Srečno, Lidija!

Today celebrates my writer/poet friend and here are some photos from ten days ago when us four last met. We had lunch and then drove up to Orle where the last battle for the liberation of our city was fought.

You wrote three novels, “A Spare Life”, “Skrita kamera”, and “Non-Oui” – probably my favourite, about the family history of a Croatian woman Neda (No-Yes) who marries to Sicily, and her granddaughter of the same name who visits Croatia.

You have also published several books of poetry. You write in Macedonian since this is your mother tongue but you get translated into many languages. There is one poem that hits especially close to home because this is how it goes:

Going back 
by Lidija Dimkovska
Translated by Ljubica Arsovska and Patricia Marsh

When you go back to your home town
you visit museums and galleries,
pause to listen to the buskers,
light candles in all the churches,
buy books by local authors
and the CDs by local bands
which have come out over the last six months,
treat yourself to some chocs from the town factory facing bankruptcy,
make a detour to the outdoor market you haven’t visited for a long time,
meet friends for an hour or two
before going to a local film or theatre production
they’re not interested in,
you do a lightning tour of your home town
in just a few days, drinking water from the bottle in your bag,
buying souvenir magnets and keyrings,
sitting on all the surviving benches
from your past,
turning down all the alleyways that have remained the same,
taking photos of the new buildings which look like warts,
mumbling to yourself, incomprehensible to everyone else,
when you go back to your home town
you realize you no longer have one,
that it has turned into a simple fact in a document,
Place of Birth, a point of birth and of no return.

And while you are in Greece and fires are raging both there and in your country of origin, I’m about to move back to my new country, not really Sicily but close enough.

Here is out last day in pictures. There were occupiers, eagles, goats and the lovely Slovenian countryside.

Happy birthday and as I told you already, in my mind you are ten years younger.

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  With your husband, my poet friend.

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  Our lunch place.

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  French fries tea! They look much healthier already.

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  Apple strudel, amore’s choice of dessert.

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  I liked this view.

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  Then it was up. Orle above Ljubljana.

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  In May 1945 the last battle for the liberation of Ljubljana was fought here.

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  Hence the Partisan greeting. 😀 At that moment we heard some gunlike noises from the stone quarry below. Occupiers!

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  Erected in May 1989. I remember our primary school class having to walk up there but this monument came later.

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  Slovenian characteristic hayrack.

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  The view of the valley below.

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  This place has been heavily upgraded since I saw it last.

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  This is Orle and eagle = orel.

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  Any thoughts on this fence?

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  More hayrack-like features.

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  Then I noticed some movement from where we were sitting…

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  A goat!

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  Many goats!

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  Our liberated city. The trees were not cut for the view. I hope.

This day in my blogging history

• 2014: Support your local punk rock band of friends

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  2015: Mother reading Lidija’s A Spare Life

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  2016: Three doors from and around Mozirje

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