Rose of Sarajevo

by Ayşe Kulin

“No. A soldier told me up in the camp.”

  “You can’t go, Fiko. You’ve got school. You’re too young. Your father would never allow it, and nor will I.”

  He didn’t say a word, but as soon as they got home, Fiko slipped into his room, silent as a shadow.

  The following day Nimeta set about organizing her brother’s departure. She placed an ad addressed to Esat. They’d had a long chat when he’d called her at work to tell her how to get to Burhan’s camp. He knew that she had two children and a brother who hadn’t spoken since his wife and son were killed in the Zvornik massacre. She’d wanted to thank him with a gift of coffee or cigarettes, but he’d turned down her offer and refused to give her his address. When she pressed him, he said that if there was ever an emergency, she should put an ad in the paper and he’d call.

  After placing the ad, she waited. She’d been visiting her brother every day after work. Raif had seemed fine ever since he decided to fight, but she worried that he’d get depressed again if he had to wait too long.

  When several days had passed without any word from Esat, she considered taking her brother up to the mountains herself. Then she remembered the sniper fire and the mines. Though she didn’t fear death for herself, she couldn’t bear to leave Hana and Fiko orphaned.

  Then one Thursday, just as Nimeta was giving up hope, a note arrived at the TV station in which Esat promised to take Raif up to the mountain a week later, when a food and medicine delivery was scheduled. She would be informed of the exact time and meeting place at the very last minute.

  Nimeta dropped everything and raced to her mother’s house.

  “Where’s Raif?” she asked when Raziyanım opened the door.

  “Where would he be? In his room staring at the wall.”

  She burst into his bedroom, where he was sitting on the bed and, yes, staring at the wall.

  “It’s finally happened, Raif. Esat sent word. You’ll be leaving next week.”

  “You came into my room without knocking,” Raif said.

  They’d been squabbling over this since childhood. Nimeta had always complained about her mother walking in on her, and Raif got annoyed at his big sister for the same reason. Nimeta started laughing.

  “I’m sorry. At least you weren’t up to anything top secret when I came in. You weren’t even picking your nose.”

  “I was thinking private thoughts,” Raif said.

  “Aren’t you excited about the news?”

  “I’m not excited about anything anymore. We’re all like zombies these days: the living dead.”

  “I thought the prospect of fighting in the mountains had brought you back to life.”

  “Nothing’s changed. Before, I was dead and didn’t talk; now I’m dead, but I talk. I hope that I’ll be dead at the hands of the Serbs when I go up to the mountains next week.”

  Nimeta sat down on the bed and put her arm around her brother.

  “It’ll pass. It’ll all pass, Raif,” she said. “One day we’ll have grown into old people who’ve known real pain. But we’ll have happy memories too. Don’t give up on life. It’s always worth living.”

  Raziyanım had managed to cram a lifetime’s worth of underwear and socks into her son’s duffel bag.

  “Mother, where did you find all this underwear?” Nimeta asked.

  “Some of it belonged to your father,” Raziyanım said, “back when we got married.”

  “Mother, do you really expect Raif to run around in forty-year-old underpants?”

  “If he doesn’t want them, he can give them to someone else. Waste not, want not.”

  The Bosniaks had always been a thrifty people, storing away everything in wooden chests and never throwing anything out. It was the tribal mentality of a people accustomed to displacement and forced migration, born out of the ever-present fear of finding themselves destitute and dependent on others. Since Ottoman times, their homeland had seen a succession of wars and occupations: the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Kingdom of Serbia, the Balkan Wars, World War I, and World War II. The Bosniaks had good reason to keep everything they owned in wooden chests.

  “What’s in there, Mother?” Raif asked, pointing to a second bag.

  “Don’t open that until you get there.”

  “What’s in it?” Raif asked again, seeming not to hear. “Is there food in there?”

  “I made you some zucchini börek, Son.”

  “Do you think I’m going off to a picnic?” Raif asked as he reached inside and tried to unknot a plastic bag.

  “Stop it, Raif,” Nimeta said. “Once you’re up in the mountains, you’ll be grateful for whatever’s in there.”

  “Do you want to turn me into a laughingstock, Nimeta? She’s done everything but pack me lunch.”

  “Nobody will be laughing at you,” Nimeta said. “They’ll be thrilled you’ve joined them and, believe me, they’ll be even more thrilled when you share your börek with them. They’re even worse off than we are, Raif. I can only imagine how much Burhan has missed Mother’s cooking.”

  Raziyanım shot Nimeta a look of appreciation. The shops were empty, but everyone with a patch of soil was growing tomatoes, zucchini, and potatoes, and selling whatever extra they had. A friend with a backyard vegetable patch had been providing Raziyanım with her pick of produce at a reasonable price before they were sent off to market. This was only the latest example of her mother’s resourcefulness. Twice a week, Raziyanım pushed a handcart all the way to the brewery in Ciglane to get fresh water from the spring there. The mains, electrical grid, and gas networks were being bombed on a regular basis, and they had sometimes gone up to two weeks without a single drop of water from their taps. Electricity and gas they could do without, but life was impossible without water. “Mother, don’t get yourself killed chasing after water,” Nimeta had said.

  “It would be quicker and more painless than dying from not having water,” her mother had retorted. And she was right.

  “Raif, don’t forget my letter,” Nimeta said. “Make sure Burhan gets it. I’m counting on you.”

  “Look, I’ve already tucked it away in my pocket,” Raif said, showing her the inner pocket of his jacket.

  “They’ll pick you up at five in the morning. Have you set your alarm clock?” Nimeta asked.

  “I’ll be up all night in any case,” Raziyanım said.

  She had mixed feelings about Raif’s decision. No mother is happy about sending her son off to war, but she had to accept that it was war that had brought him back to life.

  “Mother, don’t try to stop him,” Nimeta had told her. “Just for once, put your own feelings aside and support him when he goes up to the mountains. I know how much you want to keep your children tied to your apron strings, but just this once let him go.”

  She’s never forgiven me, Raziyanım thought to herself. She’s still blaming me for something that happened twenty years ago, and she’ll keep blaming me for not sending her to Istanbul until the day she dies.

  Actually, Raziyanım deeply regretted not having allowed her daughter to marry that Turkish boy. If Nimeta had settled in Istanbul, she and the rest of the family could have gone and lived with her when the war started. Her daughter-in-law, grandson, and sister-in-law might have been alive today. And Raif wouldn’t have been forced to choose between a life staring at walls and probable death up in the mountains.

  Nimeta threw her arms around her brother.

  “Be careful, Raif,” she said. “Don’t take any foolish risks. Stay healthy, and come home with Burhan one day. We’ve still got some good days ahead of us. Believe me, we’ll put all that we’ve suffered behind us.”

  “God tests us in this world,” Raziyanım told her son. “None of his servants can escape the trials of this world. Nimeta’s right. Stay safe, and don’t cause me any grief.”

  Here we go again, Nimeta th
ought to herself. Emotional blackmail from Mother.

  “Come here my little nephew,” Raif said to Fiko. “You and I are going to have a private man-to-man talk before I leave.”

  “Keep it short,” Nimeta said. “I’ve left Hana with Azra.”

  Raif went off to his room with Fiko, leaving the women in the living room.

  “You see that?” Nimeta remarked to her mother. “Raif’s being a good uncle to Fiko again. It’s a good sign. Once he comes face-to-face with death up in the mountains, he’ll forget about his pain and the past. He’ll realize that life is all that matters.”

  “Is that what you think, that life is all that matters?” Raziyanım asked.

  “Don’t you?”

  “When you reach my age, you’ll think differently about what is and isn’t important,” Raziyanım said.

  When Fiko appeared at the end of the hall with his uncle, Nimeta hugged her brother one last time. She gritted her teeth to keep from sobbing. At the front door, Raif kissed Fiko and his sister again.

  Hand on the doorknob, Nimeta said, “I’ll pick you up after work tomorrow, Mother. You can stay with us for as long as you like.”

  “Come stay with me here,” Raziyanım said.

  “But Mother, there isn’t enough room for the four of us. And it’s too far from the kids’ school.”

  “Can’t you talk about this tomorrow?” Fiko said. He seemed impatient to get home.

  “May God’s blessings be with you, dear,” Nimeta said on the way out the door, the tears she’d suppressed running down her cheeks as soon as Raif couldn’t see her anymore.

  Raziyanım stood at the window and watched as Nimeta and Fiko raced across the green lawn of the park next door. In a few hours, she’d watch from the same window as her only son went off to war in the chill of early dawn, perhaps never to return.

  Hana was waiting on the neighbor’s balcony when Nimeta and Fiko got home.

  “I tried to put her to bed, but she wouldn’t listen,” Azra said. “She’s been scribbling in a notebook all night.”

  “She’s following Zlata’s lead,” Nimeta said. “You know the girl I told you about, the one who’s keeping a journal? Hana’s taken to writing every night as well.”

  “Has Raif gone?” Azra asked.

  “He’s leaving early in the morning,” Nimeta said. “May God watch over him and shield Mother from the kind of pain he’s suffered.”

  They said good night to Azra and went home.

  A few minutes later, Nimeta tapped on Fiko’s door. He’d gone straight to his room.

  “Have you gone to bed?” she asked.

  “I’m just about to.”

  She pushed open the door a crack, just enough to see her son putting something under his pillow. She pretended not to have seen. He looked mortified.

  “I know how upsetting it must have been to say good-bye to your uncle,” Nimeta said. “And I know how much you’ll miss him. But he’s doing the right thing. Your father will keep an eye on him. This meaningless war will come to an end one day, and they’ll come home together.”

  Fiko got out of bed and hugged his mother tight.

  “Good night, Son,” she said, closing the door behind her.

  When she got to her own room, she found Hana in her bed, the sheet pulled up to her chin. “What are you doing in my bed?” she asked.

  “Can I sleep with you tonight?”

  “Okay,” Nimeta said, “but I’m not letting Bozo in my room.”

  She crawled into bed, gave Hana a hug, and fell into a deep but troubled sleep.

  When she woke up, it was nearly nine o’clock, and Hana was still sound asleep. She must have forgotten to set the alarm; she was sure it hadn’t rung. She jumped out of bed, ran to the kitchen, and sawed a few slices off a loaf of stale bread. Then she took the tea kettle and the bread down to the entrance to the apartment building, where her neighbors had long since finished their morning cooking. The wood-burning stove they’d set up there was one of many dotting the streets of the city. The trees that had once provided shade were now used as fuel.

  She went back inside without waiting for the kettle to come to a boil. She’d gone through hell to get some milk for Hana, but the fridge wasn’t working, and it had curdled. She made a face at the smell, and dumped the milk down the drain. She splashed some water on her face from a bottle that her mother had lugged home from the brewery and walked down the hall to wake Fiko.

  “The alarm didn’t go off this morning,” she shouted through the door. “You got an extra half hour of sleep.” He probably needed it as much as she had, she thought to herself. First his father, now his uncle . . . He was losing the men in his family one by one, just at the age when he needed them most. Would she be able to act as both mother and father to him?

  She went into the kitchen and set the table. They had some olives and some gooey butter to go with their bread. She shook her head at the sight of the pitiful breakfast spread out on the table. Was this all they had to show for all the years they’d slaved away, she and Burhan doing everything they could to make sure their kids enjoyed a better life than they had? Nutritious meals, good schools, new clothing—she tried to swallow the lump in her throat.

  There was still no sign of her son.

  “Fiko! Don’t make me come and get you! You know what I’ll do,” she shouted down the hall.

  There was nothing like tickling to get her son out of bed. He had laughed so hard when he was little that Raziyanım had come to the rescue, afraid he’d choke to death. That’s what it had been like living with her mother: she couldn’t even tickle her own son.

  She grabbed a pinch of mint, put some tea in a small cup, and ran down to the stove. She’d brew the brownish liquid that passed for tea these days right in the kettle, making a hot concoction that tasted and smelled of absolutely nothing. It was the lack of coffee that got to her, but how were regular tea drinkers managing, she wondered? Moving the kettle aside, she arranged the slices of bread on top of the stove.

  She started thinking about Burhan. What did he have for breakfast? How many people would get shot today? She read the daily lists of casualties at work first thing every day and counted herself lucky on the days she didn’t find the names of her husband and friends. Now her heart would beat twice as quickly as she scanned the lists for Raif’s name as well.

  As she carried the kettle and the bread up to the kitchen, Bozo kept rubbing against her leg. She opened the balcony door so that he could get to his litter box.

  “Fiko!” she shouted. “If you’re not out of bed by the time I’m through with the bathroom, I’m coming in to get you. Don’t say you weren’t warned.”

  She went into the bathroom and locked the door. Out of habit, she turned the faucet in the shower, which produced a mocking “tisss.” She poured a cold, thin stream of water over her body, watching the droplets roll across her skin. Had Raif arrived safely? Esat had told her that it was normally about a two-hour drive but could take up to four hours. When she’d gone up with Fiko, it had taken them three hours because they had kept stopping to check for mines.

  She’d expected to find Fiko eating his breakfast when she stepped into the kitchen in her bathrobe. The little rat was still in bed! She marched down the hall and threw open his door. Fiko wasn’t there. She went back to the kitchen, then checked the living room, the dining room, and Hana’s bedroom. When she went into her own bedroom, Hana was still sound asleep. She checked the kitchen again, then Fiko’s bedroom once more, tearing the pocket of her robe when it caught on the doorknob. She turned on the light without pulling open the curtains.

  There was an envelope on the nightstand. Heart sinking, weak at the knees, she sank onto the bed and tore open the envelope addressed to “Mom.” On a sheet of lined paper torn from her son’s notebook, she read:

  Dear Mom,

&n
bsp; I wanted to tell you earlier, but I was afraid you’d try to stop me. I’m going up to the mountains with Uncle Raif and Dad to fight for Bosnia, because a lot of guys as young as me are fighting, and I should be up there too. I’ve wanted to do this ever since we visited that day. I can’t think about anything else. I know you’ll understand and that you’ll forgive me. Kiss Hana and my grandmother for me. Don’t let this upset you, and try not to worry about me. I’ll be with Dad and Raif. See you one day soon in free Bosnia.

  All my love,

  Fiko

  ETHNIC CLEANSING

  Summer 1992

  When Stefan Stefanoviç first told his bosses at the newspaper that he wanted to do an investigative piece on the Bosniaks forced to flee to Croatia, and that he hoped his research would influence international opinion, the reaction was lukewarm at best. Thousands of ethnic Croatians fleeing Serbian atrocities had been inundating Croatia for the past year. Nobody would want to read about Bosniak refugees, they told Stefan. But when tens of thousands of Bosniaks who had been forced out of their homes at gunpoint, many of them tortured as well, began massing in camps on the Croatian border, Stefan pitched his project to management again. Europe could no longer ignore this humanitarian crisis, and the plight of refugees would have to be addressed on an international platform.

  “Unfortunately, print media doesn’t influence the public the way television does,” he said. “So if we want to draw attention to the thousands of people massed on our border and the torture they’ve suffered, we’ll need a piece that is absolutely riveting. Otherwise, nobody will care about the ethnic cleansing being perpetrated against the Muslims by Karadžić.”

  “Frankly, I don’t care all that much myself,” Boris said, “but if you’re determined to write this thing up, knock yourself out.”

  “Boris, do you have any idea how many people have been killed or displaced since April, when Karadžić declared the Serbian Republic of Bosnia?” Stefan asked.

  “About three hundred thousand.”

  “That was the figure back in April. By now it’s risen to 1.1 million.”