th
visitor here since 25th February 1996 ! Welcome !
th
visitor here since 25th February 1996 ! Welcome !
PART I : EASTERN EUROPE
"...an iron curtain sprang up across the continent from Szczecin on the Baltic to Trieste on the Adriatic..."
Winston Churchill, 1945
Eastern Europe always fascinates me. During my school years, I became interested in these once mysterious nations behind the iron curtain - lands of stormy history, untouched countryside, exotic national costumes and the political rhetoric of their communist leaders, and such interests prompted nicknames like `KGB', `Soviet', `Comrade', etc...
Marshal
Tito
Then came the downfall of the Iron Curtain and the finally that of the fall of the Soviet Union. My determination to visit these lands intensified as I read accounts of the great political changes, the new hopes (as well as the dashing of many of these hopes) and aspirations, as well as the untouchness of these nations to modern mass tourism.
In 1993, after graduation from university, I visited Western Europe as well as the beautiful Czech Republic. The latter, with its well-preserved Mediaeval capital, Prague, left sweet memories that I have not forgotten even today...
It was these memories that prompted me to visit the eastern part of this continent again...
I departed on 23 May 1995 for Moscow on an Aeroflot flight which passed through Delhi and Tashkent, capital of the Republic of Uzbekistan. This was the first time I took the notorious Russian airline and must be one of my most uncomfortable flights - no movies, no inflight entertainment whatsoever on a 12-hour journey. In Moscow, I switched to another Aeroflot flight to Vienna.
Note that the some of the pictures from this sites are copied from other
sites. Sites where pictures were taken from are listed in the "Links"
section of individual pages.
Vienna, heart of the Austro-Hungarian Empire
Ljubljana
& Bled in the scenic Slovenia
Zagreb,
Croatia - a country at war
Budapest
- Glories of old Hungary
Romania
: Transylvania & Bucharest
Bulgaria
: Land of Icons & Frescoes
PART
II : TURKEY : LEGACY OF THE OTTOMANS
TWC's
Homapage
The Russian and East European Studies Virtual Library - a great resource site from the University of Pittsburgh ; Updated monthly.
Open Media Research Institute The Open Media Research Institute (OMRI) is a non-profit, public service research enterprise dedicated to the study of the former Soviet Union and East-Central and Southeastern Europe.
And to find out the latest exchange exchange rates of Eastern Europe's currencies, visit OMRI's exchange rate site !
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