Hey everyone…. This blog is by Stephanie and Kathy we are going to cover in bullets the history and civics we have learned so far on this trip to BiH….

 

Tuzla

 

• The American corner is an actual corner located in the public library of tuzla. And was founded by the U.S. state department. It was begun in 1994 and the books were donated by the American army stationed in Dubrovna (base eagle) This space is used for books by American authors to teach American customs, cultures and holidays. To bring in us speakers and authors, and to teach English. Used by youth groups (the 4-h leadership group, and the youth for youth group.
• Medieval Fortress at srebenik it was first written about in 1333. originally built by Hungarians. Then rebuilt by the Turkish empire, also used by the Germans in world war 2.

 

 

Mortar

 

·        40% of population is Muslim

·        30% creation

·        30% other religions and Jewish (at this time there is only 40 Jewish people) during the war they were killed or they left.

·        Mosque are everywhere on one side of the city and catholic/ other churches are on the other side. You can hear the Imman calling them to prayer 5 times a day.

·        The Croats placed a huge cross at the top of a hill to show victory over the Muslims in mostar.

These bullets are from the youth leadership conference in Mostar

The conference was a reunion of the last 5 generations of BiH students who participated in the youth development program of the U.S. state department.

The goal is to take different people and any difficulties that exist and help them to network to make positive things happen.

• The speaker named Besin Spahic; he explained how people who live in BiH have mental pollution. Meaning nationalism, separatism, religious intolerance, he said it was praticly a disease. In short and simple terms, he said we are all the same, we all come from the same place, and all this separatism is unhealthy for the country. He also mentioned that some people from BiH depend on others to solve their problems, and if know one will step up to solve them who will.
• U.S. State department spongers a site called alumni.state.gov witch is great for finding resources for community improvement, alumni grants, networking, and workshops, etc…
• They broke a group of 100 or so people up into small groups to come up with ideas of a good leader… here are some examples….

Responsible, wise, educated, modest, organized, etc…

• The second workshop they explained some of the projects they put together, to help BiH and their communities.
• Then the Drama Workshop we had to demonstrate a  moment of intolerance that we have preformed on someone else (have video of one skit)…  we went out into the larger group and performed our skits… and we switched roles so as to feel what it would be like to have that intolerance towards them.

 

Zenica

 

·        We Visited the new city museum and saw displays from Illyrian Culture from 200 BC.

·        Castle Granduk a castle/ fortress with one town house and mosque, being restored and kept up by the city museum.

·        It is at the top of a mountain surrounded by other mountains and a river.

·        For many centuries it was impenetrable.

 

Livno

 

• World hope international- their main emphasis is to alleviate in justice, through education, enterprising, communication and health. They joined forces with the youth that came to Delaware for a summer eco camp. Witch also combined community health.

 

Split Croatia

 

• On the way to split we passed busko lake. It is the largest manmade lake in Europe.
• In Split, Diocletian place, built in 200 AD.
• The BIG Plate, in witch they would all sit around and eat it was about 4' in diameter.
• Diocletian was interested in columns, and fixtures, and statues from Egypt and Rome. So he would bring back pieces from destroyed buildings that were overtaken by other powers.
• There are 2 sphinxes.
• The entire basement, was still in tact, but because everything was the same they new what the other 2 floors looked like.

 

 

Sarajevo

 

• We met with Gregg Wiitala, 2^nd in command for U.S. AID for BiH. He is doing economic reconstruction, especially in dairy foods mushrooms, fruit processing and regulatory environment. He is also trying to address the problem of small businesses getting licenses. ; trying to help exportation of energy, and wireless internet.
• The Civitas (NGO) it is coordinated with the state department, department of public affairs. They are involved with a civic education program. They have created a civics curriculum, being used by everyone. And they are also bringing youth together from the different cantons, to teach democracy and human rights. They also give teacher seminars, on new methods of teaching.  They have a program where students write articles poetry, in their native tongue, that touches on popular topics that are important to youth today... for example the media promotes images of women. The website is… www.civitas.ba....

 

 

 

 

 

Traveling through 3 countries in 3 hours was a task. Going form Serbia to Croatia, we had to give our pass ports, and then 10ft away we had to do it again. And then from Croatia to BiH, we went through the same process.

 

Attempting to enter the state department was almost the same… no cameras, ipods or cell phones were aloud… and pass ports or ID were shown twice..

 

That has been our summarized 2 weeks in BiH… cant wait to see everyone love lots

Stephanie, and Kathy

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