July 9: Making the Most of Mostar

Alaina: This morning at our host family, we had pancakes with nutella and pizza for breakfast! I know pizza for breakfast sounds odd, but it was good anyway.

We then got to visit a beautiful school called “Leptir” where we toured the school and sang songs with the students. This is a school and a care center for people with special needs. The school is colorful and filled with their artwork. The students presented us with a butterfly painting that they made using finger painting.

The butterfly painting by the students of Leptir.

They chose a butterfly because Leptir means butterfly in Bosnian. The leader of the school explained that the school is called Leptir because, “We are all butterflies but we all come from unique cocoons.” The Leptir students especially enjoyed that drumming and dancing that was led by Kimani and the World Rhythm Ensemble.

They performed for us, we performed for them, and we sang together as well!

World Rhythm Ensemble at Leptir

After leaving Leptir, we drove to Mostar where we went on a tour of the famous bridge of Mostar and the town around it. We also went underground to see an archeological site of an old mosque that used to be there.

The Neretva River from the bridge.

The water here is beautiful and so clean. It seems like it is a big part of life here. We had a magnificent concert at a puppet theatre in Mostar. The choir from Mostar, who were all ladies dressed in blue, sang really well. The kids took selfies with my sister and I right after the concert, and we all had to say goodbye to our one-night hosts.

The previously mentioned "ladies in blue"

Aliana: On our way out of the theatre, the rain began to pour really hard, so we all had to grab something to put over our heads so that we would not get extremely soaked. Thankfully, a lot of us had umbrellas or raincoats. The bus had to park few minutes walk away and we had to deal with the rain on the way. Paula, our tour guide, was leading us along with Matthew who were both great in the situation. What at first seemed to be really stressful ended up being really funny. We eventually all accepted that we were getting soaked in the rain. When we reached the bus everyone was pretty wet but was in a mostly good mood. Singers made jokes that were really funny about being soaking wet and having to go back over the border into Croatia.

Fortunately (and unlike the first border crossing) we didn’t have to leave the bus this time. They collected our passports and quickly returned them. Then we were on our way to a hostel at our next destination: Metkovic, Croatia. We arrived, got our room assignments and got quickly into our beds after a long day.

Singer of the Day: Alexis, for surprising us all with an amazing Arabic solo in one of our collaborative pieces during the concert. She went up there and did a wonderful job and with excellent pronunciation!