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Japanese school field trip #domestictourism #fieldtrip #students #studentfieldtrip #schooluniform #summerheat #summer #fushimiinari #inari #temple #shintoshrine #shrine #daytrip #kyoto #kansai #japan (at Fushimi Inari-taisha)

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Diary Trip to the Balkans

Dr. Greg Kent and our MA students write about their adventures in Bosnia, Kosova and Croatia.

Sunday 28th April Stolac, Bosnia > Mostar/Sarajevo, up the Neretva valley  Rita Carvalho writes: Our first day in Stolac started early with the sound of the call to prayer coming from the closest minaret. Minutes later the bells of the nearest church sounded equally loud. We remember thinking that it almost sounded like a ‘competition’ between the two faiths. Demir Mahmutcehajic, a local politician and former activist gave us a tour around the town and we interviewed him at length on many subjects. He explained to us that Stolac still experiences a huge divide between Croat and Bosniak ethnicities. The children, as Demir explained, still attend segregated schools, and depending on the families, befriending people from a different ethnicity seems not to be easy.

In the end, all of the interviews pointed to similar issues and problems, as the very last one in Sarajevo with Balkans Insight, journalist Elvira. Constitutional reform is the major obstacle and it is hindering the country to its further development. Although people do care about these issues, they are more concerned about keeping their jobs and maintaining a decent standard of living. Questions such as “Do we have enough money to send our children to school?” or “Can we afford our parents medicine?” occupy the minds of most people. And who can blame them? With four governments and four million people (a rough guess as there is no census so far) such a small country cannot maintain such a huge administration; again, one of the main reasons for constitutional reform.   By the time we had finished all the interviews was around 2pm, and we decided was time to see some exhibitions in the city. As such, we went to the Srebrenica Gallery and to the Sarajevo Siege Exhibition. If somehow we thought we were prepared for what we were going to see and experience we could not be more wrong. For some of us the experiences were too personal for different reasons, what we felt, what we heard, what we saw from the inside and then on the outside in the reality were just too wrong. It still lacks explanation. All these crimes are still denied by many of those who committed them – that haunts the victims.  Wednesday 1st May Pristina, Kosova > Shkodra, Albania

Karolin Kuhla writes: After a rather short night in a minivan, passing through the borders of Bosnia, Serbia, Montenegro and finally Kosova (only possible against a payment of ‘insurance money’), we arrived at our destination: Pristina. Compared with the cultural beauty recently experienced in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the capital of the newly independent Republic of Kosova appeared less remarkable, but still friendly with regard to its citizens nonetheless. We were, furthermore, lucky to conduct three impressive interviews in spite of the fact that the 1st May is a national holiday in the Balkans. Firstly, we interviewed Albin Kurti, a charismatic, well-read and highly entertaining leader of the Vetevendosjei, an Albanian nationalist political movement, opposition party and activist network. His movement for Self-Determination argues in favour of a reunification with Albania.

We heard a different, perhaps more nuanced, certainly less nationalistic perspective from Linda Gusia, an academic and women’s network activist. Eli Gashi,the director of Alter Habitus, an Institute for Studies in Society and Culture, joined us for afternoon coffee in the centre of Prishtina. She deepened our understanding of the post-conflict reconciliation process in the region by explaining their project about a collective memory in Kosova and how transitional justice still needs much to be done. With thoughts of these meetings swirling inside our heads we visited the old bazaar of Pristina before we went back on the road, making it in good time to get some impression of beautiful Albania on our way back to Dubrovnik.  Thursday 2nd May  Dubrovnik, Croatia

Our R & R involved an extremely early morning visit to the Old City of Dubrovnik, a walled, once city-state, clearly of incredible wealth and matching piety. Packed with beautiful sculpture, ornate buildings hewn from marble and limestone, the magnificence of the ‘pearl of the Adriatic’ makes the crimes committed by the Serbian besiegers back in 1991 so incomprehensible... on yet another level. I can remember at the time of the Dubrovnik siege thinking, ‘some people (in the UK and elsewhere) only get agitated when a world heritage site gets attacked... where have they been while Vukovar and its people were bombed to oblivion.’ Looking down on Dubrovnik from the hillside as we left for the airport, I was struck by how, holding the memory of those who lost their lives in the random slaughter of the artillery bombardments from the hordes in the hills, how impossible an act it seems, how remote those emotions and irrational calculations seem now as Croatia readies for EU accession perhaps propelling the remainder of the region into new perilous waters...