october 1996.
We get nice mornings here until about middle of october, sometimes even longer than that. I had some color negative left in the praktika, which I guess I meant to take to Mongol to be developed - we don't do our photos for a long time now - so I made a few shots this morning. Including Lena and Nina as they slowly wake up and get dressed, one for daycare, one for school. Specially this shot as the good old red bike, with a 15mm nut on one side and 17mm on the other side of the rear axle, is prepared to take the kids' seat.
We left Lena in the daycare along the way, it's by the community [centre], and then pedaled on to work - I to the smaller Bangro's building by Žitni, she to the city hall. Along the way we were joined by Marina, who now lived somewhere in our area but further out, in one of those two short streets at the end of the neighborhood. She was experimenting with her hair then, toning all of it a couple of shade lighter every two months, and then letting it grow. So it was considerably darker by the top, and somewhere around her butt, or below it, she was quite a blonde. An interesting effect, hence memorized.
The kilometer and a half that she drove behind us was a bit odd, because we sort of tried to exchange a sentence or two, but this is the trunk road, the trucks are roaring, and there can't be any conversation.
Had I not made this shot, I wouldn't even remember any of this.
This month I installed the last bits of the BarSys at Zeki's restaurant, somewhere halfway between the busodrome and Žitni, in a sidestreet but near the corner to the main street. These final touches were the automatic insertion of sales and costs from the restaurant into the main ledger, which is always the thing that's done last.
The restaurant was interesting, they managed to hide the tamped earth floors with carpets. Were they any flatter and if there was any more echo, they could fool the eye, but, well, nothing is perfect. Lenka was cooking and that's where I actually saw her the first time.
Of course, they never used the app properly, and just like any other of their endeavours, the restaurant didn't last more than a few months. They never paid for the software, unless we count a couple of lunches where we'd take prospective customers. Had they lasted, that would have been some twenty dinners and we'd break even.
Dad would customarily volunteer me to drop by the vineyard after work, which was okay, even programmers have a soul, a bit of greenery, relaxation and physical activity wouldn't go amiss. The trouble was in him being the same as he was twenty years ago, assuming that I need to do no thinking whatsoever, he planned everything that's to be done. And how. He'd annoy me additionally when I'd say „okay, got some field work, will drop by when I finish there, on the way back“, to which he'd invariably add „good, just come a bit earlier“. And once there, he'd find ways to annoy me further, e.g. calling me from the other end of the vine row, which is about 70m, to come. I'd ask what does he need, but no, just come. I'd come and he'd say he needed a hammer. Well it was right by my foot, I could have brought it along, you could have told me right away. Or when he'd load the wheelbarrow for me to push to the well, where he heaped up the biomass for composting. He'd always load it precariously high. The path is narrow, on the border of neighbor's vineyard, which went wild, the branches would snag the load, it'll fall. „Ah it won't“. „Okay, whatever falls, has fallen, I'm not stopping“. And it did fall, and he had it his way.
Once it happened that I came there with our engineer and Pali. I parked the kafeni on the levee, as usual, and started calling dad. Luckily, I had the skill, what with Blaja's lessons on how to pull voice from the belly, and the practice in my years of renaissance and enlightment*, so shouting his name across the river came easy and efficient. Dad was already somewhat deaf, but the neighbors would hear me and tell him, and usually he'd appear on the other bank, coming down to the boat to ferry us across. There wasn't much to do. I remember the dialog about neighbor's vineyard, when I asked for engineer's opinion on it
- which vineyard?
- this one right here
- where here?
- right in front of your nose
- where in front of nose? where do you see a vineyard?
And he was right, it was such a jungle that the vines were hard to spot. The fat guy visited seldom, and even then not to do any work, just to cool it off, away from his wife's long tongue. Among the weeds I even spoted a dandelion flower on a 60cm long stalk. That's how much it had to grow to reach the sun.
For the drive home the guys had to give me a little push, because I parked with front wheels in mud... 3cm deep. Even that was enough to be a trouble for kafeni, it couldn't pull itself out, its clutch was greasy and slipping. Which was okay except when starting upslope, that would be literally a no-go. I always took care to park downslope, in case it won't start, which did happen maybe twice a year. Once in Belgrade, on a gas station, I filled it and then it wouldn't. It was easy to push, so in two easy steps I got it to pedestrian speed, jumped in, second gear, released the clutch, starts, goes.
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* the word for education as a branch is 'prosveta', lighting-through, ergo enlightment
Mentions: Bangro, BarSys, Blagoje Vajski (Blaja), Jelena Sredljević (Lena), Jovan Dimijan (Zeki), kafeni, Lenka Dimijan, Marina Čikezin, Nevena Sredljević (Nina), Pali Bodor, praktika, Žika Šašić (Mongol), Žitni, in serbian
3-I-2024 - 23-XII-2025