Skopje Throwback

I think this photo is from 2007...It's of an anti-abortion poster I saw in Skopje, Macedonia. (I'm just trying to say that Skopje isn't solely about grossly oversized statues of Alexander the Great....at least it wasn't 4 years ago.)

Skopje, Macedonia

In Skopje, sidewalks are for parking, not walking.

Stone Bridge, Skopje

On my way from Kosovo to Copenhagen, I spent the night in Skopje (at the lovely Hotel 903-ta, of course!). I was walking over the stone bridge and into the main square.

I really, really, really like Skopje.

Skopje, Macedonia: 3/3/11

Astonishing.

Ambitious.

Outlandish.

The sheer size and number of buildings and statues under construction in central Skopje at the moment is nearly unbelievable. There is even a newly inaugurated Holocaust Memorial Center.

The following three photos were taken along the Vardar River (somewhat near the main square) and in these you can see three of the buildings that are in various states of completion.

This next photo shows a newly erected statue along the Vardar (with a building in progress in the background).

And, finally, if you look behind the two women on the bridge, you should be able to make out a huge pedestal that's being built (to the left of the flag and beneath the green sign on top of the building). I'm not sure who is going to go up there, but I bet it won't be a Macedonian of Albanian descent.

Good-bye to Kosovo: 3/2/11

I can't believe that my time in Kosovo passed so quickly. It was good to see so many friends and former students. I leave Kosovo looking for pathways that will take me back because I do not believe I am finished with Kosovo yet.

I left Kosovo via the southern border on the Pristina-Skopje road at Hani i Elezit (where the Kosovar border guard made sure to give my passport and extra clear exit stamp). As the crow flies, the distance between Prizren and Skopje is 40-ish miles. However, the drive Skopje from Prizren is circuitous and takes around three hours (and that's going through Ferizaj and not through Sterpce which may cut about an hour off the drive, but the road goes through the Sharri Mountains and was snowy).

The Restaurant & Pizzeria Park-U, which is a few minutes outside of Ferizaj on the main Pristina-Skopje road, made a really good farewell macchiato. Plus, the bathrooms were very clean and well-stocked.

Next destination: A night in Skopje then of to Copenhagen!

Not the Vardar

For whatever reason, as I was walking along the river earlier, I was
suddenly reminded of the River Vardar, which runs through Skopje,
Macedonia. Hiroshima has 7 tributaries cutting through the city, so
there's a lot of river to walk along.

Macedonia Part 2

Saturday, June 27th Continued

The cave church of Radozda was small, but worth the hike up the many steps. It made the oily cheese & ham crepe I ate for breakfast move a little uncomfortably in my stomach, but that's what I get for being a good sport and eating what I'm served. After walking back into town and returning the key to Dva Biseri, where I wish I had eaten breakfast, I hopped in the little Chevy Spark and drove back towards Struga so I could get back on the main road that would take me around to Albania.

Much how Lake Tahoe straddles California and Nevada, Lake Ohrid is shared by Macedonia and Albania, with Macedonia being in charge of the bigger chunk. In fact, here are a few other statistical comparisons of the two lakes (gleaned from Wikipedia):

Lake Ohrid
Max depth: 940 feet
Area: 138 sq miles
Shoreline: 54 miles
Elevation: 2273 feet
Residence time of water: 70 years

Lake Tahoe
Max depth: 1645 feet
Area: 192 sq miles
Shoreline: 71 miles
Elevation: 6225 feet
Residence time of water: 650 years

I attacked Lake Ohrid in a clockwise manner, starting up at the top and heading west. The border crossing between Macedonia and Albania near the lake took forever. It was the first time I had crossed into Albania with a car with Macedonia plates and it took longer than expected. When you enter Albania in a Kosovo-plated car, the guards practically roll out the red carpet (having a US passport doesn't hurt, either). There was extra paperwork to fill out as well. Additionally, the natural chaos that seems to come with Albania affects the border guards, so the whole process isn't as organized and structured as, say, driving into British Columbia at one of the major crossing points from Washington.

About an hour later I was on my way, heading once again clockwise around Lake Ohrid. My first stop was in Lin, Albania, a tiny town just inside the border and plopped right on the lake. It was a spur-of-the moment decision. Lin has a pre-Byzantine church that's surrounded by a chain link fence and locked up. There is a person with a key who does charge some sort of entrance fee, but I decided to head to a cafe and have a coffee instead.

Per usual, driving in Albania is a rather loose and fast affair. There was a lot of traffic on the road from cars with foreign plates, and I think because national elections were on Sunday, people working abroad were coming back home to vote. The road took me through Pogradec, which was where I was planning to have lunch, but it was so frenetic and crowded and dusty and ugly, I decided to skip my stop. Instead, I stopped just before the border heads back into Macedonia at Tushemisht. Lunch was nothing spectacular, but I was able to spend the leftover lek I had from a previous trip.

I entered back into Macedonia and continued my way around the lake. I stopped at Sveti Naum, a monastery founded in 905 by St. Naum, and I poked around a bit. It's perched right on the lake and there are fantastic views. There are also peacocks running around the grounds making noise and flapping around. One can stay at the monastery for 37 Euros ($52). I considered it, but it was early yet and I decided to continue.

On my way towards the town of Ohrid, I stopped at the Bay of Bones, which is a recreation of a village that had been established on the shores of Lake Ohrid during Roman times. It was good to get out of the car and walk around, but I'm not sure I would recommend it as a tourist stop. I also stopped at the Monastery of St. Stefan, another church built into a cave that required the walking up of several sets of steps. There were other people in the very small church when I arrived, so I waited a bit, poked my head in when I had a moment to do so, and went back down to the car. At that point, I was feeling pretty churched out.

I spent the night in the town of Ohrid in a small apartment in the old town. I didn't have a lake view, but I did have a comfortable bed and the area was pretty quiet.

Sunday, June 28th

After breakfast in my room (I bought some muesli and milk and a fantastically ripe melon the night before), I took a walk down to the church of St. Jovan of Kaneo. I love this place. I could not go to Ohrid without going here. Once I walked down to the church, I was pleasantly surprised that it was open, which it's never been when I've gone. The caretaker explained that many of the frescoes and icons had been damaged or stolen, and that it was a popular wedding spot. I walked around the grounds a bit, admiring the flowers and enjoying the lake view. As I walked back up towards town, I took one last look at the church and started to think about where I wanted to go next.

My circle around the lake was complete, and I had another day left with the car. As I walked back to where I had parked, the idea came: Macedonian wine country. I consulted my guide book and settled on going to the Popova Kula winery in the town of Demir Kapije. It took a few hours to get from Ohrid to Demir Kapije, but the roads in Macedonia are very good. Plus, drivers aren't crazy like Albanian drivers, so it was an easy drive. I arrived to the winery in the early afternoon and decided to spend the night. I splurged on a room with a bathtub. The first thing I did was to go to my room, take a bath, have a nap, and suddenly it was time for dinner.

In fact, I almost chose to sleep through dinner, but I did think better of it (sometimes when I take naps in the afternoon it's difficult for me to motivate for evening activities). The winery has a terraced restaurant, which was where I chose to sit. Macedonia has a rich agricultural region, and Popova Kula is smack in the middle of it. Driving in I saw roadside sellers with peaches and melons and zuchini and eggplants and greens and honey and other goodies, which is why I was so highly disappointed with my dinner. I ordered chicken in a peach sauce and was served a dry piece of chicken with a 1/2 of a canned peach on top. For breakfast the next morning, I was given toasted bread, a few packets of non-local jam and honey, and a coffee without milk (because they didn't have any). In an area so rich with agriculture, it was disappointing. The wines were fine, and the bathtub was nice, and it was quiet, but the food was blah.

Monday, June 29

The drive back to Skopje was easy. It took less than an hour. Because I had a few hours left with the car, once I returned to Skopje I drove up to the huge cross that towers over the town and enjoyed the view over the city. I then took the car back to Avis, had lunch, and went back to the bus station for the 3.5 hour ride back to Prizren.

This was a fantastic was to end my two year stay in Kosovo.

Macedonia: Part 1

Only a week ago I was still in Macedonia. I'm glad I spent my last weekend in Kosovo taking a trip around Macedonia. My destination was Lake Ohrid, a lake located in the southwest of the country. I'd been to Lake Ohrid before, but I'd never driven around it and I wanted to check out some of the churches spotting its shores.

Friday, June 26

I woke up, gathered my things, stopped by Princ to buy some of their yummy cheese-filled breakfast pastries, and headed over to the bus station. There are two busses that leave Prizren for Skopje during the week: the first is 5:30 am and the second is 9:00 am. I opted for the latter. A bus ride that used to take about 2.5 hours, stretched into 4 on that day. I don't know why it took so long, but I thought it would never end. As the crow flies, Skopje is a measly 40km or so from Prizren: it's just on the other side of the mountains. However, the road doesn't take the most direct route. By the time the Kosovo-Durres road to the Albanian coast is totally finished, going to the Adriatic will be a much quicker drive.

On Thursday night, I reserved a car from Avis (there are two Avis's in Skopje, one at the airport and one at the Ramstor). It was much cheaper to reserve the car through Avis's UK site than it was to go through the US Avis website (by about $70).

This is the car, a Chevy Spark.

I drove from Skopje down through Tetovo, stopping at the Pasha Djamija, or Prince's Mosque. The outside of the mosque is quite colorful and, at a glance, looks like the backs of playing cards.

The Pasha Djamija of Tetovo.

From Tetovo, I drove down to the Mavrovo National Park (an alternative way of driving between Skope and Ohrid that bypasses Kicevo). The park was lovely: small towns, mountains, greenery. I wish I'd had longer to stay and check out the hiking options, but I was headed towards Debar (outside of the park) to look at the Monastery of Sveti Jovan Bigorski (Saint John the Baptist) and the Nunnery of St. George. At both places, I had to put on a skirt (provided free of charge) and photos weren't allowed. The monastery had beautiful icons and frescos which reminded me a lot of Rila Monastery in Bulgaria. The nunnery had a beautiful garden and several nuns running around mowing the lawn, pulling weeds, and trimming up the bushes.

After leaving Debar, I headed onwards towards Ohrid. I made a wrong turn at Struga (which is a town on the lake) and ended up driving along a lake-side road that took me into Radozda. It was starting to get dark, so I decided to stop and find a place to spend the night. I stayed at the Villa Radozda, who had rooms with a great lake view for 20 Euros ($28). I thought that was fine. The place was quiet and I had a fine night's sleep.

Saturday, June 27

After a not-very-satisfying breakfast at the Villa Radozda (crepe with oily cheese and oily ham fried in oil and covered with sesame seeds), I grabbed a banana out of the car and walked down to Dva Biseri, a small restaurant in town. Above Dva Biseri, in the cliff walls, there is a cave church dedicated to the Archangel Michael. The door to the cave is locked but there is a key at Dva Biseri. Of course, when I walked in, no one spoke English, so I just pointed towards the cave and said, "Key?" while making a gesture like I was unlocking a door. It worked, and I walked up to the cave.

To get to the church, one has to walk up a substantial series of stairs. However, it's worth it. Some of the frescoes inside date back to the 13th century.

...to be continued (experiencing computer troubles at the moment)...

Skopje in Pictures

From last weekend in Skopje, I give you 13 pictures:

The text on the packaging reads: "Aromatic mixture of Tahebo and Green tea with orange aroma. Recommended for revitalization and straightening the organism." Drink, go forth, and straighten.

Juicing K

I was in Skopje last weekend and I made an impulse purchase: a juicer. No one has brought fresh juice to Kosovo yet. I crave, crave, crave fresh carrot juice. I found German imported carrot juice in the supermarket, but it tasted like preservatives, not carrots. I have eyeballed juicers here, but I'm not quite ready to spend $120 on a counterfeit juicer. I was ready to spend $35 on one that comes with a 24-month guarantee. The juicer is small and messy and a bit of a pain to operate, but it gives me fresh juice. And I really, really, really appreciate that.

Really, really, really. On my first day with it, I juiced 2 kilos of carrots (4.5 pounds or so). (I'm not turning orange yet.) The second batch of carrot juice I mixed with apple juice and orange juice. Very nice.

As soon as I have a bit more time, I'll upload some of my Skopje pics.

To Skopje (but not beyond)!

I haven't been to Skopje since my return to Kosovo. I like Skopje. I like that there's bacon. I like that there's a movie theater. I like that I can wander around the city and there are suitable sidewalks to walk along. The leaves should also be changing and brilliant. When I first went to Skopje this time last year, I was so happy to be out of Kosovo. A lot has happened in a year, and I've not only adjusted to life in Prizren, but I am enjoying it. I no longer see Skopje as the great escape necessary to keep me sane.

That said, I'm looking forward to going. I am presenting at a conference on Saturday, so I'll head out tomorrow (Friday) and hop back on Sunday. I've already mapped out my eating plan: sushi, a burrito, and maybe some vegetarian food. I'll be parking my head at the Hotel 903-ta, which still seems to be one of the best hotel deals in the city. Yeah, the Best Western and the Holiday Inn boast, well, Best Western and Holiday Inn standards (and they have bathtubs), but those places go for 100 Euros per night more. That's 200 Euros. That's a lot of sushi and burritos. Plus, the 903-ta is clean, on a quiet street, and the staff are friendly. What more could a gal ask for?

Lemons into Lemonade

Even though I've been avoiding thinking about it, I am a bit bummed out that I can't be home for Christmas. I have classes scheduled at the university today (the 24th), Boxing Day, and New Year's eve. I can't justify cancelling classes just so I can go off on holiday. Today, however, when I arrived at the university for my 9am class, all of the desks and chairs from all the classrooms had been piled out into the hallways. Classes have been quite unexpectedly cancelled until Thursday. Not one to let a lack of communication keep me from holding classes, I conducted my 9am class with five students in a freezing cold classroom (our breath was highly visible). We had a few presentations to get through and I don't have enough time left to reschedule them. Of course, after the presentations were done, we all went home (or to a cafe for coffee).

I was a bit miffed, to tell the truth. Had someone informed me that classes this week were to be cancelled, I could have gone home for Christmas. Ugh. Instead of wasting my suddenly free week moping around the house, grumbling because I could have returned to Reno were it not for the university conspiring against me, I'm going to Prague. I booked myself a flight out of Skopje on Thursday, and I'll return on Sunday. Instead of waiting for Thursday to roll around before I head out to the airport, I'm leaving tomorrow to spend a few nights in Skopje before I go to Prague. It's unfortunate I have classes on New Year's Eve, which, to tell the truth, will probably fall through for some reason-or-another, but accommodation is fairly pricey everywhere on New Year's Eve, so maybe it's just as good that I'm returning to Kosovo.

Prague! I hardly gave it much thought although I did briefly consider Vienna with a side trip to Bratislava...maybe I'll do that in the spring. I've always wanted to go to Prague, and I managed to book a direct flight, so why not? The place I'm staying, the Aparthotel City 5 is giving me a room for 50 Euros per night, which I thought was reasonable (their rack rate during this superhigh season is 109 Euros per night).

I went to the bus company to make sure the bus from Prizren to Skopje is running tomorrow: it is (both the 5:30am and 9am departures). In Macedonia, Christmas is celebrated on January 7th (Orthodox Christmas) so it'll be business-as-usual there. Tomorrow is a holiday in Kosovo as is Orthodox Christmas. I'm excited to take a bit of a vacation because although I can't come home, I can at least go somewhere new and interesting.

Merry Christmas!

Last Weekend's Skopje Trip

Last weekend's trip to Skopje offered me the usual: bacon, a bathtub, and clean sidewalks to walk along. I found both places I was seeking: Biona for green tea & Harmonija for macrobiotic food. The green tea I bought, the only kind available, wasn't quite what I was hoping for. It has a strong barley flavor and I prefer my green tea green (for lack of a better adjective).

Harmonija was worth the search. One of its big benefits is that it's a non-smoking restaurant (a rarity in the Balkans). The food was pretty tasty, too. I had a veggie kebab with tofu, onions, and mushrooms with a slivered beet and carrot salad with LOTs of parsley. I took a piece of chocolate cake topped with a thick tofu pudding back to the hotel with me. It turned out to be downright scrumptious, tofu topping and all.

I've been trying to upload photos, but am having a hard time at the moment (I think it may be a busy cable connection). However, I've managed to upload a few. Skopje has some great graffiti:

I think I'll try making a slideshow.

No Thanksgiving for K

I've decided I'm not celebrating Thanksgiving this year. It's been three years since I've had a Thanksgiving meal and because I'm not being inundated with messages about turkey and family and holiday togetherness, it's no loss. I was invited to a dinner being held by someone from the US Mission in Pristina, but to tell the truth, I couldn't be bothered. If I'm going have to ride the bus somewhere and spend the night, which is what I would have to do in order to attend this dinner, I'd rather go to Skopje. So that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to Skopje. Not tomorrow, which is the Big Day of Turkey, but on Friday (assuming the place I want to stay has availability for both Friday and Saturday nights).

During this trip to Skopje I want to check out two places: a macrobiotic restaurant called Harmonija and a health food shop called Biona. Harmonija looks like it's a place with Japanese-style food (think Brown Rice Cafe). Biona might have Japanese tea...might. The write up I found on the shop says that it "offers selections in Japanese products." Of course, that could mean they have anything but tea, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

The weather looks like it'll be good, too, which means I'll be able to take the 'real' camera and not just my point-and-shoot. I'm keeping my fingers crossed! I also stumbled on a new blog to read: from macedonia. It's written by a Japanese person who is living in Skopje. I like that.

Escape from Prizren

Taking the occasional escape to Macedonia is going to be what keeps me sane while I am here. I left Prizren Thursday afternoon to go up to Pristina, the capital of Kosovo, for a meeting and dinner. The only way I could swing dinner was to spend the night in town. To take the greatest advantage of those arrangements, I decided to make a weekend out of being away from Prizren. On Friday morning I went to the bus station and boarded a bus for Skopje.

View out the bus window somewhere in the middle of Kosovo

My plan was to spend Friday and Saturday night down in Ohrid, a town in southwest Macedonia on Lake Ohrid. I missed the 10 o’clock bus out of Skopje by 8 minutes, which meant I had 4 hours to kill before the next bus. My first stop was breakfast. I found a decent little café in the Ramstor shopping center that makes a pretty mean omelet. Well, it was listed on the menu as an omelet. What I got was more along the lines of an egg scramble. It was pretty tasty nonetheless.

My tasty "omelet"

My next destination was the grocery store. Yes, Skopje has museums; and, yes, there are plenty of other shops to shop around in. But I really like grocery stores. In fact, I far prefer grocery shopping to clothes shopping. The Ramstor shopping center has a pretty decent grocery store and it was a worthy trip. I was planning on waiting until Sunday to buy a few things on my back to Prizren, but I couldn’t help myself. I bought a small bag of quinoa, a can opener (impossible to find in Prizren even though there are cans which require their use), muffin tins, and the Bradt guide for Macedonia.

Pics from around Skopje

By the time 2 o’clock rolled around, I was on the bus and ready to get myself to Ohrid, a 3-hour ride. The bus was full. As usual, the seat next to me was one of the last to be filled. I didn’t talk to the woman who sat next to me until a stop about half-way through the trip when I asked her how long the bus was going to be stopped for and if there was a toilet (10 minutes and yes).

She didn’t stop talking for the rest of the ride. As it turned out, she’s a radiologist at a children’s hospital in Skopje and was travelling to Ohrid to visit her ailing parents. She also kept an (empty) apartment in Ohrid and offered it as a place for me to stay. Since she was going to be spending the night with her parents, I would have the place entirely to myself. I thought about it and figured it would be okay. As soon as we debussed in Ohrid, she whisked me to her apartment and offered me figs that had been soaked in honey and sitting in her fridge for who-knows-how-long. The figs were good, the apartment was not.

Although it was very kind of her to offer me a place to stay, I wish I had declined. There was no bed. I slept on a child’s foam couch, the kind that flattens out into a bed-type thing. There weren’t any sheets, so I used a scratchy tablecloth. The heaters didn’t work and I couldn’t get any water to heat up. The curtain rods were devoid of curtains, and the floor was soft in places. I found a store to buy toilet paper. I took a very chilly sponge bath. It was pretty cold and I couldn’t find many blankets, so I slept in my down jacket which I had fortunately thrown in my bag at the last moment.

My Friday Night Digs

Are mailboxes a good indicator of their owners?

The next morning we had agreed to meet at 10:30 am back at the apartment and she was going to take me around town. As I usually do, I woke up early. Not one to waste a morning, I walked down to the water and around the old town. After having a breakfast picnic down by the lake (I couldn’t find any place serving breakfast), I headed back to the apartment to meet her. By 11:15 am she hadn’t shown up. I weighed my options, grabbed my bag, and went back to the bus station. I was pretty tired after a poor night’s sleep and I was desperately wanting a shower. So I returned to Skopje and booked myself into the Holiday Inn.

Pics from around Ohrid

In retrospect, I should have just found a place in Ohrid. But I wasn’t thinking. The reason I went to Ohrid was to tour the sites (it’s a UNESCO World Heritage site) and try to do some hiking. I covered a lot of the churches and ruins during the morning, but I would have liked to see what else the town had to offer. After I was on the bus, I was trying to consider my hotel choices. I knew the Holiday Inn was within easy reach of the bus station, close to the center of town, and would likely have rooms with bath tubs.

As soon as I got off the bus in Skopje, I walked the 10 minute walk to the Holiday Inn, stepped up to the desk and said, “Do you have any rooms for the night?” The desk clerk nodded, said he’d give me the corporate rate of 134 Euros, and I was in my room less than 5 minutes later. I sat on the bed and sighed. The room had a tub, a comfy bed, and an angled view of the River Vardar. Determined not to think about how much cash I had agreed to lay out for the room, I walked back to the Ramstor shopping complex with one thing on my mind: Lush. I wanted to make the best use possible of the bathtub.

The Ramstor Lush isn’t a store but a little kiosk by the escalator. I couldn’t find what I was looking for, a Dreamtime bath melt, so I found something else that I thought would be suitable. When I got up to the register the guy said, “I am so happy today.” “Oh, yeah,” I replied, “Why?” “Because Manchester is playing blah blah blah.” I lost the thread of his conversation here. When he realized that either I was not British or that I really could care less about football (soccer) he said, “You know, this product would be really nice with something from our half-off table. It’s called Dreamtime.” And I squealed, “That’s it! That’s what I want!”

Happy, I took my purchase and went to find some dinner. I settled on a place called Irish Pub for two reasons. One because I wanted a Guinness. Two because I was in the mood for sheppard’s pie. I went in, sat at the bar, looked over the beer menu and decided on a Leffe Blonde. They also had Chimay Blue and Red. White would have been my preference, but they didn’t carry that. They didn’t have any of the Leffe Blond, either, so I went with a Guinness. The menu had an odd mix of items. There weren’t any meat pies or stews on offer, but there was quite an array of Indonesian curries. What caught my eye, though, was the grilled salmon.

I haven’t had salmon since my arrival and it was g-o-o-d. Salmon with potatoes and spinach. I lingered over it as long as I could. As I finished dinner, the bar was starting to fill up. I considered sticking around to strike up a conversation with one of the English-speaking groups that had come in (I don’t get a lot of random conversation with other native-English speakers and I miss that), but my lump of Lush and the bathtub were calling me.

After a great night’s sleep, I was happy to discover that the Holiday Inn offered a free breakfast buffet. For the most part, the buffet was nothing special: overcooked eggs, cheese, olives, white bread, assorted meats, cereal, and bacon. Real bacon. Because Kosovo is predominately Muslim, pork products don’t exist. I ate my fair share of bacon on Sunday morning and it was good.

The view from my room





More random pics from Skopje

Since the bus back to Prizren didn’t leave until 4pm on Sunday, I decided to spend the day walking around Skopje. Most of the shops are closed so I just roamed around. I didn’t find anything particularly interesting, but I was so glad to be walking around on clean sidewalks without stray dogs lurking around piles of garbage. For lunch I happened to stumble into Skopje’s only Mexican restaurant, Amigos, where I ordered and ate a surprisingly decent burrito. I asked them to make it without the nacho cheese and cream (I’m not sure if that meant sour cream or something more insidious although what’s more insidious than nacho cheese?) and to add a side of jalapenos. The rice inside the burrito was more like Spanish rice, but it was better than Mexican food I’ve had in Japan (except for one place down in Kumamoto City which is fantastic). It was a good find.

Amigos



A good find at the grocery store: Organski Japonski Jabolki
aka kaki (Japanese) or persimmon

I can see myself taking the occasional weekend escape. I won’t be staying at the Holiday Inn, but I must say, between the bacon and the bathtub, it was worth every Euro.

Gimme a Break

Living in Kosovo is a bit more stressful than I usually let on. Between trying to meet everyone else's English language needs and dealing with the challenges day-to-day life brings, I need a little holiday. Granted, one weekend won't bring me complete rest and relaxation, but I think getting out of Kosovo is key to my sanity. Where will I go? Where else but Macedonia!

I've decided to take a trip down to Ohrid, which is supposed to be just lovely. I remember a Macedonian student I had waxing poetic about the place. The trip should be straight forward. I have to stay in Pristina tomorrow night in order to attend a dinner I've been invited to (I think the last bus for Prizren leaves around 6 pm, which barely leaves time for a late lunch much less dinner). I'll head to Skopje from there and then go on to Ohrid. The bus station in Skopje has a great website that lists arrivals and departures from the station and is incredibly user friendly. The bus station itself is a bit drab but highly functional and that's ultimately what matters to me. I like easy-to-use bus stations. Pristina's stacione autobuseve doesn't fit that bill.

Sigh. A weekend away. And with the price of rooms in private residences in Ohrid at around 10 Euros ($14), it could be a fairly inexpensive weekend at that. I'll let you know how it all turns out!

The Pics

Here are a few (hopefully of interest) pictures of my trip to Skopje and Thessaloniki. I wish I had brought my 'real' camera instead of the point-and-shoot, but it was raining when I left Prizren and I didn't want to haul around a larger camera in a downpour.


This was my salty pancake. The crepe part was pretty tasty, but the lunchmeat and mustard filling didn't really float my boat.

This is Skopje, Macedonia. I took this from the castle ruins that overlook the town, and this is towards the main downtown area. Up on the hill there is a rather large cross that I haven't had the time to find any information about.

Random graffiti on historical buildings is both intriguing and irksome...more irksome, I think. This was up at the castle ruins.

A few photos of other spray-paintings around town:

Thessaloniki is in no way immune to grafitti, and I think this is my favorite piece from the entire trip:



Thessaloniki also had a few picture-worthy signs, too: A store called Reno; a restaurant called Meat Me; and somebody called Kirsten.

In order to lull myself to sleep one night, I was flipping through the tv channels on offer. The Simpsons are definitely a worldwide phenomenon. I'm surprised that the show was subtitled and not dubbed.





Waiting in line to leave Greece and go into Macedonia. Customs lines are the same everywhere, or so it seems. You wait, and wait, and wait, even if there are only 3 cars ahead of you.

A random road shot in Macedonia. It's unremarkable except for the lack of trash. Were this a road through Kosovo, there would be litter everywhere. Not a little bit of litter, but heaps and heaps of the stuff overflowing into the road. You may think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not.

And, finally, the sign for the bus that would take me back into Kosovo. Luckily, I can mostly sound out Macedonian cyrillic, but this particular sign would flit between this and roman letters.

I wanted to upload a few more photos, but, unfortunately, I'm running into Blogger problems. Perhaps next time.