FBU-2013-06-20

Date of Interview

6-20-2013

Interview Location

St. Louis, MO

Length of Interview

125:54

Date of Birth

1955

Gender

Female

Religion and/or Ethnicity

Muslim

Description

She was born to Muslim parents in Brcko. She remembers a happy childhood in which they had everything they needed. Father was a railway worker and auto mechanic while her mother stayed at home. After studying in Sarajevo, she married her husband, a fighter pilot in the Jugoslav National Air Force, and moved to Belgrade in 1982. She began to notice enhanced divisions between working and political classes and the steady rise of nationalist parties. They declared themselves as Jugoslavian. Starting May 1991, her husband was no longer allowed to fly planes because he was Muslim. The houses of non-Serb Army and Airforce members in Novi Beograd were marked with an X. All the men were taken to Batajnica Air Base, and the women stayed. Their door was marked with an X. That evening she blockaded the doors, and soldiers tried to get in. In the morning, she found the mailbox destroyed and their last name removed. Non-Serbs were made to feel unsafe and unwelcome. She decided it would be safer to stay with her parents in Brcko. May 1st 1992, Arkan’s Tigers arrived in Brcko. Her Aunt was murdered because she was a professor. She witnessed the murder of her 92-year-old grandmother, PEŠTALIĆ (Haso) VASVA. After her grandmother was murdered, she decided it was safer to go back to Belgrade. Gunshots into houses of non-Serbs were routine. She received word that her Father and Mother had been taken to a concentration camp in Brezovo Polje, between Bijeljena and Brcko. Arkan was in Brezovo Polje. With the help of a Serb copilot, her husband was able to fly a helicopter to Bijeljena. They told Arkan’s Tigers that they were there to take a “bastard sniper” back to Belgrade to stand trial. They successfully extracted her mother and father and flew them back to Belgrade. Her family was able to escape to Croatia. She left Belgrade on 12JUL1992. Her husband had family in Turkey, and she ended up in Adapazzari, Turkey. She was in Turkey for 5 ½ years. She faced a lot of discrimination in Turkey for being a refugee, and there was no assistance from the government. Life was tough in Turkey. She lived in a trailer and mended clothing at a university for money, but it wasn’t enough. She came to St. Louis in 1997 and moved first to the Morgan Ford areas before moving to South County in 1998. Both her Husband and Son have struggled with substance abuse. She began working as a cleaner at both a Lutheran and Methodist church. She still identifies as Jugoslav and has difficulty because she doesn’t feel any sense of belonging and no longer has a country. She indicates significant PTSD from war and has worked many hours in therapy to process and talk about her experience. Mentions explicitly the stigma surrounding genocidal rape that women face.

Keywords

Brčko, Belgrade, Novi Beograd, Batajnica, Brezovo Polje, Adapazari, Turkey, Yugoslavia, St. Louis [MO], United States, Yugoslav Air Force, JNA, Arkan, Escape, Concentration camp, Ethnic cleansing, Discrimination, Isolation, Parent during the war, Raising children, Familial substance abuse, PTSD, Therapy

Pre-War Residence

Belgrade

Wartime Residence

Belgrade

First Country of Residence

Turkey

First US Residence

St. Louis, MO

Document Type

Oral History

Collection

Fontbonne University

Digital Format

MP3, MP4

Digital Publisher

Center for Bosnian Studies

City

St. Louis, MO

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In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted.