July 10, 2007
Sarajevo index | streets
Larisa
Kurtovic and I were both graduate student instructors for Michael Watts last
fall. She is a PhD student in Anthropology at Berkeley which means that she
is the social science equivalent of a rocket scientist. She wanted me to visit
Sarajevo this summer, and since I was going to Naples to present at the AESOP
conference, I thought it would be wise to take this rare opportunity to have
a Bosnian show me the city.
Larisa's friend
Vedran Residbegovic helped show me the town. He is studying film, and was back
in Sarajevo to teach film techniques to high school students.
The destroyed building
in the middle right of this photograph is a former barracks. It reminds me
of Darul Aman Palace in Kabul, with its twin cupolas. The new house in the
foreground is made with concrete posts and slabs, and hollo clay-tile bricks.
This seems to be the typical construction today in Sarajevo. When finished
it will be stuccoed over, so that it looks like the houses behind it in this
photo. In the distance are the twin towers that mark central Kabul, and a new
cylindrical office tower rising from behind a low ridge.
Here is a postcard-view of the center of Old Sarajevo. The National Library
is at the bottom right. It was a sad day for many Sarajevans when the library
was hit and burned. It is still being restored.
This different view from almost the same spot shows a ruined house in the foreground. I suspect it was destroyed in the war, but it was one of the only un-rebuilt houses I saw. As in Kabul, the un-rebuilt buildings are those on the most valuable property, where reconstruction involves property-control conflicts.