You'll notice, first of all, that I have added several links to other blogs along the side. I think you should definitely check out my sister-in-law's, as she can probably offer you the most clues as to why I am so screwed up...for those of you who are desperately trying to figure that out. For the rest of you, just read it because she writes good.

I'm actually beginning this post fairly close to midnight...so it's possible that it might end up as a Saturday post instead of a Friday post. Today, as I arrived home from the end of a particularly grueling week at work, I realized that today marks the one year anniversary of the date which I returned home from Kosovo. I was looking at my pictures from that trip earlier this week, and experienced this sort of...sadness...that is hard to put into words. Particularly when I'd see the pictures of the buildings that had been completely destroyed, and the sheer poverty in which most of the people live. It's really a different world. A country without its own government, its own currency, its own banking system. In fact there's no banking system at all- every transaction is done in cash. But at the same time, the people there have this quiet mix of happiness and sadness about them. It's almost impossible to explain unless you've been there and I'm pretty sure I'm not doing it any justice at all.

There was this girl there named Bardha. She's about 17 years old now, I think. Anyway, she and this other boy named Dardan sort of were my two favorites there. Bardha was really quiet and shy, and somewhat sad...understandably so. It's no exaggeration to say that anytime I talked to her or even looked at her, I would just feel this incredible burden of sadness. A massacre took place in the city of Suva Reka, in which almost an entire family was assassinated inside a pizza parlor by Serbian forces. I saw that pizza parlor last year...it's a burned out shell of a building that they are not going to ever repair. As I understand, they're leaving it as it is, as a memorial.

What's also kind of sad is the....I guess the only way to say it is ignorance...of many of the ethnic Albanians there. They all suffered hardships at the hands of the Serbs. So, understandably so, many of them harbor a deep hatred of the Serbs. Serbians who still live in Kosovo have to live in walled off areas, protected by UN troops, otherwise they'd be attacked by the Albanians. I think many of us made the natural mistake of adopting the Albanian's attitude toward the Serbs. To be honest, it was hard not to. When you looked around and saw the utter devastation and heard the stories of what they had suffered, it really made you mad. However, to expand the actions of some Serbs in order to condemn all Serbs is tantamount to the very racism of which the Serbs were accused.

I think the same can be said of Germany. I think the tendency to hold modern Germans in contempt for the crimes of the Third Reich is a narrowminded view...although also understandable. I say this because I have friends and family who are German and the attitude of Germans today is 180 degrees from that of Germans in the 30s and 40s. Still, everytime I meet a German who is over 65 or so, I can't help but wonder what they did.

This is something I've thought about quite a bit over the last few years, largely because of where I used to work. My job there was basically just to listen to and research the testimonies of Holocaust survivors. I heard stories that would make one's blood run cold. (As a side note, I think my experience there also enabled me to be able to listen to the stories of people in Kosovo. Whatever they told me, I'd probably heard worse.) But at the same time, one has to realize that many of these survivors would not have survived were it not for the kindness of some German who risked their own safety. These ranged from families who took Jewish children in and raised them as their own to SS guards in camps who simply looked the other way as a prisoner escaped from a camp or ghetto.

So to say that all Germans are guilty of the Holocaust is not accurate. To say that all Serbs are guilty of ethnic cleansing in Kosovo is not accurate. Some Germans, yes. (Too many, in fact.) Some Serbs, yes. But to hold every generation accountable for the crimes of one generation is just wrong.

Anyway....sorry for that serious and pensive musing. It was all sparked by the anniversary of my return from Kosovo. Perhaps tomorrow I'll regale you with tales of levity.