In this episode David takes us to the capital city of Bosnia and Herzegovina to discover Sarajevo’s sights, sounds, and tastes. Sarajevo is a bustling capital with several historical, cultural and gastronomic stops to experience.
David starts off in the city center where he meets up with his local guide Raza to begin the tour. The best place to start is the Eternal Flame, located in the city center. It has burned continuously since 1946 except during the Bosnian War 1992-1995. It is on display for everyone to see.
David and Raza then take a walk along Ferhadija, Sarajevo’s main pedestrian street that links the two different parts of the city – the 19th century buildings dating back to the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Medieval district dating back to Ottoman occupation. In the mix there are also several communist-era buildings when Bosnia existed as a republic in the Social Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Yugoslavia, for short).
At the point when Ferhadija Street meets the Ottoman quarter, there is line on the floor that shows the split. All along Ferhadija Street there are shops, restaurants, cafés, and banks. It is also where the Eternal Flame is located.
Before Raza and David head into Bascarsija (Ottoman district), they make a quick stop at the square of the Sacred Heart Cathedral. In Bascarsija they visit the Gazi Husrev-beg Mosque, which was built 1530. Afterwards, Raza shows David the different ways to drink a traditional Bosnian coffee at a local Kafana. After fueling up, David stops by Sebilj fountain to have a sip of water. Legend has it that anyone who drinks from the fountain will return to Sarajevo, so we’ll see if David makes his way back one day to experience more of what to see and eat in Sarajevo!
Now time for a little souvenir shopping down Coppersmith Street. Raza shows David the most typical gift one could buy here – a copper coffee pot used to serve Bosnian coffee. All this walking around made them work up quite an appetite, so they head to a bakery to try some delicious pies (cheese, spinach, and meat). The pies are baked over a coal oven and are the perfect fast food. They are also very inexpensive.
Next thing David tries is cevapi (pronounced che-vap-ee), which is pretty much the unofficial national dish of the country. Day 2 takes David and Raza to see the city from a magnificent lookout point, Zuta Tabija, or “yellow fortress.” David recommends driving or taking a taxi there because the climb to the top is quite steep. From here you can see the center of the city and the rolling green hills in the background (in case you didn’t know, Bosnia is one of Europe’s most lush and verdant countries).
After quickly seeing Emperor’s Mosque, Raza takes David to see the exact spot where Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie, were assassinated on June 28, 1914. At the time David visited (2014) it was the 100th year anniversary of their untimely deaths. The assassination triggered the start of the First World War. After revisiting such a pivotal point in European history, David gets curious to see where all the bread he’s been eating comes from so Raza takes him to a nearby bakery, Pekara Alifakovac. They specialize in Somun bread, which is what is served with cevapi. This family-owned bakery churns out hundreds of Somun breads each day, and they have a pick-up window for customers on the go. It’s very hot inside but the experience was well worth it, especially since they allowed David to eat a piece of freshly baked bread.
Last but not least, David heads outside of the city center to visit one of the most culturally significant places in Bosnia, the Sarajevo Tunnel or Tunnel of Hope. Visitors can now see a portion of a tunnel that allowed Bosnians to smuggle in weapons and supplies during the Siege of Sarajevo (May 1992 through November 1995).
And there you have it, a brief intro about what to see and eat in Sarajevo. We hoped you liked it!
This is Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Today I'm going to take a tour of the city with my guide, Raza. She's a local, she was born here.
She's going to show us the main sights and she's going to take us to try some traditional foods
and drinks. Raza, let's go. Eternal Flame is the memorial of civilian and army victims
from 1946 and it's burning from that period till now. Only during the last war period,
which was 1992-1995, there was no gas and it was totally empty without fire.
Right now we're walking on the main pedestrian street. So Raza, tell me a little bit about the
street. Where does it start, where does it finish and what can we find along the street?
So this is the main street of Sarajevo, Ferreira Street it's called. And this street is starting
from the Eternal Flame to the beginning of the old part, Vistachja. In this street you can find
all kinds of shops, also with trademarks from the whole world, nice coffee bars, bakeries,
different kinds of shops. We're in the square of the Sacred Heart Cathedral and right in front of
it you'll see this and this is called the Sarajevo Rose. Wherever you see this in the city is where
grenades went off during the war. So if you follow the pedestrian street you get to a point
where east meets west. Behind us we have the part of the city that was built by the Austro-Hungarian
Empire in the 18th century and behind us we have the east, the old town and it was built by the
Ottomans in the 15th century. We are staying now in the front of the biggest mosque on the Balkan.
It's called Ghazi Khosrovec Mosque. The mosque was built in the year 1530 by Ghazi Khosrovec. He built
also the big school of Islamic madrasa and the clock tower on our left side. And here next to
the mosque we have the mausoleum of Ghazi Khosrovec. About to try some traditional Bosnian coffee
at a Bosnian kafana. Now Raza, what's the name of the kafana and how do I drink this?
So we are now in a typical Bosnian kafana. It's called Miris Dunja and you can drink it
on the two ways. The one is to put these sugar cubes inside and to drink it like that and some
people they take a cube put it a little bit in the coffee, drink that and then you can drink it.
Behind me we have one of the landmarks of Sarajevo. This was one of the main points of the old town
and it's called Seville fountain. It's a public fountain dating back to the 15th century.
The original was burnt and this one dates back to the year 1890.
They say that if you drink from this fountain you'll come back to Sarajevo. Let's go drink from it.
We're here on the street called Kazanjiluk or coppersmith street. It's in the old town of
Basasja. So what can we find here? We can find different kind of souvenirs. Let's find some.
Let's go. So if you want to buy in Kazanjiluk street a typical Bosnian souvenir then let's
a copper thing to do a Bosnian typical coffee.
Here we are on the main gastronomic street in Sarajevo. It's called Prava Jiluk. Here you can
eat cevapi, burek and other traditional Bosnian pies and we're gonna go try some right now.
Right here we have four different pies. Raza, what do we have here?
We have a pie with spinach and cheese. We call that one zelenica. And the other one it's only
with potato. We call that one krompirusa. And the main dish burek with meat beef and potato.
If you want to be really traditional have it with yogurt.
I'm about to eat cevapi. This is practically the national dish of Bosnia. Basically it's minced
meat kebab served with bread and raw onions. I encourage you to try some of the sour cream.
And you can order it in 15 pieces depending how hungry you are.
Behind of me you can see the national library which was built by the Austro-Hungarian period
and this is the most popular place in Sarajevo from that period.
For an incredible view of Sarajevo come up to the top of the yellow fortress. There's two
fortresses here in the city the yellow and the white. The white is on the other side of this hill.
This fortress was built by the Ottomans in the 15th century. There's only a fraction of it left
but from here you have incredible views of the city.
This is Empress Mosque. It dates back to the 18th century
and it replaced the original first mosque of Sarajevo. That dated back to the 15th century.
From here the city started its expansion. This mosque is still very active today.
Behind us we have a very important bridge. An event took place here in the year 1914
that marked the beginning of the first world war. Now Raza what happened? So the young Muslim
Gavrilo Princip shot Prince Ferdinand and his wife Sofia and they were the heirs to the throne
of the Austro-Hungarian empire. Now let's go to the other side of the bridge and see
where they were assassinated. This year 2014 marks the 100 year anniversary of the assassination.
I want to show you a traditional Bosnian bakery and this one specializes in
somun bread. That's the bread that you eat when you eat cevapi. Let's go inside.
So we are now in one bakery, old bakery called Agva Kvac. Here we have somun. This is a typical
bread kind of art for Sarajevo city. With somun you can eat cevapi. It tastes very well.
It takes about 30 seconds from the time they put it in to kind of bring it out.
And when you eat it like this it's really hot.
Delicious. Some of the best bread ever.
Take it. It's mine. We're here in Bucmir. It's located about a 15 minute drive from the city
center of Sarajevo and this is where the Kolar family built the tunnel of hope. That was built
during the Bosnian war to bring in and out aid and supplies to the city. Now let's go in and speak to
one of the members of the family. In the museum you can see the original part of the tunnel. It's only 25
meters long. Original tunnel was 800 meters long but we managed to preserve 25 meters.
You can see also a lot of pictures from that period and upstairs is the exhibit room with
equipment we used at that time for digging and for transport and some other things like
documents from that period and papers, notes, diaries and stuff like that.
