Visit to Bosnia
Jun. 25th, 2013 12:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackLast week Liv and I went to Bosnia for a week and a half for my friend's wedding.
Travel
We were a little scared that there might be some problems going through Istanbul because of the protests, but everything was fine. Although I wish there had been some way to show solidarity.
We were a little worried about navigating round Bosnia whilst not speaking the language at all, but we managed. We got a taxi from the airport all the way to the town we were staying in, which was expensive, but probably better than trying to immediately negotiate buses. A lot of the time my friend was there to help.
Countryside
The countryside is unsurprisingly amazing. We spent a couple of days in the small town near where my friend's wife grew up. It was small enough there obviously weren't many tourists, so often had to negotiate with almost no words in common, but everyone was exceptionally tolerant and helpful.
Most places we went hadn't a lot of specifically vegetarian food, but normally had one or two things, which were usually very nice. The menus helpfully have pictures on :)
Phone reception
Both hotels and some other places had wifi, which was lovely. I like the future a lot.
I said I'd try to pick up a local sim card, and I wish I'd tried harder; being able to make calls without worrying about the cost, and if possible having google maps, would have been really useful.
For some reason, I couldn't connect to any of the mobile telephone networks for more than a few seconds. My friend on giffgaff has the same problem. I'm not sure what was wrong.
Wedding
My friends were already legally married, but hadn't had a proper wedding. It was a catholic wedding in a beautiful airy church in the village his wife grew up in.
The wedding was mostly in Croatian, but with the vows in English, and the readings translated into English. Unfortunately, I'd assumed the priest or someone was managing the wedding, but apparently he was just ploughing ahead with a usual service, and expecting the awkward English guests to jump in if possible at the appropriate point, which was rather difficult, though it turned out ok.
When I'd not been given any text to read, I'd assumed my friend was just being too busy, and there would obviously be a text to read from during the service. But apparently not, I was just supposed to know by osmosis what to read.
But very fortunately, I'd been asked to read the appropriate passage from the bible about God making woman from a rib, and hence man leaving his parents and cleaving to his wife, and when you look at it, it's fairly obvious which bit makes a nice complete reading for a wedding, beginning after "god created the earth" part and ending before the "and then they were naked" part.
I'd looked it up in the hotel room wifi, and hadn't expected to need to whip my smartphone out in the middle of the service, but it was the only option. Unfortunately, my phone decided it needed to reload the page right then, and switched to saying "cannot load page". So with mild trepidation, since most people who spoke any English were people I knew well, I apologised and gave as much as I could remember, which turned out ok.
But, well, I guess giving an unscheduled speech from memory in the middle of a wedding is a good introduction to public speaking.
Afterwards there's a big reception, with much drinking of locally distilled spirits, and 80s dancing.
Sarajevo
Afterwards we spent a few days in Sarajevo, where we didn't have anyone who could speak Bosnian, but people are geared up for international tourists.
Sarajevo is a beautiful city, littered with street cafes, blending Turkish, Austrian, Soviet and Mediterranean culture. It sits in a river valley, surrounded by hills on all sides. The river itself is shallow but wide and lively, with a bridge every few hundred metres.
Recommendations
The hotel Marat Zepce (just outside Zepce) and Pension Harmony (in Sarajevo) were both very helpful. I don't have anything to compare them to, but I would consider going there again if I were visiting.
Travel
We were a little scared that there might be some problems going through Istanbul because of the protests, but everything was fine. Although I wish there had been some way to show solidarity.
We were a little worried about navigating round Bosnia whilst not speaking the language at all, but we managed. We got a taxi from the airport all the way to the town we were staying in, which was expensive, but probably better than trying to immediately negotiate buses. A lot of the time my friend was there to help.
Countryside
The countryside is unsurprisingly amazing. We spent a couple of days in the small town near where my friend's wife grew up. It was small enough there obviously weren't many tourists, so often had to negotiate with almost no words in common, but everyone was exceptionally tolerant and helpful.
Most places we went hadn't a lot of specifically vegetarian food, but normally had one or two things, which were usually very nice. The menus helpfully have pictures on :)
Phone reception
Both hotels and some other places had wifi, which was lovely. I like the future a lot.
I said I'd try to pick up a local sim card, and I wish I'd tried harder; being able to make calls without worrying about the cost, and if possible having google maps, would have been really useful.
For some reason, I couldn't connect to any of the mobile telephone networks for more than a few seconds. My friend on giffgaff has the same problem. I'm not sure what was wrong.
Wedding
My friends were already legally married, but hadn't had a proper wedding. It was a catholic wedding in a beautiful airy church in the village his wife grew up in.
The wedding was mostly in Croatian, but with the vows in English, and the readings translated into English. Unfortunately, I'd assumed the priest or someone was managing the wedding, but apparently he was just ploughing ahead with a usual service, and expecting the awkward English guests to jump in if possible at the appropriate point, which was rather difficult, though it turned out ok.
When I'd not been given any text to read, I'd assumed my friend was just being too busy, and there would obviously be a text to read from during the service. But apparently not, I was just supposed to know by osmosis what to read.
But very fortunately, I'd been asked to read the appropriate passage from the bible about God making woman from a rib, and hence man leaving his parents and cleaving to his wife, and when you look at it, it's fairly obvious which bit makes a nice complete reading for a wedding, beginning after "god created the earth" part and ending before the "and then they were naked" part.
I'd looked it up in the hotel room wifi, and hadn't expected to need to whip my smartphone out in the middle of the service, but it was the only option. Unfortunately, my phone decided it needed to reload the page right then, and switched to saying "cannot load page". So with mild trepidation, since most people who spoke any English were people I knew well, I apologised and gave as much as I could remember, which turned out ok.
But, well, I guess giving an unscheduled speech from memory in the middle of a wedding is a good introduction to public speaking.
Afterwards there's a big reception, with much drinking of locally distilled spirits, and 80s dancing.
Sarajevo
Afterwards we spent a few days in Sarajevo, where we didn't have anyone who could speak Bosnian, but people are geared up for international tourists.
Sarajevo is a beautiful city, littered with street cafes, blending Turkish, Austrian, Soviet and Mediterranean culture. It sits in a river valley, surrounded by hills on all sides. The river itself is shallow but wide and lively, with a bridge every few hundred metres.
Recommendations
The hotel Marat Zepce (just outside Zepce) and Pension Harmony (in Sarajevo) were both very helpful. I don't have anything to compare them to, but I would consider going there again if I were visiting.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-25 02:19 pm (UTC)And I've been noted in various jobs for being one of the people you can yank into a meeting to draw a diagram on a whiteboard and explain stuff without any preparation or prior warning. I've been complimented on how polished my presentation was on at least one such occasion. (-8
On the other hand, I agree about not using electronic devices for giving talks at a wedding. At my cousin's wedding, the bride broke with convention by giving a short speech of her own, the main thrust of which was that she was going to dump her now-husband if he gave a PowerPoint presentation as his speech, and he thought she was joking but she'd like to point out she wasn't. (-8
When I was best man, I did prepare my talk in PowerPoint, but then printed out the slides as my cribsheet. This worked beautifully with just one minor problem: it helps if you clearly mark the last page. It was a little disconcerting when, in mid flow, I confidently turned the page to find nothing but a fine oak table beneath. Kinda broke my flow, that!
I used to know someone who had a relationship with a Sarajevan. It's ironic to hear you worried about flying to Sarajevo via Istanbul — a decade ago the situation would have been more than reversed! Certainly my friend's partner was deeply traumatised by the the events that followed the disintegration of Yugoslavia. A decade doesn't feel long enough for the emotional scars to heal. And sadly, I get the impression Sarajevo is the pretty much only cosmopolitan multicultural melting pot — there's still a lot of deep mutual enmity elsewhere.
It sounds like you've managed to avoid having any of that history impinge and have had a fabulous time, though!
no subject
Date: 2013-06-25 05:35 pm (UTC)LOL. I'd rather they talked it out, rather than made jokes about it, but I share the general sentiment. Although, I think powerpoint is a special case, because it's really useful for presentations, but has a bad reputation as leading to the stereotypical bad powerpoint presentations...
I confidently turned the page to find nothing but a fine oak table beneath. Kinda broke my flow, that!
LOL.
It's ironic to hear you worried about flying to Sarajevo via Istanbul — a decade ago the situation would have been more than reversed!
I was very conscious of it (before my friend went to Bosnia, the war was about ALL I'd heard of it). But Bosnia has been comparatively stable since the war finally ended, even if it's still suffering a lot economically, whereas Turkey, previously pretty stable, was suddenly suffering mass protests like those in the UK and Sweden.
A decade doesn't feel long enough for the emotional scars to heal.
Not at all. Everywhere we saw was doing amazingly well considering, but I was acutely conscious that most countries I went, the most recent genocide was in WWII, and people are only now recovering, but in Bosnia, it was in the 90s, which is really awful :(
So it didn't affect me personally (and I don't know anything specific about my friend's family), but saved the entire "history of bosnia" for the follow-up post, soon to be followed by a further follow-up post.