User:Swebos/sandbox

= Memory Flower =

Memory Flower is a symbol of genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and a clear reminder of the greatest war crime in Europe since World War II.

Although it is connected to the 8,372 victims of genocide in Srebrenica, and many do call it Srebrenica Flower, it actually stands for the victims of all mass executions of Bosniaks in places like Prijedor, Kozarac, Foča, Višegrad, and other municipalities.

Memory Flower is made by the crocheting association “Gračaničko keranje”, situated in the northeast of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The original idea came from the former Grand Mufti of the Islamic Community in Bosnia and Herzegovina Mustafa ef. Cerić. The conceptual design was made by Jasminka Čamdžić, and out of the five samples she proposed, the flower that everyone wears today was chosen.

Each flower is crocheted by a skilled master and it requires a great deal of patience to produce. The women who make Memory Flowers are survivors and related to victims of war. They often do it in company, sharing war stories and prayers with each other. Therefore, each individual flower represents one woman, carries a story and some painful memory, but also love. Those who wear the Memory Flower take on the responsibility to pass on the collective memory of genocide.

Azemina Ahmedbegović, the President of the crocheting association, says, “Each flower is authentic and unique. None is identical to any other. Standardization makes no sense, because each flower has its own identity, its own story that is tied to a particular individual. Each speaks of those 8,372 people who lost their lives in Srebrenica. Nowadays, everyone is looking for this flower, so I am both happy and sad - happy because people want it, and sad because I cannot reach everyone.”

Memory Flower is not a commercial project. Women from Gračanica believe that commercialization is not befitting the memory of the victims symbolized by each flower. Their goal is that everyone wears the flower. Prominent personalities such as Ban Ki-moon, Pope Francis, Angelina Jolie, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Eric Cantona, and many more have worn it, testifying that the women of Gračanica have succeeded in conveying the truth.

Memory Flower received the support of the NGO “Mothers of Srebrenica” from the very beginning. It did not appear in public until they approved of it.

Symbolism
Memory Flower carries a strong symbolic message. One part of the symbolism is woven into its constituent parts: white is the color that symbolizes the innocence of the victims, green represents hope and the struggle against forgetting the horrors of genocide, and the 11 petals represent July 11, 1995, when Srebrenica fell and the mass killings of men and boys began.

Memory Flower is a symbol and reminder of the Bosniak tragedy and their collective trauma. Trauma has the power to destroy the worlds of individuals and nations. The Bosniak people divide time into two parts: before and after the war. At the collective level, trauma shapes the people. Destructive emotions are very often sublimated through art, monuments, and narratives.

Memory Flower is precisely an attempt to capture all the suffering of Bosniaks, the pain and suffering they went through, in one symbol. The scale and intensity of the crimes are difficult to grasp, but trying to channel the complexity of the aggression against the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina through a simple symbol is an opportunity to try to understand the force of violence perpetrated against Bosniaks.