Day 84: Welcome to Sarajevo

Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina

Sarajevo isn’t a city easy to get around with public transportation. Sarah and I decided to join the tour offered by our hostel. At $20 bucks, it’s definitely worth it since we were able to visit all the major sites in one day. And a few of these place we would not have been able to get to without a car.

First site we visited was the Tunnel museum. During the war, this was the only way for people in Sarajevo to obtain food and other needs for survival. Situated in a valley, Sarajevo was then surrounded by Serbian army on the hills. The United Nation wasn’t able to help much other then to get control of the airport for easy access for international press and army. Also, they weren’t really siding with either the Bosnians or the Serbs. Thus, people of Sarajevo built this tunnel near the airport knowing that at least the UN would not have the Serbs attack the area.

Other important site that we visited were:

Holiday Inn (Where it’s the only safe haven in the city center and where the foreign press and photographers stayed at)

Sarajevo Olympic’s bobsled (A symbol of Yugoslavian glorious peaceful and happy time)

The site of Franz Ferdinand’s assassination. (He was an Austrian archduke and his death was the catalyst of World War I)

In the tour, we met a few people: Seamus from Ireland, Maria from Spain and Gabrielle from Italy and ended up going with them to have traditional Bosnian coffee and hookah. I never did try the hookah since it’s peach flavored and I’m allergic to peach. I could have beaten Sarah’s and Gabrielle’s hookah smoke tricks by blowing them out of my ears I kid… I kid…