The Darker Side of Mostar

The sound of the gurgling river seems to seep through the cobble stones of the narrow alleyways, lined with shops selling Ottoman silks and rugs. Others sell objects slightly more ghastly. Knives. Helmets. Any type of war time memorabilia you can think of, something that is in abundant supply in parts of the Balkans. Minarets penetrate the skyline of the old city which hugs the banks of the river and a huge church tower dominates the western side as sepia roofs give way to modern constructions of glass and concrete. 

High above this a massive cross stands on a hilltop. Mostar is a city of two distinct cultures. Herzegovinans are largely Muslims while the cities Croatian and Serbian residents are Christian. It would be nice to say the two live in complete harmony but they simply don't. They intermingle in their daily lives to an extent but it's clear what the predominant religion is on each side of the river as you move away from the Mosque dominant old town.

The city lacks any big checklist attractions but everywhere you look the city responds with intriguing tight streets and ornate buildings. An old triangular bridge spans an airy gorge like gap over the river the city surrounds. The city itself sits in a bowl, surrounded by not overly high but quite steep mountains. You can spend ages in the old town, or Stari Grad in the local language, simply taking the place in. But no longer being a well kept secret with an out of the way location it attracts the tourists it deserves. American, British and German accents seep from everywhere and the streets are crowded with outsiders, interspersed with the odd local commuting to and from a mosque. The latter is a small minority when juxtaposed against tourist volume. This quickly makes the old town a tiring place to visit.

* * *

War time sentiments

I step up on a block, gripping the top of the concrete barricade and hauling myself into the dark, dingy and graffiti covered space within. My feet crunch as I hit the floor. Rubbish. Lots of rubbish. Everything from plastics, to glass, to household items to the odd bullet casing. I advance forward, cringing as I notice several syringes in close proximity on the ground. The place is obviously frequented by junkies. Good thing we came in the morning. The ground floor bares little resemblance to a inhabited space, only a partitioned room with tile lined walls eluding to its prior function. 

We make our way through a creepy, dark labyrinth of small rooms before realising the stairs weren't in this part of the building. We were glad to escape the dark enclosed space and quickly found the stairs we had spotted from the road. And then I looked up. The stairs double back eighteen times, ascending nine stories, precariously perched on the edge of the building with no kind of protection. This becomes quite an intimidating prospect for those that know these stairs survived and eighteen month siege. 

 

Luckily the stairs looked and felt extremely structurally sound and the only thing to contend with was the drop down into the alley way below as you advanced up the stories. On the third floor I saw the first distinctive triangular point, the thing that had initially drawn me to the building which I had seen in a rather obscure online article. Few people come here. Junkies and the odd curious foreigner that likes to get into the very heart of a place, that's about it. 

I walked towards the unsupported protrusion of grey concrete, noticing the sheer amount of frosted glass lining the sides of the room and the cabling, now well and truly redundant, hanging uselessly from the ceiling. The shelling was so relentless that literally no glass still remains in the window frames of the building. Mostar's past is very much in your face here. If you don't notice the numerous bullet casings lining the ground where snipers squatted, cleansing certain ethnicities of the civilian population, you will definitely notice the huge shell holes in the walls.

I stand in the very point, protected from a sizable drop by a thigh high railing of concrete. Looking out on the city below from this height I notice more and more how much of the city has simply been put in the “lack of funding” or “too hard” basket and left standing in the state the siege left it. The locals that lived through this period and remain in the city have daily reminders of their cities terrifying past. Its hard to imagine living through that and remaining in the city that delivered so much uncertainty, heartbreak and sheer terror. 

The building almost talks, raw emotion seeping from it, from the graffiti that lines the walls to the debris that covers the ground. Some beg for harmony. Others are have no relation to the past, artists have just discovered that this building offers plenty of open walls. I make my way up, eventually arriving on the roof. The city seems far below now and possibly the best close up view of the city lies below me but I cannot help but wonder what it would have looked like standing here a mere twenty years before. 

On the way down we notice a sub-roof. We hadn't seen any way on to it but searched around, finding a fire escape which does not line up to the regular stairs. This gets us onto the sub roof at the level of about story three with a short descent and small jump. This roof, probably once covered in tables for coffee and lunch breaks is now covered in a consistent ten centimetre plus layer of eroded broken glass. As the windows were all gradually shot out this caught the bulk of the glass. The glass doesn't crunch, its too weathered for that. It shifts, clinking a little. From the end of the roof you can look back up the line of points, making you notice just how high up you were at the top. I picked up a couple of casings and headed back to the exit point. 

We easily spent an hour and a half in here, wandering around. As I descended I noticed the light had changed, illuminating the ground floor considerably more. We looked around one last time and climbed over a different wall, avoiding the parts of the building that are favourites for junkies.

* * *

One afternoon Dan wanted to paddle through the city so I dropped him off and headed for the hills, wanting to find a way up to the cross that stands sentinel over the city. The back streets aren't exactly easy to navigate. I went down what may or may not have been a one way street for 1.5km, tucking in the mirrors as per usual. On another street I had to avoid a pot hole that was literally three quarters of a metre deep. Eventually I got on a narrow, winding road where I still advantaged from having the mirrors tucked which took me up into the mountains.

Soon valleys beyond Mostar began to open up and I reached the saddle below the hill I wanted to climb. The road needed to reach the top is tiny with a hair pin entry from the direction I was coming so I missed it, forcing a three point turn in a less than safe situation. I went close to five kilometres up the road hunting but found nothing reasonable. 

As I made my way up the mountain I began to see sculpted stones depicting the stations of the cross on the outside of hair pins. There was a fountain part way up so I stopped here for a drink and washed my face, warding off some of the heat of the evening. As I rounded a knoll the cross suddenly came into view. It really is a dominating construction, much bigger than I would have expected and the city seemed very far below. I sat for fifteen minutes or so, more than content doing nothing but taking in the panorama doused in evening light.