Bosnia’s tourism promotion ad.

Have you enjoyed the video? Ok, good! Now seat back, relax and get ready for a dose of reality as “Bosnia and Herzegovina is not as singularly idyllic as the video below shown,” said another blogger who happened to blog this same video. There is nothing wrong with canoeing along the Una or Neretva river, sipping whine in fancy restaurants, or roaming around the Old Town, snapshooting pictures like a passing by tourist–which I did plenty. But I think to get more out of your trip to Bosnia, you should flip a page or two to learn a bit more about the country’s history and culture.

For some reason, I think a lot of people’s, non-Europeans, awareness of Europe stop with the Western countries, namely UK, France, Italy, and Germany. Throw out some Eastern country names other than Russia and you’ll witness some sort of subtle confusion on people’s face. Not only branded by the label Eastern, Bosnia to many people is still hecka messed up and chaotic. I’m not an economist nor business/political analyst so I can’t really say how “hecka messy” Bosnia is. In someway, I think it does as groaned by a random police man I talked to on the street. “Bosnia nije dobro.” It means “Bosnia is not good.” But as a tourist, why should you care? You’ll only be there to have a good time, right? I bet you won’t even notice anything wrong. In this of sort of messiness, though, you’ll probably encounter one of the most friendly and hospitable people you’ve known.

Welcome to Bosnia!

 

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