"I am Balkan man. Sam... is not Man."
The male species of Homo balcanicus is a curious creature.
I watched an excellently made Bosnian film the other night, Kuduz (1989), in which the letter R in the English subtitles was sometimes mistakenly replaced with a W. “Whewe awe you, whewe awe you?!” the main character screams at one point. But I digress.
Kuduz is apparently based on a true story. Kuduz is a humble man in a small Bosniak town. He is driven to madness when his emotionally unstable and neglectful wife leaves him for another man, taking his one true love with her, their young daughter. In a fit of rage Kuduz kills the wife and the lover. He spends the rest of the movie on the lam, but unable to flee the town because he cannot help himself from trying to see the little girl. Eventually he is caught and imprisoned.
Kuduz is portrayed as a sympathetic character, a good, hard-working Bosniak with a weakness for occasional bouts of anger, who is driven to the brink by betrayal and love.
It reminded me of a conversation I had with my friend Dzida a while back.
“So what would you do if you caught your wife with another man, Sam?”he asked me once.
“Uh, I dunno… I-”
“Would you hit her?”
“Um, I don’t think so,” I stuttered.
“I would kill him and then I kill her. You must,” Dzida asserted authoritatively, making a karate chop motion.
I snorted, “Yeah right, you caveman.”
Dzida chuckled and slapped me on the back. “Are you not a man, Sam?”
“Well , yeah...”
“You must be man. That is what you are. Where is your honor? Are you man? Are you a man, Sam?”
“Yeah, I…”
“No, Sam. You are not a man. You are boy. I am real Balkan man,” he said with a broad smile, puffing up his chest. “Sam… is not Man,” he declared to the others in the room, waving his hand in a broad arc. We all laughed at my expense.
Good old Dzida, the loud swashbuckler who loves telling stories, talking about anti-American conspiracies, making friends and chasing girls. I was occasionally perturbed by his backwards beliefs, but he has never been anything but generous and hospitable to me. When I mentioned this conversation to my friend Adnan, he laughed and said “Dzida is just a crazy Sanjaki,” referring to Dzida’s birthplace. Sanjak is the only Muslim region of Serbia, whose people are renowned for their militancy, hard drinking and loud mouths.
The last time I saw Dzida was several weeks ago. He was bristling under evil stares from his father, who was sitting in the back of a police car. Dzida had crashed his car into a store window in a fit of speed-hungry machismo. Since his name was not on the insurance, he had to call dad and ask him to take responsibility. I had heard a lot about this father, a former Major in the Bosnian special forces during the war. When he arrived I was surprised to see a small, diminutive, squirrelly man standing next to Dzida’s hulking frame. But in patriarchal Bosnia, the father is king, especially if he is a trained killer. Groveling to the Major, Dzida looked like a jittery little boy who had just wet his pants.
I watched an excellently made Bosnian film the other night, Kuduz (1989), in which the letter R in the English subtitles was sometimes mistakenly replaced with a W. “Whewe awe you, whewe awe you?!” the main character screams at one point. But I digress.
Kuduz is apparently based on a true story. Kuduz is a humble man in a small Bosniak town. He is driven to madness when his emotionally unstable and neglectful wife leaves him for another man, taking his one true love with her, their young daughter. In a fit of rage Kuduz kills the wife and the lover. He spends the rest of the movie on the lam, but unable to flee the town because he cannot help himself from trying to see the little girl. Eventually he is caught and imprisoned.
Kuduz is portrayed as a sympathetic character, a good, hard-working Bosniak with a weakness for occasional bouts of anger, who is driven to the brink by betrayal and love.
It reminded me of a conversation I had with my friend Dzida a while back.
“So what would you do if you caught your wife with another man, Sam?”he asked me once.
“Uh, I dunno… I-”
“Would you hit her?”
“Um, I don’t think so,” I stuttered.
“I would kill him and then I kill her. You must,” Dzida asserted authoritatively, making a karate chop motion.
I snorted, “Yeah right, you caveman.”
Dzida chuckled and slapped me on the back. “Are you not a man, Sam?”
“Well , yeah...”
“You must be man. That is what you are. Where is your honor? Are you man? Are you a man, Sam?”
“Yeah, I…”
“No, Sam. You are not a man. You are boy. I am real Balkan man,” he said with a broad smile, puffing up his chest. “Sam… is not Man,” he declared to the others in the room, waving his hand in a broad arc. We all laughed at my expense.
Good old Dzida, the loud swashbuckler who loves telling stories, talking about anti-American conspiracies, making friends and chasing girls. I was occasionally perturbed by his backwards beliefs, but he has never been anything but generous and hospitable to me. When I mentioned this conversation to my friend Adnan, he laughed and said “Dzida is just a crazy Sanjaki,” referring to Dzida’s birthplace. Sanjak is the only Muslim region of Serbia, whose people are renowned for their militancy, hard drinking and loud mouths.
The last time I saw Dzida was several weeks ago. He was bristling under evil stares from his father, who was sitting in the back of a police car. Dzida had crashed his car into a store window in a fit of speed-hungry machismo. Since his name was not on the insurance, he had to call dad and ask him to take responsibility. I had heard a lot about this father, a former Major in the Bosnian special forces during the war. When he arrived I was surprised to see a small, diminutive, squirrelly man standing next to Dzida’s hulking frame. But in patriarchal Bosnia, the father is king, especially if he is a trained killer. Groveling to the Major, Dzida looked like a jittery little boy who had just wet his pants.
posted by Sam at 4:34 PM
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