'Yugonostalgia' Takes Hold in Slovenia
Some 1,000 people gather near a statue of Josip Broz Tito - Some 1,000 people gather near a statue of Josip Broz Tito during a ceremony commemorating the 26th anniversary of his death in Sarajevo, May 4. (Getty Images)
This year, Slovenia celebrated the 15th anniversary of its secession from Yugoslavia. The economy is good, and the country will adopt the euro next year. Slovenia has been hailed as the great Balkan success story. But many look back longingly toward the days when Slovenia was still part of Yugoslavia. For those who feel "Yugonostalgia," life felt better in the days of Josip Broz Tito.
College dorm rooms are decorated with posters of the former dictator, and crowds deliver a lively response to "Racunajte na nas," which was written in 1978 as an anthem to socialism and to Tito.
Jurij Krevil, who runs a cafe in the Slovenian capital of Ljubljana, says that life felt easier when Slovenia was known as Yugoslavia.
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"People had sure jobs, social security was on a very high level, the pension was guaranteed," Krevil says. "So you didn't have to save anything, I mean, you could spend anything you got. You didn't get much, but with that you could live very well."
Recently, in a documentary called Sretno Dijete (Lucky Kid), filmmaker Igor Mirkovic sets out to find the heroes of his youth, the Yugo-rock stars of the 1970s and '80s. The film was a big hit in Slovenia.
"Even us," Mirkovic says in the film, "who were raised with powerful frustrations, because we lived in a poor country at the end of the world... even we felt like this was the place to be."
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Back then, Yugoslavia was comprised of six republics, three religions, five languages and a population of 25 million. Croats, Serbs, Bosnians, Slovenes and other young Yugoslavs traveled across the country to see sold-out stadium shows by bands such as Azra and Film.
Today, fewer than 2 million people live in Slovenia. The vast majority are Catholic, and nearly everyone speaks Slovene. Bands have a harder time crossing borders to other former republics, and journalist Tomas Zaniuk notes that record sales are not what they used to be.
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ROBERT SIEGEL, host:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Robert Siegel.
Independent Slovenia is celebrating its 15th birthday, the anniversary of the day it became the first republic to secede from Yugoslavia. Slovenia's economy is thriving. It's a member of NATO and it's the only new E.U. member deemed ready for the Euro in 2007. Still many in Slovenia are ambivalent about the changes they've seen.
From Slovenia, Amy Standen reports.
AMY STANDEN: Earlier this summer, the band Zacleneisha(ph) played to a crowd of students here in downtown Ljubljana, Slovenia's capital.
(Soundbite of music)
The gelato stands and outdoor cafes were packed with shoppers. Ljubljana could have been any prosperous western European town, which is why Racunajte na Nas(ph), one of the songs that brought the crowd to its feet seem a little incongruous.
(Soundbite of music)
STANDEN: Racunajte na Nas, or Count on Us, was written in 1978 as an anthem to socialism and Josip Broz Tito, the former dictator of Yugoslavia.
(Soundbite of music)
STANDEN: Today, it sounds like what people here called Yugonostalgia, the yearning for the days before Slovenia left Yugoslavia and socialism behind.
Mr. JURIJ KREVIL(ph): I was always proud to be Yugoslavia.
STANDEN: Jurij Krevil runs a café in Ljubljana where a photo of Tito, broad shoulder and handsome with a wide Slavic brow hangs behind the register.
Mr. KREVIL: Everybody knew Yugoslavia. If they didn't know about Yugoslavia then they knew about Tito. The red (unintelligible) of Yugoslavia was welcomed everywhere.
STANDEN: A Slovenian passport will also get you pretty much anywhere you'd want to go today, but the name of Slovenia's Prime Minister Janez Jansa may not ring a lot of bells. U.S. President Bush is only the most famous person to have confused Slovenia with Slovachia. U.S. Today made the same mistake. But Slovenes don't just miss belonging to a country that everyone new. Some say life back then was simply better. Again, Jurij Krevil.
Mr. KREVIL: The life actually was simple. You didn't have any worries. People had true jobs. Social Security was on a very high level. The pension was guaranteed so you didn't have to save anything. You could spend anything you got. You didn't get much but with that you could do very well.
STANDEN: Very well indeed. In those days, the workday ended at two in the afternoon. Workers and their families took annual vacations on the coast or in the mountains. Most Yugoslavs owned a home. It was a poor, but in many ways an easier time. Carman Pechnick(ph) is a property manager in Ljubljana.
Ms. CARMAN PECHNICK: I remember when I was younger. For example my parents, they had a lot of free time and if I compare their life to my life now I see that I'm rushing all the time. I'm trying to arrange things. Today, I think people, with all that we have, we are never satisfied. We always have some thing we want and we can't get.
STANDEN: Recently a documentary called Sretno Dijete, or Lucky Kid, was a big hit in Slovenia. In it filmmaker Igor Mirkovic sets out to find the heroes of his youth, the Yugo rock stars of the ‘70s and ‘80s.
Mr. IGOR MIRKOVIC (Filmaker): (Speaking foreign language)
STANDEN: Even us, he says, who are raised with powerful frustrations because we lived in a poor country at the end of the world where films and books came with a hundred year delay, even we felt like this was the place to be.
(Soundbite of music)
STANDEN: Back then Yugoslavia comprised six republics, three religions, five languages. A population of twenty-five million. Croats, Serbs, Bosnians, Slovenes and other young Yugoslavs traveled across the country to see sold out stadium shows by bands like (unintelligible) and Azra.
(Soundbite of music)
STANDEN: Today, fewer than two million people live in Slovenia. The vast majority are Catholic. Nearly everyone speaks Slovene. Tomas Zaniuk is a journalist for the country's state funded alternative broadcaster, Radio Student Ljubljana.
Mr. THOMAS ZANIUK (Journalist): Before, we were culturally diverse it was not really a big language barrier and also you could understand each other. And you had this common background living in socialistic Yugoslavia.
STANDEN: Bands today have a harder time crossing borders to other former republics. Each record sales, Zaniuk says, aren't what they were in the days of Yugoslavia.
Mr. ZANIUK: Together with the common cultural space, it was also the common marketing space. The records were sold out and printed in much higher numbers than now. Now it's normal for middle popular bands to sell maybe 2,000 records. That's a good score, and before even the band school would never come to the mainstream could sell easily 20,000 records.
STANDEN: The funny thing about Yugonostalgia is that it doesn't necessarily entail any real desire to go back to those days. It's like being nostalgic for your childhood. You may romanticize it, but that doesn't mean you want to relive it. Alacha Delbelyak(ph) has written widely about life here after socialism, and he says that what passes for Yugonostalgia today is a hollow gesture. True Yugonostalgia, he says somewhat nostalgically, was dangerous.
Mr. ALACHA DELBELYAK (Author): In the early 1990's, when the war for Yugslavs' succession continued to rage, to pronounce yourself a Yugonostalgic person meant sticking it out, meant putting your reputation at risk because Yugonostalgia was in the early ‘90s dismissed as the smoke screen for those that cannot let go of the political heritage of former Yugoslavia.
STANDEN: Young people, he says, may hang Tito posters on their walls and listen to Yugo rock but that's as far as it goes.
Mr. DELBELYAK: Slovenians, young Slovenians, when they reach into the stocks of matter for coming from all diverse Yugoslav traditions, they do so without any effort, inclination or desire to reconstruct a political structure of Yugoslavia with Communism. That is not in the horizon of Yugonostalgia at all.
STANDEN: Like any nostalgia, Yugonostalgia says a lot more about the present than the past. From an American perspective, Slovenia has everything a post-socialist country could want. Ljubljana throngs with tourists from around the world. Slovenia has one of the strongest economies among new E.U. members. But material wealth doesn't necessarily translate into a better life. And among those who remember the old days, Slovenia's recent progress is a mixed blessing.
Ms. PECHNICK: With all these consumers things such as, I don't know, cinemas and all these things, you can do a lot but you are robbed from relationships. That is one of the things that I have noticed.
STANDEN: Again, property manager Carman Pechnick.
Ms. PECHNICK: A lot of that Yugonostalgia is because we remember the time when we had better relations with each other, a kinder life. We were not so anxious and so nervous about everyday life. This is present a lot nowadays and I don't think it was there 20 years ago.
STANDEN: The furious pace of Westernization may be inevitable but it may also be the reason that so many people keep looking back.
For NPR News, this is Amy Standen in Slovenia. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.
