Eurovision

This year the winner of Eurovision is Serbia with song “Molitva” (Prayer) performed by Ana Marija Serifovich. I think she deserved the prize. She is really talented singer and her style is somehow different than the style of other performers. 

While the voting was in progress, Serbia was competing with Ukraine, but at the end Serbia won while Ukraine was second. I find this very interesting because few years ago in Turkey, Ukraine and Serbia were also competing and Ukraine won the contest with Ruslana, while Serbia was second. Anyway it was exciting to watch Eurovision and thanks to all countries which gave 12 points to Serbia.         

The Interview with Ljubomir Glishin

My second interview for the research paper was with my grandfather Ljubomir Glisin. Ljubomir is 77 years old and during the “Tito’s time” he was a police officer. So as I new what was his job, I thought that he could tell me something more about Tito and his politics.   

As Alexander has already told me about the living standard and how people used to live in general, Ljubomir told me something more about Informbiro Period. It all started in 1948, when Tito definitely rejected Stalin’s proposal of joining the
Soviet Union. After that tensions between Stalin and Tito grew. As my grandfather said “It was only matter of time when the Soviet Union is going to attack
Yugoslavia.” Everybody expected the attack and most of the police officers were sent to the border with Hungary and Rumania where the
Soviet Union was expected. A big part of Yugoslav military was situated near the sea along
Croatia where Soviet submarine were situated and ready for the attack. The tension lasted for four years and eventually with Stalin’s death everything was over. Like the most of the people who witnessed that time, Ljubomir said that it was unclear why Stalin didn’t attack
Yugoslavia. After Informbiro Period, Tito’s politics had prosperity and country was growing from every point of view. As Ljubomir was police officer, he said that corruption was much lower than nowadays. 

Information that I got from Ljubomir could be compared with the ones that I got from Alexander and they could tell us that the general impression about Tito’s
Yugoslavia was good.        

Fly Like a Bird

This is one of the pictures that I applied for the History Matters Photo contest. It was taken in the central Serbia. Name of the river on the picture is Morava. This place is actually situated near my native town and I’ve been there hundreds of times. I really like the view from the top of the mountain.

The April 17 History Matters at WIUU

On April 17, this year, at WIUU we had the “History Matters” program which was organized and presented in honor of the true history matters of Ukraine and other countries. During this program, students have presented their Power Point presentations about different kinds of topics: Holodomor, medicine, Holocaust and so on.  

Photo contest took a part in this program as well and it had three categories: animals, landscape and lifestyle. Each of the categories had great photos and I believe that judges had a hard job in choosing the lucky winner of the contest.  

Among many people who visited this happening, I would like to mention the most important guests and those were grandmas who lived through some of the events which were presented by students (Holodomor, Holocaust). The whole impression about the “History Matters” is great. I really encourage this kind of events and I want to say thanks to Kristina Gray who was the main organizer of this happening.

Josip Broz Tito: The Achievement and Legacy of Piece and Unity for the People of Yugoslavia

As you can see the title of my research paper is “Josip Broz Tito: The Achievement and Legacy of Piece and Unity for the People of Yugoslavia”. At the firs sight I thought it was to long, but I think that it really presents what my research topic is about so I put it to stay as it is.  

The outlines for my research paper are: I Introduction; II Early Years; III Tito and the WWII; IV Tito’s Dictatorship; V Tito VS Stalinl; VI Tito’s death,Yugoslavia without Him; VII Conclusion 

The thesis statement: “Even his legacy couldn’t live on; the name of Josip Broz Tito will be written in history as the name of one mysterious figure that maintained unity among the people of
Yugoslavia and saved its sovereignity from foreign influences.“     

The Interview with Alexander Jevtich

As I went to Serbia, to spend Eastern with my family I took a chance to interview the both of my grandfathers in order to help me with my research paper. As I am writing about the Josip Broz Tito, I thought that my grandparents could be of a big help and I was right.  I interviewed Alexander Jevtich, who is my grandfather.

While talking to Alexander, I found out a lot about the living standard while Tito was the president of Yugoslavia. As Alexander said living standard was higher than in East Europe. Yugoslavs were permitted to travel with their passport wherever they’d want to. When I asked him about Tito’s dictatorship and was he more like Stalin or how was he anyway. He answered to me the way a expected him: he said that Tito was far to different from Stalin but anyway he had some undemocratic rules that people had to follow. For example church was forbidden in schools, universities, everywhere. As another example he told me that no matter whom you were, you had to be a member of Communist Party, otherwise you wouldn’t get a job, a credit in a bank, or you would be discriminated in lots of fields. Also it was forbidden to say anything that would be against the president and its party. He also mentioned that the country was having a big debt, but people were able to buy houses, cars and so many other things by credit they would get from a bank. After all, Alexander seems to be more satisfied with the way they used to live while Tito was the president, than they live now.

Anyway the interview was rather interesting and the most of the information I alredy used in my research paper.  

Titoism

The term Titoism was named after leader of Yugoslavia, Josip Broz Tito and it presents a kind of philosophy that is in some aspects similar to Stalinism and from some other aspects it differs. The both of philosophies are based on reaching communistic goals. But Titoism was based on reaching communism independently, rather than in unions with other countries, while Stalinism was based on reaching communistic goals in unions and that is why he created Soviet Union and Warsaw pact. At the end, neither Titoism, nor Communism reached full communistic system, but Titoism was one of the main reasons why Tito refused to join U.S.S.R.   

Tito vs. Stalin (Informbiro Period)

Informbiro period is the period from 1948 to 1954, when unlike the rest of Eastern European countries; Yugoslavia refused to join Warsaw pact and remained socialistic. During this time tensions between Yugoslavia and Soviet Union increased. Tito, the leader of Yugoslavia, openly rejected Stalin’s proposal and disagreed with many aspects of Stalinism. Many people found this Tito’s decision very risky. Khruchov said that he was sure that if Tito rejects Stalin’s proposal, Stalin will intervene militarily. After all that happened, it seems that Tito was the only one who stand up to Stalin’s regime and save independency of his country.  

 Campbell, J John:”Tito: The Achievement and the Legacy”, “Foreign Affairs”; Summer80, Vol. 58 Issue 5, p1045-1059,

  

Yugoslavia before WWII

In order to approach events that happened in Yugoslavia and its falling apart, first we must know how it all started, when did Yugoslavia become Yugoslavia and what was the purpose of making such a big country which later on, had nothing more than problems and disagreements with each other.  

In the year of 1918, King Alexander united Balkan countries and pronounced a new kingdom on Balkan, the Kingdom ofSerbs, Croats and Slovenians. Eleven years later, King Alexander changed the constitution and the name of the country toYugoslavia. During this period there were lots of conflicts between Serbs and Croats. So, the question that is often asked is why Alexander united these nations. During the First World War the territory of Croatia belonged to Austria-Hungary Empire. When World War One ended, Serbia came out as a winner and it got territories of Croatia and
Bosnia and Herzegovina. From very beginning of Yugoslavia’s history there were lots of dissidence among Serbs and Croats. One half of Croats population wanted Croatia to be independent country, and other half of population and Serbs were against it. That is how started creating of Croatian special units “Ustase”, that were against Serbian politics and later during the WWII, “Ustase” commit terrible crimes where more than 500 000 Serbs were killed. On the other hand, in Serbia (1922) communistic party with their leader Tito was getting stronger and stronger.  

This kind of atmosphere in Yugoslavia was stopped in the 30s where Hitler took his part in world’s history and his influence became on Yugoslavia stronger. But anyway, the same kind of history between Croats and Serbs was repeating after WWII, until Yugoslavia fell apart.             

A little Bit about Sports

  As all my blogs were about history, or at least they were somehow connected with history matters, I decided to write one blog about sports happenings in the worold. 

Two days ago was the final game in Open Sonny Ericsson Tennis Tournament in Miami, Florida. Two finalists were Novak Djokovich who was representing Serbia and Guillermo Canas from Argentina. After two hours of playing, Novak Djokovich won with the score of 6-2, 6-3, and 6-4. “Open Miami” is the fourth tournament in the world according to the budged which is about four million dollars. Winning the final game against Canas, nineteen years old Novak became the youngest man champion in the history of tennis. All fans of tennis are trilled with his success and he became so famous that four countries are offering him their citizenships. 

I think that sports happenings are very important in our society nowadays, because after all those political problems that the most of the countries are dealing with, sport is only thing left that is symbol of friendship and piece.