Nine Images from the Road

Image number 1. A drunken October night in 1995: At some unseemly hour, at a tavern close to the Terezino Polje border crossing. Everyone is waiting for the Croatian police to process some fifty passengers from Yugoslavia through their computers. A tipsy citizen starts calling out from the corner - in an undertone to begin with - "Serbs, get out"; the extremely gracious waitress feels uncomfortable; "Serbs out!" he shouts out a while later, but the bar remains impassive, and the waitress is even more gracious. Finally, the drunken citizen yells out: "Serbs out, damn you!", but he remains in the minority of only one person. The present Croatian citizens ignore him pointedly; the present Yugoslav citizens remain cool; the gracious waitress apologizes quietly, the man is drunk and what can you do.

Image no. 2. or Frames for doors and windows: As a person drives through the controversial zones as is the route Terezino-Polje-Virovitica-Grubisno Polje, or Gospic-Knin-Vrlika-Sinj, or the left bank of the Neretva river from the mouth of Bregave to Dreznice, he becomes extremely aware that frames for the doors and windows are plainly the most deficient item in the Balkans. Namely, not on one of the more or less expertly demolished neighboring houses can a single frame be found. On the other hand, nothing new is being built, the only constant thing being demolition, so that the desperate demand for frames seems unclear - unless they are being stolen for firewood. A similar situation occurs with roof construction beams.

Image no. 3. Peaceful reintegration: Peaceful reintegration is being carried out in the following way: the first thing to be reintegrated is the mobile property from the neighboring house; then the empty house is shut, two gas bottles are opened and the executor runs out. When butane and air blend into an explosive mixture (with aerosol effect, as the artillery men would say), a tracer bullet is shot at the house from a safe distance. In the detonation that follows the roof construction usually blows up, and the house is sufficiently shaken up to make taking frames from the doors and windows an easy task; besides it does not cause a fire, which eases the job.

Image no. 4. Regional differences: In Western Slavonia they somehow prefer to accomplish that with explosives, thoroughly; the houses are stacked in neat piles and weed has been growing out of them for the past four years; the ruins have not been cleared out by anybody, even though they are often situated on favorable construction sites. From Gospic to Vrlike and along the left bank of Neretva they prefer gas or smaller amounts of explosives, leaving the houses to stand without roofs, with gaping holes where doors and windows once stood (in slang they are referred to as "convertibles"). On the above mentioned routes there is hardly a burned down house to be seen; almost all have been demolished with explosives; it is quicker and neater. A possible conclusion: practice makes perfect.

Image no. 5. Wasteland: From Gospic, through Knin, Polaca, Biskupija, Kijevo, Civljane, all the way to Vrlike - not a person is in sight. Not a dog, a cat nor bird. Only ruins and an occasional armed and uniformed person. The ruins are older (Kijevo, Vrlika) or newer (Civljani, Polaca). Knin is intact, but there is nobody there: on our way back, around 8 pm, every hundredth window has a light on, although electricity is plentiful. On that route the Croatian police turn the blue rotating lights off which they otherwise use abundantly; answering the question why, the policeman first says that there is no need for it, and afterwards says that it is safer that way; he hurries to add that, of course, nothing has occurred, but still. From the mouth of the Bregava as it flows into Neretva, south of Capljina, until the canyon, at Dreznica, north of Mostar, the left bank has been sterilized: there is nothing except thousands of demolished houses. Tasovcici, Klepci, the vicinity of Pocitelj, Vrapcici, Pijesci: wasteland. Pocitelj is - due to certain luck - mostly intact: the old mosque is ruined, but the Turkish bath, houses, taverns (including Mutina Gallery) and the towers of Gavrankapetanovica are still standing.

Image no. 6. Differences: Mostar is in a worse state than Vukovar (even that is possible). The Cathedral (the old Serbian church on the hill) has been transformed into a neat pile of gravel. Mostar - unlike Vukovar - is a city that is alive. People are parading down the streets, mixing mortar, hauling glass, building, mending, sitting in front of amazingly ruined cafes on a nice sunny day, trading, talking and, mainly, living.

Image no. 7. Life: From the intact Jablanica, across the relatively spared Konjica, to Tarcin a certain kind of electrical railway is in operation; same as in central Bosnia, around Zenica, Zepca and its vicinity. The most frequent images around the houses are artistically stacked piles of wood to be used as firewood; everybody is chopping and sawing. From Jablanica to Konjica, in the old road taverns the same famous barbeque lamb is being prepared. In Zepca, on a foggy dawn, an older man is standing in front of a house and with the utmost patience is trying to start a chain saw. Kiseljak is Bosnian Switzerland: the cheapest provincial town in the Balkans, full of new, expensive and scratched cars (some even have registration plates); business is flourishing, money is changing hands, all currencies are acceptable. The people from Sarajevo say: let them; it won't last much longer; Kiseljak and Ilidza shall pay a high price one day for the 40 German Marks per liter of cooking oil. Those who have earned their fortunes on other people's grief, they say, shall have no luck from that money, and we shall make certain of that, no worries...

Image no. 8. Tuzla: A quiet city, mended and fixed, which has come to accept the difficulties of war. Newly dug out graves of some seventy victims of the artillery attack of Mladic's army and bitterness; things would be a lot easier for everyone without it. A democratic atmosphere: followers of the mayor Selim Beslagic are quarreling with the extremists from the Party of Democratic Action (SDA), gathered around a canton-like structures. The political pluralism of Tuzla is best illustrated by an older lady, Serbian, who is a frenzied activist of Zulfikarpasic's Moslem-Bosnian Organization. Selim Beslagic, opening the Convention of the Helsinki Citizen's Parliament, openly warns of the "danger of a one-party dictatorship" and everybody clearly comprehends what he means by that.

Image no. 9. Night club: In the disco-club of the hotel Tuzla the first person to arrive is Vedad Spahic, editor of the Zmaj Od Bosne newspaper, explaining how his ancestors were in the Handzar-division, "defending Bosnia"; he is not quite clear as to whom they were defending it from. A former reformer (like Karadzic), Spahic is now ready to wager that SDA shall "in the next elections win at least 92 percent of the votes" and wipe out Beslagic. He cannot explain what it is that annoys him about Beslagic, except that "all Bosnians should think the same", which somehow sounds familiar to us. Around him are a few very young men, nervous and lost. Enver, watching us somewhat incredulously, says: "What shall I tell my men from the unit: I was with the Serbs and I did nothing to them?" Nenad Canak retorts that he should do something if it will make him feel better, but Enver waves his hand, sits down and starts conversing with us. With him are Zeljko and Dino: Zeljko is a Serb from Sekovica, a military policeman and saboteur; "What would I do without war? I don't know of anything else anymore", he says. Dino is 19 and has the Patriotic People's League ID card with a decimal number; a fighter since 1992, one of the 58 in Tuzla. He is extremely nervous, he doesn't know what to do with us: he shakes his head, takes Enver over to the side, whispering frantically to him, then he comes back and offers us beer. Our relations remain correct and we take our leave feeling a certain mutual understanding. Nenad Canak - with his talent for "working with the mass", as our communistic comrades would say - uses the occasion and speaks to them for hours, in a quiet and friendly way. Vedad Spahic disappears and doesn't come back.

Image no. 10. Return trip: Jasmin Imamovic, a young and well-known legal advisor in his field, Beslagic's right arm, tells us how - with extreme difficulties - municipal authorities managed to restrain the refugees from eastern Bosnia, to protect Tuzla's Serbs and Croats from them; the SDA extremists and Vedad Spahic, when predicting victory in the elections are counting on that uprooted and unhappy population. They are better than that, says Imamovic; we shall preserve Tuzla. On our way back, we find ourselves in Tucepi again and continue our conversation with the young and intelligent barman; he is a former volunteer and he finds a mutual topic of conversation with Nenad Canak who was forced into volunteering. At some unseemly hour, around 5 am, the barman said: "You and we use different dialects to describe the word patriotism; both terms are used so that certain people can become rich".