Siege of Sarajevo
 

I don't know if any of you are interested in modern history of Europe but if you are then please recommend me something to read about siege of Sarajevo (1992-1996). I found some articles on Internet and even documentaries on You Tube (which strangely expired very quickly) but I'm searching for the books concerned with this topic. How did I get interested in this topic? You might ask... (well even if you don't I'll tell you :)) I had a very strange dream. I dreamed that I was living in an unknown city surrounded by the hills, where people were snipers' target...I had to crawl on the street not to be hit. And that dream seemed so realistic to me. Few days later, by accident, I found U2's beautiful song "Miss Sarajevo" and that's when I started exploring the subject. On You Tube I found 2 hours long amateurish videos sans commentary in which I recognized faces and situations from my dream... Strange but I think I had to be exposed to these films early in my youth when as a child I watched TV news with my parents... Or maybe it's just strange play of fate... I don't know but I am sure that Stevie would craft song out of it :)

I was born in Sarajevo, and lived there until the start of the war in 1992. There was no way out of the city, and I don't have a clue how my parents managed to get us out of there a few months into the war to a small town right next to Sarajevo called Kiseljak (my stepfather's birth place). There we connected with a group of people who were planing to find a way out of Bosnia somehow. We didn't have much time to organize, but we managed to leave Bosnia traveling through mountains and forests. Just a week or so after we left, an ethnic cleansing took place in Kiseljak. A lot of people (including my stepfathers parents) were killed, and the rest were taken to prisoner camps. We saved our lives, but our world was turned upside down. We lost EVERYTHING in that war. People we loved, all our possessions, our home, everything. Things were so bad back then, that even now, 20 years later we are still facing the consequences . I don't really know which books are available for you to read, but I have to tell you one thing. If you are really interested in finding the truth about the war in Bosnia/Sarajevo, BE VERY CAREFUL. There is so much false propaganda around this subject that it's almost impossible to find out what really happened.

The propaganda of which you wrote is present even in some documentaries where Serbian politicians try to convince the world about necessity of their war strategies. On the other hand propaganda is just inescapable element of history. Just look at the things that people write about Polish Concentration Camps during World War II. Just like the Polish people had been responsible for deaths of millions of Jews. Of course there were Polish people who were killing Jews...no doubt about it but it was Germans who organized all those mass execution places.

But going back to Sarajevo... What can I say? You did it. You escaped the besieged town...I can't even imagine how it is to be forced to leave your country, everything that you love and know...to lose people who were close to you and your family. That's just the curse of the war. I hope your family has found a better place to live and sooner or later you'll forget about the whole trauma...But to be honest I think it's quite impossible...You just learn to live with it but never forget...My grandmother who survived two World Wars always told me: "How can I forget it? It's responsible for who I am now"... So, it's more about learning to cope with the trauma than just making it disappear.

If you have any book recommendations...please let me know. As I stated in previous post I feel strange yet strong connection with Sarajevo.