The siege of Sarajevo

It’s been a harrowing day. First we had a walking tour of the old town with guide Bojan who did it all at hectic pace with so much information - lots of dates, numbers etc- that it was hard to retain it. We started with the replica of the car in which Archduke Franz Ferdinand was shot then continued with the history and architecture of the Ottoman period then the Austrian-Hungarian. We stopped at the Catholic Church with its rather shiny statue of Pope John Paul who visited. Francis has also been. We saw various streets which once had been assigned to different crafts. The only ones dedicated to one craft left were leather (belts and bags) and copper and now also brass, using old shell cases to make coffee grinders and vases. Bullets had been made into pens and key rings. We saw several mosques, one of which still has a messuin who climbs up to the top of the minaret to do the call to prayer - all the others are recorded. We saw our first lunar clock. It worked on a 12 hour cycle but 12.01 was dawn and 12.01 was then sunset. It had to manually adjusted. Bojan said they get a lot of Israeli tourists as one of the oldest holy books Haggadah is in the museum here. Two types of Jewish sects live peacably here but there are only about 1000 here now. (They originally came at the time of the Spanish Inquisition). However this is mainly a Muslim country and there’s a lot of sympathy for Palestine. We saw a large poster saying Israel has put down more tons of bombs on Gaza than the Nazis did on London, the USA did on Hiroshima and the British did on Dresden combined. We were also pointed out the first legal brewery in any Muslim country, built beside the Benedictine monastery (because they had the skills). We also were told that the Dervishes were here postalising. We went by many cake shops which we resisted.

Then we got a bus to the Tunnel of Hope - built to get supplies into the city from the free Bosnia area during the siege which lasted 1452 days. 11541 civilians, including 1601 children. (Fatima wasn’t born then but it is a difficult day for her because of her family and other friends - she told me a bit yesterday about how her mother escaped on the first day to Switzerland where her father worked.

We were dropped off near the hotel after 2pm so we went to the old town to get some food - veggie risotto and salad. Then it started to rain so we walked to see the church as it was on the way to the museum about the siege, but it was locked up. The siege museum was hard going. It showed photos as well as belongings and written testimonies from people who had lived through the siege and had taken part in defending their city. It’s too draining to write more about it now so I’ll leave it to you to research the siege if you are interested.

The blip is of one of the many memorials which can be seen all over the city, commemorating where people had been killed by mortars or shells.

Pauline, one of the 3 women who travel together, suggested a swim and it was just the thing after such a day. As we’ve had a decent lunch we’ll read our books tonight and have a glass of wine.