Admir K., 47

Rogatica/Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina

“Without electricity. That’s always the first thing that comes to mind. I missed the electricity because I missed being able to study. You couldn’t study your best–I’m a night person, I study the best at night. And that was a problem for me. I finished my entire first year of university literally by candlelight. Before, we called it kandilo, I don’t know about now. But the majority by the candlelight. Which wasn’t good for your vision. A typical day was that I was always trying to read something, to learn something.”

Interview originally conducted in Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian.

To start, tell me your name. 

My name is Admir K. 

Nice to meet you. 

Nice to meet you. 

Tell me about yourself. Where did you grow up? What was life like there? What was a typical day for you? 

I was born on April 1, 1975 in Rogatica. There’s something funny about that date because not even my dad believed that I was born [laughs] because it was April 1, April Fool’s Day. Those were the most important days, in the 70s… when someone was born, when someone got married, to whom they got married… So yeah, eto, I was born on April 1, 1975 as the third child in my family. My dad was Jusufa and my mom was Fatima. I was the youngest. My brother and sister are older than I am, seven, maybe ten years. I obviously used them to buy things around the city, [laughs]. I’m joking, of course. 

My childhood was really wonderful in my birth city, a little city in the middle [of Bosnia]. Everything was offline—at that time, there weren’t these online or other means of communication. It seems to me that that was one unique and really happy life, compared to what it is now. Today is really… you’re exposed to a lot of information every moment, and so you’re always under stress. During that time [my childhood], there was really very little stress, not just a little bit less stressful, but a lot less stressful.  

I finished middle school in Rogatica, high school in Rogatica–Economic high school, I finished in Rogatica, I finished the first year and second year  until… of course, I didn’t finish it… I went to my second year until April 6, 1992, when classes were suspended everywhere because of acts of war in Sarajevo. Before that, there were barricades, but we still went to school, in one way or another, and we faked some sense of normalcy and that nothing was happening. But, when the war began in Sarajevo, we stopped going to school. 

When did the war start for you? 

I think the war started for me around March 8, 1992. It’s tied to this event that happened at the high school that I went to.  It was March 8, International Women’s Day, and my mathematics professor, who was Serbian, asked us guys–with the observation that it was International Women’s Day– and she questioned only the guys about some specific math problem. And of nine guys, I was the only Bosniak, Muslim. The others were Serbian, Orthodox. And they all went to the board and they did this task. It was really difficult and no one did it right. And everyone got this verbal reprimand, but I alone received a mark down in the gradebook.

And then I asked my professor why I had received this low mark and the others didn’t. And she responded by saying that I have to be able to see the difference between her last name and my last name– clearly alluding that I was different from my friends.  That I was Bosnian, that I was a Muslim, and in that context, I have to be punished.

That’s when I thought that something bad would happen there. I wasn’t calling it a war yet, I wasn’t calling it that, none of us were… no one. War is an uncivilized forum, ovaj… some extraordinary event, at least for me. We’re all trying with all of our own natural capabilities to protect ourselves from the thought that there would be a war.

So, at the time, we all denied that there might be a war. There existed this communist and socialist ideal that was starting to break down, but no one wanted to believe in the breakdown of that communist ideal and that one strong society like there was in Yugoslavia could even fall apart and that something like that could be happening. You know, that saying of “brotherhood and unity” and all. 

I left that classroom and I told her, from some of my own feelings, to defend myself, or, how would I say this– because I felt attacked. She said, “Allahimanet,” which is our traditional Muslim name. From then on, I was marked as someone who could potentially be a part of some extremist group, at least in those circles at the time.  Those were my first thoughts that there could be a war among us. There were “peace rallies” across Bosnia-Herzegovina. The biggest ones, of course, in so-called Yugoslavian caracter, they were the biggest in Bosnia. Which is logical, Bosnia-Herzegovina was the heart of that kind of substance of Yugoslavia. I remember, one big event in Rogatica was when Branka Sovrlić sang at one of those peace demonstrations. She sang the song, “Došla voda od brijega do brijega” and she was called an extremist because of that. Someone would get called an extremist over every little thing, to dehumanize them… because the main way of war from foreign aggressors–those are Serbia and Montenegro– there was indeed dehumanization of Bosniaks and Muslims, like they’re objects. And, with that came, how would I say it… a legitimate reason to wipe them out from the face of the earth and to not exist in a certain space.

 I remember one peace demonstration in Rogatica–because in Rogatica, there was that Constitution of the Bazaar in the very center of the city where these demonstrations all took place. At the two ends of the city were Serbian neighborhoods. We held this peace rally, shouting, “Yugoslavia! Yugoslavia! Bosnia! Bosnia! Peace! Love!” I don’t know, all of that.

And in that moment, someone came from one of the Serbian neighborhoods and shot a kalashnikov into the air. And we knew then that there wouldn’t be peace, nor love, nor Yugoslavia, nor anything else. And that something else was going to happen. 

At that rally, it was mostly Bosniaks–is that right? 

Mostly, mostly. There were some Serbs who later disappeared, in the sense that they weren’t coming to these events that were calling for peace. Because later everything happened was quite different. In Rogatica, where it was two-thirds Bosniaks and one-third Serbs, all of a sudden those Serbs disappeared from the city. And we all stayed, like sitting ducks, for later when there were grenades falling and all of that. 

Ovaj… that was happening in the same way across different cities, especially in Eastern Bosnia, that was happening. 

It’s interesting, I finished school on April 15. I was talking about these peace rallies, and then everyone started thinking about what to do, how to save yourselves, something… whatever they could do to save themselves. Still, no one believed that a war would come to us. 

And when was that? What year was that? 

I’m now talking about April ‘92. You know, April 6, they were already in Sarajevo. Before that, there was a referendum on February 29 and March 1, 1992– a referendum on which we voted that Bosnia-Herzegovina would be independent. There were barricades in Sarajevo established by those paramilitary forces, Serbian Democratic Party, at that time.

 Now that I’m talking about it, I’m thinking…there was always that thought, “Sarajevo is still our metropolis, Sarajevo will be the most secure city, no matter what.” And I remember, then, my grandfather, me, and my mom–because I was the youngest–I was sent to Sarajevo to live with relatives. And I was in Sarajevo from April 15 to April 24, 1992, and, ovaj… I was there for the first shots here and the first  grenades in Sarajevo. But the thing that was hardest thing for me was the fact that I wasn’t home. I was there for ten days with my family, but in vain… there’s nowhere like your own house. And then I told my mom, “I can’t be here, I want to go home.” And then I returned to again to Rogatica with my mom on April 24. We can say that in the midst of war, we returned to Rogatica. 

And, ovaj, in Rogatica, we were essentially waiting for war. And again, I was returning from Sarajevo to Rogatica, there’s war in Sarajevo, and in Rogatica, we were living in a paradise. No one believed that anything would happen. Even right before the war started in Rogatica, it was in Višegrad, which is, I don’t know, 30-40 kilometers from us. There were war crimes and carnage everywhere. “Ma, ok, there’ll be nothing of that, what kind of…” 

I remember well that, at that time, the Sixth Fleet of NATO sailed in the Adriatic, like they were going to save us. That was always something weird and abstract to me. Like, what does the Sixth Fleet have to do with Rogatica? Nothing. 

May 22, 1992–the first grenades fell near Rogatica. Not yet in Rogatica, but then in the next few days, in Rogatica, grenades were falling. And in that time, citizens of Serbian nationality moved out from Rogatica and they moved into some Serbian villages around Rogatica. So, there was this empty space as far as Serbs go, and in relation, only Bosniaks stayed in the main city, the city of Rogatica. So, that’s when we accepted that the war was there. 

Do you think that that was planned? 

Absolutely. Everything was… 

The fact that Serbs moved from Rogatica? 

It was planned. And that Serbian Democratic Party that, at that time, was running everything in Rogatica. Imagine, in my city, the the municipal police gets split up as Serbian police and some Bosnian police, in the sense that you could even call it that– Muslim police. That was one totally weird. So, that was everything… everything I’m talking about, I’m not saying this out of emotions, there exist arguments, there exist documents. People have written books about that. 

Everything that was happening, not just in Rogatica, but also in all of Bosnia-Herzegovina– yes it was a planned attack by the aggressors. The aggressor was Serbia and Montenegro, and parties within Bosnia-Herzegovina were the instruments in their hands that they used to start war against Bosnia-Herzegovina. It happened absolutely the same way in Vlasnica, in Višegrad, in Rogatica, in Foča…So, if it wasn’t 100% the same, then it was 99% similar in methods and actions against us all. 

One side of the war's psychological propaganda that I remember–I was in my house and my entire neighborhood came to my house on the ground floor to take shelter, because grenades were falling. Our house had the highest quality construction, it had paneling in between two floors, so that if a grenade hit the paneling, it wouldn’t fall into the basement. So in that way it was safer there, and everyone came. 

I remember one moment– that we didn’t ever think would be this way– but one neighbor was a Serbian family that had moved. Their telephone still worked, and I remember that the Serbian woman called that neighbor in our neighborhood and asked her, “How are you? What’s going on?” And that neighbor wasn’t thinking that anything bad or and having that kind of thinking, she says, “Ma, we’re here with Jusuf in his house, we’re safe here.” Ten minutes later, a grenade fell immediately next to that. And we all accepted that that was in fact meant to us. To kill us. That was painful, that a neighbor could actually do that. 

Second, which I also remember well, was a call from my high school where they yelled this: “Muslims of Rogatica, surrender to the legal Serbian powers! Nothing will happen to you!” And then, as soon as they finished that sentence through the megaphone, they played some songs. Pa, some fiddle on fiddle music, that mythical serbian something about nailing the Turks to a stake, and so then… they’re calling you to come surrender, and then they’re playing that kind of music. That was absolutely repulsive. 

That’s my basic experience from that school which was obviously a camp at that time… 

Sorry… I’m following… 

Go, right? 

Go, go. 

My uncle, from my mother’s brother, surrendered in that school. He was an intellectual in Rogatica. I knew him at that time… He surrendered together with his wife and with their two kids, thank God that those kids were saved, they were sent to Sarajevo. 

But he first needed to “clean” Rogatica. That was one of their methods of humiliating us as a people, and then there was that so-called “living shield.” 

So, in front of the soldiers, those četniks, in front of them, [that living shield], he had to go against our party, Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina, that was trying to prevent the progression of the Serbian army, of the četniks, toward Goražda. Ovaj… by then, we already planned to leave Rogatica. It would be interesting to see the treatment of those intellectuals who surrendered, and my grandmother, who was a VKV driver who gathered from around the entire neighborhood. 

Those different intellectual profiles, a lot of them, according to some formal characteristics, a lot of educated people among them… and this, everyone wanted to surrender in the school. One of my grandmothers–this, now you can’t get an audio recording of this– he said, “I will not live in their hands.” And he was essentially saved the whole neighborhood, because they were, for us– for my grandma, mother, and for me– everyone left toward the forest and everyone sought freedom in some territory, generally toward Goražda. And I already had my trip somewhere, we left toward the village Burati, where my grandfather is from, where he was born. 

My grandmother is from Kramer village, so we were there for twenty days, staying with my family like refugees. I have a lot of details, now I could talk until the day after tomorrow, but I don’t… I’m trying to shorten the story. We were there for three weeks with them, with our cousins, who received us like their own. We had this feeling of shame, so we left from = Kramer and from our cousins and we left to the village of Burate with some other cousins, because for us was more of a shame to be with them. They were really lovely people to us and that was unbelievable. 

And that was some fate, I guess, God’s determination or judgement, however you want to say it, that two days after we left Kramer, we heard that Kramer was under attack from četniks, and how the majority of our family was killed. It’s unbelievable… it saved us some shame at that time, maybe. We left and what was worse, in that Burati village–where we were and where my cousins were from– they handed over weapons to that Serbian army, the četniks, and we were now like loyal citizens, that is, villagers of that village were loyal to the so-called new Serbian army. And Serbian television network came and recorded how those people were loyal to the Serbian army… that to me was the most unacceptable situation.

I was a child then, and I had finished my 17th year, and ovaj… I had acted like my parents said to. But that was the most unacceptable situation and I was just watching it and trying to persuade my parents to get out of there. We witnessed when that Kramer village was killed. All of our relatives… this, to me was… 

One day, after I moved home with my mom’s brother, my uncle–all of a sudden, through the window, I saw a man with a gun, with one of those hats. Until that point, I never saw him. And that to me was, ono…like, some limit to my tolerance. I couldn’t do that anymore.

I told them [my parents], “I’m leaving tonight. And you guys can do whatever you want.”

I argued with them until three in the morning, we left that village, Burati, to Goražda, and… that was some demanding travel, I have to admit. 

We brought with us flour, we brought cigarettes which would save our life later in Goražda. We spent the night in some forest, Kosina, four nights, on some leaves, I don’t even know how. We came to free territory five days later, in Bare, near Goražda. I gained new perspectives there. You know, I lived in Rogatica and I knew well who was a doctor, who was an engineer, who was a driver, who was a cleaning lady at a firm, who was a scholar, I knew all of that. And it was known who had better houses, better cars, who lived better… and then you come to some new places, Bare, where everything about those people scored four stakes in the ground… behind them was leaves, everyone slept on the ground, everyone had equal living conditions…

it reminded me that, because I believe in God, it reminded me that on Judgement day, that’s where everyone is one. And that was the situation that we were in. All of a sudden they were all equalized. It’s not important who finished which university, whatever there was–it wasn’t important. It’s just important that one survives. We were surviving there. 

We were in that place for three weeks. Then, there was one place in a village called Sofići, where we saved one cigarette with which we paid for a place for the night. 

They were like actual currency? 

They were actually currency. And they were really the most legitimate form [of currency] at that time. There, in Goražda, one box of cigarettes was 100KM, at that time. That’s the equivalent now of probably be 1000 marks, I’m not even kidding. I know they were 100 marks at that time. I was a little bit later, I’ll say that, later when I came to Sarajevo, I vowed to myself that I would finish some faculty. I received some scholarship and I received a 100 mark scholarship, and I know how much that was to me. It was really a lot for me at that time. 

Anyway, we were in Goražda for a month, and ovaj… and Goražda has its own special story. To be in Goražda for a month in ‘92, September, in some period, this time, ovaj… staying with some other relatives who I never met in my life… Watching again how you save yourselves. 

I remember, then, ovaj… how much this meant to me, this one good gesture– one woman from Visoko, Her name was Lejla, she knew my uncle, she came as a refugee from Rogatica a second time in this group housing in Visoko. 

She talked about us and sent us a letter from Goražde through some couriers somehow, at the time. We received that letter, and to this day, I remember on some kind of list written on paper, and she said, “My name is Lejla, I’m in contact with your son. He’s okay, and your daughter is also okay. If you can, come to Visoko, I’ll provide everything for you.” That to us, was some new… like straw of salvation, to go on that trip. And we were, then, on October 6, I remember it well, 1992 we left from Goražda toward Grbka, that was a life-saving trip, one trip from Goražda, toward free territory. 

We traveled for six days by foot.

Zorovići to Grebak, Fočanska Jabuka, descend into Trnovo, from Trnova to Bjelašnica, Igman, Lokve, Pazarić. And we went to Tarčin then, my parents and I, we sat down in some car, we came to Visoko through a place called Moštre, next to Visoko. And there we waited for that woman and she really came and saved us. Those are the names of people that you’ll always remember. I’ll remember Lejla. I’ll remember the name of one colleague, Plehe, who we stayed with in some Hotel Maršal in Bjelašnica, when we finally took a break in that whole six day trip. 

I remember that he saw that I was cold and he gave me a blanket. I will never forget that. That was unbelievable, if it were now, eto, I don’t know what I would… that blanket in that time was something unbelievable, and that is something I’ll never forget. I’ll always be in prayers for that man, and for Lejla too. 

Yeah, it can be like that for those people who really help us. 

I’m looking at some pictures, that picture… [exhales]. I see the picture from 1994 from Sarajevo. I can really see that night, and I look at everything from my wardrobe, all of that Lejla gave to me from some humanitarian aid, because I didn’t have anything of my own. And I see… look at me… so, ovaj…

[Pause].

We come to Moštre, we’re staying in one house that we lived in with two other families–that abandoned Serbian house–with two families from Višegrad, also refugees.There was one woman whose husband was killed in Višegrad, he was slaughtered at the parish on the Drina. We lived for seven months there, we fed ourselves however we could, we lived like we knew how to, in one totally new mentality among people… surviving clean. In those seven months there, I never went to school and still didn’t go. I still didn’t finish my second year. The war started, all of that passed by, we went to Visoko. 

At that time, my brother came from Sarajevo because some kind of unit for Army of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina was forming in Tuzla. Some air unit. I went with him to Tuzla then. We moved again into some house that someone gave us because my grandfather knew some guy from before, and he gave us a place to stay for a while. And then, in May ‘93, I enrolled in my third year of high school. I finished my third year. I was in Tuzla.

People accepted me in an incredible way. And I’ll remember that one place as a splendid time in all that darkness. Tuzla was like a paradise that accepted me. 

After a year in Tuzla, we left again toward Sarajevo because my entire family was there, but Sarajevo was under siege. We came to Sarajevo in April ‘94 and in Sarajevo, I finished my fourth year and I finished my fourth year in Sarajevo in the war in 1994. That was, at the time, the Economic High School in Velešićima. That’s where I finished, at the Economic High School. 

You said that Sarajevo was supposed to be the safest city. Do you think that was true?

Pa, it was in the spotlight, but it was far from the safest place where one could have been in that time, I remember it well… 

You know, some things stay in your memory because that’s what you want, and some things stay in your memory because you can’t exorcise them from yourself. There’s no chance.

 Now, what’s normal about some guy with a sniper targeting a kid of five years old? I remember my sister was targeted by some sniper in Pofalići, I couldn’t believe that that happened. That was the new environment that I was living in for that ‘94-’95 year. And before that, I was in the forest, somewhere in Grebak, I said to myself, “Admir, you need to make something of your life. You need to finish school. You need to be someone and something.” 

Because that time, I had this sudden maturation that was, on one hand, bad, and from the other side, it very clearly showed me the paths that I wanted to take in life.

I didn’t want to live the life that I was living, that kind of humiliation that I was allowing at that point. Going from house to house, pa, wondering if anyone would receive you or if they weren’t going to, if they want to give you a piece of bread, or… I don’t even know. That was for me humiliating. And I swore to myself that I wouldn’t allow that to happen anymore. 

Can you talk about what a typical day was like, for example, in Sarajevo? Did you go to school? What did that look like? What did you eat? How did you enjoy yourselves? Was there any of that in that time? 

Yes, there was. More than that, a lot of people from that time, you’ll hear, were maybe happier in the war than they were after the war. Maybe this sounds weird at first, you wonder how that’s at all possible?

That while people are dying, grenades are falling, that there’s war, that someone could have such a deep feeling of happiness. How is that possible? And it was possible, people did feel that. I could even say that I have that feeling at times. Why? Because we didn’t need that much. We didn’t imagine much for our lives in terms of goals. We had low expectations for cars, houses, apartments, all of those material needs were lessneed and we survived. Nothing else was important besides needing to survive. In everything, it was like the spiritual dimension grew. People sang. They roared. It was… great things happened. There was love of various kinds. People fell in love with each other. And so…

A typical day, I have a lot of typical days… It depends on where I was. My maturation during the war really weird because I matured one time through this conservative environment, a second time through a totally liberal environment. The conservative one was in Visoko. That totally liberal one was in Tuzla. And then in Sarajevo, my entire family was also there. But, evo…a typical day for me in Sarajevo was… how would I describe it…

Without electricity. That’s always the first thing that comes to mind. I missed the electricity because I missed being able to study. You couldn’t study your best–I’m a night person, I study the best at night.

And that was a problem for me. I finished my entire first year of university literally by candlelight.

Before, we called it kandilo, I don’t know about now. But the majority by the candlelight. Which wasn’t good for your vision. A typical day was that I was always trying to read something, to learn something.

Pa, I don’t know how I would describe it, to be appropriate for the present moment. Ono… a typical day in Sarajevo was when grenades were falling. Many were killed. We all remember from that period some kind of radio reports, when they’d say that in Pere Kosorića Square–that’s presently Hero’s Square– three people were killed by snipers from the Serbian aggressors. That’s what the news was like. Or from the Špicaste, two people were killed by the snipers. And it was really those stories, all the time. Ovaj, that seemed to be a typical day.

An atypical day was that someone wasn’t killed, and I don’t believe that there was even one day when that happened, that there wasn’t shooting

What did you eat? 

Everyone thinks of ikar from that time period. Ikar was this konzerva meat that came in humanitarian aid packets. It was quite tasty, I have to admit, but obviously I think that’s God preserving what was inside. [Laughs]. I can think… but we all liked ikar. That came from everywhere. 

I remember how innovative we were then. In front of our house where we lived was concrete. On that concrete we brought dirt, and in the dirt we grew tomatoes, we grew… I don’t even know, whatever you could grow.

In general, I have to admit, that was something green, and we grew it from something we found along the way. It wasn’t the best to eat, I have to admit. We ate macaroni very often. I don’t know, my god… I can’t remember anything besides… ikar. And if there were any humanitarian packets, lunch packs, then maybe someone would get the honor of peanut butter or something like that. 

Yeah, that was a treat. Chocolate, very rarely, right? 

Ma, I can’t for the life of me remember a time where I ate chocolate, I can’t remember. Maybe I did, but I don’t think so. We were all so thin, ono… I can’t believe how thin I was, really, just… [Pauses]. 

So yeah, that was some kind of typical day, I can’t remember everything, about what I did in the morning, what I did in the afternoon, what I did in the evening, every moment. Reports from these makeshift radios, reports about what was happening where, and so, ovaj… that’s that. 

How did you entertain yourselves? Was there anything fun to do? 

Pa, in that time, there were these so-called parties, like an escape from reality. I was lucky that I had a friend who played harmonica, and people said that I could kind of sing, and so the two of us would go to these parties together.

We had to earn it, in the sense that someone would give us something to eat that night, or whatever, I don’t even know. But in general, I would entertain myself hanging out with him and that harmonica. We would watch to see where parties were happening. 

And I remember that at that time, one time around a ceasefire in 1994, we tried to enjoy some kind of normal life, and we started going out somewhere around Dolac Malta, down, in some cafe on Čengić Vila, because in Sarajevo, those places, Dolac Malta i Čengić Vila, were maybe the most secure places in the city. And so, we’re hanging out mostly, talking about whatever, reminiscing about the times before everything, listening to music that was from just before the attacks on Bosnia-Herzegovina. So, Crvena Jabuka, Plavi Orkestar, I don’t know, Bijelo Dubme, so. 

Did you start university during the war?

I did, I did. I barely got to enroll. I wanted to enroll in university, but I didn’t have proof that I finished high school. Actually, I had proof that I finished high school, but I didn’t have proof that I finished the first and second years in Rogatica. So first you need to prove that. 

But, thank God, I got to enroll in some newly established Faculty of Criminal Sciences in 1994. And ovaj… I remember then that they told me, “There’s no  chance that you finish this.” I don’t know why or for what reason, but I was the best one in the end. Thank our dear God. I know that he was fueling me. 

I don’t know, I guess people think that if you’re going through something like that… I sometimes say, watching these migrants today, I wonder how these people, when they’re refugees, somewhere from Afghanistan, Pakistan, get on here in Bosnia. I remember how it was for me as a Bosnia, to be a refugee in our cities, because there was a real lack of understanding, and also a lot of good people. That’s when you saw how we have great people, and on the other side, a real lack of understanding and some prejudice, like that if you’re a refugee you can’t finish university, whatever. 

Is there someone who really helped you during the war? You talked about it a bit, those two…

Pa, I think that I did, I mentioned it. That Lejla in Visoko. She was the most important person, of those rescuers and everyone. Someone who gave her, really, who really just helped us during the war. She really helped us during that time.

When did the war end for you?

I was in Sarajevo for a short time during the Siege, but surely everyone would say in some rational, logical sense that the end of the war was denoted by the end of the Siege. For me, the war ended when I sat on the bus and I left for Zenica on the bus. Until that point, that wasn’t possible. During the war, I sometimes left Sarajevo. First, I’d pass through the tunnel, I’d come through Butmir, and there I would ask anyone there if they could take me in their trucks toward Osmica where Četnici could shoot us. Ovaj, toward Osmica and toward Igman, through Igman, you come down to Pazarić, then Tarčin, and then you go somewhere toward Kreševa, in Kiseljak, from Kiseljaka to Visoko…Oh that trip, do you see how many trips that was? And then you’d go left toward Zenica. 

Sarajevo to Visoko is 29 kilometers, and by bus it was so much faster. And that moment when I sat with my dad on the bus and we went on the trip next to Ilijaša and through Podlugova and we came to Visoko, that was the moment for me when it logically and rationally meant, “Aha, the war has stopped, we can move again.” 

In a political sense, we all watched the signing of the Dayton Peace Agreement in Dayton. That kind of, that was another established political moment that the war had stopped. But this was my really human, real feeling that it really ended. 

Did you notice any changes in Balkan culture before, during, and after the war? 

Changes? Pa, the changes are evident. That time we lived in before the war is in some way articulated to everyone as an ideal way to live. War brought its own characteristics. That was a time of survival. 

Pa, what’s interesting– before the war, everyone was equal in life. Everyone was equal. We all had opportunities. We had similar goals in life. In the war, we experienced that everything that you had was in fact not important, and that the only thing that mattered was being human. To be satisfied and happy with what you had, however you had it, and so on. You enjoyed the little things. And after the war, again, that materialism has appeared, like that’s somehow the essence of living. Everyone is rushing toward something, to get more money, to get more houses, apartments… everyone has those goals for themselves. For me, the most important is always to be successful and happy with yourself, happy with your partner, children, life otherwise. And for me I’m really lucky. 

Those are the changes in culture… that pre-war culture, which was more along those socialist idealistic ways, people felt like they all had everything the same. And no one was dissatisfied, everyone had the chance to go to the see, everyone had Lade, Fiće, Trstaće, those cars, and so on. Houses, apartments… it was all some level of equality. 

If you’re going to talk about general things, that was the time of “Top liste nadrealista” in Sarajevo, ovaj… the time of Bijelo Dugme, very prominent from one culture, at least in Sarajevo, that represented Bosnia-Herzegovina. We were definitely the cultural center of the Balkans at that time. 

The most creative part of the ex-Yugoslavia was Sarajevo, in the sense that rock n’ roll was the biggest here. Definitively. We all listened to that. And in the sense of everything else. Eto, that famous “Audicija” play was the most important event in terms of going to a theater to see a play. Because that was really just reflected in our essence. And it was interesting, all of us Bosnians loved it when we got to go somewhere. Eto… 

Is there something that you want students from outside the Balkans to know about the war? 

You know, they need to know that war is possible. Something that was characteristic about my time then was that we all thought that there wasn’t a chance that there would be a war, because we’re civilized, smart… we’re European. “Where would there be a war? Ma, there’s no chance, not even theoretically.” 

It’s possible everywhere. And then what I want them to know about the war, is that in no case can it ever be an option for anyone. No one could say, “Eh, I agree, let’s go to war.” There’s one of our sayings, it goes, “Whoever wants a war, let God be in his house,” alluding to if you want war, let that stay with you, in your family, let us live. We need to find other ways to work out resolutions to whatever crises in the war, in whatever way. 

And something else I want to say: war isn’t something that an ordinary man wants. War is political, by all means. Here, with us, war started with Slobodan Milošević. The political idea of a Greater Serbia that needed to be established here.

There’s a lot of those kinds of people in the world, and such people are worth fighting against. 

But from what I know, ordinary people love each other. They live with each other. None of them want war, but it happens to them. They didn’t create it. And the creators are the ones who we maybe before… we maybe didn’t take them seriously. We think that they’re not that dangerous. But they are. 

Do you have something that you want to say specifically to students from the Balkans? From Bosnia-Herzegovina? 

Other Balkan people? Pa, evo… if we’re talking about the region, I think that the cause and reason for all of these occurrences in the Balkans is the politics of Serbia. And if things move forward in Serbia, away from these nationalist notions, toward a different sense of self and politics toward others… if progress is made there, then we’ve solved the problem of the Western Balkans. 

I know and I’m sure, one million percent, that Bosnia-Herzegovina isn’t the problem. Bosniaks aren’t the problem.That idea that Muslims are dangerous, somehow, here in this part of Europe– that’s not even close to the truth. We’re people who are civilized and we don’t have those mythomaniac ideas. That’s why I think that [especially] politicians in Serbia, need to change. When the situation in the state changes, relations toward us here in Bosnia-Herzegovina change, I’m sure, that there will be long-term and stable peace in this part of the world. 

Because these are otherwise beautiful places–Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia and Montenegro… All of these places are exceptionally beautiful and they showed that in the former Yugoslavia it’s possible to progress. 

That shows…just the importance of stories like this, that you do. It’s really important that everyone knows the basic, human characteristics of war. These kinds of stories about the past aren’t in retrograde… the past isn’t because of the past. These kinds of stories are important for you, for young people, to understand how important it is to know your past. To not hate whoever and to not feel badly toward them. Just simply knowing that there exists a possibility for that to happen and to be ready. To be conscious of yourself, which is the most important… to respect yourself. 

That’s what I wanted to say… I’ve passed through a lot of places in our country, I never stopped being from Rogatica. I never stopped being Bosniak. I never stopped being Muslim. And I will never stop. Because that’s my identity, and identity is the most important. If you have a sense of self–how you are, what you are and who you are, then you’re a human. You can’t be anyone else ever, you can’t even try. 

So, that’s what I wanted to say. It’s important to tell these stories, it’s important to document stories from different people. This, my story, is maybe more minor– nothing in relation to what other people in Bosnia-Herzegovina have survived. But the problem is that these stories aren’t documented. They’re not written down. But they’re very important, so that people are cognizant of what really happened in Bosnia-Herzegovina, and what could possibly happen anywhere in the world. 

[These interviews] are therefore invaluable. Let this remain in some kind of archive, let people look at it for I don’t know how many years. It has its value… But shouldn’t be let alone that I think that this is systemic work that can provide that kind of documentarian basis for knowing what happened there. 

Do you have some other specific story that you want to tell? 

I would, Lamija, I had a lot of that to talk about. My God, I’m just… [pause], I don’t know what else to choose, I can’t distinguish between what’s important and what’s not important in this whole story. 

Everything is important. 

I think, every day, there was a story that, in that whirlwind of war, especially when someone is experiencing that as a refugee, a displaced person in that state…This knowledge of different mentalities of people… that a person could adapt to any and all circumstances. Really, a man in some sense, really is an animal, all of us could adapt to anything. We could survive anything and in that sense… How could I signal out one special event? [Breathes]. I don’t know, I don’t know…

Ma, you don’t need to, it’s okay. 

[Sighs]. I don’t know, god, what else to say. 

And finally, because this project is called The BUREK Initiative, do you have some specific story about burek that you want to tell? 

My sister and I love burek the most. For us, everyone buys the same Poli salami–somehow my sister’s salami is sweeter than anyone else’s. [Laughs]. So that’s also in her burek, and she really makes it well. 

I don’t know. Burek is characteristic for Bosnia-Herzegovina and I know that people will listen to this– burek is only with meat and there isn’t any other kind of burek besides burek with meat. Burek with cheese doesn’t exist. That’s characteristic for us, it spins in a circle, it never has an end. And so, without that end, it seems to me that it’s a story about our beautiful country of Bosnia-Herzegovina which I believe has a great future that it will be built by young people like you.

Educated, beautiful, smart. Our country is still the best country. I always remember that whenever I go anywhere, when I fly to the airport in Sarajevo, I always have some warmth in my soul. It’s beautiful to me, regardless of wherever I was and however great it was when I was there, it’s always wonderful to come back to your country. It’s a beautiful thing to have your country. 

Of course. Thank you so much. 

Not a problem. It was an honor and please. I hope that it was helpful.