Bosnian Bulletin #10
July 26, 1999
Dobar dan! (DOH-bar DAHN! Meaning "Good day!")
We thought it was about time that we start greeting you the way
all Bosnians do (during most of the day).
We are enjoying unseasonably cool, rainy days after a stretch of
hot weather. It's nice for a change, but soon we'll be ready for
some sun again!
We wanted to send you a quick update before we leave for retreat
and vacation and are out of e-mail contact for about 3 weeks. I'm
sure we'll have plenty of things to tell you about when we get
back.
Today marks one year since we left Sioux Falls, South Dakota to
begin our 3-year assignment with MCC. Hard to believe. In some
ways it seems like a long time -since we ate at Taco Bell, since
we played with nephews and nieces, and since we talked with
friends over a cup of coffee. In other ways, time has passed in a
flash -already a year since we met our MCC colleagues at retreat
in Bled, Slovenia, already a year that we've been studying the
language, already a year's worth of Bosnian coffee consumed,
already 4 months since we started our new assignment in Sarajevo.
Sometimes we stop to realize how many little things were once so
different to us that we are now quite familiar with: meal times
around 10am, 4pm and 9pm, wearing wedding rings on the opposite
hand, parking cars on the sidewalks (jump the curb!), milk out of
tetra packs, greeting people with kisses on the cheeks (Serbs
alternate 3 times, Croats and Muslims only 2), hot and cold on
most faucets are on reverse sides, usually removing your shoes
upon entering someone's home, carrying toilet paper when using
public toilets, leaving the last swig of coffee in the cup, etc.
We've also seen a lot of progress here during the last year:
Repaired roads and bridges, rebuilt houses with returned refugees
in areas that were once completely destroyed, more foreign
products available in stores (a sign of functioning international
trade), small businesses opening up (a sign of economic recovery?
at least a sign of hope!), more travel routes open via bus and
train within the country, and small signs of healing in the lives
of the people we've met.
However, a great deal of healing has yet to take place in
Bosnia-Herzegovina. This week, with our MCC Europe director,
Hansuli Gerber, we visited some of the most desperate people
we've seen yet.
In Prijedor, Bosnia (in the Serb republic), we visited one Serb
woman and daughter that are living in a small house for free
(thanks to the kindness of the Muslim landlord). The mother is
ill (both mentally and physically, I believe) and is unable to
have a job or do housework. Her daughter is a teenager who is in
school and takes care of her mother. They have no income at all.
The husband/father died before the war. They told us that they
have no hopes or dreams -they just think about surviving.
"No one knows what it feels like to be a refugee until
you've experienced it" the daughter told us. They are
completely dependant upon food aid.
In an abandoned lime factory near Sanski Most, live a number of
Serb families who are trying to clean up their heavily damaged or
completely destroyed homes, in hopes that a large NGO will come
to assist them with a rebuilding project. They are minorities
trying to return to their homes, which are now part of
Federation. They have absolutely nothing. They are completely
dependent on food aid. God only knows when some NGO will choose
their village for a reconstruction project. That money is rapidly
being diverted to Kosovo while thousands of Bosnians are still
waiting 4-8 years later.
It made me stop to imagine, if the US or Canada were destroyed
from civil war and the international community came in to repair,
probably starting with New York City and Los Angeles....when
would they start to rebuild Freeman, SD or Hesston, KS or
Rosedale, BC?
MCC is currently planning to send canned meat and other food aid
to these areas where most other support has ended. We are also
going to be exploring micro-credit loan programs and support for
other local initiatives in Bosnia-Herzegovina. There is also a
possibility of adding personal positions in the region.
The world's response to the war in Kosovo has been overwhelming,
but money for peace initiatives that focus on the systemic causes
of conflicts in order to prevent these situations, is hard to
find. We are so glad that MCC looks for ways to support long-term
peace in the region in addition to emergency aid.
As Joe Campbell, MCC conflict mediator in (his native) Northern
Ireland told us, "As outsiders, you must walk with the
people and the muck they are in and tell a good story, sing a
good song and hold their hands. Don't tell them what to do. And
remember, it looks dead easy from 1000 miles away."
So, now we'll take a break from everything here and travel to MCC
summer retreat in Texel, Netherlands. We fly from Zagreb to
Amsterdam on the 30th of July. We'll spend a week at retreat with
our MCC colleagues, including a couple days in Amsterdam (with an
Anabaptist historical tour) and Haarlem. Then, we'll visit my
former high school foreign exchange classmate, Shirley Bakkeren
in Rotterdam, our college foreign exchange friend, Thomas Wegner
and his wife in Wuppertal, Germany and John's former pastor and
his wife, Dick and Dorothy Rempel from British Columbia now
living and working in Berlin. Our itinerary is still somewhat
undecided, but we'll let you know how it turns out when we get
back, hopefully around the 18th of August.
Our e-mail address will hold your messages until we return!
God's love and peace,
Karin & John
John & Karin Kaufman Wall
Inter-religious Service
Splitska 39
71000 Sarajevo
Bosnia-Herzegovina
Office tel/fax: 387 71 442 468
Home tel: 387 71 207 860
P.S. If you would like to be removed from our mass mailing list,
please feel free to let us know. If you know someone who would
like to be added, please let us know that, too. Someone informed
us that they are receiving double copies of all our Bulletins. Is
anyone else having problems like that??}}
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