2 posts tagged “travel”

Sofia, Bulgaria at night. As big a city as Sofia was, I felt very comfortable there. There is nothing particularly amazing about it; or, I guess there is, but when you compare it to so many of the other large cities in the world, it pales a little. But, the people were friendly, and there was an interesting mix of upper-class international business people and the destitute (who inhabit most of the rest of Bulgaria).

It was quiet while I was there, hovering in that perfect time after the rush of tourists, right before autumn creeps in and frosts take over. The leaves were starting to change and settle on the pavement, and in the early mornings the side streets were blocked with markets, which cleared out in time for morning rush-hour traffic. The city is big, and tall, and soviet buildings loom overhead ominously, wetting the ground with hundreds of individual air conditioning units that hum loudly in the afternoons.

When it rains in Sofia, you can walk down the cobbled historic streets and watch puddles form in the sunken indents where graves are located. You can eat at cafes that use sections from early Roman columns as tables; walk th rough a squat, square soviet apartment complex to the courtyard, and you'll find a 3rd century bathhouse, surrounded by clothes lines and mothers keeping a careful eye on children that clamber over the dilapidated ruins. A pedestrian tunnel under a major throughway uses the original city walls as supports; commuters tread over impossibly smooth-worn stones that have been tread already for thousands of years. The history is there, in Sofia, it's just lived in, on, around.