"Adio" to Dubrovnik A tale of two refugees Full Monty Parlor Games Share My Fire Car - the relationship-saving device Going Straight West A year to expirience, a lifetime to understand Meeting Vuk Cultural insensitivity Sex in Serbia Buvljak experience What's news in Yugoslavia? part II What's news in Yugoslavia? Trust issues: Yugoslav Banks Hosting, Serbian style Flat-hunting Staying legally in Yugoslavia Welcome to Belgrade Border crossings The Paper Chase: Single - entry visas

I was sitting in a Pristina restaurant with my translator Boban, listening to him talk about the curse his ex-girlfriend had put upon him. "I had to leave the town," he said, "after the car accident she tried to cause." Black magic in Yugoslavia? Wasn't that stuff replaced by other forms of ideology under communism? Apparently not, as I quickly discovered. The belief in occult sciences is strong in this country and perhaps growing stronger.

In the West, astrology is popular, but the traditional practice shares the stage with a variety of other things like numerology, channeling, the I Ching and so on.

Although many Serbs have told me that they don't take astrology so seriously, they still seem to know more than your average European, especially when it comes to assessing if you are compatible. Might the daily horoscope help Yugoslavs with the high level of insecurity present in Yugoslav society, the lack of belief in the political system and in the rule of law?

For instance, one of the most popular shows on private channel BK TV is its daily horoscope. The spot features an ominous voice chanting the name of each sign, proceeded by female voice providing a short prognosis of what is to be expected in the areas of health, job and love for the following day.

Knowing someone's astrological sign also appears to be as crucial as one's name. In the U.S., asking somebody's sign denotes the desire to pick somebody up as in the often used joke, "hey baby, what's your sign?" Why, in a country where scientific achievements are particularly strong, does astrology get such high credence? Perhaps it has something to do with a tradition of occult sciences and strange folkways still present in the Balkans, especially among pre-Communist generations.

Most grannies and great aunts still practice in art of reading coffee grounds. The woman who read mine was about 4 ft. 5" with a hunchback and a crooked nose from a village outside of Belgrade. She made me make an imprint with three fingers and based on that, saw that I was going to be traveling soon and had an ill family member. It's too bad that she couldn't tell that my flight was going to be delayed due to bad weather or that the fish on Hungarian airlines would give me food poisoning. Perhaps more fingerprints were needed.

Besides older village residents, Gypsies are also known to be naturals at Tarot card readings and virtually every woman carries a pack of them in her skirt. Curious to hear what kind of tale one would conjure up, I sought out a woman at the Trubaca festival in Guce. We joined her on a car seat cushion and leaned against the old, tire-less Yugo as her husband drank Serbian coffee.

Her small pack of cards were dirty and worn and came in three languages: Serbo-Croatian, German and English. Knowing a fair amount about the Tarot, I was first surprised that she didn't allow me to pick the cards myself.

The other shock came when she told me how long I was going to live since Tarot cards don't give out such information. The woman's particular cosmology and life experience didn't really mesh with mine and her reading was not very instructive, but rather simplistic: I would be traveling soon, I would come into a great deal of money and I would finally be rid of a man who was burdening me.

Then came the intriguing tale of curses and cures. "Have you lost anything lately," the woman asked. Well, a lot of things were probably misplaced, but not entirely lost. I decided to answer: "My mother's wedding ring." "Ah," she said. "There's a woman who used to come to your place but she doesn't anymore. She's jealous of you and she stole your ring," she said. Plausible but not likely, I thought. Nonetheless, I started to flip through my mental file. Had I caused envy lately? Who had been in my apartment lately?

"So where is the ring and how do I get it back?" I asked. "It is buried in an unknown tomb," she said. "You must confront the evil woman and ask her what she did with it." There was no more to say since that was all I would get for my 20 dinars. For a couple of hundred Deutschmarks more, I could get a cure for the various array of curses hanging over me. The directions were to keep the root in my pocket along with stale bread for seven days. I passed on the offer and felt slighly uneasy until three months later, when I myself found the ring buried in the bottom of a wooden soap box.

by Jennifer C. Brown    

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