Shipka memorial church is a Bulgarian Orthodox church built in the style of a Russian Orthodox church.
The front of the Shipka Memorial Church
It was build during late 19th century as a dedication to the Bulgarian, Russian, and Ukrainian soldiers who lost their lives in liberating Bulgaria from the Ottoman empire. The gold plated domes are of typical Muscovite style from the late 19th century.
There is a crypt in the basement that has graves that serves as a memorial for and contains remains of the soldiers who lost their lives in battles of Shipka Pass during the Russo-Turkish war.
If you are in northern Bulgarian, I recommend stopping by Troyan Monastery. It is definitely worth a couple of hours of your time.
Walking up to it, the entrance is fairly simplistic, which is to be expected from a monastery.
The entrance to Troyan Monastery; very simple, as expected. However, your attention diverts to the mosaic to the left.
The mosaic on top of the left entrance doorway is a new modern day recreation of a roman style mosaic of virgin Mary with baby Christ.
Roman-style mosaic of virgin Mary and baby Christ.
Virgin Mary has a special place in this monastery. The church here is home to the three handed virgin. Here is an image of it from wikipedia.
Three handed virgin; considered holy in Bulgarian Orthodox Christianity. Maybe the artist was tripping and drew 3 hands, which then became holy. [Image source: wikipedia]
The dwellings in the monastery are simple as well.
Simple, but adequate, dwellings in the monastery.
The only splash of "opulence" I saw among the dwellings was this fresco.
19th century style fresco among the monastery rooms
However, the church located in the middle is pretty impressive. It built on a low elevation, much like many other churches build during the Ottoman rule. This is largely because the law during the Ottoman rule was that no church should be taller than the mosque in town, and so churches were build at low elevation so that they can build high ceilings without it looming higher than the local mosque.
Here is are views of the outer walls of the church from the lower ground level, and from a higher elevation.
View of the church from the ground level that is lower than the surrounding land
View of the church from a higher level (from the patriarchs’ graves).
It is the 19th century frescos that impress the most. The pillars along the entrance walls make a favorable first impression.
Notice the paintings along the friezeAnother view of the frieze along both entrances to the church
However, it is the frescos along the walls and ceilings both inside and outside the church that impress the most. While I did not take any photographs of the inside, here is a collection of the frescos on the outside that should give you an inkling of what lies inside the church.
Fresco with a skeleton rowing in a sarcophagus and a fish in it swallowing a person. I have no idea what this is about.This is a continuation of fresco along the ceiling.Another fresco at another part of the ceiling.
You will be much more impressed with what's inside the church. It is covered in murals along all walls and ceiling.
At the side of the church, I came across a small entrance with some writing on it.
A sign that says that inside lies the bones of monks, freedom fighters, and area orthodox christians
Based on the sign at the entrance, I had to go see it for myself, and it did not disappoint.
The bones, as promised.
The place also has a separate section for the patriarchs' graves, and a bell tower, but it really didn't offer much to an atheist tourist :)
Hitar Pitar is a quaint little restaurant and hotel in the village of Beli Osam in Bulgaria (close to the Troyan Monastery). It has a neat collection of decorative artifacts that make for an interesting collection of photos.
The restaurant is located on the banks of the Beli Osam river.
Hitar Petar restaurant as seen from across the river
Across the river, on the other bank, we see an interesting decoration; it is a 2.5D fresco/mural of a house, a man on a donkey, a water wheel, and a wooden window A/C unit. Check it out.
2.5D mural/fresco of Aahouse and a man on a donkeyWater wheel and wooden AC unit pasted on the wall
At the entrance to the restaurant is a wooden cannon made from the trunk of a cherry tree.
Cannon made from Cherry tree trunk
To the right is an outdoor chapel that looks a lot like a small temple in rural india.
Tsarevets fortress was a medieval stronghold of the erstwhile Second Bulgarian Empire located near the city of Veliko Tarnovo (which was also the capital city of that empire). While the fortress is in ruins, the recent reconstructions and restorations make it worth visiting.
View of the fortress from the city.
The fortress itself is situated on top of a hill of the same name. The stronghold consisted of two forts, one on each hill. You can see the ruins of the second fort on the hill in the left hand side of the photograph above. The second fort is not reconstructed well enough to attract tourists.
Let's step inside.
Entry
You enter the fort complex from the city on a ridge
The ridge separating the fortress and the city is more apparent when viewing the city from inside the fort.
Notice the ridge that connects Veliko Tarnovo city to the fortress.
From the Tsarevets fortress, you can see parts of the reconstructions of the second fortress (Trapezitsa) on the neighboring hill.
Reconstructed watch tower on Trapezitsa as seen from Tsarevets.
Ruins
The ruins in the fortress have been well preserved, for the most part.
Well preserved ruins.Most of these ruins were civilian buildings. After all this was part of the capital city.
Reconstructions
Also, there are a lot of reconstructions, especially along the outer wall of the fortress.
This is a reconstructed small chamber attached to outer wall.
Only the outer wall is reconstructed. The inner buildings' ruins remain as just plans on the ground.
Part of the outer wall is reconstructed. Notice the reconstructed turret.
The outer wall reconstruction is impressive. Notice the reconstructed watch tower and a reconstructed turret.
Church
At the top of the fortress is a reconstruction of the church that once stood there. The church is called the Patriarchal Cathedral of the Holy Ascension of God. It was built in the place of an early Christian church.
The reconstructed church. While the outside looks simple, the inside is simply beautiful.
When you step inside the church, you realize that this is really not a reconstruction, but in fact, a complete reimagining of an early christian church with a modernist abstract expression.
For instance, consider this painting of Christ at the altar.
Christ and Mary at the altar of the church. The style is very modernist.
The murals along the walls and ceilings are absolutely stunning. Take a look.
The city seems to have taken this style in pretty well. You can see murals in a similar style all over the city. Here is an example.
Modernist mural in Veliko Tarnovo
In all, it was a very interesting visit, and worth your time, if you are a history buff.
Oh, and two notable missing images are that of Baldwin's tower and the palace ruins. Unfortunately, I just forgot to photograph them. So here are images from the web as consolation.
I work on Google’s air travel infrastructure team, which powers Google Flight Search. Last month, I did a #HangoutOnAir with university students in India. The main focus of that talk was to introduce the students to the sort of challenges that we face. The talk is up on Google Plus, and has since been split into two parts.
In the first part (which is targeted for a general audience), I cover the fundamentals of flight booking, tackling issues like routing (10,000+ routes for SFO-JFK!?), seat availability, fare codes, pricing and more. It answers questions such as, “why did you pay $50 more than the person sitting next you in the plane for the same ticket?”, and “why are tickets on this flight from SFO to JFK available when flying SFO to BOS via JFK, but not available for a non-stop flight from SFO to JFK?”
In the second part, I get into the computer sciency details of the complexity of airfare search (even the simplest versions of this problem are NP-hard), and provide a (over)simplified description of QPX — the engine that Google uses to search and price airfare tickets. This talk is targeted at computer science students and professional.
