Sunday, April 29, 2007

"It was the only time ever that I did not use my roots knapsack with a flag on it"

... told me my journalism prof, Alan Conter, referring to an assignment in Bosnia in 1999. He arrived in Sarajevo on the last flight before the airport closed down. It was also the same day the war started in Kosovo.

Conter then headed to Banja Luka, a region whose status I haven't quite figured out- it is "the capital of the Serbian Republic of Bosnia". The geographic and ethnic complexities in the Balkans is the depth of something which I am just starting to plume.

My prof and another journalist were there to talk to Bosnians of Sarajevo and to Bosnian Serbs in Banja Luka. The Canadian embassy didn't want them there at the moment, fearing agitation. "It was a little scary, the week before there was an anti-NATO demonstration," my prof told me.

"It’s a very drab Stalinist-style city, it must have been badly damaged during WWII. A lot of architecture was Tito-inspired gray yuckness."

"I didn’t have major expectations. Sarajevo was part pretty, part shelf-shocked. Driving to the Croat part of Bosnia, we drove through villages that were completely destroyed. You are advised not to drive to the shoulder of the road because of mines and stuff. Sarajevo seemed cosmopolitan. Banja Luka was tense. It’s a very drab Stalinist-style city, it must have been badly damaged during WWII. A lot of architecture was Tito-inspired gray yuckness. The hotel we stayed in was from the 1950s, it was one of the most hideous hotels I've seen- purple wallpaper, "disco gone mad" style."

Another one of my teachers (and a writer at The Gazette), Donna Nebenzahl, had been in Sarajevo to write a section for a book about activist women in the world. Along with a photographer, she visited an organization called Women for Women International, a house where women can learn different working skills.

"They were kind of viscerally afraid. I felt really guilty that we had done this to them."

"We met two women who worked for Women for Women International who had been there all the time through the fighting and had been there through the war. They talked about the stress they had gone through.

One of the ideas was to use one of those two women as examples of this organization. So we went with them to the countryside and thought we would photograph them around the ruins of a village. We went out there. Because Nancy [the photographer] needed a strong visual- we walked around one of the derelict houses. One of the women had a total breakdown. She couldn’t stay. I felt horrible because it brought all of this stuff back.

The strange thing about Sarajevo is that it looks so benevolent. And then you realize, because somebody tells you, don't go off the road because some mines are strewn here and there.

People are trying so hard to rebuild houses and homes. When you go into the city, you see a Holiday Inn in the main drag of Sarajevo. They gave it a name I've forgotten.

It was like an alley of snipers. There were so many buildings that were just pockmarked with guns. There we craters from grenades and shells filled with red cement which people called Sarajevo roses.

It must have been a Sunday on a beautiful hillside that was covered with graves. There were many families there at the grave of an 18 year-old that died during this thing...

When you travel with a photographer. You realize how much people are willing to do. It’s not because there’s anything huge at stake. They let photographers do a lot and maybe my friend was good at that.

These were women that understood what they had gone through. They helped other women come to term with their loss. But they simply could not step back. They couldn’t go anywhere that was the past. They were kind of viscerally afraid. I felt really guilty that we had done this to them. But on the other hand you go to the house and there were women who would actually learn to do things- build furniture. You really could see how important the connection was. What would these women have done without Zaneb [the founder of the project]? This is emotional, psychic help, a way to rebuild their lives."

Speaking to some of my profs who have gone to the Balkans is just part of my preparation for my upcoming departure there. I've already gotten in touch with some people on-location, Canadians working in Kosovo.

All in all, my preparation is going quite well. I've just finished my last exam and now I'll be able to read, interview and pitch as much as I can in the following two weeks.

Oh, and pack!

Sunday, April 22, 2007

Prelude to pitching

When I was in Guatemala last summer, internet access wasn't always available and that made pitching stories hard. Three days before leaving for my internship, I still didn't know where I was going and what exactly I would be writing about.
That means I didn't know which publications I could pitch to and I flew off with only a vague idea of the whole process of trying to sell your ideas.
I learned pretty quickly that mainstream media are reluctant to publish stories about international development. Being new to the pitching process didn't help me either. It was frustrating to spend a lot of time writing pitches and receiving negative replies... a week later.
But my efforts weren't useless in the end. I met the editor of the English Guatemalan Revue magazine, who was very friendly and explained what she was looking for in an article. She liked my idea about the development of San Juan la Laguna and ended up publishing my story.
That's why I'm trying to get in touch with as many editors as I can before leaving. I know that I'll be one step forward to getting stories out there when I'm in Sarajevo and Kosovo.

Sunday, April 15, 2007

One-month countdown

I've been surfing the web, trying to find places to stay in the Balkans and planning my specific travel itinerary.

I know it's not going to be a problem in Croatia, but I was a bit concerned about Kosovo.

According to wikitravel, "Kosovo is quite safe (so long as you spend more time listening to people then spouting your political opinions) but it is also an area that is ripe for conflict. Conflict is quite often foreseeable long in advance, so if you're planning to go, check the news several weeks in advance to make sure that no major 'incidents' have occurred that could lead to rioting or other civil conflict."

This might be cause for concern... but also an indication interesting events are bound to take place:

The UN Special Envoy for the Kosovo Future Status Process, former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, has now, after 14 months of intensive negotiations with Belgrade and Pristina, presented his settlement proposal to the Security Council. Ahtisaari's bold proposal, which recommends Kosovo's independence with initial supervision by a strong international civilian and military presence, is the only viable option for the international community, and for Europe in particular. (Now is the time to permanently resolve the status of Kosovo - by Joschka Fischer, Taipei Times, Sunday, Apr 15, 2007, Page 9)
The image “http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/20/Former_Yugoslavia_2006.png” cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.

map: wikipedia.com

Saturday, April 07, 2007

The grant

I should have written this almost three weeks ago, just for the sake of celebration. But end of sessions have a great inhibiting effect on me.

I was in the editing room at Concordia, snapping away at some clips for my last short documentary of the semester. Besides me, my faithful laptop that has never left my side since November. My eyes were begging me to leave the room, bloodshot and dry.

And then, the news. It popped into the email inbox on the screen of my laptop.

I got a grant to pursue my independent journalism project in the Balkans this summer!

Of course, the world stopped turning and my doc was suddenly not a priority anymore. I got that warm, bubbly feeling inside my throat- that energizing feeling which makes life worthwhile. I made a few phone calls to announce the news... That was March 14.

Writing the proposal for a Millennium Grant was quite time-consuming. I got the idea to look into the roles of Canada, international aid and the media in the Balkans based on the internship I had done in Guatemala the previous summer.

But this time, I wanted to be on my own and be free to explore the themes I chose and to have more time to do it. I love being immersed in a specific cultural environment trying to understand the dynamics and customs of different societies.

And the Balkans have been a coup de coeur of mine ever since I visited Croatia three years ago.

I'll be landing in Zagreb on May 16th, a bit more than a month. Until then, I'll be interviewing Canadians who have reported and worked in the Balkans, working on my Serbo-Croatian and reading as much as possible.

Just plunging into the history of this beautiful part of the globe that has seen so much destruction and pain...