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James Mason | all galleries >> Galleries >> Journalists > BBC in Kiseljak
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BBC in Kiseljak

I hooked up with the BBC at a small hotel in Kiseljak. We were headed to Tuzla for the anticipated circus with the evacuation of refugees from Srebrenica. The BBC had very graciously offered me a ride up the road. This little hotel had a bar with a pool table. While I was enjoying a beer and reading a Croatian paper a "famous" North American photographer appeared. He also was headed up the road. We played some pool and chatted while waiting for our rides. Five Croatian paramilitaries came in, most extreme members of the most extreme element. They sullenly eyed the two foreigners.....finally one walked over and said to me in Croatian, "we don't speak English, but we don't like the way this guy relates to you. Do you want us to take him outside and teach him a good lesson?" It was true, the famous guy was really condescending. But I told the Croat that I was bored and I found his irritating manner to be a diversion. The famous guy never knew how I'd saved his hide that day. My ride came first and I was hoping that the Croats would be left alone with the big star, but they left when I did. Interpreter Vera Kordić on the right, driver and all around useful guy Elvis Barukčić in the middle. He is now a Facebook friend. On the left is Katie, I think. She was very helpful and I am sorry I don't remember her name.


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Anthony Massey 29-Jul-2011 22:34
On the left with a rucksack is BBC producer Katie Finigan. On the right is BBC fixer Vera Kordic. Katie left the BBC in 2010 but her husband is still a cameraman with us in News. I believe Vera still works as a journalist in her home city of Zagreb. The BBC base in Kiseljak was the Hotel Continental, famous for its bean soup, and this picture is taken outside this famous hostelry. Turn right to go to Sarajevo, left to Vitez or Tuzla. Those crates take me back - how many gallons of Fructal we all drank. But in besieged Sarajevo that quantity of soft drinks would have been worth a lot of money. I once bought back a stolen BBC car for fewer bottles of Coke and Fructal than you see in the picture.