Lessons of Inderterminate Nature

Where the author recounts a particularly interesting day spent at hands of Montenegrin protesters, gets very close to the Balkan wars, refuses a bevy of Balkan brides, and ponders the future of this idyllic little town…

Lessons of Indeterminate Nature

A shallow stream runs down from the hills between Kosovo and Montenegro, passing several small farming villages in this lazy, pretty valley. The dramatic snow-capped mountains that are the trademark of Montenegro define either side of the valley with their sheer cliffs and dense pine forests.

Three single-lane roads come together into an intersection at the mouth of the valley with a café, a grocery store, one or two other merchants, and a nice new bridge.

This was our second time driving through the town of Murino. The first time was around 8:00 AM (roughly 2 hours earlier), as we traveled up into the mountains looking for a border crossing indicated on our map. We needed to be in Kosovo in a few hours. Time was short, the snow was falling, the truck was heavy with 1500 kilos of humanitarian aid and other merchandise, we had already been driving for more than 12 hours and this pass was lower than the only other tiny little line on our map that connects Montenegro (“Crna Gora”, to the local population) and Kosovo.

Up around 2000 meters (6000+ feet) they had stopped plowing the road, and even with tire chains, we were unable to continue on to the border crossing. So we had turned around and carefully made our way back down the little one-lane road, hoping to find that the other route into Kosovo was not similarly blocked.

Arterial Blockage
It was just after 9:00 AM when we pulled up to the bridge and were forced to stop due to a large commotion on the bridge itself. A truck was sideways across the bridge, several cars were strewn around at odd angles, there was a crowd of people milling around a fire, and several policemen could be seen speaking to the crowd.

I dispatched Boris, my co-driver, to use his knowledge of the Serbo-Croatian tongue to determine what was up. Driving a large truck in this part of the world, with doors sealed by the customs department and large SFOR and NATO shields on the front and back, is not an entirely risk-free venture. So, keeping the engine running, remaining a safe distance back from the bridge (where a quick U-turn was possible), and keeping my eyes on the side of the road to keep anyone from successfully sneaking up on me, I waited for Boris to return with his report.

Safety, and/or The Lack of Same
Montenegro never officially participated in any of the Balkan wars that made the SFOR and KFOR peacekeeping missions necessary. However, the Montenegrins have never made it any secret that they really consider themselves a part of Serbia, and generally like Serbia (or the “Former Republic of Yugoslavia”, if you prefer the country’s formal name).

In less politically correct conversations, you can hear the Montenegrins referred to as “the Texans of Serbia”, without the benefits of big hair and great barbeque.

The western part of Kosovo and the south-eastern part of Montenegro are areas that are particularly proud of being Serbian, and the common belief is that NATO’s war against Serbia was blatant unwarranted aggression against a sovereign state. Add to that the generally held belief that the trial of Slobodan Milosevic in The Hague is an elaborate conspiracy, and you have an area that is not openly hostile, but not friendly to Westerners or those working for SFOR/KFOR.

So it was not without some trepidation that I sat conspicuously in my SFOR/NATO labeled vehicle and awaited Boris’ return and report. The large crowd of people all staring at me with unshielded dislike added to my concern. All of my senses were running at 150% as I tried to read the intent on the faces in the crowd, scanned the bushes to see if they concealed anyone, watched my rearview mirrors, checked out the men in the crowd with their hands in their pockets, assessed possible escape routes, kept an eye on Boris’ location in the crowd, estimated the weight of the vehicle blocking the road and if I could get up enough speed to ram through it in an emergency, etc, etc, etc.

This was taking too long. Boris had his back to me, so I could not see his expression, but his posture seemed to still be laid back and relaxed. (In fact, on reflection, I realize I have never seen Boris anything other than laid back.) But I am sitting on this bridge, exposed from all sides with a crowd of Serbian-sympathizers carefully checking me out.

Just when I think I am going to burst an artery, Boris scratches his head, turns around, and walks back to the truck in a slow and thoughtful mode. He climbs into the passenger side, shakes his head and gathers his thoughts for a moment before enlightening me.

“It’s a strike.” He says with a puzzled smile of the truly mystified.

My eloquent reply consists of one word: “Wha?”

“They are on strike, and we are stuck here until 3:00 PM, but the organizers want to buy us a coffee.”

When In Rome
The demonstrators were quite understanding about our urgent need to get to a border crossing with Kosovo, but their resolve to maintain their blockade was absolute and there was nothing we could do.

So we went into the one café in town and did what all people in the Balkans do when they stop moving for a moment: we had a coffee. One of the organizers, a stocky laborer with the demeanor of a construction site foreman, said the two of us were the most excitement the town had seen in several years. It was also somewhat of a coup for their small demonstration to have netted a fish as big as an official SFOR vehicle, and they were not about to let us go until 3:00 PM. Maybe they would even have a media circus!

The matronly café owner with the two gold teeth took us under her wing immediately. We became her favorites. She was determined to feed us, and to get us married to some local girls before we left town that afternoon. (Not an unusual set of activities, I gathered.)

The event organizer bought us both a coffee, and after some small resistance on my part, convinced me to join him in a shot of Rakia. Every country in the world has their version of Rakia. The important parts of a good Rakia are that it be made with some readily available local fruit (usually apricots or plums), be very clear, very strong, and easy to make at home in your backyard still. Call it Moonshine, Palinka, Vodka, Slivovitz, or any of hundreds of other names, but it is all the same.

What a Balkan morning…I was the chief attraction in a public disturbance, and was drinking coffee and moonshine before breakfast.

Your paycheck is going to be late…again
It was time to get to the root of the problem and use our Western ingenuity to devise a way out of this situation. We had been on the road since 5:00 PM the night before, and were looking forward to a meal, bed, and not sitting in the truck any more.

So we started asking about the demonstration. Maybe there was a crack in their logic somewhere big enough for us to fit through.

On the other side of the river is a modern building that looks “designed” enough to be made by Ikea. This is one of the textile factories that make Yugoslavian military uniforms. The crux of the demonstration was that the workers were upset that they had not been paid…

…in TWO YEARS!

Unsurprisingly, we could see their point, and so our desire to run their blockade subsided substantially. After all, they had a good case, we were being fed free coffee and Rakia, and our short time in the café had already turned us into small-scale celebrities. (Apparently it is not every day that a Dutch man who speaks fluent Serbo-Croat and an American get stuck in their blockade!)

Their demands were reasonable as well. They did not expect back-pay or compensation for the two years of lost salary. All they wanted was to make sure that their pension plans continued uninterrupted for that two year period.

That seemed like an extraordinarily reasonable position to Boris and I. But apparently the owner of the factory did not see things the same way. Or at least he didn’t agree with them the last time they talked to him about three months ago. Gossip was going around that he had gone to Australia with all of the company’s money, but wherever he had gone, they could no longer find him to continue the negotiations.

The woman running the blockade (who we dubbed “Blue Hat”) had taken the workers’ case to the government, but had not been able to get anyone to listen to her. They called, they wrote, they banged on the Mayor’s door until their hands were raw. Nothing worked.

Then they hit on the idea of the blockade.

Their reasoning was that they could get the media’s attention (and hopefully the government’s as well) and finally be able to come to some resolution. After all, at the end of the valley were logging areas and a small border crossing…someone would notice the blockade, and then they would finally get the attention of someone who could help.

That was three weeks ago.

Every weekday from 8:30 AM until 3:00 PM, they blockaded the bridge. If you had a note from your doctor, were a member of the police force, or were driving an ambulance, then you could pass. But nobody else got by.

As with everywhere else in the Balkans, the taxi drivers were the first to capitalize on the situation. Several of them grouped up on either side of the bridge and ferried people up and down the valley on either side of the blockade.

Amenities
During the course of our conversation, the café had become very full. It was only the size of your average bedroom, but now there were around 15 people sitting and standing around us as we talked with Rakia Man.

Someone tapped me on the shoulder.

I turned around to find a very large man sitting on a chair near the wall and leaning conspiratorially toward me. He had either had a lot to drink already this morning, or all of the synapses in his brain were not wired up correctly. (I never did find out which was true, although everyone just treated him as if he was a bit of an embarrassing older brother.)

He pointed to a coyly smiling bleach-blonde girl sitting in the corner of the room and said, “She is very pretty, no?”

I knew where this one was going already. But Boris and I had decided that we needed to be as polite as possible and avoid causing any possible offense. So I turned to look at the girl, and I saw a pretty woman around 23 years old, who had seen a lot of Baywatch and was doing her best Pamela Anderson impression with what she had. With her head still tilted down, she looked up at me and smiled. I smiled in return.

“Yes.” I said. “Very pretty.”

He smiled and said expectantly, “I can get her for you, if you want.” And followed that up with a wink and a good-natured punch to my shoulder. “Is true!” he continued. “I get her for you. You tell me, and I get her for you.”

I looked over to her and she was a little exasperated with Big Dumb Dude, but clearly fancied the exotic stranger from America.

I told him “Thank you, but it is too early in the morning for me.” He smiled, winked again, and reasserted his offer with a knowing nod, then retuned to his coffee with a self-satisfied smile.

I looked back at Blondie, and she waved him off but gave me another smile which told me everything I needed to know.

Goldentooth, the café owner, loved all of this and started going off on how, just over the hill in Kosovo (someplace she had never been), that every man had five women.

To Be Continued…

By Christian Jacobsen. All rights reserved.