A Day at the Zoo

Today we headed to Pionirska Dolina which is the City Zoo in Sarajevo. Among other animals, this llama was particularly my favourite. The moment it got out of this fabulous hut in the photo, it kept staring at me or I felt as though it was. Anyway, do you remember the scene in the Harry Potter series where a silver stag appears as Harry Potter conjures the Patronus Charm to repel dementors? Well, that is almost what I felt when it emerged out of nowhere. A typical llama it was after all but I loved it. Have a look! 

Well I wanted to share two videos about the zoo life. The first one is pretty old: A Day at the Zoo is a 1939 Warner Bros. animated cartoon in the Merrie Melodies series.

The second one, Creature Comforts, was originally a 1989 British humorous animated short film about how animals feel about living in a zoo, featuring the voices of the British public "spoken" by the animals. It was created by Nick Park. 

Black Bean Salad for Iftar

It's been almost one week since we returned to Sarajevo and I haven't had the opportunity to go grocery shopping yet. The list of the things that's running out or already has is waiting restlessly on the refrigerator. Well, it was another rush hour before Iftar yesterday and I didn't have many choices. I quickly found a jar of black beans and soon we enjoyed a great salad. Here goes the super easy recipe. I just used what's on hand. 

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup of freshly cooked black beans
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 medium tomatoes, chopped 
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 clove crushed garlic
• 1/4 cup fresh chopped parsley
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of sugar (to taste)
• Salt, pepper and oregano to taste

Directions

In a large bowl, combine the beans, onions, tomatoes, parsley, garlic, lemon juice and olive oil. Add sugar, salt, oregano and pepper to taste. (The sugar will help balance the acidity from the tomatoes and lemon juice.) Chill before serving.

Dreams and the King

''I think we dream so we don't have to be apart so long. If we're in each other's dreams, we can play together all night.'' Bill Watterson

All men dream and so do I. I dream mostly about people. I dream about people who are mostly far away from me. Some of them live just a few blocks away and some are a few countries away. They share their stories with me in my own dreams and I think it is my privilege to be there with them. 

I do not really care whether dreams are today's answers to tomorrow's questions. They might be as well. However, I do attach so much importance to events occurring in dreams. The moment I remember what happened in my dreams in the morning or later during the day, I write to the person or people concerned and inform them about all the details. They of course don't react or interpret the dream as I would and it makes me pretty disappointed yet I keep on believing that dreams are there for us to play together some more throughout the night. 

Well, the last person I dreamed about is Queen Elizabeth II. I won't go into details but in my dream she was on a short trip in Istanbul accompanied by all her family including Kate Middleton. The next morning, I was having my morning coffee and I was surprised to find this image of a king with his crown in my cup. 

P.S. I haven't written to Her Majesty about my dream yet. :)