Final thoughts

I've spent the last two weeks gushing about how pretty Croatia is, how I learned so much, how I think I can finally hold up my end of a conversation about Balkan politics and the wars US forces fought there a generation ago. The land is very pretty, Dubrovnik is magnificent, but I think what I take away more than anything else is an appreciation for what we were fortunate to have in our nation. Two hundred and ten years ago, we were the new nation - twenty years out from independence and a war and we had leaders like Adams and Jefferson fighting for the Presidency, Madison and Monroe designing our government, John Jay on the judiciary, Hamilton designing the Treasury. Lots of different things contributed to American success but I do hope the Croatian people find a similar leader in their near future. They have so many neat natural sites to share with humanity, so much history to preserve. I look forward to watching them and I am very glad I had an opportunity to visit their developing nation.

Rainy Dubrovnik

The Croatian government really needs to work on its marketing - to let tourists know what is available. There were no local references to the fact that the HBO series Games of Thrones is filmed there so if I did not know that before I left New York, I never would have had the adventure I had today. For fans who will understand the reference, King's Landing scenes are filmed in Dubrovnik. Sunday night, I googled the series to see if anything else was filmed right around Dubrovnik and found information that the large island right off the city was another film site. My next search was for the island, called Lokrum, which contains a nature reserve and is promoted as a good day trip out of Dubrovnik. Reading on was a small reference that Richard the Lionhearted visited the island off as he returned from the Crusades. He promised money to build a church on the island but the city fathers asked to use the money to build a church on the mainland instead. Of course with this tie to northern European history, I had to go out to the island.

The weather this morning was overcast which means that the boat did not make the 10:00 trip - they said come back at 11. At 11, the boat owners said to come back at noon. The weather did not look any better but for some reason the boat left so I made it to the island. There are about 20 sites on the island - a combination of nature sites on beaches and man made forts and churches so after stopping at the abbey remains and watching some strutting peacocks, I hiked to the fort on the top of the island. The trails were rather rough. Got there as the clouds turned really dark and the rain was visible out on the ocean - so now I have no idea why the boat didn't leave at 10 but made we wait until after noon to get to the island! The views of the city from the fort were magnificent but I decided to be smart and turn around and hike back to the part of the island with more people on it and the boat to take us off the island in case the weather got really bad. It turned out be a good idea as I was about halfway back when the skies opened up. Still, as I was soaking wet and as the boats only came back in hour increments, I figured I should finish the visit, seeing a beach with some neat rock formations and some lovely gardens with ties to the Austrian-Hungarian empire.

Once back in Dubrovnik - which clears out of tourists considerably in the rain, I visited the aquarium which had lots of eels and large ugly fish that I am very glad I did not know swam in the Adriatic when I ventured in earlier in the week and finished my trip by gorging myself on some cheese pastry made with philo dough that tasted really wonderful. The trip homes starts early tomorrow and while I am looking forward to returning home, I am definitely glad I got a chance to see parts of Croatia and the beautiful city of Dubrovnik.

Languages

The requirement in schools here is that everyone speak three languages, their own, previously called Serbian-Croatian but now named after whatever country you happen to be in. I'm told the language is the same although they say they have regional accents and pronounce words slightly differently. The second language is English which is required from the first grade. I asked why English given the Italian heritage here and the fact that both Austria and France controlled the country for part of it's history and was told English is the language of tourism and of computers. I guess that is true, the Asians I met - quite a few as I walked the wall on Saturday all spoke some level of English. Some I spoke to as we took turns taking pictures of each other weren't exactly fluent but all were able to have a simple conversation. Our hotel has a few tour groups from other countries - one from Italy and two from I believe China and Japan. Back to Croatian schools, a couple years later - around the fourth or fifth grade, everyone starts another language, Italian, German or French. Sometimes chosen by whatever family ties you might have as one does see Austrian-German and Italian names in the region. The result is that everyone is trilingual to some extent, which is amazing to behold. The other thing that impressed me was how book educated many of the people we met were despite the fact that they did not have university degrees. Those of my generation spent those early adult years fighting in a war to keep their nation independent so a university education never really was an option. It is still out of reach to many and even if you received a university education, there are not employment opportunities so many still bypass it to go straight to work. This means they rely on their secondary schools to teach topics like economics, European/world history, science and math, much more than we do in American schools. If you were to put me in a social situation with so many of the people I met on this trip, after a conversation (which would need to take place in my language, not theirs) I would tell you that they all have a university education. One person told me they had a friend who had the privilege of going to school in America. The stories they told about American students were disheartening as the student arrived on campus very prepared and very ready to study and learn only to be confronted with students looking for easier classes and insistent on a party/work balance for their university years. As I edit this a week later, I think this story stuck with me quite a bit. The story teller wasn't telling me about how smart her friend was - just about how disciplined and I realized that in their struggle for success as a nation, this discipline is important - and something that we as a successful nation take for granted quite a bit more than we should.

Mostar, Bosnia

I got a bit of grief from caring friends when I mentioned my interest in taking a bus to Bosnia while I was in Dubrovnik and while I appreciated their concern, I figured this was a once in a lifetime chance. Thankfully, there were a couple of others interested on the hike so we booked a private car to take us for the day. The price was unbelievably cheap-200 Euros and gave me some sense for what is a good part time salary in this nation as if you did the drive every working day of the year you would make under $70k a year before expenses - gas was about $5-$6 a gallon. Working that much is impossible - the season starts as part time work in May and then full time June-August and then part time again in September and maybe some in October. Our driver was educated as a merchant officer and worked for a time in the shipping industry that is a smaller part of his nation's economy. This tour driving was viewed as a good job - especially as his small company - three of them - established enough of a reputation to be on US travel websites as a company to call.

The drive was up the penisula to a river bed that fed miles of farmland, quite the site in a country where so many farm plots are so small. In order to get into Bosnia to see the sites, we had to cross from Croatia into Bosnia once, then drive about 12 kilometers and drive back into Croatia and then drive for about 20 minutes before crossing into Bosnia for good. This is because the Dubrovnik Republic gave a 12 kilometer stretch of coastline to the Ottoman empire so that they would serve as protection from the Venetians. That probably happened 600 years ago and despite all the other border changes in the area, that border still stands.

Once into Bosnia, we drove along the river and immediately saw the results of the war in buildings destroyed by artillery fire. Many buildings remain destroyed or have lots of bullet holes in the sides of them - even more evident here because so much is built out of concrete. There is some new construction as well but as the Bosnian's have less industry than Croatian, they have less money for rebuilding. Curiously enough they reported are rich in minerals but are still waiting to figure out how to properly harness that wealth. Another interesting thing about Bosnia is that the signs are all in both the Latin and the Cyrillic alphabets and that in many rural places, the Cyrillic words are spray painted out. The Cyrillic alphabet is still used in Serbia so this vandalism is a political statement.

We stopped in the town of Pocitelj which had ruins from an old fort and a mosque in it. The fort was well positioned to guard a valley. Once out of the car, it was obvious that we had left Catholic Croatia. Many of the women we saw were dressed in Islamic head scarves. The men were also dressed in a less Western way. We briefly walked around the town which gave us a good sense that we had entered a different land. I actually took a picture of the street as in addition to finding the road less than even to walk upon, I was amazed that a functioning community with what seemed to be an active mosque, still had roads made of stones like these. Then it was on to Mostar - a town where Croatian Christians live on one side of the river and Bosnia Muslims on the other. The bridge that spans the two sides is very symbolic and after being destroyed in the war, has been rebuilt. Mostar sits in a river valley which meant that during the Homeland Wars, each side occupied a hill top on one side of the river and just kept shelling the hell out of the town. Around the bridge is a Turkish type market with lots of little stores, many with Turkish and other Arab type goods. We stopped for lunch in the restaurant our guide recommended, with girls in native costumes who speak perfect English and can explain the menu and how they accept three types of currency, Bosnian Marks, Euros, and Croatian Kunas. They also have pictures on the menu so you can see what you are ordering. They are all set up for tourism, despite the fact that they are not a top tourism spot. We ordered their native meat sampler, I ordered their native rice and veggies dish plus their chicken soup - which they called bey soup and we had grilled vegetables. All good.

Shopping in the market was interesting because only about one in ten stores took credit cards. In one store, I needed to show the clerk how to work the credit card machine so that I could make my purchase! I got some pashmina scarves at a fraction of the NY price and some necklaces made by local women. The necklaces are both embroidered and made out of scarves. Somewhat simple but rather interesting and I love the idea that they came from Bosnia. Left unsaid is that after the war, the women's income may have largely depended on their necklace sales. We didn't stay that long and after lunch drove around to see both some new construction - a Mall that would fit into many US cities and still blocks of buildings that had been absolutely destroyed by the shelling.

Now we are back in Dubrovnik and headed for a swim before dinner. (See told you it was safe!)

Dubrovnik

Last night at dinner as we peppered, ok, bombarded, our guides with questions about the war, one of them got quite emotional and excused herself from the table. Today I had some small sense of what she was feeling as we toured Dubrovnik as it was in its glory and saw so much that the city has preserved "Lest we Forget" to use their phrase.

Our hotel is right on the water with entry into the Adriatic and a saltwater pool with an amazing view. The city is about a 10 minute walk so that means we always have a magnificent view of the walls. After breakfast on the terrace over looking the sea as we watched hotel staff empty, clean and refill the pool (so much for any hope the water would warm up!) while eating, we met our guide. She is actually a retired guide who teaches the new guides but also does VIP tours. She knows our hiking guide from many years ago so he convinces her to come give tours for the six US company tours he guides each year. As we walked into town, she explained about the Dubrovnik Republic in the middle of the empires we learned about earlier in the week and how they were both diplomatically skilled and wealthy enough and just plain lucky to survive in history. They also were remarkable liberal in their thinking for the time - especially when one realizes they were surrounded by the Ottomans, Austrian-Hungarians, and medieval Venetians - not societies known for liberal thought. The walled city was impregnable for the life of the republic, although the French built a fort overlooking the city when Napoleon's army came to rule here. She told us how the city established quarantine areas to prevent ships from bringing in diseases and how the Republic was ruled by a Senate which elected leaders for one year at a time-early term limits. A sign over one government building warns state rulers to leave the personal interests behind and protect the public. We all had laughs at that phrase, picking on Croatian, American and Australian politicians who could benefit from such a message.

We walked through the main street which has one end narrower than the other creating an optical illusion to make it feel longer than it is; saw the Croatian equivalent of the Spanish steps and visited a Benedictian monestary which contains one of Europe's oldest pharmacies. The monastery also houses relics from many saints each tiny fragment preserved in a gold and silver, foot or arm - an early rather useless prosthetic device. The monastery also had many old books from those printed on early Gutenberg presses to handwritten ones with color and decorations to rival those well known in northern Europe.

Our guide also spoke to us of the siege of Dubrovnik in the fall of 1991/winter of 1992. She lived outside of town when the hostilities started and moved in with older relatives behind the walls. She told us now it started with all communication being cut off as television and radio towers were taken down by the Serbs and Montenegrans. The citizens were not able to get information, electricity or water for periods of time during the siege which lasted for 9 months. Food came in by flotilla protected by a couple dozen small war boats - all that the Croatian army had to try to save the citizens of such an old and beautiful city. Each entrance into the town has a big sign with a map that showed all the houses which were hit and the different levels of damage. Now you cannot tell the city was subject to a brutal attack and such horrible deprivation - the only real sign visible on the red roofs which make up all the roofs in the city. The roofs are made of concrete and clay and are made to last 300 years but as you look at the buildings you can tell that many of the houses have much newer roofs. Those are the houses who had roof damage from the shelling and while the bright red is beautiful, it also serves as visible reminder of the war.

Near one of the gates is a small museum-really one room in a building with archives that houses a memorial to honor all the Dubrovnik Defenders as they are called. The room has flags and photographs. Some look like seasoned soldiers but some look like the teenage boys they were.

When we finished the tour, I headed up to the cable car, largely because there was a cruise ship in the harbor and too many people being ferried ashore. I figured, correctly, that they would not have time to climb the mountain. The scenery is brilliant, you can see all the walls round the city and miles of surrounding water and islands.

You also have a powerful reminder of the war - the other side of the cable car docking station looks out on the battlefield from the siege. You can see the destruction of the trees in the land held by the Serbs. The Defenders took over the old French fort of Napoleon. The fort was highly damaged by the war and you can tell that tourist dollars have not yet been used for repairs as you can easily imagine the fort and the cold wet walls as part of a battle site. The fort now houses a war museum that explains what happened in detail. Parts of the museum dealing with the shock of the Croatians that Dubrovnik could be attached reminded me of 9-11 but I was faced with the realization that my city was attacked for one day, their city was attacked for more than a year. We also had world support in the aftermath, the world was bigger on words than actions for Dubrovnik. 20 years later they are still rebuilding but we are still rebuilding a decade on and our damage was much more isolated. Altogether a very though provoking tour.

As I returned to town enough of the cruise ship inhabitants had left the town to give me a shot to brave the wall walk. This is not for the faint hearted as once you start the climb, you can only walk one way and there are very few places to get down off the wall. The views are spectacular and you realize why Dubrovik was indestructible until the war machine of the 20th century.

Tomorrow, three of us are headed to Bosnia, another country which suffered under the Homeland Wars.