Not Quiet on the Eastern Front

Belgrade, Serbia

Aug 19,2025

I had intended to end this summer’s trip in Finland and was supposed to fly back home from Helsinki. But this trip felt unfinished in a vague way; something was not quite what I’d expected although I would hard put to put a finger on exactly what. More than one person I spoke with over the months urged me to go to Bosnia and Serbia and maybe some of the other countries of eastern Europe. So, on a whim here I am on a flight from Helsinki to Belgrade. As I stare out the window, the sky is cloudless and I have a clear view of the patchwork quilted lands below. With the help of google maps, I can identify most of the countries we fly over. It feels weird to be winging across lands in a few hours that I took three months to travel overland.

It was late when I landed in Belgrade but the bus from the airport to downtown was crowded. Animated discussions amongst strangers on the bus made me curious. Are Serbians always this open and friendly? Or was something amiss that required this give and take? The bus seemed not to follow its usual route and veered off. And then it hit me – of course! The detours were likely because of the protests.

I got to the hostel close to eleven. No sooner had I got in the door than we heard a series of bangs. They could be firecrackers. Or gunshots. And then we heard a few shouts and the thud of running feet. A couple of young women running past, slipped inside. They were some of the demonstrators.

The student demonstrations that started a few months ago are still going on although they no longer take prime place in the media for reasons I cannot fathom. Every night the demonstrators meet at different places in Belgrade. They begin late, around ten pm and march. And clash with the police. Teargas is what this group was running from. The two women who had come in caught their breath, rested a bit and then donned their face masks and left.

As I stood outside, I saw another group come streaming down the cross street. These are hardly the dangerous, out-of-control crowds that the media describes. While a couple did overturn the garbage bins as they went, to create makeshift roadblocks, most marched peacefully by.

Postscript: Aug 22, 2025

From Belgrade I traveled to Nis and quite by accident happened to be in the place where another march was taking place, also latish. Organized and orderly are words I would choose, were I asked. And varied; there were people from all walks of life, spanning the spectrum from students to families to the middle-aged to older folk. There were young children walking with their parents, and even toddlers in their strollers.