Cape to Milan

Mostar is not only a pleasant city in its own right; it serves as a convenient base for a host of other intriguing and beautiful day trip destinations. After reading about the surrounding vineyards, waterfalls, and old cities, we were excited to plan the best route to soak in all of these wonders. Unfortunately, we soon realized the necessary public transport links were infrequent or nonexistant.

So we decided to take a regional tour offered by the owner of our hostel. We love to stay in hostels when we can so we can meet other travelers and swap stories or advice. Plus, Hostel Madja is something of a legend among Eastern Europe backpackers, mostly due to “crazy” Bata’s full-day (lasting until 11:30PM!) tour of all the places we wanted to see–and then some!

Bata loaded all of us–five different nationalities–into  his disco-balled van and proceeded to regale us with stories of Mostar’s best and worst moments. It was humbling to hear about his wartime experiences, and we valued his openness on the issue so much because it’s not a topic you can casually bring up with locals. Because of his Muslim surname, he was almost killed by a Croat soldier who was searching for Muslims in his apartment building. Surprisingly, the soldier recognized Bata from school–not as a friend, barely even as an acquaintance–and risked sparing him even in front of a superior. And for what? Bata says it is this instance, this window into the complexities of human nature, that caused a substantial part of his psychological suffering after the war.

But it wasn’t all somber; Bata’s best talent in his ability to deftly weave war stories with impersonations of Sean Connery while blasting the nation’s popular, cheesy turbo-folk on the radio.

Our first stop was at his favorite burek joint. Burek is a warm pastry filled with spiced minced meat, potatoes, spinach, or cheese. He reveres this place because of their commitment to the tradition of cooking burek over coals.

We drove past this Yugoslav-era military base on our way to the pilgrimage site of Medugorje.

Thirty years ago, Medugorje was nothing but rocky terrain and a few villagers. But in 1981, six teenagers claimed the Virgin Mary appeared to them on a nearby hill, delivering an important message that they cannot reveal until the time is right.

Now it is a burgeoning religious wonderland with 80,000 hotel rooms to accomodate the daily arrivals of mostly Italian pilgrims. And there are plenty of real estate offices, too, in case they want to make their pilgrimage more permanent (and many do!).

Here is a statue of Jesus that recently cracked at the knee. Fluid trickles out of the crack, and pilgrims line up to dab cloths with the substance. The fluid was tested and is reputed to have a chemical makeup like that of tears.

One of Medugorje’s main streets, full of religious trinkets and gelatto.

The Vatican has never validated the apparition, but in March it announced that they would be forming an investigative commission to resolve the issue.

Next, we visited the Kravice Waterfalls–my favorite activity of the day! We actually swam across that strong, chilly current to get to the waterfalls. It was hard to breathe when we first dived in the frigid waters, but what an exhilirating experience!

Alex also made use of the rope swing.

After drying off and sampling some local drinks like the strong rakija and the sweet green walnut liquer, we visited this Ottoman-built fortress. The city is on the road from Dubrovnik, so the Ottomans built a bath house and a hotel to keep potential informants around and relaxed. After a nice scrub and some Turkish coffee, wouldn’t you be more willing to spill trade secrets?

The good thing about going on a tour is we had people to ask to take pictures of us!

This is the beginning of a tower we climbed, but before we ascended, Bata challenged us to find the secret exit soldiers could have used.

Guess who found it (and won a beer because of it)?

In the tower

Over a hundred houses fill the city walls, but only a few are currently inhabited. Most of the largely Muslim residents left during the war because of the town’s proximity to Croatia.

We had the opportunity to visit one of these few remaining homes, also home to some very old vines.

We were treated to some BiH hospitality!

We tasted a variety of homemade syrups (sage, mint, and pomegranate) as well as Bosnian coffee. The proper way to express your enjoyment of a food or beverage here is a phrase that literally means, “It hurts my head.”

This sour cherry pastry was the best.

On the way back to Mostar, we stopped at this Dervish house. Dervishes follow a mystical form of Islam; followers here will sway and talk themselves into a trance to attain communion with Allah. This ritual can last all night.

The source of this river is somewhat of a mystery because of the vast network of caves beyond this opening.

A cup is provided to drink from the clean, cold river; you are also supposed to make a wish.

The list of prohibitions upon entering the Turkish house.

Ornate ceiling

At this point, we were exhausted–but not done yet! We stopped at Bata’s favorite grill for cevapi, a type of spiced sausage.

You might be thinking that Bosnia is a war-torn country that probably has little left in the way of major tourist draws. That may be true to some extent, but there’s one major exception to that rule: Mostar. (Actually, there is another exception that Caroline will talk about soon, but that’s another story.)

Makes the day trip from Croatia seem like it might be worth the trouble, huh?

Mostar means ‘bridge keeper’, and the bridge in this picture is the reason for this city’s existence, as it gave a big part of the Ottoman-controlled region a trade route with Dubrovnik. In fact, it was perhaps the most famous Ottoman bridge in the world until it was destroyed by Croats during the war; the bridge that stands today is a replica, symbolizing the effort to reunite the country’s fragmented population.

The area surrounding the bridge is a picturesque old town, with minarets jutting up perfectly in every shot.

Mostar’s (surprising) tourist boom has made the old town quite the place for trinkets, but it’s very pleasant nonetheless.

The translucent blue and grey water rushing through the city in its various rivers looks very refreshing. Makes you want to jump in!

Even this neighborhood of Yugoslavian housing blocks looks inviting with one of these cool streams flowing through.

Also, it makes for an abundance of restaurants perfectly positioned by the rushing water, where you can sample Bosnian meat specialties at a reasonable price. (Don’t count on being able to sample any non-meat specialties.)

This Ottoman house, on display for tourists, made us miss Turkey.

We went down to the riverbank to get a view of the house, and found out the room we were in was supported like this!

In case you were thinking all of this is much too idyllic for postwar Bosnia, it frankly is.

Out in the housing block neighborhoods, you can see block after block of war-damaged buildings. This building is in much better shape than many buildings on the front line, which are still bombed out shells. Nowadays, the war is remembered through art like this.

Before the war, Mostar had a decent population of Serbs, Croats, and Muslims (Bosniaks). The Serbs were quickly defeated and left the area, and, for a period of years, the city’s Bosniak and Croat forces fought. In graveyards such as this Muslim one, the dates of death are all disturbingly close together.

One shocking thing about the ethnic conflicts in BiH is that everybody looks the same! Like, outsiders would never be able to tell the differences between different ethnicities. But as different influences–Turkish, Croat, and Serb–made their way into BiH, family names and places of worship began to differ. When the conflict broke out, some children didn’t realize they were of a different ethnicity than their friends and neighbors.

Although things are obviously much improved today, there are still visible signs of the divide. Schools, religion, political parties–even beer!–are strictly divided along ethnic lines throughout the country.

Take how this cathedral was rebuilt after the war. In America, such a thing would never be permitted. In BiH–especially in a municipality that is dominated politically by Catholic Croats–this gets built. Perhaps it’s just a way for Croats to practice their religion. But Bosniak Muslims view this church, and its unimaginably massive tower, as marking the area in the name of Croats.

Mostar’s Muslim population also views with intimidation this cross, erected on a hill that was used by Croat forces for sniping and bombing the city below.

But symbols of hope are present as well. This building, in the center of town, is BiH’s only integrated school.

Throughout our stay in Dubrovnik, we told locals our onward plans when asked. We were going to cross over to nearby Trenbinje, a city of about 50,000 people just across the border in Bosnia i Hercegovina (which I’ll call BiH for short).

This plan was universally met with shock and confusion. “Why in the world would you want to go there?!” we would be asked. Even when we tried to steer the conversation another way–we knew well that people from Dubrovnik just plain don’t like Trebinje or the people who inhabit it–the question would come up once more, “So what makes you want to go to Trebinje, again?”

But we held steadfast to our plan. I had found Trebinje on Google Earth and thought it looked pleasant and worth a visit since we were passing through the area. Not enough of a reason for people from Dubrovnik, but it worked for us.

So we headed for the bus station to take the sole daily bus between the two cities–not much of a bus, really; more like a minibus. On the way to the station, the sweaty walk forced us into a taxi cab, where the driver again did all he could to dissuade us from making the trip. As I handed over the 40 kuna cab fare for the 2km journey (!), I thought it was ironic that the driver added, “Make sure you watch your bags in Trebinje.” $8 for a three-minute cab ride is just as good as robbery to me!

After all of this build up, we wondered what we were in for. Is Trebinje really as bad as everyone makes it out to be?

As we quickly learned by exploring the flower-filled center, of course not. Trebinje is a perfectly pleasant medium-sized city. It’s certainly not as wealthy or historical (or expensive) as Dubrovnik, but we could find no reason it should be avoided.

Unlike Dubrovnik, which was never conquered by the Ottoman Turks, Trebinje has an Ottoman-style old town.

Unlike other places we had seen, where the old town serves mainly as a tourist attraction, in Trebinje it is just another residential neighborhood.

Trebinje’s market, where locals go to pick up herbs, fruits, and vegetables, in stark contrast to the market in Dubrovnik!

Trebinje’s stone bridge is famous for its a unique design.

To be honest, Dubrovnik does have more of a reason for its distaste to Trebinje than I’m letting on. Although they do also look down on it for not having the historical riches and spectacular seaside setting of its coastal neighbor, Trebinje is the closest manifestation of Serbian dominance in the former Yugoslavia that Croatians–particularly those from Dubrovnik–had to work so hard to brush off.

This man, Jovan Dučić, was a poet who is now considered a hero to Serbians everywhere, whether they live in BiH, Serbia, Montenegro, or Croatia. For that reason, Trebinje is an important place for the Serbian people.

This Orthodox church is Dučić’s burial site.

Inside the chruch. The burial site was built by a BiH-born American business man.

The burial site stands on top of the biggest hill in town, and now serves as a fully functioning Orthodox monastery, complete with shale-roofed workhouse…

…and monastic donkey!

The place also has an excellent view, which is the main reason we made the hike.

Trebinje is part of the Republika Srpska, the region of BiH administered by Serbs following the 1990s war with which the name Bosnia is now synonymous, in the eyes of most Americans.

Now is probably a decent time to attempt to explain the Bosnian conflict. (If you mainly look at ths blog for nice pictures, you can scroll down to see some lovely shots of Dubrovnik!)

The idea of Yugoslavia was a union of Slavic people–Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. As Yugoslavia fell apart in the 1990s, Slovenia–a wealthier republic that enjoys proximity to Italy–gained independence somewhat quickly and painlessly.

Croatia was next. The (mainly Catholic) Croats wanted independence from Yugoslavia, and, after a civil war where many of Croatia’s (mainly Orthodox) Serbs were killed or expelled into BiH and Serbia, modern-day Croatia was born.

Then it was BiH’s turn to decide if it wanted independence. Here, there was no overwhelmingly dominant population: Serbs and Croats were nearly equal in numbers. Serbs loved the idea of being part of Yugoslavia–a pan-Balkan powerhouse headqaurtered in Serbia’s own Belgrade. Bosnian Croats wanted to join their Croatian brothers in their newfound independence. The two couldn’t agree, and war broke out.

Quickly, the country was divided up: Croats took over the west, expelling all the Serbs, and Serbs dominated the east, expelling all the Croats. This eastern part now has a separate government from the rest of BiH, called Republika Srpska.

But if only it were that easy. BiH also has a major Muslim population that didn’t fit with either ethnic group, and neither Croats nor Serbs envisioned a significant minority of Bosnian Muslims (called Bosniaks) in their single-ethnic areas. These were the most horrifying images from the war: atrocities committed against civilian Bosnian Muslims by Serbs and Croats.

Sadly, if you look hard, you can still see lingering tensions with Muslims in the area, even though most have fled or were killed in the war.

Despite all this, we found the inhabitants of Trebinje to be totally kind and friendly. At dinner, the restaurant-owner was so pleased we stopped in the city that he poured us both a glass of the local after-dinner drink, just to try. (There’s something that would never happen in Dubrovnik!)

Trebinje was a good place to learn that it’s important not to blame what happened during a conflict on the whole group of people associated with it.

Edit: Since the one topic that seems to draw more visitors to this blog than anything is how to get to Trebinje, I’ll go ahead and add that info. One bus per day goes from the main bus station in Dubrovnik daily to Trebinje at around 1PM. It costs about 40 Kuna if I recall correctly and takes around an hour. The bus goes to Dubrovnik from Trebinje in the morning. From Trebinje, there are buses into Montenegro (Niksic and Kotor, I believe) at a greater frequency than along the Dubrovnik route. There are also a few buses to Mostar per day.