Nazi puppets and skull towers

After getting home late in the morning I choose to skip the free walking tour of the city and sleep until 12. Good thing I checked out all the tourist sites the day before. I eventually get to the Republic square for a different type starting at 3. The walking tour of Zemun.
This was a very worthwhile tour. Zemun is a part of Belgrade now, but originally was it's on town steeped in history that is very different to the main city across the river. It's most important role was the border crossing between the Ottoman Empire and the Austro Hungarian Empire, a place people were quarantined for thirty days before making a successful cross due to the fears of contagious disease.
Secondly, this area avoided Hitlers revenge on Belgrade during WW2 (Yugoslavia originally signed a treaty with the Nazis but reneged after mass protests). The reason this area was spared was due to it becoming part of the independent state of Croatia. A puppet state of Germany that was involved in the mass genocide of Serbs.
The city did not escape communism however as seen by ugly apartment blocks on the outskirts of town and one of the buildings, the airforce command was bombed in 1999.
I quite enjoyed the town,  and the surrounding hills had lovely views of Belgrade and a commemorate Tower which looked lovely in the grey skies. The town isn't well looked after though. All the beautiful buildings of the 18th and 19th centuries are looking run down and the areas has a thug reputation.
The evening consisted of goulash, an obvious influence of the time under Hungarian rule,  and back to the night life. Firstly enjoying a jazz bar a bunch of others from the hostel and some random Swede's (I made friends with them because I like to pretend jag kan pratar liten svenska) in what at first looks like an abandoned house, and then back to the boat clubs.
This morning I arose earlier as I caught a bus at 1pm to the second biggest city of Serbia, Nis. There is obvious roman influence here which I always enjoy. As well as this there is also a concentration camp which sadly isn't open to view while I am here. But I did see the Tower of skulls. This is a Tower build by turks that contained the skulls of the Serbs they killed in battle. The skulls had been skinned, with the heads being stuffed and sent to Constantinople as a gift to the ruler at the time.
It has quite a lot of places of interest, and will be a little sad I can't spend another day exploring, but I have to leave at 10am.
A couple I met at dinner are heading to sofia via a taxi like service and will only cost me 20 euros which is cheap for what it is and faster then the bus. Plus there are very few services each day that leave for sofia and are often booked out, so accepting the piece of luck.

So onto Bulgaria where you will next here from me.

Joshua