Read more about our activities this month:

Educational Programs and Visits

Throughout September, we welcomed educational groups and visitors from different cities across Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as from France, Japan, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, and the United States.

We were also pleased to welcome back a group from the Ukrainian NGO STAN, which returned to the Museum for another visit and a conversation with our Education Programme Coordinator and Lead Educator, Merima Ražanica.

International Research and Documentation

In September, War Childhood Museum Ukraine announced two new collaborations to strengthen its work documenting childhood experiences of the Russian-Ukrainian War: a partnership with the Ukraine War Archive and a new documentation initiative within the “People of the Future” project.

The Museum also completed its research and documentation project in Colombia, conducted in collaboration with researcher Louis Monroy Santander. Through the project, WCM collected personal stories and objects documenting childhood experiences shaped by Colombia’s decades-long armed conflict. In an interview marking the conclusion of the research, Monroy reflected on the stories he encountered and the lasting impact of conflict on people’s lives.

Monroy also presented the Museum’s documentation process at Javeriana University in Bogotá, sharing photographs and stories from the research with students, educators, and practitioners.

In the Netherlands, the Museum launched a new initiative to collect personal stories from people who experienced war as children and now live in the country. The initiative invites contributions from different generations and communities, including those affected by the Second World War and conflicts in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Ukraine. The collected stories will become part of the Museum’s international collection and contribute to a wider initiative to present WCM’s work through a major exhibition in The Hague.

To mark the International Day for Universal Access to Information, September 28, Andrii Borutia, researcher and public program coordinator at War Childhood Museum Ukraine, reflected on the state of Ukrainian archives and open data, highlighting their importance for preserving memory during wartime. Read his article (UKRAINIAN).

Exhibitions and International Projects

In September, the youth-created exhibition “Nekad se zakuha” (“Things Sometimes Boil Over”) was presented at the Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina as part of the PitchWise Festival.

Developed by young people from Prnjavor through the “Furaj mir” (“Live Peace”) program, with the support and mentorship of the War Childhood Museum, the exhibition explores the experiences of displaced people and refugees who now live in Prnjavor. Through food and everyday experiences, it examines themes of survival, care, displacement, and rebuilding a sense of home. Following presentations in Prnjavor and Novi Pazar, the exhibition reached audiences in Sarajevo.

September also marked the conclusion of texTALES, a two-year project co-funded by the European Union through the Creative Europe Programme. The project brought together partners and participants from Italy, France, and Greece to explore how fashion, textile design, and storytelling can challenge stereotypes about migration and promote inclusion.

The collaboration resulted in Handle With Care, a travelling exhibition and fashion collection shaped by personal experiences of migration and belonging. Watch the final video documenting the creative journey of texTALES, from participants’ stories and collaborative workshops to exhibitions across Europe.

Peacebuilding and Education

To mark the International Day of Peace, September 21, the War Childhood Museum organized “The Body Speaks the Language of Support,” an Image Theater workshop with 15 ninth-grade students from Mula Mustafa Bašeskija Primary School in Sarajevo.

Through movement and creative expression, students explored empathy and solidarity with children affected by armed conflict. Together, they developed a short performance imagining a world without conflict and the steps needed to build it. Take a look at the workshop video.

Our Education Programme Coordinator and Lead Educator, Merima Ražanica, also participated in the panel “Classrooms for Peace – From Education Policy to Classroom Practice” at the forum “War is the Topic. Education is the Purpose.”, organized by BIRN Bosnia and Herzegovina. The discussion focused on the role of education in fostering peace and translating peacebuilding principles into classroom practice.

The War Childhood Museum Ukraine team also participated in the “Vidsich” Book Forum in Zhytomyr on September 19. Svitlana Osipchuk, Program Director of WCM Ukraine, joined the panel “Dignity Begins in Childhood,”discussing the importance of preserving diverse childhood experiences of war and avoiding simplified narratives.

At the same event, Nataliia Ponezha, co-author of the Museum’s educational materials How to Talk to Children About Memory: Using the Object-Based Learning Method, led a practical seminar introducing participants to object-based learning and its application in classrooms and community work.

Institutional Cooperation and Public Engagement

In September, the War Childhood Museum hosted a reception with members of its Global Advisory Board and the American Chamber of Commerce in Bosnia and Herzegovina (AmCham BiH). The event brought together business leaders and representatives of the diplomatic community, providing an opportunity to strengthen relationships and exchange ideas about supporting the Museum’s work. Take a look at the atmosphere from the reception.

Our Exhibitions Manager, Ivana Roso, participated in the sixth Sarajevo Creative Meet, held under the theme “City as a Stage.” As part of the panel “Cultural Institutions as Creative Infrastructure,” she discussed the role of museums and cultural institutions in supporting contemporary artistic practices, education, community engagement, and the development of Sarajevo’s creative ecosystem.

Members of the War Childhood Museum team also joined Race for the Cure, showing solidarity with people affected by breast cancer and their families.

Media Mentions

The War Childhood Museum continued to receive attention in international and regional media throughout September. Below is a selection of coverage from the past month:

• Growing Up in War: Memory Becomes Peacebuilding – IJAB (ENGLISH)
• The Weight of Remembrance: Museums’ Considerations in Portraying the Past – Balkan Diskurs (ENGLISH)
• War Childhood Museum – Deutsche Welle / DW Travel (VIDEO)

By joining the Global WPS–HA Compact, the War Childhood Museum became part of a network of organizations and institutions working to strengthen the role of women and girls in peacebuilding and security. The Museum joined the initiative following Bosnia and Herzegovina’s accession in December 2025, when it became the first country in the Western Balkans to do so.

During the event, the Museum presented its work and contribution to documenting the experiences of children affected by war, with particular emphasis on the importance of including girls and young women in discussions about peace and security.

By joining the Compact, the Museum committed to integrating its objectives into its existing research, exhibition, and educational activities. This includes strengthening the documentation and presentation of the experiences of women and girls affected by war, creating space for discussions about the gender-specific dimensions of wartime experiences and peacebuilding, and providing opportunities for girls and young women to actively contribute their perspectives to conversations about peace and security.

Through its programs and international partnerships, the Museum will continue working to ensure that the voices of those who grew up during war are heard and valued, including those of girls and young women whose perspectives are essential to understanding the consequences of conflict and building sustainable peace.

More information about the Global WPS–HA Compact is available at wpshacompact.org.

For children growing up during war and conflict, memories of school are often intertwined with uncertainty and disruption. Yet within these memories are also teachers who offered encouragement, created moments of normalcy, shared knowledge under extraordinary circumstances, or simply remained present when so much else was changing.

Across the War Childhood Museum’s collection are stories in which teachers appear in different ways — sometimes at the center of a memory, sometimes in a seemingly small moment that stayed with a child for years.

On World Teachers’ Day, we share some of these stories and remember the teachers who became part of childhoods shaped by war.

A Send-off

The classes in the “Skender Kulenović” primary school, where I attended second grade, were held in poor conditions. They took place in an apartment building, which our teacher Elvedina Fazlić, with great effort, had turned into the most beautiful classroom we could imagine.  

This photograph was taken in 1995, in front of the entryway to the building where the classes were held. My teacher and my friends from class gave me this photo, along with a letter, as a parting gift when I left for a different school in another part of the city.

Azra, born 1987

Bosnia and Herzegovina

My First, Red Report Card

The war’s beginning “forced” me to hurry up and finish the first grade. As a real geek, of course, I had all A’s and positive reviews from the teachers’ council written into my beautiful red report card. Vacation had ended, but the war was still raging. I started second grade in a makeshift classroom in a former billiard club. Improvised schools, classrooms—and report cards. At the end of the year, I begged my teachers to write my grades into my beautiful red report card— but they would not do it! We got small, sad looking, paper report cards that looked like pages that had been pulled out of our usual report cards! And that continued into third, fourth, and fifth grades. Although the school had its “official” paper report card, I continued to scribble my grades into my red report card so that they would all be in one place. I kept doing this until fourth grade. I lost my second-grade report card in the intermittent years. Now, this red one is my only reminder of the one subject in my eight years of schooling that I did not finish with an A. It was in second grade, in a makeshift classroom, and the teacher was testing my times tables: “How much is 9×9?” “89,” I said. Then I corrected my answer to “87,” and finally to “81.” It was already too late—“Sit, B!”

Merima, born 1984

Bosnia and Herzegovina

The Miraculous Medal

In sixth grade, my history teacher told us the story of the Virgin Mary’s apparition to Sister Catherine Labouré in Paris. The Virgin gave Catherine clear instructions on how to mint the medal and told her that whoever wore it around their neck would be protected. At that time, my home city, Beirut, was gripped by civil war. 

Believing in the medal’s protective power, I went home and asked my mom for one. She eventually found this silver version and gifted it to me. I have worn it ever since. It has been with me through countless escapes to the shelter, days of missed school, and the loss of many typical teenage experiences.  

Over the years, I have gifted many more Miraculous Medals to my friends and family, but this first medal stayed with me as a symbol of faith, hope, and resilience. Now, it finds a new home at the War Childhood Museum.

Lina, born 1976

Lebanon

Certificate of Appreciation

When the shelling was heavy, our neighbour took us to his house. We stayed there for two days. Then, we joined my grandfather in a camp in Lebanon. Now, we live in a tent.

This is the first Certificate of Appreciation that I have ever received. I got it after midterms because I had good grades. It’s such an important thing to me. My little brother ripped it. When I told my teacher about what happened, she gave me a new certificate. I like the teachers in my school because they are nice, and the school is very colourful.

Whenever I needed to feel proud or to encourage myself to do something difficult, I would just take the certificate out of my drawer and look at it. It gave me strength.

Maha, born 2004

Syria

The Youngest Student

Even during wartime, we attended school. One day, a shell fell near our classroom. The shrapnel shattered the windows but the glass fragments were stopped by the curtains. The blackboard was pierced by shrapnel. We, the children, ducked for cover and waited, motionless. When the dust settled, the teacher said simply: “It’s over, we are moving on!” Then she picked up the chalk, wiped the shrapnel-ridden blackboard, and continued with the lesson. 

Besides school, we participated in extracurricular activities. That is how I, at 12 years of age, became the youngest student of the Sarajevan Foreign Language Center at Obala. It was the city’s oldest foreign language center, and had continued operating even during the war. Thanks to that course, and my great affinity for languages, I now work as a freelance English language translator.

Naida, born 1981

Bosnia and Herzegovina

As part of its international research and documentation work, the War Childhood Museum collaborated with researcher Louis Monroy Santander to collect objects and personal stories from people whose childhoods were affected by the conflict. Through these objects and testimonies, individual experiences become part of WCM’s growing international collection documenting what it means to grow up during war.

We spoke with Louis about the stories he encountered during his fieldwork, the objects people chose to preserve, and what documenting childhood experiences can tell us about both war and its lasting impact.

During your fieldwork for the War Childhood Museum, what has stayed with you most from the stories people shared about their childhoods?

What has stayed with me most is how the effects of war often continue long after childhood itself. Many of the people we spoke with experienced violence or displacement when they were young, but these experiences continued to shape their lives in different ways as they grew older.

The stories are very different from one another, but many speak about having to adapt repeatedly – to displacement, insecurity, discrimination or the loss of people and places that were important to them.

At the same time, these are not only stories about what happened to people. Some of the participants later became human rights defenders, community leaders or peace activists. Documenting their childhood experiences therefore also means documenting what they carried with them into adulthood and what they chose to do with those experiences.

The War Childhood Museum documents personal experiences through objects and the stories connected to them. What did this approach reveal during your work in Colombia?

Objects can bring us very close to someone’s personal experience. Large historical events can sometimes feel abstract, but an object allows us to see what those events meant in one person’s everyday life.

The stories we collected come from very different parts of Colombia – cities, small towns and rural communities – and from people whose childhood experiences were very different. Their objects and stories reflect displacement, separation from family, insecurity and other consequences of the conflict, but also memories of home, family relationships and the ways people adapted to difficult circumstances.

Looking at the conflict through childhood experiences also brings attention to things that can disappear from broader historical accounts: what a child remembers, what they were afraid of, what they valued, what they carried with them and what they decided to keep many years later.

Was there anything about working with personal objects that changed the way you understood the stories you were documenting?

Working with objects makes the process very personal. An object may look ordinary to someone else, but for the person who kept it, it can hold an entire story.

During the documentation process, we were not only asking people what happened to them. We were also asking why a particular object mattered, what memories it carried and why they had kept it for so many years.

That creates a different way of talking about war. Instead of beginning with armed groups, political events or statistics, we begin with someone’s lived experience. The object becomes a way into that memory.

What does it mean to you for these stories from Colombia to become part of the War Childhood Museum’s international collection?

It means placing individual experiences from Colombia alongside childhood experiences of war from other parts of the world. The conflicts may be very different, but some experiences of growing up during war can speak to one another across countries and generations.

For me, this has also been a professional and emotional process. Listening to these stories and documenting the objects connected to them has made me think deeply about how violence affects people not only while a conflict is happening, but throughout their lives.

Preserving these experiences is important because they add something that statistics and historical accounts cannot provide on their own. They allow people to encounter war through the memories of individuals who experienced it as children.

By bringing these stories into the War Childhood Museum’s collection, they become part of a broader record of childhood during war – one that preserves differences between conflicts while also creating space to recognize experiences that people across different parts of the world may share.

Together, these initiatives strengthen different aspects of the Museum’s work—from ensuring the long-term preservation of already documented testimonies to recording the experiences of children and teenagers whose families have been affected by captivity.

War Childhood Museum Ukraine Joins the Ukraine War Archive

The War Childhood Museum Ukraine has partnered with the Ukraine War Archive, Ukraine’s largest digital platform preserving evidence, testimonies, and other materials related to the Russian-Ukrainian War.

As part of the collaboration, the Museum is sharing testimonies previously featured in its exhibition projects with the Archive. These include stories from children and teenagers about living through Russian aggression, forced displacement, and experiences in temporarily occupied and frontline territories.

“We are glad to cooperate with the Ukraine War Archive because they are a prime example of an institution focused specifically on preserving collected materials. The Ukraine War Archive also offers a ready-to-use set of preservation tools, so we are pleased to apply them and transfer the previously published materials of the War Childhood Museum,” says Svitlana Osipchuk, Program Director of the War Childhood Museum Ukraine.

The Ukraine War Archive operates as a closed platform accessible to verified users, including law enforcement agencies, international organizations, journalists, documentary filmmakers, researchers, artists, and other professionals working with war-related materials. It preserves photographs, videos, audio recordings, written testimonies, interviews, and open-source content, with different access levels available for sensitive materials.

“We are thrilled about this collaboration and welcoming the War Childhood Museum Ukraine into our partner community. The recorded testimonies of the Museum are particularly valuable for documenting and preserving children’s experiences during the Russo-Ukrainian War. Now, these testimonies will become part of the Ukraine War Archive’s collections, which will not only help safely preserve the material but also allow verified users to work with the testimonies for various purposes—primarily aimed at achieving justice and preserving the memory of living through this war,” says Iryna Pavliukovska, Head of Partnerships at the Ukraine War Archive.

For the Museum, the collaboration provides an additional way to ensure the long-term preservation of collected testimonies while making selected materials available for professional research and other forms of engagement. These personal accounts can contribute to a broader understanding of how war transforms children’s lives and how their experiences become part of the history of the Russian-Ukrainian War.

Documenting the Experiences of Families Affected by Captivity

At the same time, the War Childhood Museum Ukraine is continuing to expand its documentation work. In collaboration with “People of the Future,” the Museum has launched an initiative to record the testimonies of children whose loved ones have returned from captivity.

“People of the Future” is a project of the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, created for children and younger siblings of prisoners of war, fallen defenders, civilians unlawfully deprived of liberty, and people missing as a result of Russian armed aggression. The project brings together government institutions, businesses, humanitarian organizations, civil society groups, and benefactors to support Ukrainian children affected by the war.

“When we watch news reports about defenders returning from captivity, it is always a deeply joyful yet poignant moment. It brings immense joy to the families who have waited for their loved ones to come home. But the story does not end there. Years of waiting, uncertainty, and the impossibility of learning even the slightest detail about a loved one’s fate leave a profound mark on the entire family—on everyone who waited,” says Svitlana Osipchuk.

Through the initiative, the Museum seeks to better understand and document how waiting, uncertainty, separation, and the return of loved ones from captivity affect children and teenagers.

By both preserving previously collected testimonies and continuing to document experiences that have received less public attention, the War Childhood Museum Ukraine is working to ensure that children’s perspectives form part of the record of the war and remain accessible for future research, education, and remembrance.

Read more about our activities this month:

Educational Programs and Visits

Throughout August, we welcomed educational groups and visitors from different cities across Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as from Italy, countries across the Western Balkans, Greece, the United States, and Ukraine.

The Museum also welcomed Volodymyr Bachynsky, Ambassador of Ukraine to Bosnia and Herzegovina, who met with WCM founder and Director General Jasminko Halilović. During the visit, they discussed the Museum’s work in Ukraine, where WCM has been active since 2018 and has built a collection of more than 1,000 testimonies from children and young people documenting their experiences before and after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Research and Documentation

In August, we shared more about the War Childhood Museum’s ongoing research and documentation work in Colombia, launched earlier this summer as part of our efforts to document and preserve experiences of childhood shaped by armed conflict around the world.

The research is being conducted by Louis Monroy, WCM Research Collaborator, a university lecturer in Colombia whose work focuses on international relations, peacebuilding, and transitional justice.

Through the project, WCM is collecting personal stories and objects that shed light on childhood experiences from 1948 to the present day, spanning different periods of Colombia’s decades-long armed conflict. The project expands the Museum’s international collection and contributes to preserving diverse experiences of war-affected childhood across different historical and geographical contexts.

Peacebuilding and Education

In August, we looked back at “Creativity for Peace,” a two-year program through which teachers and students across Bosnia and Herzegovina used creative approaches to promote peace in their schools and communities. We shared moments from the program’s closing event and reflected on the experiences and connections built along the way.

We also spoke with Vernesa Manov, a teacher from Donji Vakuf who, together with her students, expanded the program activities—from creating a school museum to organizing humanitarian initiatives in their community.

International Projects

In August, the two-year texTALES project, co-funded by the European Union through the Creative Europe Programme, came to a close. Bringing together partners and participants in Italy, France, and Greece, the project explored how fashion, textile design, and participatory storytelling can challenge stereotypes about migration and create space for dialogue and inclusion.

The collaboration culminated in Handle With Care, a travelling exhibition and fashion collection shaped by participants’ personal experiences of migration, belonging, displacement, and home. Take a look at the final video retracing the two-year journey of texTALES, from storytelling and creative work in social tailoring workshops to the collaborative process and exhibitions across Europe.

Stories From Our Collection

In August, we launched Monthly Story Spotlight, a new series highlighting one object and the personal story behind it from the War Childhood Museum collection each month.

For the first edition of the series, we shared Lilian’s story from Gaza. Before leaving her home, she visited the sea one last time with her friends and collected seashells—a small object preserving the memory of a place and a moment before displacement.

The series will continue to introduce audiences to individual stories from the Museum’s collection, which includes more than 7,000 stories and objects documenting childhood experiences from 22 armed conflicts around the world.

Marking Important Dates

On World Humanitarian Day, August 19, we highlighted stories from the War Childhood Museum collection that illustrate the role humanitarian assistance can play during war and the ways children experience and remember receiving it.

We also marked 34 years since the burning of Sarajevo City Hall, which was set ablaze on the night of August 25–26, 1992, when it housed the National and University Library of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Around two million books and other library materials were lost in the fire.

Among the objects preserved in the War Childhood Museum’s collection is a book that survived that night, rescued from the burning library by our contributor Alma. We revisited Alma’s story and the story of the book she saved, which decades later became part of the Museum’s collection.

Media Mentions

The War Childhood Museum continued to receive attention in international media throughout August. Below is a selection of coverage from the past month:

• Sarajevo, the Museum Preserving Children’s War Memories – Osservatorio Balcani Caucaso Transeuropa
• War Childhood Museum – Deutsche Welle / DW Travel (VIDEO)
• Not Remaining Silent Without Causing Trauma: How to Talk to Schoolchildren About War and Memory (UKRAINIAN)

The Educational Resource Center shows how the Museum’s collection can serve not only to preserve stories, but also as a learning tool.

“The main question we are trying to address through our materials is: how can we teach about and reflect on the experience of war while the war is still ongoing? School curricula are not adapting quickly enough to this need,” says Svitlana Osipchuk, WCM Ukraine Program Director.

The educational materials were first developed by the War Childhood Museum Bosnia and Herzegovina. The WCM Ukraine built on these materials, adapting them to the Ukrainian educational context.

“Our approach equips teachers with the tools to adopt a trauma-informed and sensitive approach to teaching during the ongoing war,” explains Osipchuk.

From Objects to Questions

Object-based learning involves active engagement with artworks, artifacts, archival materials, or digital representations of objects. It encourages students to look closely, notice details, ask questions and develop their own ideas. The object opens the way for research and discussion.

This was one of the ideas that guided Nataliia Ponezha, a teacher, and Anna Lenchovska, a psychologist, in co-authoring the educational and methodological materials for WCM Ukraine’s Educational Resource Center.

Nataliia Ponezha, private archive

Every object in the WCM collection is connected to the real experiences of children who lived through war. In the classroom, these objects and the stories behind them can help students reflect on their own experiences of living through wartime, using the experiences of other children as a starting point for conversation and reflection.

One of the first lessons Nataliia created was based on a simple object — a telephone. “The artefact itself — the telephone — is universal and familiar to everyone. Now I can see that this is the story teachers most often test in their classrooms.”

Educators who used the Center’s materials during the testing phase found that using an object as a starting point can create some distance from difficult personal experiences while opening discussion about topics like memory, loss, home and identity.

From Object to Action

The Center’s materials include creative tasks, group work, visual activities and other ways of working with an object. “It was important to me that the activities did not come down to conversation alone. I wanted children to act — to complete practical tasks, work with their hands and interact with the material,” says Nataliia. 

One example is a lesson based on the story titled “Big Problems”. The object becomes a starting point for creative work with modelling clay. Through a familiar image, students can approach more difficult topics connected to children’s experiences of war.

The activities also change depending on students’ age. Younger children work more with creative and visual tasks, while older students are encouraged to compare, analyse and interpret.

At the same time, the materials are not strict instructions. “These teaching materials are not a rigid set of instructions. This applies both to the content and to the age boundaries,” explains Nataliia.

The same object can lead to different questions depending on the lesson, the age of the students and the teacher’s approach.

“War should not be the only framework. So I deliberately expanded the context and looked for entry points through broader topics,” adds Nataliia.

For example, museum stories can be used in civic education and history lessons. They can open discussions about dignity, memory, values, migration and other topics.

From Materials Development to Classroom Use

The development of the Ukrainian educational materials took around eight months. To test the lessons in practice, WCM Ukraine invited teachers to join the project through an open call, which attracted considerable interest. Participants were introduced to object-based learning, a trauma-informed approach and practical ways of using the lesson plans.

The Museum organised online training seminars for teachers from across Ukraine. The sessions combined the methodology of object-based learning with psychological aspects of discussing war and memory with children. Teachers could also exchange experiences and ask questions about using the materials in their classrooms.

The lessons were then tested in schools across Ukraine. In total, 63 teachers conducted 69 lessons with more than 1,600 children and teenagers in 17 regions, including frontline and recently liberated areas. The lessons took place both online and in classrooms. The testing process also helped the Museum understand how teachers adapt the materials to different ages and classroom contexts. 

The War Childhood Museum Ukraine continues to support educators through networking meetings and individual consultations, giving teachers an opportunity to discuss their experiences and ask questions as they use the materials from the Educational Resource Center.

Big Problems

I was born in Kherson, where there are big problems now. Our courtyard was bombed. During the missile strike, the trees fell. Even the most stable ones were broken. Afterwards, barely any remained standing. Everything was in ashes. All the glass was broken. We lived on the eighth floor, and we still live on the eighth floor here in Kyiv.

One day, I saw those Z-kas driving on our roads. A month later, for our own safety, we went to Kyiv.

I made this tank with my own hands; I spent an hour making it. In Kherson, I have a whole drawer with three shelves filled to the brim with my models. I miss Kherson.

Mykhailo, born 2014,

Kherson

Colombia’s decades-long armed conflict has taken different forms and affected generations of children and families across the country. Through its work in Colombia, WCM is collecting personal stories and objects that shed light on childhood experiences from 1948 to the present day—from the emergence of guerrilla movements and the period marked by drug cartels, through the expansion of paramilitary violence, to the peace agreement and conflicts of recent years.

“Each year, we continue to develop our research activities in order to include as many diverse stories as possible in our collection. While every conflict is different, the impact on childhood carries common threads across time and place. Including stories from Colombia is important to the WCM’s mission of ensuring that more children’s experiences of war are being heard,” said Aynura Akbaš, Research Manager at the War Childhood Museum.

Documenting Experiences Across Colombia

In July, Monroy conducted field research in Barrancabermeja, where he documented the experiences of people who were forcibly recruited into guerrilla groups as children. During his stay, he also visited the House of Memory and the Human Rights of Women, an organization with a long-standing commitment to human rights, memory, and the experiences of women affected by violence.

“These stories serve as an insight into some of the underlying issues behind the Colombian armed conflict, serving as a tool for non-repetition of violent acts against society,” said Monroy.

The research process seeks to create space for participants to share their experiences on their own terms, recognizing that memories of conflict are deeply personal and that there is no single way to tell a story about childhood and war.

“The Museum’s Colombian collection brings together personal stories and objects connected to childhoods shaped by armed conflict, spanning the period from 1948 to the present day. Each story offers an individual perspective on how armed conflict has shaped childhood in Colombia,” says Aynura Akbaš, Research Manager at the War Childhood Museum.

Creating Space for Children and Young People to Share Their Stories

At the end of July, WCM supported the organization of a workshop in Bogotá for children and young people whose family members had been kidnapped by guerrilla groups. Using artistic methods, participants were invited to explore and communicate their experiences in ways that felt most appropriate to them. Some chose to contribute stories and personal objects with the Museum, becoming contributors to its growing Colombian collection.

The workshop reflects an important principle of WCM’s research and documentation methodology: children and young people should have agency over how, when, and whether they share their experiences. Objects, drawings, photographs, memories, and personal stories can all become ways of communicating experiences that may be difficult to capture through conventional forms of testimony.

The work underway in Colombia is part of the War Childhood Museum’s broader commitment to preserving the voices and experiences of children affected by armed conflict worldwide. As the Colombian collection continues to grow, the Museum aims to document the diversity and complexity of these experiences while respecting each contributor’s dignity and their right to tell their story in their own way.

Read some of them below. 

Humanitarian Aid Packaging Collection

I wanted to keep a memento of something completely new to Yugoslavia—humanitarian aid. We laughed about it at the time, thinking: Come on, by Monday everything will be back to normal. That’s the real reason why I kept that first tin. But the crisis wasn’t over by Monday, and more tins followed. Soon we were eating things that had never been seen before in Yugoslavia. It was an excellent reason to collect all those wrappers and tins.

At one point as I was forming this collection I had to ask myself how long I would continue to do so. That’s when I decided to keep collecting either until I made it into the Guinness World Records or until the war ended and we stopped receiving aid. Thanks to the journalists who visited Sarajevo, I was able to send a letter to Guinness. I continued collecting wrappers as I awaited their response. Even though my collection made it into the record book, the number of wrappers is actually greater than the one listed by several hundred.

We even erected a monument to ICAR in Sarajevo, but few remember that there were actually three different types of ICAR tin. Because of details like that one, collecting proved to be a good way to preserve our collective memory of that period.

Filip, b. 1981, Bosnia and Herzegovina

Magic Wand

This magic wand was part of a New Year’s care package filled with colorful knickknacks from a humanitarian organization that was active at the time. The New Year’s celebrations included a recital. Each child received a magic wand: we hoped that by playing “abracadabra” we could make the war end.

Unfortunately, it took a long time for the war to end. I held on to that magic wand, occasionally lending it to younger children to make their own wishes, provided that they return it to its rightful owner.

Denisa, b. 1981, Bosnia and Herzegovina

Letters for First Graders

During the Siege of Sarajevo, we had our classes in improvized basement classrooms. When we were in first grade, on one occasion, we received humanitarian aid care packages that contained toys and letters from our peers from other countries.

I kept mine to this day because they reminded me of the wonderful feeling of knowing that, even in the most difficult times, there was someone out there thinking about us.

Alma, b. 1988, Bosnia and Herzegovina

A Box for Play

I got this box in early 1999 from an English humanitarian organization. When the bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia began that same year, and when the air-raid sirens sounded for the first time, it was the first thing I brought down to the basement with me. I would play with this box’s contents during all 78 days of the bombing.  I spent the time in the basement together with my mom and my younger brother, while dad who was in the army was often at the military airport. Whenever dad was home we would read the “Zabavnik” children’s magazine or play games from the box. During my time in the basement, I also discovered books and comic books. These things comforted me and brought me fun, but today they remind me of the fear and danger I felt.

Maja, b. 1990, Serbia

Reward for an Important Task

Occasionally, we received humanitarian food aid, which was distributed based on the number of “heads” in a household. My family would receive one loaf of bread and one end piece. The bread was distributed near my grandmother’s building, in a place hidden from shelling, so we children were allowed to go out and stand in line for bread. 

Once, while waiting in line, I was given the “important task” of going behind the counter to help the local community representatives with cutting and distributing bread. For a job well done, I earned two loaves of bread and 10 dinars. I never spent those 10 dinars. I kept them, alongside this ration card for bread distribution.

Naida, b. 1981, Bosnia and Herzegovina

One of the program participants was Vernesa Manov, a teacher at the First Primary School in Donji Vakuf, who, together with her students, expanded the program activities far beyond what had originally been envisioned—from creating a school museum to organizing humanitarian initiatives in the local community. Below, read her reflections on the program and what it brought to her students.

From Trust to Partnership

Vernesa emphasizes that her story with the War Childhood Museum did not begin with the “Creativity for Peace” (CfP) program, but much earlier, when she shared her personal story and objects from the war with the Museum. Because of that experience, she says, she had no hesitation about applying when the call for participation was announced.

“I was simply looking, after everything that had happened, for a space and for people who, without hatred, nurture a culture of remembrance in a normal, civic, peacebuilding way. So that what happened to us never happens to anyone else.”

Speaking about her collaboration with the Museum, she particularly emphasizes that it was this sense of trust that motivated her to become even more involved.

“The War Childhood Museum created a sincere, safe, friendly, and well-intentioned environment for me, where I felt I could do everything I wanted to do with my students through your projects.”

When a Project Grows Beyond Its Original Scope

One of the activities within CfP was initially envisioned as a classroom exhibition in Donji Vakuf that would help students broaden their understanding of others and strengthen their empathy. However, the activity grew into a permanent museum corner at the school, which uses personal stories to teach students about experiences of war in a constructive way. Vernesa says she quickly realized that she wanted to create a space that would continue to live on after the project ended. Students, teachers, the school administration, and technical staff all became involved in creating the space, while over time, the exhibition also began incorporating objects contributed by other school staff.

For Vernesa, this is proof that the project became much more than a set of activities.

“I don’t think we simply carried out activities. I think we carried out an entire project mission.”

Learning Peace Through Concrete Actions

Vernesa believes that one of the program’s most important outcomes was the way students began to understand their own role in the community. One of the exercises they completed as part of the program, which focused on empathy, inspired the idea of working with the people who use the public kitchen in Donji Vakuf.

“Through this ‘Creativity for Peace’ project, I wanted the students to understand that they are part of a larger human endeavor and that they themselves are doing something for the benefit of humanity, for the benefit of our country.”

The children, she says, quickly embraced the idea and demonstrated that solidarity does not depend on how much someone has.

Big Ideas Do Not Depend on the Size of a Place

At the end of the conversation, Vernesa reflected on common prejudices about smaller communities. She believes that young people, through their work, demonstrate just how meaningless such divisions can be.

“I think it is precisely children and young people who are moving beyond the usual clichés about small and large communities and breaking down that taboo, those prejudices. There are great young creatives in Donji Vakuf. There are children with big hearts in Donji Vakuf. And there is tremendous enthusiasm among people who refuse to accept that they cannot bring their big ideas to life.”

For her, this is precisely one of the program’s key values—showing young people that where they come from does not prevent them from creating, helping others, and building a culture of peace.