January 29, 2021 – Lockdown is apparently taking a toll on one Hercegovac. The man from Široki Brijeg wrote to Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković and begged him to reopen the borders between Croatia and Herzegovina so he could eject his wife from the family home for a month and send her to his mother-in-law's

The message from Hercegovac Ante Zovko (Ante Marinkov) was reposted on the Facebook page Imocki crnjaci where it picked up some 3 thousand likes in less than 6 hours.

The town, Široki Brijeg, where this particular Hercegovac (a man from Herzegovina) lives is just 35 kilometres from the border with Croatia. Lots of Croatians live in this area, including this Hercegovac, his wife and his child. But not, it would seem, his wife's mother, who apparently lives in Croatia.

Široki Brijeg in Herzegovina, around 35 kilometres across the border from Croatia © Anto (talk)

The Hercegovac's reason for wishing to eject his wife and child for a month was to change up the atmosphere for a time. One presumes he was not being entirely serious with his request.

The Hercegovac is not the first man to seemingly reach the end of his tether while restricted to staying in the family home. In April 2020, after just one month of being housebound, a man from a village near Osijek in Slavonia left his wife in the family home and went to live nearby in a tent.

Speaking anonymously at the time, the man's neighbour told the local SiB.hr news portal the couple have been happily married for 30 years. But, it seems the pressure of being around each other so closely during the lockdown was too much even for their strong union.

The neighbour was happy to report that since his friend pitched his tent in the nearby locale, relations between the man and his wife had actually returned to their usual levels of warmth and friendliness. The wife even came regularly to visit her husband in his tent.

© John Waring

"My neighbour has been in his tent for a few days now,” he told the portal back in April. “He puts up a table and chairs in front. Occasionally our other neighbour comes over to drink some rakija (with him). I visited him too.”

The neighbour said his friend had quit the family home due to boredom more than anything else. Even after being happily married for 30 years, being around each other 24 hours a day was apparently just too much.

Perhaps in this more chivalrous response from the Slavonian man, Hercegovac Ante Marinkov could take some inspiration? After all, it's surely easier if one person departs from his family home in order to change the atmosphere than if two are forced to leave. Ante should find a nice spot in the fields nearby – not too close – and simply pitch up a tent. Problem solved! If he's lucky, his wife might come to visit bringing rakija.

ZAGREB, 4 January, 2021 - The Croatian government on Monday decided to declare 5 January a day of mourning for eight young people who died of asphyxia on New Year's Eve in Posusje, southern Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Four young men and women aged between 18 and 20 presumably died as a result of asphyxiation in Tribistovo, not far from Posusje in the night between 31 December and 1 January.

Unofficial sources have said that their death was most probably due to asphyxiation caused by a gas-powered generator unit that supplied electricity to the house where they were staying.

Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said today that observing a day of mourning for those young victims was a sign of solidarity. He added that the decision on the day of mourning was supported by President Zoran Milanovic and Parliament Speaker Gordan Jandrokovic.

Croatia's top officials earlier sent condolences to the families of the victims and the local authorities.

September 1, 2020 – Wedding numbers in Dubrovnik-Neretva County have been limited to 50 maximum after a Coronavirus outbreak was traced back to someone's big day. But, who can possibly stop the juggernaut of joy that are Croatian summer weddings?

Epidemiological guidelines can only be followed so far. You can put some extra space between the tables, insist people wear a mask, and aim for the highest standards of hygiene. For all the measures insisted upon by the Croatian state and the sincere efforts of some business owners and their staff, a necessary part of the burden falls on personal responsibility.

People tut and shake their heads in disbelief at the photos and videos of irresponsible Italian youths in the nightclubs of Pag. Others assign blame for Croatia's international safety downgrading on specific regions of Dalmatia and the kind of tourists who visit there. But, there is one homegrown phenomenon which Coronavirus cannot hold back - nor epidemiological measures - and to which no outside blame can be assigned - Croatian summer weddings.


© Pexels

From spring until autumn, the sound of car horns fills Croatian streets each and every weekend. Youths dangle precariously from car windows, the national flag flutters in the air and the strong scent of rakija arrives especially early, even before midday. An occasion of unrestricted joy, of tradition and, usually, extravagant expense, Croatian summer weddings are long in the planning and the fuel for a thousand remembrances. They are automatically dissected after their occurrence, each minute detail compared against the other weddings you have attended.

“They had sarma. In the summertime! And with nothing, only bread. No potato. No rice. Also, there was no fish,” one Dalmatian wedding guest recalled in 2019, after accompanying her husband to a Croatian summer wedding in an agricultural part of the continental region.

“But, surely there was rice in the sarma?”

“Well, yes. But also, the flowers we wore were not as nice as those at my sister's wedding. Her's cost 200 kuna per person!”


Sarma, served in summertime. With no potato! Some details of Croatian summer weddings will never be forgotten © Gurman chef

Everything has to be done correctly. Everyone has to be invited. The seating of guests is given more consideration than the planning of a national counter-attack.

A young couple from Osijek, now residents of Sweden, didn't so much want a traditional affair for their wedding of this year. Both are of an alternative nature. They would have sat miserably through hours of tamburica music. Instead, they wanted similar friends to DJ some music they enjoyed at a more informal gathering, without the compulsion of inviting all the cousins who they only ever see at extended family weddings. A fair request, right? After all, it was their big day, right? Wrong.

Everyone agreed. Except for the bridegroom's sister. She hit the roof “You cannot possibly have a wedding without the tamburica band and all the cousins! We went to ALL their weddings, and gave them gifts! They owe us!”

After ceaseless petitioning to their parents, her demands were eventually met. The parents gave in and refused to pay for the wedding unless it was done correctly. The couple married alone in Sweden, before one witness, who they didn't even know. In Croatia, your big day does not belong just to you. It belongs to everyone in your family.

Nothing can stop this juggernaut of joy. Not poverty nor personal wishes. And certainly not Coronavirus or epidemiological guidelines.

Civil Protection Headquarters in Dubrovnik-Neretva County recently banned 'large' weddings. The maximum number of guests for each wedding is now set at 50. This is in response to an outbreak of Coronavirus in Metković, which stemmed from a wedding held there on 15 August. 38 active cases of Coronavirus were subsequently recorded. And few who've attended a Croatian wedding would be surprised.

Who will try to tell the boys not to drink too much at a wedding, then not to hug or dance with their cousins? Who will tell the godfather of the bride that he must remain distant from his guests, and alone wipe the tears of happiness from his face? This is a day he waited for all of his life.

No wonder, as Slobodna Dalmacija reports in their coverage of the situation in Neretva, that in response to the new limits, Croatian summer weddings are simply now moving across the border into nearby Herzegovina. There, wedding numbers remain unrestricted. No masks will be required to ruin the close group family photos. There probably won't even be anyone stopped on the way back through the border for carrying leftovers. Nor potentially carrying coronavirus.

There is no easy fix to this situation, no simple solution to appease both authorities and celebrating families. We can only hope that the case in Metković is an isolated one and the porous nature of the border with Herzegovina remains the advantage it always has been for Croatians living in the region. For whosoever tries to impede the festivities of Croatian summer weddings is surely fighting a losing cause.

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Statistics show that about 12,000 deaf people live in the Republic of Croatia, but unfortunately it is rare for them to complete their higher education.

As Ivan Tominac/Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 14th of April, 2019, Josip Ivanković was born in Čapljina, Bosnia and Herzegovina, but just one year after his birth, he was declared deaf, and this fact was one of his reasons for his relocation to Croatia. His move to Croatia certainly paid off as being the right move, and Josip, despite the diagnosis, managed to develop his speech and the technique of listening. That was, as Josip himself states, a painstaking and long process.

"The situation is that I have to treat speaking Croatian as if I was speaking a foreign language," Josip Ivanković explained.

For four years now, his speech and listening abilities have been being developed at the SUVAG Polyclinic, where Josip learned to speak with vibration, tone amplification, visualisation and by learning anatomy.

"When I learned to pronounce the letter ''r'', I had to touch the vocal chords of the logopad to feel a certain vibration and titration, then I'd lean my hand on my neck to feel the same vibration, so I learned to pronounce the letter ''r'' I learned to pronounce ''ž'' in a similar way, I just put my hand on my head. Generally speaking, the hardest letters to pronounce for the deaf are l,č,ć,đ,dž,lj and nj, and the reason for that is that such letters can't be visually identified. They're explained through the anatomy of the oral cavity, just like a doctor explains the heart's organs, or where the blood enters and where it exits,'' explained Josip.

After the kindergarten era ended, in which he learned the basics of socialisation, it was decided that he should attend a regular school.

This period of schooling, without any curriculum adjustment, he adds, was defined by perseverance, and communicational misunderstandings are, in his words, quite normal and natural.

"The professors made me equal with my peers, and this proved to be a good thing because I learned so much about the world of those who can hear, and I learned how to gather information," said Josip. As stated, statistics show that about 12,000 deaf people live in Croatia, but it is rare for them to complete higher education. Josip was not one of them, and he completed a college which has some very demanding academic requirements for its students.

He enrolled at FER (University of Zagreb, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing), and the likelihood of him completing his studies was slim, yet Josip had different plans for himself.

"At the beginning of the semester, it was very difficult for me to adapt,'' recalled Josip. Before Josip's arrival, professors from Zagreb's FER didn't have any experience in working with people with impaired hearing. At the beginning, he failed several exams, but he didn't let that dampen his spirit, and later he turned to further consultations.

This combination led him to become the very first deaf person to graduated from that college.

"The professors were very approachable, and our relationship was very flexible and adaptable. I will never forget how Professor Brnetić, instead of me asking him, personally invited me to consultations during the holidays and showed me much he cared that I didn't miss anything from the lecture. On the other hand, one professor asked me during consultations why I didn't go to the lectures and asked me how I was learning. I told him that I don't go to the lectures because I can't hear them. I took out a 100-page notebook with my assignments, and the professor was surprised that I did all that without having gone to any lectures. He asked me to lend him that notebook and later I learned that he'd showed my notebook to all of the professors. Believe it or not, a year after when I came to his office, that copy of the notebook was still on his desk,'' Josip stated, recalling his faculty days.

In the end, none of the obstacles he faced along the way turned him away from his goal, and he passed 62 engagements that mostly relied solely on him and his level of dedication. This FER student didn't have to wait around long before a job opportunity came knocking, and it wasn't your regular offer. He started his working life at no less than Rimac Automobili as an Embedded Hardware Engineer. Rimac had no problems with his deafness and offered him a position after his interview.

''At the beginning of the job, I was given a pretty demanding project that I had to complete within a month, which was the length of my trial period, and when the project ended I realised that I was able to complete it and was given the green light to remain with the firm,'' Josip said. The work never stops at Rimac Automobili, and at the moment, Josip is working on a project for the development of electric car chargers.

"Communication skills are the most difficult for me, because I have to invest extra energy into lip reading and that's mentally challenging and difficult. Imagine a situation in which a colleague is referring to professional terms, and I need to decode them with and put them into context in order for me to have any understanding. Imagine switching off your ears, and focusing your eyes on their lips alone.

You aren't likely to understand because they're not using standard words, they're using technical phrases that are difficult to decode and recognise. At the beginning, it was very difficult for me to follow verbal communication and understand the complexity of the project. Of course, since working here I've changed a lot and become much more calm, more focused and concentrated on the small things. The worst thing is when a colleague does not know how to communicate with me properly, and this is where I'm concerned about information which is valuable to the project, and that's an extra effort. Each colleague has his own specific way of speaking and they aren't all the same in communication. With time, I somehow adjusted to them, and they also had to adapt to me, I accepted that this was all normal and there would always be a situation where they couldn't understand, but I'll always ask them to repeat themselves not just twice, but 1000 times!'' concluded Josip.

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Click here for the original article by Ivan Tominac for Poslovni Dnevnik

Ever heard of the Croatian emigrant at Pearl Harbour? His bravery not only saved many from certain death, but saw him sacrifice his own life during the infamous Japanese attack.

As Morski writes on the 8th of December, 2018, Petar Herceg Tomić was a Croat born in Prolog, a village in the Municipality of Ljubuški, Bosnia and Herzegovina, in 1893. He became an American hero in World War II for his heroism and sacrifice during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour on December the 7th, 1941, in which he lost his life. He was posthumously awarded the medal of honour, the highest American medal symbolising great courage, according to Novi list.

Just how did this boy from quiet, rural Ljubuški become a Croatian emigrant at Pearl Harbour?

Among the first victims of the sudden Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour on December the 7th, 1941, which began the brutal Second World War on the Pacific, was the American Utah battleship. Hit with two torpedoes, the vessel began to turn over, and only the sheer courage and devotion of Officer Petar Tomić prevented more casualties. Paying the price of his own life, Petar Herceg Tomić saved the rest of the crew from certain death.

Tomić mainaged to maintain the part of the vessel hit by the two torpedoes until most of the crew left it. All this was done under merciless Japanese aircraft. As the ship began to fail, Tomić encouraged the crew to escape. During that terrifying time, he controlled the pressure so as to avoid a devastating explosion, as in such a case, even those who were rescued would also have been killed. Despite his brave efforts, Tomić and another 58 crew members, remained forever captured in the vessel.

In the official explanation of the recognition of his bravery and priceless sacrifice, it states that Tomić, upon realising that the Utah battleship was definitely doomed, remained in his position in the engine room until he was convinced that the boilers were secured and all the staff had departed from the doomed ship's engine room. By sacrificing his own life, he saved the lives of his crew, writes the Virtual Museum of the Emigration of Dalmatia (Virtualni muzej iseljeništva Dalmacije).

Tomić was born, as stated, in Prolog, a small village which consisted of just 120 houses, in 1893. His real name was Petar Herceg, and his family nickname was Tonić, which he later transformed into his last name, Tomić. He arrived in America in 1913 and joined the army. After the First World War, he joined the Navy, where he became the chief engineer on the Utah battleship. This fateful move was how he found himself in Pearl Harbour when a sudden attack by Japanese forces on the US Navy's main base in the Pacific led the US to enter the Second World War on the side of the Allies.

The remains of the Utah battleship still lie in Pearl Harbour, and along with it lies a memorial and a plaque honouring the Croatian emigrant at Pearl Harbour's heroic deed. The plaque was initially placed there to mark the 30th anniversary of the attack.

One year after Tomić's death, in December 1942, an escort destroyer named U.S. Tomić was built at the Brown Shipbuilding Shipyard in Houston. For thirty years, the vessel served in the American Navy, before being removed from the register, and eventually ending its military ''career'' in 1974. President Franklin D. Roosevelt posthumously awarded Tomić the Medal of Honour.

No matter the incredible turn of events the life of this Croatian emigrant took, nothing was so incredible as the search for his living descendants, to whom the medal was handed. After nearly a decade of searching, and even judicial proceedings, Robert Lunney eventually found Tomić's descendants, still living in Prolog, Herzegovina. After six and a half decades, the prestigious American medal of honour was awarded to Petar Herceg Tomić's living family back in 2006 on the deck of the largest carrier of the US Navy Enterprise aircraft, which was inaugurated near Split.

December the 7th, 2018 - The intangible heritage of Croatia is complex and varied, so let us take a look at yet another one, which involves cheese. The preparation of cheesecloth cheese, locally called sir iz mišine, is a long tradition in Dalmatian inland, Dinara, Velebit, Lika, and the western Herzegovina area.

When the initial production of this piece of intangible heritage of Croatia first began isn't known, but even the ancient Illyrians prepared this type of sheep cheese. One of the theories says that production began when milk stored in sheep paunches accidentally started the fermentation process. This kind of milk had whey and cheese, which during that time, became a tradition to make.

The way of making the cheese hasn’t changed much from the beginning. Back then, the cheese was made from whole sheep milk but today it's done with skimmed sheep, goat, or cow milk too. It is preserved in sheep or goat paunches which gives it its typical smell and spicy flavour. It is usually produced during summer from extra sheep milk and it can be consumed from autumn onwards.

In order to make this cheese, one should follow several procedures. First, the paunch should be appropriately prepared, then the milking should be done and milk preparation should follow right after it. The whey should be prepared too. Making and preparing the sheep or goat paunch is important as it ensures good cheese making. The paunch should be properly washed, disinfected and dried from 15 to 30 days.

Knowledge and skill with regard to this craft is traditionally inherited from generation to generation. When everything is ready, the brewing process can start and the product can be stored in the paunches. Finally, the stored cheese needs to age, and then it is ready.

The brewing begins right after the milking and the brewing time depends on the temperature (ranges from 31-35°C to 35-40°C) and the strength of the whey. When the mixture forms a certain structure, the first layer is turned over to even up the temperature of the whole batch, then, it is cut into cubes and should rest until the whey turns into a greenish – yellow colour.

This cheese mass is then put in cloths and subsequently pressed.

After pressing the cheese, salt is added until there is enough cheese to be put into the paunch. If the paunch is filled with cheese one-time only, this ensures better quality. When the paunch is filled, the cheese is shredded and then crumbled. It is important to remove all the air from the paunch to ensure that it matures in controlled conditions (12-15°C). It takes 2-3 months to achieve its specific characteristics and to be ready for consumption.

To produce one kilogram of cheese, you'd need 7-8 litres of skimmed milk or 7-9 litres of fresh sheep or mixed sheep/cow milk. To produce 12 to 15 kg of cheese and 7-8 litres of slurry, you would need 100 litres of whole sheep's milk. The mature cheese is then taken out of the paunch and stored in low temperatures with the appropriate humidity and level of hygiene.

The area where this cheese is made is usually agricultural regions where you can find livestock like sheep, lambs, and goats. To keep this tradition going and in order to continue this type of cheese production, it is important to help to preserve small family businesses and agricultural estates which are involved in making it.

Nowadays, there are some differences in production as the sheep and milk used are different from the traditional type. In addition, technology is used to produce the cheese which makes it higher quality in the modern day.

Despite technology's influence, it is important to preserve most of the traditional ways of making the cheese active by passing down knowledge of this tradition. The final product is often a very rare find on markets and in stores but it can be found on agricultural estates and villages where they still make it.

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SOURCE(S) (text and photos): HAH, Agroklub

The drama around Pelješac Bridge continues as the neighbours continue with their protest against the project.

More earthquakes in the region as Herzegovina is hit.