Young Countries, Long Histories

From the new nation of Kosovo (2008) to the slightly older Montenegro (2006) to the venerable Bosnia and Herzegovina (1992), I'm seeing places I never thought I could go.

First, Becca, Becca's dad, and I went to Kosovo.  For a capital city Prishtina felt small in a good way.  It had a nightly xhiro (community evening strolling in the street) and a pedestrian-friendly city center. I visited the new Bill Clinton statue on Bill Clinton Boulevard, which was fun, but unfortunately through history a lot of historic Prishtina has been destroyed, leaving a Turkish house and memories manifested in numerous memorials to war heroes and victims.  After a visit to Prizren, which is slightly more historic and touristy, we headed back into Albania on it's first real highway to drop Becca's dad at the airport.

Then, we were off to Montenegro, straight to Durmitor National Park.  Before I explain this experience, I need to ask if anyone is a Peanuts fan, as I have a new found respect for Pigpen, in whose shoes I have now walked miles-- poor kid.  Durmitor is deceptive.  It's gorgeous and has a charming ski village right outside the park.  The walk around the lake takes visitors through streams and waterfalls.  Instead of enjoying the simple pleasures below, Becca and I decided to visit an ice cave, which we never reached.  What we did find were hordes of swarming mosquitoes and flies.  After four and a half hours up, we needed equipment to cross snow fields.  We were hiking too early in the season, so we turned around and more or less ran down to escape.  Oh, Pigpen, how I understand, and I'm sorry, so sorry.

Now, I'm in the oldest of these new countries and my favorite, Bosnia and Herzegovina.  Sarajevo is scarred by its past but still feels modern and comfortable.  The old town has character and a fabulous fruit and vegetable market.  Among other sights, we visited the history museum in Sarajevo, which focuses on modern history.  The past was clear through horrific pictures of bombed buildings and bloody people.  One display showed a diagram of how people could live in an apartment with sandbag barriers in the place of missing walls.  Others showed photographs of a classroom with blood splatters, taken in January 1993.  I would have been eight, and it reminded me that many of the people walking down the streets lived in those sandbagged apartments and taught in or attended basement schools.  Sarajevo has more cemeteries than any city I've ever been in and aside from those, a few buildings, and holes in the pavement filled with red resin where mortar shells killed someone called Sarajevo roses, I would not know what the city has been through.

Today I spent in Mostar, south of Sarajevo.  It also bears scars from the war but is fun to visit and has a bustling old town and a clear rushing river crossed by a majestically reconstructed bridge.  As all things come to and end, I'm saying goodbye to Bosnia and Herzegovina tomorrow and moving into another slightly older country, Croatia (1991).