I am writing this from Zagreb, from a friend of mines computer. We met each other today after more then fifteen years. I cant believe it…such a long time…
He left, like myself at the beginning of the war, in 1992. His whole family left then, exchanging a house with a family in Croatia who then came to live in Bosnia…We chatted for hours, so much to say, and to get to know each other again…He hasnt been back to Banja Luka, where he grew up, for fifteen years. So, in a way, I was-am a connection to the past and possibly to the future…We agreed he must visit…Home that he imagines has become a picture in his mind, perhaps fiction, perhaps not, but it seems so important to make the physical and emotional connection again…
This afternoon I spent some time in the Home for Jewish Elderly, together with Dona Danon, an Anthropologist (who has kindly offered to help with this part of my research as she is writing an MA Theses on Sefardic Jewish women). She found out that there is a woman who is sewing the clothes for burial especially for the residents of the home, but we were not sure if the women themselves prepared anything. The seamstress was there when we arrived and had prepared the clothing, laid out with a dark sheet underneath, looking quite sombre and rather institutional. The clothing for burial consisted of the white dress which looked like a sleeping gown, the white scarve and the white socks. I was curious to find out from her that men were buried in the same clothing as the women, in the white gowns. She believed that there wasnt much deviation in terms of preparing a different type of clothing.
After this Dona spoke with a few women with whom she has established a relationship through her research and none of them had prepared such clothing (partly because the Home took care). I was greatful that she asked, as it is such a sensitive thing to ask, and through the past few weeks of speaking to the women myself I appreciated more the delicate nature of the project. On Tuesday, I met a woman who had prepared everything, but didnt want to be photographed. When I asked her why not, she said its just something inside…
We spent the rest of the afternoon chatting to a vivacious woman, in her 80s who told us many interesting facts about her life. She told us that the most tolerance she experienced was during the 1st Yugoslavia (which was the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovens), she said all the religions were respected and given space…She also spoke about Mesa Selimovic, one of my favourite writers, which has shaped so much of my adolescent thinking and writing aspirations…He used to visit her home, and spend long times chatting to her father…She tought this was because his relationship to his father was very distant. I have to admit it was so exotic listening such personal tales about a writer I admire so much.
