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Friday 4 July 2008

A hint of heroism

Thomas Leveritt enjoys Sarajevo

The cheap flight boom of the last decade, among its many blessings, has given Europe the gift of the British stag night. Barcelona, Prague, Ljubljana — the citizens of these cities must have struggled to moderate their joy when British life forms started appearing in plane doors, two by two and already saluting the night, arms raised in demented solidarity, cans in place of black gloves.

It seems only a matter of time before Sarajevo joins this happy list. It’s cheap, it’s beautiful, everyone speaks English, it’s bombproof — where better for men to go to create mischief? For now, however, before easyJet and Ryanair set up direct flights, Sarajevo still hasn’t been swarmed on by the Great British Horde. Its authenticity is all still intact, the disgusting street-food is their disgusting street-food. Let’s not pretend that part of the pleasure in travelling to an exotic and authentic place isn’t to tell people you’ve just been to that exotic and authentic place. Because Sarajevo — the name itself — retains a battered glamour, it blazes with some kind of heroism, a hint of danger. The chances of getting shot are a lot thinner than in Washington DC, but the word Sarajevo is simply some kind of magic spell. Picture yourself opening the Monday meeting: ‘I was wandering along Sniper’s Alley the other day when it struck me that third-quarter strategy could benefit greatly from...’ You’ll be the most authentic person in the room. You’ll carry the day.

So it’s lucky that it’s also such a great place. Because — let me lay my cards out: it’s a deeply wonderful city. I love it. I go there all the time; I wrote a novel set there; I may actually be in love with it. Physically. The small city centre, where you’re likely to spend most of your time, is a great piling-up of different flavours of beauty: mediaeval, Turkish lanes hung with rugs and silverware giving immediately onto wedding-cake Austro-Hungarian splendour, playful Secession façades, grand Romanesque cathedrals, communist-era tram stations that look like Boba Fett’s helmet, obscure Orthodox monasteries, and a lot of mosques (a lot of mosques; Wikipedia says 186) representing every level of spectacularity.

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