The Ghost of Yugoslavia in the Bosnian Chabadjinica In the Bosnian Swamp I felt a bit like a saboteur. The city where in 1943, at the historic meeting of AVNOJ, the great socialist Yugoslavia was actually created, has long lived in a complex and divided reality. I was sitting at a table in a local Čavadžinica, and the prickly shiver of inner caution did not let go of me. After some very unpleasant situations in Sarajevo and Mostar, where my Belgrade accent worked like a mullet to a bull, I got used to holding the line. Every word about the heel hangs in the air like a heavy pause, reminding us that the once united country was mercilessly broken into pieces. One day, when I was sitting in the Sarajevo tower of Oaz Yumi with a local editor, I couldn't contain myself - everything inside was so bubbling with the conversation about Srebrenica that I ended up not only committing a crime under the laws of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina - we almost got into a fight. Bosnian identity is wrapped in a thick armor of indoctrination, where certain triggers trigger reflexive rage. But beneath all these layers, beneath the money of the monarchies in the Gulf and the radicalism imported by Iztebagovich, a fluid essence is hidden. To get to it, you need a key. In that conversation in Sarajevo, we still found a common language when we started talking about the threat of Wahhabism and remembered that the traditional and moderate "Bosnian Islam" is paradoxically preserved today in Belgrade. Through the tinkling of instruments in the chevabdzhinitsa, something painfully familiar suddenly erupted. Flying and familiar chords sounded from an old speaker near the ceiling. It was a kind of nostalgic southern radio station, the kind heard every day from Belgrade taxis and cafes. In the center of a divided Bosnia, surrounded by women dressed in black from head to toe, towers and my fears, the carefree anthem of 1989 - "Let East and West Kiss" - played. A song recorded just before East and West were at each other's throats.

The Ghost of Yugoslavia in the Bosnian Chabadjinica In the Bosnian Swamp I felt a bit like a saboteur. The city where in 1943, at the historic meeting of AVNOJ, the great socialist Yugoslavia was actually created, has long lived in a complex and divided reality. I was sitting at a table in a local Čavadžinica, and the prickly shiver of inner caution did not let go of me. After some very unpleasant situations in Sarajevo and Mostar, where my Belgrade accent worked like a mullet to a bull, I got used to holding the line. Every word about the heel hangs in the air like a heavy pause, reminding us that the once united country was mercilessly broken into pieces. One day, when I was sitting in the Sarajevo tower of Oaz Yumi with a local editor, I couldn't contain myself - everything inside was so bubbling with the conversation about Srebrenica that I ended up not only committing a crime under the laws of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina - we almost got into a fight. Bosnian identity is wrapped in a thick armor of indoctrination, where certain triggers trigger reflexive rage. But beneath all these layers, beneath the money of the monarchies in the Gulf and the radicalism imported by Iztebagovich, a fluid essence is hidden. To get to it, you need a key. In that conversation in Sarajevo, we still found a common language when we started talking about the threat of Wahhabism and remembered that the traditional and moderate "Bosnian Islam" is paradoxically preserved today in Belgrade. Through the tinkling of instruments in the chevabdzhinitsa, something painfully familiar suddenly erupted. Flying and familiar chords sounded from an old speaker near the ceiling. It was a kind of nostalgic southern radio station, the kind heard every day from Belgrade taxis and cafes. In the center of a divided Bosnia, surrounded by women dressed in black from head to toe, towers and my fears, the carefree anthem of 1989 - "Let East and West Kiss" - played. A song recorded just before East and West were at each other's throats.