In my heart forever

By Nora Steller

After a series of eventful day trips, Tuesday (20 June) was our designated zoom day. Unfortunately, we could not go up to Mitrovica due to the current tensions in the North. However, we were very fortunate to have three organisations from the North meet with us online and share a more Kosovar Serbian experience with us. A few of us gathered at the hostel at 9:45 to join the first zoom of the day together, where we had the pleasure to meet Emma from the New Social Initiative (NSI), an independent Mitrovica-based civil society organisation dedicated to building an inclusive society in Kosovo where citizens from all ethnic groups actively participate in governance. NSI focuses on building trust amongst communities, normalising relations between Kosovo and Serbia, empowering non-majority communities, fostering dialogue, and promoting citizen participation. For this, they bring together individuals from all over Kosovo and collaborate with key stakeholders through various projects. 

 

Emma’s rich background particularly stood out to me. Being partially Montenegrin, Bosniak, and Turkish, and growing up in a Serbian community in Kosovo, she reflects Kosovo’s complex diversity. In Emma’s words, she is a “walking minority” in the mainly Albanian-populated country and faces much discrimination. We were all quite moved when Emma told us the story of how she became specifically interested in working for NGOs that aim to reconcile Albanian and Serbian communities. One day, she crossed the New Bridge in Mitrovica with her best friend. The latter opened up to her that it was her first time crossing the bridge, which came as a shock to Emma who was used to visiting her grandparents in the South. Emma’s friend who had always just walked to the middle of the bridge and then turned back around is not a rare case; overwhelmingly many individuals have never crossed the bridge out of fear of uncertainty, not knowing what awaited them on the other side. This made Emma realise how important it is to expose Kosovars to one another, which is why projects towards reconciliation are needed. Gathering individuals from all over Kosovo and making them share their experiences with one another helps make Kosovar Serbs and Kosovar Albanians realise the similarities they share. 

 

Unfortunately, NGOs like NSI can get crushed very quickly by tensions like the very ones occurring in the North at the moment. Emma highlighted how devastating an impact such conflicts have, destroying decades of work and demotivating people. For the last month NSI workers have not been able to come to their office and have had to work online. NSI also had to postpone the implementation of several projects, as it was not logical to try and implement peacebuilding projects while everything was so tense and people so scared. Moreover, it is very difficult to get individuals from Serbian communities in the North to participate. This stands in contrast to the involvement of Kosovar Serbs we met in Gracanica. Emma explained that individuals in Mitrovica have different priorities at the moment. It was very striking to hear how their current experiences differ from outside narratives. Whilst local people supposedly are getting used to the situation, Emma described how the sound of air-raid sirens going off regularly, for instance, triggers and scares the population. Especially those individuals who survived the 1999 war are affected by this. Emma shared with us how her own mother struggles from PTSD and gets very uncomfortable every time she hears the sirens. Meanwhile, people in the South do not experience the same feelings since they are distanced from the tensions and have a more external perspective. This year we could not cross the bridge. Therefore, speaking to Emma online and still being able to hear her story was of singificant value to us young peacebuilders. 

 

We had a few hours to spare before the next meeting. A few of us decided to go to a relatively modern bakery close to our hostel whilst others went to meetings for their individual projects. Although Olive is just a few metres down the street, the heat and heaviness of Pristinia’s midday air quickly hit us. At this point we almost started missing the chilly rainy days earlier in the week, and anticipated our upcoming lake day. After two more zoom meetings with CBM and IBCM our concentration was low, but we were glad to have been able to talk to our partners in the North, whilst escaping the heat in our cool hostel. 

Immediately after the last meeting, some of us rushed to the hairdresser; we deemed this to be our chance to get fresh and affordable haircuts before the summer. At 7pm sharp we all met at Shpija e Vjetër for dinner - the first time of the day that we all got together offline. Another breathtakingly beautiful restaurant with amazing and cheap food awaited us here. To finish off the day we walked through Pristina’s streets, under beautiful garlands, where we went for drinks in cute little bars and shared funny personal stories with each other. These small moments are the ones I will carry in my heart forever.