The Breakup of Former Yugoslavia

6.22.17
The Breakup of Former Yugoslavia (1992)

Imagine living for 4-1/2 years with a daily barrage of 326 mortar shells destroying your home, killing and/or maiming your loved ones all hours of the day and night. By the time you hear the shells nearing it is already too late. There is no water, no electricity and no food. You are burning anything you can find to keep warm - paper, clothing, sneakers. Every time you need to leave your home to get water or food you are the target for the rooftop snipers who don't shoot to kill, but to immobilize you so you draw others to help you - providing more targets for the enemy. 

You can't live without water, but you can die trying to get it. You are 6 years old. Your father and/or brothers are missing - most never to be found. It is up to you to sprint as fast as you can with an empty 5 liter container, hoping the bombed out abandoned vehicles will provide enough cover to get you to water and make it back to your mom and  family.

The exposed skeleton of an apartment building in "sniper alley."

The map below shows where you are trapped - you are in the center of the city, Sarajevo Bosnian Territory. The enemy Serbian forces surround you and there is only one way to try to escape to the Free Bosnian Territory, and that is through the Sarajevo Tunnel (also called the Tunnel of Hope), an underground passage just under the Sarajevo Airport, controlled by the UN - who didn't help and didn't hinder its construction. 

The tunnel linked the Sarajevo neighborhoods of Dobrinja and Butmir. It was 3150 feet long, dug in 1993 in 4 months and 4 days by about 200 soldiers, through nearly 2500 feet of soil by hand, less than 5 feet high and only 3 feet wide 

More than 10,000 people were killed in the 3-1/2 years of this war. Historians estimate that more than 1 million trips were taken through the tunnel, transporting about 20 million tons of food, war supplies and humanitarian aid so the Bosnian army could defend itself against the well-armed Serbs. It also provided people with a way to get out. 

We decided to spend the rest of the day with reflections of this regions past, starting with a quick stop at an area park, encompassing the mouth to the Drava River, to enjoy the beauty of Sarajevo.

We took a short carriage ride that turned out to be hilarious when the white horse in the carriage behind us began prancing as if he was a Lipizzan stallion - picking up speed until he was almost in our back seat with Heather and Mike. (So surprised that this photo wasn't blurrier since there was a lot of movement going on in our carriage - in addition to the laughing).

As their carriage streaked by ours, Susan was clinging to the inside of the carriage shouting, "let me out, let me out!" 

Five of us returned to Dzulagin Dvor 

for more of their cevapi 

(at a 20% discount since we were with OAT) 

and more of Sarajevsko beer.

Our day of mixed emotions ended with a wonderful home visit to Jasmine's apartment. We lucked out being served dinner by a former chef. Afterward I enjoyed a delightful game of UNO with her 7 year old son, Alvi. (Photo credits to Jennifer Sanderson).