Hope Takes Flight in Kosovo, Yael Sachs,
Goodthings.com
This personal account of Kosovo from a transplant to the region
offers a much more uplifting portrayal than news reports of its
civil-war aftermath. Yael Sachs’s letter, posted on
Goodthings.com, relays the writer’s fond encounters
with Kosovars, whom she finds to be ‘exceedingly warm and
hospitable.’ Two examples of this affability especially stand out
in her mind: 16-year-old Anisa and 18-year-old Lavdrim,
enthusiastic students who attend one of Kosovo’s ravaged schools.
Although ethnic tension is still very strong in Kosovo, Sachs says
the youths are working for tolerance. She tells of the duo’s
outlook for their homeland, their actions to help wipe out
prejudices between people of differing ethnicities, and their eager
plans for their own futures. ‘For the first time, when asking
Kosovars about their take on the ethnic tension between the
Serbians and Albanians, I met an untarnished vision of coexistence
and goodwill,’ she writes.
–Julie Madsen
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