Catching Up and Fudbal

Snowy day at the Sebilj Fountain in Bascarsija ("main market") of Sarajevo

Despite all my determination to keep up with my blog and keep everyone informed on my Bosnian adventures, life happens and here it is nearly 4 months into my year and I have only a little to show for it. I hope to remedy this in the new year, but I am not making any commitments that will certainly be broken, so please enjoy the occasional posts as they come. Here is one. I hope you enjoy.


At the Bosnia v. Spain football game

Like the rest of Europe, football is huge in Bosnia. Some friends and I were able to get tickets at the last minute to see Bosnia play Spain. We drove to Zenica, a city about an hour away from Sarajevo to the stadium there that was packed out to see this big game. It wasn't too much different from my sporting event experiences in the States. They even had some sausages in bread that looked almost like hot dogs.

This was my first European football experience. Before that, all I had seen were Clemson soccer games. I had heard about the rioting that sometimes goes on at games like these and about "hooligans" and all that, so I didn't know what to expect, but it really wasn't bad at all. The fans were intense, but well-behaved. Everyone was very respectful during the Spain National Anthem and at one point in the game, Spain was cheering for Bosnia and Bosnia was cheering for Spain in a half-mocking cheering battle.

I'm no football expert, so I can't tell you all about the game, but it was amazing to see the Bosnian and Spanish players' athletic abilities. Spain as the number one team at that time was especially impressive. The highlight of the game was when, as my friends and I ascended the stadium steps to leave and with only about a minute or two on the clock, Bosnia scored two goals to lose the game honorably.

The Bosnian Football cheer:

"Hajmo Bosno, Bosno, Bosno. Hajmo Hercegovino!"

The Sarajevo City Hall

City Hall, 1992

One of the most beautiful buildings in Sarajevo, in my opinion, second to the Art Faculty, is the City Hall. A shell hit the building in 1992 at the beginning of the war, destroying the ancient documents it contained.

Well, 14 years after the war, this building is currently being renovated and is fenced-off and locked-up to tourists. That is, unless you just walk in through the open gate.

I had been spending the afternoon with my friend who had been showing me around the city's historical buildings-- the Franciscan Church, Sarajevska Pivara (the city brewery), Zestra (the olympic stadium), and other great spots around town.

I followed him through the gate and into the magnificent rotunda of the city hall. We noticed a couple of people talking in an adjacent room, so we quickly took the makeshift construction stairs up to the upper floors of the city hall. Most of the plaster was chipped off the walls revealing the brick and mortar construction underneath, but there were small patches of the original plaster that showed the ornate paintings of this Austro-Hungarian relic. To an architecture enthusiast this was an adventure.

We explored the floors, ducking underneath low-hanging wooden beams, carefully ascending the precarious wooden stairs, and entering the dark attic with our cell phones as flashlights.

After a while, we remembered the two people downstairs and how we could get caught for trespassing. (If anyone is reading this who is with Sarajevo police or government, please forgive us.) We hurried downstairs just in time to see the man and woman who were the only other people in the building exit through the only exit, the front door. We ran to the door to avoid being locked in and were greeted by a friendly man in his 40s taking a smoke break on the porch of the city hall.

My friend greets him in Bosnian and begins a conversation with him. My Bosnian at that point was limited to only a few phrases, so I didn't understand any of it, other than it appeared very cordial. My friend introduced himself and shook the man's hand and then introduced me. I shook his hand as I heard Mirza say something that sounded like "architect" in Bosnian. The handshake was firm and longer than normal and the guy had a big smile on his face as we were introduced. I thought it was a little strange at how friendly this guy was being, but I am in Bosnia and people are very friendly here.

After we said our goodbyes and walked away from the city hall, I was relieved that we weren't reprimanded for trespassing, but I was also curious. I asked my friend, "What did you say to that man?" He responded, "Oh, I told him that we were both architects and were inspecting the building before the next phase of construction begins. He was the head of construction on the project. I told him you were an architect from America who specialized in Austro-Hungarian art restoration."

Sister in Sarajevo

Elizabeth, the long lost sister from Berlin, visited me in Sarajevo on 10/31. It was a great break from the norm and of course great to see my older sister who I hadn't seen in over a year.

Our Halloween began with a walk through the city. What else? Bosnia is a walking city and it's very hard to get lost. The city is built along a river. See here:



After soaking in the city from the streets and a view of the city at sundown from a lookout, we soaked in hooka or "shisha" smoke in a Turkish style cafe where we sipped Bosnian Kahva. This is coffee that is made in a small pot with very finely ground coffee. It is served on a bronze tray with sugar cubes and is drunk from small ceramic cups with bronze bases.


Our dinner nook at Inat Kuca

We dined (yes, dined) at Inat Kuca, or "House of Spite" where we were the only customers in an authentic, old Bosnian-style home that served great lamb, stuffed grape leaved, Bosnian gulash, bread, and salad. "Inat" is a Turkish word that means stubbornness or spite. The original owner of the home bargained with city officials way back when to have his home rebuilt, brick for brick on the other side of the river so that the city could build its City Hall on his home's land.


The Spread

Our evening came to a close with cheesecake and a beverage amidst costumed Sarajevans.

During the three full days that Elizabeth was here, we explored the National Museum, hunted down the Sarajevo avant-garde art scene, and walked the beautiful countryside outside Sarajevo at Vrelo Bosna.


Slightly awkward pic of Elizabeth and me in a horse-drawn carriage at Vrelo Bosna.

Sarajevo: Fireworks, Grbavica, and Communist ER Rooms

A lot has happened and my first month in Bosnia isn't even over. Rather than detailing events from each day, I'll tell you a few stories....



Ramadan is a Muslim month of fasting. The fast lasts from sun up to sundown. One of our first evenings in Sarajevo, our team walked up to an overlook created by an old stone wall shaded by large trees. (See first two pics in "Welcome to Sarajevo!" post below.) The overlook provides a scenic view of the city in the valley of the Miljacka River. The sun was setting as we took pictures and soaked up the scenery. Some camera men began setting up their equipment nearby and an old man arrived with a mortar for fireworks. Not knowing what to expect, we began to descend the hillside, through a Muslim cemetery towards the Old Town. Before we got far, a red firework boomed overhead and immediately hundreds of minarets across the valley lit up with white lights and the Adhan began blaring through loudspeakers. The valley echoed with the sound. We're not in Atlanta anymore!

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[Bridge across Miljacka River to Grbavica]

Let me introduce you to my neighborhood. Grbavica is a quite neighborhood in the New Town where many families with childrend live in Communist-era high-rise apartment buildings on the southern side of the Miljacka River.


[The entrance to our building. Two grocery stores in our buidling!]


[This street just across the river from our apartment is closed off every evening at 5 and on weekends for walkers, runners, bicyclists, and skaters.]


[Communist-era high-rises. Look closely for bomb damage still present.]

I just finished reading Love Thy Neighbor on the plane ride back from Croatia to Sarajevo. My second arrival to Sarajevo began with finishing the book that is a first-hand account of the war that took place in this city 14 years ago from a journalist's perspective. The stories in the book were never as real to me as when I read one that involved my new neighborhood. Peter Maas, the journalist/author of the book recounted a time when he had been given a tour by a Serbian soldier during the siege of the city. The Serbian led him into Grbavica, into a high-rise, down into underground bunkers where Serbian soldiers slept, and back up into one of the high-rises. The way, Maas describes the high-rise he was in convinces me that he was in one of the two near our building, if not in ours itself. From the top floor (most have 15), the Serbian soldier showed Maas the view of the city from the window where a sniper was posted aiming for people in the city as part of their ethnic cleansing agenda. He pointed out the modern, yellow and orange Holiday Inn where Maas was staying and pointed his pistol at the civilians entering and exiting the hotel. The Serbian soldier said "See! No shoot!" to try prove to Maas that he wasn't shooting civilians.

Over 33,000 Bosnian civilians were killed in the war.

From my window, I can see the same Holiday Inn. The bullet holes in buildings and grenade blasts in sidewalks throughout the city and now this are eerie reminders of this city's all-too recent past.

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Now for some good news right? Well, this is good news: I'm out of the hospital!

Let me back up.

This past Wednesday night I came down with something-- we're still not sure what caused it, but one instant I was sitting at coffee with some colleagues and a new friend chatting about barbecue ribs and Bosnian cuisine and the next minute I was vomiting, shivering like crazy and having diarrhea.

The day before we had visited Vrelo Bosne, a beautiful park outside of Sarajevo one of the natural springs that feed into the city comes from the mountain that stands besides the park. Chad and I had dipped our water bottles into the stream at the source, being told by locals that it was safe. Being the good Eagle Scout I am, I remembered all the precautions I used to take when drinking water in the wild, but thought how great it was to not have to worry about that stuff.


[Vrelo Bosne. Don't drink the water.]

Well, it got so bad that night that I had to ask Andrew to take me to the ER. I vomited from the window of the taxi on the way to the hospital and was prepared for a long wait in the lobby of the ER. We were greeted by a local who laughed at me for "drinking too much Bosnian beer and having too much fun with Bosnian women" and who marveled "How do you draw buildings when you're drunk?" after learning that I had been an architect.

Surprisingly, I was helped after about a 30 min wait and then the fiasco began. First they took blood, then they x-rayed my stomach, then they ran an ultrasound, then they hooked me up to an EKG and took my blood pressure, then after seeing probably five different doctors and being helped by the same amount of nurses, they gave me what I had been asking for all along. Andrew had been faithfully using his Bosnian and a Croatian pocket dictionary to try to communicate with the hospital staff what exactly was wrong with me and what I needed (an IV for dehydration). At about two in the morning, I was finally given an IV with fluids while Andrew sat beside the stretcher reading The Three Amigos. (I need to add that between all these tests and procedures they had to transport me by wheelchair or ambulance to the different departments, that were apparently in different buildings. Being moved around this much is no fun for someone with nausea.)

So, by 7:30 am once the IV was done, I thought I was done and would be promptly discharged to go home and shake off the rest of the illness on my own, but I soon found myself in another ambulance being carried to the operation ward of the hospital. I was then escorted quickly through white halls and into a room where a pair of pajamas and a bed was waiting for me. I was told to change and get in bed. We were also given some paperwork that said something about an operation.

At this point, Andrew, who had been with me this whole time, and I knew that something wasn't right and that we needed some help. Several phone calls with an emergency hotline and several doctors asking where I felt pain in my stomach later, it was determined that I didn't need surgery. (Thank God!)

Then they decided to move me to a different room that had a TV, a fan, and its own bathroom, an upgrade to be sure and let me stay there while another IV replaced my fluids. Now somewhere along the line, a nurse had made a mistake in inserting the IV needle causing a leak, so by the third IV my arm was numb and throbbing with pain. Another teammate, Griffin, hung out with me, while I lay in the hospital bed all that day until I finally shook my fever and then all that was left was the intense pain in my right arm.

Griffin was on the phone with Andrew commenting on the difficulty in finding someone who spoke English in the hospital when a girl who was passing by outside on the sidewalk heard her comment through the open window and said "Oh, I speak English! Do you need help?" The girl then helped Griffin communicate to the doctor and nurse that I was ready to go home. (It turns out that she happened to know one of our teammates Rhesia!)

I was finally free, feeling much better, except for a very sore arm. But now my arm is almost back to normal and I am almost back to normal eating and drinking habits. The night I came home, however, Chad, my roommate got sick, and now as I'm writing this, it sounds like my Andrew has caught the bug as well.......

Pray for healing!

Split and Porec, Croatia 9/6 - 9/17

[Me in front of a mausoleum inside Diocletian's Palace in Split]

After a few days in Sarajevo, just enough to get our mouths watering, we took a bus to Split, Croatia, a gorgeous city 5 hrs due west of Sarajevo. The next two weeks were set aside for International Bible School and a conference. Split is on a peninsula jutting out into the Adriatic. It is known for its seafood, Italian influence, and Diocletian's (Roman Emperor) palace. Being on the coast and sprawled across a mountainside, Split reminded me of Genoa, Italy, where I studied abroad for a semester.

The first night there we had amazing seafood a restaurant wedged into a corner of the old palace walls. The "riva" was lit up, a band was playing some polka-like music, and there was a small gathering around a stone table where locals were cracking walnuts with a large hammer. After our stroll and some ice cream Chad, Andrew, and I left the girls at the hostel and hiked back up to our apartment which was supposed to be only 20 minutes away. It ended up taking us over an hour with no map, no address, and two of us with injured feet. We finally made it though and by then thought we knew Split like the back of our hand, but the next morning we took the wrong bus and found ourselves on the wrong side of town again on our way to class......

That week we had a crash course on the second half of the Old Testament. The goal of the course was to make our "hearts burn within us" as the disciples' did when Jesus taught them on the road to Emmaus. It certainly sparked a desire in me to go back and look at some books in the OT that I seem to always skip over. Two of the most interesting things our professor brought out were the Hebrew "chiastic" structure and Hebrew "parallellism."


[Split harbor at night from overlook]

It's good to be back in Europe. Fresh bread, fruit markets, cafes around every corner, football, espresso, good cheap beer, old buildings, strange currency, charades, bus rides, taxis, and always on the go. In Split I felt like a tourist, and by the end of our time there, I was ready to settle down in Sarajevo. But first, Porec....

Our time in Porec was restful. We stayed in a hotel on the coast that if I hadn't known better, could have been mistaken for a retirement home. Every morning and evening people would herd into the hotel cafeteria for an all-you-can eat buffet of Croatian cuisine.

In our time off during the conference, we played ultimate frisbee and a game of football (read "soccer" from now on) in the rain. Good time of bonding and training, but still anxious to get back.....

Welcome to Sarajevo!

Muslim cemetery.












I'm here!













View from apartment.

More words to come. For now, pictures must suffice.

Greetings from Copper Mountain Colorado!

Hello! I am at Copper Mountain ski resort 2 hours outside Denver for STINT Briefing.

We are learning a lot and meeting many like-minded folks and getting energized for what's to come.

The truth that God has a plan for his entire creation is being made apparent through the teaching and worship here. The fact that we can be a part of that is a huge privilege.

While the conference has been one meeting after another, tomorrow (Sunday) we have some free time to explore the mountain and participate in many activities at the resort (disc golf, golf, rock climbing, etc.)

I will be posting cultural observations, photos, and stories from travel on this blog as often as time allows while I am in Sarajevo. If you would like more in-depth ministry updates to know how to pray, please email me at nateframbes@gmail.com. Thank you for reading and stay tuned for more!

Welcome!

Hello, this is where I will post photos and journal entries during my stint in Sarajevo, Bosnia.

I depart September 2nd for this land that I have heard and read so much about and soon will see for myself. I hope that I will be able to share many great things with you on this adventure.

Come back soon!