A big football night last night in the Brits in Bosnia household. Not only was England playing against Croatia (and there are quite a few Croatia supporters who live around here) but Bosnia was playing against Turkey. As Bosnia was once a part of the Ottoman empire and the high proportion of Muslims in Bosnia is as a direct result of that occupation, the links between Bosnia and Turkey remain strong. Bosnian Muslims are often called Turks by the Serbs and Croats in Bosnia. Not only were there strong historical and cultural links to this game, it was also totally vital that Bosnia won if they were to have a chance to go to the World Cup Finals in South Africa next year, which would be their first major footballing championships.
Adam is starting to show quite a bit of interest in football. He enjoys watching people play it, and is full of who we are going to support. We have constant conversations about who the teams are and what colours they wear. As Bosnia wear blue, and so do Chelsea (my family's team) he is very into versions of blue kit. As the day went on and more and more people starting appearing wearing Bosnian kit, he started getting quite excited.
Adam: I'm going to support Bosnia
Me: Good idea darling. I am too. But I'm supporting England in their match against Croatia. Do you remember we saw Croatia the other day. They have a flag with lots of red and white squares on it. Like that one over there.
Adam: What colour is our flag?
Me: do I talk about the Union Jack here or the St. George's cross? The cross is easier, let's run with that one for the moment. It is a red cross on white, like the picture of a knight in your book.
Adam: What colour is Bosnia?
Me: Blue and yellow - look, like that flag over there.
Adam: What happens if England play Bosnia?
Me: Well, we support England.
Adam: I think I want to cheer for Bosnia against England. They wear blue.
Me - in my head: **&&%%&%&&! Who are you kidding? Your grandfathers will never talk to you again! Your father may never talk to you again. I'll never watch an international with you. Supporting the English football team in all their misery and occasional moment of glory is a part of being English, it is what defines us. Then again, this might be the moment when you are spared the abject pain of being a life time England supporter; so hopeful every time, only to be so disappointed - without fail. But on the other hand, the Bosnian football team comes from the same stock, they also have the ability to self implode and clutch defeat from the jaws of a great victory. Arrghgh, what do I say? Bosnia as a second team definitely yes, but to support them over England? What happens if Bosnia qualify for the World Cup and we end up playing them? Does this mean that he thinks he is Bosnian and not English? Is this a good thing, does this show how he has adapted to living here? How can we reinforce a sense of being English whilst we live abroad? How does football define identity? Gosh I can think fast as I haven't even opened my mouth yet in response and my thoughts have covered a lot of ground.
Me: Are you sure? Bosnia is where we live, but we are English so we really should support England.
Adam: Yes. I am going to cheer for Bosnia.
I feel the time may have come for us to consider moving back.
Showing posts with label identity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label identity. Show all posts
Thursday, 10 September 2009
Wednesday, 17 June 2009
red red tape.. stay close to me
Back to our battle with the never-ending, soul destroying, employment creating Bosnian bureaucracy. Using an unexpected flanking manoeuvre, Bosnian bureaucracy has actually opened up a new front in this war, which is occupying most of my time, much to my enormous irritation.
For once it isn't the visa application that is causing my misery. That is not to say that the process is finished, rather the quagmire continues, involving more police reports, extra notarised documents and vast sums of money. It is too unbelievably dull for words.
No, this little skirmish has come from the boys nursery, where we need to reapply for our places next year. This process includes handing over various documents, including passports and birth certificates and having a health check. I could cry. We're still recovering from the last time we had to go and have our health checked out and that was only 2 months ago. The battle to get them to accept the certificates we got that time is ongoing. But this battle is nothing compared to the battle to get them to accept our birth certificates.
The problem is that in Bosnia your birth certificate is re-validated every 6 months. Yup, every 6 months every single Bosnian must go back to the relevant ministry and get a stamp, or whatever it is that they do to show that they are still, well, born. Because, you know, just maybe they have been born again and not in the religious sense. When I produced my birth certificate, the original one and now 37 years old, their jaws nearly hit the floor. The boys' certificates, looking considerably less dog eared, are also not valid.
They would also like us to produce our ID cards. But of course we are British and therefore don't have ID cards (and long may that remain the case, despite the fact it would make my life here a lot easier). That has caused a fair amount of head scratching and ponderous scratching of chins. No ID cards. Possibly, I said, we could use our passports instead. Well they thought that might be ok but could they get back to me on that one. I await their verdict.
I have filled out the form though. But it was in Bosnian and therefore a bit hit and miss, so I've probably applied for them to be taught in German and only on Tuesdays.
I'll just keep on turning up at nursery. They'll have to let us in in the end.
For once it isn't the visa application that is causing my misery. That is not to say that the process is finished, rather the quagmire continues, involving more police reports, extra notarised documents and vast sums of money. It is too unbelievably dull for words.
No, this little skirmish has come from the boys nursery, where we need to reapply for our places next year. This process includes handing over various documents, including passports and birth certificates and having a health check. I could cry. We're still recovering from the last time we had to go and have our health checked out and that was only 2 months ago. The battle to get them to accept the certificates we got that time is ongoing. But this battle is nothing compared to the battle to get them to accept our birth certificates.
The problem is that in Bosnia your birth certificate is re-validated every 6 months. Yup, every 6 months every single Bosnian must go back to the relevant ministry and get a stamp, or whatever it is that they do to show that they are still, well, born. Because, you know, just maybe they have been born again and not in the religious sense. When I produced my birth certificate, the original one and now 37 years old, their jaws nearly hit the floor. The boys' certificates, looking considerably less dog eared, are also not valid.
They would also like us to produce our ID cards. But of course we are British and therefore don't have ID cards (and long may that remain the case, despite the fact it would make my life here a lot easier). That has caused a fair amount of head scratching and ponderous scratching of chins. No ID cards. Possibly, I said, we could use our passports instead. Well they thought that might be ok but could they get back to me on that one. I await their verdict.
I have filled out the form though. But it was in Bosnian and therefore a bit hit and miss, so I've probably applied for them to be taught in German and only on Tuesdays.
I'll just keep on turning up at nursery. They'll have to let us in in the end.
Monday, 16 February 2009
important bits of English culture
Before we moved here we did quite a lot of thinking about the ways in which the boys would be exposed to a new culture and how that might affect them. One of the things we hadn't really thought about before we moved to Bosnia was how the boys would be affected in terms of absorbing English culture.
Some things are no different: we have bought/had sent out enough tea bags to sink a Boston tea ship. The number of CBeebies DVDs that we have here would start a library of their own and I don't think they would be watching anything different if we were in the UK. The toy shops in Bosnia sell all the same sort of stuff - we've found great jigsaws, transformers, Thomas the Tank Engine kit, you name it really. I think they'll have enough cultural references with their peers to not make a difference on their return.
But this weekend I started to wonder about how we will build their cultural identity. This weekend was a big rugby weekend in the UK. England were playing Wales, which is an enormous match at the best of times, particular so this year. If we'd been in the UK we would probably have gone round to someones house and watched it on TV - the adults all participating in that time honoured past-time of shouting really loudly at the TV as England promise much and then proceed to throw it all away.
We looked around for people to watch it with, but for some extraordinary reason the game was not on Bosnian TV and noone wanted to watch it with us. We managed to access it via the Internet and D and I watched it on the computer, shouting at the screen as England adhered to form; promised much, threw it all away.
Adam was intrigued by this new routine and wanted to watch. But it became very evident that he had no idea what he was looking at. I realised that he didn't know what the English flag looked like, what our national anthem was, what colours the English play in. He doesn't know of our ancient sporting rivalries, the matches that have a little extra needle. As long as we remain here they won't be exposed to the English national games of rugby and cricket. He will see a lot of football, but he'll believe that the team he should support wears blue (although coming from a family of Chelsea supporters this is probably not such a bad step).
This got me thinking. Maybe we would be doing them a favour. Maybe a life spent not being constantly disappointed by the English teams performance (in football, rugby, cricket, insert name of sport here) would be preferable. But hours spent shouting at a TV screen as England collapse yet again is such an integral part of being English we need to ensure they are exposed to this. The next big rugby game is in 2 weekends time and we shall be watching it, teaching the boys to shout 'come on England' and sing the national anthem.
That said, the Bosnian football team are known for promising much only to spectacularly fail to deliver. Not so different really.
Some things are no different: we have bought/had sent out enough tea bags to sink a Boston tea ship. The number of CBeebies DVDs that we have here would start a library of their own and I don't think they would be watching anything different if we were in the UK. The toy shops in Bosnia sell all the same sort of stuff - we've found great jigsaws, transformers, Thomas the Tank Engine kit, you name it really. I think they'll have enough cultural references with their peers to not make a difference on their return.
But this weekend I started to wonder about how we will build their cultural identity. This weekend was a big rugby weekend in the UK. England were playing Wales, which is an enormous match at the best of times, particular so this year. If we'd been in the UK we would probably have gone round to someones house and watched it on TV - the adults all participating in that time honoured past-time of shouting really loudly at the TV as England promise much and then proceed to throw it all away.
We looked around for people to watch it with, but for some extraordinary reason the game was not on Bosnian TV and noone wanted to watch it with us. We managed to access it via the Internet and D and I watched it on the computer, shouting at the screen as England adhered to form; promised much, threw it all away.
Adam was intrigued by this new routine and wanted to watch. But it became very evident that he had no idea what he was looking at. I realised that he didn't know what the English flag looked like, what our national anthem was, what colours the English play in. He doesn't know of our ancient sporting rivalries, the matches that have a little extra needle. As long as we remain here they won't be exposed to the English national games of rugby and cricket. He will see a lot of football, but he'll believe that the team he should support wears blue (although coming from a family of Chelsea supporters this is probably not such a bad step).
This got me thinking. Maybe we would be doing them a favour. Maybe a life spent not being constantly disappointed by the English teams performance (in football, rugby, cricket, insert name of sport here) would be preferable. But hours spent shouting at a TV screen as England collapse yet again is such an integral part of being English we need to ensure they are exposed to this. The next big rugby game is in 2 weekends time and we shall be watching it, teaching the boys to shout 'come on England' and sing the national anthem.
That said, the Bosnian football team are known for promising much only to spectacularly fail to deliver. Not so different really.
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