Until our permanent home is ready, we are staying in a hotel two blocks from Saint Sava Orthodox Church.  We can see it from the hotel window. It is so close and is such an attraction that we should see it first.  The hotel clerk provides a walking map and warns us to return by 1 o’clock or expect to die from the 100 degree heat. 

The kids are not much interested in seeing the church on their first day, so we find a marketplace instead.

The streets are narrow, so cars park wherever there is space — pulled up on sidewalks, tucked into alleys, hidden in tiny garages.  Buildings are pale stucco, thinly washed in city grime.  We make out way past hair salons, aromatic coffee shops, organic food markets with neatly packaged pantry staples, clothing stores smaller than American closets, dry cleaners, apotekas (druggists), and at least two bakeries on each street. The streets are irregularly plotted, winding, disconnecting and reforming, but the blocks are short and the dome of the church is visible from most intersections, so we navigate by guess.

People do not smile or greet you.  They do not seem unfriendly, they just keep themselves to themselves.  The women are stylish and feminine in sundresses and flowing pants; the men are generally in jeans and polo shirts or t-shirts.  While many people eat a pastry neatly wrapped in paper, no one holds a coffee cup.  Cell phones seem rare — though I’m certain everyone has them — but dogs are plentiful, tucked under cafe tables or taking a morning constitutional with their owners.

The market is a triangular space filled with metal stalls under canopies. Produce sellers and retail vendors share the space, so comfort sandals are neighbors to peaches. A border of permanent grocer and butcher shops confines two sides of the market space, and the third side seems to be comprised entirely of resale vendors. The whole thing has a flea market feel to it, levels of orderliness left to the preference of each vendor. We buy large, warm berries from a quiet man who carefully pronounces the cost (120 dinar). At another stall Josh adds some Oreo cookie socks to his collection (200 dinar). Then we head back to a tree-shaded sitting park we had noticed on our way.

We share the berries and watch the pigeons, glad that our first attempts at Serbian aren’t complete failures.

It’s not uncomfortably warm yet, but we head back toward the hotel. Across the street from Saint Sava we find a gelateria and place our order (480 dinar; our purchases for the whole day equal less than $8). We sit at an outdoor table near to a tanned woman wearing a straw sunhat. Two dogs lie at her feet. One wags its tail and looks at us in the friendly, expectant way of all dogs. We finish our gelato and make our way past several more salons and restaurants, as well as the greenest vehicle I’ve ever seen.

The city by day is full of people walking, sitting at cafes, talking with one another; people on their way to work, to shop, or to meet a friend. The city at night is just as busy. Now the open space in front of Saint Sava is filled with families — little children chasing one another around parents, who sit on benches, holding dogs in their laps. Popcorn vendors fill paper sacks and pass them to children while grandparents count out small bills. Couples walk, groups of young women gather in groups to talk and laugh, electric trams whisk by, making hardly any noise.

The graffiti that covers most walls is less pronounced when daylight is gone, the trash on the sidewalks less noticeable. Lamplight is confined to walkways, and the recesses of the the parks are in deep shadow. No one says hello, and we still can’t manage to elicit acknowledgment or greeting from our companions in the park. We return to the hotel by way of the flower-covered automobile and call it a night.