bosnia trip

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"Why do you wake up in the morning?"

An elderly couple looking over the town from the hill

This question has been a special question since I went to Bosnia for a humanitarian trip from May 24 to April 1, 2001. To be honest, I was not interested in volunteer work but in creating a good resume for college. However, I was eventually influenced enormously on this trip. It made me see, listen to, and touch the remains of a war very clearly and impressively, rather than reading about it from a history book.

It was early spring, when the pink cherry blossoms were in full bloom with emerald trees behind them. It must had been a lovely peaceful town, before the war.

A lake.

The houses with huge holes on the walls. Surprisingly, people actually live in those buildings. This is the house without its original roof.

The sight was a nightmare, but real. Many buildings and houses still had countless scars of war, black holes of destruction on the walls, and some houses did not have roofs because of the air raids; however people have been living there making "temporary" plastic walls or roofs. I was tense and scared staring the black holes everywhere.

Apartments with holes on the wall. These are houses made after the war. These were on the hill where I took the picture of the elderly couple.

The original bridge was destroyed and temporary birdge was built, but it has not rebuilt yet.

The yellow tapes are for the areas where landmines still remains.

Our host mother, a great cook. The neighborhood kids

Fourteen of us went to a small village, Gorazde, where mostly Serbs and Muslims are living, and stayed with local families in groups of four. Throughout the week, largely around the area, we made hundreds of family packs, which consisted of a pack of flour, sugar, rice, laundry detergent, and a bottle of vegetable fat, and delivered these packs to families. I have never suffered from hunger, but there, certainly, were people who needed those basic foods, even a little help.

This is the ban used for distribution and the storage, where we made family packs. This is inside the storage. It was a part of where it used to be a factory.

During the food distribution, I saw an old lady gazing at us from the third floor of a bare gray concrete building. After catching her eye, my friend and I went to her room, and she was waiting for us at the front door, alone. Her legs were shivering. We knew that she had bad legs, so we carried the family packs inside the room. She beckoned us to stay in the room, so we sat on a pink sofa and I noticed that the floor was cold and rough. She started talking in Bosnian. I listened to her emotions, looking into her eyes. My heart was filled with tears, and she gave me a hug. It was a fragile hug since she was very skinny, but it grasped my heart tightly.

We also distributed sweet packs. The rainbow!

"Why do you wake up in the morning?" Lou Felo, our trip leader, asked us. I think about Louﾕs question a lot. A lot. Everyday I go to the cafeteria to have my meals; however some people cannot. I can study at school; but some youths cannot. I was able to go to Bosnia for volunteer work and then return to the comfort of Switzerland, but they are living under very difficult conditions from which they can not leave. Life is not equal. We should wake up and think about the luck we already have, because the Bosnians I met wake up only to survive that day.

	It was early spring, when the pink cherry blossoms were in full bloom with emerald trees behind them. It must had been a lovely peaceful town, before the war.
A lake.


The houses with huge holes on the walls. Surprisingly, people actually live in those buildings.	This is the house without its original roof.
The sight was a nightmare, but real. Many buildings and houses still had countless scars of war, black holes of destruction on the walls, and some houses did not have roofs because of the air raids; however people have been living there making "temporary" plastic walls or roofs. I was tense and scared staring the black holes everywhere.


Apartments with holes on the wall.	These are houses made after the war. These were on the hill where I took the picture of the elderly couple.


This is the ban used for distribution and the storage, where we made family packs.	This is inside the storage. It was a part of where it used to be a factory.
During the food distribution, I saw an old lady gazing at us from the third floor of a bare gray concrete building. After catching her eye, my friend and I went to her room, and she was waiting for us at the front door, alone. Her legs were shivering. We knew that she had bad legs, so we carried the family packs inside the room. She beckoned us to stay in the room, so we sat on a pink sofa and I noticed that the floor was cold and rough. She started talking in Bosnian. I listened to her emotions, looking into her eyes. My heart was filled with tears, and she gave me a hug. It was a fragile hug since she was very skinny, but it grasped my heart tightly.


We also distributed sweet packs.	The rainbow!
"Why do you wake up in the morning?" Lou Felo, our trip leader, asked us. I think about Louﾕs question a lot. A lot. Everyday I go to the cafeteria to have my meals; however some people cannot. I can study at school; but some youths cannot. I was able to go to Bosnia for volunteer work and then return to the comfort of Switzerland, but they are living under very difficult conditions from which they can not leave. Life is not equal. We should wake up and think about the luck we already have, because the Bosnians I met wake up only to survive that day.