Belgrade!

First (real) stop on our travels: Belgrade… Which is apparently pronounced Beograd. We arrived early in the morning after a super cold overnight train, however once we arrived it was like we stepped back in time! The cars, train system, and the architecture were super old school.

Some notes on the city:

1: Some of the most beautiful churches:

No words necessary

2: Remnants of the War: In school, I was taught the Yugoslav war as the story of a federation coming apart with Serbia trying to keep it all together by any means necessary. Going to Serbia, we could see a lot of reminders of the toll of the war.

From destroyed buildings

To preserved bombs and tanks

To even some good ol’ fashion propaganda

Even when we met people, there was clearly a lot of built up resentment from the war and tensions with neighbouring states. It was super interesting to see, but also scary because you didn’t want to touch a nerve.

3: Food: The cuisine and stuff in general was incredibly cheap. Sam and I went for multiple incredibly fancy, multicourse dinners and never paid more than $10 a person. However, the cuisine was mostly pork, thankfully there were a couple chicken or veal options mixed in. It is clearly a meat-based cuisine so didn’t have many veggies or fruits in Belgrade.

4: Architecture:
A cool mix of old buildings with classic Soviet style mixed in

Other fun things:

Got my caricature done:

Ended up on money:

After an awesome couple nights in Belgrade, we headed off by minibus to Sarajevo!