Kragujevac entered my life with a sound that electrified me. The radio presenter explained that it was a thing called "Entering the Harem". Kragujevac group Smak. After that summer, in the mid-seventies, I will become a high school student. Once and for all, I remembered the quick-fingered guitarist's nickname - Točak.
A few years later, as a high school graduate from Tuzla on an excursion, I got off the bus and came face to face with a stone bird with a broken wing in Šumarice. It was a modernist visual complement to "Bloody Fairy Tale" by Desanka Maksimović. By the way, since my childhood there were products from Kragujevac all around me - Zastava's four-wheelers. The Kragujevac factory made Yugoslavs mobile.
Even in history classes, Kragujevac was able to shine with its importance. Then he was absent from my life for a long time, until recently I decided to change that. I'm going to visit my uncle's sister who lives in that town - we haven't seen each other in decades.
Entry
Entering Kragujevac is not exactly "Entering the harem". The roundabout is marked with a huge cross, and the next one with a Fiat sign. We stayed in a quiet street in the center. The first walk through the city takes us through Svetozara Marković Street. It contains a whole series of preserved houses from the first half of the 19th century. From the capital period, as historians refer to the time from 1818 to 1841, when Kragujevac was the first capital of the awakened Serbia.
In front of the house of protege Miloj Barjaktarević, I learn from a board in Serbian and English that between 1873 and 1875, Svetozar Marković, the founder of the socialist movement in Serbia, lived there, after whom the street was later named. To us, the people of the third decade of the second millennium, such houses look like miraculously preserved valuables. There are several of them in the street. Some of them were built in the style of the Kosovo ground floor. Unlike buildings that rarely evoke such an association, houses like this seem to have eyes and a face. Creatures that tell stories. Who knows what the creaking of the hinges and the creaking of the wooden floor would tell if a person stepped into one of them.
Faith, education, rock and roll
Kralja Aleksandar I Karađorđević Street leads us to the Holy Assumption Cathedral, which the locals call the New Church. The Byzantine-Romanesque style and material - brick and stone - the extremely well-kept church yard and the vivid colors of the interior give this Orthodox temple a classy look. Since the church was built under the Obrenović family, and is located in the street named after Aleksandar Karađorđević, symbolically, in the middle of the republican era, Kragujevac was provided with an exemplary inter-dynastic coexistence.
It's time for the first coffee in one of the cafes near the New Church. From there, it is not far to another place important for Serbian history and identity. The Kragujevac Grammar School was founded in 1833. It was the germ from which academic education in the Principality of Serbia developed.
It is not out of place to remind that students who will be remembered by history sat in the Kragujevac benches: military commanders Živojin Mišić and Radomir Putnik, storyteller Radoje Domanović, founder of the socialist movement Svetozar Marković, actors Mija Aleksić and Ljuba Tadić - to name just a few.
The gymnasium building on Đački trg is really impressive. It was created in 1887 according to a Viennese design, even the joinery was done in a Viennese carpentry workshop. This representative beauty is only 136 years old and is holding up well.
A few steps further we see a group of unusual bronze figures. I recognize the sculpture of the guitarist - it's Točak. And then everything is clear. These are members of the group SMAK, Radomir Mihajlović Točak, Slobodan Stojanović Kepa, Zoran Milanović, as well as the late singer of the group Boris Aranđelović.
I remember that I read somewhere in the media how the bronze band started its eternal performance here last September. These life-size sculptures are the work of Belgrade sculptor Katarina Tripković.
I'm glad to see the group that introduced me to the world of rock and roll almost half a century ago. But I can't help but wonder if there might be some truth to the rumor first spread by punks - that rock is dead. How else would rockers be turned into bronze?
From there we go down towards the central city square - Trg Vojvode Putnika. Another important building awaits us there, completed exactly 120 years ago. Although it is now a courthouse, it is historically known as the District Head Office. Right in front of the facade is - as befits - a monument to Radomir Putnik.
For me, the important fact is that in 1915, a melody was played for the first time in this very building, which will be a sound emblem of national pride for more than a century. That year, Stanislav Binički performed his "March on the Drina" for the first time, which was dedicated to the Serbian victory at Cer. In the audience were famous listeners such as Radomir Putnik and Archibald Rice.
The flag is no longer red
As soon as you cross the bridge on Lepenica, you can see Topolivac, a monument from 1977 that reminds us that Kragujevac was the first Serbian town where the labor movement won a majority in local elections - in the second half of the 19th century. This is also logical, because the Topolivnica was moved from Belgrade to Kragujevac in 1851. Two years later, the company Zastava was created, without which industrial development in Serbia would be unimaginable.
The administration building of the "Zastava" in front of which we are standing was built in 1926. The clock on it stopped during the painful transition, so they repaired it a few years ago. "Red Flag" - as the company was called in Tito's era, has become a kind of cousin to a number of Yugoslav generations from the last century, imperfect, somewhat old-fashioned, but very necessary. Cars with that mark are licked and cared for like family members. A gun with that marking was used at weddings and New Year's celebrations.
We're moving on. Another building summarizes important moments of Serbian history. The old church, or as it is officially called - the Temple of the Holy Trinity. Prince Miloš Obrenović spared no expense when he built this church in 1818. The bells first rang on it in 1829.
The Sretenj Assembly was held right here in 1835 - that's when the First Serbian Constitution was adopted. Until 1859, all assembly sessions were held in the gate of the church, which was later moved to the neighborhood, in the Old Assembly building.
We return to the center, we come across the hotel Kragujevac, in whose garden we let the impressions settle in with a glass of white wine.
Between Yugoslavia and Velika Šumadija
The sun made us happy this morning. Fickle May has changed its mind and is giving us a hot day. First, we wander around the center, without any ambitions to additionally deal with the city's rich past. We come across girls who are registering new members in the Radnički fan club on the street. The music from the loudspeakers has an infectious rhythm - the melody is unequivocally Electric Orgasm, and the theme is "The whole of Yugoslavia is playing rock and roll".
But the words are different: "I love Kragujevac, I love, I support Radnički/ day and night, night and day I hold it close to my soul". Or a little later: "The First League, the First League, it's too small for us/ The Champions League is the right place for the workers". Then follows the chorus: "Igra kolo, igra kolo, great Šumadija/ only a real Serb is cheering for Workers".
Perhaps the fan structure is Šumadija-Serbian, but on the worker's bench sits Feđa Dudić, born in Sarajevo. This year's success of Radnički bears his handwriting.
In that aimless walk, we happened to come across an interesting monument at the place where the streets of King Aleksandar Karađorđević and 27 Marta meet.
And for me it was a revelation - the baton that was handed to Tito on Youth Day was created on the initiative of the youth of Kragujevac as early as 1945. With this, this city was additionally registered in the symbolic universe of the sunken state.
From that place, we head to the northeast of the city. Today we intend to make a pilgrimage to the place where Kragujevac civilians were shot by the occupying Wehrmacht in October 1941.
Silence over Šumarice
You have to overcome the uphill street of Ulica Kralja Aleksandra. A large park rightfully bears that name. It is decorated in a metropolitan style. Cika Dača Stadium is right behind it. There is almost no one on the landscaped promenade towards the Memorial Museum "21. October".
Historical facts are inexorable. Even without the presence of the infamous SS, the armed forces of Nazi Germany performed the task thoroughly. She killed thousands of unarmed people. And hundreds of high school students, 18 of their teachers. They were helped by natives.
Next to the Museum itself, a panel was erected showing the last messages of people and children who were taken to be shot. The most famous of them was written by Jakov: "Don't send Lebac tomorrow". One cannot read this without a lump in the throat.
We walk on. The Memorial Park "Kragujevac Oktobar" is nurtured in an exemplary manner. That comforts me. Here one can see the systematic effort of collective memory. All the artefacts that I notice on my walk are familiar to me since my childhood. After about twenty minutes of walking, we come across the oldest monument in Šumarice - the "Monument of Pain and Defiance", a work by the sculptor Anto Gužetić from 1959. That day, in front of the Museum, we also saw the monument of the Judge by the sculptor Jovan Soldatović, or a ten-minute walk away, the Crystal Flower - a monument to Roma children who picked up to be shot as shoe shiners. But we stayed the longest at the monument to the shot pupils and teachers "V/3". The monument is my peer, it was erected in 1963.
Sculptor Miodrag Živković himself said that he was inspired by the Roman number 5 - the capital Latin letter "V". The multiple symbolism speaks of the young bird's inability to fly. It also symbolizes the class "V/3" of the First High School in Kragujevac, whose students were killed here. I haven't seen the monument in several decades. And it seems to me that - forgive me the high school student I was then - now I'm really seeing him for the first time. I approached the monument and placed my palm on the white surface. A pulse seemed to be heard inside. Or maybe my heart was heard in the middle of the unreal silence of Šumarica.
With the ship France in the Kragujevac night
We went back by taxi. We talk with the taxi driver about the pubs in Kragujevac. He recommends Hunter. It's great, but we were there yesterday. According to him, the Balkans are not bad, with music. Without the music of Old Serbia or Our Tavern. And for a deeper pocket Mustang at the Hippodrome.
We thank the taxi driver. In passing today, we saw the Lađa Francuska tavern. Actually, Lađa kod Boze. It seems that Boža is as much a brand as a line from a famous song.
To begin with - brandies drunk in Šumadija already have the quality of good whiskey. We washed down the hard and hot day with wine. "Veknice" was being smoked on the table - a specialty of grilled meat that I have not found on offer anywhere in Serbia. The musicians started the program with the instrumental "Silk Thread". Afterwards, there was everything from Starograd, Sevdah, Toma, Šaban and Halid.
I wondered if these instrument veterans would be able to pull off my favorite thing from Smack - Šumadijski blues. If I ordered it, I'd probably just get weird looks. When, as a boy, I used to put the turntable needle down on that very thing on the record, I would always smile because before the first riff, a voice would be heard, "Dear, start." We left the pub after midnight, saying goodbye to strangers as if to godfathers.
It was a sad and joyful evening in Kragujevac. Before going to sleep that night, the refrain kept going through my head: "My Šumadija sings - about happiness".
Bonus video:
