welcome to Sarajevo in Bosnia a gorgeous city that's often called the Jerusalem of
Europe and in this video we're going to explore one of the more interesting cities in the world
it's 4 p.m right now on a nice summer day in Sarajevo. this is actually my second trip to
Sarajevo. this is one of the most fascinating cities I've ever been to and one of the coolest
small cities in the world probably. This place is a melting pot of civilizations. this is
where the eastern and the western Roman empires split. this is where the Turks or the ottomans
and the Austro-Hungarians fought for centuries to take control of this land. there's probably no
better place to start the story than in the city's old town which is where we're heading right now
so the modern city of Sarajevo as you know it was founded back in the 1450s
by the Ottomans as basically a trading city where merchants from all over the region
came here, paid taxes to the city and sold their goods
and this was actually a very important trading center for the next couple of hundred years.
Behind me is this place called tashlihan which I'm hoping I'm pronouncing right and this was one of
the very first inns that was built to accommodate for the merchants that came here to the old town
of Sarajevo. It's where they stayed with their horses and everything. You can see the remains
from the outside sort of but if you go downstairs there's still a market underneath where people
are still selling stuff and this market was intentionally sort of built below the ground
so it didn't get as hot as the surrounding city and the spices did not get spoiled.
I'm in the bazaar of the old town of Sarajevo and I've never been to a place outside of Turkey that
looks so much like Turkey. Back in the day this whole bazaar was where people came to
sell all their goods and there was basically an alley dedicated for every kind of goods. So that
kind of market doesn't really exist anymore and you'll mostly find cafes and other little
shops in the bazaar, except for this one alley called coppersmiths alley where people are still
selling copper goods the same way they have been for the last 500 years. Mainly more for
tourists these days than for people trying to buy copper as a necessity but it's still
a really cool place and probably my favorite alley in the whole bazaar the old town of Sarajevo.
now it's time for my favorite part of the day which is getting some good Bosnian food
it's really hot today. so there are so many types of good food in the Balkans it'd probably take me
a 30 minute video to just go over my favorite ones. The most popular ones in Bosnia at least
are Cevapcici or cevapi. Food is very similar in most countries in the Balkans. The big difference
in Bosnia is that because it's halal food it's not made from pork and mostly made from lamb. In other
places pljeskavica and cevapi would definitely have some pork in it. but today I'm eating
this thing called Sarma.. the plate is hot.. which is like this stuffed meat wrapped in cabbage
and it's great to have with some mashed potatoes on the side. Pretty much like
everywhere in the region you usually get bread on the side
different kinds of bread too. This is so
good. I'm gonna stop talking for the next few minutes and just enjoy my meal
so right now I'm in a café in Bosnia drinking some Bosnian coffee and coffee culture
is huge in this country. Bosnians are some of the highest consumers of coffee per capita
in the world and the way they usually do it is they come to these cafes
and have a coffee for 30 minutes and this is pretty strong coffee so this is more like two
or three cups of coffee, not one. And usually they just come here sit with friends and smoke
a lot of cigarettes because Bosnians smoke a lot of cigarettes
this is um very similar to the way Turkish coffee is prepared but not exactly the same.
There are some distinct differences and there's definitely a difference in the taste but it's
still pretty decent. I definitely still prefer my americano but this is also good
behind me is the Gazi Huzrev Beg mosque which was built by the ottomans here in the 16th century
pretty much in the middle of old town in Sarajevo. this is still the largest
historic mosque in Bosnia-Herzegovina so worth a visit. you probably can't go
inside this one. there's strict dress codes and all that. but yeah on to the next one.
so after approximately 400 years of ottoman rule, in 1878 all the superpowers of Europe got
together and signed the Treaty of Berlin which handed power over Sarajevo and Bosnia from the
Ottomans which was a basically a dying empire at this point to the Austro-Hungarians for the next
30 years. People kind of have mixed feelings to this day about that period because yes on one
hand it was a foreign power occupying the place but on the other hand they made some
massive massive massive leaps in technology or just advancements in general in those
next 30 years. They spent a lot of money on infrastructure and architecture
as you can probably tell from the architecture of every single building behind me and the
country basically went from being a feudal system that was run by the ottomans to a more advanced
technological place. one thing that I find really interesting is that on this very street
there's this point maybe like 100 meters that way called the meeting point of cultures
where there's basically a line and on one side of the line everything is Austrian
architecture on the other side everything is more like the old ottoman architecture.
it's a such a weird mix that you pretty much don't see anywhere else in any city in the world
so fun fact to remember, if you're walking past the river and see some trams going next to you,
Sarajevo actually has the oldest tram network or electric tram network in all of Europe and the
second oldest in the world after San Francisco. These things have been around since the 1870s
so right now I'm in this intersection next to the Latin bridge in the center of Sarajevo and this
is probably one of the most historical spots in the world. So remember how the Austro-Hungarian
empire got control of Sarajevo and Bosnia essentially and then they were supposed to
leave after 30 years and Bosnians were sort of hoping for some independence
but they ended up never leaving so there was a lot of anti-Austro-Hungarian sentiments sort of
brewing in the region, especially from the Serbians who were right next door and had their
own independent kingdom at this point and were not a fan of Austro-Hungarians trying to take over
territory around them or their own territory. So there was this extreme right-wing group that were
willing to do whatever was necessary to remove the Austro-Hungarians from power and they recruited
essentially kids between the age of 17 to 23 to try to assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand who
was next in line to come to power to rule the Austro-Hungarian empire. So on 28th June 1914
Archduke Franz Ferdinand came to Sarajevo to visit his subjects and then while he was driving
around there was a big assassination attempt that was botched at several points but he was still
driving around the place and then his car which looks a lot like this car behind me,
this is a replica was not the original one, was making a turn right here in this bridge
when this 19 year old assassin called Princip came out with his gun, fired it several times,
killed Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophia. When it was found out that rebels were essentially
trained or linked to being trained by Serbia (and they) were it was behind this assassination,
Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. Serbia was allied with Russia so Russia declared war on
the Austro-Hungarian empire and then Germany and France, there was like conflicts in that region too
they started war with each other too and essentially world war one started
because of this one bullet that was fired here. Crazy stuff
behind me is this Roman catholic cathedral that was built in the 19th century. it's a pretty
cool building but I think what is a lot more interesting is what is in front of this building.
if you just take a few more steps outside of the main gate you'll come across this fragmented block
of concrete with red paint inside it and it looks fractured and there's about 200 of these
blocks throughout the cities and these are called Sarajevo Roses . These are spots where the concrete
was essentially destroyed from bombings during the siege of Sarajevo that lasted three years
and 11 months in the 90s. Unfortunately world war one and world war ii was not
the last time this part of the world saw violence and warfare. The Yugoslav wars
broke out after the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia sort of broke apart in the 90s
and it was a bloody conflict which claimed the lives of more than 130 000 people and no
city was probably as adversely affected by this like Sarajevo which was under siege from all sides
for almost four years, was being constantly bombed by shells and mortar.
Civilians were constantly being targeted by snipers hiding up on the hills of Sarajevo
and this bloodshed continued for a long long time. The craziest part about this is this is not even
that long ago. Everyone in the city who's my age or older remembers this very very well. That's
something I guess you should be very mindful of and very respectful of if you ever get the chance
to visit Sarajevo. I'm probably going to talk more about the conflict in the Balkans and Bosnia in a
different video but if you want to know more about it please do look up the history of this place
okay right now I'm at the yellow fortress which is right off the side of Sarajevo a little bit uphill
but it is without a doubt my favorite sunset spot in the whole city. You just get the most amazing views
ever from this place. Great place to grab a beer too if you're into that. yeah yeah I'm recording
I picked the wrong person haha
I think I'm gonna end the vlog here if you like this video don't forget to
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alright I'll catch you guys on the next one