Hakuna Matata
12 September 06
Children of DPR Korea to Tito
45 years ago, Belgrade was the host to the first summit of the Non-Aligned Movement. Although it was just a group of marginalized economies at the time, that movement did make the world a smaller place. Romanticized or not, it made us feel closer to people from the other side of the planet, and certainly did give the impression that many non-European countries had a political friend on the Old Continent, namely Yugoslavia.
The XIV summit is taking place in Cuba right now, and Serbia is, along with Croatia and Bosnia, an observing country. It would be hard for me to assess advantages and disadvantages of “rejoining” the Movement, so I will just remind you of these two Korean girls, who sang an ode to Tito back in 1978.
Their Serbo-Croatian is hard to understand at moments, but it comes down to:
That’s what our fight has given us,
Tito, Tito, Tito, Tito.
Long live Marshall Tito,
Tito – freedom.
Dunno… I won’t apologize for being Yugo-nostalgic at moments.
UPDATE: As you may see, I have blocked further commens. I hope I will never refrain to such measures again, but I feel that the post got a bit of a serious tone, instead of Hakuna Matata, because of the following discussion.
Comments
Sep 13, 05:30 PM #
Sep 13, 05:50 PM #
Sep 14, 07:25 PM #
People often remember "the good old days" as better than they were. Were any of your family guestworkers in Germany or other countries? Also, Tito's debt has come back to bite Serbs. Even now many Serbs are wanting the property back he and the communists stole. It will cost Serbia many billions to compensate him.
Tito set the country up for a fall, and even he said he didn't think it would last after he died.
Yugoslavia was a mistake - a mistake to put people who hated each other - who had all been cutting each others throats in the wars - back together under force. If people had gone their separate ways from beginning there would have been less killing in the long run.
Sep 14, 07:25 PM #
Should be "them" instead of him.
Sep 14, 07:47 PM #
Sure, SFRY was not perfect, far from it. But let me correct some of your assumptions:
1) First of all, Yugoslavian foreign debt at worst was around $20 billion (late 1980s). Current foreign debt of Serbia alone is $15 billion, Croatia has $30 billion and Slovenia around $19 billion (would be nice to compare to GDP of course, but you get the point).
2) Dunno about yourself, but I never hated anybody based on their ethnicity. None of my friends and family did any throat-cutting, and the only war my grandparents fought was against fascists and those who incited ethnic hate.
3) Most of those "Serbs" who want their property back are Karađorđevićs, who also happen to have taken a ridiculous amounts of treasure with them to London. Besides, I don't think that an apartment building or two measures up to the economy which was practically built from the ground up after the war.
4) No, I didn't know too many gastarbeiters at that time, but now I know a bunch of them. As well as thousands of kids who fled to country to avoid being recruited, not to mention all the refugees. Ever been to Požarevac or Petrovac na Mlavi, where economy is based on workers' holiday expenses?