Second Day in London

Partizan Basketball Game

I went to my second Partizan basketball game tonight. The last time I was at a game, was about 8 years ago, so it has been a while. It was quite an experience (and exercise) with a broken leg, but it was fun! I love the crowds here. They are crazy; they stand almost the entire game except during the time outs, ends of quarters, and halftime and they are singing or yelling the entire game.

They lost the game tonight against a Turkish team, but it was fun to experience it again. I just hope I will be able to see another one when my leg is healed!

THE FANS:
They fans are very dedicated. A lot of them carry flags and we are talking HUGE flags to wave during certain songs. They sing songs to the Partizan team (almost like saying they appreciate them) and they swear at and boo the other teams. It is great fun! Oh also, a lot of people bring their Parizan scarfs, so when they are singing the "Partizan" anthem they all hold it up. Here is a youtube video to show you the fans singing their "Partizan Anthem."

Check up

Well, it is official, I have now been inside three different Serbian hospitals! All I have to say is they are nice, but they are also very open...meaning people can go in and out freely even if they have an open wound. It is a little scary, but they were able to take care of me! I am happy about that!
I went to the bone doctors today and they looked at my bones, I broke my fibula (smaller bone in my leg) just above the ankle joint and I might have fractured the tibia bone just inside the fibula bone.

I have to wear a cast now for three more weeks (until Feb 7th) and then I get to wear one of those booties (the big gray boots people have to wear) for another week and then hopefully I will be on the road for recovery!

Dinner in a Hut

Tonight, Jagos and Jan took me out to eat at Jagos' favorite Kolasin (Ko-la-shin) restaurant. You can see the little restaurant in the background. The name on the sign is in Cyrillic, but it says "Savardak" (Sa-var-dak) make sure you roll the r.

It was literally a hut made by this man and it even had a hay roof! It was the cutest little place and I really enjoyed myself!

All along the inside of the hut there were shelves with really old Serbian things. The round things were snowshoes!

You can see the layers of logs, branches, and the hay! Oh and they don't repair; they just keep adding on more hay each year to the spots that are bare or thinning.

Jan and Jagos...LOVE THEM!!

The coolest Aunt in the world! ;)

The food was good; they served cheesy mashed potatoes made with fresh cheese called Kacamak (Ka-cha-mak) with a grilled beef called Goveda Prsuta (Go-ve-da) (Pr-shu-ta) Remember to roll your r's. YUMMY!

Super cheesy!

Monastery & Serbian Christmas

Today, January 7th, is when Serbians celebrate Christmas. The traditions are at midnight two nights before Christmas, one of the men in the family will go out and cut down small oak trees (one for each male head in the house and one extra one for New Years) to place them at the house for the night before Christmas. They put part of the oak trees (small branches and leaves) on the front of their vehicles for good luck and then the night before Christmas, they cut down (cut into pieces) and burn a tree for each male head in the household. We had to cut and burn four oak trees for Mihailo, Alek, Jagos, and Rale and they always have one extra that they keep until New Years to burn it the night before New Years to bring luck in the New Year. On the day of Christmas, the kids get to open presents and then later on there is a big feast cooked by the mother or grandmother of the house.

A little tidbit: Because Jan and Jagos' kids are half Serbian and half American, they celebrate their Christmases a little differently. On their Serbian Christmas, just their grandmother and uncle give them presents, where as before (American Christmas) they got their presents from Jan's family and their parents. And then on New Years, they get and give presents to and from family friends. It is really cool how they get to experience all the different holidays to stay in touch with both of their heritages. 

During lunch, they have a special bread that the kids have to choose a piece of. If they find the coin in the bread, then they have good luck for the following year. Also on the day of Christmas, Serbians will visit their church or Monasteries. Today we went to the Monastery Moraca (Mor-a-cha) where Jagos' brother, Rale, was baptized. It was a beautiful monastery and you can tell is has been around for a LONG time!

Pathway to the Monastary!

BACK: Me, Alek. Jan, Rale, and Mina  FRONT: Mihailo and Marija

Jan and I posing...again! :)

First day out of the house since I broke my leg!! SOOOO excited!

Sledding

Today was supposed to be a really fun day with a walk up the mountain, I was going to take pictures and then we were going to go sledding, but that was just the morning...the afternoon was a WHOLE different story!

I have not been sledding in a long time, so I was really excited about it! We all got dressed and I got my camera so I could take pictures of the mountains! They are so pretty here in Kolasin (Ko-losh-in).

Jagos was pointing to the mountains for us! ;)

Jan, all three kids plus Mina, Mihailo's friend from next door, and I went up sledding while Jagos was an observer/photographer! We had a blast! We were sledding on like a magic carpet sled with a handle in front (they were made for little kids, so it was a tight squeeze for me!) or "butt plates" I like to call them, and we were also using what is called a "snow tiger," it is a higher sled, that has runners or skis on the sides to help you go faster and over the rough terrain! haha We went up one hill and it was not very big, but there were rocks and the snow was powdery, so we could feel just about everything. 

We then traveled up the mountain to bigger hills and 

got some fun photos of us sledding and having a great time. :) 

On our way back down, Alek and Jagos had gone down to the house cause Alek was getting cold, and us girls along with Mihailo were left. We were on our last run, I got on the higher sled, and on my way down, I hit a bump! My feet were on the runners, but when I hit the bump my right foot turned in and my body went over, but my foot stayed right there. I heard a pop, but I had heard that many times with spraining my ankle in basketball, so I just thought I had sprained really bad at first. So Marija and Mina went to get Jagos to see if he could come and get me in the Jeep cause there was a road close by. This was the funny part (looking back...of course it wasn't funny at the time!) Jan was pulling me, while 2 five year olds were pushing me with all their might from behind! It must have been quite a sight!

All of us kids!! ;)

Jan going down the hill!

Alek coming down the mountain!

I slid along side my sled instead on on it!

Just a few minutes before I broke my leg.

When I got to the house, I took off my boot to see the damage and noticed that my foot was clicking when I lifted it up and down, I was moving it because it didn't hurt that bad, also I could move my toes and all it just was really painful when I put it in certain positions. We all thought it was dislocated because of they way it was kinda handing. So I went to the first hospital and they didn't have an x-ray machine, so I had to go 1 hour away to another hospital. I got to send a lot of quality time with my uncle Jagos! He was even nice enough to take a picture of me at the hospital while I was sitting there waiting for all the pain, because he told me if it is dislocated it is going to hurt like hell!! He got to wheel me around the hospital and pretend to drive me into walls! haha Although it was not fun breaking my leg...I had a good time with the family!

The second hospital I had to visit that night... Jagos was keeping my spirits up!

Once the Doctors got the x-ray back they said it was broken (in Serbian) and when Jagos translated for me, I thought he was joking (he likes to joke a lot) because everyone thought for sure it was dislocated, but it was true. I had to put on a half cast until the swelling went down and then get a regular cast on. We had to make another 1 hour trip back to the hospital to get the half cast taken off and the new cast put on...so Jagos ended up driving the total of 20 hours with me to and from Kolasin and to and from the hospital....QUALITY TIME! hahaha

This is a picture off the internet, but it looks just like mine does.
I broke my right fibula bone at an angle right at my ankle joint!

AFTER SLEDDING...RELAXING WITH MIHAILO BACK IN THE MOUNTAIN COTTAGE IN KOLASIN. HE WAS TEACHING ME HOW TO PLAY HIS DS! 

 AND THIS IS HOW I TRAVELED ALL THE WAY BACK TO BELGRADE...IT WAS AN 8 HOUR RIDE!
CAN YOU SAY SORE BUTT!!

Skiing in Kolasin

By the way Kolasin (pronounced Ko-la-shin) is a town in Montenegro, which used to be part of Yugoslavia, but now is Serbia and Montenegro. On the way, there are LOTs of windy roads and Montenegro is very mountainy!

I even got to see the remains of a castle when I was there!!I LOVE CASTLES!

Can you see the man standing on the top of the Castle??

 
Jagos' family has a Mountain House up there, where they stay during some of their vacations. We had to drive 8 hours to Kolasin. It was really great to see all the beautiful scenery on our way. On our first day there, we all went Skiing, well except Jan, Rale, and Alek.

All of us getting ready to go down the mountain!

Marija did really well!

Alek couldn't get boots to fit his feet, so he helped Mihailo on his skis.

The different trails you could take. I stayed on the little kid or bunny slopes!

Me doing the pizza with my skis!

Mihailo and Alek coming down!

We were getting ready to go back up the hill.

If you have seen Multiplicity...you would appreciate this!

Today we went to a Ski Slope, to do some skiing. It has been a while since I have skied, so all the kids and I went with a Ski instructor.Here you either do the hard slope or the easy slope, so I decided to stay with the kids on the easy slope!