Sarajevo

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Well here we are in Bosnia, after a grueling twenty four hour commute from Sofia, Bulgaria. We've been on four trains, two of them transnational, and when we arrived last night, we were absolute shells. Completely knackered, running on fumes. We arrived at the Sofia train station two nights ago with minutes to spare, and spent a few frenzied minutes running around (backpacks on) trying to locate our train. It adds a whole new level of difficulty to things when the country you're in uses a completely different alphabet than you're own. Like, it's still Cyrillic, like they use in Greece, but it's a different Cyrillic. Somehow.

So we finally got to our train and crashed in a sweaty mess in our compartment. So that's how the passport control officer found us, sweating and a little bit shaky.

"Hillo. Mey I see your pessport," he stated in his heavy Slavic accent.
I gave it to him and he studied it, glancing up at me with steely eyes.
"Do you hev anything to diclare."
"Some liquor I suppose."
He then had me take my bag down and got me to open various compartments, kneading my bag between his fingers, searching for a telltale something.
"Do you hev any drugs?"
"No."
"Do you do drugs?"
"No."
"Why not?" This was delivered with a kind of amused smile, without losing the steel.
"Why not?" I repeated, the way you'd say "Whaddaya mean, why not?"

Thus satisfied, he glanced cursorily at Kathleena's passport, did not check her bag. He pulled out a flashlight, and looked under the seats, in the shelves, everywhere. Then he pulled out a long, long screwdriver and proceeded to dismantle little bits of our compartment, taking off the panelling and peering behind. This he did for about ten minutes, before leaving.

Our train stayed there for about another hour and a half; we needn't have rushed the way we had. Finally our train left, and I slept little, staring out of the window, seeing strange things. Looking back, I realised I must have been dreaming at least some of the time, but the dreams I had always seemed set within the car, or just involved things I saw outside the train. Very strange, that twilight consciousness.

Crossing into Serbia we were stopped and checked again, by the Bulgars and the Serbs. I think I slept, but woke around four, staying up another three hours until Kathleena woke and we started to wonder when Belgrade would come. Finally it did, so we got off, left our bags at a left-luggage, and explored the town a little. We had some burek, which is sausage meat cooked in phyllo pastry. This variety was very greasy. Belgrade was very cool; we spent most of our two hours there exploring a wide, pedestrian thoroughfare full of shops and other things. It seemed like a very cool city, and worth spending at least a couple days there. Unfortunately it was only a stopover and we soon got back on the train.

This time we were entering into Bosnia, and our passports were checked at two different stops. We had a transfer at a little countryside station in a town called Strizivojna. We had some hamburgers. I paid with euros and have since learned that the guy gave us much too much change; he didn't know the real conversion and ripped himself off pretty bad. Oh well.

We arrived in Sarajevo last night around nine fifteen, and were on our way to our hostel when we simultaneously ran into an Edmontonian guy (born in Bosnia, speaks the language), his friend, and the innkeeper at another hostel. We ended up staying at the other hostel, which turned out real nice, clean rooms, clean bathroom, really small, and talking about everything Sarajevo with the guy.

So we settled in there and Kathleena had to go to sleep immediately. She was totally pooped. But we hadn't had anything to eat since hamburgers at two and I was starved. So I took a shower good enough to get clean after a full twenty four hours of sitting and sweating, and headed out to find food. What I found was Cevabje; a generous handful of small sausages fried on the griddle and served falling out of a thick, bready pita with a bunch of diced onions. I put ketchup on it and it was delicious and filled me right up. I went back and fell dead asleep until seven o'clock. I got right up, got dressed, and went out. It was grey and drizzling rain. I wandered around the old town, seeing things, everyone bustling around their morning commute. I had a chocolate croissant, and then some burek at a different place. Much better by far than in Belgrade. Mmm! They have it with a container of yogourt, but it's thin enough that you just drink it. I came back around nine and Kathleena was still asleep, so I woke her and we were out an hour later. That brings us to now. I'm in Bosnia!

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