Kansas City Serb Fest

I arrived in KC to drum once more for Majstory. We were playing a big Serbian festival (“Serb fest”), where groups from Joliet, Omaha, and Kansas City all gathered together and celebrated, Serbian style.

People ate and choirs from all three cities sang.

The Omaha choir representin'.

We were set up in the corner.

You can see our stuff over there next to the choir.

Then, we were ready to start. People were still eating so we began with the ballads and such, but it wasn’t long before we busted out some kolos (like the Serbian equivalent of a jig or reel).

Getting our Serb on.

We played for hours, and there was much dancing. Then after an adventurous night with crazy drunk people people visiting our hotel, we were ready to play again in the morning.

Mario, Iliya, Joe, and Zach are MAJSTORY

Highlights from this gig:

  • A bed!
  • Good times playing Serbian music.
  • A guy thought I was Serbian! I was sitting at a table finishing my beverage and a guy leaned over and said, “Blah blah blah blah. Blah?” At least, he may as well have said that because I only know a few words of Serbian, and he didn’t use either of the words I know. So I replied with a cheerful “Dobro nam doshli!” which means something like “hello” or more literally “good life to you.” I let him look confused for a second before apologizing and explaining that I’m not actually Serbian and had no idea what he said.
  • A crazy drunk dude that kept calling everyone ‘crazy’ and ‘nuts’, then laughing at the sound of his own voice. I think he laughed at the sound of his laughing too. It was a textbook example of the “feedback loop.”
  • Some delicious Serbian food, unfortunately not including roast lamb this time but still pretty good.
  • I learned how to ask “Where is the bathroom?” in Serbian. This adds to my prior Serbian knowledge of “ice” and “What’s going on?” The cool thing is I can now synthesize addition sentences; now I can say things like “What?” and “Where is Iliya?” and even “What is ice?”

NEXT: I finally get a much-needed break back in Omaha, but fail to get any rest during it.

Serb Fest!

In the tent by the beer garden which was hot.  Meaning being in the tent was.

Hundreds of people thought I was Serbian last Saturday.

“Why?” asks Attractive Girl while eating a delicious snack.

“Ooh, what is that snack?” I ask.

“It’s 호떡!” she says, smacking her oh-so-kissable lips.

“Oooh, I love 호떡!” I say. “Can I have one?”

She assumes a flirtatious motherly pose. “Only if you answer my question.”

Fair enough. The reason people thought I was Serbian is not because I’m Serbian. I’m not. It’s because I drummed for a Serbian folk music band (Majstory, pronounced like my story) at Omaha’s Serb Fest on Saturday! We were basically the dance band for the evening.

“What is Serb Fest?” asks Attractive Girl, handing me a nice greasy 호떡.

Besides being the reason I had to come back to Omaha, it was an all-day party for, of, and about Serbian things! Things including music, history, food, and of course, people. There were tables with Serbian items on them, interesting historical trivia about Nikola Tesla (he was Serbian by the way) and the Serbian Orthodox Church (priests must marry and grow beards), and singing Serbic children:

Serbs listening to Serbian childs singing Serbian songs in Serbian at Serb Fest!

Also, these children danced. Serbishly.

Serbian children can feel 7/8 just as well as adults!

You can’t see any shots of me playing with the band (I forgot to ask someone else to take pictures), but you can see our stuff set up there behind the childs. There was also a ton of super delicious Serbian food.

“What did you eat?”

Roast lamb. I think I should say it again: roast lamb. It was roasting for almost an entire day. Super good. Hey, you’re drooling!

“Oops! *slurp* But… I want to eat roast lamb!”

Don’t we all!

“Actually,” says a passing vegetarian, “I don’t.”

Well… um. Okay. But all normal, omnivorous people want to eat it.

“Are you saying vegetarians are abnormal?!”

Um… no. Dang it, I don’t even know who is talking anymore! Narrative devices aren’t supposed to be confusing! Let me talk more about Serb Fest.

“Okay.”

So there was food, and drink, and history, and tours of the church, and dancing, and music. The music was provided not only by Majstory but also by an acoustic group, pictured both above and below.

Play, play, play the Serbian folk tune!

That guy playing the upright bass is also the bassist for Majstory. What’s more, he is named Joe Brudny and he came over to my house yesterday and recorded some of that medium-sized guitar (which is actually not a guitar per se but rather a Serbian instrument called a brač) for me. Awesome.

IMPORTANT NEWS: I’ll be drumming again with Majstory for a similar event in Kansas City on September 13th! Come on over! Say “shta radish tea!” to people and they will think you’re Serbian too.

Now I am going to go before Attractive Girl or Vegetarian Girl confusingly interrupt again.