Welcome to Sarajevo (part 1)

Last weekend I was lucky enough to spend a couple days in Bosnia and Herzegovina. I went to visit my friend Jasmina in Sarajevo and we also spent some time in Mostar. Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations is one of my favorite shows, and this trip must be exactly what it feels like for him (except nobody was filming me, nobody wanted autographs, I paid for my own food, and generally nobody cared that I was there). I spent the weekend with a great host, trying local foods, learning about the culture, and asking questions about the history of the city. I had been curious about it ever since seeing Sarajevo in the news every single day in high school. In one of the most educational and fascinating, yet utterly puzzling trips I have ever been on, here's what I learned.

When I first landed, Jasmina sent me a text to "wait outside the building". Being that it was an airport, I thought that I'd have to ask which terminal/area I should wait it, but once I got outside, I understood. The airport is only the size of a small school building, so her text made perfect sense. There's only one place to wait! Within 5 minutes of getting off the plane, I was standing at the curb (including going through passport check).

That night we ventured around the main part of city center, the "old town" and some of the busier parts. Most buildings are recently built, since most of everything was destroyed in the Bosnian War between 1992 and 1996. They rebuilt a lot of the buildings to look like they were before the war, but some of them are newer styles. And as you will see later, some of the "skeletons" are still waiting to be rebuilt.

If you don't know, after Bosnia claimed independence following the breakup of Yugoslavia, Serbian forces (from Bosnia) surrounded the city, cutting them off from the rest of the country. This was part of their attempt to take some of the Bosnian land, and at some form of ethnic "cleansing" and segregation. This is why Sarajevo was always in the news, as they went nearly 4 years being cut off from the rest of the world. It was extremely interesting for me to meet some of these people and hear their stories (more later). This is just a small piece of their history but something so real and recent its still hard for people to talk about.

As a result of the war, many buildings are either damaged completely beyond salvaltion, or with dozens of bullet holes that were never fixed. It's a strange sight to see a side of a building sprayed with bullets, next to a nice new building, next to a large concrete skeleton. People say that the Serbian forces camped out in the hills and for a couple hours a day, would fire into the city, often at women and children. People had to get used to bullets whizzing around and avoiding the sight lines of the snipers. Sadly, it became a way of life.

 

One of the frustrating things for the people there is that it wasn't clear what was happening or why. All they knew is that before the war, there was nothing wrong with Croats, Serbians, and the Bosniaks (Bosian Muslims) being friends and getting along. Ethnicity didn't matter. Yet during and after the war, all of that changed. And to this day, the relationships people have with other ethnicities in the country are still not the same as it was before. As a side note, if you have access to ESPN, there is a "30 for 30" story called "Once Brothers" about two former NBA players Vlade Divac (Serbian) and the late Drazen Petrovic (Croatian), and how they used to be really close, but grew apart because of the war. Petrovic ended up dying in a car crash while the war was still happening, before their friendship could be reconciled. Check out the replay on Sunday, Dec 12 on ESPN (http://30for30.espn.com/film/once-brothers.html)

We'll come back to that later, but first, here's my first meal! Typical Bosnian meals consist of a lot of meat, as you can see. There are many Muslims in the country, so pork is rare, but my meal was beef, veal, sausage, and of course cevapi (the little meat fingers). There was also liver, but let's not talk about that. It was not my favorite. The bread and cabbage salad were welcome side dishes, as was the yogurt, as they counter balanced the richness of the meat. Jasmina suggested sparkling water as my drink to help my stomach digest. Not sure if that worked or not, but let's pretend it did. In total, all this food cost me about $12 USD (and 19 clogged arteries).

After dinner we walked around the city, admiring some of the architecture and bridges. The city is not a big one, and there aren't many big buildings. But you definitely notice a lot of the influence from all the different groups that had ruled over the region...Austrian, Turkish, and Communist to name a few. I don't know much about architecture, but even I could tell the difference. There are also many mosques and churches throughout the city, many of them erected after the end of the war. We also saw the place where Franz Ferdinand (the heir to the throne, not the band) was assassinated in 1914, which led to the start of WWI.

After wandering around, we stopped at a local brewery...and the local beer was actually pretty good. Sarajevsko Pivo, if you ever get a chance to try it.

Part 2 will come a little later, and will focus more on what I learned about the war talking to Jasmina and her friends. Come back for that!