Thoughts on The Death Of Yugoslavia by Laura Silber and Allan Little

My reading of this text, in a way, ‘bookends’ my knowledge and study of South East Europe. It was my original viewing of the series The Death of Yugoslavia that drew my attention to the region two decades ago. So in this book I was seeking to find a deeper portrayal of events by the authors.

This text does not seek a theoretical understanding of the conflict, and it only fleetingly calls upon historical or anthropological perspectives on why events may have unfolded as they did. This is rather different to the TV show, whose audience included those not familiar in the history of the region, so could have led one to believe that their analysis of events was the classic ‘ancient hatreds’ paradigm. The start of the book clearly indicates this as not being so. Instead, the book walks the reader through a series of key events that the authors see as being essential to fueling the subsequent wars and ethnic cleansing.

Echoing the same timeline as the TV show, you get further insight to some of the events and key players in the drama that was taking place in the 1980s and 1990s. It cleverly portrays the balance between the agency of individuals and those of institutions, which led to the Yugoslav state’s collapse. 

Symbolic individuals are familiar; Milosevic, Tudjman, Izetbegovic, Kucan – all heads of the republics/states they sought, and eventually came, to control. However, the spotlight also moves onto other individuals who were aggressors, and even those trying to calm the rising ethnic tensions. Borisav Jovic was Milosevic’s right hand man. Holding various functions at the Serbian and Federal level, Jovic was one of the key disciples of Milosevic’s attempts initially to centralize power in the Yugoslav state, then into the goal of uniting all Serbs. Milan Babic and Milan Martic are two individuals in Knin who took on the Serb Nationalist mantle once independence was sought by Croatia. What began as the Croatian states’ attempts to impose law and order, soon escalated to Serbian defense of their villages and towns, drawing battle lines in the process.  The Croat Josip Reihl-Kir, regional police chief in eastern Croatia, continuously tried to halt small skirmishes between Serb militia and Croat police from developing into a civil war, all the while facing pressure from above in the form of the hawkish HDZ officials.

Aside from individuals, the portrayal of institutions and forces as agents in the descent to state collapse and war are superbly woven into the story. As mentioned, the contest between centrifugal and centripetal forces for power in the Yugoslav state began in earnest once Tito died; although under him they had precedent. The multi-member presidency effectively reified the implication that republics were now the keepers of their resident nations, with a couple of notable and dangerous exceptions to that logic. Economic decline and social strife fuelled this polarized debate – symbolized by the western republics of one side, and the eastern on the other, or richer versus the poorer states. However two institutions kept them together, the League of Communists and the Yugoslav Peoples Army (JNA). ‘Brotherhood and Unity’ was still the central plank to their worldview. Any violation to the sovereignty and territoriality of Yugoslavia was verboten. It was the former that was to go first.

At the seminal, and what was to be the final, conference of the League of Communists in January 1990 (I have covered this in a past blog piece), it was Kucan as head of the Slovene delegation that led the walkout that saw the end of the League of Communists.  The centripetal forces had won. The JNA on the other hand clung on, even after the loss of Slovenia and Croatia. However, by that time, its Serb contingent moved from working under the JNA banner in Croatia then Bosnia to local Serb units. The detail of the movements on the ground are vividly portrayed, with lines of communication – either between Croatian Police forces and the leadership in Zagreb, or the Serb militias and the ‘Yugoslav’ leadership in Belgrade – explained concisely.

Further on, the details of the war and sieges on the ground, and the pathetic response by world community, is despairing. Hindsight only makes you question why the EC and UN did not do more. Initially wanting to keep Yugoslavia intact, splits developed in the international community that led to different directions and approaches on how to stop conflict emerging. Within Yugoslavia, the tussle of whether 'self-determination' should be exclusive to the republics or the nations fed into the splits in the international community. The price paid was ethnic cleansing.

What gives this book its power is the knowledge garnered from the active participants. Although written in 1996, and with the participants possibly not giving a full and frank account, the authors weaved a compelling account from numerous actors and actions of institutions, to describe the events and processes that took hold of the former Yugoslavia from the early 1980s. How it slowly describes the ethnic untangling of peoples is a daunting prospect for us in communities that are ever becoming more multi cultural. However, the book doesn’t give, nor does it need to, an account of how to stop this. Instead this book is more a warning, a warning to those who seek political power by manipulating institutions, individuals and the masses, through tools of fear and hatred, in order to put into practice a narrow nationalist agenda. 

The Development and Consolidation of the Macedonian Nation (1/5)

This series of posts are re-drafts of my dissertation entitled '20 Years On: Social Democracy in Macedonia'. This piece was written in the summer of 2012, and involved my spending a week in Skopje speaking to individuals in the SDSM and wider social democratic movement. This first post sets the scene and provides an historical overview of the emergence of Macedonian nation.

(Macedonia - without borders both cognitive and material)

Three important historical developments impact on how social democracy in Macedonia constitutes itself today. The first two, to be covered here, from the pre-democratisation period are, the development of the Macedonian nation and the establishment of the first republic for Macedonians. An understanding of these place contemporary issues surrounding national identity, nationalism, and relations with neighbours in an historical footing. The establishment of a republic for the Macedonians, within the context of a Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY), puts forth arguments as to why the communist political leadership pursued this task and would have future implications for the Social Democratic Unions of Macedonia in the post-independence era. 

Nation and Nationalism – Definitions

But first, I must clarify what I see are the definitions of ‘nations’ and ‘nationalism’. I use Benedict Anderson’s understanding that the nation ‘is an imagined political community – and imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign.’ For nationalism, Ernest Gellner’s definition that ‘Nationalism is primarily a political principle, which holds that the political and national unit should be congruent.’ and Eric Hobsbawm’s observation that ‘Nations do not make states and nationalisms but the other way around.’ are my anchor and both hold true in the case of Macedonia.

The ‘Macedonian Question’ in the 19th and 20th Centuries

The emergence of the ‘Macedonian Question’ arose during the latter part of the 19th century at a time when established territories surrounded the region whilst it was still formally part of the Ottoman Empire. In the words of Barbara and Charles Jelavich ‘When the struggle over Macedonia became more heated after the Congress of Berlin, anthropologists, linguists, and physiologists from the Balkan countries all used their specialty to claim the area for their own particular nationality.’ Serbia, Bulgaria and Greece were the three states that eyed the region, whose population was a diverse mix. The attributes for their claims came from religion, language, education, history, and culture; and were easily contested. Fundamentally, the geographic-strategic importance of this area for territorial expansion, economic gain and possible regional power status, were the reasons these claims were made, and backed by the ‘Great Powers’. Ottoman era social structures were breeding grounds for these contests, especially in regards to the church organization, to which language and education were tied; yet pro-Ottoman sympathies resulted from these clashes coming from all sides. The Balkan War of 1912 was fought to overthrow Ottoman rule, and Macedonia was split between the three states; however Bulgaria was unhappy and a second war in 1913 erupted, the result of which was the Treaty of Bucharest. During this period the people’s ‘perception from below’ in the region could be characterized as ‘not necessarily national and still less nationalist.’ according to Eric Hobsbawm. But this was of lesser importance for these belligerent states, which previously based territorial claims on co-nationals, but that soon became redundant.

The Foundations of Macedonian National Consciousness

Although a small group of people began to attest to a unique Macedonian national movement in the last decade of the 19th century, especially the establishment of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization in 1893, their sympathies were specifically Bulgarian (Jelavich and Jelavich). In applying Victor Roudometof’s ‘thesis that national identity is socially constructed, fluid, situational, and modified through encounters and interaction with other groups, thereby fostering the necessity for boundary preservation and the exaggeration of cultural difference.’, one can see that these clashes could be unending. In Ottoman administrative records there was no categorization of Macedonians with a distinct identity. The idea that the people in the region were a ‘blank canvass’ upholds Roudometof’s constructivist approach. However ‘the notion that Macedonian Slavs were not yet Serbs or Bulgarians was the germ of the idea that they formed a distinct ethnic category, neither Serbian nor Bulgarian’, according to Roudometof. This idea has its legacy in contemporary debates in the region. The debate amongst the intelligentsia revolved around delineating where Macedonia was, its administrative position within the Ottoman Empire, and took on attempts to unite the Christians of the region through a Bishopric. Although multi-ethnic autonomy was their aim, including during the Ilinden Uprising in 1903, the division of the region during the Balkan Wars took on a more important meaning. So, up to the Balkan Wars the region had become defined and markers were established as to who people were not; yet the division of this ‘imagined’ area (up to that point in time) sowed the seeds for future discontent.

Between the Two World Wars

After this territorial division of ‘Ancient Macedonia’ into Pirin, Aegean and Vardar Macedonia, and its subsequent codification after World War I, demographic consolidation occurred. Greece settled Greeks from Turkey in their area and established demographic dominance, whereas in Bulgaria the ‘Macedonian Question’ played heavily on domestic politics. Focusing on the Vardar region, whose borders are co-terminus with those of present-day Macedonia, assimilation was attempted by the Serbs with the aim to de-Bulgarize the region via methods such as name changing. Again, Macedonians weren’t acknowledged in the 1921 and 1931 census calculations as a separate entity, but were counted as Serb or as speaking Serbocroat according to Joseph Rothschild. Politically, Ivo Banac notes that in the 1920 elections ‘The chief beneficiary of Macedonian discontent was the Communist Party, which won 36.72 percent of all Macedonian votes…’ doing better in the urban areas of Kumanovo, Skopje and Tikves. Communism also provided an ideological alternative to nationalism in the region at the time, seeking to establish a Balkan Federation. However, with no sizeable proletariat, they sought to exploit national oppression for social revolution. According to Pavlos Hatzopolous the ‘nationalization’ of the peoples of the Macedonia region by the conquering states proved ripe for this agitation, even if it ultimately failed. Whilst de-Bulgarization, Serbianization, and the Comintern agreeing the existence of a Macedonian nation in 1934, were ongoing processes and events, Alexander Maxwell believes that the masses simply wanted an easy life and identified with whichever state controlled their area.

From World War II to a Socialist Republic of Macedonia

Alexander Maxwell continues that with the arrival of World War II to the Balkans in 1941 came the governance of the most part of Vardar Macedonia by the Bulgarians. At first they were welcomed, but re-Bulgarization and the removal of local elites, as well as the effects of war and displaced peoples, led to increasing support for Tito and the Partisans. The Partisans establishing a Macedonian literary language in 1944 accelerated this. ‘Macedonia’s Slavs simultaneously espoused both “regional Macedonian nationalism” and “ethnic Bulgarian nationalism” in the early twentieth century, but by 1945 an “ethnic Macedonian nationalism” incompatible with Bulgarian loyalties had emerged.’ Rooted in language, Tito sought to capitalize on this. It justified his attempt to gain control of Macedonia, retain it, eliminate Bulgarian national consciousness, and ultimately to act as a step to Yugoslav regional hegemony, according to Stephen Palmer and Robert King. The ‘Macedonian Question’ was a useful vehicle for this, and can be judged as a success in comparison to the strategy employed by interwar communists as suggested by Hatzopolous.

Only with the establishment of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia, albeit obligated to be part of the Socialist Federal Yugoslavia, could state resources create the Macedonian nation. This was achieved by creating schools, a university and a press in this new Macedonian language. Added to this was the longer-term goal of acquiring an independent Orthodox Church. Thus the state existed because of communism, so when the Tito consolidated the communist organization in the republic via patronage and trading political and economic centralism for cultural autonomy, he could command the loyalty of large sections of the population (Ulf Brunnbauer). But fundamentally, echoing Hobsbawm, ‘the republic was established, but the nation had still to be created.’

Thoughts on The Anthropological Field on the Margins of Europe, 1945-1991 by Aleksandar Boskovic and Chris Hann

Anthropology – the study of humanity – has a well-argued history over the nature of the discipline.  Can it be objective, when it’s the product of an author that is to some extent subjective? Can the observed group of people really open up to the researcher about their ways of life?  To what extent do ideologies intersect with anthropology to shape what is studied, how it is studied, and ‘when’ it was studied? In this book, the central question is to what extent anthropology has been swayed by nationalism, and later socialism, in its development as a discipline.

The interplay in this book is between western ideas of anthropology merging in with local practices of folklore, ethnology and ethnography. It also looks at the dichotomy of local and foreign anthropologists (and folklorists) and their impact on the nature of the discipline in each country, all under differing conditions of nationalism, socialism and levels of intrusion by the state.

One of the keys to understanding this text is to have an awareness of the political climate during the period, and the tumult that occurred. The examples range from orthodox communism as in Albania, through to conservative militaristic rule as was the case for a while in Greece, and via Titoism in Yugoslavia – all having periods of strict then relaxed impositions of ideology, with some having changes in ideology too. But the one process that they all went through was democratization, the end date of this book.

Yet, underneath the political clouds above, there were clashes between those who practiced the different methods of the study of humanity – whether in the present or historically.  For many, this book will read as an emergence from the outmoded ways of the study of folklore towards the western standard of social and cultural anthropology. Or, in other words, a move from an inward looking study of oneself, to one where comparison with others takes precedence. Nationalism or, more specifically, the extent to which the state reifies the dominant nation, is evident when looking at which communities are studied by folklorists/anthropologists.

The first example of this is Greece, where an oscillation of direction within the folkloric/anthropological field occurred. These have been strongly tied to the political leadership of the country, swaying between conservative dominance harking to a more folkloric unveiling of the past of Greek people, to the reformist Government in the late 1950s wanting state to have a modern vision and the ‘other’ to be studied. And back again. As the 21^st century approached, the education of students in western universities saw social anthropology being brought into Greece more pro-actively, but still having to compete with the historic and entrenched folklore of the past.

In Albania, the epistemological debates were secondary to historical materialism, relying heavily on a Marxist version of history, to draw up an ethnographic/ethnological narrative derived from Engels. Again the narrative was used to explain how ‘ancient’ the Albanians were by exploring folklore, yet while wanting to discover folkloric artefacts, the ideology also wanted it banished. Strict adherence to the one party state was obligatory, and thus no other methods of anthropology were explored.

Although under Socialism and with Marxist thought being the favourite methodology and practice, studying communities didn’t properly emerge in Slovenia until the late 1940s, and even then folklore and ethnology was dominant, as it was pre World War II. This detailed material, social and spiritual culture via a classificatory system and through collecting artefacts. After World War II there were no paradigms or theoretical perspectives to follow, so collection took priority over interpretation. From the 1950s onwards, academic trips and contacts began to occur, albeit limited. But this led individuals to move towards ethnology and the methods of analysis of daily culture and phenomena, allowing students in the 1970s and beyond to study and develop the variety of subjects they could discover.

Macedonia is probably one of the more intriguing because of its history prior to 1945 being that of a contested area by Albanians, Bulgarians, Greeks and Serbs.  The forbearers to anthropology all had a ‘nationalising’ slant to their work.  During socialism, Macedonia had to contend with the 4 established nation-states around it assessing it, claiming it, whilst looking for areas of similarity in order to acquire it. But the authors look more at how knowledge was produced in the work of the academics, and how politics had penetrated deeply their modes of working. Although the paradigm shifted from socialism to ethno-nationalism during this period, the two approaches of folklore and ethnology still worked on creating and recreating the nationhood of Macedonians.

One key observation is that this book buys-in to the ‘national narrative’ because the states that had a settled will of how anthropology should be researched, always saw the limits of its own borders as the limits of research. The investigation into the origins and development of the nation became the task these academics were enrolled in, irrespective of the name given to them by their methodology; social anthropologist, folklorist etc. Each state had a dominant nation, and those communities who could be studied had to confirm and reconfirm the uniqueness of that nation, irrespective if the political leaders were socialist or conservative. This is still the case after democratisation.

When reading anthropological texts, one should always place into context the time of writing and the persuasion of the author. One can never be purely objective, whether that is when classifying cultural or material objects, or when analysing and describing social relations and rituals in a community. As humans, we have our own unique perspective of the world, and base our judgments of the meaning of objects, rituals, and relations from that perspective. Whether from the community or foreign to it, the meanings will be different, and over time can and will change.  So by accepting the subjectivity of this social science, we can develop our own interpretation of those studied peoples, which have themselves been re-interpreted by the social scientists in a myriad of ways.

Thoughts on Ethno-Baroque by Rozita Dimova

This book has intrigued me for some years. Since writing my essay on spatial and temporal aspects to national identity and history in the Republic of Macedonia, I have seen and read more essays and books on the topic. This book I felt would add to my knowledge of the role aesthetics and materialism play in reshaping ethnic, national and social relations in Macedonia.

Rozita Dimova seeks to account for the changing roles and relations that have occurred during socialism and since the fall of socialism between, mainly, the Albanian and Macedonian ethnic groups in Macedonia. Her central theme revolves around the axis of loss and gain in the perceptions of members of both of these groups. This perception reaches back beyond the emphasis that is usually placed on the economic demise of Yugoslavia in the early 1980s, and instead looks to the 1950s and 1960s when consumerism became apparent in Macedonia and peoples experiences of it started to cement. These experiences accelerated once democratization ensued, and flowed in tandem with migrations from rural to urban settings.

Dimova’s anthropological research displays examples of how ethno-national ‘conflict’ can arise in the tamest and most innocent of circumstances. Reading the accounts, from both ethnic communities, you get a sense of how these people slowly realized their sense of loss, gain or entitlement based on their past experience and yearning for times gone by or for a better future. One example is a young Macedonian mother, Lela, who lives in an apartment block where she has to save for minor luxuries in life. The description of her deteriorated flat can be viewed as a metaphor for how the Macedonians’ feel about their place in present society. A family of Albanians moved into the upstairs flat, the constant noise of children and residue of bread making on the balcony, both creeping into the downstairs flat. This intrusion leads Lela to feel nostalgia for the past, a sense of a loss and a former entitlement because of the position her ethnicity led ‘her’ to have in the past.

Another story is of an Albanian father who is paying for her daughters wedding. His tastes reflect those of Macedonians, and underlines how Albanians are aligning their tastes to those of Macedonians. Among the Albanian community, the ability to purchase this ‘Baroque’ furniture elevated your social standing within your ethnic community. In relation to the Albanians’ standing with the Macedonians, they see it as one of eliminating the ethnic stereotype of being backward through the medium of purchasing commodities, as a way to show their advancement and economic strength. However, from a Macedonian perspective, the move towards similar tastes becomes a threat to their identity, with ‘us’ and ‘them’ becoming less distinct. Dimova believes that Macedonians don’t like the idea that Albanians want to be like them and get jealous of their commodities, but also don’t see why they would want what Macedonians like when they are richer than them and can afford other styles.

This theme of ‘us’ and ‘them’ is explored in relation to gender, especially in respect to Albanians, with an air of ‘nesting orientalisms’ about it from Dimova. Here she observes how women are seen as the carriers of Albanian national identity and outlines why Albanian men seek to keep their women ignorant and uneducated so that they wouldn’t contribute to the decline of the nation. Yet, Albanian men, particularly those who work abroad, have mistresses and are happy for them to be ‘loose’ women. This hypocrisy within Albanian masculinity arises because Albanian men fear Albanian women may prefer Macedonian men. This exemplifies loss on the Albanian side, as families in the past were rural, subsistence based, with the women uneducated and home based. A market economy and democratization works for Albanian men, and any extension to Albanian women is seen as a threat to the Albanian nation, hence Albanian men don’t want ‘them’ (women) to become like ‘us’ (men).

I see these examples highlight the importance of movement in what Dimova observes. Where there is movement, or a transition, then differing or opposing forces converge and conflict emerges. Conflict can only occur if there is a movement of peoples, commodities, customs etc, into spaces and times that haven’t experienced such movement or change. Conflicts emerge and are seen as ethno-national because the two ethnicities experience movement, or lack of movement, differently. For some Albanians it is the desire to have commodities similar to their Macedonian co-nationals; a market economy has allowed them to purchase it, and moving homes near to Macedonians meant they saw and wanted to acquire their ‘Baroque’ style of interiors. For Macedonians, they see their place as having slipped from the Yugoslav days to where they are now challenged in their dominance of the state. Former jobs pay less or are gone, and they historically didn’t need to be guest workers as their positions at home were secure. The free market has meant new neighbours and Albanians wanting to emulate them, although they now cannot keep up that same aesthetic pretence due to the last of money. Hence the basis of Macedonian or Albanian nationality is questioned. This doesn’t affect all people across Macedonia, and neither is there solely resentment or mimicry between ethnicities because it is also experienced within each ethnicity.

But Dimova delivers a fresh account of how low level ethno-national conflicts form part of people’s daily lives, and describes their attempts to rationalize their lot in life at present due to factors that are historical, cultural and economic.

My Images of SEE – 21:07, Monday 29th August

I stayed in and watched more documentaries and read, drinking the spare tinny I had from last night. I soon drifted off past 22:00. In the morning, I again got up slowly. I watched the last episode of the West Wing, then got a shower. I watched another documentary before packing. I practically unpacked then repacked so I could fit all of my new additions. Surprisingly, it still only weighed 17kg! I did dispose of a bit though.

I went downstairs to see if there was storage for my rucksack until 14:00 for my taxi. No, she said sternly, as she would be out. So I had to hang out in the kitchen from 11:15 until 13:45. I watched a woman clean, tried to sit outside but got disturbed by a wasp so retreated in, then watched two guys cook. I just read and played on my iphone. I went down and the woman was only just leaving! Charming. So I waited five minutes and a guy turned up with a minibus. I confirmed the €8 charge and we departed. He drove me there in 20 minutes. The mountains were looming closer and were more foreboding. How were we to fly out with these things? Anyway, he was a middle-aged Romanian, an academic, doing this to see Slovenia for a few years. We chatted about general Balkan history. He dropped me off and bid me farewell.

I wondered around the small terminal a while, buying sweets for the nieces and nephew, then waited for the Easyjet gate to open. When it did, I checked in and then went through security. Standard stuffreally.

I grabbed a sandwich and cake, and read for an hour. One group of rowdy lads were in the corner. I went up to the gate and sat and waited as a few boarded. Then I queued and went to the gate then got a seat at the back as I prefer.

The flight was uneventful apart from the fact that I finished reading the Lord of the Rings. We came down into a grey UK where my journey to the Balkans came to an end…but not my train journey. I then got my bag and made necessary calls home and to Liam.

I made it to the underground station at Stanstead and got whisked to London in 45 minutes, and in style. I undergrounded it to Euston Square from Liverpool Street, and ate and rested until the 21:10 train indicated Platform 16. I got on and thus made my return journey.

My Images of SEE – 20:31, Sunday 28th August

After the snack I walked west through the city. Zig zagging through the streets, ending up on the main street. I walked across to Zara for a while. I then went down the high street to the main square, towards the town hall and down the narrow street it was on. Very baroque architecture and you felt ‘closed in’ getting further down it. There were the same cafes along the street. I reached the end where there was a small medieval fair going on. I whisked past, to the left and up a small incline. 

I reached a church, then turned right, then right again to the fair. I went into a dark pub there for a glass of wine and to evade the wasps. After that I walked up the densely populated southern flank of the riverbank, to a cake/dessert shop. I again had a glass of wine and cake, albeit after a ten minute wait to be served. After that I walked up to the next bridge, crossed, and then came back to the wine bar I visited. Another glass of wine and reading.

I then went in search of food and completed a figure of eight, with the square being my start and end. I went up the high street to McDonalds to be cheap. I then walked back to the Tivoli Park. I gazed at the ‘Photos of Serbia’ exhibit, but had to cut it short as I was being followed by wasps. I walked back to my neighbourhood, then under the railway line to the Mercator shop. I got snacks and food for tomorrow. I then walked back and watched a documentary on my phone and facetimed mum, after a quick eat outside.

My Images of SEE – 13:20, Sunday 28th August

After watching videos on my phone I drifted off to sleep. I awoke at 07:30 but managed to drift back off until 09:30. I woke up slowly then showered. Before I left I asked the girl on reception if I could book a ride to the airport for 14:00 tomorrow. She did so, and said to pay the driver the €8 tomorrow. I then trekked down to the Tivoli gardens again, and right, into the centre. On the main pedestrianised street there was a café with seats outside. So I perched in a corner and had a cappuccino and chocolate croissant to wake me up. I read a little whilst there. Today the weather was overcast and cool in comparison to the last three weeks. Actually today is exactly three weeks since I arrived. Anyway the milder weather with a gentle breeze was very much appreciated. I walked down to the square, shadowed by the castle. I noticed a commotion on the bridge, and there was some sort of boat with singers on it, performing for the crowds on the riverbank.

I walked past the vacant market place, away from the town. I passed a couple of bridges until the housing became a lot less tidy and the streets quieter. I turned left over a bridge, then left, then right on to a pedestrianised street. I walked north then, through a park to the Ethnographic Museum.

A lovely new building and it was free on the last Sunday of the month. Score. Also they gave me a locker key for my bag. Very handy. The first part was about Italian coffee/espresso machines. Bizarre but interesting. The second was about a South American tribe. Very thorough and educational. The third was an identity bit. Very abstract and all in Slovene. The final part was Slovenia’s ethnography. A wide selection of materials and exhibits made it a worthwhile visit. I retreated then to the café outside for a coffee and toastie.