- 1 year ago
Književnica Ivana Simić Bodrožić rođena je 1982. godine u Vukovaru, apsolventica studija filozofije i kroatistike.
Tragedija rodnoga grada i njezina je osobna tragedija – na Ovčari joj je kao žrtva zločina ubijen otac. S majkom i bratom djetinjstvo provodi u progonstvu.
Zbirku poezije Prvi korak u tamu objavljuje 2005. godine, za koju biva nagrađena na Goranovom proljeću nagradom Goran za mlade pjesnike. Za istu zbirku dobiva nagradu Matice Hrvatske Kvirin za najboljeg pjesnika do 35 godina. Poeziju objavljuje u raznim književnim časopisima; Vijenac, Quorum, Poezija, te biva uvrštena u antologiju suvremene hrvatske poezije Utjeha kaosa Miroslava Mićanovića, kao najmlađa autorica. Pjesme su joj prevođene na razne europske jezike, a 2013. godine izašao je prijevod cjelovite zbirke na španjolskom jeziku. Roman Hotel Zagorje izlazi joj 2010. godine u izdavačkoj kući Profil, i za njega je nagrađena nagradama Josip i Ivan Kozarac (Povelja uspješnosti), Kočićevo pero (Banjaluka – Beograd; za vanredne uspehe u savremenoj književnosti) i Kiklop za najbolje prozno djelo u 2010. godini.
U veljači 2012., njemački prijevod romana Hotel Zagorje izašao je u uglednoj izdavačkoj kući Hanser, te u francuskoj Acte Sud. Do sada je objavljen i u Srbiji (Izdavačka kuća “Rende”) te u prijevodu na slovenski (Izdavačka kuća “Modrijan”). Prema istom djelu, kao koscenaristica, zajedno sa nagrađivanom bosanskohercegovačkom redateljicom Jasmilom Žbanić piše scenarij za igrani film.
Dobitnica je Večernjakove nagrade “Ranko Marinković” (2. mjesto) za najbolju kratku priču u 2011. godini. 2012. godine objavljuje zbirku pjesama Prijelaz za divlje životinje u izdavačkoj kući V.B.Z.
Tragedija rodnoga grada i njezina je osobna tragedija – na Ovčari joj je kao žrtva zločina ubijen otac. S majkom i bratom djetinjstvo provodi u progonstvu.
Zbirku poezije Prvi korak u tamu objavljuje 2005. godine, za koju biva nagrađena na Goranovom proljeću nagradom Goran za mlade pjesnike. Za istu zbirku dobiva nagradu Matice Hrvatske Kvirin za najboljeg pjesnika do 35 godina. Poeziju objavljuje u raznim književnim časopisima; Vijenac, Quorum, Poezija, te biva uvrštena u antologiju suvremene hrvatske poezije Utjeha kaosa Miroslava Mićanovića, kao najmlađa autorica. Pjesme su joj prevođene na razne europske jezike, a 2013. godine izašao je prijevod cjelovite zbirke na španjolskom jeziku. Roman Hotel Zagorje izlazi joj 2010. godine u izdavačkoj kući Profil, i za njega je nagrađena nagradama Josip i Ivan Kozarac (Povelja uspješnosti), Kočićevo pero (Banjaluka – Beograd; za vanredne uspehe u savremenoj književnosti) i Kiklop za najbolje prozno djelo u 2010. godini.
U veljači 2012., njemački prijevod romana Hotel Zagorje izašao je u uglednoj izdavačkoj kući Hanser, te u francuskoj Acte Sud. Do sada je objavljen i u Srbiji (Izdavačka kuća “Rende”) te u prijevodu na slovenski (Izdavačka kuća “Modrijan”). Prema istom djelu, kao koscenaristica, zajedno sa nagrađivanom bosanskohercegovačkom redateljicom Jasmilom Žbanić piše scenarij za igrani film.
Dobitnica je Večernjakove nagrade “Ranko Marinković” (2. mjesto) za najbolju kratku priču u 2011. godini. 2012. godine objavljuje zbirku pjesama Prijelaz za divlje životinje u izdavačkoj kući V.B.Z.
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CreativityTranscript
00:00:00A nine-year-old girl from a relatively peaceful Bukovar goes to the sea.
00:00:05A war breaks out, and summer becomes a life in exile.
00:00:09That's how a life story begins,
00:00:11translated into a semi-autobiographical novel by Ivana Simić-Bodrožić,
00:00:15which is actually a diary about growing up in the war, written 19 years later.
00:00:20When I realized how complicated and abnormal it was,
00:00:24while you're a child, you can't live in the past or in the future,
00:00:28but you live in the present moment,
00:00:31and you don't think the way adults do.
00:00:35A graduate of philosophy and Croatian literature,
00:00:38a well-known first step in that direction,
00:00:41in her first novel, Hotel Zagorje,
00:00:44she talks about her seven-year stay in Jadran, Kumrovac and Zagreb.
00:00:49She wrote an exact, honest story about all of us,
00:00:54of course, from her own experience, from a life that deserved that story.
00:01:00The story of constant fighting with her brother and mother,
00:01:03and waiting for news about her father, who was captured in Bukovar and later killed by the Ovčars,
00:01:08says that domestic people have no understanding for refugees.
00:01:12You are expelled from your city and forced to be somewhere where people live their lives,
00:01:17and in a way you hate those people who live their lives,
00:01:20because you can't live your own life,
00:01:22and you feel like they have no feelings for everything that happens to you.
00:01:27Kumrovac tells a story about the ghetto.
00:01:29Bukovars from the former party school spend their time following the news,
00:01:33drinking from the Ovčars, writing letters to politicians and begging them to help them.
00:01:38She also sent letters to Ivan and his brother.
00:01:41She also talks about how Bukovars sometimes treat Zagorje differently.
00:01:46I call Zagorje Pajceki in Romanian, and some of them are very angry with me today.
00:01:51Her upbringing is divided into refugees, refugees and those in their homes.
00:01:57We were refugees, but then there were some refugees from Bosnia.
00:02:01I mean, we were poor, but these Bosnians were really poor.
00:02:04So, among all of us, I think it's somehow human and natural,
00:02:08there is this will and desire for domination over other people, tribes, communities.
00:02:15As an illustrator and winner in the literary competition,
00:02:18Ivana describes the elite seventh high school in Zagreb.
00:02:22The first impressions are that it's a beautiful city, but also completely insensitive.
00:02:26It wasn't easy for me in high school.
00:02:28At one point, I had serious problems with grades and with the students,
00:02:32because somehow, I think it all came together,
00:02:37everything that happened to me in my life, with that rebellion, with discovering myself.
00:02:42She describes Zagreb in the scenes from the tram or bakery.
00:02:46There were no bacon rolls, I mean, there were, but they were called long rolls,
00:02:50and then we found a lot of misunderstanding in Zagreb bakeries
00:02:54when we were looking for long rolls, because they were bacon, right?
00:02:58Ivana lives today in the village of Dugoje, on the outskirts of the city.
00:03:01She studies literature and writing, and her mother has two children.
00:03:05Her husband Roman has the same profession, he is the manager of an apartment building.
00:03:10He has become their friend.
00:03:13I gave my mother and my friend to Ivana in full confidence,
00:03:19in front of my mother and the priest.
00:03:22Even though she is ten years younger than us,
00:03:25she is a girl for whom it was immediately clear to me
00:03:28that I can give her to him without any problems,
00:03:31that he will make a decent man out of her.
00:03:34With an intimate story, Ivana described the Croatian society in a cruel time.
00:03:38Her trauma is the key to her inspiration.
00:03:41She herself said in an interview that what she wrote in a book
00:03:45cannot be returned to her father.
00:03:47Of course, it is clear that this kind of trauma and loss is completely unbearable,
00:03:51but writing is the way by which you can grow up
00:03:56with such events, with such traumas.
00:04:00She wrote it in very rare pockets of free time
00:04:04that she would find between the fields and the garden.
00:04:07Even after some tests, she managed to put a lot of it into one paragraph.
00:04:11I think that during that period she could see
00:04:15how persistent and brave she was,
00:04:18and how much she wanted to show the fate
00:04:22that she inherited from her mother.
00:04:25She became a great writer with her first novel,
00:04:28and her fate is actually a symbol of Croatia in the 1990s
00:04:31and all that this country is.
00:04:42Good day, dear viewers. You are watching the show Sunday at two.
00:04:45Our guest is the writer Ivana Simić-Bodružić.
00:04:48Ivana, good day, welcome.
00:04:50Good day, and thank you for inviting me to the show.
00:04:53You were in Vukovar yesterday.
00:04:55I was.
00:04:56You don't go very often.
00:04:58Well, I don't go very often,
00:05:00maybe once every two years, once a year.
00:05:03What do you do when you go there?
00:05:06Well, actually, I went to the city for the first time yesterday.
00:05:09Otherwise, since I don't have any family there anymore,
00:05:12or any kind of property,
00:05:14I go to the cemetery during the holidays,
00:05:17possibly to Ovčar,
00:05:19and I felt the need to go to the city by myself,
00:05:23sit next to us, have a cup of coffee,
00:05:26and somehow soak up the atmosphere of the city
00:05:29and find those places that remind me of a part of my life,
00:05:34and somehow just be in the city by myself.
00:05:39What day was Vukovar yesterday?
00:05:41Windy, but it was nice.
00:05:45When you sit in the hotel Danube,
00:05:48where your dad was the boss of the hall,
00:05:52you remember, I suppose.
00:05:56Well, I don't know, it's hard for me to explain that feeling.
00:05:59Vukovar today and Vukovar in the past,
00:06:02that city has changed a lot,
00:06:04maybe not in a physical sense,
00:06:06although whoever comes to see that the center is still quite unrenovated,
00:06:09and there are still too many traces of war in that city,
00:06:13but a good part of Vukovar has not returned,
00:06:16some other people live there today,
00:06:18the atmosphere is different,
00:06:19and all those people who came back, came back completely changed.
00:06:22So that city, in some segments,
00:06:25looks like the place where I was born and spent part of my childhood,
00:06:29but on the other hand, there is some energy in the city
00:06:33around which we agree,
00:06:34and me and some of my friends who came back,
00:06:37you simply feel something heavy in the air,
00:06:40and I think it's related primarily to all those people
00:06:43who were lying on the streets, dead 20 years ago,
00:06:46and that energy somehow simply stayed there,
00:06:50because there was too much of it,
00:06:52and maybe it will take a lot of generations,
00:06:54and a lot of time for all those people to change,
00:06:57and to somehow start living there,
00:06:59people who do not remember those scenes,
00:07:01and then maybe it will be a little different,
00:07:03but for now,
00:07:04I always have that feeling that I am very excited when I go to Vukovar,
00:07:07but then when I get there,
00:07:09after we visit the graves and all the other places we go to,
00:07:14I actually wait to return to Zagreb.
00:07:18What do you think about the people there,
00:07:20what can you see there one day?
00:07:22Well, I don't know,
00:07:23quite a long time ago, when I first left,
00:07:26I hoped I wouldn't recognize anyone,
00:07:29because somehow I was a little afraid of those friends,
00:07:33and colleagues, and neighbors,
00:07:35and somehow I wasn't sure I knew what to say to them when I met them,
00:07:40but today so many new people have settled there,
00:07:43that all this has been lost and mixed up,
00:07:46and I have several friends in Vukovar,
00:07:48and that is what actually connects me the most,
00:07:51and some of my memories from before.
00:07:54You say that Vukovar is your favorite city in the world,
00:07:57but you wouldn't be able to live there?
00:07:59Well, not exactly because it's not the same place anymore,
00:08:02there are some places,
00:08:04and some moments that remind me of the most beautiful times,
00:08:07and one of the most beautiful times in my life,
00:08:09however, I don't know what I would do there.
00:08:12What do you remember from Vukovar as a child?
00:08:14You left Vukovar, how old were you?
00:08:16I was nine years old.
00:08:18What do you remember? What are the pictures that you remember the most?
00:08:21Well, I remember what I remember from my childhood,
00:08:24going out with my parents, with my friends,
00:08:28playing outside in the street in the summer,
00:08:31from dawn to dusk,
00:08:33with a piece of bread and butter in my hand,
00:08:35and I remember, I don't know, grandma,
00:08:37and that everything was somehow right,
00:08:40and maybe everyone has that feeling from childhood,
00:08:43but after all this happened,
00:08:46after that childhood that happened,
00:08:49then probably, maybe I idealize that feeling somewhere,
00:08:52and I raise it above everything that came later,
00:08:55but I can say that I spent in that city,
00:08:57really, one of the most beautiful times in my life until the war.
00:09:00Well, everyone idealizes childhood,
00:09:02I mean, it's a universal feeling among people.
00:09:05When children, especially in your case,
00:09:08it's interesting, in a way,
00:09:10you write about it in your book,
00:09:12when children, and when you,
00:09:14experience in that environment
00:09:16that people share,
00:09:18not only on those who are nice to you,
00:09:20and those who are not,
00:09:22but that they share on some other determinants,
00:09:26you write about it,
00:09:28through stories, jokes,
00:09:30you can tell me,
00:09:32when did you, as a child, feel that,
00:09:34I don't know, your friend,
00:09:36was actually something else, or that...
00:09:38Well, I personally believe that in the 90s,
00:09:41because I was really young then,
00:09:43and that such an atmosphere reigned in Vukovar,
00:09:46I wasn't quite sure what I was,
00:09:48I mean, mine is in Croatia,
00:09:50but that wasn't something that was important,
00:09:53my parents had Serbian friends,
00:09:55we all hung out together,
00:09:57that wasn't something that was being discussed at all,
00:10:00however, in the beginning of the 90s,
00:10:02some stories started,
00:10:04I don't know who was first,
00:10:06but that, in school, who lies,
00:10:08who says that Serbia is small,
00:10:10and then, I don't know,
00:10:12it started somehow,
00:10:14but it was all some kind of chaos,
00:10:16it was all something,
00:10:18no one thought that something so terrible
00:10:20would really happen,
00:10:22what I remember,
00:10:24that summer,
00:10:26at some point,
00:10:28the kids from the city started leaving,
00:10:30everyone on their side,
00:10:32at one point there were no Serbian kids,
00:10:34so it would be good for you to go to the sea,
00:10:36however, for me,
00:10:38I don't believe in others,
00:10:40nor in adults,
00:10:42but those are some of the first scenes
00:10:44that I remember when I think about it.
00:10:46You mention the sea,
00:10:48you go to the sea in the 90s,
00:10:50and from that sea,
00:10:52in fact, there is no return to Vukovar.
00:10:54Well, yes,
00:10:56I left Vukovar for the summer,
00:10:58and the first time after that,
00:11:00I returned to Vukovar in 1997,
00:11:02actually, before that, no,
00:11:04we went, we were supposed to be
00:11:06in Vukovar,
00:11:08however, the situation in the city
00:11:10became more and more complicated,
00:11:12we were advised not to return,
00:11:14my brother and I were alone,
00:11:16after a while, my mother came to us,
00:11:18because she wanted to be with us,
00:11:20my father stayed,
00:11:22and then we had to go somewhere from that sea,
00:11:24then we went to Zagreb,
00:11:26if something happens, it happens in Zagreb,
00:11:28we had a relative there,
00:11:30who took us in for a few months,
00:11:32so we ended up there.
00:11:34From that summer,
00:11:36you end up in Zagreb,
00:11:38as a child, you experience
00:11:40the beginning of the war,
00:11:42how did you explain that to yourself?
00:11:44Well, I don't know,
00:11:46through the stories of others,
00:11:48probably adults,
00:11:50yes, when you are a child,
00:11:52somehow, you have that filter
00:11:54through which you receive things,
00:11:56and shocks, and bad news,
00:11:58and you can't understand it all,
00:12:00you simply are not mature enough for it,
00:12:02and you realize that it comes much later,
00:12:04and when you are a child,
00:12:06you somehow play through it,
00:12:08and all the bad things that happen,
00:12:10enter through the game,
00:12:12in a way, your world,
00:12:14so I think that the awakening
00:12:16comes much later.
00:12:18In Zagreb, from the beginning,
00:12:20everything was nice,
00:12:22everything was great,
00:12:24I didn't have to learn anything at school,
00:12:26it was wonderful, I had a certificate,
00:12:28but it didn't last long.
00:12:30How do you see it?
00:12:32It changes, it's natural somehow,
00:12:34I think that every miracle
00:12:36is three days in one city,
00:12:38after some time,
00:12:40we had a wonderful family
00:12:42that accepted us,
00:12:44but after a few months,
00:12:46it was really hard for them,
00:12:48a lot of houses, people,
00:12:50no one had any money,
00:12:52it was all somehow,
00:12:54terribly unknown,
00:12:56and the expenses were high,
00:12:58but it's natural,
00:13:00people are like that,
00:13:02people deal with their problems,
00:13:04they live their lives,
00:13:06and they can give a certain amount of energy,
00:13:08to help someone,
00:13:10but it's not endless.
00:13:12It's an eternal thing.
00:13:14After a while, you realize
00:13:16that you can't be with your family anymore,
00:13:18your mother, brother,
00:13:20what do you do then?
00:13:22Then my mother,
00:13:24one day,
00:13:26she left her biography,
00:13:28we heard about one apartment
00:13:30in Zagreb,
00:13:32which was empty at that time,
00:13:34and we simply didn't have
00:13:36where to live anymore,
00:13:38and my mother said,
00:13:40ok, we'll move into that apartment,
00:13:42I don't want that apartment,
00:13:44but we'll have to live somewhere,
00:13:46when we're in that apartment,
00:13:48we won't be thrown out on the street,
00:13:50it wasn't our goal to move into
00:13:52someone's apartment and live in Zagreb,
00:13:54that we're here,
00:13:56and that we exist,
00:13:58and that we don't have a roof over our heads,
00:14:00and when the police came,
00:14:02I don't remember,
00:14:04because I wasn't there,
00:14:06when my mother came into the apartment,
00:14:08the first thing she did,
00:14:10she called the police,
00:14:12and said, hello,
00:14:14I'm this and that,
00:14:16I came into this apartment,
00:14:18so you come now.
00:14:20Your mother didn't throw anyone out of the apartment?
00:14:22No.
00:14:24But in that period,
00:14:26when my mother came into the apartment,
00:14:28there was no one in that apartment,
00:14:30and I know,
00:14:32that she later told me,
00:14:34through laughter,
00:14:36that it took her 10 years of life,
00:14:38because when she came into the apartment,
00:14:40the first thing she did,
00:14:42she opened the fridge,
00:14:44and there was one egg in the fridge,
00:14:46and she thought,
00:14:48ok, it's over,
00:14:50so they threw us out of that apartment,
00:14:52but then we found accommodation in Kumrovac,
00:14:54in the former political school.
00:14:56Yes, you say,
00:14:58that you were deluged out of the apartment,
00:15:00but you didn't live there alone,
00:15:02a number of people increased.
00:15:04A little by little,
00:15:06there were three of us,
00:15:08then my grandma came,
00:15:10I simply call her grandma,
00:15:12because she's from Herzegovina,
00:15:14she came from Vukovar,
00:15:16after my grandson was sent to Vukovar,
00:15:18then our friends came,
00:15:20my mom's friend and her son-in-law,
00:15:22who were placed in a pool,
00:15:24and there were, I think,
00:15:2650 of them in one room,
00:15:28it was really hard for them,
00:15:30and we were simply good,
00:15:32and it was normal for all of us to be together,
00:15:34and then my other grandparents came,
00:15:36who stayed in Vukovar,
00:15:38but they were in the part of the city
00:15:40where there were a little better Chetniks,
00:15:42so they didn't beat them up and throw them out,
00:15:44they just forced them to sign a house deed,
00:15:46and then they moved to Vukovar from 1992,
00:15:48after that they were thrown out of the city,
00:15:50and they came to us,
00:15:52so the number of people increased to eight
00:15:54in that two-bedroom apartment.
00:15:56Here you mentioned the fact
00:15:58that your grandfather was slandered.
00:16:00The word slander,
00:16:02how do you explain it?
00:16:04Well, the word slander,
00:16:06I was actually very upset,
00:16:08because I remember exactly that day,
00:16:10and I describe that scene in the novel,
00:16:12we were still at that shelter,
00:16:14behind that electric stove,
00:16:16and of course sometimes I listened
00:16:18to what the elders were saying,
00:16:20they didn't really want to say anything to us,
00:16:22and then I heard that my grandfather
00:16:24and grandmother were slandered.
00:16:26Then they thought that my grandmother
00:16:28also stayed with him,
00:16:30however it turned out that they
00:16:32spared her, and I would like
00:16:34to have another word for it,
00:16:36but it just happened that way,
00:16:38they did it to her,
00:16:40and I can't say anything else.
00:16:42No, that's abstract,
00:16:44when you're a child,
00:16:46it's very abstract,
00:16:48it's like watching a movie,
00:16:50you can't understand it,
00:16:52you simply don't have enough maturity
00:16:54in your brain, in your heart.
00:16:56Do you see that there are probably
00:16:58some emotions that people
00:17:00bring to you, and you express them?
00:17:02Of course, of course,
00:17:04and you feel it,
00:17:06and it enters you,
00:17:08but you have that filter
00:17:10You say that after
00:17:12moving out of the apartment,
00:17:14you find accommodation
00:17:16in Kumrovac.
00:17:18The book you wrote,
00:17:20Hotel Zagore,
00:17:22what was the arrival like in Kumrovac?
00:17:24Well, the arrival was also
00:17:26quite traumatic,
00:17:28because in Kumrovac they actually
00:17:30moved a group of people,
00:17:32that is, the leaders who had
00:17:34lived in the Zagreb Hotel Holiday,
00:17:36we heard about it,
00:17:38and when we came to Kumrovac,
00:17:40it turned out that there were
00:17:42a number of rooms just for those people,
00:17:44and some were not very happy
00:17:46that we were there,
00:17:48and they wanted us to go there,
00:17:50and I remember those scenes
00:17:52when we stood at the reception
00:17:54and tried to get our place in that hotel,
00:17:56some people shouted,
00:17:58well, Dobranci, get out,
00:18:00you have nothing to do here.
00:18:02I mean, these are people,
00:18:04that's what this novel is about,
00:18:06they are not Zagreb's negative people
00:18:08or Zagreb's negative people,
00:18:10they are just people,
00:18:12and these are people in a situation
00:18:14where they are completely overgrown
00:18:16and where they have no control
00:18:18over what is happening in their lives
00:18:20and in the lives of their loved ones,
00:18:22and then they simply become frightened,
00:18:24small, shy, and fight only for their place.
00:18:26However, there were also ok people there,
00:18:28as they are always found,
00:18:30and we managed to get one room
00:18:32on the third floor,
00:18:34but at that time
00:18:36it looked like a gain for us,
00:18:38and we thought
00:18:40that we would be there for a while,
00:18:42until things get a little better,
00:18:44and then we go back,
00:18:46and six or seven years have passed
00:18:48since then.
00:18:50You say you experience it
00:18:52as a gain, but your mother,
00:18:54at least that's what you write in the book,
00:18:56when she enters the room,
00:18:58she starts crying,
00:19:00she sees that...
00:19:02Yesterday you lived a normal life
00:19:04in your apartment with your husband,
00:19:06with your family,
00:19:08and suddenly you realize
00:19:10that it's a gain for you,
00:19:12a small room, and that's why
00:19:14you should be happy.
00:19:16And somehow you get the impression
00:19:18from all the other people around you,
00:19:20well, it's good for you,
00:19:22you are in a hotel,
00:19:24they would take care of you,
00:19:26and that thesis starts to spread,
00:19:28and I think it spread for a long time
00:19:30in many areas of society.
00:19:32Yes, whatever you want.
00:19:34Well, you got it, you get everything.
00:19:36For all that time,
00:19:38what happened to your father?
00:19:40Did he call you?
00:19:42My father called on the 19th,
00:19:44the 11th,
00:19:46a phone call,
00:19:48I didn't get it,
00:19:50it was at night,
00:19:52but it was early in the morning,
00:19:54and he said,
00:19:56I'm alive, I'm healthy,
00:19:58and we went crazy from happiness,
00:20:00and we bought a cake, meat,
00:20:02and we waited for him all day,
00:20:04he didn't call after that,
00:20:06and we thought,
00:20:08they must be in Vinkovci,
00:20:10they must be being deported,
00:20:12and when we saw that it wasn't even that,
00:20:14when people came back from the breakthrough,
00:20:16we thought, of course,
00:20:18he must be in prison,
00:20:20a lot of people were in prison,
00:20:22in some kind of camp,
00:20:24and then we waited for months,
00:20:26they took him to some place,
00:20:28but nothing happened,
00:20:30and the worst thing about his disappearance,
00:20:32for me,
00:20:34is that you don't know
00:20:36when you stopped waiting,
00:20:38because it's obvious that we stopped waiting,
00:20:40I mean, after 18 years,
00:20:42no one waits for him anymore,
00:20:44he probably didn't wait for him after 15,
00:20:46after 10, after 7,
00:20:48but at some point,
00:20:50there's no moment when someone tells you
00:20:52that your loved one died,
00:20:54and at that moment,
00:20:56your life turns around,
00:20:58and you're broken,
00:21:00but then, little by little,
00:21:02life goes on,
00:21:04and you have to live somehow,
00:21:06but that moment lasts for years,
00:21:08and it lasts for years,
00:21:10and you feel like you stopped waiting for him,
00:21:12and you don't know when you stopped waiting for him,
00:21:14and you can't connect to a single thing
00:21:16in that life,
00:21:18and it lasts,
00:21:20even today,
00:21:22and in the beginning,
00:21:24and you write about it,
00:21:26she tried to do the same with the widows,
00:21:28well, yes, the widows were...
00:21:30I mean, this is an amazing story,
00:21:32but in your book,
00:21:34you try to avoid the pathos,
00:21:36let me ask you,
00:21:38the pathos, the pain,
00:21:40the pain is pathos in itself,
00:21:42maybe in the book,
00:21:44it's not good,
00:21:46but in life,
00:21:48the pathos is present,
00:21:50it's artificially created,
00:21:52so when you try to
00:21:54artificially create
00:21:56that feeling of pain,
00:21:58anger, pain,
00:22:00and hatred,
00:22:02so that it becomes inappropriate,
00:22:04so that it becomes excessive,
00:22:06but the pain is something else,
00:22:08but it can't be made up of just pain,
00:22:10the one who reads my novel
00:22:12sees that there's a lot of laughter in it,
00:22:14because that's something
00:22:16life is made of,
00:22:18the widows.
00:22:20The widows.
00:22:22Well, the widows were popular at the time,
00:22:24because when you're left without
00:22:26all the other opportunities to find out
00:22:28what happened to your husband,
00:22:30father, or anyone else,
00:22:32there are a lot of those widows,
00:22:34and then we heard some stories
00:22:36that a certain widower
00:22:38really hit him,
00:22:40and that he found out
00:22:42exactly what happened,
00:22:44and I think we are people,
00:22:46and it's normal,
00:22:48at some point in life,
00:22:50you ask yourself what's going to happen to you tomorrow,
00:22:52but you won't take your phone
00:22:54and call the widower
00:22:56and ask him how you're doing,
00:22:58but it's such an abnormal situation
00:23:00that you don't know
00:23:02what to do anymore,
00:23:04you catch a cold,
00:23:06but we quickly gave up
00:23:08on the widower,
00:23:10because after a while
00:23:12you realize that they probably
00:23:14don't care about you anymore.
00:23:16You write a lot about it in the book,
00:23:18and it even causes some controversy,
00:23:20but let me answer you,
00:23:22and then we'll go on.
00:23:24Well, the adaptation to the widower,
00:23:26that's an interesting situation
00:23:28where a group of people
00:23:30from one city
00:23:32is catapulted, exiled,
00:23:34forcibly relocated to another place
00:23:36where they have to
00:23:38start living as before,
00:23:40and now we come there,
00:23:42and there are those widowers
00:23:44that we don't understand anything about,
00:23:46and we don't know what's going to happen to us,
00:23:48our life is completely uncertain,
00:23:50the fate of our fathers,
00:23:52brothers, and so on,
00:23:54and now, of course,
00:23:56in that situation you feel
00:23:58a terrible threat,
00:24:00and you feel hostility towards the people
00:24:02you came among,
00:24:04so I can't emphasize enough
00:24:06that it's not about the widowers,
00:24:08but about the story of one girl,
00:24:10and it's about her life,
00:24:12and the way she saw the world around her,
00:24:14and if you were a widower,
00:24:16or if her family came to Istria,
00:24:18or to Dalmatia, or anywhere else,
00:24:20it would probably be the same,
00:24:22because you don't come to a place
00:24:24under normal circumstances
00:24:26because you wanted to move there,
00:24:28but because someone forced you there,
00:24:30and you can't have the feeling
00:24:32of excitement, of welcome,
00:24:34and you don't expect to find something good there,
00:24:36because the good you had in life
00:24:38and that's it.
00:24:40Children know how to be there,
00:24:42children are amateurs,
00:24:44children know how to be harsh in such situations.
00:24:46Children are very cruel,
00:24:48and I think it's a natural thing,
00:24:50you simply look for your place in the world,
00:24:52you look for your identity,
00:24:54you want to prove yourself,
00:24:56and you always prove yourself
00:24:58on the basis of others,
00:25:00you can't prove yourself
00:25:02without taking others into account,
00:25:04and I think it's normal
00:25:06to have groups, clans, gangs,
00:25:08we can call them whatever we want,
00:25:10but I think the most normal situation
00:25:12that could happen
00:25:14is that a group of children
00:25:16from Vukovar, and a group of children
00:25:18from Kumrovac, come and have fun.
00:25:20I mean, nothing is more natural
00:25:22than that, because it's simply
00:25:24a part of growing up,
00:25:26and a part of a completely
00:25:28abnormal and atypical situation
00:25:30in which those two groups found themselves.
00:25:32People in Zagorje live their normal lives,
00:25:34and then 500 Vukovars come into their lives,
00:25:36with whom they don't know what to do,
00:25:38and there were wonderful people
00:25:40who waited for us and wanted to help us,
00:25:42but I keep repeating,
00:25:44it's not about them,
00:25:46it's about the story of that girl
00:25:48and the world she saw,
00:25:50or the world around her.
00:25:52And Tito was also to blame
00:25:54for a lot of that,
00:25:56you came to the place where he was born,
00:25:58where his monument is,
00:26:00how did the children feel about Tito?
00:26:02One of the paradoxes of that situation
00:26:04is, imagine now,
00:26:06moving 500 Vukovars to an elite
00:26:08former communist school,
00:26:10and if we remember how it all started,
00:26:12it all started with Tito,
00:26:14and of course Tito was not to blame,
00:26:16who else would, except for the Serbs.
00:26:18And we had to dedicate ourselves to him,
00:26:20and that was also a part of our...
00:26:22You feel that...
00:26:24You feel in yourself...
00:26:26You come into that room and see
00:26:28your mother, how poor and sad she is,
00:26:30and you see that you have nothing,
00:26:32and you have to be angry at someone.
00:26:34And Tito is there, just a few meters away
00:26:36from his birthplace.
00:26:38And then we wrote a lot
00:26:40in his memorial book,
00:26:42and we didn't do anything
00:26:44really terrible,
00:26:46we stole these plastic exhibits,
00:26:48apples,
00:26:50baked pigs from ethno-villages,
00:26:52and so on, those little things,
00:26:54and that was fun in one hand,
00:26:56and I think that every child
00:26:58would like to work at some point,
00:27:00and on the other hand,
00:27:02it was kind of cathartic,
00:27:04because we felt like we were
00:27:06confessing to someone who was really
00:27:08to blame for the situation we were in.
00:27:10Your father passed away.
00:27:12How did you achieve social justice
00:27:14at that time? Do you have it?
00:27:16What do you live on?
00:27:18Well, actually, at one time
00:27:20we only got that promotional jacket
00:27:22that was worth 100 kunas a month.
00:27:24My mother worked all that time,
00:27:26she did everything
00:27:28to have money,
00:27:30because in the beginning of the 90s,
00:27:32the rights of the dead Croatian defenders
00:27:34and the missing Croatian defenders
00:27:36were not equal,
00:27:38and for a long time,
00:27:40they were not equal,
00:27:42and then we didn't have
00:27:44a special incentive
00:27:46that would make our lives easier,
00:27:48that happened only a few years later.
00:27:50How old were you then?
00:27:52Six, seven years.
00:27:54That was the time when your
00:27:56status rights were being violated.
00:27:58Did that waiting kill you?
00:28:00You've already talked about
00:28:02waiting for your father.
00:28:04Do you wait for your father to come back,
00:28:06do you wait for the city to be free,
00:28:08do you wait for the housing issue
00:28:10to be solved?
00:28:12That waiting is really something
00:28:14that marked me all those years,
00:28:16and it's so...
00:28:18It's like a coffee process.
00:28:20You wait, but you don't know
00:28:22what you're actually waiting for,
00:28:24and who you're waiting for,
00:28:26because wherever you go,
00:28:28you're always on the way to someone
00:28:30who will solve your problems,
00:28:32and then they take you
00:28:34to someone else,
00:28:36and you don't really have
00:28:38any control over your life.
00:28:40You can't do anything
00:28:42to change the situation
00:28:44you're in, except wait.
00:28:46That waiting is marked
00:28:48by the visit of various housing committees.
00:28:50Your mother tried,
00:28:52she went from one room to another.
00:28:54If I'm not mistaken,
00:28:56the president of Tudjman...
00:28:58We contacted the president of Tudjman
00:29:00at one point, my brother wrote him a letter.
00:29:02I can say from my perspective
00:29:04how I experienced it.
00:29:06I thought they were some big,
00:29:08smart, serious people
00:29:10who really cared about us,
00:29:12but right now they don't have
00:29:14a single free housing unit,
00:29:16so they would help us solve
00:29:18our problems.
00:29:20We should just be persistent
00:29:22and show how we can be patient
00:29:24and that in the end,
00:29:26everything will turn out well.
00:29:28Getting a flat is also...
00:29:30It's always talked about
00:29:32how many people got a flat.
00:29:34I mean, we lived somewhere
00:29:36before the war.
00:29:38We didn't live in a basement
00:29:40or on the street.
00:29:42We lived in a flat in Vukovar
00:29:44that we rented after we got
00:29:46one flat for another.
00:29:48But in society, there is also
00:29:50a kind of mystification
00:29:52of people who got a flat.
00:29:54A lot of those people
00:29:56didn't live anywhere before
00:29:58they got a flat.
00:30:00They didn't live on the street.
00:30:02I mean, something happened
00:30:04to those houses and flats.
00:30:06But at that time,
00:30:08we just wanted to get
00:30:10a place under the sun,
00:30:12with a roof over our heads,
00:30:14and a nice brother.
00:30:16You didn't get along
00:30:18very well as teenagers.
00:30:20But your brother also tried
00:30:22to help you solve
00:30:24the problem of the flat.
00:30:26How old was he?
00:30:28I think he was about
00:30:3018, 17, or 18.
00:30:32He was 16 when it all happened.
00:30:34I think he was
00:30:36under a lot of pressure.
00:30:38I was young,
00:30:40so I saw things differently.
00:30:42We were left without a father,
00:30:44and he had a feeling
00:30:46that things would take over.
00:30:48I think it cost him a lot.
00:30:50He understood the situation
00:30:52that was far beyond him,
00:30:54and that should be far beyond him,
00:30:56and his age,
00:30:58and the possibility of someone
00:31:00who is 16.
00:31:02But he didn't know any other way.
00:31:04He simply wrote letters
00:31:06to the presidents,
00:31:08to the polling stations,
00:31:10and that's how our problem
00:31:12was solved.
00:31:14Here is an excerpt
00:31:16from one of the letters
00:31:18to the president.
00:31:20You can comment on it.
00:31:22Dear Mr. President,
00:31:24at the very beginning
00:31:26I have to tell you
00:31:28that writing this letter
00:31:30caused me great distress,
00:31:32and perhaps disappointment.
00:31:34Believe me,
00:31:36I didn't know who to turn to,
00:31:38and I would like to ask you
00:31:40for your kindness.
00:31:42Therefore, I would ask you
00:31:44to find some time
00:31:46and read this letter to the end,
00:31:48because it's not just about me.
00:31:50And don't blame me
00:31:52for my carelessness,
00:31:54because this is the first letter
00:31:56of this kind,
00:31:58and for a special reason.
00:32:00I am the son of a deceased
00:32:02Croatian defender from Vukovar,
00:32:04and I am currently staying
00:32:06in Croatia.
00:32:08I want to write to you
00:32:10about my pain,
00:32:12which I have never told anyone.
00:32:14I want to ask you for help,
00:32:16because I believe
00:32:18you can help me.
00:32:20The first thing
00:32:22that really hurts me
00:32:24is the war profiteering
00:32:26in our homeland.
00:32:28Many people who were
00:32:30a few years ago
00:32:32are now people
00:32:34and that's how it is.
00:32:36There is a saying in the people,
00:32:38some say war,
00:32:40and some say brotherhood.
00:32:42I take the right
00:32:44in the name of the other children
00:32:46to ask you to help us
00:32:48live a life worthy of man,
00:32:50when we have not,
00:32:52like our elders,
00:32:54lived the most beautiful years
00:32:56of our childhood.
00:32:58It was hard every evening
00:33:00until late at night
00:33:02to return to our room,
00:33:04the size of 10 square meters,
00:33:06where we found our mother
00:33:08with tears in her eyes
00:33:10because of father's absence,
00:33:12and to eat a cold meal,
00:33:14if you can call it that
00:33:16because of the size
00:33:18we got for lunch.
00:33:20It was even harder for us
00:33:22because we saw that our mother
00:33:24had a hard time because
00:33:26we could not warm her up,
00:33:28but we did not have a stove.
00:33:30Our childhood did not know
00:33:32what brotherhood meant,
00:33:34and when we lost everything,
00:33:36we realized the difference
00:33:38between having and not having.
00:33:40But in those moments
00:33:42we kept thinking of our father
00:33:44and his return,
00:33:46while many others
00:33:48pulled out their cars,
00:33:50houses, monuments,
00:33:52and I do not want to remember
00:33:54why not.
00:33:56I ask you to help us,
00:33:58and I do not want to put you
00:34:00on a chair.
00:34:02I do not ask for any great thanks,
00:34:04but just a little respect and help.
00:34:06I ask you to help me solve
00:34:08a big problem,
00:34:10and that is the housing issue,
00:34:12and as soon as possible,
00:34:14because I want to finish college,
00:34:16and in such circumstances
00:34:18I really can not teach anymore.
00:34:20In high school I have excellent grades.
00:34:22In this small room in Kumrovac
00:34:24it is difficult.
00:34:26I thank you for your help,
00:34:28and you are our last hope.
00:34:30Do not let us,
00:34:32when we are already expelled from Vukovar,
00:34:34be expelled again from Croatia
00:34:36because there is no place for us
00:34:38under that much desired Croatian sun.
00:34:40It would be the hardest for me
00:34:42if I had to go and earn
00:34:44bread for my mother and sister
00:34:46in another world.
00:34:48I want to thank you for reading this letter
00:34:50and forgive me if I took
00:34:52a lot of your time.
00:34:54This is the most sincere letter
00:34:56I have ever written.
00:34:58Thank you in advance.
00:35:00With respect.
00:35:04You say your brother surprised you
00:35:06when you read that letter.
00:35:08Well, I think, as far as I remember,
00:35:10it was his first letter
00:35:12to the President Tudjman,
00:35:14and it is interesting to see
00:35:16the gradation in the novel,
00:35:18how that letter goes.
00:35:20He is very naive at first
00:35:22and thinks that,
00:35:24as we all thought,
00:35:26something will change after that letter.
00:35:28However, the years go by,
00:35:30he still writes letters,
00:35:32they are getting shorter
00:35:34and shorter,
00:35:36while after the last letter
00:35:38you read, you ask yourself
00:35:40who would normally give them a place
00:35:42after writing such a letter.
00:35:44But that's actually the point
00:35:46of the whole story.
00:35:48But I would like to emphasize again
00:35:50that this is not a novel.
00:35:52It is a novel written
00:35:54on the basis of my life experience
00:35:56and a lot of things that happen
00:35:58in that novel are the things
00:36:00that happened to me in life.
00:36:02However, I need to say
00:36:04that it is a literary work
00:36:06and that it is fiction
00:36:08and in some moments
00:36:10it has completely invented details,
00:36:12completely invented episodes.
00:36:14And today some people
00:36:16appear to me,
00:36:18there are no documentary facts,
00:36:20there are names of some people
00:36:22according to whom
00:36:24suggestions for book characters
00:36:26have been created.
00:36:28Some people got to know each other
00:36:30and are not quite satisfied
00:36:32with their treatment in the novel.
00:36:34However, I would like to separate
00:36:36those two things and say
00:36:38that I tried to tell the story
00:36:40of that girl and to capture
00:36:42the atmosphere that ruled
00:36:44those years in our society,
00:36:46but I did not want to hurt anyone
00:36:48and I did not talk about
00:36:50anyone's life except
00:36:52about the life of that girl.
00:36:54So, some people appear...
00:36:56Well, yes, I guess
00:36:58you are referring to this email
00:37:00where a lady says
00:37:02that she did not manage
00:37:04to read the whole book,
00:37:06but the part that talks about
00:37:08growing up in Zagorje is horrible.
00:37:10That is the perspective
00:37:12of a 9-year-old child.
00:37:14The attitudes of a 9-year-old
00:37:16and a 15-year-old girl
00:37:18in the novel are not the attitudes
00:37:20that I, the author of that novel,
00:37:22have towards the world today
00:37:24or I had them before.
00:37:26My attitudes about Zagorje,
00:37:28I mean, anyone who knows me
00:37:30knows that I do not think
00:37:32that Zagorjeans are like that,
00:37:34Dalmatians are like that,
00:37:36but it is simply about
00:37:38that her life path was like that
00:37:40and that the things that happened
00:37:42to her, she saw people
00:37:44who got pensions,
00:37:46she saw people who were happy
00:37:48around her, she just
00:37:50talked about everything
00:37:52the way she saw it.
00:37:54I did not mention
00:37:56anyone else's story,
00:37:58I did not mention
00:38:00anyone's last name,
00:38:02maybe some names match.
00:38:04But my God.
00:38:06But my God.
00:38:08Mom,
00:38:10how did you recover from the trauma
00:38:12that you experienced?
00:38:14We recovered, I think, well.
00:38:16Although, once upon a time,
00:38:18in that growing up,
00:38:20my God, in every family
00:38:22there will be some conflicts
00:38:24and all of that together.
00:38:26What I am serious about today
00:38:28and as a mother myself,
00:38:30I can say that I extremely appreciate
00:38:32my mother because of everything
00:38:34that happened in her life,
00:38:36and she managed to preserve
00:38:38some warmth for other people around her.
00:38:40She never taught us to hate each other,
00:38:42she never told us
00:38:44that we are all the same,
00:38:46but she always encouraged us
00:38:48to work, to learn,
00:38:50to finish school
00:38:52and to find our way
00:38:54in the whole story.
00:38:56The attitude towards Serbs.
00:38:58Yes.
00:39:00How does it change?
00:39:02You describe it in the book,
00:39:04so I will quote you,
00:39:06who lies, he steals,
00:39:08who steals, he kills, who kills, he is a Serb.
00:39:10That's how it was in the 90's
00:39:12from our perspective,
00:39:14at least those whose family members
00:39:16were killed.
00:39:18I have that problem with Serbs.
00:39:20Of course, I don't think
00:39:22that everyone on the other side is the same,
00:39:24but what happened
00:39:26from my trauma,
00:39:28I am talking about today,
00:39:30is a certain feeling of handicappedness
00:39:32when I am in a society
00:39:34with people who come from the other side.
00:39:36Not because I really think
00:39:38that I am afraid that someone will do something to me,
00:39:40or because I think that they are all the same,
00:39:42but simply because,
00:39:44for example, I imagine coming to Belgrade,
00:39:46and there I see a room with pictures
00:39:48of Draza Mihailović,
00:39:50I see some graffiti,
00:39:52and I see those people who pass by,
00:39:54and they don't do anything,
00:39:56it's normal for them,
00:39:58and they live in such a society,
00:40:00and I can't get out of it,
00:40:02and that's why I have this trauma.
00:40:04In Očar, according to the reports
00:40:06from the trial, 150-200 Serbs
00:40:08who committed crimes,
00:40:1017 of them were charged with those crimes,
00:40:12the verdict was again destroyed.
00:40:14Some of those people know.
00:40:16I mean, a lot of people who are in the environment
00:40:18know where the displaced people are.
00:40:22These are some things I can't go over.
00:40:24Although I met, of course,
00:40:26some exceptional people
00:40:28who come from Serbia, from Belgrade,
00:40:30to change the whole story.
00:40:32That's what I wanted to say. Don't generalize.
00:40:34Of course, don't generalize.
00:40:35In the morning, you were recently given two pages about their 12-year exhibition,
00:40:40and many would be surprised by the fact that you, out of three authors,
00:40:45so to speak, three editors, chose the guys from Belgrade who...
00:40:48Yes, I did. I met them relatively recently,
00:40:52and they surprised me with the way they work in that society.
00:40:57They are obstructed from all sides, no one likes them,
00:41:00they are thrown out from wherever they can be thrown out.
00:41:02However, for the sake of all of us, and for themselves,
00:41:06they are trying to find that truth.
00:41:11They are fighting for justice somehow,
00:41:13and they are fighting for everything that happened in the 90s,
00:41:16to bring them together as a society, so that they can continue,
00:41:19and not to build the whole story on some completely wrong and false foundations.
00:41:23So, I'm not generalizing, but I have that problem,
00:41:26because there are too many things between me and the other side,
00:41:29which still haven't been solved after 18 years.
00:41:33Your story, at least in this book, ends in a way...
00:41:36We won't get to it now, but we saw something in the introduction,
00:41:40you go to high school in Zagreb, there are certain problems,
00:41:43this is almost the fall of the year,
00:41:45however, these are some formative years,
00:41:47where, as you yourself say, you are looking for...
00:41:49You get a flat.
00:41:51So, let me ask you, this show is really a story about a flat,
00:41:54how do you feel when you say, in our family,
00:41:57there was no saying, dad is alive, and we got a flat?
00:42:00When you say, we got a flat, what does that look like?
00:42:04Well, that was actually a terribly powerful moment,
00:42:09when we somehow...
00:42:11It's like nothing is happening,
00:42:13when you've been waiting for something for a long time,
00:42:15and when you've been waiting for so long,
00:42:17and it's finally happening, you can't believe that it's actually happening.
00:42:20And then it starts, around the flat, and the excitement,
00:42:23and when it somehow settles down,
00:42:25and when things calm down a bit,
00:42:27then you realize that you haven't been left without a flat,
00:42:30but you've actually been left without something,
00:42:32that no one can replace,
00:42:34and that there is no flat where you can live,
00:42:36and where you can feel normal,
00:42:38because you've lost something.
00:42:40In my case, I can talk about myself,
00:42:42what is it that I've been left without,
00:42:44in this war, next to my father,
00:42:46and next to life in Vukovar,
00:42:48is that I have that feeling that everything is possible,
00:42:51that something terrible can happen at any moment,
00:42:54and sometimes it's hard to live with it.
00:42:56How do you deal with it now, as a mother?
00:42:59It's not easy for me.
00:43:01Sometimes it's easy for me, sometimes it's not easy at all,
00:43:04because my life experience has taught me
00:43:06that I can live my life normally,
00:43:08that I don't touch anyone, I don't do anything to anyone,
00:43:11and then someone comes and creates total chaos for me.
00:43:14And I...
00:43:15One time my husband and I...
00:43:17I told him,
00:43:18we have two kids, we have our own apartment, it's great for us,
00:43:21what do you think, if the Chetniks come to our door,
00:43:23and he starts laughing,
00:43:24and I tell him, why are you laughing?
00:43:26Well, it's not something so unreal.
00:43:28My life has taught me that it's possible.
00:43:30It doesn't have to be them, it can be someone else.
00:43:32And that's that terrible feeling,
00:43:34where you're waiting all the time for something,
00:43:36and you learn, as if you've been cursed,
00:43:38that it's possible, that absolutely everything can happen.
00:43:41Is that feeling smaller or constant over the years?
00:43:44Now it sounds like psychotherapy, but...
00:43:46No, he didn't have that feeling,
00:43:48he didn't have it until my early twenties,
00:43:50until I somehow managed to slowly start to realize
00:43:55what had happened to me,
00:43:56and then that feeling became terribly strong,
00:43:58and I somehow try to bring his consciousness
00:44:01to some normal levels,
00:44:03sometimes successful, sometimes less successful,
00:44:05but it works.
00:44:06You try.
00:44:09These days I...
00:44:10I said I would ask you,
00:44:12you know that,
00:44:13that I would ask you some questions
00:44:14about, let's say, the current moment of COVID-19.
00:44:16The current story is about the Register of Defenders.
00:44:19Your father was a defender.
00:44:21How do you look at the whole controversy around that?
00:44:24Well, I wouldn't really make a lot of smart rules
00:44:27about that question,
00:44:28because, well, I'm not convinced enough.
00:44:30Would it bother you if your father's name appeared somewhere?
00:44:33No, it wouldn't bother me,
00:44:35but what bothers me is the way it's done,
00:44:38and the way the media follows it,
00:44:41and the way they talk about it,
00:44:43if they don't do anything else.
00:44:45So, the first lesson is to live in a civilized
00:44:48and normal society,
00:44:49where the laws are respected.
00:44:51If that's not there,
00:44:52everything else that comes to mind
00:44:54becomes something else.
00:44:55So, what I absolutely disagree with
00:44:58is the way it's done,
00:45:00and it's completely clear to me
00:45:01why people want to know
00:45:03who was the defender,
00:45:04who had the authority.
00:45:06It's absolutely clear to me,
00:45:07because, simply,
00:45:08from my perspective,
00:45:09there are far too many of those people.
00:45:12One more thing,
00:45:13these days,
00:45:14actually, today,
00:45:15specifically,
00:45:16the commemoration is in Jasenovac,
00:45:19or, on the other hand,
00:45:20in Dubica, if I'm not mistaken,
00:45:22and the Serbian President Tadic will be there.
00:45:25What is your attitude
00:45:27towards the fact
00:45:29that he could or should
00:45:33come to Vukovar one day?
00:45:35There were some stories and announcements.
00:45:37Did that mean anything to you?
00:45:39I think he should come,
00:45:40and not just one day,
00:45:41but I think he should come soon,
00:45:43because visiting Jasenovac,
00:45:45Blajburg,
00:45:46all of that should be there,
00:45:48but that means something
00:45:49on a symbolic level,
00:45:51because the families of the victims
00:45:52who died there,
00:45:53they are no longer there,
00:45:54that was a long time ago,
00:45:55and if it continues at that pace,
00:45:57then we can expect
00:45:58the President of Serbia
00:45:59to be in Vukovar in 50 years, probably.
00:46:01If he wants to achieve anything,
00:46:03I think it should be done soon,
00:46:05because then...
00:46:06Now, that means something to me,
00:46:08to my family,
00:46:09and maybe to the families
00:46:10of those whose members
00:46:11were killed in Ovčar,
00:46:12and that would mean something now.
00:46:13In 50 years,
00:46:14I doubt that it will mean anything to us,
00:46:16except maybe on a symbolic level,
00:46:18so I think that he should come as soon as possible.
00:46:21You succeeded with the book,
00:46:23you were surprised,
00:46:25given that it is a war theme,
00:46:27you do not describe some battles,
00:46:29but it happens during the war
00:46:31and immediately after the war,
00:46:33caused by the war,
00:46:34your fate.
00:46:35Did you expect
00:46:36that no one would read it?
00:46:38No.
00:46:39I did not expect it,
00:46:40I really thought,
00:46:41and I mentioned it several times
00:46:42to my husband while I was working on the book,
00:46:44why am I doing this,
00:46:45who would be interested in this,
00:46:47the 90s are completely dead,
00:46:49people are dealing with their problems,
00:46:51fugitives, Vukovar,
00:46:52who cares about that anymore?
00:46:54What I later thought about
00:46:56when the book achieved that success,
00:46:58why it happened,
00:46:59maybe the difference is simply
00:47:00in the way the story is told.
00:47:02I gave my all
00:47:03to raise the story
00:47:04to a universal level,
00:47:05where it is not important
00:47:06only to Vukovar,
00:47:07only to fugitives,
00:47:08only to someone
00:47:09who lives intensively
00:47:10in the 90s,
00:47:11but that the story
00:47:12is simply vital,
00:47:13because it has growth,
00:47:14it has family relations,
00:47:15it has love,
00:47:16it has hatred,
00:47:17anger,
00:47:18everything that fills
00:47:19our lives,
00:47:20wherever we live,
00:47:21and in whatever way
00:47:22we look at daily politics
00:47:23or anything else.
00:47:24So I'm glad about that,
00:47:25I can't say I'm not,
00:47:26but I really did not expect it.
00:47:27Is writing a subject
00:47:28that is not
00:47:29a subject
00:47:30that is not
00:47:31a subject
00:47:32that is not
00:47:33a subject
00:47:34that is not
00:47:35a subject
00:47:36that is not
00:47:37a subject
00:47:38You write songs, and you're a good singer, and you've been awarded in Lukavdol, if I'm not mistaken.
00:47:48Well, I had some illusions about that writing, that it would solve even more of my life problems.
00:47:54No, I'm kidding. I'm a bit, and everyone told me that when I write it, it will be easier for me.
00:48:00In a way, maybe it is, but nothing has actually changed.
00:48:04What means a lot to me, and what gathers the whole story, or part of the story, is when people call me.
00:48:12When people who lived with me in Kumrovac call me, when people from Vukovar call me, when people from Moraj call me,
00:48:18when they say, I read the book, it shook me, it broke me, thank you, I see things differently, I feel them differently.
00:48:24Well, that's what means a lot to me, because somehow I have a feeling that I didn't just heal my trauma,
00:48:31but a collective trauma that is big and thick, and I think a few people want to admit that.
00:48:37How does your mom react to the book?
00:48:40Well, my mom reacts great, my mom cuts everything out, learns by heart, remembers, and that's what's beautiful,
00:48:46and that's what means a lot to me, because she participated in the process of the creation of my book,
00:48:51because I was writing a book between two kids, and while I was struggling, she helped me a lot physically,
00:48:57she helped and protected my offspring in some moments, while I was struggling with the book,
00:49:02so somehow I consider it our common success.
00:49:07Mom, dad, in fact, this book is also a book in many ways.
00:49:12A hobby?
00:49:13Yes.
00:49:14Yes, it is.
00:49:17What kind of a man was your dad?
00:49:19Well, he was the best to me, now I don't know how much...
00:49:22As far as I remember.
00:49:23As far as I remember, he was kind, warm-hearted, he loved people, and his people loved him, I don't know,
00:49:30he was kind, he wasn't cold-blooded, he wasn't aggressive, he was the kind of dad you could have a great time with.
00:49:39Did you accuse him as a child that he stayed there?
00:49:42Yes, I mean, not as a child, but later, maybe a little, I thought,
00:49:48I mean, wasn't it more important for him to go out with us,
00:49:51so at least, I don't know where he lived and how, but to stay in that city,
00:49:55and then again, on the other hand, what if they all left?
00:49:59What if, simply, no one wanted to stay in Vukovar,
00:50:02but everyone went out and left the city, and Vukovar, then Vinkovce, then Osijek, then every other city.
00:50:09On the one hand, I understand, and I try to understand,
00:50:13but on the other hand, there is a part of me that will probably blame them for that.
00:50:17I wanted to ask you, when you put this relationship in the eye of the beholder,
00:50:20on the one hand, and Croatia, as you see it today.
00:50:23Well, you know what, I mean, it wasn't so much about Croatia,
00:50:28it was partly about Croatia, but it was about us living our lives in Vukovar,
00:50:32and then one day someone came and said,
00:50:35now you won't live here anymore, we will free the city from you.
00:50:40And how do you accept that? It's not about Croatia,
00:50:43it's about the life that my father and mother created for us, for themselves,
00:50:48and suddenly someone comes...
00:50:50Defends Prague.
00:50:51...and wants to take them there. That's it.
00:50:53I mean, Croatia is there, Croatia, but that's your life,
00:50:56you want to defend it, and you want to preserve it.
00:50:59For a long, long time, you didn't know anything about your father,
00:51:03then there was a trial on Ovcar, and you weren't even officially notified, but...
00:51:07No, actually...
00:51:08The trial on Ovcar.
00:51:09Yes, the trial on Ovcar.
00:51:12Well, that's also interesting.
00:51:14Almost ten years ago, we received a call to give blood for identification,
00:51:19in case my father was exhumed.
00:51:22After that, no one ever contacted us again.
00:51:24I don't know if anyone should have contacted us,
00:51:26because they didn't find them in the meantime.
00:51:29There are some details that I learned from the trial in Belgrade,
00:51:34from the victim's family who attended that trial,
00:51:37that my father was among the ten people who went through the hand-treatment,
00:51:42that it was like this, that it was like that.
00:51:44We never received anything official.
00:51:46I don't know if there is any official order that we should be notified about,
00:51:49but I have to admit that it's really hard to find out that information in that way.
00:51:56It's really ugly when someone comes to you and says,
00:51:59hey, listen, I heard that your father was made, that's it.
00:52:03From whom, how, why?
00:52:05I don't know if there should be some kind of system that deals with it.
00:52:09Maybe there is, but...
00:52:10You think it would be easier to...
00:52:12It would be easier, maybe, to have some kind of service,
00:52:15to collect some things and to put some weight on it,
00:52:18and to make it a little more dignified,
00:52:22than to find out about it on the street.
00:52:26In the novel, you write that you often imagine,
00:52:29and you still often imagine how he was killed.
00:52:33You say that you like to think that he was killed among the first,
00:52:36but no matter how much you imagine, you will never be able to imagine that sight.
00:52:39Yes, that's something that I didn't want to imagine for a long time,
00:52:42and I didn't have it in my plan at all.
00:52:45But when I started writing that novel,
00:52:48then somehow, after about a hundred pages,
00:52:51everything led to the fact that that sheepfold had to be resolved.
00:52:55Before that, I have to admit, I didn't even go to the sheepfold,
00:52:59because it was something for me, what would I do there?
00:53:02He was killed there, but he's not even there.
00:53:05What am I supposed to do there?
00:53:08And then I decided to go to the sheepfold,
00:53:11before I finished the book.
00:53:14There is something terrible about it,
00:53:17there is something healing about it,
00:53:20but, I don't know, I got used to it.
00:53:24Sometimes I thought about it,
00:53:27that I knew where I would have to dig deep,
00:53:30but when I started writing that novel,
00:53:33I don't know, it was so easy for me to decide on it.
00:53:36But I'm glad I am now.
00:53:39Did you think that your father was a good man,
00:53:42but that, in fact, not a single good man
00:53:45at that moment found a sheepfold?
00:53:48Yes.
00:53:49Did he owe you a lot?
00:53:51Yes, that's how it is, I don't know,
00:53:54he had a lot of friends, Serbs, Croats, Bosnians,
00:53:57they were all doing services to each other,
00:54:00as friends and acquaintances do.
00:54:03But, I don't know, there was probably
00:54:06some kind of intention from the past.
00:54:09I mean, there are a lot of personal things
00:54:12in those crimes, in those murders,
00:54:15you know, you watch someone live,
00:54:18and you can't do that, and you wait for your 5 minutes,
00:54:21and then your 5 minutes come when you have a gun
00:54:24Yes, that is symptomatic,
00:54:27I don't know if you know the story about Goran Jelisic,
00:54:30the murderer from Omarsk, if I'm not mistaken,
00:54:33who was a completely calm, decent man,
00:54:36but when he got power in the camp,
00:54:39he killed 30 or 50 people.
00:54:42After that, he was completely calm, decent,
00:54:45everything happened in Bosnia-Herzegovina,
00:54:48and the biggest witnesses of the defense, which is a paradox,
00:54:51he was a great man,
00:54:54but when he got that power,
00:54:57when he got a gun in his hand,
00:55:00he became a beast.
00:55:03I got some transcripts from the trial in Ovčar,
00:55:06and among those transcripts,
00:55:09there is a woman who also killed in Ovčar,
00:55:12and one of the defendants accuses her
00:55:15that she said to him,
00:55:18that he was the boss,
00:55:21and he gave her 5 minutes,
00:55:24that's how things were solved.
00:55:27Of course, she denies it, she was never there,
00:55:30but it is clear to all of us.
00:55:33You wrote a beautiful song about your father,
00:55:36we will hear it at the end,
00:55:39it's not the end, we'll be back.
00:55:42I got these thin hands from him.
00:55:45My father, as the real son-in-law
00:55:48of the boss of the hotel room,
00:55:51I watched him at work,
00:55:54hidden behind a poker machine,
00:55:57well-stuffed with chocolate from the duty-free shop,
00:56:00which arrived in Vukovar too late,
00:56:03as well as the international red cross,
00:56:06as well as humanity, as well as everything good
00:56:09that is infinitely late in this part of the world.
00:56:12I got these thin hands from him.
00:56:15It's not my fault,
00:56:18but how could I defend myself from them
00:56:21when they beat him up.
00:56:28In one of the stories you wrote,
00:56:31the wife asks you, tell me about it.
00:56:34Tell me about these hands and all that.
00:56:37Why don't you tell me about it,
00:56:40about Vukovar, and you tell him,
00:56:43looking at your daughter.
00:56:46That's the relationship I'm preparing for.
00:56:49I want to be responsible and smart,
00:56:52and I want to give my best to my child.
00:56:55I'm saying this because
00:56:58I don't think I have the right
00:57:01to burden my child with my personal feelings,
00:57:04heaviness, fear, anger,
00:57:07towards someone or something.
00:57:10On the other hand, I want them to know,
00:57:13I think they have the right to know,
00:57:16my older child, my older daughter,
00:57:19sometimes she asks around,
00:57:22because she saw some photos,
00:57:25some documentaries on TV,
00:57:28she knows there's no grandfather,
00:57:31so she asks where he is, what happened to him,
00:57:34I want to be smart,
00:57:37because I'm sorry,
00:57:40I call these people bad people,
00:57:43I avoid saying they were Serbs,
00:57:46and unfortunately, I would prefer Vukovar
00:57:49to be foreigners than our neighbors,
00:57:52because they came as Serbs,
00:57:55they didn't come as something else,
00:57:58and they weren't individuals,
00:58:01I want my children to know
00:58:04what happened in my life,
00:58:07what happened to their grandfather,
00:58:10and I don't want to hurt their future relations
00:58:13with people from Serbia and other communities.
00:58:16Do you write?
00:58:19Yes, I do.
00:58:22Do you want what you write in the future
00:58:25to be involved in your personal experiences?
00:58:28Something I write about
00:58:31has to be experienced in me in some way.
00:58:34The background for that novel or story
00:58:37can be something else,
00:58:40it can happen to me in the Middle Ages
00:58:43and in the Wild West,
00:58:46but the main story and the main emotion
00:58:49I can write about is something
00:58:52that really touched me,
00:58:55so a book story and a literary background
00:58:58can be something different,
00:59:01but I think it will always be a part of me.
00:59:04You mentioned Vukovar and Kumrovec,
00:59:07what is your relationship to Kumrovec?
00:59:10I recently visited Kumrovec for a long time,
00:59:13I didn't have a need to go there,
00:59:16and then we decided to go to Kumrovec,
00:59:19and I told my daughters about how we were in Vukovar
00:59:22and how we had to move to Kumrovec,
00:59:25so they demolished everything,
00:59:28and we came to Kumrovec,
00:59:31and the political school there
00:59:34has been destroyed a lot over the years,
00:59:37and then some others finished it.
00:59:40We came there in a broken window,
00:59:43and she came out of the car and said,
00:59:46my poor mother, what did they do to you?
00:59:49I met wonderful friends and acquaintances there,
00:59:52and I spent a part of my childhood there.
00:59:55First love was in Zagorje.
00:59:58Yes, first love was in Zagorje,
01:00:01but some people make fun of me
01:00:04because they say that all this is the result of that.
01:00:07Ivan, thank you for being on the show,
01:00:10I wish you success in your work
01:00:13and harmony in the family.
01:00:16That's all for today, see you in a day.
01:00:19Goodbye.
01:00:46.
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