Kosovo

Well, action, action, action. Let's say it is all in the eye of the beholder. And no. There was not the kind of action I expected. It was fun though, and it made me realize some things, manly about my course of action until September.

Kosovo has an interesting history, of which both the Kosovo Albanians and the Serbs are very proud. However, the pride in their country does not result in a feeling of ownership for it. For the layman that I am it seems that people are fed up with the international community and with the standstill the country is in for already quite some years. But I did not see much of civil courage with respect to rebuilding the city of Pristina or with regard to keeping their country clean from rubbish (I know it sounds patronizing, but if you can not even keep your streets clean, how can you than keep your politics clean..?). Then again- who am I to judge; I was there for 3 days, I have never lived there....

Everybody in BiH looked at me as if I was crazy for going there- there are supposed to be tensions and potential dangers. All true, but I did not see that. But of course there is an 'however' to this too: the people whom I talked to in Kosovo (German peace-keepers, lawyers, an OSCE diplomat) could not really asses the security situation either. Apparently no-one really saw the riots of March 2004 (today exactly 3 years ago) coming, nor did anyone see the violence during the demonstration of last month, in which two people got killed, coming either. That seems odd to me. It can mean three things: military intel is really poor, the situation is more volatile than one would think on first view, or both. And I think the latter. Which is worrying, if you look at the huge presence of the international community there. Because aren't they there to keep the peace...?

But let's hold my horses. Because: what do I know about the place? Nothing. But that never stopped me from having an opinion....