Harping on the Heartstrings

Two and a half days in Vienna with Linda Rosenthal, Susan Salm, and Friedrich Danielis was perfection. The occasion was Friedrich's retrospective art exhibition at the Tony Subal Gallery with Susan's guest performance with the Klaring String Quartet.

Linda, Friedrich, Susan and me in front of his 8 paintings at a municipal building in Vienna

What made Thursday so incredible was that Linda and I met Friedrich at the Museum of Art History (Kunsthistorisches Museum) where he was showing a group of high school students a selection of his favorite paintings. We saw Titian and Diego Velazquez and Reubens. But listening to Friedrich explain how these painters expanded the world for him...and to the students' questions about how he as a painter manages his emotions...had us in a trance. Here was a master painter creating a bridge through the centuries.

Friedrich's exhibition showed his work from the mid-60's to the present

Linda and I went to the gallery at 2 p.m. when we knew it would be empty. We savored each of Friedrich's 200 paintings, pulling one to a painting and then the other tugging to see her favorite. Color and music. We knew that this was our chance to study the work, because at the evening reception we would be pulled into conversations.

Harping on the Heartstrings...perfect metaphor for Susan and Friedrich's wonderful marriage of art and music and affection.

Like a Sore Thumb

Sticking up like a sore thumb over the Sarajevo skyline is the new Avaz building, whose torque says it all.

Rupert Murdoch + Rush Limbaugh + Silvio Berlusconi = Fahrudin Radoncic. Bosnia's very own bully. He is the voice of the extreme Muslim right who believes that outsiders (those who don't agree) have no place in Bosnian society.

"We have the situation in which a lady, who is not Bosniak, is the editor in chief of a public broadcast outlet. Believe me, we are happy to be a multi-ethnic country and this is a unique case in countries of the region that someone who is not Serb, Croat, Montenegrian--someone who belongs to the smaller ethnic group--can be editor of a public broadcast media. But we cannot permit that person, who is not Muslim, to be an editor in our Islamic community."

Whose Islamic community? Multi-ethnic is a completely co-opted political expression of "separate and don't talk about equal." The outsted "lady" in question is Duska Jurisic, who was the editor-in-chief of the news program, "Information" on Federal TV. Radoncic has laundered money into plush shopping centers and real estate. It's not like he can't afford a remote to change the channel!

Here's where Berlusconi comes in. Radoncic has a viable new political party, "The Union for a Better Future" and so the integrated conservative media machine that the Murdoch/Limbaugh energy has launched has a brother in the hood.

Truly... most liberal-minded Bosniaks here won't even enter the building. When I told a friend, proudly in Bosnian, that I had been up to the 34th floor to have a cup of coffee with Mubera and see the sun set over Sarajevo, he abruptly stopped speaking to me in Bosnian and in clear English said, "That building isn't safe. It is built on sand. Everybody knows that it is unstable." He was shaken and concerned. Later I understood that he didn't want me to see prostitutes up in the cafe/bar doing business.

Olimpijski Muzej

Micki is my art buddy here. Every week we go on a museum field trip. Today her husband, Landy, joined us to see the re-located Sarajevo 1984 Winter Olympics Museum.

Edin Numankadic is the curator of Sarajevo's Olympic Museum and gallery, and his gentleness, brilliance, and artistic touch affects you immediately. He opened the museum for us, modestly waited until we saw the exhibits, and then invited us into his private office to talk more about what it was like for him to try to rescue the most important items in the old building, store them in the basement, and then solicit funds from around the world to rebuild the museum in its new location.

The former Olympics Museum of Sarajevo: destroyed 1992 was in a beautiful Austrian-Hungarian era building.

From a journal entry of Keman Bakarsic, who was the chief librarian of the National Museum before the war: April 21, 1992. Afternoon shelling rudely interrupts what had seemed to be a nice spring day in Sarajevo. In the early evening the shelling resumes, and just before curfew (10 p.m.) the aggressors shell and burn down the Museum of the 14th Winter Olympiad. The Olympics were really something fantastic here. Now, a beautiful old building from the Austrian era and all the documentation of the Sarajevo games have been destroyed.

Here is a slideshow I found on the internet of images of the 1984 Olympics site and what happened as a result of the bombing

Re-Entry Permit

I get that foreigners have to register with the police. You can't have an immigration lawyer for a sister without figuring that out. And with cops everywhere...you just know you've got to get it done.

But 5 times to the police station?

Notarized rental agreement (including a wonderful wild goose chase with Fakica to find the right municipal office), proof of financial support, airline tickets, letter of invitation to stay (bother Dzenan again)

However, thanks to Tea's determination to make me legal...here it is!!

Academic Support Takes To The Streets

Student-led street demonstration demanding the release of Professor Ejup Ganic. He was detained at Heathrow on his return to Sarajevo at the request of Serbia. Serbia is asking for his extradition on charges of killing Bosnian Serb soldiers during the war. Ganic was also the President of the Federation of BiH and has a very loyal following in Sarajevo.

The demonstration started in front of the Economics Faculty and it took less than 2 minutes for the crowd to grow from 200 to 2000. By the time it reached the main street--Tito--the crowd had grown to 5000. The police had tried to keep it contained to the sidewalks, but when it took over the street, the police just stood aside and let it march. I marched for a while and then ran ahead to take these from the steps of the Central Bank

Transparency

Transparency: Provision to the public of clear and detailed information about policy making

Here's one way to get the information you want


In my case I went to the banking oversight office. Yeah...dressed up, credentials in hand. Recited my pedigree. The response, "Well, you're an American professor. How would I know how you intend to use this information?"

Enid

Christmas Eve at the Sarajevo Philharmonic concert--Steve and Enid introduced themselves. Later Enid I met for coffee and looked at our watches 3 hours later...books, history, travel, kids, culture...
Now we meet once a week for a hike and lunch. We're at the cemetery right above town
This time I stopped to ask a man about two buildings we saw in the distance. His wife and neighbor came out and 15 minutes later it was either move in with them for good...or take off. Enid's Bosnian is fantastic!

Enid is a history professor at the Turkish University here

Just Too Cheap to Buy a Printer

Down the steps is Epicentar--the busiest copy center in Sarajevo




HP has a monopoly throughout the world. They basically give the printers away for $80, but a two-pack ink cartridge--the HP 21/22 set--costs $70 in Sarajevo . No way. When I want to print something I go to my favorite copy center.

Here is the view from Ferhadija

Right off Ferhadija-the busiest pedestrian street in Sarajevo and across the street from the Economics Faculty

Down the alley way to the stairs

And you want to know something--the staff inside are the sweetest people I've met