Sarajevo

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After the longest train journey since the creation of trains and a 3 hour delay in Croatia where the local shop decided a good exchange rate was 1 euro to 1 kuna (it should be 10) I finally made it in to Sarajevo just as they were locking up the station.

Sarajevo is very different to the countries Ive been to so far due to its massively Turkish influence. The old town is a maze of cobbled streets lined with souvenir shops with hundreds of minarets overlooking them. Its only when you take a second look that you see that almost every single building is peppered with bullet holes and those that arent are reconstructions funded by other countries to help rebuild the region after the war when Yugoslavia broke up. The place seemed to be full of gap year students going there for the cheap beer but if you look closely enough you can spot areas of real historical importance. For example, the latin bridge is where Franz Ferdinand was assassinated starting the First World War. At the moment there is very little to acknowledge it, due in part to the fact he was Serbian.

The next day I went on a Peace and Tolerance tour of the area, basically a tour so you can get your picture taken at all the important spots from the war. We started off at the Tunnel Museum which between 1992 and 1995 was the only way in and out of the city. The whole building is just about standing after the onslaught it suffered and only 800m away you can see the promised land of the airport which so many Bosnians were killed when trying to reach. The second stop was the derelict 1984 Olympic bobsleigh track which was used as a bunker by the Serbians to fire their anti-aircraft missiles as the city below. On the way here you get to drive through the hills around Sarajevo with the road the only real safe place around. The trees are all cordoned off as they are riddled with landmines some 14 years later and you see the occasional convoy who are doing their best to find and deactivate them. Our final stop was a Second World War monument which the Serbian snipers used to shoot at the Bosnians below and a small stone structure which they used as a makeshift prison for the Bosnian soldiers they caught. The whole place has a strange air to it as you think about similar monuments in the UK which are well cared for with wreaths and the like while this one is semi-destroyed and covered in graffiti due to the new sentiments the place holds.

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