Love

Written by Dora Markulić

There is an emotion that is out of this world

It is greater than happiness, and sadness, and hatred, and pain.

It’s covered under our coats, around our hearts furled,

Love, love, love – that is its name.

Soon it will come in form

Of a baby boy laid in a manger.

That mighty man would later calm the storm

And save us from every danger.

Love is given to us from Heaven

That with the help of it we can get back to that place.

We managed to lose the Garden of Eden

But now we have the chance to reach the Sky with God’s grace.

Let’s not be stingy, let’s not only look at ourselves

Let’s show that we care for every being around us.

Prizes wait for us on the shelves

Of Heaven, as we wait to be saved by the Cross.

INTERVIEW WITH PAUL BRADBURY

On December 6, 2022, Mr. Paul Bradbury held a seminar at our faculty called How travelling the world and experiencing cultures helps build a media career in Croatia. Mr. Bradbury comes from the UK and has lived in Croatia for 30 years. Through various media (books, podcasts, blogs, etc.) he comments on the way of life in Croatia and our culture in an interesting way. It was great to hear how someone from abroad looks at our country, it was about insights that can open the eyes of young people to the good things that life in Croatia offers, as well as the business opportunities that arise from it. He also presented his book called Croatia, a Survival Kit for Foreigners. Afterwards, he asked how many students of our faculty wanted to emigrate after the graduation and how many planned to stay. He caught up with three students after the seminar to find out their thoughts. The Englishing team also had a nice conversation with Mr. Bradbury, which you can read here:

1)How did your family and friends react to your move to Croatia?

  • They were very angry with me. Back in 2002, when I was working in Somalia and Rwanda, they thought I was moving to a war zone, so buying a house on Hvar for them was “me liking to be in a war zone“, but then when I photographed it, they were surprised how beautiful it was. That summer I went to live in Japan, I was working in Hiroshima as a teacher and I gave my house to my friends for free, it was a full week and then three of them bought houses on the island (Hvar) and said: ”This place is amazing, Paul!” (laugh)

2)You said that you had come to Croatia because of the 30-second commercial. If you hadn’t seen that advertisement, would you have ever considered the possibility of coming here?

  • No, no. It was completely by a chance. Most of my life is like it.

A lucky coincidence!

  • Yes!

3)What is the most beautiful place you have ever been to in Croatia?

  • Hmm…Probably the view from our terrace in Jelsa (Hvar). We lived on the top (of the building) and the view from was just amazing. I think Hvar is obviously very beautiful but I…I really, really, really like Korčula as well – that is a really beautiful island. And I love just getting out there in the hills…You got really different kinds of places here and it only depends on what you are into.

4)What is the biggest flaw in our country?

  • You are all the champions of complaining. Honestly, I have never complained the way the Cro can. You do it in the café and you never turn all that complaining into a change – you are just happy to get it off your chest…So yeah, when you have lunch, you also have a good coffee and complain, then you feel great. I find it a little bit strange.

5)What are the most underrated things in Croatia?

  • I think that the most underrated thing in Croatia is Slavonia. I think it is a fantastic region. Also, I think the East of your country is really underrated, like Vučedol (war museum). I was blown away by Dalj and the Milutin Milanković museum there, which gets only 3,000 visitors in a year, considering that he is one of the world’s most famous scientists…It is incredible inside that museum. I think Baranja is sensational. I also noticed that Croatians don’t appreciate the lifestyle they have, they think that everything is better in the West, but you really need to stop and look at what kinds of treasures you have here and start to recognise and appreciate them.

6)You’ve visited Slavonia, you lived in Dalmatia…What are the differences and which of them do you like more?

  • I live in Zagreb now, I lived 13 years in Jelsa, 5 years in Varaždin and now one and a half years in Zagreb…I think Dalmatia is more beautiful but in my opinion, people in Slavonia are 10 times better; the hospitality here is so much better and the work. I think you guys know how to have fun and if you gave me the chance of going out with a bunch of Slavonians or Dalmatians, I would take Slavonians every single time. (laugh)

7)What is your next big project?

  • We will start a new portal dedicated to returnees and then I am looking to become a 53-year-old Youtuber, a little bit sad, isn’t it? (laugh) So I’m starting a channel called ‘Paul Bradbury – Croatian and Balkan expert’. I am going to mix videos of my experiences here, my take on destinations, opinions on certain things…And then start to do some sponsored articles with entrepreneurs to promote their businesses. Also something with Croatian and Balkans in terms of geography and mindset. We are going to start with people that Croatian media love. There could be actually a good video of the 25 most common mistakes Croats do when speaking English. (laugh) That can be a really good way to check on our English, without people judging us, so people could watch a video and say: ”Oh, I didn’t know that.”

8)Speaking of languages, my first question is what was the first word you learned in Croatian?

  • Punomoć.

9)And how difficult was it to learn our language?

  • I still do not speak it fluently; it wasn’t hard to learn because I spoke Russian before so I’m already over that pain for another language. My biggest problem here was the dialect because I learned all of my Croatian in a café, I thought it was Croatian, and then when I got to Zagreb I realized it wasn’t. (laugh)

10)Is there one thing you would change about your travels?

  • You know… what I would like to do, if I travelled again and I will, – I would like to roll back time and take technology because on my last big trip in 2001 and the one in 1998 there was no Google, there was no Tripadvisor, no booking.com, social media, email… It was just like you have a guidebook and then you go and travel with that and the part of the experience was funny in a good place and a bad place so the stories were about good places and bad places, but now you check all the ratings that are available and open… Everything is summarized so people don’t actually have the experience anymore. They take photographs, put them on social media, so they don’t actually remember the experience, ‘photograph’ the experience. I didn’t take my camera when I went to South Africa, but I can remember every day there, but in the past 10 years I can’t remember anything because it’s all on Facebook.

11)What is your favourite Croatian dish?

  • Well…If I needed to eat one dish for the rest of my life, that would be sarma. (Englishing team cheering)

The Englishing team wishes you all the best in your future. We hope you are going to stay in Croatia as long as possible. Thank you.

  • You are welcome.

Photo by Luka Šangulin (https://scontent.fzag3-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/317659560_608548221072090_3376106880595443581_n.jpg?_nc_cat=107&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=BMjTsM3R5NgAX_2ye2h&_nc_ht=scontent.fzag3-1.fna&oh=00_AfDDEUxT1-RSp4bAHoSJWKnqnVLD7nM3zkjfEgm_ec9l7w&oe=63A1E9FD)

Check out our talk with Mr. Paul Bradbury:

Estera Kovač

Dora Markulić

INTERVIEW WITH GRACE PENTA

Dunja Kreidl, our module C student from the second year of the Faculty of Education,  did a very interesting interview with Grace Penta, 24-year-old English teaching assistant at our faculty.

1)Can you tell us something about yourself?

  • I am the older sister in my family. I really like to sail. I like to play other sports as well but sailing is my favorite. My favorite dessert is brownies and my favorite food is oatmeal.

2)Which University have you graduated from?

  • I graduated from the University of Chicago in 2021 and I studied public policy.

3)What brings you to Osijek?

  • I am in Osijek as English teaching assistant as you know. I am here through a program called Fulbright and that’s kind of a 9-month exchange program. I am in Osijek specifically because Fulbright and the US embassy have a good relationship with University, but I chose Croatia because of couple of reasons. One of them was immediately Literacy Days campaign that they have across the country. I was really interested in that.

4)Would you like to stay here longer and why?

  • I would like to stay here longer. I feel like nine months is not enough time to explore all of Croatia and the whole Europe in general. It is close to other places that I’d like to travel and just more time. Osijek is a really pleasant place to live, you know, and I got to be here at fall, through winter and in the spring, but I want the summer too.

 5)Now, when you explored the Faculty of Education, could you tell us some differences between our faculty and faculties in the US?

  • That is interesting… One is just a name; we do not really call it “faculty”. “Faculty” here means the subject area. “Faculty” in the US means people that work at the school, like professors and teachers and assistant professors, those are the faculty members. I think there are more similarities than there are differences. Faculties here are smaller and more specific. At university that I went is all of public policy, which is a bunch of different types of policy. When here, you have like right next door is tech and computer science. It is very specific.

6)What is your opinion on our educational system?

  • I think it is good from everything I have seen. It has a lot of similarities and differences with the US. I think the most interesting difference is that I learned about is how in the US a first grade teachers are always a first grade teachers, second grade always second, third grade always third grade…But in Croatia if you are a first grade teacher, you move next year to second and next year to third and next year to forth. That does not happen in the US and I have not even considered that it could be done that way.

That is a huge difference too – a free education through college. I think that is a huge plus. I think that the US should do that. That is a fantastic idea.

7)What is one part of Croatian culture that you would like to share with Americans?

  • The soccer culture; you got some strong, strong soccer fans. Today is the game, yees! Burek should definitely be shared with the US. I like the US coffee culture like carry on coffee, but I like the idea of here, sitting down and having long conversations – that doesn’t happen very often in the US. It is very common here. That culture should definitely be carried over. I think people also here… in an article that I read for a class it was talking about how in Croatia when you meet someone new you do not ask them right away what do you do. You ask them like where you are from and it is trying to get more personal aspect of who you are. In the US we focus more on what someone’s job is, what they do for work and that is a lot of who they are, but in Croatia you are more than that and I like that.

8)You told us that your family currently lives in Japan, have you lived there too?

  • Yes. This is my family’s second time living in Japan. We lived there when I was younger, when I was in preschool age and then we moved to basically California afterwards. So, I lived there when I was younger for 3 years. I visited 2 years ago to see my family and I will be going back in a couple of days for Christmas.

9)How did moving around impact you?

  • I think overall it had a positive impact. I think it allowed me to see a lot of different ways of living, people are very different even across just the US. I think I had a brought perspective abroad view. I think it has also allowed me to learn how to be adaptable and change my environment and how to be independent; to start over in a new place, like feel comfortable and try new things. Those are some of the ways, there are probably a lot of impacts.

10)Where do you see yourself in 5 years? What are you wishes for the future?

  • I would like to be traveling probably. I would like to be working in a way that allows me to travel and to be doing beneficial work that impacts people possibly beyond myself. I do not know if that would be in Croatia but somewhere around the world. Like to get out of the US for longer.

Thank you very much for this interview.

  • Thank you.

Dunja Kreidl

December 13, 2022

Joy

Written by Dora Markulić

It’s not a matter of whether we have a lot

Rather, are we satisfied with what we have been given?

For happiness we cannot say “It’s a star I caught.”

Rather, it is a star that says that in this moment I am livin’.

Soon we will be looking forward to a Child in the nursery,

The one who will give us mercery

But above all, why we are still covered

With black hazes ’cause the golden ones we haven’t discovered?

We wait Him every year, but we haven’t become wise

And instead we are in search of a greater prize.

Let’s try to change the way of thinking this year

That the hazes of JOY come, and the black ones disappear.

Peace

Written by Dora Markulić

Why do we light candles, play soft music, drink tea

When worries and problems just accumulate in ​​our thoughts’ sea?

Anxiety has become our biggest disease

We all say in one voice: “I need PEACE, PEACE, PEACE!“

We get lost in the loud conversations, material things, city crowd,

We are losing ourselves piece by piece

Above our faces there is a grey cloud,

And we are wondering: “Where is the PEACE, PEACE – peace?“

Maybe it is a buried treasure, maybe it’s Pandora’s box

Maybe it is cunningly lurking, to surprise us, like a fox.

But if it is a plant, let’s plant patience like peas

One day we will calm down, look into the jar and say:

 “It has sprouted – MY Peace, Peace, Peace.”

Hope and Faith

Written by Dora Markulić

It is hard to think that after the greatest sufferings,

The greatest grace is waiting for us.

It is hard to think that we are connected by strings

With Sky, and that we can be saved by the sign of the Cross.

“Gone are the good times…”  – we often complain.

What will happen to us tomorrow? – we wonder.

But one day we will just from life sunder

And for this world we will be just a small, pale stain.

These times can be as beautiful as times before

Everything depends on our good will

When Optimism appears at our door

Let’s say cordially “Hi, come in!”

If perhaps another guest decides to keep us company

If it comes in the form of an evil wraith

Let’s not be afraid, because luckily

In the most difficult moments, with us are always HOPE AND FAITH.

MY FAVORITE WORK OF ART

“All grown-ups were once children… but only a few of them remember it.”

When I was a child, my parents and I had many routines. One of them was reading books
before going to bed. My father loved reading to me so when I was five years old, he bought
me my first book. The little prince.

I remember we read it only once and I didn’t like it because there were no pictures there. My father was disappointed and the book stood untouched on our bookshelf for twelve years.

I was seventeen when I read it and I fell in love with the characters, the story and the beautiful quotes. Someone said that Little prince is a book that you can read every year and each year you will understand it differently. Now I read it very often and each time I feel like it was written especially for me and my current situations, problems or dilemmas.

I can’t explain it, but that children’s book teaches the readers so much about adult life. Maybe we are all just lost pilots who are waiting for their little prince with the sun in his curls to remind us that there is something pure and innocent in a child that still lives inside us. It’s not only about that spoiled rose, but it’s also about love, friendships, and inner beauty.

This Christmas I took the book from our bookshelf and wrapped it in wrapping paper. It was a Christmas gift for my ten-year-old goddaughter. Last time I visited her I saw the book in her room, on the bookshelf. Unlike my dad, I wasn’t disappointed. I know that Little prince is
waiting for his turn, and when the princess decides to read it I hope she will never forget him.

“I have lived a great deal among grown-ups. I have seen them intimately, close at hand.
And that hasn’t much improved my opinion of them.”

Written by: Dorotea Blažinčić

THE FRAMEWORK

Written by: Dorotea Blažinčić

I always thought that only a great teacher or parents could raise a decent adult. But as I was growing up, I realized that I wasn’t raised only by adults. This is their story. The story about amazing little human beings who changed my perspective.

It all started a year before my high school graduation in the theatre where I had my drama classes. At the beginning of the new season, my drama teacher informed us about some changes that were going to happen. She decided that it would be a good idea to invite all the kids from the younger group to come and do a season with us, the oldest group there. Honestly, I was shocked. I mean, I was 17 back then and I thought that I was finally ready to do a serious play. What did I get? A group full of kids who were constantly noisy and couldn’t focus on the script. However, I decided to give it a try… but only for a month and see how it will go. I still vividly remember my first time with them because I had to sit between two boys and keep an eye on them because they were always messing around. I didn’t enjoy it. Nevertheless, the month passed by quickly and I still wasn’t sure whether I should continue going to drama classes, so I decided to stay for one more month.

Then, December came. In our theatre, December is always the busiest month – that month we play for two weeks, two plays a day, which can be exhausting because we don’t play them in our theatre. That means we also need to travel. That December changed me. We spent a lot of time together and I didn’t even realize, but I started looking forward to each day that I got to spend with the kids in my group.

I can’t pinpoint the exact moment these little ones came into my heart. Perhaps it was that rainy evening when I was waiting for my turn to go on stage. I spread out a thousand papers in front of me in order to prepare for the exam when Roko entered the dressing room carrying biscuits and tea from the vending machine.

Maybe, I fell in love with them the day we first stood together on that stage. They weren’t so little, but I felt so grown up at the time, and they seemed so small to me. Only under the spotlight were they big, nearly grown-up. Responsible for each of their actions at least as long as the magic of the show lasts. We were everything. We were smurfs, we were mice and cats, we were ghosts and aliens, we were big and small…and we were family.

Somehow, between rehearsal and scripts, jokes and fights, travels and rides I realized that I must stay with them, no, I would love to stay with them. And… I did. We ended a great season together.

Time passed quickly and we started another season together. However, that season was different for me and I had to give up going to drama classes. I had family problems, but I also had to study for the final exams. When I said I was quitting, nobody believed me until I stopped showing up. That decision was very hard for me, but I knew I made the right choice.

Then, one day in March, I received a phone call from my drama teacher who asked me if I could come to the theatre. I immediately agreed because I thought she needed my help and I missed my kids from the group. So, I came. As I was entering the theater, I had a strange feeling because it was unusually quiet and nobody was running around like they usually do. I got extremely nervous because I thought I was late, which I hate, so I rushed to the stage. Suddenly, music started playing and I heard someone singing a song. All of a sudden, I saw them. All twenty of them stood on stage with a birthday cake. Then it hit me. They are singing to me. They remembered my 18 th birthday.

After we ate the cake, I asked them if we could do our play one more time. We bowed together last time… or so I thought. They convinced me to do another play with them. The play’s premiere was supposed to be held in the middle of my matura exams, but I didn’t care. After every exam I took I went to the theatre because I knew that my kids were waiting for me.

The premiere went great, and a few months after I enrolled at the college and moved away. I left them, my boys, my girls, my troublemakers, my drama queens, my drama kings… my family.

I didn’t come to the theater until their new premiere. I sat in the first row, which I never do, and I watched them. When I saw them standing on that stage, my eyes filled with tears. Those are my people, my kids, my family. I was indescribably proud.

After the play, I went into the dressing room. They all rushed to meet me, we hugged, and I started crying because I realized how fast they have changed. Faintly, I heard Roko asking Matko which shaving foam was the best, while Lana and Ena chuckled gently in the corner about some new boy who had come into the class next to theirs. Life happened, with or without me.

Five years ago, when someone asked me what I wanted to become, I would have said – an actress. That was before them. Now, I know what I want to be, who I am meant to be. I want to be someone who holds their hand when they are scared. Someone whom they can trust, someone who can play with them, someone who will learn something from them and with them. Even someone who will always sit in the front row with eyes full of tears.

Because of you, I know my place in this world, and for that, I am extremely grateful. I will always have your back… because you had mine.

UNPLUGGING

A movie review written by: Dorotea Blažinčić

The whole world of today is living in a digital world, due to incredible technological
advancements, but also to the worldwide pandemic. This technical revolution has affected
people’s everyday lives, and while it may appear that life has become easier for us because
everything is available to us at all times, the issue is if this means we have forgotten what real life is and how to live in real life when the gadgets are switched off.

The movie Unplugging is a 2022 American comedy directed by Debra Neil-Fisher and
written by Brad Morris and Matt Walsh. It stars Matt Walsh, Eva Longoria, Lea Thompson,
Keith David, Nicole Byer, and Al Madrigal. The movie was released on April 22, 2022, by
Vertical Entertainment. The premise centers around Jeanine and Dan (Longoria and Walsh), a happily married couple raising their teenage daughter (Finley) in Chicago. Jeanine is a busy commercial leasing director and former attorney who is tied to her iPhone 24 hours a day, seven days a week, while Dan operates a hot sauce micro-business out of the family garage. Unfortunately, the “happily” aspect of their marriage is at risk of collapsing thanks to familial technocracy. When Jeanine’s supervisor forces her to take a two-week “mandatory vacation” after one too many office emails, Dan decides what this relationship needs is a digital detox: a three-day weekend in the countryside with no phones, tablets, or other distracting gadgetry. It’s just the two of them in a rustic cabin in the woods, with no mobile service to complicate matters. The escape appears to be working for a moment, but they’ve both snuck into their phones, resulting in an anxious quest for a signal.

I decided to watch this film because I wanted to see how life works when we entirely
disengage from social media, which is something I deal with daily. I had high hopes, but was
disappointed. The narrative of the film is very predictable, if not quite dull. Although the
movie was labeled as a romantic comedy, it was neither romantic nor humorous. The main
characters, portrayed by Longoria and Walsh, are good enough to keep things interesting, but Unplugging seems to lose its way. This is especially obvious at the end when things slow down and focus on conveying a deeper point. It puts Unplugging in an awkward position. The film has no issue bringing the absurdity (the most notable example being a sequence featuring a chicken taking aspirin), yet it also appears to have something to say. As a result, the plot is totally inconsistent and more confusing than anything else.

To summarize, I would not recommend this film. Although the film’s concept was good and
likely worth discussing further, the production was disastrous. Instead of the storyline
focusing on something specific and developing it until the end, we get a few different
interpretations of many things, none of which are completed. The film is unfinished, and after 94 minutes, all I can say is, “I should have been the one doing the unplugging.”