The zoo and other stories.

They have a zoo here in Sarajevo. Mr B planned a Surprise Sunday for me which basically involved taking me to somewhere I had not been before. When I say zoo I mean a park with a few animals in it. Let me sum it up like this; the first enclosure we came to was a racoon enclosure. I took a walk up to the side of the enclosure to get a better look and lo and behold a racoon was out... heading right for me along the OUTSIDE of the cage. It ended up being fed by a kid somewhere near the cage.

A Bosnian Turkey in Sarajevo Zoo.

The next enclosure contain CHICKENS.... chickens in a zoo! Ok, so some were fluffy and cute, but chickens? Followed by a horse, a donkey or two, some goats, and some highland cattle. I couldn't help but have a little giggle at the exotic creatures the zoo had. It was basically a farm. To be fair it did have a couple of zebras and two large brown bears as well.

The bear enclosure just made me sad though. The enclosure itself was a fair size, but people were throwing crisps and the like over the edge to the bears, who just sat there begging for food. The worst bit was the fact that people had actually thrown whole  packs of crisps in there including the plastic packaging. Who does that? That made me mad. I read that before the war the zoo was full of animals. Mr B told me how there were lions and wolves. There is a sad article in the New York Times talks about how the animals were all killed during the 4 year siege.

 www.nytimes.com/1992/11/04/world/at-sarajevo-zoo-the-last-survivor-dies.html

All the animals looked healthy enough, but it really took me back to how zoos were in the UK 20 years ago. Not really about the animal's welfare although in the local newspapers they do say they are trying to work with environmentalists and acquire new areas and creatures for the zoo.

www.setimes.com/cocoon/setimes/xhtml/en_GB/features/setimes/features/2009/01/12/feature-01

A lot of Sarajevo reminds me of the U.K 20 years ago. The smoking everywhere, which I have mentioned before, the economy here, the view of women and other ethnicities, the view of homosexuality. The fact that it reminds me of how it was though,  means that there is a possibility it could change in the same way.

The market in Ciglane

That said it was a beautiful hot and sunny November day and it was great to get out and about. We wandered for sometime around the "zoo" and then finally went off to the market to buy some proper coffee and fruit and veg. The market in Ciglane is massive and full of local produce and definitely worth a visit although prices for clothes are not much cheaper than the shops. Mr B tried on a jacket which looked like a cheap, but nice item of clothing, only to find out it was 100km. (50euros), to me that is not market prices. The food is all reasonably priced however and I love to wander the market stalls.