PEACE AND GOOD LINGERIE TO ALL

The people of Sarajevo are vanquishing their

erstwhile tormentors with merrymaking and clean underwear, writes Patrick Bishop Sarajevo NOW THAT a solid peace seems to be settling on Sarajevo, the shops are filling up with goods. First to appear were gro- ceries: bottles and tins and swaying sides of dried meat, stacked up in what once would have seemed like hallucinatory abundance. Next came knickers. Walking through the supposedly sternly Islamic old town, I noticed every other store seems to be sell- ing lingerie.

`No one could get underwear for four years, except what was sent in by the aid agencies,' explained a young woman. 'It's the first thing everyone wants to buy.'

This heartening development suggests that after nearly four years of suffering, food and sex have replaced death as the chief preoccupations of Sarajevans. Truly, the city is returning to something like nor- mality. The tang of fear is missing from the air. You can stroll rather than scuttle across the hazardous intersections where the concrete sniper screens will, in a few years (please God), be historical curiosi- ties, the Balkan equivalent of an Anderson shelter in the backyard. To the fury of the Serbs who ran them, the checkpoints on the roads out of town have been bulldozed away and the little Hitlers who manned them returned to impotence and obscurity. At night the city glitters with glorious elec- tricity, mocking the tormentors in the dis- mal hills, above which they must look down and rage at what they are missing. Sarajevans pride themselves on their appetite for fun. Over Christmas they were determined to prove it. Christmas Eve was strangely, almost tropically warm. The streets were heaving with revellers. The main disco, 'BB', was packed with adoles- cent girls and boys obeying in advance the injunction that would be given by Cardinal Puljic at midnight Mass in the cathedral, to `turn Sarajevo into a city of joy'.

At the Pension Hondo — a cosy hack hangout — Fiko, the owner, had decked the place with baubles, plastic Christmas trees and Santas. Fiko is a Muslim, as are most of Sarajevo's citizens, but with ecu- menical impartiality, they are happy to cel- ebrate any religious festival as long as there is a knees-up involved. Even at the worst times, Sarajevans maintained a deep dedication to enjoying themselves, stubbornly returning to the bars and cafés the moment that shelling conditions allowed. Many of the inhabi- tants have doctorates in the art of partying.

This point seems to have been lost on some of the stars of stage, screen and pul- pit who are now flocking to the place, earnestly determined to show the inhabi- tants a good time. This week the post-war celebrity list was headed by Bono of the pop group U2, in town for a New Year concert.

Sarajevo always attracted a number of war tourists, but at least the likes of Susan Sontag and Joan Baez turned up while the shells were still falling.

The most significant new arrivals, though, are the Americans of the Nato- led Implementation Force, who now buzz around town in their broad, squat Humvee jeeps, the Arnie Schwarzeneggers of the vehicular world. The locals are delighted to see them. For them, America still means hope and prosperity. The veteran hacks are less pleased. For them it means no tables in their favourite restaurants, now crowded with GI Johnny-come-latelies.

The press corps views peace with mixed feelings. There is relief and gratitude that the killing has stopped, but somehow the old place isn't the same. Without the gun- fire and the sinister charm lent by proximi- ty to death, which invested the shattered buildings and mortar-splashed roads and pavements with a diabolical chic, Sarajevo almost seems just another war-ravaged Bosnian city.

Almost but not quite. Normality will never be able to reduce Sarajevo to ordi- nariness. Something great happened during the years of siege that must be set against all the black evil that was done in the war. Despite death, hunger and humiliation, the inhabitants never lost their sense of dignity.

If the pattern established in the rest of Bosnia had prevailed, neighbour would have turned on neighbour and the Serb and Croat minorities would have been driven out, leaving the place in the hands of viru- lent Muslim nationalists.

Yet in the middle of the madness, sub- jected to the psychological and physical torture of bombardment and encirclement, sanity, decency and humanity won. Signifi- cant numbers of Serbs and Croats elected to stay on.

Cynics argue that the pre-war tradition of tolerance in the city has been exaggerat- ed — harmony was enforced by the iron fist of communist rulers, only too aware of what would happen if nationalist aspira- tions were allowed to stir.

If so, the policy has worked remarkably well. Questions about people's attitude to ethnicity and willingness to live again alongside the Bosnian Serbs are answered with the neatness of a catechism response.

Yet the sentiments seem real enough. On Christmas Day, at the Pension Hondo, the proprietor's wife was showing off the photos of the wedding of her son, now liv- ing in Germany. She pointed proudly at the bride. 'A doctor,' she said, adding proudly, `And a Serb.'

Sarajevo has provided the world with an epic example of grace under pressure. Bono and the rest of the compassion trip- pers should be visiting the city in the spirit of pilgrimage, seeking humbly to learn, not to bestow.

If Bosnia's communities are to be recon- ciled, Sarajevo will provide the model and the inspiration. When the international donors start reaching into their pockets for the money to rebuild Bosnia, Sarajevo and its heros and heroines should be at the top of the list and nothing should be begrudged them. Give them bread. But give them Wonderbras too.

Patrick Bishop covered the war in Bosnia for the Daily Telegraph of which he is now for- eign editor.