Bulgaria
In June of 1999, I had the opportunity to visit a cyber friend I met on the Internet: Ivan Invanov. We started in in Sofia, the dirty Capitol city of over over one million people, plagued with the aftermath of Communism, now struggling with it's new found Democracy and private businesses.
Several very beautiful Orthodox churches, blended with Islamic Masque and advertisements for American cigarettes are among the highlights of the city.
One wonders why the Communist left the gold on the churches. The one in the upper left was closed to worshipers and the public so attendees of a European trade convention could see...Very Important Persons as Ivan put it. Money can buy anyting, including a church.
Not all things left by Communism were bad, for many really wonderful (but unkempt) parks were created. In case you are wondering, that is TomBear (yours truly) on the bear.
Beauty of a bygone era.
One of hundreds of mouments to the winning of a war. Seems battle was the national pastime.
