Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina

On Wednesday evening I walked eight kilometers up the Miljacka River and visited an old Turkish bridge known as the Goat Bridge. When I returned to my hostel that evening, the owner, Salem, was in a talkative mood, so we sat together and drank beers all night, and he told me about the war and the seige of Sarajevo.

On Thursday morning I took a train from Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, to Mostar, the capital of Herzegovina. The train ride was spectacular (in spite of my hangover) as we climbed over the Bjelašnica Mountains and came down the Neretva River gorge on the other side.

The Neretva River is, without question, the most beautiful river I have ever seen in my life. The water is emerald green! I don't know if it is the color of the water that makes something common uncommonly visible, or if it is the rock formations beneath the water, but the bright green water swirls in the most mesmerizing patterns. You can sit and stare at the river for hours, and people do!

The Neretva River runs right through the heart of Mostar, with its pristine (reconstructed) old town and famous Turkish bridge connecting the two river banks. Outside of the old town, Mostar is not as charming. This city suffered more damage to its buildings than any other town in the former Yugoslavia. I am staying near the former front line, where every building has been destroyed beyond repair, and yet no effort has been made to demolish these horrible reminders of the hatred that divided (and divides) the city. Most local residents still don't cross the front line, and the EUFOR soldiers in Mostar are armed (with unloaded, holstered sidearms, but armed nonetheless) and on patrol. In this regard, it is very different from Sarajevo.

I spent yesterday and today(Thursday and Friday) wandering around the old town, visiting the tomb of the Sufi Sheikh Juju and the mosques of Karadžozbeg and Koski Mehmed Pasha. I also visited the Museum of Herzegovina and watched their extremely disturbing film about the destruction of the Old Bridge by Croat forces in 1993. (The reconstruction of the bridge was completed in 2004.)

It was interesting to watch the old men heading to their Friday prayers today. Bosnia-Herzegovina is a very secular country, which is a large part of why I like it so much, but ethnic identity is determined entirely by religion here, so there are a certain public displays of religiosity that do occur. In Lebanon and the Palestinian Territories, the old men don their best suits and khaffiyas for Friday prayers (otherwise you don't see a lof them wearing khaffiyas), while here in Herzegovina, the men don their best suits and their little black berets. I don't know why, but that made me really happy to see. They just looked so darn cute!

(Image from Internet: "Roman Bridge at Mostar", by Csontváry Kosztka Tivadar)
(Photos by Eric: Roman Bridge at Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina)

Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina

I spent the early afternoon yesterday visiting the Gazi-Husrevbey Mosque and Madrassa, Bosnia's most important Islamic institution. In the late afternoon I visited the Sarajevo Art Gallery, which houses an impressive collection of modern and contemporary Bosnian art. At dinner (fresh green salad, pepper chicken, and Montenegrin white wine), I met the European Union representative in charge of introducing Value Added Tax to Bosnia-Herzegovina and the US AID coordinator for Bosnia-Herzegovina. Both men were rather stuffy, and neither spoke a word of Serbo-Croatian, in spite of living here for years. But they were interesting dinner companions, sharing their professionally optimistic and personally pesimistic views on the future of the region. Both men assumed that the Republika Srpska would eventually break away from the Bosnian Federation and join with Serbia proper, especially if Montenegro votes for independence in its May 21st referendum and Kosovo manages to separate itself from Serbia.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4768370.stm

This morning I visited the Serbian Orthodox museum attached to the old Serbian Orthodox Church of St. Michael the Archangel. Afterwards I visited the Svrzo House Museum (Serbo-Croatian is as vowel-phobic as Hawaiian is consonant-phobic) and was able to see how the Muslim elite of Sarajevo lived in the 18th century -- not too shabby! And finally I visited the Ashkenazi Synagogue, rounding off my tour of Sarajevo's Abrahamic communities.

After three days of beautiful blue skies and sunshine, it is overcast and chilly today. The mountain air is deliciously crisp and clean here, and one would never guess that Sarajevo was once Yugoslavia's industrial center and remains the region's major steel producer.

I can't get over how calm and peaceful this town is, especially given its recent past. UNPROFOR (the United Nations Protection Force that failed to protect anybody and never used force) was replaced by SFOR (NATO's Stabilization Force), and that has now been replaced by EUFOR (the European Union Force, that consists of Germans, French, Spaniards, several misplaced Turks and the occasional lost American). You see these EUFOR soldiers all over the place, but none of them are armed, and they appear to be little more than uniformed tourists. You also see Bosnian soldiers every now and then, but they too are unarmed. (I assume there is a moritorium against weapons in Sarajevo -- an excellent idea for any town.) Of course, the Sarajevo police carry side arms, but they seem like a good-natured bunch of local boys, too busy drinking coffee and flirting with the girls to be bothered with fighting crime -- if there exists any crime to fight.

Aside from Budapest, Sarajevo is the first place I've visited on this trip where I've felt I could live for a while -- months or years. Serbo-Croatian is much more gentle on my ears than its Northern Slavic cousins, and I really enjoy saying "da, da, dobro!" ("yes, yes, good!") when they bring me my beer. The people are kind and generous and funny, and very happy to see unarmed foreigners in their town. Really, you should think about visiting!

(Photo by Eric: Spanish EUFOR troops, Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina)

Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina

Dahab, Egypt was hit by three bombs yesterday, killing 23 and injuring 62:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4941446.stm

You can see the Neptune Hotel, where I stayed, in picture 7 below. The bridge in pictures 1 and 2 was immediately beneath my window:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/4941026.stm

The Al Capone restaurant is where I ate dinner most nights:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4940908.stm

I have made only a few new friends on this trip. One is Salem, who worked in my hotel in Dahab. His name means "Peace," and we have kept in touch via e-mail since I left Dahab two months ago. In his last e-mail he sent me a picture of himself (above), and ended his message saying, "Really I miss you." Really, I hope I don't have to miss him too. Such incredible stupidity.

The Christian Science Monitor interviewed Hany Aly, the manager of the Neptune Hotel, and he sounded rather upbeat, stating that the cafe where Salem works is still open for business. This makes me optimistic that Salem's pretty picture doesn't deserve to be posted on my blog.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0426/p06s01-wome.html

(Photo received via e-mail: Salem at the Neptune Hotel, Dahab, Egypt)

Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina

Alright, maybe I'm not badder than ever, but I'm definitely back! My armpit is still stinky, but no longer itchy. The funk that formerly resided in my left armpit has now migrated down to my right hip. One can only guess where it will go next. I'm considering taking a shower when I get back to Hawaii -- sometime soon!

Sarajevo is a fantastic little town! It has a lively little cafe scene, with people of all ages filling the streets every night. It also has a surprisingly good brewery, with a pint of tastey beer costing only $2.00!

They are doing a lot of reconstruction work here, with money pouring in from the international community. Most of the buildings are still covered in bullet holes, but the streets are all being resurfaced, and there is a fair amount of optimism for the future. More than any other place I've seen on this trip, I would recommend Sarajevo as a vacation destination for my friends and family back home. Just don't step on the landmines (they estimate it will take another 20 years before all the mines are cleared).

Yesterday I hiked up two of the mountains surrounding the city. The outlying neighborhoods are incredibly charming, with narrow, winding, cobble-stone streets snaking their way up the hillsides. The two story wooden homes are all covered with stucco on the street level and emblished with carvings on the second floor. Most houses have wooden balconies that jut out over the street with wooden half-arches supporting their weight. But even the homes on the narrow side streets are covered with bullet holes, and many have rooms missing from missile strikes. Some of the more badly damaged homes are laying in ruins, while others are being replaced by newer models. Sadly, all of the open areas in these neighborhoods (the former parks?) have been transformed into graveyards. Muslim graves have both headstones and footstones, giving a Christian eye the illusion of many more dead than actually reside in these places. (Betchya didn't know I have a Christian eye, did ya? Check it out the next time you talk to me -- my left eye is always busy loving my neighbor, if ya know what I mean.)

Much like the wooden churches of Romania, the neighborhood mosques of Sarajevo all have wooden minarets that blend nicely with the alpine setting. There are mosques on every other street, and it seems many of them have been built within the last ten years. In downtown Sarajevo the Croat Catholic and Serb Orthodox churches are still standing, and their bells still toll every half hour, adding to the musical Muslim call to prayer that fills the air five times a day. I visited the old Serbian Orthodox Church yesterday and was surprised to see that it suffered no damage or looting during the war.

I have found some excellent restaurants here in Sarajevo. While the traditional Bosnian cuisine consists of meat heaped upon meat and soaked in fat, there are plenty of fresh vegetables to be found, and a few restaurants have decided to emphasize the fresher and lighter side of the Bosnian kitchen. Not only could you survive in this town as a vegetarian, you would actually have some delightful options! I had a great vegetable risotto last night, with home made bread, fresh salad, and some tasty home made white wine!

(Photo by Eric: "Sarajevo Rose", caused by a rocket strike, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina)

Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina

I'm back, and I'm badder than ever!

I arrived in Sarajevo at 6:30 this morning after a thirteen-hour train ride from Budapest. The city was covered in a thick blanket of fog when I arrived, but the sun came out this morning after ten days of non-stop rain, which I happily missed.

Sarajevo is a beautiful little town set deep in a valley with a pretty river (the Miljacka) running through it and completely surrounded by mountains (notably, Mount Jahorina and Mount Bjelasnica, the sites of the 1984 Winter Olympics). There are only 600,000 people living here, and the majority of the town can easily be seen on foot in one afternoon (I speak from experience). In spite of its obvious beauty and comfortable small-town feel, it remains a gloomy city, with the majority of its buildings showing scars from the 1992-1995 war and a large percentage of its population (especially the men) showing their own physical and psychological scars (missing limbs, terrible burns, and nervous twitches, just to name a few).

I went straight to the National Library when I arrived this morning to see how the restoration efforts are proceeding. It doesn't look like much has been done to fix this building, tragically destroyed by Serb incendiary bombs on 25 August 1992. Almost the entire archival and manuscript history of Bosnia-Herzegovina was lost that day. There is a new glass and steel dome covering the building, but the inside remains gutted.

From the Library I proceeded to the Latin Bridge where Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie were assassinated by the Serb nationalist Gavrilo Princip on 28 June 1914, kicking off 92 years of non-stop human stupidity, and counting.

I spent most of the day wandering around Bascarsija (the old Turkish Quarter, and the most picturesque area of downtown Sarajevo) and strolling into the new town, past the now-famous Sarajevo Holiday Inn onto the once-deadly stretch of road known as 'sniper alley'. Returning to Bascarsija, I briefly stopped by the Serbian Orthodox Cathedral and the Gazi-Husrevbey Mosque before spending the remainder of my afternoon in the Novi Hram Gallery of Jewish Art, the old Sephardic Synagogue, and the Jewish Museum of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

I sampled some traditional Bosnian cuisine today as well. My lunch consisted of a tasty soup that had a thick, shimmering layer of grease covering a spicy, creamy, dead-animal concoction underneath. The main course was a fried egg, cream, and meat extravanganza that made our Hawaiian Loco Mocos look like a health-food snack. If the landmines don't get me, the food surely will.

It's nice to be back! I hope to hear from the regular band of fun-loving commentators, if you're still out there!

(Photo by Eric: Bosnian National Library, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina)

Budapest, Hungary

After a bizarre overnight bus ride from Istanbul to Bucharest (during which I helped my Romanian and Gypsy co-passengers smuggle gold and leather across the border), I caught a train from Bucharest to Brasov and then another train to Sepsiszentgyörgy in Székelyföld (Transylvania). I spent a very relaxing week in Sepsiszentgyörgy visiting with old friends.

On Saturday I took a train to Budapest, passing miles and miles of flooded farmland. On Sunday morning I went to St. Stephen's Basilica for Easter Mass and then met with some friends in the afternoon. Yesterday (Monday) I celebrated Easter with Doktor Kriszta, Cserveny Kinga, and the Cserveny family (very dear old friends I first met in 1992) , including the little fertility ritual of sprinkling water on all the girls' heads while reciting the poem:

Zöld erdõben jártam,
Kék ibolyat láttam,
El akart hervadni,
Szabad-e locsolni?

Eric's translation:

Wandering through a green forest,
I came across a blue violet,
that was beginning to wither and fade.
May I sprinkle her with water?

Cute, isn't it?

More next time from Sarajevo...

(Photo by Eric: Sepsiszentgyörgy, Transylvania)

Istanbul, Turkey

On Tuesday morning I met Hungary's chief archaeologist in charge of Ottoman era excavations, who also happens to be a specialist in Turkish baths, conducting research here in Istanbul. Inspired by our brief converation, I headed to Çemberlitaş Hamamı, a traditional, 16th century bathhouse in the heart of Istanbul. It was an experience to be remembered, but not repeated. The "bath" itself was nothing more than a large slab of hot marble with several small fountains and basins situated around it. After laying on the hot slab and working up a sweat for about 10 minutes, a large, hairy, gorilla-like man entered the room and abruptly splashed me with a bucket of warm water. He then tied a loofa mit to his hand, much as a boxer puts on gloves prior to beating someone senseless, and he began scrubbing my skin in an apparent attempt to draw blood. He grabbed me by the scruff of my neck and tossed me about like a rag doll, scrubbing my back and arms and legs as I tried not to squeal.

Finished with round one, he left the room, and I foolishly thought I had survived the worst of it. Returning a few minutes later for round two, he had a bar of soap and a large bag of suds. He proceeded to cover my body in about six inches of lather and began massaging the lather into my skin. The massage actually felt good for about 30 seconds, but it quickly turned violent. He yanked me around into a dozen unnatural positions. As he attempted to rip my left arm out of its socket, I finally broke down and let out a shrill scream. He stopped, looked me in the eye, and angrily said, "I give good massage!" I timidly agreed, but then tried to explain that I have bursitis in my left shoulder and it doesn't feel good when people try to remove my arm by force. My explanation only seemed to enrage the man, and he continued his attempts at detaching my limbs. Tossing me onto my stomach, he began to massage my legs, driving my boney knee-caps into the hard marble slab. I tried to scamper away, but my sudsy body just slipped around on the smooth surface, and his iron grip held me in place.

Slapping my back, he ordered me to stand up and follow him into another room for round three. Seating me beside a marble basin that bore an uncanny resemblance to a toilet, he splashed me with water before scrubbing my neck and behind my ears. I felt like a small child being angrily cleansed by his over-zealous, cleanliness-is-next-to-godliness, doesn't-know-her-own-strength grandmother. A shampooing followed. Like every other step in the process, it was pleasant at first, but then his scalp massage turned into an aggresive attempt to push his thumbs through my skullcap and into my brain. While I am fairly certain I suffered a small amount of brain damage, my cranium somehow remained intact.

At the end of round three I was ordered back onto the marble slab to rest and sweat before round four. Another man entered the room and told me to go take a shower. A shower? Why in the world did I need a shower at this point? But I dared not argue. Emerging from the shower I was led into another room for a massage. Hadn't I already suffered through enough massages for the day? Exhausted from the first three rounds, my opponent was replaced by another gorilla for round four. Couldn't I have a replacement as well?

This last massage was done on an antique massage table with rusty legs. The man firmly ran his hands over my back and legs, attempting to find any tender spots that he might exploit during this final round. Having discovered all of my weaknesses, he set about methodically exploiting them to his advantage. Using the full weight of his body, he drove his thumbs into every tender strip of muscle on my body. Resistance was futile. The match was won, and he knew it. After 50 minutes of abuse, the referee stepped in to declare a t.k.o. I was finished.

Heading back to the shower, limp and thoroughly defeated, I wondered if I could make it back up the stairs to the dressing room. Back in my hotel, I fell into a deep sleep, my brain too damaged to dream. I awoke the next morning with aching muscles from head to toe, understanding why the Ottomans had lost their empire.

On Wednesday I dragged myself out of bed to visit the Grand Bazaar and the Spice Bazaar, the Süleymaniye Mosque and the Eyüp Sultan Mosque, and the tombs of Beyazıt II, Süleyman the Magnificent, Hürrem (a.k.a. Roxelana, Süleyman's favorite concubine), Mehmed IV, Hatice Turhan Valide, Eyüp Sultan (a Companion of the Prophet Muhammad), and a half-dozen other sultans, sultanas, and pashas. While the mosques were fairly empty, the tombs were crowded with worshipers, particularly the Eyüp Sultan Türbe, which boasted a footprint of the Prophet Muhammad and had a magic tree in the courtyard that seemed to drive a lot of people to tears. Perhaps they were grateful for surviving the previous day's bath.

Today (Thursday) I took a passenger ferry up the Bosporos strait to the mouth of the Black Sea. After climbing around a medieval fortress and enjoying lunch near the water, I returned to Istanbul to arrange my travel plans.

I will be leaving for rural Transylvania tomorrow, and I won't have access internet for at least a week. I probably won't pick up the blog again until I get to Bosnia-Herzegovina, in two or three weeks. I desperately need a vacation from this blog, and my trip to Transylvania seems like a natural place to take a break.

Sending my love to all of you, I'll see you again in Sarajevo!

(Photo by Eric: Venerable tombs, Istanbul, Turkey)

Istanbul, Turkey

Yesterday (Monday) I visited the graveyard of the 19th century Ottoman sultans, where I was able to witness some quality tomb-veneration. Afterwards I headed to Topkapi Palace, the one major tourist attraction I missed during my last visit to Istanbul. The palace was quite beautiful, and the harem warmed my heart, but the highlight of my visit was the Sacred Safekeeping Rooms that housed an impressive collection of Islamic relics. Much to my delight, I was able to see golden, bejeweled reliquaries containing hairs from the Prophet Muhammad's head and beard (the kinds of things you wouldn't want to find in your salad), dust from his tomb, a tooth from his mouth, a letter he composed to the leader of the Copts, and even his footprint. The rooms also contained swords that belonged to the Prophet Muhammad and the Rightly Guided Caliphs (Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, and Ali, the first four political successors to the Prophet Muhammad), as well as the Prophet's standard, bow, and seal. The relgio-political highlight of the collection was the mantle of the Prophet Muhammad, housed in a solid gold chest (Mullah Omar, eat your heart out!). They also had a nifty collection of items taken from the Kaaba in Mecca, including a dozen or so locks and keys, raingutters, a door, and the golden cover that once surrounded the Black Stone. (The caretakers of the Kaaba must have loved to see the Ottomans coming to visit.) All of this was presented in a very solemn atmosphere (in spite of the tourists who refused to acknowledge the "no photography" signs, and the museum guards who ran about frantically hissing in strained whispers, "no pictures, no pictures!") accompanied by live Qur'anic recitations.

In a nearby room they kept the royal treasures of the Ottoman sultans, including the (famous?) Topkapi Dagger and the 86 carat Spoonmaker's Diamond (I tried to steal it, but the security guards got all huffy -- some people have no sense of humor). The Royal Treasury also boasted the skull and arm of John the Baptist, lifted from their original resting place in Damascus, Syria.

All told, it was a very satisfying day.

(Photo by Eric: The Golden Horn as seen from the Topkapi Palace, Istanbul, Turkey)

Istanbul, Turkey

Turkey is burning:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4870912.stm

But you wouldn't know it in Sultanahmet (the Waikiki of Istanbul).

(Photo by Eric: Sultanahmet at dusk, Istanbul, Turkey)

Istanbul, Turkey

Moving right along...

Today I visited the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts, which has a spectacular collection of woven carpets, some of them measuring perhaps 20' x 40', and a surprisingly large number of them coming from Transylvania. I also visited the Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque. Istanbul has changed considerably since I was here in 1994. There are a lot more tourists, and a lot more people trying to take advantage of the tourists. The city is incredibly beautiful, but all the hassle certainly detracts from the experience.

There is also an Islamic revival evident in Istanbul these days, with a significant percentage of young women wearing headscarves and a smaller but highly visible group of women covered in black from head to toe. Such was not the case in 1994, when the only women wearing hijab were Gulf Arabs on vacation. The mosque was also a lot more packed today than it had been in 1994, and even the pre-recorded call-to-prayer has been replaced in many cases by real live muezzins.

(Photo by Eric: The Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey)

Istanbul,Turkey

And the fun never stops!!!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4865928.stm

I particularly enjoyed the comment by TAK: "With our actions we will turn Turkey into hell."

But before it get into my travels in hell, allow me to quickly recount the remainder of my stay in Israel, so as to further alienate myself from my readers, and to serve as a helpful reminder for my feeble brain:

Last Sunday I took a relatively non-controversial tour to Galilee. We visited the Roman ruins ın Beit She'an, the lakeside town of Tiberias, the Church of the Multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes and the Church of the Primacy of Saint Peter in Tabgha, the ancient town of Capernaum, and the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth.

On Monday morning Roger and I paid a visit to the Alternative Information Center in Jerusalem (http://www.alternativenews.org/). We then spent the remainder of our day at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Memorial and Holocaust History Museum (http://www.yadvashem.org/).

The Israeli national elections were held on Tuesday, boasting the lowest voter turnout in the history of the country.

On Wednesday morning Roger and I joined a tour led by the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (http://www.icahd.org/eng/). About half an hour into the tour, our guide, Jimmy Johnson (!), received a phone call informing him that a Palestinian family was being forcibly evicted from their home in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan. Jimmy Johnson offered to take the group to the eviction site, but the coordinator of the the American academics and peace activists on our bus decided to stick with the regularly scheduled tour itinerary. So Roger and I hopped off the bus and caught a taxi to Silwan. Just one block below the popular tourist destination of the City of David we found a dozen armed men from a private security company protecting about 30 young guys from a private moving company who were in the process of removing all the worldly possessions of a Palestinian family from their home. The home had been bought by the family in 1928 (some 39 years before Israel took possession of this area), and they had the land title to prove it (but not the firepower to defend it). Three generations of this family stood and watched in disbelief as their life was loaded onto a van and taken away to the Israeli government who would then sell their possessions in order to reimburse the Israeli settlers for the expense of hiring the private security and moving companies. And all of this was done within the bounds of Israel's apartheid-style legal system.

We then took a taxi towards the West Bank village of Anata, immediately outside of Jerusalem's city limits. We walked a while before asking directions from two men who then drove us several more kilometers to the Israeli military checkpoint outside of Anata. We walked across the checkpoint and into the town before stopping once again to ask directions at a pharmacy. The pharmacist put us into another taxi that took us down to the school, our intended destination. The Israelis have built their "Security" Wall right through the school's playground, and every afternoon at 2:30 the Palestinian children trade rocks for teargas with the Israeli soldiers. Unfortunately, we were unable to witness this little ritual, as the children had the day off to watch the 85% solar eclipse. We took some pictures, then a nice man gave us some bananas and water, and we went home.

Then on Thursday I flew to Istanbul, which was bombed on Friday.

There, all caught up!

(Photo by Eric: Palestinian children evicted from their home, Silwan, East Jerusalem)