Around the Balkans in 20 Days – Part 10

The luxury of a twin room is that one does not disturb the other when it comes to tossing and turning, or when one gets up. I think John was happy of this fact as I turned out of bed at a not too late a time, in order to get breakfast.

I sat in the jazzy reception area where breakfast was put on, alongside a family with two toddlers and two straight couples. I grabbed some coffee, cheese and bread, sat myself down, and then oscillated between looking up news on my phone and awkwardly smiling in appreciation when one of the toddlers became rambunctious. After my second cup of coffee, and fully briefed on world news, I returned to the room to wake a sleepy John and get ready for the day out. It must have been around 10:30am.

It was a grey day, so John wore jeans and a jumper. I stopped after adding a jacket, wanting to keep my shorts on, as it was still warm. We visited the small bakery at the T-junction yards from our B&B, so John could grab a pastry to eat as we walked. As we began to retrace our route yesterday, it decided to rain. So we ducked into the Produce Market on Mula Mustafe Bašeskije, the site of the mortar attacks that killed scored of people during the siege. In-between walking around the food stalls in search for one that sold umbrellas; we stopped and read the mural to those killed that took up the whole space of the back wall. Once we looped round and walked back to the road, we managed to locate a stand that sold allsorts and purchased an umbrella for 10KM (about £5).

We then carried on towards our destination, the railway station. We passed the memorial from yesterday, and now noted that the road we were walking along and the pedestrian road yesterday becomes Maršala Tita – Marshall Tito. The rain was dying down as we passed the modern BBI shopping centre to our left, and arrived at a large junction with Ali Pasha’s Mosque commanding a dominant position. We crossed over the road and at a fork, took a right, splitting off from the main east west road taking us direct to the station. Away from the traffic, we looked up and around us. The street was quiet, with the odd café having seated patrons outside. The brown-grey Austrian-style blocks that started off the street still had bullet holes on them, alongside more recent graffiti. These then opened up to more familiar 1960s high-rise blocks before the train station plaza and tram stop welcomed us.

The train station was built in the modernist style, reflecting that of Templehof airport in Berlin. Almost light yellow in colour with a hint of marble effect; the curved building seemed to hug the plaza area in front. Only a handful of people seemed to inhabit the plaza and cafés nestled under a canopy at the station entrance. The modern, glass mini skyscraper loomed over us to our right as we approached the main ticket hall. There was as much life in here as there was outside, and we were soon to find out the reason why.

I approached one of the two open ticket desks and asked if there was a train to Mostar in a few days time. She shook her head politely, to which I responded with a “No!?”. She then explained in simple terms that there were no trains south. The train line is closed. This now made sense, as research I did before the trip seemed to imply that there were no trains. But learning from my previous trip, I thought things might have been different when here. We were then directed to the bus station located next door. We walked around past a couple of newspaper kiosks and entered the rather dated building plastered in an array of adverts for a multitude of bus companies and routes. We walked in to a small, dark-wooded ticket hall, and joined the queue. We didn’t need to get the tickets today, but I wanted to check how much they would be and how frequent the service was. After greeting the ticket seller with “Dobar dan” I soon conversed in English to ask my key questions. The price was similar if not a little cheaper than the train, and there were around 7 buses a day. He gave me the times of them so we could consult. Prior to the journey, I had already booked a bus ticket from Dubrovnik to Split to get the flight home. They were a Croatian company, but had services from Croatian parts of Bosnia. I noticed that they had services from Mostar. Later on, I would marry up the Sarajevo-Mostar route, plan for a short stop over, and then book a ticket for the Mostar-Dubrovnik route.

John wanted a soft drink, so we went to one of the kiosks outside. After purchasing, we had an idea to visit the Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina then the National Museum, which were located next to each other. So we walked south alongside the heavily fortified US Embassy, crossed the main road, and went in to the Historical Museum first. The building had still not been renovated since my last visit, and everything had a sort of ‘thrown together’ sort of feel to it. The display in the lobby area was different to before, with a wall of pictures juxtaposing photos of buildings in Sarajevo immediately after the siege with those recently.

We were directed to go downstairs with two other people for an English tour, led by a strapping young blonde lad in his 20s who was working in the archives. We descended a set of stairs in a small, glass-encased tower, and approached a doorway that had further steps beyond it and into a concrete bunker at the basement level. On our right, after the doorway, were two 1960s low-rise style black leather and silver framed chairs. The archivists’ opening speech focused on these with a story of the visit of the man himself, Tito. I felt that he was aching for us to be both amused and surprised to learn that Tito sat in one of these very chairs before us, so much so that he offered to take our picture in them. We politely declined. He seemed downbeat at our disinterest.

At the bottom of the stairs, and in the first of two sections in the bunker, was a display of Communist paraphernalia, which our guide talked us through with an air of having done this hundred of times. Batons, posters, badges, patches; you name it. We then wondered through a seriously thick metal security door. The room was encircled with militaristic metal shelving, which seemed to underscore a lot of what was on display in the damp and gloomy space. These items were from the Partisan struggle during WWII and contained many firearms and low-grade weapons. Some of the gorier items were clubs containing nails, or barbwire wrapped sticks. Again, there were other items from the period, which the guide talked us through.

When the tour ended 20 minutes later we ascended the glass staircase into the sunlight, continuing up to the second floor where the exhibition was. It came in three parts, the first part being new since my last visit. This was an examination of the material life of Yugoslav citizens since 1945, instantly drawing John and mine’s attention. A squared-off section of the main hall had within it a maze style layout that led us to move between themes. One theme looked at holidays and transportation, showcasing vintage posters of the national airline JAT and emphasizing the liberal migration policy Yugoslavia had in the form of ‘Gastarbeiters’, in deviation from other, Soviet dominated countries. Another theme looked at material life in the home. The 1970s chic outfit of a living room encouraged John to exclaim that it was an exact replica of ours back home. You couldn’t deny it. I fancied a couple of the pieces of furniture myself for the living room.

Once we made our way through this, we then went on to the second phase that looked at the siege. This was chronologically ordered and from a political angle, displaying items that the army or citizens used over the 5-year period. An example was a makeshift cooker that was used when the gas was turned off. I hurried around this part as I had seen it previously, but I still managed to give John the odd contextual explanation as he went around. The final section was post-Dayton looking at the settlement and subsequent governance of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

After this, and all the walking we had done up until now, we decided to go for a drink and a sit down. As we descended the stairs I noticed a cast iron life-sized statue of Tito in commanding pose out in an unkempt courtyard. This was a replica of the one in the grounds of the House of Flowers in Belgrade from a few days ago. I grabbed a snap and continued down the stairs. Tucked at basement level, at the back of the museum, was a café simply called “Caffe Tito”. If there was any evidence to suggest that Bosnians had a soft spot for Tito and Yugoslav nostalgia, then the last hour and half was proof enough. We slid past the patrons sat outside in the warmth, all young and student-like, and headed inside to cooler climes. Despite my aggravation from the heat, I ordered a hot coffee. Thinking ahead to the rest of the day, my third coffee before midday was a bit ambitious and could go either way. In between chatting and updating ourselves with social media banter, we admired the kitsch décor that had sparingly been placed on the walls in the dimly lit interior. The odd poster here and there from post WWII times, and a framed map of the now disintegrated country, was peppered amongst the Partisan and Pioneer memorabilia in the foreground of walls printed in bold patterns in the red, white and blue of the Socialist Yugoslav flag.

After finishing our drinks, we went to the neighbouring National Museum. This one featured archeological artifacts and a botanical garden in the courtyard. Having been before, I rushed around half re-reading signs on the displays. After a wonder around the gardens, we soon departed. We walked eastward to pass the dominant glass encrusted Parliament building on Trg Bosne I Hercegovine. The Holiday Inn loomed across the road as we walked on to a new shopping mall on this main axis of roads. We decided to eat here, visiting the food market section on the top floor, and chose to visit a restaurant that offered an array of food styles, mostly Western. I decided on a chicken, apple and hazelnut salad, which was delicious. Having rested our feet once again, we then walked back to the old town, taking in other side streets and buildings that we had not yet seen.  The most impressive was the Bezistan. This was the old, stone-built market hall in the centre of the old town. Now mostly full of shops selling rather tacky tourist stuff, the odd clothes shop or bag emporium stuck out. I imagined it to be mesmerizing when merchants sold textile or copper in the hall, the noises of production mixing with chatter and camaraderie, all for the shopper to see.

I knew the intense coffee intake earlier would now lead to a massive crash. In desperation, and with a renowned sweet tooth, we stopped at a café in the old town that had a vast selection of cakes on offer. I opted for a coffee and walnut cake that had layers of crushed meringue in it. It was divine! I also had a Bosnian coffee – why the hell not!

We decided to pay a visit to the Sarajevo Pivo Brewery, located on the south side of the river, not too far away. It had a museum too, so we decided it was worth our while. We crossed the river, admiring the town hall building once more, when I stumbled upon a street sign on a building that we were approaching. Below it was another sign with some explanatory text. The two newer signs were on the opposite side of a window to an older one. The newer street sign indicated the road to be called Ulica Obala Isa-Bega Ishakovica, named after the city’s founder. The older one was called Obala Pariske Komune, named to mark the 1871 revolutionary, socialist government in Paris. What the explanatory sign detailed was the history of name changing on this particular street. The Paris Commune connection is an obvious post WWII change. The newer name is a reflection of the Ottoman heritage that present day Bosniaks hold as part of their identity.

The whole issue of naming and re-naming is fascinating, and has been the site of common ideological and national struggles in South East Europe, particularly in the post-Communist era. The symbolic power that naming has, is a reflection of those who are in dominating positions at any one time. When you move beyond street names that come from geographic, topographical or commercial markers, such as Mostar Road, Mountain View, Copper Tin Alley for example; the act of naming then becomes political. This street in Ottoman times was named after two trades that existed on this side of the river when expansion of the city came along. When the Austro-Hungarians decided to regulate the river and create an embankment, they renamed it Careva Street, Careva being ‘Emperor’ in an obvious nod to their Monarch. In 1914, for 5 years, it was named after a sultan before returning to Careva Street then changing to Careva Obala, obala being ‘left bank’. It then changed to Francuska (French) Obala in 1927, then during a period of 4 years under the occupation of the Independent State of Croatia it held a different name before becoming Obala Pariske Komune. It changed to its current name in 1993. One can draw from this, that the last renaming was the attempt of Bosniak officials to lay down a marker that Sarajevo is a Muslim, Bosniak city, with a heritage that rests largely on its proud Ottoman history that will not be erased even when under siege.

We moved on and took a street that climbed up the hillside from the river. I noticed a number of Serbian registered cars here, so was unsure if this was a predominantly Serb area. We then reached the brewery. It was a dominant terracotta-bricked, gothic-styled building that seemed sort of out of place here and rather Bavarian. We passed the goods entrance and noticed a sign for the museum. We went in and noticed that it was literally a room that was 8 meters by 8 meters. The girl on reception said that we could pay something like £2 for the museum, or £3 for the museum and a free drink at the pub. We opted for the latter ticket. So we looked at the brewery themed objects on display and read a bit about the history. I noticed one piece that mentioned that this brewery had a connection with one in Petrovaradin Fortress in Novi Sad. What a coincidence.

We soon left and went to the pub. It was actually very impressive and very spacious. It almost had the style of a very well done Wetherspoons with added Germanic flair. Wood paneling dominated the décor; with a traditional bar almost spanning the whole left side of the pub. You also had a balconied area. We were only amongst a handful of patrons. Obviously too early for most, but I did notice that they had entertainment on at a more modest time of 8pm. We grabbed a seat and claimed our first pivo, fresh from the factory (or one would imagine). Having enjoyed the taste, we paid for another round before leaving.

We descended the hill back into the old town and ate somewhere non-descript. After that we attempted to find one of 3 places we believed to be LGBT friendly venues. After lurking around near the Orthodox Church and canton buildings, we gave up and returned to the B&B. Better that we didn’t drink any more, as we would be driving the next day.

Around the Balkans in 20 Days - Part 2

We awoke in a daze, not only because of our previous days in Berlin catching up with us, but to the new surroundings in Skopje. Air con whirring in the corner of the room and sunlight peering through the curtains, signified a new day in new accommodation. A refreshing shower preceded our flight down stairs on to the main square in search of breakfast.

We traversed the square to a series of cafes and selected one at random. Our hunger was satisfied with a light continental breakfast and coffee. Although it may seem that we were eager to return to homely comforts, we were in the perfect location from which to observe passersby and wake up more agreeably.  Spritzers emitted a cooling mist from the canopy intending to cool us patrons, however a slow breeze turned it away from John and I, leaving a tumbler of water the only option to cool down in the mid-morning heat.

We had an appointment with our hostess’ father to take us to the police station at eleven o’clock. So we strolled back to our apartment, all 90 seconds away, and paid him a visit.

The one thing to know about Skopje is that it is basically a massive village – everyone knows everyone. Our hostess’s father (let’s call him Mr Airbnb) took us on the “ten minute” walk up to the police station. We arrived twenty minutes later, his popularity evident by the peppering of greetings to passersby along our route. Despite his self-admitted poor English, Mr Airbnb succeeded in pointing out prominent buildings and monuments along our walk.

I have never been fond of the grotesque mutilation of the modernist buildings in Skopje’s city centre. On my first visit here, in 2009, the main square was a stoic blank plaza, with either the Kale Fortress or Millennium Cross as its only backdrop. Over the years as I have revisited, additions such as statues, new government buildings, and even galleons on the Vardar, have all increased the sense that Skopje has become what many have called ‘Disneyland’. Its main square littered with poor representations of selected historic figures, the disappointment being that Macedonia has a much more varied and diverse history than that which the Government wants to present to its people and the world. Yet the resistance to these buildings and monuments, and by extension to the Government pursuing the vanity project, was all the more evident in daylight as we walked on. An ironic symbol of the vast waste of money being spent appeared as we turned a corner, the revamped Ministry of Finance, itself now the victim of the ‘Colourful Revolution’.

We entered the local police station, and John’s nerves piqued as he saw the ‘No Guns’ sign on the glass entrance door.  Several burly Macedonian officers were speaking in raised voices to and over one another, between an office to our left and a reception cubicle to our right. Being in a police station is usually an uncomfortable experience, a sense that you have done something wrong sweeping over you.  Our only comfort was Mr Airbnb being our bridge between sightseer and illegal alien. He picked up two documents, and explained that we had to complete them. After a couple of minutes, we completed our papers and returned to the reception desk to hand them and our passports over to the officer at the desk. He inspected our passports, to check that our details on the documents were identical, and then recorded our stay in a logbook. Evidently, government money had not been spent on IT equipment to register visitors.  Once we received our passports and a small docket that we had to keep on us, we departed. And so, after our first experience registering our stay in a country, we thanked Mr Airbnb and ventured off back to the main square.

As noon approached, I decided that we should do a little exploring. As the day was slightly overcast, we could spend a little longer outdoors than what we could if we had the sun and heat bearing down on us. We aimed for the Old Bazaar, having first to pass through a vanguard of kitsch neo-classical buildings on the rivers left bank, there seemingly to thwart curious visitors from proceeding any further.  The insinuation being that Macedonia was Macedonian, and its history had to reflect that. We carried on regardless, to discover another present and past that hid behind them.

The architecture of the Old Bazaar could not be more different to the modernist buildings occupying the right side of the river.  Faint yellow, single and double tier buildings, lined stone slab streets. Their terracotta roofs hinting towards their near Mediterranean location, yet the overall feel of the neighbourhood was primarily echoing its Ottoman lineage. Weaving narrow streets branched out uphill to our left, or onwards towards the main market space. Shopkeepers were making the most of the dry weather, sitting outside their cosy shops, almost as advertisements for the shops themselves rather than the wares contained within. After rambling along the main thoroughfare, we were met by the bustling general market. Located on a narrow strip of land, between the main road heading north into the Skopje suburbs, and the old town, the market was a hive of activity.

This was the heart of the predominantly Albanian part of town. Many of the stalls sold trinkets with the Albanian national flag, mirroring those flown on nearby buildings. The switch from Macedonian Cyrillic to Albanian Latin script in only a few hundred yards was keenly felt, though not altogether unfamiliar for an English speaker. Groups of older men sat with Turkish coffee and played dominos, whilst mothers and children nosed at the offerings on food stalls or those selling household items. It reminded me of my childhood in Wrexham.  Not the coffee and dominos.

We turned back on ourselves, and instantly took a right turn to begin walking up the hill. I knew that ahead of us was the one experimental modernist building in the neighbourhood – the Museum of Macedonia. I was aware of how empty the exhibition was from a previous visit, but the grounds of the museum contained an Ottoman building that I was curious to see.  As we turned a corner, we entered the concrete stone plaza that gradually rose to the museum further up the hill. We veered right to investigate the rundown Ottoman structure. Kurshumli An was an old caravanserai, or what we would call an inn. Although not open for us to have a look around, we studied the architectural style - rather byzantine in look, with the use of slim terracotta bricks. A hidden gem juxtaposed next to its modernist neighbour.  A group of 5 or so children played football on the weed-strewn plaza, indifferent to us whilst we took pictures. The marvel of these two buildings, and that they were not looked after, brought home the extent to which the governments – both city and national – fail to grasp the potential for tourism with the existing historical buildings and monuments. But a part of me also felt that it was an adventure was to seek them out, and an onslaught of tourists would begin to tarnish their untouched grandeur.

And so onwards we went, scaling the hill still further. After passing yet another small group of domino players in this quieter area, we saw one of the neighbourhood’s larger mosques peaking out above buildings ahead of us.  And this was the moment we were caught off guard. A smaller mosque we were walking past sounded up its tannoy to deliver the mid afternoon call to prayer. Then the main mosque ahead of us, evidently with a greater number of tannoys producing a roaring loudness, competed with the smaller mosque for attention. Then in the distance two or three more calls to prayer erupted.  Although I had experienced the call to prayer here previously, for John this was his first ever experience. An immediate fear – had we trespassed on to someone’s land, or was some other trouble imminent - immediately turned into marvel at the spectacle around us.  

As the calls receded, we continued our climb around past the main mosque, and up towards the Museum of Modern Art. From its grounds we had spectacular views of the city below and beyond. The Philip II stadium dominated the foreground to the south west, the river snaking around it towards us, and then swerving to pass us below. Southward, over and above the city, the Millennium Cross emphasised the Orthodox Christian population residing on the right bank of the Vardar. We descended the hill via the Kale Fortress. This was the first time I had managed to explore its grounds, blocked on my previous visits by ongoing excavations. The grounds contained very few standing structures, those being a number of guard towers on the perimeter facing the city. Aside from the walls of the fortress, the only things of note were the vaults that had been uncovered that resembled mere stone trenches.  We did a return trip along the fortress wall, gauging the drop from its ledge to the ground outside and pointing out possible past entrances Ottoman soldiers may have used.

The sun was starting the break through the overcast sky as we returned back to the city via the Stone Bridge. But I, with the strange copious amounts of energy I tend to have, was eager to point out further sights from my past visits. A burning desire to ‘show off’ Skopje came over me. John knew he had to keep up regardless. We followed the river towards the City Park to gaze upon the monument marking the Partisan take over of Skopje in 1944, in the grounds of the government building. Unhappy bedfellows I am sure. We toured the block that would lead us back in to the city, passing dated air con-pocked residential tower blocks resting next to the byzantine looking Cathedral of St Clement of Ohrid. Avoiding a return to the square, we turned south towards the City of Skopje Museum. This is housed in the former Skopje Railway Station. Only a third of the modernist 1920s building remains, but the simplistic clock still points to the time the devastating 1963 earthquake struck. The reason for a lot of the brutalist 1960s architecture rose out of the ashes of this disaster, mostly as gifts from an array foreign capital cities and countries. A nod to Yugoslavia’s then widely regarded non-aligned status.

A natural finish to the busy day led us next door to Ramstore Mall. I knew of a cheap supermarket in the basement where we could grab basics for breakfast and lunch. We did a shop to last us our stay, and strolled back to our apartment. Needless to say, by 5pm we had knackered ourselves into an afternoon nap. Air con naturally on.

Around mid evening time we woke up, just as the sun was beginning to set on the city. Our apartment came with a narrow balcony that overlooked the square, so we sat on the two campstools that were there to take in the transition to twilight. At the supermarket I was keen to get my hands on some wine from the Tikves region. M&S had only recently begun to stock it at £8 a bottle back home. Here, it was £3.50 for the priciest. I bought one to take back home with me, and another to enjoy now, as we soaked up the views from up on high. In the summer heat of Skopje, a glass or two of red from the region eased me into the relaxing evening that lay ahead.

Once refreshed and dressed, we went down to the busy square and were seated on an outside table at Pelister. An easy first choice for us to eat at, for it has an eclectic mix of local and pan European food to satisfy our tastes at reasonable prices. We could also people watch – our favourite pastime – as couples and families strolled around Alexander the Great and his horses. After devouring my risotto, washed down with a local crisp white, we departed the restaurant and walked along the riverside embankment strewn with cafes and bars where we earlier had breakfast. You had two sections to each bar; the main bar that protruded from the brutalist shopping mall, and across a pathway from it an outdoor part with seating, fans and TV screens. Beyond that, another pathway and then the river. We chose a particularly rowdy bar, unsure whether the night may develop into a club or party. Two strong vodka cokes, on par with Spanish resort levels, arrived at our table, so that we finished our busy first full day in Skopje sat outside taking in the mildly chaotic nightlife that Wednesday offered us.