I found this article about languages in Europe interesting. It's not too long. Maybe you'll enjoy it too.

Deutsche Welle

One thing I don't miss about living in LA is the sound of helicopters. They seem always present in LA. News channels have them all over the place. In Santa Monica, at least, it really seemed like there were always helicopters.

In Zagreb, I don't think I've heard a single one. And that's nice. Not many airplanes either. The airport is not near and small planes are also much less common here. LA also seemed to have trash trucks every day. And Mexican immigrants working on people's yards with various loud equipment; leaf blowers, lawn mowers, hedge trimmers, etc. None of that here. The parks are taken care of, but it's not constant noise from all of these sources. Most noise is from scooters and cars screeching around.

I *do* however miss all the vast amount of choice I had in LA. Tons of different ethnicities live there, so any kind of food is available. Any DVD or CD you can think of, you can usually find.

Zagreb doesn't have a wide range of ethnicities living here and there are not very many different kinds of restaurants. Not much in the way of ethnic food at all, actually. Except for maybe 5 restaurants. Some Chinese, some Japanese and one Indian place. But it's severely limited. And the range of choice for CDs and DVDs is fucking awful.

But then I don't have LA traffic to deal with either. I just take the train, tram, bus or walk. The train's the best for avoiding traffic, but not entirely reliable either. It's often late or doesn't show up at all. But, really, it's pretty good 75% of the time.

Just some thoughts of the moment.

My new website launched yesterday!

http://www.matthollingsworth.net


It took about a month to build it, using a Content Management System called Joomla. This tool made it much easier to make, and to make it much better than I could have done from scratch on my own.

The site is mostly my comics art portfolio site. It's got tons of my color work for Marvel Comics, DC Comics, Vertigo, Dark Horse Comics, ONI Press, Wildstorm Comics and Top Cow Productions. Go take a look, willya!?!?!?!

Okay, a bit of a rant here. So much for the niceties of that last post.

I fucking hate scooters of all incarnations. It's a nice fantasy of Europe that people in the States have and scooters are part of that. Like it's romantic or something. But scooters suck ass. They're fucking awful. They're extremely loud. And they seem to give off far more exhaust than a car.

I have a neighbor who has one. He's got a really old one that looks like an old moped and not so much like a scooter. He takes it outside and revs it up all the time. And we always want to go chop his fucking head off and shove it up his ass. People race around on them in this area and they're fucking loud. It's like a lawnmower engine or something.

A plague on scooters!

This blog is not intended to comment on politics in the region. It's meant to be a cultural blog, to show the things about mankind that bring us together, not separate us. Like food, drink, music and vampires.

Yes.

And as such, I'm not really going to be commenting on Kosovo or any of that stuff. If you want to read stuff like that, go read Balkan Baby and watch as a Westerner living in Zagreb gets embroiled in controversy over politics and his perhaps ignorant opinions. I don't hold the claim of not being ignorant. I am. Commenting on stuff I know little about seems folly.

But, in the same article that discusses Kosovo, it also discusses some Croatia related news. I suppose it's ultimately politics, but I'll let basic news items like this through if they merit any attention. No offense intended to any Balkan readers.

From Deutsche Welle:

During a visit to the Balkans, German Defense Minister Jung underlined his support for the supervised independence of the breakaway Serbian province of Kosovo as well as Croatia's desire for EU and NATO membership.

...

Jung also supported Croatia's bid to join the European Union and NATO.

"Germany will continue to support Croatia's European perspective and efforts to join NATO," he said.

Croatia hopes to receive an invitation to join NATO next year and from the EU by the end of the decade.

Jung will travel to Macedonia and Albania on Thursday. Both countries are hoping to get an invitation to join NATO next year.

To read the article in full, go here:

Deutsche Welle

From Deutsche Welle:

The success of Balkan music in getting German and European clubbers onto the dance floor is proof that culture doesn't have to spread from west to east. DJs are giving a new sound to the eclectic music with old roots.

People enjoy Balkan music because they can dance to it, said DJ Robert Soko, who emigrated to Germany from what was then Yugoslavia before the Balkan Wars in the mid-1990s.



"People had sort of hit a dead-end as far as new music went," said Soko, whose show is called Balkan Beats. "Suddenly a new sound came along that was danceable. When you mix it well with modern sounds you get a result that works great in clubs.



"It has ethnic or traditional elements that are fused with more modern beats," Soko said, adding that the traditional components can include brass instruments, Oriental sounding semi-tones or Slavic-language texts.

To read the rest of the article, go to the Deutsche Welle website:

Deutsche Welle