20 Belgrade: An Oasis of Indulgence

TERAZIJE

Belgrade’s inaugural skyscraper, the Albania Tower in Terazije square, was built between the two world wars as the city’s first mark of urban modernity. When my grandfather was a child, he was enrolled at the school there.
One of his most prominent memories from that time was of the blinding lights of the scrolling news on the adjacent Borba building. He would stay behind all day and late into the night reading the headlines, hypnotised and fearful of missing out. For him, Terazije was the Times Square of Balkan. His attachment to the location makes sense given that his grandfather – my great-great-grandfather – could have easily been one of the main characters of the 1932 work authored by Boško Tokin, which shares the same name as the square.
The novel Terazije is an intense account of the city in the years after the First World War, in the words of the author, a ‘moving, boiling, hasty and fervent testimony of modern Belgrade.’ The book depicts a thriving subculture populated by a multitude of individuals who each transgress the conventional expectations of society. My great-great-grandfather would occasionally leave his family behind to plunge into Tokin’s world of corrupted politicians, introverted literary circles and ruffled bohemians. I try to envision what it must have been like for him to abandon his domestic existence, which was full of decorum and propriety, and enter the void in search of a liberated, hedonistic and decadent lifestyle.
The writer conjures a fascinating vision of 1930s Belgrade, depicting the city in erotic detail. I picture the exhilaration my great-great-grandad – the stiff family patriarch – must have experienced immersed in this emancipatory underground. Tokin describes sexual experi-ments following the style of De Sade and the Kama Sutra, gay and drag parties in kafanas, and many more sensual occurrences. We can only speculate on the tumult of this era in which wars and money collided in a full-frontal crash with bodies pursuing a more liberated attitude towards sex. In Terazije, Tokin writes:
Nothing is definite. Crystallisation is the thing of tomorrow. Everything is possible due to Americanisation. High voltage. We are the Wild West where a naked fist clears the way… Money. And always mercilessly, and almost without beauty. Material interest and sexual indulgence. We are bound to these modern ways, but there is no airplane to take us to the future … We are chained to this Belgrade and our only luxury: woman. Therefore, there are more disappointments.

THE Файронт

All the city guidebooks agree on one fact – Belgrade is full of beautiful women. I’m not entirely convinced that this is flattering. But maybe there is a kernel of truth in the observation since the city’s streets ring out with the sound of high heels belonging to flâneuses, gold diggers and other disobedient women. If you wander past a monstrous row of warehouses called Beton Hall, you’ll find the Lafayette cabaret bar. There, ‘Bella Ciao’ is sung passionately at the Файронт (closing time). Yes, you’ll notice that one restaurant in Vracar took the title of Baudelaire’s Fleurs du Mal (1857), and yes, there is a cocktail bar on Slavija named after Josephine Baker, the first Black American star to visit Belgrade. And yes, Maya Angelou did once dance and drink slivovica at a private party in the Belgrade suburbs. It all, I’m delighted to say, happened.
In her memoir, Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry like Christmas (1976), Angelou recounts her time as a dancer–singer in the opera Porgy and Bess. Upon reading this book, in which she travels on tour to Belgrade, it was my immense pleasure to hear a word from her about ‘slivovitza,’ a sumptuous plum brandy. Furthermore, according to an old newspaper she read in the 1950s, the proper way to drink ‘rakia’ is to combine it with treacly apricot confit which slides slowly down the throat, thereby softening the following brisk and cutting sip of colourless liquor. The aftertaste of apricot or other fruit comes later, like flashy resemblance, or nostalgia – in the words of Svetlana Boym, a ‘longing for a home that no longer exists or has never existed.’

SONJA MARINKOVIC

There were flâneuses before women took up guns and joined the resistance. In the jazz age, girls rabidly rejected traditional roles and threw themselves into theatre, joining reading groups at women’s clubs and engaging in premarital erotic encounters. These new ways of living brought everything good parents forbid and bad girls desperately seek – the dissolution of the old and the establishment of a new moral order.
The revolution had nude female breasts at its centre. Just as Eugene Delacroix painted a bare-chested Liberty, first at the barricades of the French Revolution, I frequently dream of one of the heroines of the People’s Liberation Army, Sonja Marinkovic. A revolutionary and national hero of Yugoslavia, Marinkovic resisted German occupation in the Second World War and fought for political and social equality. When she was assassinated by Nazi soldiers in an abandoned cemetery in Bagljaš, she refused to be shot in the back and exclaimed: Shoot, these are communists’ breasts!
Even though it is impossible and imprudent to sexualise the Nazi’s murder of the young antifascist, her stoic resistance against evil was infused by an unstoppable desire for freedom and life. In its essence, eros is the force of life, and as the playwright Olga Dimitrijevic wrote in the drama of the same name: ‘I often dream of a revolution.’ In the newly formed state, Yugoslavia, women fought, struggled and eventually won their liberation. Women were finally officially out of the home. As a woman, I feel Yugoslavia is my homeland. If at a restaurant the 1989 song ‘Yugoslovenka’ starts to play, the establishment’s female patrons, regardless of their age or status, will step on top of the kafana table. Frantically grabbing their hair, sliding their hands from breasts to thighs, emulating the unadulterated sensuality of the singer Lepa Brena, they sing joyously together:

My Slavic soul is broken
I am Yugoslovenka

EPIPHANY ON ICE

Winter is biting and ferocious in Belgrade. All the flash is hidden. But there is a glimpse of skin and sweat to be found in an unlikely place. The mass dive for the cross emerges from the Orthodox custom of the blessing of the waters. In a formal gathering, the high priest, dressed in a sticharion adorned with galloons of golden fringe, throws a cross into the water in commemoration of Christ’s baptism, and his revelation as the Messiah and the second figure in the Holy Trinity, at his baptism in the River Jordan. Crowds of men gather on Ada Island or in Zemun, on the shores of the Danube and Sava, ready to find and retrieve the cross from the frozen depths.
The atmosphere at the dive for the cross is fuelled by rampant testosterone, with the religious swimming contest turning into a winter carnal festival. Tattooed bodies, tensed muscles, vermilion cheeks and trembling jaws form
a physical megastructure waiting for the doves to be released as a signal that these men may dive into the ice. For years now, I’ve been trying to figure out if they are all devoutly religious and what they might have in common. Maybe the divers are performing a faithful search – a sort of personal redemption – since most of them have the look of a hooligan combined with the stoic pride of a Slav guard and the blank gaze of a mercenary. The striking absence of women fills the dawn of January 19th with homoeroticism in the way that only epic war scenes can. But the energy is peaceful, despite the masculine charge. The mood is merry but dignified with the white doves, silky flags and balloons in national colours alongside the naked athletic bodies.
For more than five years, artist Marko Stojanovic has persistently gone out to capture the essence of the event, which somehow always slips away from me. I prefer to watch from inside, where it’s warm and dry. This year, staring lazily through snow-covered windows, I’m filled with tenderness similar to a post-orgasmic numbness. As I shift sleepily in bed, I wake up the man lying beside me. He has no tattoos, soft skin and no goosebumps. He’s also half-awake, with no idea where he is, nor any clue that I’ve just voyeuristically watched 200 angry men dive into the ice. His gentleness, an antidote to the toxic masculinity outside, perversely turns me like the strike of a sinful epiphany.

THE SECRET SERVICE FASHIONISTA

One long evening spent with fellow writers where the wine was flowing, I heard a stunning story involving the secret service and a designer jacket. I’ve long been fascinated by the salacious details of political love affairs, so you can imagine my intrigue when someone at the table hinted at an unexpected level of controversy. Let me tell you how the wiretapping of Yugoslav president Tito unfolded.
To be honest, the circumstances which led to the fall of Rankovic, the ‘number one’ in the state security’s apparatus were unknown to me. And that night I was craving juicy gossip, unaware of where the story would lead. We were tipsy, glamorous and furthermore at the very location where the cultural elite of Belgrade met the secret service. Founded in 1946 as the Serbian Writers’ Association’s eatery, the walls of Klub Književnika (the writer’s club) and the heavy, velvet curtains which cover the windows have hidden the greatest affairs of the 20^th century in Belgrade. In a single night, I learned that a passionate lady transformed the course of Yugoslav history through her dalliance with an emerging poet.
It was not only the men of the communist regime who had secret love spots. The cultural official Mrs V. owned an entire cosy studio apartment to conduct her raunchy escapades in. Located in the city centre, she’d invite youthful, prospective cultural afficionados over for conversations – chats that, as it turned out, got rather lewd. Rumour has it that one of her protégés – a young Yugoslav poet – had an insatiable passion for designer clothes. One day, he bought a luxury winter coat from a shopkeeper, a decadent, branded item which was a serious offence at the time, and this unfortunate fashion choice was his downfall.
Convinced there was something untoward going on in Mrs V.’s apartment, the secret service blackmailed the young poet into wearing a wire upon his next visit. The conversation that allegedly followed had all of us at the writer’s club screaming with laughter. Apparently, she divulged giggling fantasies from her youth about the phallic nature of a relay baton, reflecting on the erotics of a girlhood passion for sports. Someone at our table asked for the brand of the coat, another suggested a classic label. Maybe, we mused, Mrs V.’s love interest perfectly personified Belgrade. Like the young poet, the city is a little rugged, romantic at heart and hemmed in by brutish power. A ruthless social climber with a soft spot for poetry and edgy design.

IVA NEW BALKAN CUISINE

In the Belgrade world of fine dining, there are few places that serve food as delicious as Iva New Balkan Cuisine. Last year, it won a special Bib Gourmand award for great value. The restaurant takes its cues from the old days of eating at home, family gathering style, with dishes presented in a way that makes you feel like you’re in some sort of royal dining hall with the atmosphere of a cosy bistro.
Ever since I’ve known him, I’ve been impatient to introduce my lover to Iva. In my opinion, morning is the ideal time to dine there. Upon arriving, I looked around at my lover’s face; he was confused by the idea of eating outside in winter but intrigued by my new concept of fine dining for breakfast. This place is like no other, with its beautiful design, impeccable service and delicious cuisine based on traditional dishes from all over the Balkans. We started with a favourite – baked soft cheese with raspberries, honey and a variety of nuts. The place has a very elegant vibe. People around us were chatting and we felt like French New Wave cinema characters – all effortless and vibrant. Following in the tradition of granny get-togethers, the food kept coming in small portions. I feasted upon an absolutely delicious vegetarian ‘faschierte schnitzel’ garnished with lettuce and the famous paprika dish ‘ajvar’ – roasted, minced ripe red peppers, which shares its name with the Persian ‘xaviyar’ made of salted roe and caviar – and homemade Dijon mustard. The fusion of flavours delivers a post-colonial symphony of tastes that have never met before throughout the rich history of the Balkans. Between glasses of ‘rakia’ and sparkling wine, we chose the cold-pressed wild blueberry juice partnered with a lemon melissa tart with white chocolate ganache and crispy shortcrust pastry to start our day. Across the table, an erotic tension flourished and, after devouring our meal, our guts full of joy and pride, we were ready to conquer the noisy and dirty Belgrade streets.

TECHNO CATHEDRAL

The other night, I was at the club Drugstore, immersed in the red lights of the lobby covered in white tiles. The venue is a former meat factory. The white square tiles are not original, but, nevertheless, there are still concrete ditches on the floor, supposedly for the blood. Anywhere else maybe I wouldn’t even notice such a detail, but everyone who visits the club is hypnotised by the post-industrial architecture. The music was subdued and seductive.
Occasional shrieks of laughter cut through the white noise of murmurs and tensed-body silence. In the hall, there are pointed concrete arches, modernist and geometric, but also gothic. On a front wall, near the ceiling, there is an unexpected statue of the crucifixion, the symbolic death of the ego. Often, clubbing is compared to a meat market, as if everyone there is on the prowl for a hook-up. But to me, a night out is a rather religious catharsis. There’s the rapt attention paid to the music, the dancing-in-a-trance until exhaustion and out-of-body experiences.
The dancefloor was crowded with beautiful people, many pairs of sunglasses, feathers, gold and colourful garments while others were dressed entirely in black. Everything was exactly as it should be. The crowd moved in a blur. I heard distorted echoes and pre-emptively sensed the memory loss they’d be experiencing the next morning. At the entrance, I saw a group of people standing and watching as if they were hesitating. One of them recognised me and I waved at her. She whispered inaudibly to her entourage, before joining me at the bar, all alone. A beautiful smile uncovered rows of perfect shiny teeth.
‘Where are your friends?’ I asked, a little confused.
‘They went. Simply didn’t like it. It’s too morbid here!’ She just spits it, I was hit, but the sentence sounded unfinished, so I stayed expecting a sequel.
‘Imagine, they asked me – are you sure all these people on the dancefloor are alive?’ She laughed. Her endorphin release was almost palpable.

SACRED DESIRES

Railing against piety and chastity, David Pijade’s The Passion: A Novel of Belgrade Life (1921) is considered to be the first lesbian novel in Serbian literature. It is written as an epistolary, as a series of letters penned by its heroine, Radmila, a tragic figure who embarks on an affair with a nun at a monastery. Suppressed by social expectations and the impossibility of a same-sex intimate relationship, she engages in a series of self-destructive and masochistic encounters. Over the course of the novel, Radmila meets serval male characters, and she writes longingly about her persistent passion for her lover Margita. Like the protagonist herself, The Passion is feverish, focused on only one thing, which is the attempt to somehow suppress or quell one’s desires. Tragically protracted between norms and passion, Radmila, our Belgradian Venus in Furs, sets her life ablaze striving for freedom. Through his short manuscript, Pijade was catapulted into an erotic controversy and scandalised by polite society. While many passages read as dated to a modern audience, his prose deftly explores the theme of sacred lesbian love.

THE HEART OF SERBIA LIES IN A WOMAN'S PANTIES

In the 1990s, while living the flamboyant lifestyle of a violinist for the national theatre, the writer and artist Nela Šukara transformed herself into a striptease dancer. A true exhibitionist, Šukara loved sex and spoke openly about the joys of making love. In addition to her erotic dancing, she also wrote poetry, moralised no one and had a hearty sense of humour. During the Kosovo crisis, Šukara offered fellatio to a US president, in order to motivate the NATO alliance to resolve the crisis, end the war and stop the bombing of Serbia. In short, she was a passionate and unstoppable tornado of crazy and forbidden urges. But then again, why should a blowjob be an unspeakable taboo while war is considered normal?
Leading on from Šukara’s legacy, Radmila Petrovic is breaking all conventions. The young poet, who hails from the raspberry fields of Western Serbia, bluntly exposes untameable desires, crafting her lines whilst riding a tractor. Her poetry collection, My Mom Knows What Happens in The Cities, published by PPM Enklava in 2020, tackles the untouchable, a rebellion against the culture of silence that is present in the Balkans. She touches upon subjects that are traditionally deemed masculine. In her unpretentious, short and exciting verses, she writes:

regarding the Kosovo issue
general,
peonies are blooming
in my panties.