Over the next few hours an amazing pilgrimage started to unfold. The woman, Suada, took us to all the houses and apartments linked to her family in the now-liberated suburbs. First to her apartment in Ilidza, then to her mother's house in Idjarici. Fragments of life history emerged: it was a fairly well-to-do, middle-class family that had worked hard, accumulated many possessions, had to flee at the beginning of the war from the Serb-held suburbs to Sarajevo, and were now returning. After their four-year absence, they found, as feared, that all had been looted -- the electric wire torn from the wall, the tiles in the kitchen and bathrooms gone, and all furniture, floors, and kitchen and bathroom appliances stripped to the bone.

Suada was obviously upset about all this, and coming upon the various scenes she would start in a trance to wail, hands raised to the sky, ritualistically pacing around the devastation, starting to resemble the central heroine of some mournful Central European movie, camera- and light-conscious, performing the role of her life. But in the trips between the houses she seemed to calm down, smoking cigarettes and making small talk.