During the siege of Sarajevo, it was a constant struggle to maintain faith and hope. Allowing the Serbian nationalists to demoralize us was considered just as much a failure as any massacre, any atrocity.

Artists in the city organized plays, screened films, held poetry recitals, and constructed everything from small football courts to Italian pizzarias underground - away from the constant danger of mortar shells and sniper's bullets. It was all an attempt, as Alma Duran said, "to show those beasts that are killing us that life will triumph over death."

It was also an expression of intellectual superiorty against those primitive minds that were destroying one of God's greatest cities to achieve immoral and fascist objectives. When the Serbs spraypainted "This is Serbia!" on the side of the post office, someone in Sarajevo spraypainted the response, "This is a post office, you peasant."

One of the greatest symbols of this surreal resistence was the Miss Sarajevo Under Siege pageant. Girls wore combat uniforms and army boots, carried guns, and walked on stage with beautiful smiles before a crowd of Bosnians, United Nations officials, foreign media personnel, and Holiday Inn staff.


The winner that night was a young girl from the Dobrinja district of Sarajevo, nicknamed Little Hiroshima for the amount of destruction it bore on the front lines.

Inela Nogic accepted her crown (and AK-47) by explaining this was her way of fighting. She instantly became a legend.


After seeing a CNN interview with Inela Nogic in which she responded to the question, "What will you do with your year as Miss Sarajevo?" by saying, "I have no plans, I could be dead tomorrow." the band U2 took a song written about her, Miss Sarajevo, and made it famous around the world.