Adventuring: Welcome to Sarajevo!!

I can hardly believe that it is Saturday I am trying really hard to keep the days straight, figure out what time it is, and come to terms with the fact that I am actually in Bosnia right now!

After 12ish hours of traveling I arrived in Sarajevo yesterday afternoon, got a quick bus ride to our hotel, and then had a delicious buffet lunch of Bosnian specialties. Lots of meat pies and vegetable pies, sausage, and pickled vegetables.

After getting a moment to catch our breath my prof rushed us to our first meeting, with UNHCR (th UN High Commissioner for Refugees). At the UN office building I work at in DC, the UNHCR office is right down the hall so it was cool to be able to compare the work and philosophy of a more administrative-focused office in DC with this field office in Sarajevo.

The women we spoke with at UNHCR had an interesting dual perspective, working with the UN to handle refugees and internally displaced persons as well as having to survive the conflict in their home themselves. On of the UN workers, after painting a rather bleak picture of post-war society said, "I am surprised that anyone returned to Bosnia after the war...and I am from here."

After the meeting we walked around Sarajevo for a bit. It is so interesting to walk down the street and look at the architectural differences between the buildings. On a single block will be a beautiful, elaborate building from the Austrio-Hungary Empire, next too a dismal, unadorned building from Tito's communism, right next to a super modern western-European building with lots of glass walls and windows. Walking down each street is a different view into the past, a different chapter from Sarajevo's history all squished together on a single street.

We spent the evening in the old Turkish quarter, an all pedestrian area of the city with stone walkways and beautiful old buildings and shops.