Monday, 28 June 2010
Sunday, 27 June 2010
Thursday, 17 June 2010
Tuesday, 15 June 2010
Monday, 14 June 2010
Thursday, 3 June 2010
One week in Sarajevo - On-arrival training
My European Voluntary Service (EVS) on-arrival training, 3 weeks after I arrived in Serbia, took place in Iliza, Sarajevo's suburbs. Of course, as any longer trip in the Balkans, it took ages to arrive. The bus trip with the famous Serbian bus company "Nis Ekspress" lasted around 11 hours. The purpose of the on-arrival training is to meet with the other volunteers working in the Western Balkans region and to have 5 days of practical activities and conversations about the integration in the Balkan societies (cultural differences, language, religion, habits and customs) and about our different projects and expectations.
We were a group of around 20 volunteers located in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia (or FYROM) and Serbia! It was the occasion to meet volunteers from different European countries currently living and working in Serbia and its neighbouring countries, share our experiences and information about everybody's projects so as to enable creating links for possible cooperation in common projects.
The city
Coming from a traditional catholic country which is Portugal, and having all my life until today lived in countries where the predominant religion was Catholicism, the first impact I received from the interior of the mosque was its warm beauty and simplicity of decoration. I always thought that our churches are often too exagerated in furnishement and hold very rich and luxury items which in my personal oppinion contradicts the essence of the catholic moral and ethic.
This small cubic space reserved for the women drove my attention in many aspects: first, why was is much smaller than the space for men? Then, why is it in the back and not in the front for instance? The explanation to the second question is already given above. As for the first question, our guide explained that women, contradictory to men, are actually not obliged to come to the Mosque in order to pray. They can rather stay at home and pray from there. Why? Because according to him "women have different lives: they have many duties such as being mothers, wives, housekeepers and professionals." Because of so many duties there are less women than men who come to the Mosque every day. While saying this he insisted in highlighting the fact that women get in any case fully rewarded. Men have the obligation to go there 5 times per day [...]
"God did not created the human being to be perfect. He made him to make sins and to ask forgiveness"
"Everything belongs to God - we need him but he doesn't need us"
Anonimous
Sarajevo, 12th May 2010