Sretan Bozic

Ronnie got a little cultured today. He was invited over to one of his friend’s parent’s home for their Christmas celebration. Yes, this happened today, his friend is from Serbia and they switched over to the Gregorian calendar and like everyone else had their own way of doing it. The Catholics just added 14 days all at once and kept Christmas on Dec. 25^th. The Serbian Orthodox didn’t move all at once and they didn’t keep the date but they celebrated Christmas on what day it would have been by adding 14 days…anyway it is way confusing. You should look up how many variations there are on people converting from the Julian calendar over to the Gregorian calendar…mind boggling.

Back to the celebration, Ronnie was served more kinds of meat than I knew existed cooked in all kinds of yummy ways. He had Sarma (Serbian Cabbage Rolls stuffed with beef and pork and spices), ćevapčići (small rolls of mixed minced meat – pork, beef, and lamb), Serbian Pita stuffed with cheese, Veal Steaks, Beef Steaks, Ribs, Ruska Salata (Russian Salad ), Lamb, a Christmas Cake (Chesnica) – it has a silver coin inside and whoever finds it will have good luck for the next year, and a Banana Cake (A sponge cake with a banana in the middle with chocolate and coconut on top. He was also offered some šljivovica (plum brandy) which he turned down for two reasons. One, he was there on his lunch break and you’re really not supposed to drink on the job and two, he’s really LDS he just doesn’t know it yet.

He was given a pair of wool slippers made by his friend’s Baba (grandma) for the whole family. They are very cute and very warm, but I don’t think they have very many wood floors over in Serbia. We can slide so good with the slippers on, I feel like Tom Cruise in Risky Business, which by the way I’ve never really seen the whole movie just the sock sliding part. It almost feels disrespectful to walk on something that was made by hand, but I’m sure she didn’t make them to sit around, so to good use they will go. He was also sent home with extra food so the whole family could try some.

Then to top off his cultural rich day, a lady he works with sent him home with homemade tamales. Oh by the way, the title of this post means Merry Christmas in Serbian.