Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
As I left Trebinje and continued on the road, it became apparent that the
complex nature of things here comes across in the powerful language of l ags.
Just as bars throughout Europe don't want football team colors, and pubs
throughout Ireland don't want the green or orange of the sectarian groups,
l ags in this region come with lots of pent-up political anger. h roughout
the day I saw dif erent l ags, each one l ying with an agenda. Croats salute
their red-and-white checkerboard l ag, while Serbs proudly hoist their l ag
with four C's (the i rst letter of “Serb” in the Cyrillic alphabet). But in the
not-too-distant past, each of these l ags was also employed by an oppressive
regime—so Croats and Serbs each view the other's l ag as equivalent to a
swastika. Meanwhile, the country's oi cial l ag—which nobody really embraces
(or is of ended by)—is a yellow-and-blue, triangle-and-stars coni guration
dreamed up by the European Union.
While most tourists can't tell the dif erence, locals notice subtle clues
that indicate they're entering a dif erent ethnicity's home turf—those highly
symbolic l ags, discreet but hateful grai ti symbols, new road signs with
politically charged names, and even ATMs with instructions in Croatian,
Bosnian, or Serbian—but not the other two languages. During the days of
Yugoslavia, these languages were all lumped together into a single, mutually
intelligible mother tongue called “Serbo-Croatian.” But, stoked by the patrio-
tism of proud new nationhood, each of these groups has artii cially distanced
its language from the others—inventing new words to replace ones they i nd
“too Serbian” or “too Croatian.”
Later, after a two-hour drive on deserted roads through a rugged landscape,
I arrived at the humble Serb crossroads village of Nevesinje. Towns in this region
all have a “café row,” and Nevesinje is no exception. It was lunchtime, but as I
walked through the town, I didn't see a soul with any food on the table—just
drinks. In this village, where unemployment is epidemic, apparently locals eat
cheaply at home...and then enjoy an af ordable cof ee or drink at a café.
A cluttered little grocery—with a woman behind the counter happy to
make a sandwich—was my answer for lunch. h e salami looked like Spam.
Going through the sanitary motions, she laid down a piece of waxed paper
to catch the meat—but the slices landed wetly on the grotty base of the
slicer as they were cut. A strong cup of “Bosnian cof ee” (we'd call it “ Turkish
cof ee”)—with highly caf einated, loose grounds settled in the bottom—cost
just pennies in the adjacent café. Munching my sandwich and sipping the
cof ee carefully to avoid the mud, I watched the street scene.
