If someone were to say that he climbed Zek's Head, the third highest peak of Bjelasica, 30 times through snow and ice, it would be understood as a feat worthy of respect.
When Milija Delević and Slobodan Šljivančanin say that they have been working for so many years on top of a moody mountain, keeping alive the transmitter from which more than half of Montenegro receives a television signal, it sounds like a heroic act.
At 2.117 meters above sea level, Delević, Šljivančanin and other younger colleagues from the Radio Broadcasting Center spend years remembering many difficult and unbelievable situations.
They say that the mountain does not change the mood, but they also admit that it used to be even more difficult.
"We used to walk almost 30 kilometers from Beran on ice and snow to get to the top of Zeko's head. Sometimes it was two days of hiking," recalls Delević.
"And days are like years..."
In recent years, the arrival has been made easier because in the winter, when the weather permits, the shifts at the transmitter are brought in by helicopter.
"It wouldn't be easy if you were in the most comfortable conditions, separated from your family and the rest of the world, let alone on top of a mountain bound by snow and ice"
"Everything else is the same as before. The mountain does not change the mood. A lot of snow falls, which is piled up by strong winds up to the third floor of our building. Then we shut up and wait for the days to pass, and they pass like a year", says Delević.
Teams change every eight days, weather permitting.
“This winter was one of the 'best' in terms of the amount of snow since I've been working at the transmitter, so one shift lasted 26 days. Due to bad weather, the shift could not arrive either by helicopter or on foot, so the same people remained on shift for 26 days.
There were worse situations when the shift lasted an incredible 36 days. It wouldn't be easy if you were separated from your family and the rest of the world in the most comfortable conditions, let alone on top of a mountain chained with snow and ice," says Delević.
A thick fog rushes down the newly speckled mountain
His colleague from the shift, who returned to Podgorica together with "Vijesti" reporters the day before yesterday, Slobodan Šljivančanin says that it is not at all easy to end the long winter days, even though he was born in Žabljak and is used to long and harsh winters.
They didn't even have time to say goodbye to their colleagues who will be protecting Zek's head from "damage" for at least the next eight days, because the helicopter had to return immediately. Although April is coming to an end, at the top of Bjelasica at noon the day before yesterday it was like the middle of winter.
Although it used to be a well-paying job, once he left the transmitter, he never came back
A strong cold wind was blowing and thick fog was hurrying down the newly spotted mountain chained with thick debris, so every moment of delay was too long for the very accommodating pilots of the police helicopter unit Rak Nikolić and Igor Delević. We had to go right back.
"There used to be more people there, including us from broadcasting and the army, which has its own facility there. When more people make it a little easier, time somehow flies. But that doesn't help when you have to go somewhere, when something has to be done.
Once it happened that a soldier fell ill, the weather was bad and when, after indescribable efforts, he was brought to Kolašin, the doctors could only declare death. A year ago, our colleague from Vranjaštica, a village ten kilometers from Zekova glava, could not go to his mother's funeral for three days.
Although it used to be a well-paying job, once he left the transmitter, he never came back. Delević and I have been working together for 29 years and somehow we have survived. I guess it helped that we were involved in sports when we were young, he swimming and I skiing", says Šljivančanin.
"This democracy killed us"
Even though they work in incredible conditions for at least half the year, people who spend their working lives on top of Bjelasica and Lovcen have not had an allowance for working in difficult conditions since 2003.
"Now nothing is valid anymore, so it turns out that it is the same to work at the top of Bjelasica and Lovcen and in the middle of Podgorica"
"If the conditions are not complicated by the fact that you work at over 2.000 meters above sea level, kilometers away and completely cut off from civilization, which even today you often have to walk for hours to get to work or go home, 'one working day' lasts eight days or a month and more, if time captures the mountain then what is difficult.
The temperature at night drops to minus 30. While I was working up there, and that lasted well over 20 years, I slept in a room that was not heated and at minus 10. Today, that is not counted as working in difficult conditions, so due to the cancellation the allowance, which used to be up to 40 percent of earnings, we have been arguing with the employer for years.
For half a century, people in these jobs were guaranteed special but well-deserved rights, but this democracy killed us. Now nothing is valid anymore, so it turns out that it is the same to work at the top of Bjelasica and Lovcen and in the middle of Podgorica", says Ljubo Vujović, who joined broadcasting in 1972, and for almost 20 years was the head of the transmitter in Bjelasica.
It's easier to be president
How difficult it is to work in those conditions and how it used to be valued and well paid is told by an anecdote recounted by Vujović and his oldest colleagues.
"When they presented me with the award, I joked that it would be fairer and more useful if they gave me three of my wages"
When in the early sixties, as they say, the then president of the Parliament of Montenegro, Andro Mugoša, with the technical director of Radiotelevision Titograd, Ljubo Kosović, came to Zek's head, he was greeted by Mišo Čukić, the first head of that facility and, as they point out, the man who was the first in the Balkans to work on TV devices.
"Then Kosović, wanting to make a joke, asked Mugoš how much his salary was. When a high-ranking communist official said how much it was, Kosović addressed Čukić with the words 'do you see, Mišo, how much higher your salary is than the president's salary'. Mišo answered him indifferently, 'no big deal, I could somehow replace him, but he can't replace me,'" said Vujović.
He said that three decades ago he received the first prize for technical creativity, and received an amount equal to three salaries of the general director of the then Radiotelevision.
Šljivančanin told how at the top of the mountain, after two or three days, everything starts to get in the way
"When they presented me with the award, I joked that it would have been fairer and more useful if they had given me three of my salaries, because at that time, as the head of the facility in Bjelasica, I was fattening up the general director with my salary.
Back then it was normal, and today it is 'normal' that some clerk typing something in a warm office in Podgorica gets a higher salary than those people," says Vujović bitterly.
After a few days, everything starts to bother you
Šljivančanin told how at the top of the mountain, after two or three days, everything starts to get in the way.
"I've been on duty with Milija for almost 30 years, but it's in vain, sometimes people get in the way of themselves. Such are the conditions, you are separated from your family and the world, and time locks you in a room for days. It's not easy to endure even with people you've known for so long," says Šljivančanin.
"Then, in a time I don't even want to remember, I had to go to Jelovica to bring a switch weighing around 15 kilograms"
His colleague Delević is also known for the fact that, sometimes in bad weather, he used to go down to Jelovica, fifteen kilometers from the transmitter, twice a day.
"The problem was not the distance, the problem was the bad weather and the fact that you go straight up the hill and down the hill, so you don't know which is harder. I remember at the end of the eighties, when it started to be cooked in what was then Yugoslavia.
It was January and it was necessary to repair a device and enable the transmission of an important session of the federal assembly from Belgrade. Then, in a time I don't even want to remember, I had to go to Jelovica to bring a switch weighing around 15 kilograms. "It sounds incredible to a person now when he remembers what he survived," said Delević.
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