Bosnia And Herzegovina

Sometimes it’s dangerous to find cheap trips when you just search the low cost airlines websites to see where you can go from your hometown, when you feel bored and want to see something new. It was extremely cheap to go to Tuzla and I hadn’t ever heard about the place before, neither did I know in which country it was situated. It turned out to be a small city in Bosnia and Herzegovina and I thought to myself, it’s cheaper than going to the next town in Sweden by bus and it’s probably summer there already since it’s a bad version of spring in Sweden right now. All my friends laughed and said “Bosnia? Hell no” when I asked them to join and so I thought to myself, let’s do it anyway and I went on my own.

On the plane I suddenly realized I seemed to be the only tourist, all the others seemed to have some kind of relation to Bosnia. But I thought nothing more of it. Then we landed on the smallest airport I’ve ever been to, next to a farm with cows and I thought to myself "what have I got myself into?"

I had booked a bus ride into the city center but since almost no one was going they had arranged for me to join a cab instead. In the cab the driver and the other passengers started to question my trip to Tuzla:

“So, where are you going from here, to Sarajevo?” (which is the capital)

“Do you have relatives in Bosnia?”, even though she didn’t seem to believe the question herself.

And on and on.

When I told them I was going to stay in Tuzla for a couple of days and that I went there just to enjoy the sun while seeing something new they all got quiet for a while and I realized this was the same reaction I had gotten from my friend Bojan when I had asked him about Tuzla before I booked the flight. His family has roots in Bosnia and he said Tuzla is just somewhere you go to go somewhere else, and he recommended Sarajevo for me instead. I ignored this advice since I was just going to stay for a couple of days and I thought how bad can it be?

As soon as I got to the city center by the cab I realized they had a different view of what a city center is. I had to walk quite a bit in an extreme heat, sometimes you should be careful for what you wish for, and all I saw was poverty along the way. And the lake that I had seen on the maps looked more like a drained sewage going through the town. When I finally arrived at the hotel they couldn’t speak English and all I understood was that they had no room for me due to some electrical problem. Or that somebody else had overstayed their time. They seemed to change excuses along the way and since we couldn’t communicate that well they called their daughter so she could talk with me on the phone. She explained there was an electric problem with my room so I couldn’t stay and that I needed to go to another hotel. I wasn’t happy with this and just when I thought I had to go look for another hotel suddenly the mom and dad who ran the hotel said “the room is now ready for you”. I was confused to say the least but at the same time I was relieved so I just went with it and checked in, hoping not to get an electrical shock by staying there.

The hotel next door was supposed to be five stars, but I'm not so sure about that

I hit the streets and realized it was a small city with nothing much to do, so I sat down at the square, ate a pizza and listened to the Muslim prayers being called out. I had been that ignorant before the trip that I had no clue that Islam was a major religion in some countries in south central Europe.

Religion isn't my cup of tea but I like that the towers make good nests for the birds

I drank some Fanta Madness as the flavor was called, this must be a sign, because it’s madness being here on my own with nothing to do in a town where a power plant seemed to be the closest thing to a tourist spot.

Then two human sized beer bottles walked by, maybe there’s potential in this town anyway.

The next day I had decided that I should give Bosnia a new chance and so I got up early, and I had no problem waking up since the Muslim prayers woke me up at 5 AM. I was one of the first to arrive at Panonsko Jezero, the biggest artificial salt lake in Europe, for a morning swim, but it wasn’t the big experience I hoped for. It was mostly beaches made of hard stones so I could hardly walk barefoot on them, while making my way down to the water that seemed to be an oasis for bugs.

I refused to give up on Bosnia so I went to the tourist agency to find my way to a castle ruin which I had seen in pictures before, and it looked amazing and I thought it was worth a day trip. They told me how to get there by local bus but I couldn’t even find the bus stop. A girl passed me by and two guys started whistling after her and making gestures of her breasts to show her their affection. It seemed like something you do in a bad movie with Adam Sandler or in the stone age.

I quickly learned that bus stops in Bosnia isn’t the same as in Sweden, they were just small shelters with no signs of what they were. And I also understood that the time table is nothing that’s important. While riding the bus to Srebrenica I saw that horse and wagon was also an alternative to having a car.
I walked Srebrenica up and down and round and round but I couldn’t find any information about how to get to the castle and after I had asked some people that didn’t know English about it, by showing a picture, it seemed like it was too far away. “Taxi”, they said and pointed in a far direction.
I looked for a taxi for two hours and I couldn’t find any, which was strange since it was a small town and there weren’t even any at the central bus station. I asked at the bus station how I could get a cab and he just laughed and said “the cabs here don’t do much taxi driving, they mostly use them to deliver drugs so it might be hard for you to find them”. I took that as my signal to go back home again, not only to Tuzla but to Sweden.

The next day I was leaving for the airport and while waiting at the so called central bus station in Tuzla for the cab I was standing at the other side of the road to get some shade. That’s when two stray dogs turned up at the bus station and stared at me. I had heard about wild dogs in Bosnia before the trip and that I should avoid them and so I was lucky that the road was quite busy so they couldn’t get over to my side. They kept on staring at me and they tried and tried to get over the busy road and they almost got ran over. They must be eager to get to my side that they almost sacrifice their lives. Then suddenly they found a spot and ran over and at the same time I ran over to the opposite side where they had been and when I looked back they now stood in the shade looking back to me like they were wondering “How did he get over there? Wasn’t he supposed to be over here?”.

The cab came to my rescue and I thought nothing more of the wild dog encounter since this was before I had been to Kosovo and Albania where the wild dogs attacked our car and people around us. At this moment of time I still saw dogs as cute pets and that the only reason to avoid them was because they might have some disease so that I shouldn’t pet them. And I’m glad that I was this naïve or I would have been scared to death.

The cab driver told me about his latest trip to Sarajevo and that the young girls were so fine in their miniskirts, and that I should have went there because there is good pussy there as he said. I felt uneasy with the subject so I tried to do the most Swedish thing to do, I tried to talk about the weather. “So it’s really hot here? How’s the winter? In Sweden we have snow in the winter” etc.
I could tell he got bored and instead he picked up a young girl in the taxi and said he could give her a ride and that was the end of our conversation.

* Best things about Bosnia and Herzegovina – they have an airport so that you can leave
* Most mediocre thing about Bosnia and Herzegovina – the pizza was alright
* Worst things about Bosnia and Herzegovina – the degrading view of women

Best countries in the world according to the nerd (will be updated with every post):
1. Andorra
2. Belgium
3. Bosnia And Herzegovina
4. Albania
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