After, we left Sarajevo. I kind of dozed off. When I woke up, it was a winter wonderland. It was about 3 degrees C in Sarajevo, and it was -3 degrees C. It had snowed the night before in Sarajevo, so it was slippery, but it didn't really stick. But here, it was white! Everywhere! Lovely! We passed a bombed out and abandoned village, covered in snow. It was a little surreal. Then we had to go down the winding icy mountain road on a coach bus. Luckily, Boris has earned the nickname Ms. Frizzle, so the magic school bus did it somehow.
Then we went through a tunnel, and whoa! No snow! There was a lovely green river flowing alongside the bus, the weather warmed up to 5 degrees C, and we had a lovely balmy drive through the mountains. I have some great pictures.
The valley we were driving through was a strategic valley as it opens to the sea and is very difficult to occupy without help from the locals. We stopped at a museum along the road that was opened by Tito to commemorate a dramatic WWII battle against the Germans. The Yugoslav Partisans were suffering, so they withdrew to this stronghold, and 80,000 Yugoslav citizens came with the military, bearing the wounded Yugoslav soldiers with them. The bridges were all destroyed, so the army built a tiny wooden bridge in 19 hours across the river and up a cliff alongside the old, destroyed train bridge, and had a good battle and whatnot. Our translator, Duska, is an art historian, so I am not exactly clear on what happened. Military translations are not her strong suit.
Anyway, we arrived in a very windy Mostar. Very windy. We actually postponed our city tour til tomorrow morning because the wind is so strong. We instead went to a lecture from the Nansen Dialogue Center. After, we went to dinner at a nice restaurant as a group. LaVana, Meichen and I sat with Darco (whose Christian name is Gabriel), a handsome, charming Croat (who has been dating a girl for 6 years. Damn!). He is a 3rd year Political Science student who is in charge of his faculty's student newspaper. Remember, the years are different. In the US, we have a 4-1-4 system for bachelors, master and doctorates, whereas in most of Europe have a 3-2-3 system. He watches MTV, and asked us if the shows he sees there are real to most American's lives. Answer: hell no! We are a diverse group (Meichen is Chinese, LaVana is Bahamian), so we compared politics and culture a lot.
It was a fun dinner. However, this is the second time I have ordered chicken with curry for dinner, and the second time it has been bland. I haven't had anything spicy since I've been here, and that's not by choice. I don't like spicy food, but everything here is mild. Ah well!
Anyway, we go to Split, Croatia in the afternoon. I hope to be able to buy some souvenirs here in Mostar tomorrow morning, and some from Croatia in the afternoon. Should be exciting! Back in the almost-EU!
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