudder, dirtier than me and a bit a little regardless about were they are, its just like home with cheeper beers.
I am supposed to meet Mina, Natasa, Jeremie and Nicolas here but none of them is there today, they will arrive on Friday. So after resting a bit in a park, recovering from the sleepless train journey, i meet some crazy people. Most crazy of all, probably Dr. Rock. We have quite a few drinks with his gang on the park lawn before getting into the festival.

Dr Rock on his way to the festival, crossing this crazy bridge were massive loudspeakers blast music. We are also half way down the Rakija bottle and full of beers...

Dr Rock and ???

Reloaad, a bit of energy. It is about 10pm, i am way to drunk for the time of the night. Got caught up by events once more. Around midnight exausted from the trip and Dr Rocks crazyness, i fall asleep on a lawn of the festival, to wake up a couple hours later for....

a beautiful early sunrise and DJ Hype!!

Around 8 am i go to sleep in a remote place i found, in the middle of a bambous field, nice and fresh and shaded. Far from the afterparties along the danube, the crazy camping and all the englishmen ;) Tonight was very rocky.

Fascists and The Police

Monday was a day full of tourism, walking, chilling on the beach. Monday night was crazy once again, going to a Boat (not a Splav, a real boat this time) playing old rock, grunge and punk hits like the Clash, Ramones, Nirvana, the Offspring (self estem yeeaaaa!). It was great listening all these songs again, remembered me of sooo much. As i was alone, Jeremie having to work in the morning, I met lots of people. Some musicians, some tv show producers (the serbian Survivor mouahahahah), brothers and sisters, rock fans and a real drunk lost guy.
At the end of the show, the real drunk guy calls me as i m leaving. I join him and his "Friends" he just met and was obviously anoying... I chat a bit, the usual thing, were are you from, what do you do here and where do you go? Then a red haired girl joins us, she is bit drunk too and says "ooo I looooove French" was this very stupid, slightly sleezy voice ... then "I would like to know how to say F#@! me in frensh"... mm ok i see. The next sentence i remember was "I hate black people....". And i m realy convinced your a lost and stupid B*#@? Anyway i decide to wast a bit of my tiome, enjoy the sunrise and try to get some commen sence back in that girls head...
We wlak avay, the drunk guy follows on his bike and an other wierd lost guy is following us in the distance. I have to say here that i never felt uncomfortable in Belgrade and that in this situation i probably would have in many other cities... We manage to get ride of those 2 lost guys, go for a coffee and i keep trying to educate that girl... in vain...
The conversation goes something like this...
- I hate blacks
- Why?
- I dont know, they smell.
- You smell to, like sweat, smoke and its not exactly pleasent.
- O i dont know, i m a skinhead you know.
- So that is why you hate black people?
- Yes!
Very frustrating discussion... I got to learn that she hates Black, Gay, Jewish, Old, Asian, Gypsy and Arabic people... that she will suicide when she is 60, that she has only violent movies (not necessarily bad ones though...) etc...

Next day, waking up is difficult little sleep :) Tonight we are going to see the Police concert with Jeremie! Real good concert though a bit short. My favorita are still cant stand loosing you and so lonely :) Here are a few pictures :