Peđa Bajović, Montenegrin-born, Serbian-raised, a Bosnian living in Croatia, Yugoslav leftover and stand-up comedian who has been trying to leave the profession for years
When I recently declared myself on social media to be a person of Yugoslav cultural identity, the first response came from a man in Čakovec, northern Croatia, sarcastically asking what exactly a “Yugoslav cultural identity” was supposed to be.
I told him the best proof of its existence was the fact that he was asking me rather than someone whose neighbourhood begins barely thirty kilometres from his town – in a country and culture with which that part of Croatia shared roughly 800 years of history.
Hungary, that is.
“But we’re not in the Balkans!” he replied.
Had he said Croatia was not Yugoslavia, he would have been absolutely right. Yugoslavia has been gone for quite some time. Had he said that a Yugoslav cultural space no longer existed, he would have found plenty of people willing to agree with him.
But he didn’t.
He said – the Balkans.
And there we have a problem.
For politics, business and everything involving conference badges, panel discussions and people looking terribly serious, we invented “the region”.
But once the conversation becomes less formal, particularly in Croatia and increasingly elsewhere across the former federation, Yugoslavia somehow turns into – the Balkans.
It sounds safer.
And you don’t have to explain to anyone where you were in 1991.
The only problem is that it isn’t particularly accurate.
If we really mean the Balkans, then Albania and Bulgaria have to join the party, obviously our on-again, off-again Balkan friend Greece, at least two-thirds of Romania and perhaps Turkey – probably the only country for which “Balkan” sounds like an upgrade from its Asian reality.
Yet our little countries, all born from one country, would apparently rather embrace one large and vaguely defined geography than one small and painfully specific history.
Why?
I’ve been collecting answers for years. The puzzle is nowhere near complete, but we have a few pieces.
So I might as well share them, since you didn’t ask.
They have the fewest problems with all this down south, in North Macedonia. Then again, hardly anyone asks them about much.
Call it “Bulgaria” if that helps!
Montenegro is probably the most relaxed when someone mentions Yugoslavia. EU membership, meanwhile, has been just around the corner for years.
Now all they have to do is find the corner.
In Bosnia, complete with Herzegovina – which will join the EU on the same day I finally get an appointment with a state neurologist to find out why my eye keeps twitching – the main priority is simply that nobody starts shooting.
If the shooting starts, whether it happens in Yugoslavia, the Balkans or “the region” becomes largely academic.
Everything else is empty political talk.
And unlike appointments with medical specialists, Bosnia never runs short of that.
In Kosovo, anything is better than Serbia!
The Slovenes more or less don’t care. In fact, “the Balkans” can sound rather warm and human whenever they need a little distance
from the cold Austrians, northern Italians and strange Hungarians.
They are far enough from the Balkans to enjoy them.
In Serbia, people spent years saying Yugoslavia had lifted them out of the Balkans.
Two attempted versions of “Serboslavia” later, they found themselves firmly back in.
And finally – my Croatia.
Much like its cousin next door, Republika Srpska, it collectively decided that being on the periphery of something bigger was preferable to being an equal partner somewhere it once belonged.
And now they are where they are.
Neither here nor there.
But at least it isn’t Yugoslavia.
In short, the name of the former country has become a dangerous word.
“The Balkans” is much more convenient. It may not be particularly accurate, but at least nobody gets too upset.
And me?
Born in Montenegro. Raised in Serbia. A Bosnian living in Croatia.
If I try to explain it properly, I need a map, two wars, three passports and at least one coffee.
So – Balkan.
Much easier.
