Well, wasn't this week exciting!.... but today, it's day 7 - a day of virtual rest, almost : )
Some people here in Sarajevo give you their thoughts:
AK [Unemployed-Model] Sarajevo-RBiH
This is post war blues. Aside from the few who are employed in aid agencies, the average wage is around 100 Deutch-Marks a month, if you're lucky enough to have a job. There is nothing to do here but drink & think.
R.R. [Radio Producer-UN] Berlin-GERMANY
Dictionary of (ex) Yugoslav terms, part one:
Glavni Grad (engl. capital)
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"Say something", says Simon, and the only further information on WHAT THE HELL to say is that what I should say could be "just anything". I didn't expect anything like this. What to say on a Sunday afternoon in Sarajevo? Talk about my hangover? About my biggest wish - AN END TO CURFEW? About the sounds we hear through the open window - a few children, cars, some bits of music from a radio nearby - a gunshot?
Sarajevo is basically a small, boring town, and if there wasn't the Olympic games and some four years of shelling and daily media coverage, only a few tourists and small town enthusiasts would know exactly where it is.
I LOVE big cities, especially those ones that are not TOO big. Like Berlin. Like Belgrade. Life seems to start at two millions of inhabitants, and turns into Chaos if there are more then four. Sarajevo is just too small - some 340.000 people live here at the moment, at least I seem to remember this as the official number UNHCR, the only reliable agency here, has put out - although one has to admit that the Sarajevians as such are certainly much less small towners than, for instance, the Stuttgarters or the Zagrebians.
That's all I have to say for today.
B.B. [Driver-Association DIA] Sarajevo-RBiH
You'll never understand... unless you were here. But, light this and it'll all disappear.
S.B. [Teacher] Sarajevo-RBiH
What do you want me to say, who is this for? .... No I don't want to say anything - I've nothing to say. Oh! InShallah.
H.P [Editor in Chief-UN Radio] London U.K
It's like this, Sunday doesn't move on the reality timescale, it's just an endless waterfall of hangovers and self pity. In Sarajevo everyday seems to be an excuse for escapism. Wether it's sickness, desperation, frustration or a false appreciation of the moment. I'm lying here trying to work out if it's just that I'm ill or that it's finally dawned on me that I'm in way over my head...... Just leave me alone and let me sleep to the gently soothing sounds of the `call to prayer'.
K.B. [Assistant Minister of Education] Sarajevo-RBiH
To be quite frank & sincere this is how I feel today....I am a small church not a great cathederal.
(Reflecting on the frustration of having to "gratefully" receive several tons of useless and obsolete textbooks. A gift of some thoughtless but well meaning individual who had not considered that the cost of transporting this paper to Sarajevo could have rebuilt a school!)... "Just give me the money... please".
There you have it... Sunday. An interesting variety of characters telling it how it is - or isn't!
S.D. [UN & iHAC]
