A fantastic experience in Bosnia, part 2

On the morning of 11 April we go back into the centre of Tuzla; we meet a woman who tells us a bit about what happened in the city during the war and about her life now. They give us a bit of free time and we decide to wander round the little market, really very characteristic; you can find everything, from mobile phones to fruit and vegetables, modern clothes and typical objects. Later we take part in the Women's demonstration that happens on the eleventh of every month; a great many women gather and walk through the streets of the city carrying pillowcases with the names of their loved ones killed in the massacre embroidered by hand, all of this to make sure NO ONE forgets the people who lost their lives; it's a way of underlining their suffering and the harm that was done to them.

Carrying those pillowcases is a symbolic gesture but also an emotion; you probably can never understand the pain these people still feel today, but it makes you reflect on death. A quick lunch and a coach journey to Srebrenica, a small town of barely 5000 inhabitants that was hit by the war in 1995; the first thing we see getting off the coach is an endless series of GRAVES... a sight that makes your heart weep... and right there, in the cemetery, we met the mayor of the town, who was glad to see that young people like us wanted to learn the history of that massacre, to see that destroyed and poor world and carry those images with us forever. Enormous blocks of stone engraved with the names of the thousands of dead who were exhumed from the mass graves, identified and buried in that immense meadow, are arranged in a semicircle.

The emotional peak of the whole trip was the visit to the factory that housed the UN blue helmets during the war, now turned into a Museum-Memorial, an ice-cold shed despite the outside temperature being about 15 degrees, where silence reigns; everything has stayed as it was except for two small black rooms: in one a giant screen shows a very sad video in English; it shows interviews with some mothers who lost their husbands and sons, dead or missing in the war, young survivors who remember the massacre and talk about it, people hoping that among the hundreds of bodies found in the mass graves a loved one of theirs will be found. In the other room, in some glass display cases, are the belongings found on some of the dead (for example a pair of glasses, a cigarette case, a marble...) and a short description of the object and the person it belonged to.

On the way back on the coach we all thought about what we had seen, we all gave in to moments of reflection and even a few tears; it is truly terrifying. In the evening, to release the tension, after dinner at the hotel we went to a concert by Dubioza Kolektiv, a Bosnian band (entry cost only 2 euros) in a nice venue, crowded, indeed PACKED, with people dancing and letting loose. A sleepless night chatting, a classic on the last evening of school trips. 12 April 2008: In the morning, on the coach again towards Sarajevo, a short visit to the barracks of the Sfor soldiers, Italian soldiers who welcomed us and explained their task in Bosnia and their mission. Lunch in the barracks canteen and flight back from Sarajevo to Turin. Personally the return was a bit traumatic: coming back to our world, realising how lucky we are and how many things are absolutely useless and superfluous.

It was a fantastic experience; I had fun with the other students, I partly understood what poverty and suffering are, and I felt intense emotions that cannot be put into words. I wrote this diary because I too wanted to help people not to forget and to give you some advice: visit these places. I know they aren't tourist destinations, it isn't a holiday at a resort, it isn't just sea-and-disco, but it's a place where you can have fun while growing and thinking!