Mini-Tour of Pristina

I walked all over Pristina on Sunday and took pictures of the center. Above are the flags outside of the main library, which looks like a building from Halo or something. From left to right, you have the Kosovo flag, the Albanian flag, a mysterious white flag, the EU flag, the NATO flag, and the U.S. flag. Did I mention there was a large international presence here in Kosovo?

This is a half-finished Serbian Orthodox church. Construction ended when the war began in 1999.

A clock tower (Sahat Kulla) in the older section of town.

This is (I think) Mbretit Mosque, aka Fatih Mosque, aka Xhamia e Madhe. It was built in 1460-61 by Sultan Mehmet II a few years before he conquered Constantinople.

This is (as far as I can figure out) the Jashar Pasha Mosque, which was built in 1834. You can see the clock tower behind it.

Skenderbeg is an Albanian national hero who rebelled against the Ottoman Empire in the fifteenth century. His statue stands in front of the main government building.

The main pedestrian street in Pristina is named after Mother Teresa, who was an Albanian Catholic. There are cafes all over the place and it's usually pretty busy.

Another shot of the bizarre library building. You have to admire the architect's conviction, I guess.

A market in the older part of town, near the mosques.

I think this is the Çarshi Mosque, which was built in the 1400s to celebrate the Ottoman victory in Kosovo in 1389. The area around it used to contain a bazaar and a hammam (Turkish bath), but the communists were not interested in preserving them. This is a shame because the Ottoman-era bazaar in Sarajevo is beautiful (and totally like sugar for the tourists).

This monument was unveiled around the time when Kosovo declared independence in 2008 and became the world's newest nation. I'm not sure whether I like or dislike the graffiti, but I think it probably looked more impressive when it was squeaky clean.

So those are some of the main landmarks of Pristina! There are not that many historical places because Pristina was something of a backwater until the 20th century, but the old part of town near the three mosques is pretty pleasant, with lots of shaded, winding streets. I like the lively cafes and restaurants.

By the way, I'm not sure whether to write Pristina or Prishtina in English. Pristina comes from the Serbian, which was how the word presumably entered English when Kosovo was part of Yugoslavia. (In Serbian there is a little diacritical mark called a haçek on the "s" which makes it a "sh" sound.) In Albanian, you spell it "Prishtinë," which is the indefinite form, or "Prishtina" in the definite form. The definite form is closest to how it is usually pronounced. The U.S. Embassy here still uses the old spelling, but it seems more logical to switch to the Albanian these days. Quite the linguistic conundrum!

After my long picture-taking trip I think I have finally got my bearings. I'm looking forward to wandering around more (and visiting all those cafes)!