The next morning I found my way back to the bus station and grabbed the next bus to Mostar.






More winding roads through Bosnia-Herzegovina's extremely rugged countryside. More war damage; but also some compelling mountain scenery. Beautiful green rivers, as well as abandoned bullet-riddled houses and damaged roads.

Two and a half hours later I arrived in Mostar. Usually I do not get very sad when I see destroyed towns, but Mostar, in fact, made me feel sad for it. It is, or was, or sort of still is, a tourist spot. All around the river that divides the Croation community from the muslim community are souvenir sellers, peddling postcards and plates and velvet paintings of a famous historic bridge that connects the two communities. Upper class restaurants dot the rocky cliff along the river, the most prestigious being the ones with the best view of the bridge. Souvenir selling, restaurants, hotels, all of this is a major industry in Mostar, or was, and sort of still is .







The only problem is that the bridge was destroyed in 1993 as a result of heavy combat between the Croats and Muslims. There is an intiative to rebuild the historic bridge, as can be seen on the riverside as a team of archaeologists collect the pieces of the bridge, number them, and continue scouring the area for more. Still, the tourist industry spawned by this bridge lives on, and this is the most sad element of this town - that these people have lost a valuable treasure and refuse to admit that it is gone and try to live without it. Instead it is as though people are pretending that it still exists.







The bridge was symbolic in many ways. Travel advisories are warning about Mostar right now, telling travellers to avoid it - there was a riot one month ago in the city. It seems as though the Croats want their own semi-autonomous state, just as Republika Srpska does. The destruction of the bridge is as symbolic as it is practical - things can never be the same here again, between these two communities.







So unlike Banja Luka, which seems as removed from the remnants of war as I could imagine, six years later in Mostar nothing has really changed. Even now the downtown core is little more than a sprawl of blasted buildings with the exception of several mosques and one big church, which have been rebuilt. On the muslim side of town a new graveyard is in the making, spreading its way up the side of the eastern mountain, complementing another one right below it.

Mostar still receives tourists, from both Split in Croatia as well as Sarajevo. Its livelihood is, or was, or sort of still is, tourism, although it is amazing that any tourists would still come here given that its beautiful old bridge not longer exists, and its historic old quarter has been blasted to pieces as well.








I can only take so many pictures of destroyed buildings and graveyards, and in Mostar I am hard pressed to find anything else to photograph. I sat down and had dinner and listened to a bunch of American diplomats(with one Canadian) talk useless small talk. The dinner was massive and cheap, and worth the USD11 price tag which included two beers. I sat back and pondered more on this city: fighting was brutal in Mostar. Nearly a third of the downtown core is still a mess of bullet-riddled buildings. Adding insult to injury, there was the riot a month ago, sparked by demands for a Croat-designed semi-autonomous republic.

There are American soldiers wandering around, looking totally bored, doing little but browsing souvenir stands. There is also a footbridge across the river, of course not nearly as spectacular as some old medieval bridge. I left the restaurant and started looking around for a guesthouse I had listed in my guidebook.









I did not find it; however I wandered further west into the suburbs, along tree-line boulevards and rusting old fences with many abandoned mansions. I stopped at an intersection to review my map, and I heard car horns blaring off in the distance. They were getting louder, and soon a cavalcade of vehicles drove past me, the Croatian flag billowing along the rooftop. My first thought was that perhaps someone had won a soccer game; but then I realized that it was more likely linked to the recent riot, a tactic for drumming up support for a semi-autonomous Croatian territory.

The politics here are thick, to say the least. Mostar's fate is far from over.






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