Janine di Giovanni: What I saw in the war

Translator: Joseph Geni Reviewer: Morton Bast

Translator: Nika Ambrožič Reviewer: Rok Krulec

This is how war starts.

Vojna se začne tako.

One day you're living your ordinary life,

Danes živite svoje vsakdanje življenje,

you're planning to go to a party,

načrtujete obisk zabave,

you're taking your children to school,

peljete svoje otroke v šolo,

you're making a dentist appointment.

se naročate k zobozdravniku.

The next thing, the telephones go out,

Nato pa so izklopljeni telefoni,

the TVs go out, there's armed men on the street,

ne dela televizija, na ulicah so oboroženi ljudje,

there's roadblocks.

na cestah zapore.

Your life as you know it goes into suspended animation.

Življenje, ki ga poznate, navidezno izgine.

It stops.

Ustavi se.

I'm going to steal a story from a friend of mine,

Ukradla bom zgodbo prijateljice

a Bosnian friend, about what happened to her,

iz Bosne o tem, kaj se ji je zgodilo,

because I think it will illustrate for you exactly what it feels like.

ker se mi zdi, da vam bo prikazalo, kakšen je ta občutek.

She was walking to work one day in April, 1992,

Nekega aprilskega dne leta 1992 je bila na poti v službo

in a miniskirt and high heels. She worked in a bank.

v minikrilu in v visokih petah. Delala je banki.

She was a young mother. She was someone who liked to party.

BIla je mlada mamica. Rada je hodila na zabave.

Great person.

Krasen človek.

And suddenly she sees a tank

Naenkrat pa zagleda tank,

ambling down the main road of Sarajevo

ki se plazi po glavni cesti Sarajeva

knocking everything out of its path.

in gazi vse pred seboj.

She thinks she's dreaming, but she's not.

Zdi se ji, da sanja, pa ne.

And she runs as any of us would have done

Kot bi storil kdorkoli izmed nas, steče

and takes cover, and she hides behind a trash bin,

in se skrije za smetnjak

in her high heels and her miniskirt.

v svojih petah in minikrilu.

And as she's hiding there, she's feeling ridiculous,

Med skrivanjem se počuti trapasto,

but she's seeing this tank go by with soldiers

ampak pred seboj vidi ta tank z vojaki,

and people all over the place and chaos

ljudi povsod naokrog in kaos

and she thinks, "I feel like Alice in Wonderland

in pomisli: "Počutim se kot Alica v Čudežni deželi,

going down the rabbit hole,

ki pada v zajčjo luknjo;

down, down, down into chaos,

dol, dol, dol v kaos

and my life will never be the same again."

in moje življenje nikoli več ne bo isto."

A few weeks later, my friend was in a crowd of people

Nekaj tednov kasneje je bila moja prijateljica v množici ljudi

pushing with her infant son in her arms

in se je s svojim fantkom v naročju prerivala,

to give him to a stranger on a bus,

da bi ga dala neznancu na avtobusu,

which was one of the last buses leaving Sarajevo

ki je bil eden zadnjih, ki je zapuščal Sarajevo,

to take children out so they could be safe.

da bi otroke spravili na varno.

And she remembers struggling with her mother to the front,

Spominja se, da se je z mamo prerivala na čelo

crowds and crowds of people, "Take my child! Take my child!"

velike množice ljudi: "Vzemite mojega otroka! Vzemite mojega otroka!"

and passing her son to someone through a window.

in da je svojega sina podala nekomu skozi okno.

And she didn't see him for years.

Ni ga videla več let.

The siege went on for three and a half years,

Mesto so oblegali tri leta in pol

and it was a siege without water,

in med tem niso imeli vode,

without power, without electricity, without heat, without food,

energije, elektrike, gretja, ali hrane

in the middle of Europe, in the middle of the 20th century.

sredi Evrope, sredi 20. stoletja.

I had the honor of being one of those reporters

Imela sem čast, da sem bila eden izmed novinarjev,

that lived through that siege,

ki so bili priča temu obleganju.

and I say I have the honor and the privilege of being there

Pravim, da je bila čast in priložnost, da sem lahko bila tam,

because it's taught me everything,

ker sem se naučila vsega,

not just about being a reporter, but about being a human being.

ne le o poročanju, temveč tudi o tem, kako biti človek.

I learned about compassion.

Naučila sem se sočutja.

I learned about ordinary people who could be heroes.

Spoznala sem navadne ljudi, ki so bili heroji.

I learned about sharing. I learned about camaraderie.

Naučila sem se deliti. Naučila sem se kolegialnosti.

Most of all, I learned about love.

A predvsem sem se naučila ljubezni.

Even in the midst of terrible destruction and death and chaos,

Celo sredi groznega uničenja, smrti in kaosa

I learned how ordinary people could help their neighbors,

sem spoznala, kako lahko običajni ljudje pomagajo sosedom,

share food, raise their children,

si delijo hrano, vzgajajo otroke,

drag someone who's being sniped at from the middle of the road

zvlečejo nekoga s ceste, ker streljajo nanj,

even though you yourself were endangering your life,

čeprav tako ogrožajo svoje življenje,

helping people get into taxis who were injured

pomagajo poškodovancem v taksije,

to try to take them to hospitals.

da bi jih lahko odpeljali v bolnišnico.

I learned so much about myself.

Toliko sem se naučila o sebi.

Martha Gellhorn, who's one of my heroes, once said,

Martha Gellhorn, ena izmed mojih vzornikov, je nekoč dejala:

"You can only love one war. The rest is responsibility."

"Ljubiš lahko le eno vojno. Ostale so odgovornost."

I went on to cover many, many, many wars after that,

Kasneje sem poročala o zelo zelo veliko vojnah,

so many that I lost count,

toliko, da jih ne znam niti prešteti,

but there was nothing like Sarajevo.

a nobena ni bila taka kot v Sarajevu.

Last April, I went back to a very strange --

Lanski april sem šla na zelo čudno,

what I called a deranged high school reunion.

čemur bi rekla prismuknjeno obletnico mature.

What it was, was the 20th anniversary of the siege,

To je bila 20. obletnica obleganja,

the beginning of the siege of Sarajevo,

pričetka obleganja Sarajeva,

and I don't like the word "anniversary," because it sounds like a party,

a ne maram besede "obletnica", ker se sliši kot zabava,

and this was not a party.

to pa ni bila nobena zabava.

It was a very somber gathering of the reporters

To je bilo temačen shod novinarjev,

that worked there during the war, humanitarian aid workers,

ki so tam delali med vojno, humanitarnih delavcev

and of course the brave and courageous people of Sarajevo themselves.

in seveda pogumnih in hrabrih prebivalcev Sarajeva.

And the thing that struck me the most,

Kar me je še najbolj presenetilo

that broke my heart,

in mi strlo srce,

was walking down the main street of Sarajevo,

je bil sprehod po glavni ulici Sarajeva,

where my friend Aida saw the tank coming 20 years ago,

kjer je moja prijateljica Aida pred 20 leti videla tank.

and in that road were more than 12,000 red chairs,

Na tej ulici je bilo več kot 12.000 rdečih stolov,

empty,

ki so bili prazni,

and every single one of them symbolized

in vsak izmed njih je predstavljal

a person who had died during the siege,

nekoga, ki je umrl med obleganjem

just in Sarajevo, not in all of Bosnia,

in to samo v Sarajevu, niti ne v celi Bosni.

and it stretched from one end of the city

Raztezalo se je

to a large part of it,

skozi večino mesta

and the saddest for me were the tiny little chairs

in najbolj žalostna stvar so bili majhni rdeči stolčki

for the children.

za otroke.

I now cover Syria,

Zdaj poročam iz Sirije,

and I started reporting it because I believed that

s čimer sem začela, ker sem verjela,

it needs to be done.

da se to mora storiti.

I believe a story there has to be told.

Verjamem, da se mora njihovo zgodbo povedati.

I see, again, a template of the war in Bosnia.

Zopet vidim šablono vojne v Bosni.

And when I first arrived in Damascus,

Ko sem prispela v Damask,

I saw this strange moment where people

sem doživela nenavaden trenutek, ker ljudje

didn't seem to believe that war was going to descend,

niso verjeli, da se bo vojna zares zgodila.

and it was exactly the same in Bosnia

Bilo je natanko tako kot v Bosni

and nearly every other country I've seen where war comes.

in v vsaki drugi državi, kjer sem videla prihod vojne.

People don't want to believe it's coming,

Ljudje nočejo verjeti, da prihaja,

so they don't leave, they don't leave before they can.

in ne odidejo, ko bi lahko odšli.

They don't get their money out.

Ne dvignejo denarja.

They stay because you want to stay in your home.

Ostanejo, ker hočejo ostati doma.

And then war and chaos descend.

Potem prideta vojna in kaos.

Rwanda is a place that haunts me a lot.

Pogosto me preganja Ruanda.

In 1994, I briefly left Sarajevo to go report the genocide in Rwanda.

Leta 1994 sem za kratek čas zapustila Sarajevo, da bi lahko poročala o genocidu v Ruandi.

Between April and August, 1994,

Med aprilom in avgustom 1994

one million people were slaughtered.

so pomorili milijon ljudi.

Now if those 12,000 chairs freaked me out

Če me je prestrašilo 12.000 stolov

with the sheer number,

že zaradi številke same,

I want you just for a second to think of a million people.

bi rada, da si za trenutek predstavljate milijon ljudi.

And to give you some example, I remember

Naj vam podam primer: spomnim se,

standing and looking down a road as far as I could see,

da sem stala na ulici in gledala v daljavo,

at least a mile, and there were bodies piled twice my height

kjer sem vsaj kak kilometer videla par metrov visoke kupe

of the dead.

trupel.

And that was just a small percentage of the dead.

To je bil le majhen delček mrtvih.

And there were mothers holding their children

Na njih so bili otroci v objemih mater,

who had been caught in their last death throes.

ki so jih objele v zadnjih izdihljajih.

So we learn a lot from war,

Veliko se naučimo iz vojne

and I mention Rwanda

in Ruando sem omenila,

because it is one place, like South Africa,

ker je to kraj, kot je Južna Afrika,

where nearly 20 years on, there is healing.

kjer se 20 let kasneje celijo rane.

Fifty-six percent of the parliamentarians are women,

56 odstotkov poslancev so ženske,

which is fantastic,

kar je neverjetno,

and there's also within the national constitution now,

in celo v državni ustavi je,

you're actually not allowed to say Hutu or Tutsi.

da se ne sme uporabljati besed Hutu in Tutsi.

You're not allowed to identify anyone by ethnicity,

Nikogar se ne sme identificirati glede na etnično pripadnost,

which is, of course, what started the slaughter in the first place.

saj je to začelo pomor.

And an aid worker friend of mine told me the most beautiful story,

Prijateljica, ki je humanitarna delavka, mi je povedala prekrasno zgodbo,

or I find it beautiful.

vsaj meni se zdi prelepa.

There was a group of children, mixed Hutus and Tutsis,

Obstajala je mešana skupina otrok, ki so bil Hutu in Tutsi,

and a group of women who were adopting them,

in žensk, ki so jih posvajale.

and they lined up and one was just given to the next.

Postavili so jih v vrsti in vsak je šel k naslednji v vrsti.

There was no kind of compensation for, you're a Tutsi,

Nobenega oklevanja ni bilo, če je bil nekdo Tutsi

you're a Hutu, you might have killed my mother,

ali Hulu, kar bi lahko pomenilo, da je bil odgovoren za umor matere

you might have killed my father.

ali očeta.

They were just brought together in this kind of reconciliation,

Skupaj so jih privedli, da bi se pobotali,

and I find this remarkable.

in to se mi zdi neverjetno.

So when people ask me how I continue to cover war,

Ko me ljudje sprašujejo, kako to, da še vedno poročam o vojni

and why I continue to do it,

in zakaj nadaljujem,

this is why.

je to razlog.

When I go back to Syria, next week in fact,

Ko bom šla nazaj v Sirijo, to bo naslednji teden,

what I see is incredibly heroic people,

bom videla neverjetno pogumne ljudi,

some of them fighting for democracy,

od katerih se bodo nekateri borili za demokracijo,

for things we take for granted every single day.

za reči, ki se nam zdijo samoumevne.

And that's pretty much why I do it.

Zato to počnem.

In 2004, I had a little baby boy,

Leta 2004 sem rodila fantka,

and I call him my miracle child,

ki mu pravim čudežni otrok,

because after seeing so much death

saj se je po toliko smrti,

and destruction and chaos and darkness in my life,

uničenju, kaosu in temi, ki sem jih videla v življenju,

this ray of hope was born.

rodil ta žarek upanja.

And I called him Luca, which means "The bringer of light,"

Poimenovala sem ga Luca, kar pomeni "prinašalec luči",

because he does bring light to my life.

ker mi v življenje prinaša luč.

But I'm talking about him because when he was four months old,

Govorim o njem, ker me je, ko je bil star 4 mesece,

my foreign editor forced me to go back to Baghdad

moj urednik za zunanje zadeve prisilil, da sem šla v Bagdad,

where I had been reporting all throughout the Saddam regime

od koder sem poročala vseskozi Sadamov režim,

and during the fall of Baghdad and afterwards,

med padcem Bagdada in po njem.

and I remember getting on the plane in tears,

Spomnim se, da sem se vkrcala na letalo v solzah.

crying to be separated from my son,

Jokala sem, ker sem bila ločena sina.

and while I was there,

Ko sem bila tam,

a quite famous Iraqi politician who was a friend of mine

me je slaven iraški politik, ki je bil moj prijatelj,

said to me, "What are you doing here?

vprašal: "Kaj delaš tu?

Why aren't you home with Luca?"

Zakaj nisi doma pri Luci?"

And I said, "Well, I have to see." It was 2004

Rekla sem: "Moram videti." Bilo je leto 2004,

which was the beginning of the incredibly bloody time in Iraq,

ko se je v Iraku začelo zelo krvavo obdobje:

"I have to see, I have to see what is happening here.

"Moram videti, kaj se dogaja tu.

I have to report it."

O tem moram poročati."

And he said, "Go home,

Rekel je: "Pojdi domov,

because if you miss his first tooth,

ker, če boš zamudila njegov prvi zob,

if you miss his first step, you'll never forgive yourself.

njegov prvi korak, si ne boš nikoli odpustila.

But there will always be another war."

A vedno bo nekje še kaka vojne."

And there, sadly, will always be wars.

Na žalost bodo vedno vojne.

And I am deluding myself if I think, as a journalist,

Sama sebe slepim, ko razmišljam o tem, kaj lahko kot novinarka,

as a reporter, as a writer,

kot poročevalka, kot pisateljica

what I do can stop them. I can't.

storim, da jih zaustavim. Ne morem.

I'm not Kofi Annan. He can't stop a war.

Nisem Kofi Annan. On ne more ustaviti vojne.

He tried to negotiate Syria and couldn't do it.

Poskušal se je pogajati s Sirijo, a mu ni uspelo.

I'm not a U.N. conflict resolution person.

Nisem odgovorna oseba OZN za reševanje konfliktov.

I'm not even a humanitarian aid doctor,

Nisem niti humanitarna zdravnica

and I can't tell you the times of how helpless I've felt

in ne morem vam povedati, kolikokrat sem se počutila nebogljeno,

to have people dying in front of me, and I couldn't save them.

ker se pred menoj umirali ljudje, ki jih nisem mogla rešiti.

All I am is a witness.

Sem samo priča.

My role is to bring a voice to people who are voiceless.

Moja naloga je, da ljudem brez glasu dam glas.

A colleague of mine described it as to shine a light

Moj kolega je to opisal kot "posvetiti z lučjo

in the darkest corners of the world.

v najbolj temne kotičke sveta."

And that's what I try to do.

To poskušam storiti.

I'm not always successful,

Nisem vedno uspešna

and sometimes it's incredibly frustrating,

in včasih me to zelo razjezi,

because you feel like you're writing into a void,

ker se počutim, kot da gre moje pisanje v nič,

or you feel like no one cares.

da nikomur ni mar.

Who cares about Syria? Who cares about Bosnia?

Koga briga Sirija? Koga briga Bosna?

Who cares about the Congo,

Koga briga Kongo,

the Ivory Coast, Liberia, Sierra Leone,

Slonokoščena obala, Liberija, Sierra Leone,

all of these strings of places that

vsi te kraji,

I will remember for the rest of my life?

ki se jih bom jaz spominjala do konca življenja?

But my métier is to bear witness

Moje poslanstvo je biti priča

and that is the crux, the heart of the matter,

in to je jedro, to je srce zadeve,

for us reporters who do this.

razlog, zakaj to novinarji počnemo.

And all I can really do is hope,

Lahko le verjamemo,

not to policymakers or politicians,

ne v politike ali v tiste, ki sprejemajo odločitve,

because as much as I'd like to have faith

saj, čeprav bi rada verjela,

that they read my words and do something,

da berejo moje besede in glede tega kaj storijo,

I don't delude myself.

se ne zavajam.

But what I do hope is that if you remember anything I said

Upam pa, da, če si boste do jutri zapomnili karkoli,

or any of my stories tomorrow morning over breakfast,

od mojih zgodb,

if you can remember the story of Sarajevo,

si boste zapomnili zgodbo o Sarajevu

or the story of Rwanda,

ali o Ruandi,

then I've done my job.

to pomeni, da sem opravila svoje delo.

Thank you very much.

Najlepša hvala.

(Applause)

(aplavz)