Posted by: samaha | October 4, 2007

You Know You’re Bosnian When

(you’ve stolen this from somewhere else and written a note that you’re going to steel it) 

your family owns a manual coffee grinder

you take your shoes off when you enter the house, and every family member has his/her own slippers (plus some extra for the guests)

your neighbour comes over every day uninvited, for coffee

your father wears striped pajamas

you start your day with a cup of coffee and a cigarette

you have 17 consonants and 2 vowels in your last name

your mother/nena won’t accept the fact that you’re not hungry

you have “pita” (Bosnian food that is like a pastry puff filled with salty fillings like cheese or meat) for dinner at least 4 days a week

you have “sarma” (stuffed cabbage) for dinner the remaining 3 days

a loaf of bread is eaten for lunch every day

you’re 6 and your father sends you out to buy him “Drina” and “Sarajevsko”(brand of cigarettes)

you don’t speak to your cousins who support “Zeljo”

your nena insists you eat something with a “kasika” (spoon) at least once a week

you chop up some onions and then decide what to cook for dinner

your mother insists that “promaja” (draft) will kill you

your mother tells you not to sit on the concrete slabs, or your ovaries are going to freeze

your mother tells you to wear “potkosulja” (undershirt), no matter what the temperature outside

your mother tells you not to sit close to the TV, and not to use cell phones, because you’ll get brain tumor

your mother tells you that you’ll get sick from drinking cold water

you tuck in your “potkosulja” (undershirt) into your underwear

your parents wonder why you take showers every day

your parents tell you that they had you, AND your sister/brother when they were your age

a couple of days really means a week or so

your parents have “goblene”(needlepoint) on their walls, and “heklanje”(fine handmade lace) on every piece of their furniture, including the TV

your parents make “zimnica” (canned vegetables) every september

your mother threathens you with “samo cekaj dok ti se babo vrati kuci” (just wait till your dad gets home)

you spend all your family vacations in Neum (only part of Bosnia on the Adriatic)

you drive there in a family “golf” (small as a yugo)

you take a car to go everywhere

you begin most sentences with “jebi ga”, (fuck it) “svega mi” (I swear on everything), or “Tita mi” (I swear on Tito)

your young cousin doesn’t know what “Tita mi” means

you can’t explain what “bolan” means, but you use it all the time – (um yes – I have no idea what it means)

you’re the only one who gets all the Mujo and Suljo jokes

you know the entire script of “Walter brani Sarajevo” by heart

you despise your cousin who’s going out with an “unproforac” (UN worker)

your mother bakes a cake without oil, sugar, eggs, or flour, and she calls it “a war cake”

the time is divided into “before” and “after” the war

your father refers to all politicians with “djubrad” (idiots), “lopovi”(con-artists), and “kriminalci”(criminals)

you have at least one best friend from high school who went to “their side” and you still can’t explain it to yourself

your remaining friends from high school live in Australia, Norway, Germany, and Malaysia

you don’t want to talk about the war to anyone, but that’s the only thing you talk about with other Bosnians

you have at least three passports, and have lived in at least 4 countries in the last 12 years


Responses

  1. It sounds so much like my parents after WWII. They were Jewish Holocaust survivors from Poland.

    If I walked over someone’s legs who was sitting on the floor, my father would make me go back over them, or else he thought they wouldn’t grow, or it was bad luck or something.
    And it they spoke like you describe, before the war and after the war, but never to us children did they talk about the war until much later, and then only small stories, each filled with misery and horror. It was all they could bear to tell at one time.

  2. Dear Samaha,

    This is a great post. I’d love to reproduce it at a newish collective blog website called Muslimstan.net

    Please contact me at

    contact AT yahyabirt DOT com

    Kind regards, Yahya Birt

  3. Oh, sweet flavor of childhood! Many, many of these things made up my childhood here, in Romania, too!

    As a local flavor, I’d add secretly listening to Radio Free Europe, shush-ing all comments about Ceausescu (the Romanian Communist dictator, for those who don’t know).

    I could also add avoiding to step on four-hole sewer lids (bad luck) and passing under two-pole street signs (the same…), wearing horrendous high-school uniforms…

    And, of course, our very own variant of Russian Roulette: tell a political joke and try to find out who, of your friends, is a Secret Police informer.

  4. At least you don’t have the “you come home with 98% and your parents ask you where the other 2% went”… lol

    you know, with a few changes, this list could easily apply to bengalis as well!

  5. I need the recipe for War Cake.

    Jebi ga! ;-)

  6. hi samaha, sorry just catch your blog and dont even have the time to read the rest, yet I have to ask you: are you Bosnian? I mean coz I am and when I saw: “you know you are Bosnian when…” I was like:WHAT?? :D
    lol
    mahsuz selam

  7. Eid Mubarak, Dear Sister, to you and your family :) May the day be filled with love and joy.

    Ya Haqq!

  8. Irving – OMG – My parents made me do the same thing when it came to walking over someone’s legs and eid mubarak to you as well.

    Yayya ;-) – agreed

    Cottonbud – I need to add much of that to my list as well. Ahhhh the stories I could tell about trying to keep my mouth shut in regards to politics.

    Haleem – we got something called batine (a beating) for that 2%

    Jihad – that would be 1 part what you have in the fridge and 2 parts what’s in the cubbard :-)

    Leila draga – drago mi je da si skuzila. Dobro dosla i selam i tebi. Dodzi sto cesce – pristavicu nam kafu.

  9. ma ovo je srpsko…nije promaja nego promaha.. and i can explain bolan…it means onaj ko je bolestan (one who is sick) bosnians dont say that very often any more we say ba (serbs say bre) and the three passports are bullshit cuz u can only legally have one at a time!

  10. Bosanski Vojnik – I was wondering about promaha – ali sam opet sigurna da ovo je poceto od Bosanaca – i to od nekog ko je prije rata rodzen u inostranstvo. Mislim ali nisam sigurna da znam osobu od kojeg je pocelo.

    As for the passports – all three may not be valid but knowing how Bosnians hold on to things for “uspomene” (memories) I’m sure that many .. at least in the United States do have 3 passports even though all are not valid: A Yugoslavian passport (pre-war) a US passport after becomming refugees and then a Bosnian passport (post-war).

    Did you know that Bosnian Americans have the right to dual citizenship? Even I, who was born here in the United States has the right to obtain Bosnian citizenship without having to renounce my American citizenship.

  11. Lol i was reading this thinking its all true!
    I agree with Bosanski Vojnik that Bosnians say Ba more often then bolan

    either way good job at putting this together!
    although you should add
    ‘ Bosnians are the only race that suffer from promaha’!

  12. Hey,

    This is really great.. I like it… Good job.. Cause many of these things my mom tells me everyday.

    Now a comment for Bosanski Bojnik: ono sto kazes da nije promaja nogo promaha mali moj to sve zavisi sa koje strane bosne dolazis u krajini se kaze promaja a to neznaci da smo srbi. A druogo sa “bolan” cura nije mislila na osobi koja je bolesna nego na uzrecicu koju svo bosanci upotrebljavaju kako naprimjer: Bolan jesi ti vidjela sta je ona Bosanski vojnik napisao..
    Eto po tome se vidi koliko ti znas svoj rodeni jezik i koliko razumijes engleski…

    Selam
    Dayzee

  13. Oh yeah and something else Bosniens started saying ba only after the war and don’t tell me no, cause I have been in every part of Bosnia before and after the war. In fact I teach Bosnien..

  14. Selam Dayzee! It’s not my original work – this has been out there for years but every time I read it, I laugh and I had to share it just because it’s so spot on.

    A jeste – to je tacno da sve zavisi iz kojeg kraja dolazis. Znam sama da sam navikla na rjec hljeb, a oni iz krajne mi vole reci da je to srbsko, nije hljeb vec kruh. A sad nemoj da vam pricam za “srbsku kafu” – Jole!

  15. Bosanski Vojnik – Umm..so yeh its promaja..promaha is an after-war word thank u very much lol..it seems that now ppl wanna make up their own freaking language after the war to distinguish themselves..since when do we put an h into everything..go back 2 ur roots man..ur selling out..go bosnia!!

  16. svi ostavljaju komentare na engleskom a svi skoro znaju bosanski/srpski/hrvatski. al jebi ga, istina je skoro sve sto pise.

  17. Regarding the “bolan” and “ba”, it depends on where you are in Bosnia… I am from Mostar, and there it’s all “majke ti” “bona” “bolan” all the time…. While when I was in Sarajevo all I heard was “ba” in every sentence.

  18. Eh jebiga, bas tako! :D

  19. dearrrrr dearrrr.
    half of this stuff is serbian,wtf.
    some stuff is true,but not all of it,
    because serbians do this shittt.
    whatevverrrrrr :]
    just wanted to make a pointtt.

  20. hahah! evo citam s mamom i smijemo se! Bas si sve potrefio!

    too funny!!

  21. Nina, before the war in Gacko, back in the 80s, everyone even the serbs called it promaha, and used “h” instead of “j” and spoke with the same accent bosnians speak with now, so it’s not an after war thing nor trying to make an identity. I think its more of a seljaci if anything.

  22. Uh nao vo bi se moglo puno reci odnosno na vase komentare,kao prvo ja sam iz kladuse i cjeli zivot govorim kruh i prije bi rekla sumur neg hljeb ,hljeb mi bas zvuci srbski.Takodje kazem promaha.Al manje vise vazno nezelim ulaziti u to,jer ja mislim da mi ni sami neznamo pravo pisa jer danas svako malo selo ima svoj nacin izgovaranja.

    A sto se tice to “BA” “Bona” “BRE” vidim sta je bosanski vojnik htjeo da objasni medjutim nije objasanjo u mnozini i do kraja,al eto ja mislim da je to ipak samo izreka da nikvo znacenje nema,ja takodje koristim to ba i to previse.Ali to ja samo izrekla pocetak recenice kao sto u ameriki koristimo “u know” “i know” zar ne ?

    ps.samaha amerika ti niakd nece zabraniti da imas svoje drzevljanstvo bez obzira sto si ovdi rodjena ako si rodom iz bosne imas pravo na to.Ali pokusaj iz njemacke il neke druge drzava sigurno nedaju.

  23. There was a saying my mother would use when I was mischievous as a little boy “ako te udarim, crna ce te krv obliti” or “if I hit you, black blood will engulf you” It was a figure of speech of course, but I always laughed when she said that trying to imagine how hard she would have to hit me for that to happen. Anyway, I wonder if anyone else heard that one before?

  24. yep, we had sarma yesterday and pita today. It’s all true. Hvala puno – Dina

  25. Uh oh, have to learn to make coffee the right way! And how to like coffee (shudder!)…

  26. Making the coffee won’t be too dificult and liking it – half coffee half milk works for me.

    Although .. I have a feeling that coffee will be the least of your problems. You’re going to have to learn to live with the whole coffee and cigarette tradition! If you’re not used to smoke filled rooms .. you might need to start practicing now.

  27. I took me a while to come to terms with rooms occupied by (then) Yugolsavs – in the end I realised that survival req

  28. Sorry, lost the end of that, survival required me to leave the room. How do they have any lungs?

  29. Right. I am definitely not used to smoke and I don’t like it. Maybe I should go sit with our neighbor while he smokes, to prepare! Or just stand behind the car every time we start it…

  30. im from bosnia … i was born and am still living here … a lot of this is true , especially the “they wont accept your not hungry” fact :D
    leila molio bi te da ne poistovjecujes bosnjake sa bosancima … bosnjaci su jedno , bosanci su nesto drugo … i vi ostali dijasporasi ste zaboravili da postavite da oni koji su ostali u ratu se smatraju vaznijim i mrze dijasporase – u forgot to put that those who stayed here during the war feel that they are more bosnians than those who fled :P :P:P
    nemate vi ba pojma… vama je mozda vazno sta je srpsko sta je hrvatsko sta je muslimansko … e pa nama sto smo zapravo i dozivili rat , nas vise boli “k” ! samo ocemo da zivimo…vi nesto pricate, neki veliki bosanci, neki veliki muslimani ne znate ni pisati kako treba:S:S
    hljeb govori maltene citava bosna i to govore bosanci bez obzira odakle ta rijec potice …
    istina je da i bosanci i srbi imaju dosta istih rijeci zato sto su i jedni i drugi dugo vremena bili pod turcima dok npr hrvati nisu … tako da hljeb nije samo “srpska(a ne srbska)” nego i bosanska rijec …
    neki kazu promaja neki kazu promaha isto vam dodje -.-
    sve u svemu ur so full of it :P

  31. Ja sam iz Prijedora (sad dijaspora) i mi smo govorili propuha… nekad promaja, nikad promaha.
    Not that there’s anything wrong with that :)

  32. Hahah dobra si bona xD
    ja kad kazem majki da nisam gladna…uhh da bog sacuva..ona meni naporno govori da jedem dok ne izadjem iz sobe..but i am sorry to say i don’t start my day with coffee and a cigarette :P

  33. puno istina samo ote rijeci su malo ne pravilne….Moj Otac je iz Bijeljine i Mati iz Brcko…mi smo uvijek govorili Hljeb ne Kruh Nikada promaja uvijek Promaha….I tako gotovo cijela bosna prica zivio sam u Tuzli i u Sarajevo…a kad sam doso ovdi u Americi ima puno raje iz Kladuse i od Prijedora tamo…neke druge rijec isto gotovo hrvatski…Kazu Vlag ne Voz…Kazu Kruh ne Hljeb…Kazu Val ne talas…..

  34. HEHEHE ovo prepucavanje “nije to je bosanski… ne nije nego to je bas srpski…itd…dokazuje da smo iz Bosne!!!evo ni ja si nemogu pomoci pa moram nekom pametovat, a to ce biti SEMIR313:
    HAHAHAHAH NIJE BOLAN “Vlag” NEGO VLAK AHAHAHAH…


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