Luka Gakić

Luka Gakić was born in 1985 in Bosnia and Herzegovina and came to London in 1992. He explains how when he goes to Bosnia he realises that people there have experienced things he has never experienced, and vice versa.

Listen to Luka (mp3, 390kb)

Transcript

'One of the things that alienates me from a lot of people, certainly in Sarajevo from all of the people, is that they have had an experience that I can't begin to imagine, and I have an experience conversely that they can't begin to imagine. It’s an experience that you can describe, but it’s a kind of, it’s a description that when I hear you describing it, I can't really picture what you’re telling me.

'And just in the way that when I describe my education, my schools and various silly little traditions I did at Harrow and the fact that we had to wear straw hats to school and things like that - like sure, they can I suppose picture that in some way, but just in the way that I can never comprehend what I'm being told, they can never really comprehend what they’re being told.

'And I think that immediately separates me from anyone who stayed behind in the war… You know, not being able to leave your house, your flat and your block of apartments for three and a half years, you know, eating plain, sometimes uncooked rice for three years.Like these, these are things that I can imagine people doing - but I can't comprehend, you know, I really can't.'

Copyright Evelyn Oldfield Unit