Not My Best or Happiest Day Ever...

So last night I updated the firmware on my Canon 5D DSLR. While I was doing that, I happened to read Canon's Service Notice: EOS 5D: Main Mirror Detachment.

My "walk" this evening was more of an ascent, straight up through Vratnik to a small lookout and some cemeteries high above the city. I started taking photos...and "clUNK!" my mirror fell totally off. Just as described in the service bulletin. I'll have to rush ship it back to Canon in the hopes that it can be repaired in time for our cruise the latter part of August. What a bummer to be here for my last 2 weeks without a camera.


Cemetery At Sunset - Above Sarajevo



My Last Photo - Sarajevo

What I Learned Today

Yes, you can eat too many fresh blackberries (at least I can).

Today I finally walked to the huge cemetery, Sarajevsko Groblje Bare which I have photographed from a distance a number of times, including here. I learned it is the main city cemetery (Gradsko Groblje) and that there are very few victims from the war buried there (and so corrected my earlier blog post here). I walked through a huge chunk of the cemetery and it almost seemed as if people didn't die 1993-1995.

The cemetery is laid out in sections which vary in size and shape. But just to get an idea of the relative prominence of the various religions here goes. There is a section for Jews, a very small section each for Evangelicals and Adventists, 20 sections for Atheists, 14 sections for Catholic (plus a small one for "Old Catholic" (Staro-katolici) whatever that means), 26 sections for Muslim and 16 Orthodox sections.

I miss my Photoshop, but in the meantime here are a few of today's photos. I takes me 3x as long and the results are 10x worse using the laptop, the touchpad and the Photo Gallery/Paint combination.

Map of the Sections of Bare Cemetery - Sarajevo




Reflection in the Windows of the Meditation Building - Gradsko Groblje, Sarajevo




Groblje Bare - Sarajevo




Groblje Bare - Sarajevo




Groblje Bare - Sarajevo




Haystacks - Groblje Bare, Sarajevo

An Attempt...

using a laptop w/touchpad, and using a combination of Windows Photo Gallery (adjust color) and Paint (resize) here are three photos from the Jewish Cemetery a couple days ago.

Jewish Cemetery - Sarajevo



Jewish Cemetery - Sarajevo



Jewish Cemetery - Sarajevo

Alifakovac Cemetery

This evening I walked up to the Alifakovac Muslim Cemetery. It sits on the hill on the eastern end of Sarajevo, the south side of the Miljacka river...across the river from Vratnik, a frequent location for photos I've posted. I shot another 70 or so photos that you are unlikely to see anytime soon...

What made this cemetery interesting to me is the variety of the stones. The modern stones (1992 - present) here are a wide variety, far beyond the identical white obelisks lined up in most of the other recent Muslim cemeteries such as Koševo, Srebrenica and Kovači. Another interesting thing is that the old tombstones, from the Ottoman era, are sort of scattered here and there in the midst of the modern graves...in one case even sort of poking out of a recent grave site. Many of other modern cemeteries, such as Kovači, have the Ottoman era graves more grouped together.

Jewish Cemetery Sarajevo

I walked up to the Jewish Cemetery (according to the sign, the second largest Jewish cemetery in Europe after the Jewish cemetery in Prague) after work this evening. It wouldn't have been such a long walk and steep climb if I hadn't made a wrong turn or two. I felt like I climbed half way up Trebević. I found the cemetery a bit before sundown so the light was great. I took 63 photos...maybe a couple will make it here once I'm back on home turf computer-wise....

Learning to Fly

I saw a baby bird learning to fly today...about 50 ft up, back and forth between the tops of a couple of poplar trees. I thought "that's not very graceful" and a moment later I thought "well...the baby bird is flying....and I'm not" ...sort of puts it in perspective