For hundreds of years the Balkans has been a region fraught with war, occupations and yes, more war - the most recent being the various conflicts from 1990–2001 that saw the end of Yugoslavia and the bloody creation of a handful of separate countries.

If you scratch the surface and look past the shimmering aquamarine waters of the Croatian coastline, venture inland and into Bosnia, the scars seem all too recent.  I can imagine this would become even more apparent if you headed further into Bosnia, Serbia or visited Kosovo. But I can only report on what we saw and quite frankly that was pretty sobering in itself.

Empty houses, wasted farmland and abandoned construction sites.  But new churches - always plenty of new churches (or God boxes as my darling Aunt loves to call them).  It almost seems like the wars are still going on but have shifted to 'covert operations' as the various religions jostle for position.

During our day trip to Bosnia our cousin pointed out at least three new and extremely large God Boxes of different denominations - no problem there - what was intriguing was the fact that, say, a huge Roman Catholic church was being constructed in a predominantly Serbian town (Serbs generally follow the Greek Orthodox religion) so a statement was definitely being made.  And on a hill not far away of course there will be a beautiful new mosque – more than likely built with foreign money.

I believe in freedom of religion and individual freedom of choice to believe in what you want.  However, I found this 'church race' rather sad – the wars in this region have been underpinned by religion and it seems that the churches themselves are keeping the embers smouldering.

As I mentioned in my previous blog inland Croatia is stunning as is neighbouring Bosnia, not surprisingly being neighbours and previously being one country much of the countryside is similar.  What is sad is when you see farming settlements abandoned and unproductive.  Our cousin explained; "This was a Serb area; they left during the war and have never come back."

I'd probably not come back either – their homes were looted and often partially destroyed, and as my cousin explained there are problems with infrastructure (eg. no one to pick up the milk in some regions).   What's more, I don't know if a bunch of Serbs moving back to the new Croatia would be made that welcome.

I need to point out here that I'm not trying to convey a political slant, I just find the whole thing such a shame.  We are classified as Croatians but travelling through the country and stepping in and out of Bosnia we could not help but feel sadness for the people of all religious backgrounds who had had their lives destroyed or made extremely difficult for the sake of making small nations independent.

I'm not saying that these countries did not have a right to independence, I'm saying that when you look beyond the flocks of tourists, the wounds inflicted in the fight for that independence don't seem to be healing – beneath the surface the independent countries don't seem to be doing all that well.  Yes, Croatia has it's booming tourism industry, but that appears to be all. Nearby Montenegro is fighting for a piece of that pie also, as is Bosnia. 

I know this blog might be viewed as inflammatory by some - especially those staunch Croatian nationalists that I know exist in Auckland.  The strange thing is that I was one of you until I made this recent trip with Dad and Aunty.  I'm not professing to be an expert on the region, people, but I've tried to call it as I saw it.  In time I can only hope that those independent countries find enduring peace and prosperity.

The shell holes in Bosnia made me cry. The thought of divided families tormented me – what if you were a Croatian married to a Serb?  The stories of people turning on their neighbours was beyond my comprehension – but it happened and it was horrible.

I'm aware that this is probably my deepest and darkest blog yet but I needed to do it.  Aunty and Dad, I hope you like it – thanks for opening my eyes.


Sayonara,

Lenska

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