Despite lack of local media coverage, I have been able to follow the flooding in Bosnia ( proper) and Serbia. Terrible. Some of these small towns I recognize from bus trips, and others, I don’t. But the photos of town squares underwater, and recently built houses flooded broke my heart. To see this country, which I think of as my adoptive home, struggling again is sad. It is hopeful. though, to see the photos of soldiers carrying puppies and children, to see water being delivered to people, to see people being evacuated but then, what happens when the water recedes? What happens when the doubtless newly exposed mines appear?
Here I sit in my house, looking onto a sunny day, a day after a rainy deluge. The creek by my house rose and the rain fell so hard that you could hear it ping like hail. Yet, today, the sun is out, the trail is clear. Debris of trees is stuck on bridges and muddy swatches have been cleared off the trail. And how quickly could my house be flooded as those are in Doboj.
Life is very fragile. And Mother Nature so unpredictable. But life is also very tough. My little Snooks, who I first saw quivering in a deluge, is now peering happily out of a window. She hasn’t grown much, but her exuberant spirit makes her seem larger than life itself. She gives me hope and laughter each day. She lives in the moment, hoping her new sisters will play, and shrugging off their snubs.
Amy in Mostar 