Mackenzie and I have had lots of changes over the past year-and-a-half: the birth of our twins, Greta and Benjamin, and the passing of my mom and our cat Milo. My work has taken something of a back seat, particularly since the end of June. As we get our feet under us with the twins, I will start to ramp back up with the research including some domestic and international travel.
The first step in this process was a trip from October 10 to October 17 to Sarajevo, Bosnia for the Kennan Institute's Alumni Conference on the theme "Conflicting Memories, Unreconciled Narratives." I applied for the conference soon after the twins were born; we thought that everything would be under control by three and a half months of age. Well, it didn't quite work out that way, as we found out when I was gone for a week. But that is a story for another time.
On the way to Sarajevo, I made a quick stop in Cambridge to meet my post-doc who is assisting on research related to Kalmykia. We walked around town and I met with some academics at the Mongolia and Inner Asia Studies Unit, where ongoing projects include the Kalmyk Cultural Heritage Documentation Project.
At King's College Chapel
Punting on the river
After a day in Cambridge, it was on to Bosnia. Surprisingly, jet-lag wasn't a problem--clearly one of the benefits of baby-induced sleep deprivation. I arrived in Sarajevo on Friday afternoon. The host city for the 1984 Winter Olympics and today the capital of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo was subject to the longest siege of a capital city in the last two centuries of warfare (and longer than Leningrad during World War II by a year). From April 1992 until February 1996, Bosnian Serb forces occupied the heights around the city and launched artillery, mortar, and sniper attacks on the civilians below. There is extensive and excellent literature about the history and experience of the siege; I recommend Barbara Demick's Logavina Street to give a sense of what life was like in the city at this time.
Graffiti on one of the side streets
Looking southeast towards the old town and the heights above the city
View from my hotel room
During my initial walk around the city, I climbed up to one of the many cemeteries where those who died during the siege of the city from 1992-1996 are buried. At sunset, there was a beautiful view to the west that encompassed the whole city.
Looking over the cemetery and the city.
A panorama of Sarajevo at sunset.
The next day, I traveled to Mostar--Herzegovina's administrative center--with one of the other conference participants. Mostar is best known for its reconstructed Ottoman-era bridge. First built in the 16th century, it was destroyed in November 1993 after shelling from Bosnian Croat troops supported by the Croatian state (one recommended documentary is linked here). Today, the bridge has been reconstructed, although tensions are still apparent in the city between Bosnian Muslims in east Mostar and Croats in the west. A shop-owner spoke of Croatian nationalists living in Mostar who had never seen the old bridge despite living in the city their whole lives. Despite these tensions, Mostar is an historic and beautiful city that attracts many tourists. One of the highlights is watching the locals jump from the bridge once they collect enough money from onlookers--the going rate is 30 Euros (about 40 dollars). We took the evening train back from Mostar to Sarajevo along a scenic gorge and through the mountains of Bosnia.
A view of the old bridge (Stari Most) and the heights from which Bosnian Croat forces shot down on the city during the war (marked by the cross).
The spire of a recently constructed church in west Mostar and the cross on the hill in the background
One of the locals preparing to jump 24 meters (about 80 feet) into the water (about 5 meters deep) below the old bridge. We didn't stick around to see if he survived.
A view of the old town on the west bank of the river.
The train to Sarajevo arriving in Mostar.
A view from the train.
Another view from the train.
Two days of conference activity were punctuated by touring the city and visiting a local museum. One of the most important historical sites in Sarajevo is the place where Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and his wife Sophie were assassinated by Gavrilo Princip in June 1914. The assassination led to heightened tensions between European powers and the start of World War I a little over a month later. The Latin Bridge is today preserved; the historical narrative about Princip has changed over the years, depending on who was in control of Bosnia. Another notable site is the War Childhood Museum, which houses a rotating collection of artifacts donated by children who survived the siege of Sarajevo.
A view of a sniper's line of fire from the mountains to the south of Sarajevo onto the square in front of the Catholic church.
A Sarajevo Rose - a memorial site to someone killed by a mortar attack. The scar in the concrete has been filled in with resin and painted red.
Our group in front of the historic mosque in the Ottoman part of Sarajevo.
At the Latin Bridge, where Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated.
One of the exhibits at the War Childhood Museum
The caption for this exhibit. The contributor was born in 1979, like me.
The final part of the conference was a day trip to Srebrenica, in eastern Bosnia. Srebrenica is located within the Republika Srpska, the majority-Serb territory in the shape of a boomerang in the country's north and east. Srebrenica was the site of the mass killing of 8,372 Bosnia Muslim men and boys (age ~14 and older). A number of those complicit in the genocide--most notably the Bosnian Serb general Ratko Mladic--have been found guilty of genocide on the basis of their actions at Srebrenica. Because the bodies of those killed were buried and then moved and reburied, the process of identification is difficult. Srebrenica was particularly powerful for me because I remember exactly where I was when the massacre was just starting; on July 10, 1995 I turned sixteen and we were visiting Lillehammer, Norway (site of the 1994 Winter Olympics).
The cemetery in Srebrenica where the victims of the genocide were buried
Graffiti left by the Dutch soldiers at the UN base at Srebrenica
A view of the UN base in the Srebrenica safe area where Bosnian Muslims gathered after the offensive by Bosnian Serb troops the second week of July 1995
Srebrenica today
One of the killing sites, a factory in a town to the west of Srebrenica
As the statue in Volgograd calls to the Russians, so does the United States call us back home. We have a few more blog posts about Russia to come, but we have in fact returned to our homeland. This post is about our last weekend of travel in Russia.
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Flying out from Elista can be a bit tricky. The airport is small--tiny, even--and is only serviced by one airline with three weekly flights. These flights are also very expensive in comparison to other air service within Russia. So a common alternative for travelers is to go to one of the nearby bigger cities (Astrakhan, Rostov-on-Don, or Volgograd) with more consistent air service to Moscow.
For our flight to the capital, we chose to leave from Volgograd. We were there earlier in May, and I had traveled through Volgograd during my previous visit to Kalmykia in 2010. So on Saturday we woke up at 4:00 a.m. to catch a taxi from Elista to the Volgograd airport. The service is incredibly inexpensive--about $15/per person for the 300km journey--and the drive gave us a chance to see the stretch between Elista and Volgograd in the early morning light (it was nighttime when we came back this way before).
Entering Volgograd; Buildings here are generally larger and more densely built than in Elista.
The Lada: a common car in Russia
Driving through the city of Volgograd
After a little more than three hours, we arrived in Volgograd. The city is known for its bad roads, and these have been made worse by construction that is underway to improve infrastructure for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. We had some extra time before our flight at noon, so we stopped for about 45 minutes at Mamaev Kurgan, where the memorial to the World War II Battle of Stalingrad is located.
Approaching Mamaev Kurgan - the hill where the Motherland Calls statue stands overlooking the river - and the new soccer arena
The kurgan--or hill--was the site of intense fighting between German and Soviet forces in the early days of the battle (September 1942). Eventually a sort of stalemate set in, with both sides controlling parts of the hill. The Soviets were able to hold out until they defeated the German forces in a counterattack in early 1943. In commemoration of the battle, the Soviet Union began building a memorial on the kurgan in the late 1950s. The Motherland Calls, which dominates the memorial complex and the skyline of the city of Volgograd, was finished in 1967.
Her size is comparable to the Statue of Liberty in the United States, maybe a little bigger.
The traditional approach to the memorial is from the Volga River, on the east side of the hill. As you walk up, you pass an entry statue, an avenue of poplars (and fragrant choke cherry trees), and a pair of walls that symbolically depict the course of the battle.
A view of The Motherland Calls! from below the walls that symbolically depict the course of the battle.
The people on the steps give you an idea of the scale of this memorial complex.
We approached from the other side and didn't have time to make it all the way to the main entrance. We did get to see the symbolic walls, as well as the reflecting pond on the Square of Heroes, the military honor hall, and a number of smaller statues. The honor hall includes an eternal flame and the names of approximately 7,200 defenders of Stalingrad during the battle. It is guarded daily by Russian soldiers.
The Square of Heroes and its reflecting pond. The text on the wall on the right-hand side says: "With an iron wind blowing straight into their faces, they were still
marching forward, and fear seized the enemy: were they people who were
attacking? were they mortal at all?!''
Another view of the reflecting pool, with the stadium under construction in the background.
(Inside the memorial hall)
The walls of the hall guarding the eternal flame are covered with the names of the defenders of Stalingrad
The "Mother's Sorrow" statue with All Saints' Orthodox Church in the background.
Another interesting site on Mamayev Kurgan is All Saints' Church. There was some controversy over its construction, primarily because the kurgan is viewed as a secular site of remembrance, and the construction of the church potentially privileges Russian Orthodoxy over Russia's other historical religions. The church, nevertheless, is a beautiful structure:
After touring Mamaev Kurgan we went to the airport for our flight to Moscow. After checking in to our hotel, we took the train from the airport to the city center. Moscow is served by three airports, and all three are linked conveniently to the city center via these trains. Our train was modern, clean, and very comfortable. From the end station we hopped on the metro for two stops and went to check out Red Square.
The Moscow (МОСКВА, in Cyrillic) train station
Red Square is the large open area to the northeast of the Kremlin. It's bordered by the Kremlin's walls, St. Basil's Cathedral, the department store GUM, and the state historical museum (counter-clockwise from the southwest). Lenin's mausoleum is also on the square along the Kremlin's walls, as are the burial sites of other communist party dignitaries and Soviet heroes (for example, Joseph Stalin and Yuri Gagarin).
Red Square, Moscow
The department store GUM
The walls of the Kremlin, with Lenin's Mausoleum (middle-left in foreground)
Lenin's Mausoleum, where Lenin's body is on display for a few hours every day
St. Basil's Cathedral
The interior of St. Basil's is unlike other cathedrals we have visited. Rather than one large room with vaulted ceilings, St. Basil's has a labyrinth of hallways and small niches across multiple levels accessible via steep, winding staircases.
Lenin's mausoleum keeps strict hours, five days a week for three hours a day, and was closed when we arrived. Instead, we toured St. Basil's cathedral, with its byzantine interior, detailed chapels, and painted walls. After our tour and another stroll through the square--where posing for Instagram photos was one of the main activities--we hopped back on the metro to meet a friend of mine from graduate school who lives in Moscow.
The area around Novokuznetskaya metro station is bustling and increasingly hipster-fied; we found a good Irish pub (that didn't actually serve any Irish food) for our final meal in Russia. We then headed back to our hotel near the airport for a few hours of sleep before our early morning flight.
