Words from the Balkans

I had the honor of talking to several people, despite how fast I was moving on my travels in the Balkans. They have lived through things most of us have only read about, and hopefully will never experience ourselves. I asked them about freedom and democracy, the former Yugoslavia, the genocide, religion and communism. Here are some of their words.
On independence:

• "Before people didn't have to think for themselves, now they do and they are not ready."
• "Things were so much better with Tito and communism. My kids could go to school. We had medical care. Now we have nothing."
• "With communism we had health care and homes, we had bigger salaries. We were taken care of."
• "It's a difficult transition, but it always is, I am sure things will improve, we are adjusting."

On the genocide:

• "If you had told me 20 years ago that this would happen I would have laughed. You can't imagine. I can't imagine."
• "I left, I had to. I had to forget, but the people still living here, they aren't forgetting. They can't forget if they stay."
• "It happened so fast.I don't understand how it happened.It was never a problem before. I'm from Croatia. I married a Muslim from Mostar (Bosnia). Nobody cared. Then all of the sudden, people became like animals. So fast. It happened overnight, they became animals."
• "I can't forget. But there is nothing I can do. There is no justice. But like the Chinese saying, 'The stupid only look back. The smart look ahead.'"
• "I lived in a cellar with the Croatian army for 2 months. For 2 months, I didn't know if my husband and children were alive or dead. My husband was right there. All he had to do was cross the bridge to get to me, but he couldn't. It took him two months and he had to go all the way to Moscow first. He had to get fake papers to leave. We were lucky."
• "People just turned into animals. I saw neighbors looting stores, people I knew doing these terrible things. You couldn't imagine."
• "I never thought it would happen here. Never. It could happen anywhere. Nobody is immune."

On Albania

• "Of course things are better after independence. People have been learning. After 1997 it was hard, but we are rebuilding."
• "The bunkers were mistakes, there were a lot of mistakes made back then. But we must try to forget and look forward."
• "We used to think the whole world was against us. That is why we built the bunkers. We thought everyone wanted to attack."
• "They built them because my parents used to be afraid, but now they are not." (bunkers)