Day 48 - 7/9/11 - Wednesday- Sarajevo- Zagreb

On a technicality, Cinthia and I can say we did rough it and stayed in a dorm room in Sarajevo. I say technicality as we were the only 2 in the dorm room, which had eight beds. Given we had arrived around 10.30pm last night we were confident that we would be the only ones in the room for the night, especially after the receptionist said she still had other empty dorm rooms. Given we only intended to sleep and check out, there was no point searching for the local Shangri La.

Although it is no longer peak tourist season, it is still a risk to arrive in a big city post 10pm without accomodation, however Cinthia and I were becoming increasingly brazen. We are hopeful this practice won't leave us sleeping on a park bench one luckless night, however what do they say about the brave being fortunate? The accomodation was quite run down, however super cheap, and in the Mayor's office, locationally speaking.

I guess I voted for the Sarajevo stopover, mainly to understand the recent war better, the history of this city, and just take up the opportunity of seeing another culturally interesting city. The best way to do this we thought was to do a city tour, so searching we went. After a couple of false starts, we found a tour that not only went through the city history, it also bussed us out to the airport, where we could go through a short section of the tunnel that was used during the war. The tunnel went under the airport, linking the city of Sarajevo with a free Bosnian area. The Serbians had otherwise encircled Sarajevo, intending to create an economic blockade until the Sarajevians relented and agreed to Serbia's demands. The airport during most of the 3 year siege was controlled by the UN, who otherwise were seen as useless during the war. The UN were seen as unable to protect themselves from the Serbs, let alone protect the Bosnians.

Perhaps because the blockade limited the media's knowledge of what was happening, combined with the fact the war didn't involve Australia or the US, it didn't get much media airplay at the time. However one simple statistic gives an indication of the seriousness of this war- 200,000 people died. This included a fair number of Serbians and Croatians, however the largest amount were probably the Bosnians.

When a war is fought on the basis of land, or resources the motives usually seem quite clear. When a war involves politics or religion it is often more complex. When a war involves both, and numerous semi autonomous regions, it can be terribly complex. This war, for Serbians was seen as a civil war, for Bosnians and Croats it was seen as Serbian agression, and for outsiders it war just a war.

I don't claim to be an expert on the war, however here is a long paragraph explanation of my understanding. Serbia (president Milosovic) wanted a Serbian Orthodox state, and started implementing favourable policies toward this outcome. When Croatia and Slovenia voted for independence, war started, initially with Croatia, with tanks coming via Montenegro. The Bosnians, in 1992, also voted strongly for independence, and Serb agression was turned even more heavily on them, including the Sarajevo blockade. Croatia fought with Bosnia, however when Croatia and Serbia agreed for peace on the basis of splitting Bosnia between them, war also broke out between Bosnia and Croatia in the South. Eventually, after an almost 4 year siege and 200,000 deaths in Bosnia alone, NATO stepped in (after US pressure to act), and within an hour, Serbian military had been pounded and thus retreated. shortly thereafter a peace settlement was reached. Serbia was forced to recognise the former Yugoslavian states as seperate countries.

Going through the tunnel was not quite as harrowing as the Cu Chi tunnels in Vietnam, as these tunnels were 1.6 metres high. The tunnel was used to bring in 'black market' supplies, but primarily weapons to help the people defend themselves. The Serbians worked out there was a tunnel, however thought it was to evacuate the Sarajevans, and therefore thought they would end up easily taking the city. This did not prove to be the case, as the siege dragged on.

After a tram ride on a tram older than our W-Class, Cin and I now spend the familiar task of awaiting a transport. This time the mode is train (our preference over bus), and hence our present location is Sarajevo's train station. It is a 10 hour journey. Next stop is Zagreb, Croatia's capital, however we don't know whether we will go and explore Zagreb for a few hours, or high tail it straight through to Ljubljana, capital of Slovenia. Either way, lets hope for a decent sleep on the reclining train seats.