Poor bodies of ours...

Thank God the final is tonight and we all leave in a day or two, 'cause we couldn't possibly continue like this, our bodies are so saturated with fast food and alcohol, it's really taking a toll at this point! But hey, guess what we're doing tonight!!! :)

Anyway, last night was the Fashion Party at Euroclub. Christina, Jonas and I decided we would dress very "fashioney" and I basically ended up looking like a pink-and-purple school boy, Jonas was Amy Winehouse, and Christina was just a crazier version of her fierce self.

We were the talk of the entire party, I have tosay. Everyone was looking, pointing, shouting good stuff at us, giving us the thumbs up, and there was even some laughter. But we were as confident as we could be, strolling around, knowing we looked the best there. :)

But we left the show a bit too early I think, right after the catwalk was done - we all agreed we should have stayed around a bit more, just to mingle and get noticed some more, cuz there was loads of people there that did not get the chance to see us. :)))

Anyway, we went to Eurocafe and met up with the regular crowd there and had another crazy alcohol night.

Came back to the apartment oh, around 4... and we woke up at around 13:30 today. Whoooa, this adventure is almost done and it's been great throughout!!!

Bosnia to the final! (but did you really have any doubts!?)

In a terrible, terrible semifinal, a bunch of good songs thankfully were voted into the final!

It was actually a boring show, well, the first half anyway.... The most annoying and boring thing was all the fans being there just so that they can be seen on camera, not to see the show. I mean, I did not even make any efforts and I managed to be on TV a few times. Ahahaha, well, I guess I did make an effort for the Bosnian performance and the opening of the Bosnian envelope, but it's not like I had to run for the camera... the guy was right there, pointing the camera at me and all I had to do was look back at it. :)

Oh and I have to tell you about this Azerbaijani guy that was sitting right in front of me... He had the HAIREST butt-crack I have ever seen on a human... it was like an ape, ewwwww. How did I see it? Ahahaha, well, low-rise pants plus short shirt - voila, butt-crack exposure! Giannis and I were dying of laughter... it was very entertaining during the first half of the show.

Anyway, it was fun times last night again - more partying, more dancing, more wine.

Today we decided to spend the day by sight-seeing. Geert and I were a little late to meet everybody, but I did appreciate the extra sleep I got, I felt a lot better, and feel a lot better today!

We ended up at the Bohemian quarter - Skadarlija - a cute little neighborhood with lots of expensive restaurants and cafes. Good food, nice scenery, fun people. Ahahah, we ended up ordering a plate of mixed meat for everybody and Jonas and I told them to put the chicken and the beef on a separate plate, since neither one of us eats pork meat. Well, they really did separate the two, but the chicken was wrapped in bacon!!! Ahahahahah...

Laughed a lot, fed some cats and then it started raining. Went to buy some wine to use in the press center whil we watch the rehearsal for the 2nd semi and here I am!

Stay tuned for more exciting stuff I guess! :)

Mmmmm sooo much wine soooo little time :)

What a fucking day yesterday!

Well - first, I realized that I lost my photo camera, my brand new one... boo hoo hooo... but well, I didn't let it get me down, cuz I'll just buy another one. :) Good thing is that I've been uploading pictures continuously!

Anyway, yesterday.... started off with the Turkish party at 6 on one of the many river boats. Lots of free Turkish food and local alcohol mmmmm, except the wine was piss warm ahahah... I still have two glasses, who cares. :)

The Turks also organized an outside concert kind of thing, where the public could come and watch as well. They had a lot of the other performers come, such as Sweden, Czech Republic and Serbia, so it was lots of fun. Outside, breeze, no stuffy indoor spaces.

But we couldn't spend a lot of time there as we wanted to go to the Icelandic party, which was a whole town away, ahahaha.

Oh and yes, I have to say, I have been acting like the personal taxi-getter for these foreign friends of mine here. :) But I enjoy it really and it's good cuz this way they don't get ripped off and lost.

So, off we were to the Icelandic party - which I have to say was the best party so far! Regina and Fridrik sang a dozen Eurovision hits and the crowd were very entertained.

Ahahah and yes, we ended up sitting in the VIP section, cuz nobody was checking. We had our own bar, our own food that just kept coming and coming and coming. The Danish singer showed up and I think he was expecting to sit where we were sitting ahahah, but we were not going to give up our nice little abode. :)

After mmmm like 4 or 5 glasses of wine and tons of finger food, it was time to check out the Portuguese party, which again, was on the other side of the town - taxis are our best friend!! :)

We arrived at Portugal late, so we were just able to see one performance, which was good anyway. I was at the bar, ordering the drinks for everybody, and the bar lady took out her phone and started recording the Portuguese performance ahahah... She just stood there, and when the performance was over our drinks came ahahah...

After Portugal, we went to Eurocafe, just to unwind, or so we thought. They ended up playing some nice upbeat Eurovision stuff, so we had some drinks there too and we danced as well. And then we spent some time on the balcony and soon enough it was time to go.

That's it for now. Blog ya later!

Christina, Jonas and me - the stars of Serbian shopping centers YAY!

Yep! We were really stars last night at the Karaoke show at the shopping center Delta City.

20 local people (and a couple of fans, and two delegation members) sang Eurovision songs, trying to win some nice ticket packages.

Christina, Jonas and I took it all very seriously of course! :) It was actually a very, very fun show that was very well attended! And there were some good singers too.

There was a girl who sang Marija Magdalena perfectly and with stage presence, all the while she was sooooooo nervous. We thought she did a fantastic job considering how nervous she was and awarded her the perfect score - 12 points from each of the three us! She was soo happy, poor thing. But I would be too - she won 2 tickets for each of the nights!!

But the real fun started for us at the end - ahahahah... Jonas ended up on stage singing Hero with the host ahahaha. The girls loved Jonas, let me tell you!

And THEN - the show ended and all these people, the contestants mostly, wanted to take pictures with us, as well as wanted our autographs!!! Such a bizzare feeling, let me tell you! And all we wanted to do after the 3-hour show was piss, smoke and eat!!! :)

Fun, fun show - pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/mnbajric/Beograd2008

Laka performing at Greek party (video)

http://picasaweb.google.com/mnbajric/Beograd2008/photo#5201328743903879762

Greek party - best party yet!

Well, I've only attended the Macedonian party and now the Greek party, but we had the best time in Euroclub last night.

150 pictures (+ video of Laka performing) at http://picasaweb.google.com/mnbajric/Beograd2008
:)

Kalomira and the Cypriot lady started off the performances, after mingling for an hour and being followed by various reporters, photographers and the fans of course. Kalomira is such a typical American it's quite sick!!! :)

Anyway, once the Greek and the Cypriot bitches were done, they started introducing other performers - including Morena, Dima (who was, once again, desperate as fuck for attention!), Mor ve Otesi and of course Laka!

Laka had absolutely the loudest and most welcome reception as well as applause after the performance. They were once again fantastic - see the short video I've uploaded!

After they performed, I had to run and take a picture with both of them. Of course, they were both fucking crazy!!!!!! And of course they were happy when I told them that I will be sitting in the front row and will have a flag shirt on :)))

Once all the performers finished, the GREAT DJ who was Greek played Eurovision songs for the next 4-5 hours and oh my god, it was all so great. He didn't let the songs play all the way through, but he'd mix them halfway through with very nice transitions.

I think some of us danced for 2-3 hours straight! By 2:30, some people were leaving, including Jonas, Roger and Christina and Bibi and Rastko a bit later. I stayed until closing with Miroslav and some other OGAE Serbia members.

We got to Miroslav's place around 4:30 and I was in bed withing 2 minutes. The end! :)

I'm on a jury!!! :)

OGAE Serbia and the biggest company in Serbia, Delta City, are organizing a karaoke show at the biggest shopping mall in Belgrade today. It's supposed to be for locals and prizes include ticket packages to the semifinals and the final.

Well, Jonas, Christina and I were picked to be on the jury. So, we're gonna be listening to about 20 performers who will sing Eurovision songs and then we will judge each by giving them 1-12 points. :)

It's gonna be tons of fun I think! :)

Macedonian party - May 15

The first day of parties and what a start!

Right after the Bosnian press conference finished, I ran to the Eurocafe to attend the Macedonian party. When we got there, it was completely packed with people, which is always a good sign!

Then we found out that there was tons of Macedonian food to eat and tons of free drinks too. Actually, the entire night we ended up drinking free wine. The only time I remember paying was for Giannis's beer!

Anyway, as stuffy and smokey as the cafe was, the atmosphere was really good. Tamara, Adrian and Vercak all sang some other songs of theirs live, and of course lipsynched Let Me Love You as well.

Tamara was also joined on stage by her older sister Tijana Dapcevic, who is a fairly big star in the Balkans. They sang bits and pieces of few of the most known Macedonian traditional songs. It was nice. :)

Then they decided to pay a tribute to Tose Proeski, by playing a five-minute excerpt of an English-language documentary about him. Well, needless to say, it sucked all the good energy out of everyone and left us all feeling sad.... bad choice for them to do this. They should have just played or sang a couple of his hits as a tribute, in my opinion.

Anyway, we moved to the balcony, 'cause it got way too hot and ended up staying there the rest of the time.

And we had a grand old time there - that must have been at least 10 of us there. We laughed a lot, it was pretty insane at times. And we drank like a bunch of pirates. We paid for all of that when we woke up this morning, ahahaha. :)

Bosnian press conference

Pictures from the conference: http://picasaweb.google.com/mnbajric/Beograd2008

The ladies in the wedding dresses were asked if they were married - one of them said that she isn't and the other said she had a husband, couple of children and a grandchild...

At one point, Laka shouted out:
"Volunteers of all countries - unite!
Volunteers are always the best - because they are free!
Long live volunteers!"

A Radio Belgrade journalist asked if they will walk through the Belgrade street Knez Mihailova with the signs they brought into the press conference, and Laka said:
"Maybe if the situation in the world was different, we'd go all around the world with them. Maybe we will, but we don't have any free time!"

An Australian journalist asked what the signs meant, and Laka explained that they are there to remind the world that love is the key!

Some of the signs read - "we want love for the rabbit," "bring the witches back onto the brooms," "we want our victory to be fixed!"

Bosnia TO THE WONNING!

I'll say it this once (and probably more times too):

BOSNIA WILL WIN EUROVISION 2008!

Just came back from the second rehearsal and OH MY GOD what a great fucking performance. I know I'm Bosnian and everything but what I saw 30 minutes ago I did not see yet in Belgrade. Great stage colors and lighting, great singing by both Laka and Lela, great bombastic sound, great act... it was all just great! Here is a video of it:

http://picasaweb.google.com/mnbajric/Beograd2008/photo#5200677596797034146

And of course, the pictures are at http://picasaweb.google.com/mnbajric/Beograd2008

Demanding Ukrainians!!!

Ugh! I'm a bit disgusted by this new story that has surfaced...

Apparently, the Ukrainians are being such big drama queens about where their party is that it is making many feel sick about it.

The Euroclub, which is actually a great space is not good enough for a "top star" like Ani Lorak... it is good enough for Cyprus, Greece, many others, including even Dima Bilan!!! But no, not good enough for the queen Ani Lorak! Ugh......

Belgrade river boats

Are the place to be, if you want to have a fun time or a quiet dinner.

Jelena, Jonas, Roger and I went to Amsterdam, one of many river boat cafe/restaurants behind Hotel Jugoslavija. It's apparently the most frequented place. It's actually quite posh, with a section for just sitting down and having a drink and a separate space for fancy dinners.

We ended up just having a FEW drinks, ahahaha... I had about 3 glasses of wine, and I think my comrades had about the same number of various other drinks. We talked up a fucking storm, really, for two hours non-stop. Quite a relaxing time we had.

Then Rastko, Bibi and Lior joined us, and soon after we were heading home or Euroclub (depending on who you ask, ahahahah). On the way out, we noticed that another river boat place called Apocalypto had live music coming out of it, so we decided to make a stop there as well.

Bibi, Jelena and I were having quite a good time there, since the live band was playing some old evergreen music, including some good old turbo folk hits. ;) Needless to say, the foreigners weren't impressed and thus we were off back home!

Pictures!!!!

Here are the pics I've taken thus far. I'll add more as time goes along...

http://picasaweb.google.com/mnbajric/Beograd2008

Karaoke

Was quite fun last night. Didn't know what to expect, and I'm not a big fan of karaoke in general, but it was lots of fun last night. There was lots of booze to be had there, woo hoo.

There were tons of fun people there, everybody having tons of fun, really. And lots of them sang too, most of whom could actually hold a tune.

Jonas ended up singing It Hurts, which was kind of painful, since I guess the key was completely wrong for him, ahahaha. Still, it was really fun! :)

Oh and Beauty Queens came to visit, as our surprise guests. They of course sang Molitva karaoke style, as well as Zavet a bit later in the evening.

We left around midnight and headed to EuroClub. We danced a ton and drank a ton too, but Jonas and Roger wanted to get the hell out to nurse their babies at home. :) Well, we ended up walking, and there was no lack of bitching from me as a result. Boy, was it a long-ass walk!!

Anyway, walk up a bit late this morning and just starting the day off with this blog thingy!

See ya later!

Ukraine again

Pretty effective performance, I have to say! A little gimmicky, just like everything nowadays, but not too much really. Good choregraphy and she sounds convincing. I told Bibi this will win. :) So... we'll see!!

Ukraine - May 13...

One, two, ooone, twooo, shaaady laaady one twoooo, yes, yes, thank you...

Jeezus, she's been going on for 5 minutes now, testing her voice and microphone I guess too... She's a little stuck up I think :)

Stigo sam!!!!

Here I am in Belgrade finally!

I flew in on the 3rd, but then went to Bosnia for 10 days.

Took a bus from my hometown in Bosnia to Belgrade last night... oh boy, what a ride, ahahaha, it was interesting to say the least.

Anyway, got to the press center last night around 22:30 with my bag and all, parked it in the OGAE Serbia office and then went drinking :)

Felt a little sick in the morning and until I just ate mmmm... anyway, just signing in for a bit. Haven't seen anything yet properly, so when I do I will post more! :)

First post

Just testing. Blog will soon be active!