People like Bill Carter

Bill Carter (born 1966) is a writer and director. He directed the documentary film Miss Sarajevo, which consists of amateur video material he shot during his stay in the besieged city of Sarajevo. He is the author of Fools Rush In, his memoirs of working for an aid agency during the War in Bosnia and Herzegovina. He teaches journalism and film at Northern Arizona University.

Carter became involved in the Balkan conflict when he was traveling the world after his girlfriend died in a car crash in 1991. After traveling to Split, he joined The Serious Road Trip, a humanitarian aid organization distributing food and medicine to places the United Nations and the Red Cross would not go. Arriving in Sarajevo, he decided to stay with the Sarajevans, inspired by the way they tried to maintain the life they had before the siege began. He saw Sarajevo as key because Sarajevans refused to be divided along ethnic lines with many Serbs joining the defence of the city against the Serb nationalist besiegers.