Birthdays and Goodbyes--21 June 2019

By Nada Elbohi

I woke up today not to my alarm, but to the voices of my housemates singing “Happy Birthday” in English, French, Romanian, and Dutch. When it comes to my birthday, I have always held high expectations, yet these usually go unfulfilled. Typically, my birthday passes by and I’m reminded that it’s actually not so different from any other day. This year, though, was different. If you had asked me a year ago how I plan to spend my 20^th birthday, I would have never imagined celebrating it the way I did. Even if you had asked me about my birthday right before we left for Kosovo, I still had my expectation set quite low. This was the only year in which I was completely wrong (okay, maybe not the only year, but still).

The night before was full of celebrations, birthday wishes, (delicious) food, and cake, which in reality was much fancier than a typical birthday cake. The morning after was a little less festive as the trip drew to an end and goodbyes had to be made. While there was no rushing to early meetings at Newborn, we still followed what had become our morning routine accompanied with a full-fledged bathroom schedule for seven people. I usually take a little too long in the shower, messing up the following shower turns, but I think for my birthday everyone was more lenient with me. I had no complaints or knocks on the bathroom door! We, the people of Enver’s house, had initially planned to meet at Newborn with the rest of the class for brunch in an extended celebration of my birthday. However, since we woke up late and time was running short, we decided to have some coffee and cake near Enver’s house as the bus was coming by our place on the way to the airport anyway.

During the short drive to the airport, I said my goodbyes to the beautiful Kosovo and to Enver’s house and family, which had already begun feeling like home to me. Once we arrived at the Pristina Airport, I gauged the reaction of everyone else as we walked through the doors and waited in a busy line at the check-in desk, acknowledging the end of our time here in Pristina.

The day was long, moving from flight to flight. Our tedious trip began with our departure from Pristina, heading to Basel. At Basel, we had to pass through security, passport control, pick up our baggage at the carousel, and check-in our suitcases once again. It was exhausting. To add to the pleasantries of fatigue, the people at the airport were uncharacteristically unfriendly. First of all, while I was in the line at passport control, everybody tried to push ahead of me, repeatedly cutting the line. Second, I’m pretty sure I was the only one checked for customs because I’m not white and because when the security officer asked me where I was coming from, I replied, “Kosovo” (i.e. discrimination 101).

After our flight was delayed at Basel, we finally landed in Amsterdam at around 11 pm and arrived at the dorms at about midnight. My birthday was finally over, and I say finally because it felt unusually lengthy. Nonetheless, I can’t deny that it was a special day (including/especially the night of June 21^st). It was a birthday to remember: turning 20 in Kosovo with wonderful people and a day full of restlessness and flights.

Until next time, Kosovo!

Virtual peace

By Ana Carolina Pinto

Kosovo has been a wonderful experience. We have met local Albanians and Serbs who welcomed us with open arms and hearts, never making us feel uncomfortable or uneasy. Yet, when reflecting on the political context of the country, I wonder whether Kosovo is experiencing “virtual peace”. Despite the relative success of peacebuilding efforts since 1999, an argument can be made that such success only implemented “virtual peace”. As argued by Richmond and Franks (2007), liberal peacebuilding often implements a form of peace which embodies elements of liberal peace, but is conclusively not liberal peace. In Kosovo, high unemployment, the perception of government corruption, and failed reconciliation efforts suggest that although Kosovo lives in a democratic republic, such a republic is volatile and weak.  Here and in other peacebuilding missions, institutionalization has achieved a type of peace, but one which is neither liberal nor sustainable. This is reflected in the continuous loss of hope which many of us observed while interviewing locals. Although, Kosovo no longer exists in war, but instead is a society where the streets are peaceful and full of life, in reality, the population living in Kosovo does not see any progress or development since the country’s independence in 2008. In my opinion, Kosovo is in a stalemate with Serbia, with the EU, and with itself. As Petrit Selimi of the Millenium Foundation voiced; “We cannot build an open society in a locked cage”. He expressed this opinion in relation to the lack of visa liberalisation in Kosovo however, such sentiment can be applied to a variety of quarrels in Kosovo. For example, whilst Kosovo no longer looks or portrays itself as being in a conflict, the international community will not treat Kosovo as being a peaceful and sovereign country until a Kosovar-Serbian agreement is signed. On the other hand, the absence of this agreement is generating more hopelessness for the Kosovar population, thus creating a continuous feedback loop of negativity. 

At the same time, “virtual peace” is not purely negative. Whilst “virtual peace” should not be the goal of local elites or peacebuilders, “virtual peace” should not be perceived as objectively negative. Despite the shortcomings mentioned above, Kosovo is progressing as a society. When reflecting back to 2008, today the Kosovo government can function almost entirely independently and its people live in relative peace. So, whilst “virtual peace” is not ideal, it is a stepping stone towards a systematic and slow improvement of peace through the long-term process of peacebuilding. However, this can only be achieved if hope is sustained for the future of Kosovo, especially among the youth.

Perspectives

            On a more personal note, I deeply enjoyed our experience in Kosovo. It has been a trip which will be hard to forget. The people of Kosovo, both Albanians and Serbs, were absolutely wonderful to us and I hope I have the chance to return rather sooner than later. However, with our experience in Kosovo comes a necessity and obligation to understand the presence of biases in our interpretations and understandings of Kosovo as a nation-state. Firstly, our experience is biased because we are foreigners and thus, people will treat us and express their opinions differently than when addressing a local about the same issues. Secondly, everyone we had the chance to interview, whether local or otherwise, also had their own personal experience of Kosovo and thus, their opinion and understanding of the conflict is biased towards their individual experiences. Lastly, our interactions with locals were limited to locals who can speak English. So, although the level of English was far better than we expected, it is important to understand that the Kosovars/Albanians/Serbians who do speak English are most likely of a higher social-economic class hence, our experience of Kosovo is biase towards the higher economic classes in Kosovo. This however, does not tint or damage my personal experience of Kosovo as it is an experience I will never forget. Nevertheless, it is beneficial to understand that there are biases present in every individual’s story.  

My fondest experience in Kosovo

            During our trip, we were encouraged to meet locals. This made me quite uncomfortable as the process of interviewing locals felt rather invasive. That is why meeting local Kosovar judges in south Mitrovica was one of my fondest memories in Kosovo. Instead of us approaching them, they approached us and answered all of our questions with such kindness. Here is an uncomfortable picture of myself and Nada with those judges: