Archives for July, 2004

A screenshot from the Javascript game Triglav.

When Slovenes hear the word Triglav (literally “three heads”) they probably think of the 2.864-meter-tall mountain of the same name. It’s Slovenia’s highest peak and an important national symbol. There’s even an old saying about having to climb Triglav in order to become a true Slovene.

Triglav the game, on the other hand, is a free RPG you can play in your browser. (I had problems with Firefox, but none with IE.) You can play for free by clicking here. Just select “arcade mode” or “career mode” to begin.

And no, the mountain and the game have nothing to do with each other.

Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?

Watching the idiot box, that’s how. According to a recent survey by Eurostat, Slovenes spend about 40% of their free time watching television. Not that they’re the only couch potatoes in Europe. The results show that “watching TV and video was the main free time activity for both men and women in almost all countries.” This holds especially true for Hungary — the only surveyed group that spent more than half its free time in front of the boob tube.

The survey includes data from nine EU countries: Belgium, Germany, Estonia, France, Hungary, Slovenia, Finland, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

Some interesting points about Slovenia and how it compares to other European countries:

• Slovenian men are in last place when it comes to spending time reading.
• Slovenian women are in last place when it comes to spending time doing volunteer work. (The men are also in last place… but they’re in a three-way tie with Belgium and the UK.)
• Slovenes spend more free time than anyone else “resting.”
• Slovenian men have 24% more free time than Slovenian women.

Also worth noting: Norwegian women are the only ones who spend more time socialising than watching television.

Data for more European countries will be available in the future. In the meantime, here are some other results:

How is the time of Europeans distributed? (PDF)

A beer truck lost its valuable cargo on Mariborska cesta in Celje.

What is it about Maribor street in Celje and bizarre accidents? (Thanks Dejan and La Flaca!)

Thank Heaven! the crisis — The danger, is past, And the lingering illness, Is over at last — And the fever called "Living" Is conquered at last. — Edgar Allan Poe, For Annie

A bird? A plane? Or a guy who’s had too many Karlovackos?

And while we’re on the subject of soccer (i.e. football, i.e. nogomet): perennial Slovenian champions NK Maribor lost to Arsenal last night, 3-2. Andrej Budja was there… I’m guessing (hoping) he’ll be uploading some photos soon.

Infantry Regiment Nr. 87 from Celje, which fought in Galicia and in the Alps.

The First World War, which ended almost 90 years ago, claimed another casualty over the weekend. A 70-year-old Italian farmer, Aldo Busato, was showing a WWI bomb to a friend when it exploded, killing him instantly. His friend was seriously wounded.

Busato may be the final victim of World War I — perhaps even the last person on earth to be killed by the Austro-Hungarian army. (If the bomb, in fact, originated from them. Reuters only mentions that Busato lived in northeastern Italy, site of intense fighting between Italy and Austria-Hungary.)

This site, Austro-Hungarian Land Forces 1848-1918, has a ton of information about the now-defunct Imperial Army. This page gives you a pretty good idea of how diverse the army was, while their links page is overflowing with interesting stuff.

Finally, this page is dedicated to the 87th Infantry Regiment Freiherr von Succovaty (pictured above) which was more than 80% Slovene, and which suffered heavy casualties throughout the war, before becoming part of the new Slovenian army when the war was lost and Austria-Hungary disappeared.

This happens to me a lot when I go shopping here:

SALESPERSON: “That’ll be 465 tolars.”
MICHAEL (pays with 1000)
SALESPERSON: “Do you have 500?”
MICHAEL: “No, sorry.”
SALESPERSON (angry): “How about 65?”
MICHAEL: “Nope, sorry.”
SALESPERSON (angrier): “Five?”
MICHAEL: “Sorry.”
SALESPERSON (collects the change in silent rage)

Is it just me? Lately I seem to be spending a lot of my shopping time explaining what bills I have (or don’t have) in my wallet. And I rarely seem to have what people need, which always makes them angry.

Sometimes this can be a good thing, though. I remember going to a store once to buy some envelopes. The saleslady was pretty rude, even by Slovenian standards. I urgently needed the envelopes, though, so instead of walking out I waited until I got to the register and then played my trump card: the purple monster known as the 10.000 SIT note. I then eagerly waited for her questions (”Do you have anything smaller?” “Do you have…?”) and triumphantly replied: “No!” to the entire batch. She had to go crack open another register to gather the necessary change. And I left the store feeling great.

A new houseguest who cries for rest.

Today after work I drove to the city and in the parking lot saw a small, beat-up sparrow. It was hot today, around 32 degrees Celsius (about 90° Fahrenheit) and the bird was just sitting on the tarmac with its mouth wide open, not daring (or able) to move. It was a miserable sight, but I continued walking because I had things to do and people to see and miles to go before I could sleep.

About two hours later, I returned to the parking lot and saw the same sparrow (in Slovene: vrabec) sitting in exactly the same location as before. I also noticed that he was missing an eyeball.

This time I couldn’t leave him, so I scooped him up and chauffered him home. On the way back, I thought of the old Simon & Garfunkel song, Sparrow, and especially the line that goes:

Who will take pity in his heart,
And who will feed a starving sparrow?

I should mention that I have some experience nursing injured sparrows back to health. Actually, I have just one experience and all I can remember is lots of applesauce administered via toothpick. But that sparrow was in relatively decent shape when I found him. This one was demolished. I already explained that he was a cyclops — but his malfunctions were numerous and included things like a bright-pink head wound. And to top it off, he was young. Too young to be outside his nest.

We stopped at the vet’s for some antibiotics and advice. I initially thought that the sparrow had lost his eye to vicious siblings, but the vet suspected a cat attack. Either way, we went home and prepared a thick brew of oatmeal, milk and egg yolks. We also asked around and found someone with an old cage we could borrow. We cleaned the sparrow, fed him and medicated him.

I’m not sure he’ll wake up tomorrow, but if he does I’ll be ready for him.

When Cyrillic and Latin collide…

(Thanks Dejan!)