“This is a good place to hide a mass grave,” says Severin, our driver. Suddenly my eyes get stuck and I can’t blink. I hear myself asking a question I don’t want to know the answer to: “How do you know that?”

We’re somewhere near Olovo, a small town an hour outside of Sarajevo, getting deep into thick woods and testing the limits of our rental van on a narrowing gravel path.

“Because there is no civilization at all,” he laughs, finishing his sentence and comforting me not at all. After the war in the early ‘90’s, soldiers had to find civilian work in a ravaged economy. Severin, it turns out, worked for the Office of Missing Persons, mapping mass graves throughout the countryside. Like the men we’re on our way to meet, he built a post-war career in terrain like this, though I learn afterward this will be his first time walking through a minefield.

The path widens and a couple of official-looking men open a barricade to let us pass. We join a convoy of Civil Protection vehicles, who are waiting to lead us into the mine-contaminated area. I step out of the car and a woman in fatigues and combat boots approaches with a clipboard, saying only: “Signature. Blood type. Here,” pointing to what I presume is a liability release for my death or dismemberment. I sign and date and guess my blood type, which I realize I probably shouldn’t make a habit of.

The obvious commander, Senahid Abdihodžić, begins explaining the map we’re standing next to: “We are currently in the mine-contaminated area of Petrovici in the Olovo municipality. It covers 2 million square meters. You can see the investigation lane that we created and landmines and UXO (unexploded ordnances) that were found during this recent period. So far, we have located more than 35 landmines and UXOs and we expect to find more because this is a very highly mine-contaminated area and the operations are not completed yet.”

Nothing is lost in translation—this is a very highly mine-contaminated area and the man standing next to Senahid is living proof. Nuraga Kadric is his name and he lives in the town nearby. He has—twice—stepped on a landmine on this hill: “I still remember the location where I stepped on the mine, even though it’s twenty years since the war was over, I still remember and I will show you when we go up there.”

Not more than 100 meters up the hill, Nuraga calls over his shoulder and points to a single tree—this is the spot. Here, at 10:30am on the 23rd of December, 1993, he was passing through the area with his squadron and stepped on a mine. 

He was lucky to only suffer serious injury to his right heel, but when he stepped on another landmine on March 18, 1995 (also during the war), he lost half of his left foot.

Senahid’s team consists of eight deminers and a medic. Each deminer can typically clear about 70 square meters per day. Here, the placement of the mines isn’t random—they were placed in groups by soldiers to block forest paths and protect trenches along the confrontation line. Where you find one, you’ll likely find others.

To me, the mine looks like a black plastic lens cap stuck in the dirt, not alarming at all. “Yeah, most people wouldn’t recognize the mine, it wouldn’t alarm them either,” says Senahid.

We continue hiking and another expert, Hamdija Sisic, points out a trench (a pile of branches) and next to it a big ‘X’ carved into the high-side of a tree trunk—a warning from the mine-planting unit for their comrades. Demining for more than 20 years in many different countries and contexts, these guys know all the tricks. “In time, you get to love this job—it’s the most human job you can do, saving other people’s lives,” says Hamdija.

Yet it’s not just a job for humans. If the vegetation weren’t so high and the terrain so steep, the team would have engaged a mine-detection dog team to help reduce the search area more quickly. The dog teams are much faster than manual deminers, able to clear up to 1,600 square meters per day.

Yes, you read that right: Dog teams. 1,600 sq. meters compared to 70. It’s a space that Marshall Legacy Institute (MLI) is championing, and we’re here to learn how.

Descending gently into a backdrop of rugged, snowy purple mountain peaks, the only thing missing at the training center in Konjic is a Julie Andrews soundtrack playing over the loudspeaker. Instead, the dogs in the kennel bark excitedly and incessantly as we survey the  training ground marked with 10’x10’ boxes and fuse-less landmines buried throughout. 

Each box contains a different density of mines—some have none, some just one, some have a few. Wearing full protective gear (a heavy flight jacket and helmet with face shield), Braninir Stankovic walks out to the field with his German Shepherd partner, Simone, on a 10-meter leash: “Simone is very sweet and loves petting. Sometimes she likes to work,” he laughs.

Getting serious, Braninir calls ‘souk!’ and training begins. Simone promptly sets out sniffing in a straight lane and returns to the trainer—her nose to the ground the entire time. Should she detect a mine (smelling the explosive powder), she would sit and remain still as the trainer walks the perimeter of the box, marking the X/Y coordinates of the mine with wooden stakes. Once Simone is safely out of the area, the manual deminer will use the markers and a metal detector to confirm the mine. At this point Braninir rewards Simone with a rubber ball game that apparently never ever gets old. And the search continues.

This method is used to reduce massive areas of suspected mine-contamination down to allow for more targeted searches and greater efficiency. The dogs train here for six-months before they’re matched with a handler whom they’ll typically work alongside for the duration of their demining careers. Braninir and Simone are nearing the end of their 1-month ‘integration’ period when they get familiar with each other before their first deployment.

Aziz Fatic and Amir Badzak are two of the most experienced mine-detection dog trainers in the world, with twenty years of experience between them, they’ve prepared several hundred dogs for work all over the world: Bosnia, Croatia, Lebanon, Herzegovina, Kosovo, Serbia, Afghanistan, Syria, Sri Lanka, Ethiopia. “My first dog was named Jason,” remembers Amir, “And I worked with him for 2-3 years. We were a good team. Then Jason went to Lebanon and I got Lekaron. Lekaron was the first dog that I trained independently. It took us a little bit of time to adjust to each other but then we worked together in Kosovo and Serbia for 4-5 years.” For these dogs, success is measured in meters, not mines. 

“To be a good dog handler,” Amir says, “the most important thing is love. There is a perfect bond between the handler and the dog. It’s indescribable unless you experience it for yourself. It’s the perfect bond that exists.” Not surprisingly, most of the handlers adopt their dog-partner once they’ve retired from the rigors of demining.

Ivica Stilin is an Operations Manager for MAG, one of MLI’s partners, and oversees four manual demining teams and one MDD team (that is, a Mine Detection Dog team made of two handlers, each with a dog-partner). Having worked in humanitarian demining since 1995, Ivica has developed teams and demining capacity in Sudan, South Sudan, Mongolia, Libya, Sri Lanka, Bosnia + Herzegovina, Croatia.

The threats are a daily reality and it’s often children who are most at-risk—their innocent curiosity a deadly trait and not just in Bosnia and Herzegovina: “In Mongolia, something like 20 years after conflict, people are still getting killed or injured on mines,” Ivica tells me. “We stopped one time because a little girl lost her hand and eyesight because she found something in a garden and that thing exploded,” he remembers.

It's the children who are most at risk for losing life and limb, and it’s the next generation that will inherit mine-riddled land if swift progress isn’t made soon. 

For most American kids, landmines are a foreign concept, whereas Bosnian kids begin their mine risk education just after learning the alphabet.

“We start with the first graders and we teach them how to recognize the potential dangerous areas because not all of them are properly marked,” explains Marija Trlin, who (among many other things) oversees the CHAMPS program for MLI in Bosnia. “If the grass is overgrown, if there are heavy bushes, if there are trenches, they are clear signs of mine contamination. We teach our children not to be curious and not to touch something in the unknown areas, how to save themselves if they find themselves in the contaminated areas. These are the classes we give to our schoolkids.”

Teacher Larisa Jahic nods along in emphatic agreement, “Avoid anything suspicious. If you see a cherry tree full of fruits, don’t go near because there are mines.”

Since helping to launch CHAMPS in 2014, Marija has established partnerships with six schools throughout BiH, which have monthly Skype calls with U.S. schoolchildren. She remembers one Skype call particularly well, when she had arranged for a survivor, Dragana, to join and share her story with kids in Connecticut: “Dragana, when she was five, she lost her mother and a leg, and a girl from North Mianus asked her, ‘Was it harder for you to lose a mother or a leg?’ And Dragana answered, ‘That’s a good question. I think at that point I was more thinking about my leg because I was only five. As I was growing up, I realized what it is to not have a mother while you’re a young child but I wasn’t aware of that at the moment she got killed.’”

Elise Becker, VP of Operations for MLI, has observed many similar calls and questions. “On the U.S. side,” she says, “It builds exposure to a serious issue—the landmines issue—and builds global understanding and relationships. The middle school aged kids are the best age because they’re old enough to understand but young enough that they’re not over-committed already or cynical.”

In Ms. Jahic’s classroom, the students sit adorably, shoulder-to-shoulder in two rows, squeezing to fit everyone in the frame. They face a laptop screen where another group of kids sit similarly and stare back, though halfway across the world in North Mianus Middle School in Greenwich, Connecticut. What??

Yeah. This cross-cultural friendship and learning—created and facilitated by Marshall Legacy Institute—has become a regular exchange for 28 schools throughout Connecticut. Since 2005, the kids of this school district have raised more than $160,000 to send 13 highly trained Mine Detection Dogs to 5 countries. In addition, they’ve helped provide mine risk education to kids growing up in post-war contexts, and prosthetics and wheelchairs for young landmine survivors.

A little girl holds a picture up to the webcam: “This is our school mascot…it’s a hawk, which is a bird,” she offers sweetly before being elbowed by a know-it-all, “They know that…” The U.S. teacher-moderator chimes in, “One of the dogs that they sponsored, they named ‘Hawk’ after their school mascot.” The Bosnian kids turn to each other and whisper-practice the new English word: Haw-k.

Amina speaks up for the Bosnian group and tells how they recently went to Sarajevo to support Fantomi at their opening games where they won 1^st place (to be fair, they’re long-time international champions and decisively the best team in Europe). “Fantomi Sitting Volleyball Team is a team where the members of the team are landmine survivors—disabled people who don’t have part of their body, like a leg or something like that. We received a volleyball signed by the whole team,” she says, as she holds up a picture of the moment on her phone.

Sidenote: The gentleman presenting the ball is Mirsad Mirojević, Founding Member and Director of Fantomi. As a soldier during the war, he lost his right leg to a landmine on the slopes of Olympic Mountain Igman. His leg was amputated below the knee in an improvised surgery room. In the years that followed, he and dozens of others would meet daily to play sitting volleyball. “Our idea was to get us all together, a little group of people in the same shoes, to help each other and support each other, to get out of the house and start living normal life. Even during the war when we went through heavy bombings, we met every day and tried to practice,” he says. “With some improvised tools, no lights, no glass—it was drafty and cold—but we did it every day. So, we started the Fantomi club and now they are world champions and European champions and half of them, at least, are members of the national team. I couldn’t dream what would happen twenty years later.”

Back in the classroom, the U.S. kids erupt with questions for Amina: “Is it just like normal volleyball but you play on the floor? Or are there different rules?”

The Bosnian students confer and respond, “The net is lower and the court is smaller, but otherwise the rules are the same, but everyone can’t get off the floor they have to sit all the time, they can’t stand up or jump.”

Another question, “Do they all have to have the same disability? Or is it just a disability?”

Amina explains, “No, every person is different. Some don’t have their leg above their knee, or some don’t have a finger or a toe.”

It continues like this, beautifully, for some time until the U.S. kids reciprocate with a big achievement: “We raised enough money this year, I think, to get another dog,” says one boy, “We named it Emily, after a girl that went to our school and died two years ago in a boating accident.”

The Bosnian students absorb sweetly, congratulate them and share that recently they were able to help a survivor named Damid: “When he got injured it was during the war time and he was just a little kid, maybe 9 or 10 years old, he wasn’t that big, and he found a little toy car somewhere on the street and he was about to play with it and drive it on the wall of a building, and that car was actually a mine and it exploded in his hand. He lost his arm and his eye, so we gave him a prosthetic arm and he is very happy.”

The empathy on both sides is enough to make me weep with hope for all of humanity—not for long though as the U.S. classroom pivots abruptly, “Want to hear our graduation song??” I hear the little introverts moan “noooooo!!!” in the background, to no avail. And so begins a pre-pubescent rendition of the theme song for The Greatest Showman, followed by their favorite dance: The Floss. “It’s from a video game…” they offer, but no explanation is needed as this one is known by every 12-year-old with internet access.

“This project changed me as a person, firstly,” admits Ms. Jahic, “And then I can also see the impact those kids are making. For example, our neighbor, Suada, lost everything in just one second. During the war, a bomb fell on her house and killed her husband and sister and brother-in-law, injuring her as well— she lost her right leg. She had poor prosthesis, it wasn’t good enough, she couldn’t walk on her own. She used a wooden stick just to move three or four steps. So, when CHAMPS offered to help she was a little surprised. Marija visited her at her house and said, ‘We definitely need to help this woman, she is so strong.’ So one day the kids and Marija and myself we went to Bauerfeind to have a workshop on how to help the people making prosthesis—and Suada got her prosthesis. A few months later, I met her on the bus and she was getting in and out of the bus alone and I was shocked. I couldn’t believe my eyes. She said, ‘Thank you so much, you are not aware how much you have changed my life.’”

As she tells the story, Emela starts weeping quietly next to me. In a world and at a time when societies seem to default to division and causes more often make us calloused instead of compassionate, these profound and profoundly simple exchanges between children an ocean apart are nurturing a sincere concern for the marginalized in the hearts of the next generation.

Like Mirsad and Suada, Adis Smajevic is a victim of war and received a prosthetic leg at Bauerfeind with the help of CHAMPS. He remembers being peppered with questions from curious kids: “Sometimes the questions do sound funny, but they’re trying to understand how it is: How do you walk on snow? How do you ice skate with a prosthesis? Do you fall in winter time? Is it icy?” he chuckles. “And I’m happy that I got the opportunity to bring this closer to them, of course. I don’t expect little children to understand the problems that I’m going through, but I think that discussing these problems with children is as important for us as for them, because if they have this problem closer to them maybe they will be able to understand it better and help other people with disabilities.”

Adis was 15-years-old when a grenade fell into his bedroom. It was wartime, so he was operated on in a makeshift hospital without running water, electricity, or proper medication. “Until I was fifteen, I lived a normal life except for the fact that at one point in time the war started. But when I got injured, it was a life in constant pain—struggling with infections and hospitals, until I got sepsis and barely saved my life and went through the amputation process. It was not an easy life, it was a life full of struggle and full of pain.”

Today, nearly twenty years later, we are meeting the day before he is to be fitted with a new knee, a huge milestone to celebrate especially given all he’s endured and his two little ones who have long wanted to play tag and ride bikes with him.

This knee would not have been possible without Marshall Legacy and Bosnia’s humble hero, Mirsad.

“I met Mirsad a couple of years ago here at this prosthetic facility by chance when I was fitted for one of the prosthesis I had before,” remembers Adis. “It was a moment when I realized how important it is when you talk to a person with the same problems. It takes another disabled person to fully understand.”

This is a sentiment that Mirsad knows this well and one that has fueled Fantomi since the beginning: “Having a group of people with similar problems, we actually exchanged all the experiences, feelings, emotions, pains. What we even did, we exchanged parts of our legs. Like, if this screwdriver fits you better or this foot, let’s change! Maybe yours will fit mine better. But it’s only possible among the people who understand you.”

“During and after the war, I visited hospitals on a daily basis—at least 500 people I visited and supported them with my own example that life didn’t stop and they will be able to walk again and be able to continue with their life. That’s the example that I wanted to share with other people,” says Mirsad. “Disabled people are not integrated into society, especially civil war victims. The only way for civil war victims to get proper aid and prostheses are through international organizations, like MLI.”

And that’s exactly how Adis is getting a new knee. “For him, being a disabled person and aware of the lack of money in this country for civil war victims and aware that I am a young person with above-the-knee amputation and little children, he discussed how to improve this prosthesis that I’m getting through CHAMPS and they figured out a way to get this electronic knee from USA, from his friends and partners, giving me this new opportunity. I am beyond grateful and happy,” says Adis poignantly. 

“One of our best players—he is a member of the national team, he is captain of our team—he was only six when we found him, standing on the street without a leg. And we kind of scouted all of our players, like ‘Do you want to join us? Do you want to start playing sitting volleyball?’ And now he is a very successful young man and I am very proud. His name is Mirzid,” says Mirsad. 

We arrive at ‘Former Frontline in the Middle of Nowhere, No. 95’—I swear that’s the address we were given—and Sead Vrana (leader of the country’s most badass search and rescue team) briefs us on the situation: “In the last week, during our training, one of the locals from the village 10km away approached us and told us he buried the UXO there [pointing up the hill, toward the forest] and said, ‘Somewhere between the foxhole and the road.’”

Sead’s team tried to search for it using the metal detectors but with this being a former confrontation line there was too much other scrap metal in the ground for the detectors to be effective. “So, today we are going to use a mine-detection dog to see if we can locate the UXO and then dispose of it. We will use the decayed hotel as a barricade between us and the detonation. This is a live situation, we do not know what or where it is, but the dog will try to find it. In this situation, nothing can do the job like a dog,” he says confidently.

“I want to highlight that all of these guys are former members of the air assault units, SWAT teams, special operations units, long-range recon, so you have actually a bunch of the special forces guys, who are deadly but gentle,” he jokes, sort of.

Jesmin and Rico are sent in to the forest to begin searching, just like we saw in the training fields, except this time I, too, am in a heavy flight jacket and helmet…and my stomach’s in my throat.

It takes Jesmin and Rico just fifteen minutes to sniff out the ordnance. Jesmin marks the spot, pulls Rico out, and Suad—the disposal technician—approaches to confirm the detection. This is the most dangerous part, Sead tells us, because we don’t know yet what we’re dealing with and/or how corroded or volatile it might be—a mine, an unexploded ordnance, a 500lb bomb, you get the idea.

Why is this the most dangerous part? Sead explains:

Suad uses a prodder to determine depth and size, then his hands to gently brush away the soil. He confirms a 60mm mortar shell with Sead over the walkie talkie, and Rico is rewarded with the rubber ball game. Their next step is to carefully hook a 100m rope to the tailfin of the shell and pull it from the ground slowly—this ‘hook and rope’ technique is to figure out if it’s simply fired and unexploded, or it’s booby-trapped. We are instructed to take cover behind the building, and wait.