Zagreb Quotes

On the whole it’s not wise to remind the devil that he’s the devil, especially when we were getting on so well.

Sometimes a stupid man is only a couple of good guesses away from looking clever.

A man might think he can stare into the abyss without falling in but sometimes the abyss stares back. Sometimes the abyss exerts a strange effect on your sense of balance.

Looking at him I felt as if I had just met a powerful gorilla while at the same time being in possession of the world's last banana.

Zagreb

One day I hoped some thoughtful historian would point out the close connection between the Mercedes-Benz motor car and Germany’s favorite dictator and that the Lord would find a way to pay these bastards back for their help in bringing the Nazis to power and keeping them there.

This is a non-smoking car. Clever car, It'll live longer that way

Jugoslavija danas zauzima ubedljivo prvo mesto u svetu ро rezervama naučnih radnika. SFRJ takode drži i svetski rekord ро broju akademika i doktora nauka mereno na kvadratni kilometar. Najveca koncentracija naučnih radnika zabeležena је u najstarijim i najuglednijim evropskim univerzitetskim centrima kao što su Beograd, Zagreb i Priština. Pošto rađaju ko šljive, brој doktora nauka se jedno vreme opasno približio broju nepismenih.

Is that so? Trauma in Hampstead? Let me guess, catastrophic hernias from making a mistake picking up a sack of money, reaching for a book on the top shelf and being bludgeoned by a misplaced gold bar.

a Croatian seismologist named Andrija Mohorovičić was studying graphs from an earthquake in Zagreb when he noticed a similar odd deflection, but at a shallower level. He had discovered the boundary between the crust and the layer immediately below, the mantle; this zone has been known ever since as the Mohorovičić discontinuity, or Moho for short.

Dalia picked up her negligee. She didn't need my help, it wasn't very heavy.

life is full of shit—one disappointment after another. Life will not be merciful, so find shelter somewhere out of the wind, avoid trouble, and watch what you eat.

Sabah soğuk bir duş aldı, ama Mrs. Zagreb'in göğsü sanki duş perdesinin arkasında onu bekliyordu. Arabayla istasyona giderken yanağına dayanmıştı, sekiz otuz üç treninde yol alırken omzunun üstünden gazeteyi okuyordu, servis aracında, şehir merkezine giden metroda onunla birlikte hafiften sallanıyordu, işyerinde gün boyu kafasından çıkmadı. Delireceğini sanıyordu.

Svetla su bila nepersonalna forma života. u restoranu "Zagreb" stolice su bile složene na stolovima. noge stolica su - u karnevalski obrnutom svetu - upirale u tavanicu. Crvena slova robne kuće "Beograd" padala su niz fasadu. Manekeni u "Centrotekstilu" su stajali u Anubisovom polukoraku. Nisam znao da li je svet prerušen ili mu je ovo pravo lice ? Noćni Beograd je postao magičan. Mesec se obliznio, nebesa su postala mnogostruka. Vazduh je bio lak za udisanje. Da je umesto mene tim ulicama šetao čarobnjak iz Drohbiča, on bi primetio da je nebo pokazivalo "sve nove slojeve svetla, preseke bledozelenih stena noći, plazmu prostranstva, tkivo noćnih maštanja." Časovničarska radnja bila je puna štrecanja sekundara, puna vremena.

Frane Selak (born 1929) is a Croatian man who has allegedly escaped death seven times, and afterward won the lottery in 2003, prompting journalists to dub him “the world’s luckiest man”. Encounters with death started in January 1962 when the train he was on crashed into a river, drowning 17 passengers. The next year, he survived an airplane accident that killed 19 people. In 1966, a bus that he was riding in fell into a river, drowning 4 passengers. In 1970 his car caught fire as he was driving, but he managed to escape before the fuel tank blew up. Three years later, in another driving incident, the engine of his car burst into flames. In 1995, he was struck by a bus in Zagreb. In 1996 he eluded a head-on collision on a mountain curve and his car fell 90 metres (300 ft) into a gorge; he was ejected from the car and managed to hold onto a tree. In 2003, two days after his 73rd birthday, Selak won €900,000 (US$1.1 million) in the lottery.

His world turned on its head for the second time at precisely ten eighteen p.m. He’d been taken into custody a little under ninety minutes earlier, but that had nothing to do with it. They did the job efficiently, boxing him in, two in front and two behind. Four men, swift and grim, clearly plainclothes law enforcement officers. One of the men in front of him stepped close, said something. He shook his head. ‘Non parlo Croato. Solo Italiano.’ The man nodded as if unsurprised, tipped his head: come with us. He followed the front pair to the unmarked saloon parked up on the kerb ahead. Before he got in the back he glimpsed the glitter of light off the restless water of the bay, the masts of the boats shifting in the embrace of the marina at the bottom of the hill. He glanced at his watch. Five past nine. Fifty-five minutes to go. * The room was a cliché: ivory linoleum curling at the edges, dusty fluorescent lighting strips with one bulb flickering like an eyelid with a tic, cheap wooden tabletop with metal legs bolted to the floor. The smell was of tobacco and sour sweat. He sat facing the door, alone. After seventeen minutes, at nine forty-four by the clock on the wall, the door opened. A woman came in, dark-haired, with glasses like an owl’s eyes. Two of the men who had picked him up followed her in. One seated himself in the chair. The other leaned against the wall, arms folded. She stood across the table from him, his passport grasped loosely between her fingertips like a soiled rag. Without introduction she said, her Italian accented but fluent, ‘Alberto Manta, of Lugano, Switzerland. Arrived in Zagreb on September second. Checked in at Hotel Neboder here in Rijeka the same day.

But in my wretched efforts to stay alive at almost any cost I could still hurt and be hurt in my turn, and as long as death’s black barrel organ was playing it seemed I would have to dance to the cheerless, doom-filled tune that was turning inexorably on the drum, like some liveried monkey with a terrified rictus on its face and a tin cup in its hand. That didn’t make me unusual; just German.

Her novels, which I have not yet read, are usually described as the work of a writer’s writer, or perhaps of someone who has been to the Institute for the Theory of Literature in Zagreb.

April 20, 1939 1' The [Nazi] movement for freeing the world from the Jews is a movement for the renaissance of human dignity. The all-wise and Almighty God is behind this movement. —Fr. Franjo Kralik in a Zagreb Catholic newspaper, 19412 RIDES THE BEAST

that’s the thing about urgent paperwork: the longer you leave it the less urgent it becomes.

Stuhlreiter, Đurđica, Sonata, Zagreb, 2019 . Str. 206.-207. Sunčana nesvjesno položi ruke na trbuh. Stane smirivati nevidljivi dio sebe koji nema pojma što mu se sprema. I šaputati mu počne, tiho da je nitko ne čuje. Bit će ti bolje kad te ne bude, vidjet ćeš. Jebeno je sve ovo kamo te misle baciti i, ako se može, bolje je zaobići te gnojne rane, prelaske ulica, i duboku vodu. Sve su to gadne stvari i boriti se s njima čisti je gubitak vremena. A tek duša, koja je to jebena gnjavaža! Ne daj ti, Bože, da imaš dušu, bit ćeš promašen slučaj i gubitnik za sva vremena. Kad bi se rodilo bez duše, bilo bi bolje, ali kako to izvesti? Da ih možda pitam mogu li ti očistiti samo dušu? Izrezati je i baciti, pokloniti nekome tko bi se baš volio mučiti, a ti da možeš lijepo hodati svijetom bezbrižan i bezdušan. Gaziš sve na što naiđeš i jebe ti se živo za jadnike što cmizdre ili spominju nekakvu pravdu. A tek glazba! To ti je nešto najstrašnije što možeš zamisliti. Istina, ne znam za gitaru, violinu i slična sranja, ali klavir... Ne, bolje ti je da ne znaš, pahuljice moja! Vrati se lijepo tamo odakle si došla, jer ovo nije mjesto za tebe. Nije ni za mene, ali što ću kad me stara nije na vrijeme počistila. Znam sigurno, rastopila bi se na suncu, uvenula bi kao prozirna latica. Možda bi te napali i crvi, gusjenice bi se hranile tobom, plazili bi po tebi žohari, a ja ne bih mogla ništa. Ne bih te mogla obraniti, mrvice, jer se ni sama ne mogu sakriti od kiše i sunca, a kamoli od tuče ili gromova. Bježim pred njima, povlačim se u crne rupe, a tebe ne bih mogla povesti sa sobom. Ostavila bih te, jer sam sebična kuja i mislim samo na sebe.

I became aware of the slow wearing-down process the government was exerting on Christians. The effort seemed to be centered on the children. Leave the old folks alone, but wean the young people away from the Church. One of the first churches Nikola and I visited was a Roman Catholic one in a small village not far from Zagreb. I noticed that there was not a single person under twenty in the entire congregation, and I asked Nikola about it. In answer he introduced me to a peasant woman who had a ten-year-old son. “Tell Brother Andrew why Josif is not here,” said Nikola. “Why is my Josif not with me?” she asked. Her voice was bitter. “Because I am a peasant woman with no education. The teacher tells my son there is no God. The government tells my son there is no God. They say to my Josif, ‘Maybe your Mama tells you differently, but we know better, don’t we? You must remember that Mama has no education. We will humor her.’ So? My Josif is not with me. I am being humored.” A

Plato talks about something called anamnesis, which is when something long forgotten comes to the surface of a man’s consciousness. Now, I’ll admit that just sounds like a fancy word for remembering something, but actually it’s more than that because with remembering, it’s not necessary to have forgotten anything, which makes for a subtle distinction. That’s what cinema does.

Ni sljedeći dani nisu mi pružili puno olakšanja. Čim se saznalo da krećem u Kongo, javio mi se poznanik sa sljedećom porukom: Imaš li neki viši smisao (objave, lova, čitanost) ili čisto ideš poginuti zakurac? "Dobro ti je rek'o" - prokomentirao je Miro dok smo se vraćali natrag u Zagreb.

Pisce/autore intelektualne/kritičke proze, inače se NE SMATRA PISCIMA, u pravom smislu, jer su to (“u pravom smislu”) samo “beletristi” (pjesnici, novelisti, romanopisci, čak i dramatičari). Bilo koji pop, recimo iz 16. st. koji je sačinio kakav brevijar ili tko zna koja popadija iz recimo 18. ili 20. stoljeća, koja je skuhala koju zbirčicu pjesama uvijek su bili, jesu i bit će VAŽNIJI od PISACA KOJI MISLE! Zato su u “Leksikonu stranih pisaca" (Školska knjiga, Zagreb, 2001) svoje mjesto mogli naći bezbrojni minores-i, beznačajni i u svojim sredinama, uvršteni da se popuni kvota, recimo neke nacionalne književnosti ili ostvari rodno/spolna ravnopravnost zastupljenih, ali na račun važnih intelektualnih pisaca (koji se u predgovoru “Leksikona” tretiraju kao autori “nekih književnih PODVRSTA … (esejisti, putopisci, feljtonisti, momoaristi, filozofi, književni povjesničari, kritičari, teoretičari)”. Naprosto, riječ je o SUZBIJANJU PAMETI u literaturi - čak i kad je riječ o intelektualcima koji znaju pisati i za “široke mase”, odnosno od njih biti prihvaćeni. Ovo pišem i pro domo sua, jer sam u mnogo navrata iskusio takvo podcjenjivačko odbacivanje u vlastitoj sredini. Moje knjige intelektualno-kritičke proze (eseji, feljtoni, polemike) desetljećima su gurane na stranu, jer je moj raznorodni opus naprosto isuviše kabast … Kad se prestalo da me se tretira tek pukim novinarom (jer sam sudionikom u štampi po medijskom duhu vremena, kao moj uzor A. G. M.!), onda je smišljen PRETINAC - PUBLICISTIKA. To je ama baš glupav pojam … Dokonao sam, ne baš tako davno (jer da jesam na vrijeme, bio bih se preorijentirao!), kako je u Hrvatskoj tekstualnosti BOLJE BITI MAKAR I OSREDNJI autor fikcionalne proze (iz lijenosti i gluposti zvane “beletristikom”) nego NAJPAMETNIJI AUTOR INTELEKTUALNE PROZE. Ali ako sam i to dokonao, ponovno sam se vratio staroj mudrosti: “Radi svoj posao i ne očekuj pljesak”, a pljusak govana ionako nas sve čeka kad nam lijes spuste u raku…

experience I was keen to repeat. Meanwhile, Kaltenbrunner

Time in Zagreb is moving much faster now than your inner time. You’re stuck back in your own time frame. I bet you think the war took place yesterday.

ss. Currently Zagreb, Croatia. The appendix to this volume gives the current names and national affiliations of all of the venues in the former Austro-Hungarian Empire visited by the Wild West in 1906.

The two countries not only turned their external gates into mechanisms of proper control but also shifted this first “line of defense” as far away from the countries’ borders as possible and into the countries of origin. Arguably, the model for this externalization of immigration control was the 1924 US Immigration Restriction Act, which made the departure of prospective immigrants for the United States conditional on a visa to be granted by an American consular office abroad and the granting of the visa conditional on passing a medical inspection—previously conducted at Ellis Island—in the country of origin.9 West Germany took steps in this direction, starting in 1957, by gradually introducing candidate interviews at diplomatic missions in Belgrade and Zagreb to assess eligibility for acceptance, an option that did not exist in other European countries where the FRG had no embassies or consulates.

Contrary to the idea that anyone with even remotely German descent would be recognized as ethnically German, German ancestry at times counted for very little compared with language skills in the family. This can be seen in the case of Barbara and Marko K. from Komletinci in Croatian Syrmia. Their first application, filed in 1963, to relocate to West Germany with their four sons was rejected even though both partners had German mothers and Barbara even spoke German quite well. Over a year after the family had filed their application for the second time in 1968, they received a letter from the BVA explaining that they were in fact not German Volkszugehörige, because this required a Bekenntnis. And the “most reliable evidence” for this Bekenntnis—according to the BVA—was the use of the German language in the family. Since the consulate in Zagreb had revealed that the family spoke Croatian at home, they had to be considered ethnically Croatian and were therefore denied permission to immigrate.40 This outright identification of language and Bekenntnis, which was not covered by section 6 of the BVFG, had become common administrative practice for Germans from Yugoslavia. In the overall system of co-ethnic immigration to the FRG, it was not until the large-scale Russian German immigration of the 1990s that language skills obtained such an important status.

Probavni sistemi koji traju jedva pet-šest decenija misle da su Spomenici čija će slava zračiti još milenije.

Ovi pisari srednjoškolskih čitanki naročito su odabrani kameleoni koji blistaju mijenjanjem svoje farbe po načelu rentabiliteta.

Mitos je jedini način kako neuki vjernici tumače zbivanja na ovoj planeti. Biblijski mitos, socijalistički mitos, eskapebe-staljinski mitos, rosenbergovska imitacija tog mitosa koja je rodila današnju SS-stvarnost i obratno.

used to take many long and uncomfortable hours in a bus, car, or train to journey between the deep interior of Croatia and the coast. But the building of several massive, graded, and multi-laned superhighways from Zagreb down the mountains to Rijeka, to Senj, to Zadar, and to Split along the Adriatic coast has cut the distance dramatically

From Zagreb to Rijeka now takes ninety minutes, to Senj two hours, and so forth. Because of the collapse of distance effected by civil engineering—to say nothing of the explosion of global tourism along the Dalmatian seaboard—Croatia has changed both economically and, to an extent, psychologically. Croatia has begun to move away from a more ethnically obsessed Balkan orientation in the direction of a more cosmopolitan Mediterranean one.

Ljudi čitaju kako hoće (da čitaju), a ne kako je napisano." (Zapisi iz godine 1933, Djetinjstvo 1902-03 i drugi zapisi, str. 286.; Sabrana djela Miroslava Krleže, sv. 27, Zora, Zagreb, 1972.)

Socrates learned to his cost, the true nature of democracy is to encourage corruption and excess in all its forms. But the

His name was Kurt Waldheim.

abyss stares

For years, Zagreb, Croatia’s chief city, was a layover on the way to the country’s island-studded coast. No more. Tourism had shot up more than 20 percent from 2011 to 2013, when Croatia joined the European Union. Accompanying that rise is a raft of modernized and recently built lodgings, including some three dozen hostels — important additions to the town’s once-inadequate accommodation scene.

Uite, cineva mi-a oferit țigări, altcineva ziarul, am fost întrebat cum mi se pare acum țara și oamenii au dat din cap la toate prostiile pe care le-am spus. Cînd au coborît în Zagreb, una din fete, care nu se uitase la mine deloc, doar își scutura părul din cînd în cînd, mi-a lăsat două caise pe o farfurie de plastic, privindu-mă ca și cînd ar urma să ne revedem mîine. Am spus mulțumesc. Aș fi în poziția să-ți trimit o caisă prin poștă.

Like the areas in Croatia far from Zagreb, Bosnia was mainly full of nothing: vast expanses of rocky soil, so that even the grass looked like it’d prefer to be rooted somewhere else.

during the forty-five years of the socialist system in Zagreb there was only one bank robbery!

Ali meni je to izgledalo i zvučalo kao crna misa. Malo kasnije približila mi se skupina glasnih mladića. Malo sam se zamislio kad sam shvatio da su svi odjeveni u crno. Mislio sam da su to neki ustaški batinaši, sve dok im nisam uočio ovratnike i shvatio da su svi svećenici; no onda Sam se zapitao, »U čemu je razlika?.« Nakon svega što sam vidio u Jasenovcu, katoličanstvo mi se nije činilo vjerom koliko prokletstvom. Fašizam i nacizam bili su sami po sebi gadni, ali ovaj mi se drevniji kult učinio gotovo jednako izopačenim.

Ali sada brzam. Priče imaju početak, trebale bi čak imati i sredinu, ali nikad nisam siguran imaju li priče kao što je ova doista i kraj; barem ga neće biti dok se god osjećam ovako zbog žene koju nisam Vidio, niti dodirnuo, niti govorio s njom već tisuću godina.

He was dead, buried the month before with full military honors with a clove of garlic in his mouth and a stake through his heart. He was well out of it, his last thoughts of revenge upon his Czech assassins still suspended inside his elongated El Greco head like so much frozen gray mud, and there was no more harm he could do anyone.

...overall, Kudei promises to be an exciting talent. This novel is a fun stand-alone that combines (...) the atmosphere of an invented underground magical Zagreb, and the snarky, ironic energy of Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett.