2004-06-18 - 5:31 p.m.
Balkans:
My trip to Serbia, Montenegro, Croatia and Bosnia-Hercegovinia was a pleasant mix of education and relaxation. The marble walkways of Dubrovnik, Croatia, with its 100 foot high medievil walls contrasted against the Adriatic blue and the Dalmatian mountain greens was a magnet, keeping me there for several days of lazy walking and cappucino drinking. Many coastal cities -from Montenegro to north of Dubrovnik -are perfect little hideaway villages, with few tourists, plenty of water and scenery, and lots of fresh fruits and vegetables to eat. It was just what I needed as a respite from Peace Corps life in Uzbekistan.
The Balkans were awash with war literature, war tourism, and a detectable vein of timid anxiety that war could return. More than one local told that the 1995 Dayton Accords were only a long cease fire and that they expected the worse in the future. The war is ten years gone. But as a rookie to this area it was ever present. Artillery shells, bullet scars, burned buildings and smashed cement stroked the country-side of Bosnia-Herc. Its hard, from any reading, to not place a majority blame on the Serbs. In Sarajevo, Bosnia, the story of the three year seige told from the perspective of the native Bosnians (even Bosnia Serbs) was one of scorn towards the Serbs. For three years they controlled the heights surrounding Sarajevo and lobbed mortars into the city center, killing 11,000, but terrorizing many more. I am no Balkan scholar so I am not completely confident on the underpinnings of this conflict, but the destruction was poignant.
The mystery that exists in the long history of the Balkans was juxtaposed on my trip by two side stories- one of a religious pilgrimage to Medugorje, Hercegovinia and the other of the biography of Fred Cuny, a charasmatic humanitarian. The trip to Medugorje, where in 1981 six children saw a vision on the Virgin Mary on a hilltop was out of sync with the rest of my trip. In Medugorje, large restaurants, shops, and tour buses filled the streets. Americans were a large majority of the crowd. In Mostar and Sarajevo, only an hour from this small village, Americans were very unrepresented. But in the inaccessible hill town, they ruled the show.
The story of Fred Cuny followed me the entire way as I brought the book, "The Man Who Tried to Safe the World," by Scott Anderson. Cuny was a colleague of my former Peace Corps Uzbekistan Country Director. Cuny disappeared in Chechnya in 1995, trying to broker a cease fire between the Russians and the Chechyans. But beforet this, he was a mythical figure in the relief industry. And some of his most famous work was in Sarajevo. It was significant for me to read this, chapter by chapter, as I skipped from one Balkan city to the next because it reminded me about how many people exists in the world who do amazing things, but go unnoticed. Cuny saved thousands of lives in his 50 years. Maybe hundreds of thousands. He spearheaded the resettlement of Kurdish refugees during the first Gulf War, brought water and gas to Sarajevo during the seige, and helped evacuate Grozians during the First Chechyan War. Fred also did tons of other missions. As the cable TV mourned Pres. Reagan endlessly (for good reason, but endlessly), I pondered the news that 5 doctors from Medicens san Frontiers were killed in Afghanistan trying to establish a clinic in the rural north. Thousands of these people work everyday to make life better for others, while placing their lives in danger. It's amazing and needs to be remembered as well.
Those are my lessons from the Balkans, and that they all love Ohio (Dayton Accords). Lets hope the peace remains.
