Leonidasz naplója: 2016. október 2. (558. nap)

A business trip is normally a business trip but not exactly if you go to Pirot, one of the southernmost town of Serbia. I know this very well since I have gone there many times though I had already that sensation during my first trip. Because in contrast with many other places people really live here, they really know how to live. I am not talking about their life-style (which is also very lovely and very natural, a little Slavic, a little mediterranean, a little rustic, a little civil, a little traditional, a little modern, a little everything), I am talking about their heart, about their enthusiasm, about their istinctive trust, about their open, welcoming sincerity and about their hospitality which comes from the deepest layers of their sensitive soul.

Close to two weeks ago I had again the chance to get to Pirot. The job was OK, we more or less managed to do it during the official days of the visit, but I didn't hurry up to the airport in the usual Friday evening rush, instead I decided to stay for the whole Saturday having in mind our common plans to arrange some excursion in the surronding on that day. The organisation of the excursion was the task of my collegue who is also organizer according to his profession so this responsability suited to him very well. I must admit that he made a perfect job, I couldn't imagine anything better than what he concieved.

Three of my collegues came to my hotel by car to take me and very soon we were already zigzaging up on the serpentine road above Pirot with wonderful views practically on the whole valley. Village people are not very rich in this region but they have a big sense to build very friendly and cosy houses, so besides the panoramas and the landscape I enjoyed the passages through the habited areas too. After the long uphill (sweating even from the thought that Sasa went up there by bicycle) we started to descend in the valley of Zavoj lake. First a land-slide created this lake in 1963, the fastly rising water level woke up the habitants of the small village called Zavoj on a rainy and gloomy winter night. This village was situated just on the bank of the blocked stream which forced them to leave their homes for ever within few hours. However the community stayed together in the new field what they got from the municipality of Pirot for the construction of their new houses there, even today most of the people in this district are originaed from that flooded place. Later the lake was stabilized by a dam to divert all simillar future risks and to make a reservoir for a hydraulic power station downstream. Now it could be a wonderful tourist attraction too if someone invested a little capital into few coffees and frige magnet selling boutiques or if modern tourists were not so stupid and could marvel in the beauty of the nature without a coffee and without few frige magnet selling boutiques in the twenty meter proximity of their parking cars. So in lack of many tourists mostly the weekend houses of some pirotiens dot the hill-side, as I said with very inviting terraces, gardens, fire making places, open kitchens and view and view and view on an earthy paradise everywhere. We stopped at several places, we made photos, visited the a hut of another collegue, tasted some pure spring water, and so on, and so on. As I said these people know how to live so it didn't raise them the smallest problem to spend few hours there in a very simple, but still very pleasent way.

When we finished the lake I was already full of wonderful experiences but the sun-set was still very far. First we returned to Pirot, then we changed to the opposite direction heading this time towards the Serbian-Bulgarian border but not so long on the high way, very soon we turned on the right and we continued on a small country road which took us among the hills. After the first village we found ourselves in a gorge-like valley where the road went through tunnels and under carved rock formations since this was the only way to lead it in the narrow precipice. Few kilometers in this unbeleivable canon and we arrived to a point where the valley somewhat widened and a green meadow which dizzling cliffs surrounded from almost all directions gave us the impression that another word is opening here for the soul to make us forget at least temporarily the annoying side of the usual one. Probably the old ancestors of the orthodox monks still residing here had simillar feelings many centuries ago when they started to build up their church and their monastery in this touching and heavenly amazing environment. Many years ago I also had some urge to retreat from the civilization in a simillar way but finally I stayed and I do not mind it. However I can imagine that for certain people this sort of retreat might help to encounter the fullest richness of human existence. So the best is if everyone goes on his own way (without declaring it as the only chance for the salvation) but everyone must always go and towards the same destination since the latter is surely unquestionable :-)!

After the short visit to the church (I learnt that you never walk out from an orthodox church straight forward, you have to turn and to back out, I can confirm that this is not a stupid convention since I tried both ways and the feeling of the second is quite different from that of the first) and a little walk around it for the spiritual touch (it really came) we turned our attention to more earthy desires of our stomach though we didn't have to leave the spiritual touch for it either since the restaurant was just in the neighborhood of the monastery and on a very nicely situated place of a forest slope. We were just taking our seats at the table when Sasa and Branislav arrived who are so close friend to me as Old Shatterhand is a friend to Winnetou for ever. They had some family obligations during the morning but after that they came immadiately and the lunch we took already together. The food was the usual excellent and I followed my usual eating habits in Serbia, I had so much of the starters (you cannot resist to their delicious salads, cheese, ham and paprika) that I could hardly eat a semi portion of the main dish. Perhaps this is a bit strange but I don't think that it will ever change. If it will change I will eat even more starters and no main food at all :-)! However thinking back to that 1-2 hours it was not just the food to praise. The company, the atmosphere, the different story tellings and definitely the different story listenings changed the meal to a real social expirience completly macthing the special, intimate atmosphere of the place where we were. As I said these people know how to live.

When the lunch was over Sasa and Branislav had to leave (very big thanks for their coming) but for the rest of us it was still too early to return to Pirot. We continued up beside the stream, the valley became more narrow, frankly speaking the same gorge-like as before the monastery. Two more stops followed, the first at a trout growing farm which also supplies the fish for the restaurant where we had eaten, the second at an old, long deserted and almost completly ruined mountain hotel spa. The latter was more than sad. Twenty-thirty years ago it must have been a pearl of the region, a luxory building on a hillside with a magnificent view on the romantic scene of the valley and that of many hills around, with a huge atrium-like pool hall in its center. The best hotel rooms had a balcony looking on this central space too which must have been at that time full of relaxing people, full of joy, full of light, full of the worryless safety of a life which passed away during the ten year war and during the regime change that followed. Now it is difficult to say if that safety ever existed or it was always just a projection of the wishful mind. And it is difficult to resist to a surge of reflections (triggered by that ambivalent character of our current progress) about things which went very well in the past and might never go so well in the future again.

On the way back we had the chance to enjoy the gorge one more time, we stopped at another monastery for 5-10 minutes just to have a short glance on it from outside, and arrived to Pirot half an hour before my appointment with the taxi driver who had to bring me to Sofia. Nothing special on the road, nothing special on the airports, the following day I smoothly went back to Nyíregyháza and for one week I had no time to write about anything. But then I felt very strongly that it couldn't stay like that. My Serbian friends sacrificed a lot of time to be with me and the least I can do for them is that I put down my wonderful experinces in this blog entry. My experiences about an excursion which couldn't happen without their very positive and very welcoming approach. You must appreciate this kind of people because you cannot find them everywhere. We are hunted men, all of us, we are all struggling for big goals and in the meantime we forget the most elementary things very often. If we don't take care of ourselves and if we don't take care of one another (both need the practice of the same abilities) things will go out of our hand. Challanges are tough, humanity is weak. But not at Pirot. Because the people there know very well how to live...