SURPRISE BUTTSEX WITH CANNON

Thanks to Pete - he managed to find the painting I have renamed 'Surprise Buttsex with Cannon'. I believe this was from the London National Gallery. This shows the English can be a bit naughty.



EDIN BIG BOSS OF TITO46

[Logan notes in brackets.]

Despite the hideous waste of my time and money the registration problems caused me, Edin (owner of Tito46) proved to be an entertaining and engaging host. Kane (an Australian staying there) and I questioned him about the recent war they had and Edin told us the following:

Bosnia lost it's heavy industry during the war. Because of this, people lost their jobs. Right now, he puts the unemployment rate at 50%, though other Bosnians I've spoken to think it is up to 60%. Edin believes that due to this, revolution will come - it is inevidable.

The people in Bosnia like that the USA ended the war but dislike the agreement that was forced upon them causing the government to be split three ways - Serbian, Croation and Bosnian. Because of this, there is effectively no government as the three sides rarely agree on things. [Oddly enough, there are three different animals I've seen that seem to live in harmony loose here - pigeons, cats and dogs. They aren't after each other at all. I'm sure there is an analogy here but I don't know enough about the politics to go further with it.] Even the language is split - it is called alternatively Serbian, Croation and Bosnian - even though it is exactly the same language.

The people aren't nationalistic but the government(s) are.

Bosnia use to be the heavy industry of Yugoslavia.



CAST OF CHARACTERS

Kane the Australian. I swear to god, Australians are everywhere. No, it's not a bad thing. Anyway, Kane is an mechanical engineer graduate and seems to be a nice, laid back guy. He's been doing a lot of traveling around before he settles down to his career.



DOGS

For some reason I haven't figured out, there are a lot of loose dogs wandering around. They seem happy and well fed though they wear no collars. No idea what that's all about.



THE NEW HOSTEL

It's a bit more rudimentary than I had first thought. Little things like the shower I used had no where to hang up the sprayer and the water pressure made me think it was broken. And there was no shower curtan. I had asked about that but was assured 'someone will clean it up'. I figure so long as that 'someone' is not me, great.

I decided to pay the full price for tonight and if I like it to pay the remander of the previously negotiated lower rate for additional nights. So long as it doesn't completely suck, I'm going to stay there for a week. I'm tired of moving.

I was keeping track of my expenditures and I think that I'm right at the break even point. This means that I'm probably not going to be spending a month or couple here. I've heard that Serbia is about the same price but Romania is cheaper. I am not sure if I want to try staying in this country and slowly heading east or if I just want to pop over to Romania. I'm not sure how fascinated I am to see Serbia. I'm not really wanting to do the tourist thing right now so much as just live really fucking cheaply.



BRIBERY WORKS

So, I went to the new hostel and discovered that - for reasons that escape me - they haven't figured out that laundry can equal a nice source of extra income. They suggested I do my laundry myself. The sinks there are fucking tiny. After doing a couple pieces, I said 'fuck this' and went down to see the staff who were sitting around drinking coffee at a table outside of the hostel talking and smoking.

"Who is the person who does all of the cleaning for the hotel?" I asked Mirza. He pointed to a lady across the table from him. I got her name (Minela) and said "I'll give you 10 BAM to do a bag of laundry." She looked surprise and after much talking in Bosnia it was agreed. I had to specify I didn't want them sorted, ironed, startched, etc. Just cleaned, dried and stuff back into the bag.

Bribery. It works.



THE OLD MARKET

Mildly labrynthine, I was wandering around looking at all of the stuff for sale. Stuff I have no use for nor wish to carry. I did, however, come across belly dancing outfits complete with bangles and such. Since they seemed to be out of the XXXL size, I decided to take a pass on them. They also have a shitload of 'turkish coffee service' sets. I have no clue why - nobody seems interested in buying them. It's like a factory went nuts making them and a whole bunch of merchants are being forced to display them. I have no idea how they stay open, I really don't.

Fortunately, the Turks are everywhere here so I went to a Turkish restaurant. I got some food - and a salad. I did a lot of 'staring at it suspiciously' but I eventually ate it. It's suppose to be good for me somehow. I'm going to try to eat more of them. Well, actually, one a month would be 'more'. The Turkish restaurant was playing (not surprisingly) Turkish music. I'm not really into Turkish music but it is better than if they were playing something like the Bee Gees. Which is still popular in the Czech Republic. Because they are currently living in the 1980's. Which is why Jana likes to wear white pants. In another 20 years, she'll start photoshopping the color of the pants she's wearing to change it. Ten years after that, white pants will come back into style.

My ranting about Jana aside, my lunch consisted of some sort of stew, bread, a salad and water - all for 9 BAM.

And yes, I'm still doing the 'Viking Funeral' custom when I'm done with my food. For those who don't know the custom of the 'viking funeral', when I am done with the food, I drape the napkin across the remains like a funeral shroud. This is the 'abbreviated Viking Funeral' ritual. The restaurants tend to object if I then light the plate and the contents thereof on fire and send them off to sea.

As a side note - something I haven't seen in the Old market (or Sarajevo for that matter) is XXX and porn stuff. I suspect this is due to the various religions but it's absence actually is interesting.



BEGGAR SCHANINAGANS

Apparently, the beggars around here have another fun trick they like to do. When someone decides they wish to be generous they pull out their wallet to get some money out. The beggar then grabs it and runs off. This is a good reason to pack bollos. Fortunately, I'm not affected by this because I tend to throw (foreign) coins in the beggars general direction or drop them on the street where I'm walking as though I am clumsy. Which, I actually am. This is still the best way to get rid of your foreign coins after you've switched countries.

Costs for one day - the record

5 BAM - taxi. I was feeling too lazy to hump my heavy ass pack a couple kilometers.
10 BAM - promised to the cleaning woman if she cleans my laundry. I will need to pay this probably once a week.
20 BAM - lodging cost (for a week rate, this is one day's worth)
9 BAM - Lunch
3 BAM - Breakfast
1 BAM - Fanta
5 BAM - Thyme tea and an expresso while I type up this stuff.
7 BAM - dinner
2 BAM - coffee

I think I'll have to go further east to make financial ground but right now I think I'm very close to the break even point. Very, very close. Maybe a tad over. If the local currency wasn't artificially tied to the euro, I think things would be much, much cheaper. It's starting to look more and more like 'interesting places in Asia' might be the ticket.

According to two Turkish folks I met in a cafe, Turkey is actually more expensive than here. I can't tell you how depressing I find that.



INSANITY KICKING IN

The town of Sarajevo is located on a long, flat area. It is surrounded, football stadium style, by the suburbs. A shitload of houses, streets and businesses on hills. Tourists don't go there. I decided to climb up the hill in the name of 'health'. It was a 'obviously my brain has broke' moment for me.

So I hiked up the endless hill.

They have a lot of mosques in Sarajevo - all the major religions are represented here as a matter of fact which is one of the neat things about it. But when I was up on the hill was the first time in twenty some years I'd heard the Muslem call to prayer.

While on the hill from hell, I encountered a shop keeper who had very good English. Although he saw very few people who spoke English (he seemed surprised to see me - given that steep assed hill I get it - he said he worked on his English since he was a shop keeper. I wish that attitude would spread to the areas actually used by tourists.

If you're traveling with others, there is always someone else you can try to pin the blame on for your stupid ideas. When you're alone, it's harder. Since nobody is around, I'll pin the blame on Richard. He told me to find a different way off of the hill.

Let us say that the suburbs up on the steep assed hills do not suffer from 'civic planning'. It is a maze. Really. I felt like Pac Man traveling his maze. Instead of ghosts to worry about, I had cars that did 40-60 KPH. They have a saying here "When you cannot be bothered to watch for traffic in Sarajevo, you have grown tired of life." Well, that is to say they will have that saying here - I just started it. I had walked under the thinking that as long as I was going downhill, I'd be OK. No - some roads that start to go down later go up and up.

And up.

I got a couple good pictures from altitute that felt above cloud cover. When I get good internet some day I will post them.

The neighborhood I saw between gasps for air and cigarette breaks appeared to be very poor yet clean. Like the people who probably had no work or money or perhaps even hope still cleaned the sidewalks outside of their home with water. Poor but proud. I'm glad these folks are (in general) too poor to beg or you couldn't swing your bag without getting charged for assault.

The reactions of the people themselves to me way off of the tourist trail was anything from friendly to a bit hostile. I'm sure some were wondering how I got my fat ass up there at all.