SARAJEVO (2002)

In 2002, I accidentally found in the library 3 books about the war in the former Yugoslavia, which took place in the 1990s. These books described the views of all sides: the Croats, the Serbs and the Bosniaks.

In the books, everyone was right, even if they had 3 totally opposite beliefs. That’s why I decided to visit Sarajevo with my own car. I was 27 years old and it was my first trip far away, and my first trip by myself. After four days of driving, I was amazed when I reached the city.

My goal was: ‘to find the truth, answer the question of guilt and come up with a solution.’ And oh yeah, I gave myself 3 weeks to figure this out.

Scroll down to read how that went....

(These photos are a small part of a large reportage).

MY PERSONAL STORY ABOUT WAR

At age 13, I wrote my first ‘novel’ of my own about World War II. The main character in the book was named Arnold, a boy whose father collaborated for the Germans. Arnold, on the other hand, secretly joined the resistance and even had a Jewish refugee under his bed. Two different truths within one family. It was quite a complicated story for a 13-year-old.

It came out of the history lessons I had in school about World War II. That people can think so differently about things that a war arises, I didn't understand as a child. Who or what drives them to do that?

A decade into my life, I thought politics would give me the answers. I read stacks of books to look for answers, explanations and most importantly, thé truth. Half the time I was angry at the news on TV, and even at the newscaster. When discussing world politics with others, I tried to dominate the conversation. But I caught myself saying that my opinion also floated in all directions.

In 2002 I read three books about the war in the former Yugoslavia (90s). These books described the views from the various parties: the Croats, the Serbs and the Bosniaks. Everyone was right, even though they had three totally opposite beliefs.

Since I no longer understood anything about it, I decided to drive my car to Sarajevo to go ask the people themselves. To my own surprise, I reached the city after only a few days. My goal: find the truth, answer the question of guilt and come up with a solution. I gave myself three weeks to figure it out.

But once I started walking in the city, I was too afraid to talk to anyone. The visual effects of the war in and around Sarajevo gripped me a lot and I asked myself all the time: What am I doing here? Who am I really to just come here and ask questions?

For three days I walked around with my camera in my bag. I became too scared and too shy to take a picture because I thought I would offend people by portraying them.

Then I met Admir. He was the first person to talk to me in days. “What warm weather!” he said to me and smiled. I agreed. And then he said, “Who are you? What are you doing here?” He asked me for coffee on a terrace 50 meters away. I was so happy that someone was talking to me after a week of silence. That day we decided that Admir would become my translator for a small fee a day. And we became friends.

He took me to visit his family and we went to the park with his friends who were also Croatian and Serbian. We drank tea with families in the villages around Sarajevo. And he showed me the place in the mountains where they had tortured him and killed his father. How much he had been through.

During my stay in Sarajevo, my black-and-white vision became quite useless and the idea of one solution evaporated. There turned out to be thousands of truths and even after reading three history books, I was far from being a historian. Confused as I was by the failure to find a solution, there was nothing to do but just listen. Without finding a “final truth,” I returned to Holland.

These photos were never published because I forgot to write a story, and I did not write down most of the names. But Sarajevo remains one of my most important trips. It was my beginning of many trips, to see the world in many layers and to become aware of the judgments in my head.