Day 10

Breakfast
Walking Tour
Lunch
Srebrenica Exhibition Memorial Gallery
Walk and Beverages by the River
Dinner

     We started the day off with breakfast in the hotel. It was your standard European breakfast....meat, cheese, hard-boiled eggs, cereal, fruit, pastries, etc. It was in a room with a vaulted brick ceiling which was quite nice. After breakfast we headed into the Old Town for a walking tour. We figured it would be a good way to get our bearings and find out if there were any sites we should visit while we are here. We went to the tourist company called 'Meet Bosnia' and our guide was Edin. The tour was free and you just tip at the end. They did mention other tours they have but there was no pressure. He was a great guide. He covered about 500 years of history, up to the assassination of Franz Ferdinand. The tour was supposed to be 90 minutes but it ended up being over 2 hours. Edin was wearing a scarf representing a big soccer game that was happening later in the evening between the Sarajevo Football Club and the Celtic Football Club. (Sarajevo ended up losing 3-1)

    Edin explained many of the buildings and the history of the city including the plight of the Slav people under successive rulers like the Ottomans and the Austro-Hungarians. We visited spots of important historical events and looked at the different places of worship. In a very small area of a few blocks there are mosques, a synagogue, a cathedral, and a Russian Orthodox Church. Edin shared with us the history of Jewish populations in Sarajevo. They had been driven out at different times in history. Before WW2 there were around 24 000 Jews living in Sarajevo, after the war there were only around 3000. Today Edin said there are around 1200 Jews in the city.

     We also saw many interesting historical buildings and learned the history of local businesses. Some of the old streets are not made of cobbles but of rocks. They are so polished from people walking on them that they can be very slippery. It was interesting to go into back lanes and streets we hadn't noticed before. We saw a 'Sarajevo Rose' which is a scar on the pavement where a shell killed people. If 3 or more people were killed they filled the hole in with a red resin to remember the deaths. We also went into an area next to the Old Town we didn't even know was there. It had some great outdoor cafes and shopping. I plan to go back there tomorrow to look around. After the tour finished we went for lunch. We had Cevapi again for lunch. The boys had theirs with bread but I skipped the bread and went for the meat and salad. They have good fresh salads here.

     After lunch we went to the Srebrenica Exhibition. It chronicled the genocide in July 1995 that saw over 8000 Bosnian Muslims, primarily men and boys, by the Bosnian Serb Army. It was a very powerful exhibit that combined photographs, film, and old posters from the time period. We were allowed to take pictures and I took a lot I plan to use when I teach the Genocide Studies course in the fall. The posters were very interesting. They were produced at the start of the conflict and they used pop culture symbols and altered them to reflect what was happening in Sarajevo. I bought one the posters that shows the Mona Lisa crying with an image of Sarajevo in the background. There were many shocking photographs of the discovery of the mass graves and of the efforts to exhume and identify the victims. There were also images of graffiti by the Dutch peacekeepers relating to the Bosnians. Quite disturbing.

     When we came out of the exhibit it started to rain so we went to find a sheltered spot for a drink. We ended up in a little outdoor cafe by the river that had covered seating. Mark had his usual beer, Joe had an iced coffee, and I had a cappuccino. I rarely drink coffee so it was quite the treat. We popped back into the hotel to get organized and research a restaurant for dinner. We ended up at a place that served some traditional Bosnian food. Mark had a Bosnian pot which was like a meat and vegetable stew. Joe had goulash and mashed potatoes, and I had stuffed peppers and salad. It was very yummy. Right before we got our food the skies just opened up and it poured. We were sitting outside under cover but it rained so hard some got on us. It is fairly warm here though so it was okay. After dinner, a little more wandering....dessert.....and back to the hotel.

     I did some last minute planning for travel the next few days. We leave on Thursday for Mostar. We are going to take the train and apparently we just buy our tickets on the day. Fingers crossed that is the case!! We leave Mostar on Saturday to go back to Dubrovnik to catch a flight back to Paris where we will stay overnight before flying home on Sunday. I had to buy bus tickets from Mostar back to Dubrovnik. I bought some online but they have to be printed, We are hoping our hotel can help us with that. The guy at the desk tonight doesn't have very good English and couldn't figure out the email so we hope someone tomorrow will be able to help us.  We will have to cross the border a few times on that trip and apparently the trip can take longer if the border is busy....could be the case on a Saturday. I think I have given us enough time so fingers crossed we make it.