Of all places, I found myself celebrating my 30th birthday in Serbia. This is wild.
There’s no better way to compensate for my stupidity over missing my bus from Sarajevo to Belgrade than to (1) hire a private car (for 180 fucking Euros), (2) stay in a 4-star hotel, and (3) go book shopping.
No, I’m kidding. Actually, I’m not. I should be punishing myself for messing up my itinerary and wasting a couple of Euros, but instead I ended up spending more.
It’s my 30th birthday in a few hours and I don’t want to be hard on myself, just for a day.
While carrying my 2 huge-ass luggages and a backpack on my way to my lovely hotel, I passed by this very nice Mexican restaurant and promised myself to get some burrito before I go sightseeing. After checking in at my room (and having my usual self-prepped welcome drink aka a hot decaf flat white), I took a short break by settling down while casting episodes from The Office on the TV screen.
I went to take a walk outside, and apparently my hotel is located by Knez Mihalova Street, the most popular street in Belgrade. There were high-end shops and fast fashion boutiques, and the bright Christmas lights illuminate the whole area. There are also a bunch of bookstores, and you know what happened next.
I went book shopping. Oh of course, I did. And as promised, I went to that Mexican restaurant to have the most delicious burrito I had in my life. You can fucking customize your burrito there. Oh my God. Happy birthday to me.
Do you know that feeling you feel after shopping? Something like ‘oh-shit-my-money-i-did-it-again’ feeling? I felt that. After going back to my hotel, I continued streaming The Office episodes (this time I queued all the Christmas episodes) and started browsing McDonald’s menu. Damn, Serbian McDonald’s has an awesome menu selection. I need a cake for my birthday salubong, so I was eyeing for the iconic McCafe cheesecake. I also went to search the nearest convenience store because I needed a lighter to light my 3 and 0 candles (because, 30).
I went out of my hotel only to find out that there was a grocery right at the corner of the street. I ended up not going further because it had everything I needed: a lighter, cheesecake, Greek salad, Coke Zero, Lay’s, and a large bottled water.
I went back to take photos inside my lovely old rose-themed aesthetic hotel room and celebrated my birthday all by myself.
Never, ever, in my wildest dreams, I will find myself celebrating my 30th birthday in Belgrade, Serbia. Life is lovely. Life is wild. Life is full of surprises and I’m looking forward to be surprised a lot in the next decade of my life.