Advertisement
Things to know about Sarajevo: this is not Boston. First, Boston has good drivers. Laugh if you will, but this is ridiculous. As any of my friends know, I have no fear of jaywalking in Boston. I will not do it here. By my professor's words, "the drivers don't have the same regard for human life as we do." There's also, apart from the main streets, no sidewalks wider than perhaps 2 or 3 feet. A bazaar around the corner sells hundreds of knock-offs of Michael Kors, Chanel, and Louis Vuitton. Mosques litter the city, a synagogue is around the corner, and at one point a block from our hotel you can stand between the architectural remnants of 2 empires, centuries apart.
Also, their gelato puts literally everything in the US to shame, both in terms of cost (1KM per scoop, and note that 1KM is about $0.70), and taste.
This morning was still a bit of a struggle; 6 hours of jetlag is arguably one of the worst time differences because it's hard to just stay up to sleep it off, and whenever you wake up, your body thinks it's 3 am. After managing to get
out of bed, we headed to the American University in Bosnia and Herzegovina where we had 2 lectures, one on Bosnian Politics (which are both modeled so closely on American and yet so far from our setup), and one on Bosnian History (of which there is, frankly, way too much).
Across the street is the Bosnian Parliament, where we had the chance to meet with the equivalent of the Speaker of the House and another Representative. While the session itself wasn't that interesting - they basically just dodged or didn't answer about 3/4 of the questions - there were a few interesting tidbits we teased out. For example, there are 3 major ethnic groups in the country: Bosniaks, Croats, and Serbs. They are treated somewhat like the US treats states, even though they don't necessarily live entirely in separate areas. As such, Bosnia has 3 presidents: one from each ethnicity. Their House of Representatives has 43 people, popularly elected, to go with the 15 in the House of the Peoples. The 15 pull 5 from each ethnicity. The minor ethnicities, which include Jews, Romas, and others, are virtually entirely unrepresented in politics. As I said: so close
to US Politics, yet so far.
After the meeting was over, we went back to the hotel, where we changed before heading to the bank (the exchange places hand out 50KMs, which most establishments don't accept), then hiking up to the Yellow Fortress again. On the way down, we stopped by a pizza place that had some of the most amazing food I've had in a while.
One of the things that's great about this group is how quickly we've bonded. I had met one person here before we left, but I feel like I've got several new friends. I've spent time with almost everyone. One kid, Dave, and I clicked pretty quickly, and have been having a lot of fun playing around in this city. As much as I'm excited for the other cities I'm visiting on and after this trip, I'm simultaneously upset to know that I'll have to leave Sarajevo in 2 weeks.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.054s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 10; qc: 29; dbt: 0.0261s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb