It's been a while ...

Couple of days ago I have heard, for the first time in a long time ( must be a year or two even) with a friend of mine, whom i first met in the "early period of my Internet existence", back in 97. In those days I was joining mailing list ( do you remember those, they were like today's forums or blogs) with all sorts of topic, ranging from WW2 and WW1 battleships, computers, java programming, graphic design etc...Many of those topics are no longer interesting for me, but one of those mailing list was, i can't remember the mailing list site, but the name of the list was Evolve-Create.it was for discussions about evolution or "divine" genesis of life.

Anyway, that's not what I wanted to talk about. I mentioned a friend - well i got to know her when i was a member of aforementioned list. Her name is Elisabeth Allen, and she's American from Zimbabwe. Or maybe i should say Zimbabwean (I'm not sure if i got the right name for the citizens of Zimbabwe), who currently lives in Cheyenne, Wyoming, USA.
Elisabeth's not exactly my age - she's little younger than my Mom, but she's an exceptionally kind person who wanted to remain in touch (e-mails and letters) even during '99 bombardment of Serbia, and never was limited to the "CNN view" of my country and our situation at that time. During all that time we found out that we have lot of in common - my childhood was in a way marked with constant wars and she's, in a way, a refugee from Zimbabwe, cause she and her family left that country, not only because they were looking for better future in States but also because they wanted to escape the regime of Robert Mugabe.

Somehow, i guess when my system went down couple of years ago (thank you Mr Gates) I have lost her contact email and we haven't heard from each other ever since. But last week i got her email and it made me very happy. It's like finding something or someone even after you've given up all hope. Not much changed in her life, thankfully every one's is OK, as they can be. Main difference is that her son Brendan, who is 22 now have joined US Army and is now on tour of duty in Afghanistan. I guess it's stupid to compare them, but thank god, it wasn't Iraq. He's in US Air force, but not in flight units but as the Army engineer. Though it doesn't change much since afghan fighters don't really care which insignia a soldier wears.

That wouldn't be so special, especially to you, a blog reader who doesn't know my friend, but to me that last fact changes so much. Before that I wasn't much interested in US Army operations and in a way had little sympathy for their fights in Iraq,Afghanistan and other parts of Islamic world. From the start of post 9/11 operations I thought that they were just wasting time and money because the core of terrorism isn't a building or weapon, which US army can destroy or take away. Core of terrorism is an idea, I'm not sure which one, but if you don't fight it with another idea of same strength, you will never defeat it.

It has been 5 years since 9/11 and those two operations have achieved very little, so little that it's not hard to believe that their goals weren't simply democracies in Afghanistan or Iraq. Before i go too far, i just wanted to say that now I'm involved in those wars on personal level, at least partially. I only want my friend to have her son back in good health and one piece. I don't care who wins...

On the other subject, my life is ,these days, limited to the architecture studies (Master degree), graphic design freelancing and drawing in the free time. I don't really have much energy left, so i go out only twice a week. And it has been like that for almost a month. Somehow workload is always biggest in November. At least I'm doing the things I like but it's not a relief when it's 2 am and you still have two hours or work left and you should be back on your feets in 5 hours. Well at least I'm saving for a trip abroad. I'm hoping for 9 days visit to Amsterdam, but i'm not sure about that. But i certainly won't be staying home. Every change would be good.

Btw here are two more drawings, i've done in last couple of days.

Crtanje je nesto sto me opusta, makar crtao i chudovista i nakaze kao sto je ova groteskna karikatura jednog mog prijatelja. Mada se nekada zabrinem kada vidim koliko nakaza, sam nacrtao u poslednjih par godina. Ali kapiram da je bolje i to nego da radim "belo". Mislim da mi je dovoljno sto se drogiram slatkim i mesom.

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Drawing is for me, more than a hobby. It soothes me and relax, even when i draw grotesque caricatures of good friends, like this one. Though I sometimes freak myself out when I see how many abominations I've drawn throughout the years. But i guess it's better than to "draw white lines on the table"... :) It's bad enough that i eat too much

Pozdrav svima !!! - Hello everybody!!!

Do današnjeg dana sam mislio da je blog izmišljen samo za egomanijake, koji misle da sav običan svet prosto umire čekajući da čuje šta se u njihovim, samo njima samima,interesantnim životima, dešava. A onda sam, postepeno, i za mene neprimetno, počeo da redovno posećujem par blogova poput bloga Amerikanke, trenutno nastanjene u Beogradu - http://desperateserbwife.blogspot.com/, i bloga http://myfathershand.blogspot.com/, koji posecujem zbog veoma prostih a i dalje veoma efektnih portreta coveka koji je veoma talentovan ali zbog parkinsonove bolesti, više to nije. I sam veoma često, mada ne toliko dobro kao taj čovek, crtam i uopšte izražavam mnogo češće i mnogo bolje vizuelno nego jezički, pa mi je ta tragična situacija nekako postala veoma lična i nešto što proizvodi pomešana osećanja.

I eto tako sam nekako došao do današnjeg dana, kada sam shvatio da blog i nije tako loš ako se shvati kao mesto gde se okupljaju tvoji prijatelji, koji to ne mogu u "stvarnosti", ma kako to zvučalo. A u poslednje vreme, imam dobre prijatelje, što Srba, drugova iz gimnazije koji su otišli u inostranstvo i koje možda godinama neću videti, a i stranaca sa svih meridiana. Zato će ovaj blog biti dvojezičan, ako me ne bude mrzelo da kucam sve dvaputa. Nadam se da neće.

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Up until today I thought that blogs were invented for egomaniacs who thought that somebody is actually interested in what's happening in their lives, which are frankly only interesting for themselves. But then, somehow unintentionally, as a reflex, I started visiting two blogs. One is - http://desperateserbwife.blogspot.com/ - blog kept by an American woman living in Belgrade, which gives an interesting perspective of a stranger, visitor living in my hometown. Very informative and it makes you see what are the real flaws and also good sides of my Belgrade. Other one is - http://myfathershand.blogspot.com/. This blog is interesting cause it run by children of man who is very talented artist but now suffers from Parkinson's disease and can not continue doing the "thing", the same thing, which also my greatest hobby, maybe even more than that - drawing and painting. The story of Mr Samuel Wray is somehow very personal for me, like i can identify, what's of course rubbish, with him.
But that's how i got here and now. Today I realised that blogs are not so bad after all. They could be usefull for keeping in touch with many friends which you cannot see in real life, cause they left the country and ended 10 000 miles away in some far town, which you can only see on some screen. This is something i do. so i don't lose what most important to me - friends.

But again, maybe I'm just an egomaniac who thinks someone actually gives a shit about me :).

C'est la vie