I am an American and I love Serbia. It is a love acquired only recently, for I only discovered Serbia a few years ago. Ask someone outside the Balkans to give you an image of Serbia and they can only think of the sadness of the past or nothing at all. This ignorance is a great injustice to a culture that existed hundreds of hears before my own country was even born. i have discovered great beauty in Serbia—in the buildings, in the land and especially the people. It is this beauty I want to share with you. It is my perspective—only one American's perspective, but it is a gift I hope to share with both this Balkan beauty I have come to love and the world we live in.
—Wesley Channell
Sa ponosom za sebe volim da kazem da sam ja jedan Amerikanac koji mnogo voli Srbiju. Ova velika ljubav je stecena tek skoro, s obzirom da sam Srbiju otkrio pre samo par godina, i u nju se zaljubio. Kada nekoga izvan Balkana pitate o Srbiji, prva asocijacija uvek bude tuzna proslost vezana za ratove i prevrate, ili, cak ni nema asocijacije. Ljudsko neznanje je ogromna nepravda jednoj kulturi koja je postojala stotinama godina pre nego sto je moja, americka kultura, i bila u zacetku. Fascinirale su me lepote Srbije - lepote gradjevina, reljefa, prirode, ali ono sto me posebno fascinira jeste - lepota ljudi. Upravo je ta, vasa, lepota ono sto ja sa vama zelim da podelim. To je iz moje perspektive- perspektive jednog Amerikanca, ali je to, pre svega, poklon - poklon ovoj balkanskoj lepoti koju sam dosao da zavolim i poklon ovom Svetu u kome zivimo.
—Wesley Channell
"A Letter to My People"
I sit here
With 100 dinars
In my hand
And dream
Of a
Distant land.
A hidden
Land
To the eyes
Of the West
Who cannot see
Or understand
The joys
The pains
The hurts
And claims
Of those
Who have lived
1000 years
Before them.
I want them
To meet.
East and West
To kiss
To understand
The love
The passion
The pain
The beauty
They share
But do not see.
So I show
Them pictures
Of beauty
Of grace
Of color
And faces
And ask them
To see
To understand
To remember
To forget
To meet
And walk
Hand in hand.
—Wesley Channell