Eastern Europe retroblog: Brčko, part 1

Toward the end of our Eastern European adventure Kate and I arranged to volunteer at a children's summer camp in a Bosnian town called Brčko (pronounced 'Birch-ko'-- and if it's not then we were saying it wrong the whole time). There would be children of all religions and ethnicities here, and the idea is to foster friendship and cooperation between them. It was a very positive experience overall--thanks to our lovely volunteer coordinators Dina and Sanjin, other new friends Briony and Mujke, and a bunch of really sweet kids--but as with every other volunteer experience I've had, there were definitely aspects I found ineffective or at least inefficient.Monday, 18th June 2007 Thoroughly frustrated...yesterday we passed three boys rooting through the dumpsters at the far end of our block, and of course one of them approached us and asked for money. THOSE are the kids who need help, but as Dina pointed out, the Roma don't want or think they need any help. They don't want a better life for their families, and that is totally incomprehensible to me.We were there less than two weeks, but we quickly settled into a routine of workshops and coffee afterwards at Dina and Sanjin's favorite cafe, Jazzwa.Wednesday, 20 June 2007The workshop this morning was quieter but still a success--we did the 'pass it on' story exercise and illustrated a few of the stories afterwards, and of course most of the kids got plenty of laughs when they were read out. We started with 'Once upon a time a brother and sister left home with their pet goat in search of adventure,' and though the goat dropped out of pretty much all the stories (never featured in Dina's quick translations, anyway), there were still a few gems. 'The boy squeezed the bird and mayonnaise came out'; 'they ate five kilograms of chocolate and had diarrhea.' Lots of farting too, naturally. Our favorite illustration was a marsupial dragon--a 'dragaroo.'At three we were treated to a tour of the town library, which is housed in a crumbling but wonderful imperialist Hungarian building dating to 1892.Two views of the library:

There's so much to say about Brčko that I should split it into two posts. Next time: fresh (and not so fresh) produce, other people's toothbrushes, and an unexpected early-morning visitor.