Pulling up stakes and heading out for a while.

Well, I am headed home for the holidays. I will probably keep adding to the blog while I am back in the states, but no promises. It's been a very good trip, but I need a break, at least from the libraries. A good time to leave too, as it looks like winter is finally, actually, really here. I keep thinking that each cold snap I will post something that says that winter has finally arrived, but after a day or two the warm weather keeps coming back. Not so sure this time.

Of course, as luck would have it, I am leaving one day too early. There is a big celebration tomorrow night on the square for the 10th anniversary of the mass protest over the closing of Radio 101.

Thanksgiving at Inkpen's, then back to my apartment, where I will be sleeping on the couch again until I can get a mattress (long story, bottom line, no mattress for 2 to 3 weeks).

And every one gets three guesses as to who (or more accurately, what) the guys in the picture are. The answer after Thanksgiving.

Ok, I have to be up in 5 hours to catch a flight.

Have a happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Generations of Decay

Ok, it has been a while since I posted. Did I mention that I really hate doing funding applications? I think I understand why so many academics are Marxists. If there is any profession where you are defined by your work, it is the academy. So, after trying to compress roughtly 3 years of my life's work into 5 pages (double spaced) I now have to wait until april to find out if my 3 years of labor are worthy of support.

Ok, enough of that. On to other things. It was a wierd day today. I went to the City Museum, which is now part of my Friday routine (because the public is only allowed to use the library there on Fridays from 10 am to noon) and it was closed because one of their staff passed away. The museum was open, but all the research offices were closed. Now, that may sound strange to Americans, but I think it is actually how things should work. When someone important to an institution passes away, it should be remember, and not just with some formal statement. There should be some inconvenience, and people should take some time to stop working and remember that these institutions are human endeavors.

For some reason though "chuvar" staff were very defensive about the situation. I guess they are used to Americans who don't get how this place works. Now, to be honest, they have been giving me problems ever since I started doing research there. They want me to have a "permission" every Friday when I show up. The librarian I am working with just tells me to come by on Friday and I can work. Today they berated me for not calling ahead before coming to the Museum. I told them it wasn't a big issue. I understood the situation. But still they were upset because they exspected me to be upset about making a trip there when I couldn't get into the library.

Anyway, I have enought to do getting ready to head home next week. I have to do laundry, which take days here because the washing machine takes about 3 times as long to run as an American one, and there is no drier. I'm ready to go home and reflect and get recharged for the next trip.

So, I should fill everyone in on the local news, but to be honest there really hasn't been much. The weather has been very warm here the last week or so, so everyone has gone back to summer mode. Today Vecernji list front page had a story about whether violent compter games make kids violent. That gives you a feel for how much news there is here at the moment.

Now, to explain the picture at the begining of this post. I got lost a couple weeks ago looking for a branch of the City Library. Actually, I wasn't lost, I knew exactly where I was, I just couldn't find the library. It was not well marked. In fact, it was so poorly marked you might say it was hidden. But, in the process, I ended up in the spot where I took that picture, which has just about every phase of moder Zagreb captured in it. All of them are exhibing some degree of wear. I really love this city, but Zagreb has always been a place that is stuggling to live up to its own image of what it is, and this picture seems to capture that in my mind.

Enough for now, except the mention that the Bears made the TV page of the paper today! The one picture for Z1 TV (each channel get one picture on the daily listings) was a Football picture pluging their American Football recap, and the picture was a Bear defensive player stripping the ball from a NYGiant's player. What can I say, some things just make me smile.

A brief break to laugh

Yes, I know it has been a while since I have posted. I'm facing a couple of deadlines for submitting funding applications and conference abstracts. I'm also trying to adjust my working thesis to what I am finding in my research. When I was an infantry officer the instructors at every school I went to kept pounding us with "no battle plan survives contact with the enemy." Well, it clearly has an academic corollary: No thesis survives contact with the field. In my case, it is not a bad thing. When I came here, I had a working thesis about Croatian nationalism and the city of Zagreb. I also had a larger thesis about urbanization and the failure of Yugoslavia. At this point, my thesis about Zagreb is not as supportable as I originally thought, but what I am finding actually supports my larger thesis about Yugoslavia, so it is not a disaster. So, where is the laughter you ask? Well, in taking a break and checking out one of the on line BB's I frequent, I came across this. Take a read and enjoy. If only I could get people to pay me to do that kind of research.