Well, I'm back in London in good old Britain. That's the first thing. Although it was almost the last thing too as I feel shattered and am going to bed after I finished this post.

Tuesday was Day 7 of my trip. Both Jasmina and myself woke up fairly late due to the night before so we hung around the flat until about 3pm when when we finally managed to head into Old Belgrade on the pretense of going to some museums. We soon abandoned this and went to a bar where one of her closest friends (Joanna) works and we hung out there for a bit with another of Jessy'd friends called Bella and were very loud. I also met the owner of the bar, an American guy from Chicago called Nick who moved to Belgrade a couple of years ago.

I met three or four Americans during my trip and all of them loved the country and its people. The same goes for the other Brit I met over there. Serbia, or atleast Belgrade, has a lot of very warm and friendly people. Although it has to be said that some elements of the political establishment are not particulary desireable but every country has it's problems and Serbia has lost alot of men over the last couple of decades to war and civil war. Women in Serbia out number men 3 to 1, and it shows. Pretty much everywhere we went there were noticably more women than men - bars, streets, buses, etc.

We did see an ultra-nationalist rally in the city square protesting about the deportation of Radovan Karadzic to the Hague for War Crimes. There were only maybe 50-70 people there and I think many of those had just stopped to see what was going on as lots of people were walking by and not taking any notice at all.

I had my meeting with Richard who runs the English Book Fantasy Games Shop and we managed to sort out a number of things that can help his store and get some more titles over there.

Then we went to The Bridge Pub which is a rock pub which reminded me of an old british pub and was very nice. We were joined by four of Jessy friends (Joanna, Vesna, Milan and Nikola) and had a great night chatting about pretty much any subject under the sun. As it got later we decided we're forego attending The Academy again (as we pretty much knew if we did it'd be a really late night again and we'd drink way too much and not be able to do anything at home) so headed back to the flat where we ended up watching Fellowship of the Ring on TV and then I ran Jessy through some Chakra and healing exercises.

After finally getting to bed about 4am we had to wake up pretty early so I could get everything ready to leave. Nihad, Jasmina's father, drove us to the airport and brought coffee before I had to go. It was a real shame to leave as Jasmina is one of my closest friends and seeing her again really felt like no time had passed since she returned home in late June. This gives me hope on one hand as hoepfully this means that the next few months will also fly by until we get a chance to catch up again. There has been talk about going over for New Year, or ski-ing with her family in February or for a couple of weeks next summer - or a combination of the above. We'll also be trying to get Jasmina back over to London next summer for a few weeks whilst she has a break from university to catch up with all her friends over here and hangout. But MSN is universal so anyone with it doesn't feel too far away when you can chat to them most nights :)

The flights home were good. Especially the Zurich-London one as I really surprised myself. I am 99% of the time an incredibly shy person who can't talk to anyone I don't know or haven't been introduced to. But I had an Australian girl called Fiona sitting next to me on the plane back who I pretty much had in hysterics for the entire flight. I'm not quite sure what happened but I was being very amusing, joking and humourous and she seemed to really enjoy the flight back. She gave me her email address to stay in touch (sadly she's heading back to Australia tomorrow but is back next summer) and become 'Facebook buddies' . It also stroked my ego as she thought I was a couple of years older than her (she was 26) which was a very nice compliment from where I'm sitting :p

I think I have to try and cultivate this 'humourous' Angus. Actually, I think I probably actually just need to also try and get out socially more which requires me sorting out a strict schedule for myself which covers Leisure Games, Cubicle 7, Dragonmeet, excercising, writing/other projects and a social life. I reckon it should be possible.

Anyway... I'M HOME!!!!

It's back to work for me tomorrow and Friday and kinda Saturdayw ith the convention. I'm going to look what's on at the cinema on Sunday morning and possibly go for a movie. If I do I'll post details here and try and text the usual victims to see if anyone is interested in joining me.

I loved my time in Belgrade. I will definetly be back there within the year. But it's now back to London Life for me.

Well, it was a games shop we discovered. It was a very nice, small, store with a few shelves of games (RPGs, Board & Card Games, a few Wargames and Miniatures (Hordes, Warmachine and Flames of War) plus an assortment of English language novels, dvds and some action figures.

They also have a number of tables free for people to run games on and to run tournaments on in-store. We chatted to the lad who runs the store (Innes) and she knew Leisure Games as they check our website for New Releases and check availability of games and their prices - which was a bit surprising but very nice to hear. They also knew Cubicle 7 and had even got a pre-order for Starblazer Adventures from one of their customers when it's released and they also wanted to buy Victoriana 2nd Edition - so our games are and will be being played in Serbia! :)

The owner of the store is actually a British ex-pat called Richard. He arrived at the store when we were there and I have a meetig with him this evening to talk about getting hold of some of the more obscure titles that they'd like to stock and how we can help them in other ways.

Later in the evening we went to a bar called Academy which is a small bar connected to a club/music venue (which was shut). Jasmina knew the waitress (Katrina) and also the owner of the bar who promptly supplied us with free drinks all evening and wouldn't let us leave. I think we finally managed to escape about 2am after more beers than I want to really think about (especially as I'm not a beer drinker - I like my cider!). The owner is also a big music promoter and DJ in Belgrade and - as there were not many people in the bar apart from the group of people Jasmina knew - he threw on the sound system and played a ton of music and requests for us whilst chatting about music, travelling, and the world in general. The evening consisted of lots of talk about synthpop, darkwave, industrial, ebm and all things electronic.  also came away with a number of bands to check out upon my return which I'd not heard of before and also the desire to dig out some of the CDs I do have but haven't listened to for ages. He also played a number of his own remixes of songs which were very good and could easily be incorporated into any of the EBM sets played round the London scene to great effect.

This morning so far has been very subdued. Just chatting, going through loads of old photos and video footage with Jasmina and her father and slowly gearing up to go out this afternoon to visit some museums, go to my meeting at 6 and then we're all meeting up at The Academy again this evening for more drinks, music and very fine company before heading home for my last night in Serbia. Then tomorrow it's off to the airport and the first leg of my trip home as  fly to Yurich and then on to London.

I've had a really great time here and it'll be a shame in many ways to head back home. I may very well end up at the pub on Thursday night to drown my sorrows with the London Sluts (if I can get caught up on some emails and work) and then it's getting ready for Concrete Cow this Saturday in Milton Keynes and the Diary of Dreams gig on Sunday night. Atleast I'm going to be kept busy enough that it'll kee my mind off things!!!

See you all soon!

Angus out.

I've been out and about a lot over the last few days and it's been very interesting. Friday ended up being quite a leisurely day. with Jasmina and myself taking a trip over the river in a little boat and chatting for several hours by a large boating lake. The area is very busy during the summer months and in the evenings but was pretty dead when we were there - which was really nice as all we anted to do was sit down, have a drink and chat. We were both fairly knackered in the evening so decided to stay in and watch movies - Knocked Up, I, Robot and Wild Things being the order of the night.
On Saturday her parents took us both out for a very nice lunch in Old Belgrade. I was in my element as a massive mixed meat platter was served :) We had a little wander before heading back, chilling out for a couple of hours watching O Brother Where Art Thou and then headed back into the city to go to a Darkwave/EBM Club/Bar to meet some of her friends. On route we came across an open air free concert in one of the cities main squares for a Serbian Rock band called 'Van Gough' - a very popular band here in Serbia apparently and, I will say, very good from what I heard. I was intending to post up a YouTube vid of them to share with you guys and gals but everyone else is asleep at the moment so me trawling through music vids might not be the best thing right now. I'll try and remember to post one in the next few days or when I'm back in Britain. After watching the rest of Van Gough's show we headed down to the club. I'd forgotten what it was like to be in a bar/club where smoking is allowed inside... especially one in a basement without much air conditioning. Ouch on the eyes! Plus I later remembered the joys of smokey post-club clothes. The music was itself was very good, the company was excellent as I met a number of Jasmina's friends who were all very nice.
Today saw Jasmina, her parents and myself go on a road trip to the East of the country - out towards Romania - to visit a couple of historically and culturally important monastries and also visit one of Serbia's largest cave networks. The area in the east is incredibly picturesque with rolling forest-laden hills shrouded in low clouds and mist and the first monastry was gorgeous. Looking through part of the ruin ramparts at the hills looming above it with their tops obscured by the low cloud cover was quite magical. Next up was the cave tour which took us underground for about an hour - I love caves, stalligmites & stalligtites and the formations of stone and water residues that form over the millions of years. This network (the name of which I'll have to double check) was amazing and had some fantastic formations and colours. You could see images in many of the rocks but it goes to show I probably spend too much of my time thinking of fantasies as I kept making out strange gargoyles and demons or other mythological creatures trapped in stone :p
Our final stop was in Ravanica (which I had always thought was a Magic: The Gathering expansion set - but hey, there you go...) for the second monastry. Something struck me about it's aura which I wasn't keen on and it endeared itself to me even less by being ultra conseravtive and not allowing any women into the chapel who were wearing trousers (Jasmina was in jeans and her mother also wore trousers). Not that it stopped either of them (although Jasmina did borrow my long sleeved shirt to tie round her waist so it looked more like a skirt to any casual observer from behind) and both went in to have a look. I stayed outside though having my internal rant about conservative religions and listening to what sounded like wild and rabid dogs barking and attacking something in the distance.
We didn't get home too early this evening so we've spent a quite night having a family meal and then Jasmina and myself watched the remake of Dawn of the Dead and Bekind, Rewind - the latter of which I'd never seen before and, whilst starting off a bit slow, got a lot better as the film progressed.
Now everyone has collapsed asleep and I'm left wide awake in my usual "Angus needs little sleep and can't get to sleep anyway" state - plus my NintendoDS ran out of batteries last night as I fell asleep with it swicthed on in mid-Suduko game.
Tomorrow we're heading back into Old Belgrade, meeting up with some of Jasmina's friends for drinks and also popping into a place we passed the other day which looks like it might be a fantasy games shop :)
Hope everyone's well and to catch you all soon!

Wandered around Belgrade city centre and also Kalamengdan which is one of Belgrade's cultural centres with old ruined fortresses, Romand and Celtic ruins and some nifty slightly newer tanks and anti-aircraft guns.

The view is fantastic up there though as it looks right down the Danube and Sava Rivers and much of Belgrade itself.

Combining that with some good ice cream and a relaxing drink in a good rock pub it was a good afternoon.

Once back home Jasmina and I watched 10,000BC (which for  fantasy film was pretty good - it is in no way historical at all and I think one of my friends was complaining about that...which I don't get now as it is so obviously not historically accurate). Sort of reminded me of a slightly pre-historic Apocalypto with some fantasy/sci-fi elements thorwn in. Also really reminded me of some of the ideas that Dave and myself were talking about a few years about for a game...

Then, after dinner, Jasmina, her brother Igor and myself settled down for a game of Risk. Now I think we'd have survived longer had Jasmina and myself not fought a tit-for-tat over Europe whilst her borther consolidated his powerbase in North and South America. It was one of the quickest 'total domination' games of Risk I've ever played. Igor won a very comprehensive victory.

Jasmiona and I then watched a bit of tv (Serbian TV has subtitles for english-language programs as opposed to dubbing so I can actually watch and understand them). I think we watched a show based upon William Shatner's TekWar novels (I think that's what they're called - I missed the credits so have no idea what the show was called). It had some interesting ideas - even if they were badly written and badly acted. We also watched an episode of A Town Called Eureka - a show I'd seen advertised in the UK but had never seen. I quite liked it and will probably have to track down a few more episodes when I'm back home.

This morning has been very lazy so far but we're about to take a walk down to the docks and catch a boat across the Sava to a green area with an artifical lake (I believe there is boating). This evening we're off to see some of Jasmina's friends at a bar or club or something...

Well I arrived safe and sound in Belgrade. I have to say that just lfying into and out of Switzerland earlier today has made me want to visit the country and explore. The mountains were fantastic and it was great seeing this massive walls of mountains above the clud line and then flying down through said cloud and relaising that just underneath was were you were about to land. Must be a nightmare sometimes for pilots at Zurich!

Јasmina and her father met me at Belgrade airport and we headed over to the family flat were I was warmly greeted and treated to a meal whiskey and Serbian beer.

I've freshened up a bit now but after almost 36 hours awake I am feeling pretty knackered and we're planning on a restful evening tonight before going exploring tomorrow.

Anyway, this is just to let you know I'm here. More updates - and who knows maybe photos if I brought my cable - as and when.

PS - two weeks ago Belgrade was 34 Celcius and sunny. Today it's 14 Celcius and overcast/showery. So it is pretty much the same as London at present. In fact London might be slightly warmer!

Off to Belgrade. Taxi is here to take me to the airport in about 20 minutes.

Flying out of London at 6.05am to Zurich (Switzaerland) and then on to Belgrade (Serbia) an hour or so later. Should be touching down at 12.20 local time. Both legs take about 1hr40m so not long at all.

I will have internet access whilst I'm over there so you'll no doubt hear from me. I'm back in the UK again on the evening of Wednesday 24th September. Then it's straight into work for Thursday/Friday, convention on Saturday (Concrete Cow in Milton Keynes) and probably unpacking from the convention on Sunday followed by the Diary of Dreams gig on Sunday night. There's even the (very remote) poosisbility I might be at the Islington Academy on the Friday too for the It Bites gig! But I reckon I'll probably be spending the evening working from home in all reality.

Anyway, better just double check I have everything before the taxi arrives. Have fun!