THURSDAY, MAY 16
At the end of our very full day of walking the streets on both the west and east sides of Mostar, we stopped to buy tahini from a small nut and dried fruit specialty store. The woman who worked there was wearing a shawl on her head and traditional Islamic dress, not as common a site as one might imagine given that the majority of people living in Mostar are Muslim. A thin, delicate woman, she spoke English with a sweet, soft voice. We were surprised that most everyone speaks English here as in Croatia. In Croatia, and maybe here as well, English is taught starting in early school years.
The woman asked us how long we were staying in Mostar and how we liked it. I told her that we had only the three nights, and then said we found it beautiful, but very sad. I unconsciously moved my hand to my heart.
“Yes,” she said, a darkness momentarily passing over her bright, open face. Then we carried on, buying our tahini.
BUILDING STORIES
During the course of the day, we saw so many bombed and pock-marked buildings. These war remains are not just monuments by which to remember. The destruction is too monstrous and ubiquitous to repair, emotionally and physically. I’m sure the city, which survives from tourism, doesn’t have funds sufficient to rebuild, and I can’t help but wonder if there is the desire or will to rebuild. Who would want to move back into a home that was destroyed during war, that has blood on the fallen stones, and shards of hate inside in the rubble.
We walked in silence, which we often do, and talked only when struck by something we saw. I saw some roses, our first so far in 2019. They deserved comment and a deep sniff. Chloe wondered out loud about the story behind broken furniture in a bombed out building basement. We commented on the narrow streets, the age of the stone and plaster buildings, the tall, dominating tower of the newest Catholic Church on the west side, the peacefulness we found in a courtyard by a mosque, the way the muezzin’s call sounds eerie and sweet to our untrained ears. We wondered aloud about the few wooden crosses in the Muslim cemetery where most everyone died in 1993, even children ages five and three.
WEST OF THE NERETVA
The west side of the Neretva River is the Croatian and Christian side of the city and we saw many Croatians (the tallest people we have seen in Europe — Amsterdam included) and the largest Catholic Church. Still there are many mosques and Muslims seem to live on this side as well as on the river’s east side. The apartment where we are staying is owned by a Muslim family and it is on the west side of the Neretva.
A concrete building skeleton and a small park called, Spanish Square, with a mural of a man in a space suit drew us west. Along one side of the park is a pedestrian walk, lit by the sunlight through the green of tall, thick trees on either side. The buildings are large and have hints of the Ottoman influence in wood-carved roofing. Some are painted in stripes, a favorite decorative style for building exteriors.
We walked through Park Zrinjevac with a fountain that we couldn’t help but notice as a metaphor for the city. It’s constructed of two metal arcs with spouts that pushed water up to the top and center, but don’t meet. The water falls between them. In the park, a little girl slowly roller skated on the cement walk. There is a statue of Bruce Lee. A streetside restaurant was crowded with people drinking coffee, their cigarette smoke mingling with the sweet scent of white flowers.
We had coffee in the warm sun by a busy roundabout. Nearby was a large, Soviet-style building. Affluent people passed on the sidewalk. The three women at the table next to us wore expensive designer clothes and had designer purses. Inside the restaurant, the lights were dim, the air thick with cigarette smoke.
Further up the hill, colorful houses sat beside others in ruin on calm narrow streets that were woven into the hillside. Further down the hill, we followed a path along a small river behind the towering Catholic Church, and passed a tennis club, a cemetery, a mosque, and came to a road that leads back to the Stari Most. Housed in a watch tower right next to the Old Bridge, on the west side, is a permanent exhibition of war photographs by New Zealand photojournalist Wade Goddard.
WAR PHOTOS BY WADE GODDARD
The exhibition of fifty black and white photographs walks the viewer through Goddard’s experience of the war, the destruction of the Stari Most, the intervention of Spanish UN troops, and the lives of the people of Mostar during the war. The photos are good, but it is the story they tell that is important, filling in some specifics that are missing from the Museum of War and Genocide Victims. The tower itself is a treat, cool and breezy, typical white-painted walls with wood beams, Turkish carpets, and a small coffeeshop with cushions and low tables.
STARI MOST
A fierce thunderstorm and heavy rains cleared the bridge of tourists, much to our delight and we crossed the bridge, passing two, large wolf-like dogs that we had seen around the city, always sleeping, always near each other. A man in a bathing suit who jumps from the bridge for money was near the dogs. Tourists come on day trips, primarily, and crowd the passages on the bridge and beside it. The man is waiting for tourists to pay him to jump from the bridge.
EAST OF THE NERETVA
The east side is more devastated than the west. The stone streets and steps are crumbling. Many buildings, though some are occupied, have not been repaired since the war. Tourists don’t come here, and there is obviously less money circulating. We climbed the stairs and walked through an underpass littered with broken glass and garbage, smelling of urine. Graffiti covered the walls, and as we saw throughout Mostar, there were the words, “end fascism.”
The view on the other side of the overpass was spectacular. The city of red-ocher, tiled roofs, hugging the green hills, lay before us.
WAR AND GENOCIDE
The first place we visited in Mostar was the Museum of War and Genocide Victims, and I think that was appropriate. It set the right tone. The beauty of the Stari Most, of the Neretva, and of the cobbled and ancient streets should be seen through the lens of truth, of the painful and devastating recent history. I remember clearly when the wars and genocides were occurring in the former Yugoslavia, the images of men in concentration camps that appeared in the New York Times, the stories of rape, and the disappointing results of tribunals at the International Criminal Court in Geneva. The crimes were unfathomable heinous for the end of the 20th C, the passivity of Europe and other countries inexcusable, and the lack of justice dismaying. I wish I could believe this would never happen again.
