The Blaus - South America and Europe

28th of August - Sarajevo, Bosnia and Hercegovena

From Mostar we took a bus a few hours through spectacular landscapes along the river and through the mountains to Sarajevo. We found our little old lady to live with near the old town, and got settled right away. We were really in luck too, as we discovered that the Sarajevo International Film Festival was in town for most of the time we were going to be here.

Sarajevo is of course famous for the 1984 Winter Olympics, and here you can really see how a city can fall from glory quickly. Again, the city is part in rubble, part just shot up, and part renovated. Nothing is more obvious than the Olympic Stadium that once hosted the opening ceremonies on the world stage, now is just crumbling and has some carpet shops operating in what used to be ticket booths. It is also easy to see the distinctly Eastern European architecture, or as some might say, lack thereof. Lots of large cement buildings, and even though they are riddled with holes, have broken glass in the windows, and have been bombed to shreds, they probably never looked too much better.

Explaining Sarajevo is to explain Bosnia, which is also to really explain what happened to Yugoslavia. Sarajevo was the melting pot of Yugoslavia, where Serbs, Croats and Muslims lived side by side in relative peace. There is a corner here that has a Jewish Temple, a Mosque, an Orthodox Church, and a Catholic Church all across from eachother. During the day, you can hear church bells and the call to prayer from mosques sounding in unison. Yugoslavia was formed during WWI by grouping together Croatia, Serbia and Montengro, Kosovo, Slovenia, and Bosnia and Herzogovenia. This entire region had a long history of being dominated by larger forces, like the 500 years of Ottoman Turk rule (called 500 years of night by the Serbs), and the 100 plus years of rule by the Hapsburg Monarchy (which ended when an Austrian prince was shot and killed in Sarajevo, precipitating WWI). This history is what has led to such strong hatreds. The Muslims here are hated because the Turks were Muslims who enslaved the people here a long time ago, the Croats are hated because most recently they joined with the Nazis in WWII to wipe out the Serbs, and the Serbs are hated now because of their attack on Bosnia after Yugoslavia fell apart in 1991. All of these people and all of this drama was played out in Sarajevo from 1992 to 1995, and the wounds are still very deep here.

We met a cute girl who is a waitress at one of the restaurants that we frequent here, and we talked to her for a long time. She talked about her childhood during the war and how she wasn't able to play outside because her home was very visible and they could have easily fallen victim to sniper shots. Her family lived in the basement of their home, like mice. The kids in her neighborhood couldn't go to school because it was too dangerous, so they organized a way to homeschool children by sending them to different houses each day. She just wants to leave Bosnia, she is still scared, and she hates it here. We heard this from many other people too. Although when walking the streets things seem fine, even more than fine, beneath that exterior there are still many dark feelings brewing. One thing we have noticed is that the women here are gorgeous, all of them in perfect shape, wearing lots of expensive clothes, always completely made up. What we are finding is beneath that is a society that is just hiding their true feelings. The scars of a racially and religiously motivated war like what happened here so recently will never be healed. The hatreds are only made worse when suppressed.

In Sarajevo, we have found out that even though people have literally lived through hell (the most common phrase we get when we ask people about the war is "forget the war"), they can pretend that nothing has happened and look the part of a normal functioning society, but underneath that it is a different story. "Forget the war" means, "I don't want to think about the war", or "I don't want to talk about the war", but mostly it means "I am trying to put it out of my mind forever", but it is impossible for people to do. When you ask questions and people open up, you can hear how they "hate the Serbs", or would "kill them if they could." Sarajevo has all these people living together as neighbors again, and that is what makes it so interesting.

The Film Festival was the perfect way to get some different perspectives on this. We saw movies that were made by Bosnians, others by Serbs, others by Croats. All told their sides fo the story in different ways, through different mediums. Our favorite film was a short by a Bosnian director about the days leading up to the war called "Frame for the Picture of My Homeland." We watched the movie in an outdoor theatre set up in the middle of downtown with 1000 other people, and it was about the heart of the Serb violence against the Muslims, and it was eerie to be there watching it with those who actually lived through this horror. The festival brought out the best of Sarajevo, people were all out and looking good, and people were proud to host this festival in their hometown. We also saw a movie called "Darwin's Nightmare" about what globalization is doing to Africa, and we saw a good American film called "The Assasination of Richard Nixon." We loved having the experience of getting to see all these movies, especially in a place where there are still such raw emotions and many times the movies talk about what people won't discuss themselves.

Our last day in Sarajevo we went to the Tunnel Museum, where the Bosnians had built a tunnel 800 meters underground from the Serb occupied war zone to the safe UN zone underneath the airport runway. It showed pictures from life in Sarajevo with no water or electricity or food, and civilians being randomly shot on the streets by sniper alley. When we saw the footage we could understand why people will never forget, and don't want to talk about it. We also went to the Bosnian War Museum, which is one room in an old bombed out Eastern European cement bunker building. They dedicated exactly two pictures and three homemade guns to the war exhibit.

We have seen that the people here are very nice, and when they will talk have a lot of interesting things to say. It is also an odd town. We met another guy who runs a small restaruant in the old town, and he said that he can not find anyone to work for him. None of the young people want to work. They are still living off of the aid money that was sent here after the war, so people don't have to work to survive, and young people in particular just don't want to. They spend their days walking up and down the main strip drinking coffee and looking good, and that is it. The government wants to join the EU by 2007, but everyone here thinks that is a joke, there is no way they will be let in.

posted by The Blaus @ 12:22 PM