February 12, 1994|By Dan Fesperman | Dan Fesperman,Sun Staff Correspondent
For heating and cooking, the son, Darko, has tapped into a gas line with ill-suited equipment purchased on the black market. A striped garden hose carries the gas into their apartment through a hole in the plaster, hooking up with a homemade copper burner in the electric oven. That doubles as heater and cooker. A second hose spurts a small jet of gas for the only light in the house.
Such systems are common, and risky. On some days the Kosevo Hospital treats more gas burns than war wounds. But usually the pressure is pitifully low. It can take half an hour to bring water to a boil, and in the Jevtics' kitchen it is still cold enough to see your breath.
Darko Jevtic's mother, Maria, points to a large pot of beans on the stove. "That will feed us for maybe three days," she says. "The only thing we have to eat other than the beans is rice."
They grow cabbage in a small back lot, but can harvest only a leaf or two a day if they want to keep the supply going.
The Jevtics have a small radio, but it's down to the last battery. At night they usually talk for a while after dinner, then pile on the wool blankets and sleep.
The father of the house left Sarajevo with their youngest son, now 13, during the first month of the war. They're in Serbia, and can only get in touch with the family every few months by ham radio.
Divided families are common. When Bosnian Serb artillery units first surrounded the city, many families sent their youngest children away on bus convoys, usually accompanied by one parent. The other parent stayed to protect the home, never imagining the war would last so long or that they would be trapped in the city.
As is often the case here, the Jevtics are an ethnic mix. Maria Jevtic is a Croatian Catholic. Her mother Radmila is a Croat who married a Serb. Maria's husband and two sons are Muslim.
This makes it all the harder for them to understand why the war is being fought along the lines of ethnic and religious differences. "If we are all supposed to be divided up," Maria Jevticasks. "then where is this family supposed to live? Each in a different house?"
As Maria Jevtic speaks, a distant siren wails, signaling a general alert. A visiting neighbor, Dragica Cemalovic, says everyone ignores the warnings. A shell can fall any time at any place, she says, so why bother. She then asks an American visitor, "Will Clinton help us, do you think?"
Maria Jevtic stopped pondering that question long ago. With a thin smile she points skyward, telling her neighbor, "Only God will help us."
Dreaming of the future has become one of the least desirable pastimes. After 22 months it is simply too painful.
But sometimes they can't help themselves.
Gordana Knezevic, deputy editor-in-chief of the daily newspaper Oslobodenje recently allowed herself such a moment.
"I imagine a time when I am sitting in my living room, reading a book," she says. "My family is together again, and my children are playing outside in the sun without having to be scared to death they will be hit by a shell or a sniper. I am thinking about how nice it is to taste different foods again. I am thinking of how lovely it is to wash my hands with soap and warm water again."
For the gravediggers, any thought of the future includes the prospect they could end up in one of their own holes. They've already buried a few co-workers.
"If there was no snow today, you would see the grenade markings," Mr. Muharemovic says. "Four who are working here today have suffered minor wounds on the job. When grenades fell on one funeral, a man walking only 2 meters in front of me was killed."
Funeral processions have often been a favorite target of Bosnian Serb gun crews, making last week's deadly explosion doubly dangerous.
As Mr. Muharemovic resumes digging, a rifle shot echoes sharply from the hills to the north. None of the gravediggers looks up. Each learned long ago which sounds mean danger and which are harmless.
"It is a quiet morning," Mr. Meharemovic says, still bending to his work. "A quiet day."
TOMORROW: Love in the smoke and candlelight among Sarajevo's lost generation.
