So much to see and so many sad war reminders

7.8.15

Its official, I’m going to be haunted by the sugar forever.
Last night I couldn’t open my inhaler and this morning my deodorant roll on was encrusted too.

We walked to the railway station to buy our ticket for our next stop on our journey-Mostar in a few days,following the tram tracks to the last stop.
It took around an hour to walk and we passed lots of places of interest and shopping malls.- on our list for another time. I got told off as I wanted to go down every alleyway and explore!
Buying the ticket was simple and we couldn’t resist having a little look to make sure we know how to find our platform.
Hmm….quite an eye opener given the posh malls and tall glass buildings surrounding it.

Found a museum on our way back from the train station -1995 to 2005 I think it was called.
We were starving and decided to eat before visiting the museum and eventually found a place to eat across the river that didn’t just sell ice cream and cake, called Milkman, and I tried a Bosnian speciality -sesame seed chicken nuggets (a bit tasteless really) and John had chicken in a curry sauce.
The restaurants were all beautiful, lovely furniture, water features and plants set in amongst really scruffy run down tower blocks.
It looked just like Somerstown in Portsmouth by my GP surgery.

We went into the museum, a very run down building with loads of bullet holes.

Inside were loads of harrowing photos and accounts on the Genocide, some real tear jerking moments.

I now understand all the shelling and holes in the buildings, it was to scare people into not leaving their homes, so they would basically starve and die.

So very sad, and so recent really. Hard to imagine how people lived like this for 3 years.
There was an excellent photographic display of buildings then and now.

There were lots of positive stories about community spirit, generosity and how people realised the importance of entertainment and people began to put on live performances, music, culture and art events to make their time more pleasurable.

We walked to a huge shopping mall afterwards and on the first floor found a bar where we had beer and my Martini was served neat, but was very good.

We watched life going on and pondered on what we had seen, a big legacy seems to be the continuation of the arts, there’s posters and flyers all over the place for various events.

John spotted Havaianas flip flops in the sale in Office shoe shop. I nearly bought some online before the trip. They really are so much more comfortable than normal ones.
Brilliant value, I got 2 pairs for less than the price of one normally.

We wandered in the 2 malls on either side of the road and enjoyed familiar and not so familiar stores.

John bought shorts and I bought a belt.
We walked all the way back, but totally ran out of steam to visit all the buildings on our list, so they will be for tomorrow. Settled for just taking photos of some outsides and discovered Kinder chocolate ice cream. (could be fatal, its divine)

Suddenly it got very windy and black clouds appeared. Up until then it was hot and sunny.
We sheltered in a side tunnel with a load of other people but decided getting wet outweighed the risk of passive smoking and found a doorway by the eternal flame.

We ran to a little cafe that was doing a baklava and coffee deal so had to have that. Totally delicious and the tiny espresso coffees are wonderful.
John spotted a man dressing up as a beer bottle and giving away free cans so of course he had to go and get one!

The sun came back out so we wandered around the vibrant old town again until it was time for more beer and Martini.
The Martini was horrible, lemonade got lost in translation and it was basically lemon juice with a hint of lemon and a dash of Martini.
The bargain advertised beer wasn’t available because they were waiting for the boss to come and change the barrel. John was given a small Dutch tasteless bottled beer which he was less than impressed with.
The bar was aptly called Pirate bar and we were definitely robbed!
Almost double what we paid before, way over the top prices!
Oh well…our first bad experience and the only time we weren’t given a little slip of paper with our bill.

Despite wanting to eat the delicious cevap every day it seemed daft not to try something different so we had pizza and calzone. Absolutely perfect.

Exhausted and needing chill out time we went back towards our guesthouse.
Stopped at a supermarket on the corner for bottled water and chocolate and got tutted at by the most miserable guy at the till for putting the water by the items he had already rung up.
Made a few tutting sounds of our own, had the change thrust in my hand and think we will use the little shop further up the hill or just dehydrate in future.

We were only saying earlier that people aren’t generally very friendly.
The lady in the museum tutted at us too for picking up a leaflet, and small booklet – neither of which had any indication that there was a charge for them – and walking away. We went and paid when she called us over to ask for money but still got a loud tut!

Maybe the people are friendly, but we’re used to living among Turks who are far more demonstrative and welcoming and want to interact.
So far its only been the cemetery man and the Tourist office girls who have made any effort to chat.

more observations :

Almost everyone smokes, everywhere, inside or out.
Lots of people speak German
When you order a drinks or food you get a print out that you hand in when you pay ( except when being robbed by pirates)
We’ve never seen such a diverse range of people in a relatively small place
So much Turkish influence, adverts for Konya on trams, shops named after Turkish shops, baklava, Turkish delight, Turkish souvenirs
Bosnian ladies are very well dressed and take pride inn their appearance. Many look stunning and have beautiful make up and dresses even in the daytime.
There is very little obesity, maybe because of incredibly hard times when they got used to eating so little.

Really looking forward to day 3, so many places still to explore.