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Patchwork strips of agricultural land - it is traditional for families to have some land and if they live in the countryside they will often have a day-job but also keep some chickens, a cow and maybe grow some maize or hay as well.
Approaching Sarajevo - there are many, many cemeteries in Bosnia
Paul and Junuz from SANA, our hosts, who have put together an amazing programme for us
Live folk music is common in restaurants - a family group couldn't resist dancing along to these guys. They played one of the songs on my Rough Guide to the Balkans CD and later sang along to it from my ipod - beautiful!
Muslim gravestones here are white and shaped liked small Cleopatra's needles. Carved turbans on the top are the graves of those believed to have gone straight to heaven.
Scented and spiced tea - cinnamon I think
Turkish coffee is served everywhere and frequently - I'll have withdrawal symptoms when I leave.
The Defence Attache at the British Embassy - he gave us a full briefing on EU and NATO support for and concerns about Bosnia.
The view from my Tuzla hotel room - socialist architecture from Tito's time, but well maintained and good quality.
Laying flowers at a memorial for young people who died when a shell hit the place where they used to hang out in the evenings.
Some buildings in Sarajevo have not yet been restored.
A dedicated substance abuse rehab centre run by the Muslim community in Bosnia.
The old town in Sarajevo.
An Abrahamic trio at lunch - guess who's who. And some verses of Persian poetry on the wall behind in Farsi and Bosnian. Bosnia loves its poets, too, & they are quoted frequently.
Veal seems to be a regular on the menus here. I”ve been trying to get the simplest possible Bosnian or Balkan time-line together which goes something like Illyrian and other tribes, Greeks, Romans (especially on west side), Byzantium and then the split of the Roman Empire which meant the west of this area looked to Rome and the east to Constantinople. Then Slavs from the northeast (which eventually formed two groups, Croats and Serbs), Ottomans from the south, and much later the Austro-Hungarians from the north. Then WWI (not unrelated), then WWII, then Tito, then the war and then the Dayton agreement. I”m still not sure how the Russians come into the picture – someone please put me right. There are no samovars on street corners as there are in Iran. But I wonder whether veal came south with the Austro-Hungarians?
