I, Grace visited our clinical investigators in Sarajevo and Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina (part of the former Yugoslavia) on Nov. 21, 2008. Three clinical associates from Croatia and Bosnia accompanied me for a very short one-day tour. Sarajevo is famous for the winter Olympics held in 1984, and sadly the country was besieged between 1992 to 1996 during the Bosnian war. I was impressed by its religious diversity of Islam, Orthodoxy, Catholicism and Judaism, which is why Sarajevo is nicknames Jerusalem of Europe.
Mostar, about two and half hours by car from Sarajevo, is located in the Herzegovina part of the country. It is named after its old bridge, built in 1566. Unfortunately, the bridge was destroyed in 1993 during the Bosnian war. It was reconstructed and completed in 2004. It was very difficult to walk with dress shoe heels on the white limestone. I had to hold on to Mirna to cross the bridge with 29 meters in length and 20 meters in height. The night scenes of the bridge was unreal. Here are a few photos of both sides of the bridge.
The next morning I woke up to a beautiful early snow. I looked out from the hotel window, the picturesque views look like those in the postcards. In the fore ground, there are mosques and church towers; and in the far ground, there are many houses on the nearby hills. I stayed at Hotel Europa Garni right in the old town. The hotel was bombed during the war. It has a Moroccan restaurant in the basement which serves good Couscous! I only had one hour to photograph that morning before leaving for the airport. Here are some photographs of the old town and the restaurant.
1 comment:
Cool. I like the snow morning picture the most. MD has not begun to snow.
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