And So It Begins!

Today at 2:50 pm local time I stepped off of my fourth plane and onto the soil of Bosnia-Herzegovina. I had left Charlotte soil at noon the previous day, Saturday. I took my four flights from Charlotte to New York, New York to London, London to Budapest, Budapest to Sarajevo with relative ease and only hand luggage (for those of you who have ever traveled with me, you will recognize that this in itself was a feat). The biggest events in my twenty-hour trip were a dead fly in a salad, a cut on my ankle, and a four-inch tear in one of my two bags (and my day bag at that). Other than that, we are functioning at full capacity. Sarjevo is six hours ahead of life on the East Coast, so there is a bit of jet lag going on in my system; a lot of it related to the twenty hours that I spent traveling.

            What I have seen of Sarajevo is both beautiful and depressing. There is clear foreign influence in the architecture – both Ottoman and Hapsburg – which truly represents the divided origin that this country had. In the most beautiful Austrian-inspired building there are bullet holes that remain as evidence of the war that was here just over a decade ago. My group members and I realized quickly that anyone we saw who was our age or older (and even some who were younger) had lived through the war. Speaking of my group, I am here with fourteen other students from UNC who are all very amiable and energetic. There is one teaching assistant who can speak pretty much every language and the professor who knows the city very well. Unfortunately, there are a lot of beggars within the city and as soon as they hear English they are fast on our heels (we are also pretty conspicuous as a group of twelve, as we were tonight). They range from middle-aged women to a five-year-old boy who was particularly feisty; while I would love to give each individual 10 marks (the local currency) I am pretty sure that I would quickly lose all of my money.

            While the trip will certainly be a lot of work inside the classroom, there is a lot I need to learn about living in Sarajevo as a city. Because the country is divided ethnically, the capital has a lot of cultures intermixing. I personally find this to be a positive thing but it also means that mores and cultural norms are different in different parts of the city. For instance, many of the restaurants near the mosques do not sell alcohol, but only a few paces down a cobblestone street one can find plenty of restaurants willing to serve it. I find it fascinating. It is also not surprising to turn the corner to see an absolutely stunning building, like a cathedral, or a building entirely in ruins. The national Library is not but two blocks away from our “Motel” and it is still in shambles. It was bombed during the wars of the 1990s and has yet to be refinished because of funding issues, including reparations.

            I am more than aware that I still have a lot to learn about this city, this country, this part of the world, and the issue of international organizations. Lucky for me class starts tomorrow at one pm. We will hold class in a local pub, the owner of which the professor is a friend. While we will not be drinking during class, the option still exists for later in the evening. I would love to hear from each of you so please do not hesitate to email me.

 

Much love and best wishes,

Lauren