Dalmatian Coast September 26, 2018

Sarajevo

Sarajevo at Night

After breakfast we began the day with a walking tour of old Sarajevo. The first stop was the actual place where Frans Ferdinand and his wife Sophie were assassinated.

The card on the left side of the parking space is where Frans and Sophie Ferdinand were shot.

If you remember your history this was a key factor in the start of the first world war. From there we wandered down cobblestone-like streets which had numerous coffee and pastry shops along with a mixed assortment of dress, jewellery, trinkets, and candy stores.

Old Sarajevo Street Market

We visited a mosque then made a quick stop at the Cathedral of Jesus’ Sacred Heart, and the Congregational Church of the Holy Mother. We had a brief history of how Jewish people came to Sarajevo from Spain after Queen Isabella decided Spain would remain catholic (Spanish Inquisition). After WWII and the Bosnian war there are now less than a 1000 Jews left in Sarajevo but the synagogue still stands and is used. We glanced at the Bascarsija (has all sorts of accents that I don’t know how to make on the computer)- this is the foundation of the trading center when the city was founded in 1462.

Inside the mosque

After this 2+ hour walk we headed out on the bus and drove by the site of the 1984 Olympics. The sites have not been kept up mainly because of the Bosnian war. The purpose of our bus ride was to go to the Tunnel of Hope. This 800 meter++ tunnel was built by hand by the Bosnians between March and June 1993.

Sarajevo was cut off by the Serbs from territory held by the Bosnians on the other side of the airport. No supplies could get in. The tunnel which was small, wet and had poor air quality operated 23 hours a day. It allowed for humanitarian aide. What was upsetting was that the airport was under the control of the UN but they did not allow goods to be brought in to Sarajevo.

War damaged building

War damaged building

Evidence of the Bosnian War  (read more here)    (1992-95) abounds. Buildings are still riddled by bullet and mortar shells. Our local guide talked about his work with the Red Cross during that time; the dark-tourists that came to the city so they could go up in the hills and shoot people (reminded me of the hunters that go off big game hunting so they can show how powerful they are), the library and the holdings of over 2 million books that was destroyed by two drunks seeing who could do the most damage.

Sign on the library wall

You may have heard of the cellist of Sarajevo who sat in the rubble of the library and played a lament. (Margery—- I wondered if this was the library where the Haggadah of Sarajevo was. It is now in the museum here in the city and I was a tad distressed that I wasn’t able to go there). We also learned of the resilience and continued sense of humour of the people. Our guide told us a story how one night someone wrote on this building “this is Serbia”. The next morning someone else had scratched this out and wrote “this is the post office, stupid.” I was a bit ashamed how little I knew about this war and how many were massacred and killed. Didn’t realize that NATO was still here (saw there headquarters). Reinforces how we are so lucky….

Hanging out in Pigeon Park in Old Sarajevo

Don’t want to leave this posting on a down note… There is an election coming up. Pictures on every post. They have 3 presidents (are called a presidents committee), elected for a 4 year term and they rotate the chair of the group every 8 months. Our local guide said there must be 200+ parties and most are idiots (we only have one or two that readily come to mind). He also said that it takes a couple of hours for each person to vote as it takes so long to go through the list. Food is yummy. There are Bosnian delights (Greg made the mistake of calling them Turkish delights), pita (phyllo dough filled with meat of vegetables), baklava, cheese, pastries filled with cream…the list is never ending. Tomorrow we are on the road again.