The front page of Vijesti in the middle of a rainy week brings information - that we have a year of hard work ahead of us. The European Commission recommended that we get candidate status, but also warned us about what we need to do in order to be closer to the EU. I believe there are few citizens of Montenegro who missed this news. With a reason.
However, on the same day, in the same newspaper, only on the last pages, a text was published that talks about Montenegro as much as all those pages of bulky reports of the European administration. Maybe more. Certainly - more picturesque. So - a Podgorica chronicle, a story about another construction site without a fence. And the key sentence.
I quote: "Yesterday, the Vijesti team was at the place where the foundations are being dug, and because of which part of the Gorica hill was also undermined, they found two excavators from the company Tošković doo as well as two workers from the space protection inspection, who said they knew what was going to be built at that location , but they must not say". End of quote. Let's face it - the undermining of the hill and certain excavators from Tošković are irrelevant at the moment compared to the "workers of the space protection inspection" who "know, but are not allowed to say" what is being built there. The essence of the question is - from whom do the "space protection inspection workers" protect that space. From the press, apparently.
And the journalist, as far as I know, does not take the information home to tell the family at lunch, but publishes it so that everyone knows it. This means that the "space protection inspection workers" protect the space and information about what is being done with it - from citizens. Nice. A closed circle. And it obviously suits those who are at its epicenter.
Speaking of the epicenter, in the center is another picture of our capital, where we regularly demonstrate our European manners. Little by little, let's arrange some streets. It's going well. So, slowly but thoroughly, almost all lime trees were removed from the center. As long as she can breathe. We're going to Europe. No joke.
In Europe, there is no place for pagan tricks. And the linden tree was a sacred tree for the Slavs. According to tradition - they performed rituals and offered sacrifices to the linden tree as a deity. It was also common to believe that the linden tree protects people from evil and spells. But all these things were related to folk beliefs, that is, to the people. Ignorant regiment. The same one that the "workers of the space protection inspection" are not allowed to tell him what their legal obligations are. But let's get back to the linden. The communists, it seems, did not mind that pagan shrine. They left us a lot of linden trees as a legacy. Podgorica, Kolašin, Cetinje... Today, they are more or less all 60 years old. Those that have overtaken. And there are few of them. At least in our capital city. Because, at one point, the linden trees started to turn into logs. And since then, twenty years have passed hand in hand.
The former monstrosities, from Hercegovačka Street, were removed after the first log-decade. That's when we started our European breakthrough - the lindens just bothered you. They branched out, took up space, created shade, created a relaxed atmosphere and a pleasant climate in the center of our capital city.
And that was dangerous for our decision makers. Maybe people like them more than them and that's where the problem arises. They don't like that someone or something is dearer to the people than them.
So we turned the linden trees into logs and rolled in stone instead. Import, of course, because it's better to leave the money to someone out there. And the lindens were gone in one breath in one day. Together, they were probably over 1000 years old.
For the decision makers, they were just logs. They started with them, then they roll as they know. A synonym for demolitions and destruction has grown into democratic changes. Depending on the year. Just so they don't get hit with logs.
Many will say that they were the value of a city that does not have some preserved historical buildings and features. But for some there were logs that needed to be removed. And just when I thought that the bouldering was over, it was removed on the uncompromising path of Europeanization of the capital, a linden tree from Karađorđeva Street. There, along the street, older and more beautiful than it ever was - anodized poles for city lighting. They can be easily controlled by man. Turn on, turn off. By remote control. You can't just do it with linden. It is not powered by electricity, but by life. And everything that drives life can get out of control.
I spent a lot of time next to that lime tree in Karađorđeva. Working in a cafe in that street during my studies (an unknown category for today's youth), we were friends and shared day and night. And she saw off and welcomed many students, citizens, and by God, politicians and judges.
Thick shade, pleasant smell, tree thickness over a meter, more than sixty years old. And it didn't occur to anyone that this tree-plant-log (as anyone perceives it) is the oldest thing in this city, which was razed to the ground in 45. years. No. Magnolization and palmization are unstoppably grabbing European steps. We could fence it off, even if it had dried out, and show some people who come to our town that it is a Linden tree, as old as almost everything else in this town. It couldn't be like that, it seems.
That Karađorđeva street in Podgorica is strange. She had a 60-year-old linden tree, she also had those nemani plane trees that raise the sidewalks. Now there are palm trees. And they will get magnolias. It had and still has the Prosecutor's Office, the Court, and the Government buildings, as well as a store on the corner. And a hairdresser. Now Karađorđeva will be exposed.
Naked, stripped, without the thick burial ground in which all the aforementioned subjects rested (in police jargon). Which is perhaps good for state entities. Somehow they liked that linden and sycamore forest, so they worked in harmony with the environment. Now the thick forest is left only in front of the Prosecutor's Office building. Who knows, maybe in accordance with the European agenda, we will reach that grave. And they don't know that linden trees have a healing effect. Among other things, linden tea is recommended for fatigue pain and "overexcited nerves", as noted by folk medicine. In the case of the first one, I believe that the subjects do not need it.
But for the latter - they should think. Perhaps overexcited nerves are the reason for disrespecting what we have inherited. And with what they could possibly live in a civilized manner. Just as a European of the 21st century walks under centuries-old trees and is not ashamed of them. On the contrary. The road to Europe, we know, is thorny. You just have to jump over the logs. Everything went wrong with them.
Bonus video:
