Croatia! The Countryside & Day 17!

Prices have been very surprising on this trip.  A double scoop of gelato was 30 kuna or less than $4.  A Christmas ornament was 50 kuna or less than $7.  Today at lunch, my Coke Zero was 18 kuna or about $2.35, another person’s beer was 20 kuna or less than $3.00, and a glass of white wine was the cheapest at 14 kuna or less than $2.00!

However, a liter of gas is about 12.30 kuna or $1.60 and a gallon is 3.8 liters.  A gallon of gas in Zagreb would be $6.09!  With an average monthly salary of $900/month or $10,800/year, that shows you the difference between living in the US and Croatia.

It’s a foggy day which is common in the fall and winter, and today is a road trip into the countryside on the other side of Bear Mountain.  There are no bears there so don’t ask how it got its name because I don’t know!  It is Sunday morning, and we stop in Klanjec, a village of about 600 residents.  There is a central cathedral and monastery that is quiet until the bells ring for services to start at 11:00.  Chestnut trees, which are cut back severely in the early fall, circle the cathedrals’ grounds.

  

Walls are covered with the beautiful Virginia creeper!

Someone asks Damir about church attendance and religion now versus under Tito before his death.  Religion was not forbidden by Tito even though he was a proclaimed atheist.  He wanted citizens to be happy in Yugoslavia so he didn’t destroy any places of worship. 

Tito encouraged mixed marriages between different religions because he wanted a national identity as a Yugoslavian versus a Croatian, Bosnian, or Serbian.  Military service was mandatory for young men when they turned eighteen for one year, and they were often stationed in a different republic than their own.  This encouraged young people to move away from home, meet new ethnic and religious groups, maybe fall in love, marry outside of their religion, and result in a more blended society.

Initially with independence in 1990, church attendance increased.  The Vatican was the first country to recognize Croatia, and Pope John Paul II was very supportive .  Scandals in the Catholic Church over the last few years have resulted in decreased attendance along with less people claiming to be Catholic.

Klanjec is famous for medical tourism with several thermal spas and private medical clinics.  I might pass on the clinic but a long soak in a spa would be wonderful!  

The rolling hills are dotted with small farms where residents produce fruits and vegetables and wine for their personal use and to brag to their neighbors!  White wine is produced in this region while red is more common on the Adriatic coast.  Some people that work in Zagreb commute leaving the traffic, pollution, and busy pace of city life behind.

We visit the gallery of an internationally renowned sculptor, Anton Augustincic, in Klanjec.  

He is known for his massive sculpture in front of the United Nations Building in NYC called “Peace”.  There is a plaster model of the work in the gallery…

  

along with a multitude of bronzes both inside and outdoors.

  

He was a friend of Tito’s, and he produced several works of Yugoslavia’s President.  Tito looks very pensive.

  

The highway runs along a small stream which is the border with Slovenia.  There is a fence topped with barbed wire on the other side barely visible in the woods.  Evidently, Hungary and Slovenia both installed fences to prevent Syrian refugees from entering their countries.  

It is against the EU mandate for the free flow of people, money, goods and services.  This fence also interferes with the movement and migration of animals.  Both countries were suppose to remove these illegal fences, but it hasn’t been done.

Kumrovec is an open air living history museum with the same idea as Colonial Williamsburg displaying a traditional life in the past.  The birthplace of Josip Broz, whose nickname was Marshall Tito, it focuses on life in the late 1880’s and early 1900’s.  

Homes were small and usually wood with an entrance, central kitchen with a dirt floor, and a single room on either side with wood floors and simple furniture.  

The barns were actually bigger than the houses since they housed farm equipment, animals,…

Roofs were a thick thatch which could last twenty years.  

  

There was a weaver’s cottage with skeins of linen and flax,

corn cribs,

  

a bakery, 

  

a toy shop, 

and blacksmith shop.  There were plows and other farming equipment, 

clothes washing tubs, 

wine making, 

and chickens in the yards.

When a building’s corner were square and tight, they were called German corners.

The slightly wonky ones were called Croatian corners!

There was even a firefighter museum with equipment used in the past.

M

This large barrel on wheels was used to spread manure on the fields.

Marshall Tito’s birthplace is the major attraction.  Carved into the front door lintel is the date when the house was built…

  

His kitchen had a pole where hams were hung and smoked along with the blacken evidence.

and this cradle held Tito as a baby.

After he became President, he returned occasionally to a villa on the hillside overlooking his birth village.  He died in 1980 and is buried in Belgrade.

Tito fought with the partisans during WWII and helped to liberate Yugoslavia before gaining power and becoming President.  He was primarily a benevolent dictator who wanted citizens to be comfortable, have a job, a house, healthcare, pension, and an education.  He wanted borders open to tourist and for Yugoslavia to produce everything it needed within its boundaries.  The primary reason people liked Tito was that everything was provided by the state.  

Today is very different.  Employment can be difficult to find, and people need the personal motivation to get an education and invest in a skill and expertise.  Many people will admit their lifestyle was more comfortable under Tito while today there is more risk amid uncertainty.

Tito had multiple enemies, and citizens suffered severe consequences if they spoke out against his regime.  It was known as “disappearing in the dark”.  Yugoslavia was invited to join the EU, but Tito refused because he would have had to relinquish control.  

Damir tells us about being a Pioneer, a youth group beginning at age seven.  The group wore blue pants, white shirts, red scarves, and joining was mandatory until age 15.  Damir describes it like the Boy Scouts.  Here is the Pioneer’s Pledge which was recited:

Today, as I become a Pioneer,

I give my Pioneer's word of honour -

That I shall study and work diligently,

respect parents and my seniors,

and be a loyal and honest friend.

That I shall love our homeland, self- managed

Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia 

That I shall spread brotherhood and unity

and the principles for which comrade Tito fought.

And that I shall value all peoples of the world that respect freedom and peace!

Lunch was at a local restaurant up a steep hill along narrow winding mountain roads.  I don’t know how our bus driver makes these turns without leaving parts of the bus behind!

The views from the patio were so picturesque with a castle on the hill!

 .

Back in the city, we visit Zagreb’s cemetery designed by Hermanna Bollea, the architect of multiple buildings in Zagreb.  It is a beautiful and peaceful final resting place for thousands of Zagreb residents, but there is damage from the 2020 earthquake.

  

The columned pavilion at the entrance holds graves in the floor.

With All Saints Day on November 1 rapidly approaching, families were cleaning the tombstones and arriving to decorate the graves with flowers and candles.

 

Some graves were old and moss-covered…

and others show a recent burial  with a wooden cross since the family stone has not been etched with the information.

There were lots of beautiful monuments and tributes on the stones.

  

Just outside the gates is the morgue where the funeral procession begins followed by the priest and then the family.  The land was bought from a local poet who wanted a place for peaceful contemplation and appreciation of nature.  It was the first cemetery in Europe that welcomed all religions.

It has been a busy day and a beautiful one!  Tomorrow we leave for the Adriatic coast again but first, a visit to a national park as GJ continues Traveling,