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Balkan Intermezzo - July 15 - 22
Dubrovnik, Croatia
Dubrovnik is they type of city you fall in love with. The old walled
city is bathed with sun and nostalgia of naval dominance that locals
compare to Venice. Carefree tourists abound and everyone enjoys
the Adriatic's Dalmatian Coast.
I first visited Dubrovnik in the summer of 1991, just as fighting
was starting in Slovenia. At that time, the town was empty of tourists,
the city's livelihood, and people were anxious about what the spread
of war to Croatia might mean.
Among the things that the spread of war meant, was a decline in
tourism and economic difficulties. The charm of the city and the
faded memory of war have brought people back to Dubrovnik. It has
returned to its status as a playground on the Adriatic and on the
surface, life continues with a lightness of being carefree.
There is a stark contrast between Mostar and Dubrovnik that was
unclear at first. It was only after a few days in Dubrovnik, trying
to understand the feel of the city without the foreign horde of
tourists, that a friend (Adam Seligman) was able to offer a plausible
explanation.
In Mostar, the history of the war is being lived in the present.
Buildings destroyed during the war are on every street and the rebuilding
of churches and mosques are testament to the construction of division.
Dubrovnik, on the other hand, is already packaging the war as a
story to be sold.
In 1991, when I heard the news that Dubrovnik had been attacked,
my immediate reaction was one of outrage and sympathy. How could
this beautiful city, with seemingly little strategic importance,
that I and millions of other tourists had enjoyed, be attacked during
the war? The first reports, and for that matter the only news reports
that I remember, made it sound as if the old city was destroyed
by Serbian aggressors.
Today, there is little sign that the historical integrity of the
old city was destroyed. Parts of the city were damaged and a heroic
reconstruction effort has restored much of it, but the selling of
the war story is disturbing.
All of the bookstores and tourist shops sell a DVD of "Dubrovnik
during the War." As one enters the University, immediately
before you lay a half-burnt book with a plaque of simple description:
"1991." And perhaps most gratuitous, every entrance to
the old city has a large map of the walled city. Rather than the
typical map pointing out places of interest, this map shows the
destruction to the old city -- where roofs were destroyed; where
structural damage took place; where a bullet shell was found --
and directly points out who caused the destruction. I could not
find any other signs giving reference to other sieges on the city,
e.g. the Ottomans (a tribute was paid to them) or Napoleon.
Such symbols reinforce the seemingly artificial divisions of the
war. Dubrovnik seems like a happy city with a contented population
welcoming the foreigner. The transient foreigner, however, is less
threatening than their neighbors. Just as there is a reluctance
to exchange Bosnian and Serbian currency, the history that is being
written is one emphasizing the other as enemy rather than the other
in peaceful coexistence.
Hopefully the pragmatic pleasures of a war-free market will be enough
to prevent a return of violent conflict like the early 1990s. I
am skeptical of the power of the market to satisfy people at all
levels, and it would seem that the biggest challenge is to assure
truth in the war story and honesty about the atrocities on all sides.
Balkan Intermezzo - July 17
Perast and Kotor, Montenegro
Mountains surround the Gulf of Boka and the narrow fishing villages
that sit on these shores of the Adriatic retain an architectural
influence from their time under the control of the Venetian state.
The power of Venice has long since waned, but many Montenegrins
still want independence. According to Montenegrins I spoke with,
it was the West that forced them into a "peaceful co-existence"
with Serbia. At this point, the grumblings of independence seem
unlikely to become more than the wishes of a few willing to vocalize
their dissent, but it does hint at the general dissatisfaction with
the post-war (and pick any of the relevant wars) structuring of
the region.
Nonetheless, Perast and Kotor are two charmingly romantic places
in this very diverse region. Perast is the access point for the
church of Our Lady of the Rock, a wonderful island church in the
bay. There are many churches around the bay, many of them having
been built by sailors who called upon faith to negotiate the building
of a church for safe passage in the heart of a storm. Most of these
churches are empty and are structures of historical (rather than
living) interest.
While the majority of these churches are either Catholic or Serbian
Orthodox, some Montenegrins romanticized over a resurgence of Montenegrin
Orthodox Church. I do not know if such resurgence is the case in
terms of numerical attendance, but the meaning was clear: Montenegrins
could enhance their ethnic identity by differentiating themselves
from the Serbian Orthodox Church.
Further down the bay, the Venetians offered a solution to the differentiation
along religious lines. The city of Kotor, an impressive fortress
along the water with protective walls climbing up the mountain side,
was primarily Catholic, a religious affiliation of which Venice
no doubt approved. But the administrative structure of Venice forced
Kotor to share one of its churches with the Orthodox. Thus, there
was a church with two altars, one Catholic, the other Orthodox.
Despite a fire that destroyed part of the church and subsequently
resulted in the church having only one altar, the church remains
a symbol of pluralism and co-existence for the city.
The need to live together is as relevant today as it was when the
Venetians were governing the region. While having churches with
two altars is an unrealistic solution, it does give us a story of
co-existence we can learn from.
Balkan Intermezzo - July 20
Trebinje, Bosnia & Herzegovina
The political geography of the Dalmatian Coast, or for that matter
of the former Yugoslavia, is a mess (to use a technical term.) Ten
kilometers inland from Dubrovnik, for example, is the border with
Bosnia and Herzegovina. We visited the Serbian Orthodox monastery
of Tvrdos, just outside of Trebinje, in the Republic of Serbska
(one of the awkward arrangements of the peace accords that make
Bosnia and Herzegovina so tenuous.)
The monastery was newly renovated and, as one would expect of a
monastery, quiet. What was interesting, however, was the strong
Serbian ethno-nationalism that was evident when visiting Trebinje.
One visible marker that distinguishes the Serbs from the Croats
and the Bosnians (physical features are less reliable in distingishing
difference) is the Serbian useage of a Cyrillic script (otherwise,
dialect and intonation aside, there is virtually no difference in
the language spoken by Bosniacs, Croats, and Serbs.)
Upon entering Trebinje, I noticed more Cyrillic script than I saw
walking around the center of Belgrade, the Serbian capital. The
only thing that makes this worth noting is that Trebinje is in Bosnia
and Herzegovina. Just as Stolac and Medugorje flew the Croatian
flag, the people of Trebinje are also engaged in symbolism designed
to differentiate them from the greater Bosnia and Herzegovina. Such
divisions make the work of bringing the communities together all
the more urgent, if Bosnia and Herzegovina is to peacefully exist.
July 22 - 24
Dubrovnik to Novosibirsk
It will come as no surprise that there is not an easy way to get
from Dubrovnik to Novosibirsk.
In total, prior to departing for my Balkan Intermezzo, I cycled
from Vladivostok to Novosibirsk, so I will resume cycling from Novosibirsk.
At this point, the group is a few hundred kilometers ahead of me
and I hope to catch them by Moscow. Being behind and carrying extra
weight (sleeping bag, tent, spare tires, tools, panniers, etc.,
that they keep in the support vehicle) is a bit daunting, but my
travels back to Novosibirsk seemed to be an appropriate transition.
I had two options for getting to Belgrade for my return flight to
Moscow. I could have either taken the 5:15 pm bus from Dubrovnik
which arrived in Belgrade around 10-12 hours later, or I could somehow
find my way to Bar, Montenegro, where there was a night train with
a sleeper car. Given the length of my pending journey, I opted for
the latter, wanting to get at least one good night's sleep before
my all night flight to Novosibirsk and starting to cycle on the
day of my arrival.
Bar is around 150 km south and east of Dubrovnik, near the Albanian
border. The logistics of getting there by public transportation
are complicated; a bus from Dubrovnik only goes to the border, after
which time one must either hitch a ride or take a cab to the next
town and, depending on arrival time, take either one or two buses
to Bar. At that point, the train was looking like a less attractive
option until a friend from Sarajevo called a friend of his in Montenegro
and arranged everything.
I was taken to the border by one group of friends affiliated with
the ISSRPL and was met on the Montenegrin side of the border by
the friend of my friend. (It truly is wonderful how the network
of friendships is extended in such situations!)
Thanks to Rusmir, Ivan and two of Ivan's friends, what would have
been long uncomfortable journey became a fun and informative trip
along the Montenegrin coast. Our leisurely trip to Bar included
ice cream by the sea, a visit to the Roman mosaics of Risan, and
dinner in the walled coastal town of Budva. Conversations were informative
and I learned about the love Montenegrins had for their country.
I boarded the train ten minutes before its departure and said good
bye to my hosts whose hospitality convinced me that someday I should
return to Montenegro.
I was able to sleep on the train, which was good, as the long uncomfortable
part of the trip was not far away. The time between Belgrade and
Novosibirsk can be described as a sitting and waiting period. Five
hours wait here, eight hours there; a three hour flight, a five
hour flight, everything was such that the only thing to see was
the airport waiting hall.
In Moscow, there was the transfer from one airport to another and
there was not enough time to justify a quick visit to the city.
Waiting in the main hall for my flight to Novosibirsk, I had to
consider myself among the fortunate ones who had managed to find
an open chair. As there were more people than chairs, the luxury
of being able to sit also meant that freedom of movement was curtailed.
If I wanted to get something to eat, if I wanted to go to the bathroom,
I risked losing one of the highly coveted seats. Thus, I held out
until it was time to get on the plane, which was delayed, condemning
us to yet another 60 minutes in the sitting position.
The flight arrived in Novosibirsk at 6 am. It was 50 degrees and
raining. I asked one man about the weather, saying it had been 85
degrees when I left Moscow, and he just smiled, shrugged his shoulders
and said, "This is Siberia." I returned the smile, and
said, "Yes, I should have known."
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