This morning I updated my Facebook status:

Coffee, scones and kaymak breakfast consumed. Now on to the real business of the day: compose blog post, edit DCS yearbook pages, score grade 5 science test, walk downtown for batteries and notebook, bake brownies, catch up on email; this post ought to take care of any lingering envy about the exciting expat life.

My friend Jamie in Medford commented from her cell phone:

Still sounds fun because you’re in another country. 🙂

And Jamie is right; just being here makes everything a little bit of an adventure.  I took my camera with me on my walk downtown.  Here’s my route to the stationery store on Marshal Tito Avenue.

Directions: walk along our block past the Sarajevo Stock Exchange (SASE); look at the pictures in the window of the dance school; turn left at the corner park onto Ali-Pashina Blvd.; turn right at the 16th century mosque onto Marshal Tito Blvd.; walk through the little park with the busts of famous Bosnian poets; check out the 19th C European architecture downtown; pass the green Monument to Murdered Children of the siege across the street from the BBI Centar mall; pass the city’s best ice cream shop (it’s too cold for gelato today); pass the McDonald’s – thankfully, one of only two American fast food restaurants in Sarajevo; pass the burly pair of light-holders  in front of the Central Bank; Papirnica – that’s the stationery store!