Greetings and salutations from planet earth’s newest country, Kosovo. As it turned out, my stress about this border crossing was unwarranted. Back in Nis, I turned in my rental car at noon and then was looking forward to finding a place to keep cool in the 100 degree temps because my bus didn’t leave until 6pm. But, the owner of the hotel I stayed at said he didn’t have any reservations for that night and I could use the room until it was time to go to the bus station. Awesome! So I went out and had a nice lunch, then chilled out in my room until about 430pm, then went to the bus station cool and refreshed.

As we approached the border, the bus driver collected everyone’s ID. There was only one passport in the pile, guess who that belonged to? The driver gave our ID’s to the immigration officer, he went off for about 15 minutes or so while I waited nervously on the bus, then he returned them to the driver and we were on our way. Really? That was easy! Oh, I forgot to mention that part of my anxiety was about the fact that I decided to take a chance and not get nasal probed before going. I read conflicting reports that they either weren’t requiring it or weren’t checking it. Sure enough! I made it to my hostel around 10pm, got a quick bite to eat and went to bed.

I woke up happy and stress free and hit the streets to start exploring. Prishtina is much bigger and much more modern than I was expecting. There’s not a whole lot in the way of tourist attractions in the city, but I checked out what they do have and then mostly just enjoyed walking around the extremely pedestrian friendly downtown. First up was the Imperial Mosque (pic above) built in 1461 and currently Prishtina’s most important mosque. It was also a catholic church for a bit during the Austro-Hungarian years.

The Museum of Kosovo had a pretty good collection of Dardanian artifacts. I had never heard of the Dardanians and there wasn’t much information posted at the museum, but from what I could figure out they were around from roughly the 5th to the 1st centuries BC and they’re closely related to the Trojans. The prized artifact is the carving of the funeral procession (pic above), but they also had lots of these alien looking carvings (below). I have no idea what they are, but there they are. Then you walk up to the second floor of the museum and are instantly transported 2000 years into the future straight to the Kosovo Declaration of Independence, lots of guns and artillery, and military uniforms. I guess that 2000 year period is overrated anyway. Haha

Without getting political or taking sides, the Kosovo wars were just atrocious. Ethnic Serbians and ethnic Albanians both trying to purge each other from the region. Reports of mass murders, torture, and organ harvesting, leaders on both sides being accused and tried for war crimes, it was a mess. As it turned out, the world sided with Kosovo and it’s now an independent nation. I’m hardly an expert on the subject, but I know the USA, with Bill Clinton as president, was at the forefront of the efforts to establish Kosovo’s independence. As a result, Bill Clinton is a really big deal here. The main street through the city is named after him (see the pic at the top of the post) and there’s a huge memorial to him in the city center. Put aside whatever opinions you have about Clinton, put aside whatever opinions you have about the Kosovo wars, put aside your opinions about genocide and ethnic cleansing, and just take a moment to appreciate how much Kosovo loves Slick Willy.

Just a bit over ten miles outside of Prishtina is the Four Paws Bear Sanctuary. Apparently it used to be a common thing for restaurants to keep brown bears in cages to attract customers. The problem is that the cages were too small and the bears were usually treated horribly. Awful! When it was made illegal to own bears, Four Paws stepped in, created the bear sanctuary and started rescuing every bear they knew about, heard about, or could find. Currently they have around twenty bears in very large paddocks living the relatively good life.

I took a short bus ride and then an insanely hot mile and a half walk to see them. Given the heat, they were a lot more active than I was expecting. They had lots of shade, places to hide, and swimming pools while I had to walk a wide dirt path completely exposed in the blistering heat. Seems fair given their previous accommodations, I guess.

I had to make the insanely hot mile and a half walk back to the bus stop after hanging out with the bears. After about 45 minutes waiting in the sun, a bus came along to take me to my next stop about half way between the bears and Prishtina, Gracanica Monastery. Kosovo is mostly made up of ethnic Albanians now who are also mostly Muslim and there are a few Serbian monasteries that are caught behind the lines, so to speak. Gracanica is one of those. It’s a small and very peaceful monastery with lots of barbed wire around the top of the perimeter wall. Crazy! In any case it’s really beautiful and a worthwhile stop.

Well, my time in this interesting capitol is finished. I think I’m off to a pretty good start here in Kosovo, but it’s time to make my way to my next stop now… stay tuned…