Monday, March 1, 1999
Bosnian student eases pain of war with music
PROFILE: After escaping from Sarajevo, Spaic finds new home in
Los Angeles
By Joy McMasters
Daily Bruin Contributor
Music saved her life, literally.
During the civil war in Yugoslavia, Sanja Spaic came to Los
Angeles to study her beloved music with the aid of San Francisco
journalist Lois Melkonian.
"Music meant so much to me during the war. It was an escape from
reality," said Spaic, a second-year ethnomusicology student.
Concerts abounded in the besieged city of Sarajevo during the
war.
Through the arts, Sarajevans proclaimed, "They can kill us, but
they cannot kill our soul," said Spaic, who has played the piano
since age 8.
Five minutes after leaving for a concert one night, a grenade
hit her family’s apartment. The room which held the piano she had
played for years was destroyed – the room they had thought was the
safest, Spaic said.
The war spanned Spaic’s high school years, killing many of her
friends and prompting her brother to flee to the Czech Republic to
avoid battle.
"It made me who I am," Spaic said.
The war also allowed her to meet Melkonian, a journalist who
covered the war from San Francisco for four years.
A family friend of the Spaic’s and visiting professor at UC
Berkeley offered the Spaics as contacts in Bosnia when they heard
journalists were interested in reporting on the war’s aftermath
firsthand.
Spaic spent a whole day with the journalists as they interviewed
and investigated. She was fascinated with their work, Melkonian
said.
The first time they met, Melkonian saw that "there was something
special about Sanja," and knew that she had to leave her business
card, offering the opportunity to stay with her family in San
Francisco for a year to learn English. Three months later, Spaic
called to take Melkonian up on her offer.
A local Catholic high school offered to pay Spaic’s tuition for
a year, and Melkonian soon called to tell Sanja all the
arrangements were made.
"I couldn’t believe it because (Lois) had only known me a few
days," said Spaic. "I thought that she would forget about it."
Sanja arrived in August to repeat her senior year of high
school, this time in a new county and this time in English.
"It was really hard for me to come here," Spaic said, but she
recognized she may not ever have another opportunity to live with
an American family and practice English, a language she had only
studied in the classroom.
Melkonian and her family have helped Spaic adjust to life in the
US.
"Lois’s family is like second family," Spaic said. "We are
really close."
Though she has been in the Melkonians’ Christmas picture for the
past three years, Melkonian said, "I feel most comfortable calling
her extended family because I don’t want to infringe on the
relationship she has with her family."
Though Spaic prepared herself for only a year away from her
family, while in San Francisco, she decided to apply to UCLA to
study music.
UCLA’s ethnomusicology department, the only one in the nation,
offers students the opportunity to study music of the world, and
learn about their cultures and emotions through music, said Tim
Rice, chair of the ethnomusicology department.
"Our program offers a global perspective on music traditions,"
Rice said. "Most programs concentrate only on local or western
classical music."
"I knew ethnomusicology was all that I wanted to study. This is
the only school I applied to," Spaic said. "I knew if I didn’t get
into UCLA I’d go back home."
Spaic said her decision to remain in the U.S. and study at UCLA
was the second hardest she had ever made. But she values the time
she is spending here because of what the ethnomusicology department
has had to offer both scholastically and socially.
"I really like this department because it’s small," said Spaic.
"My really close friends that I have made here are from my
department."
After escaping from the "ethnic cleansing" of Bosnia, UCLA’s
greatest extracurricular offering for Spaic has been its
diversity.
"I really enjoy the cultural diversity here. I just enjoy being
around all different races," said Spaic. "It’s important to meet
people and learn about them and their culture."
Spaic hopes to graduate from UCLA in three years and return to
Sarajevo to work on her master’s degree because she feels
emotionally fulfilled in her home with her family, she said.
"After she graduates, I’ll take her home to Sarajevo and spend a
few weeks, and take it full circle," Melkonian said.BEN
SCHWARTZ
Ethnomusicology student Sanja Spaic came to the U.S. from Bosnia
with the help of an American journalist with whom she
interviewed.
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