Bosnians

Following the fall of the Soviet Union and the subsequent downfall of European communism, the unity of the multinational Yugoslavs began to slowly unravel.

There had always been a degree of animosity between Serbs, Croats, Albanians, and Bosnians, but as ethnic tensions simmered away following various political confrontations, a violent, xenophobic conflagration seemed almost inevitable.

One particular event that preceded this inter-ethnic conflict was the segregation of high schools in an area known as Kosovo.

Serbian political leaders believed they needed to protect the integrity of their culture and language, insisting it was superior to the region's ethnic groups.

for whom, uh,

are we trying to preserve this this town of ours or this country of ours uh more broadly speaking um because this is also something public hasn't been talking about like since never so uh is maribor a slovene town is maribor a what kind of town is it town of i don't know nepalese Filipinese, Serbians, Bosnians, the whole world, or is it a Slovene town? Although mixed, of course mixed, with relatively many immigrants.

It used to be from ex-Yugoslavia, of course.

But this was supposed to be a Slovene town.

mom and her side of the family left a little earlier so while they had to suffer through some of the war's earlier stages they thankfully escaped before the war in bosnia kicked off my dad on the other hand stayed in obadi to protect his family even when other bosnian families were fleeing to europe the uk or america and this was because at first he didn't think that they had anything to worry about without getting into too much detail and please don't crucify me in the comments for oversimplifying this The factions in the Bosnian Civil War were as follows.

The Serbs were the minority while the Bosnians and the Croats formed the majority.

And at first, the Bosnians and the Croats were on the same side, so it looked like they were going to win.

But then the Bosnian Serbs started getting backing from their much stronger motherland, Serbia, which really turned the tides of the battle and prolonged the war.

And so my dad and his family went from feeling safe up in the mountains...

All they could do was run or lay low, but all the same men were shot, cut down by machine guns, or picked off by the Serb snipers.

All my dad said he could do was run and just pray a Serb bullet didn't find its way to him.

And by some miracle, my dad made it to the tree line, escaped the Serbs, and then managed to circle around the back of them when they swept in to finish off the wounded Bosnians and burn Obadi to the ground.