Bosnians agree: Commemorate Bruce Lee
He’s far [enough] away from us that nobody can ask what he did during World War II, during World War I, or what his ancestors did under Turkey. He’s … not Catholic, not Orthodox, not Muslim. Bruce Lee is part of our idea of universal justice - that the good guys can win.
During the Bosnian War, thousands of Serbs, Muslims, and Croats were massacred simply because of who they were. The ethnic hatreds that existed prior to the war were only intensified and hardened by the senseless brutality and deliberate, focused destruction of places of worship, hospitals, homes, and schools.
The Dayton Accords at least stopped the shooting, but they hardly brought peace to Bosnia. Given what had been done in the name of ethnic hatred, it would stand to reason that there would be a great deal of resentment and unresolved anger and bitterness. Yes, the shooting and the killing may have stopped, but it would be tough to call what exists in Bosnia “peace”. Not when the government, the economy, and public projects are still contested and divided along ethnic lines.
With this as a backdrop, it’s not difficult to understand the difficulties in coming up with ANY sort of public symbol that meets with the approval of Serbs, Croats, AND Muslims. This would explain why the statue about to be unveiled is of someone with no actual or implied connection with Bosnia or the former Yugoslavia. Sometimes, you just have to go with what you can do instead of what you might want.
MOSTAR, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA ‚Äö√Ñ√¨ In the heart of Europe’s war-torn Balkans, a land where it’s hard to get people to agree on anything, there’s one point of common ground: The new Bruce Lee statue will point north.
When it is unveiled in Mostar Saturday, the 5-foot, 7-inch bronze likeness will be the world’s first monument to the late great martial arts star - edging out by one day a new statue going up in Hong Kong. Bosnia-Herzegovina is about as far as one can get from the Hong Kong streets where the Chinese-American film legend unleashed his fists of fury. But, in some ways, that’s the point….
While it may prompt some snickers, the Bruce Lee tribute will stand as the only monument raised in postwar Bosnia without an uproar. Bruce’s greatest virtue - beyond his two-fingered push up - is that he had no dog in the Balkans’ centuries-old religious fight.
That separates him from Alija Izetbegovic. Sarajevo International Airport was nearly renamed last month after the late Muslim leader. Muslim war veterans said that the airport and Mr. Izetbegovic symbolized Sarajevo’s resistance to the three-year Bosnian Serb siege of the city.
Of course, no good deed goes unpunished in Bosnia. Though Muslims might hold up Izetbegovic as a good man who fought the good fight to keep Bosnia-Hercegovina together, Bosnian Serbs view Izetbegovic as something akin to Evil Incarnate.
“Mr. Izetbegovic led an army and politics that wanted to unite Bosnia,” says Muhamed Svrakic of the Green Berets veterans’ organization in Sarajevo. “From 1992 to 1995, the future of this town was that airport. It was the only way to get any kind of food aid, or journalists, or the wounded in or out of the city.”
But Bosnian Serbs were outraged. They pointed out that Izetbegovic had been under investigation by the UN war-crimes tribunal when he died in October 2003. They therefore welcomed the ban of the name change by Bosnia’s top international official, Paddy Ashdown, who also decreed that such changes had to be approved by the central government.
“If it hadn’t been for [Mr. Ashdown’s] decision, the Serb representatives would have boycotted flying out of that airport,” says Serb parliamentarian Bosko Sljegovic. Izetbegovic’s supporters ended up with a square in downtown Sarajevo.
It’s silly to anyone on the outside, but having lived and worked in that part of Eastern Europe, this is but one instance of the myriad ways that ethnic sensibilities can be ruffled. Sometimes it can border on the petty to someone without a dog in this particular fight, but if you lived through the war, and if you understand anything about the history of Bosnia in particular, and the former Yugoslavia in general, this is pretty typical stuff.
Bosnians may not be shooting at one another any more, but the conflict continues- only in this case the weapons are symbols.
New structures that commemorate the 1992-95 war are even more sensitive. Serbs were accused of provocation after erecting a monument to their dead outside Srebrenica last summer, on the 10th anniversary of the Bosnian Serb massacre of some 8,000 Muslims. Survivors of a Serb-run detention camp at Omarska are awaiting international mediation about their proposed monument.
Rebuilding mosques, churches, and bridges also invites squabbles over whether a place was historically Croat, Muslim, or Serb. Moderates say these sites belong to everyone. “To talk about cultural heritage in these terms is totally wrong,” says Amra Hadzimuhamedovic, an architect on the state Commission to Preserve National Monuments.
At least when it comes to the statue of Bruce Lee, there’s no ideology, religion, or symbolism involved. It’s silly, and it’s meaningless, but hey, it’s Bosnia. And, of course, this being Bosnia, there had to be one last conflict…this one over which way Lee’s statue would face.
The Bruce Lee statue is something everyone can support, says Mr. Gatalo. But in a town where Croats are concentrated in west Mostar and Muslims in east, Gatalo’s group had to consider which way the “Enter the Dragon” icon would face.
“If he faced west he’d be defending east Mostar from west Mostar, or west Mostar from east,” Gatalo says. “And he can’t face south, because that’s Croatia. Facing north, he looks nowhere.”
And nowhere is a pretty apt description of where Bosnia is at this point in history, don’t you think?
