MY REFLECTION ON THE PROTEST Yere Woo

As I was dressing for the first protest of UDIK and my first peace action participation in Sarajevo, many questions circulated through my mind. What will the 1 hour look like? WouldI be accepted even as a foreigner? Are my shoes black enough for the dress code? I met Edvin on the way to a Seminar on Genocide Prevention organized by the Post-Conflict Research Center a couple weeks before. His unfettered passion for his work began from the morning we met in Sarajevo to take a shuttle to Skopje till the last sentence was spoken at the conference. Upon returning to Sarajevo, he invited me to participate in UDIK’s protest, and I couldn’t resist. When I got to the cathedral with my inadequately black shoes, I saw the group of young activists preparing for the hour with coffee and conversation. They warmly welcomed me and soon Edvin had ten of us lined up in front of the cathedral with the banner inscribed “nationalism kills.” At first I worried about the reception as the crowd looked on and people took photographs of us. Then a woman with a stern face walked up and stood beside us. Then a group of young students came over. And slowly the group grew, ebbing and flowing throughout the hour. It was then that I realized what simple action can do; it awakens dormant passivity and empowers connectivity. These seeds of action have changed societies throughout history. It brought about the end of segregation in the United States and colonial rule.

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