MAJESTIC FACES OF CROATIAN MOUNTAIN VELEBIT
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I adore mountain Velebit with deep passion. Velebit is also in love with me. Autumn there is gorgeous, magical, abundance of colours seduce the eyes and soul of everyone who walks lovely, romantic and challenging paths of this mountain. Breathtaking views change every few steps, one feels honored to see nature in its pure, untouched beauty and wilderness.
It is world of dreams which human love and desire started to create once upon of time, innocent and powerful. Nature is our imagined paradise, our fairy tale, our true connection with Mother Earth, our support and real source of inner strength.
Our souls are still creating such sparkling, wild untamed world, where we can let our spirit fly freely together with hawks through the deep blue sky.
We need to respect nature, love it, preserve it, honored it, enjoy its perfection, learn from it. There is no such wisdom and power in whole our artificial civilisation, like is in nature with all its balance and unknown number of lifeforms, which are all pure perfection. We are children of nature, Mother Earth is song of our soul, path to our divinity.
I spent last three weekends on Velebit, hiking, singing, laughing with friends, meditating, sweating and walking through the majestic miracles of nature...and want to share parts of this experience with dear people on Hubpages, through these words and these pictures.
I took these photos while hiking on the charming rocky hills which surround and hug Big Paklenica river.
Imagine warm sunny days, tender wind, birds singing and leaves whispering the secrets of the soul. Nothing but amazing beauty of indescribable creativity: pure essence of life is expressing itself in endless forms, sounds, fragrances, colours.
One just knows that Divine is here...everywhere... all-loving and all-mighty.
You know that everything is in perfect order in this universe, and that goodness must prevail.
SPIRITUAL LESSONS OF HIKING
In the human tradition, mountains have been always sacred, mystical, innocent, celebrated as home of gods, angels and Divine beings. Mountains are everywhere known as places where one can purify the soul, connect with inner wisdom, get healed, in the wilderness and distance from the civilisation.
Hiking also has very strong spiritual component: it is symbol of your present life situation, because you walk up the challenging paths towards the desired goal. Mountain paths represent your life path, challenges on the path represent the problems or challenges you meet in your everyday life, the ways you face the challenges represent how do you cope with everyday situations, top of your hill represents desired goal. When you hike you change little by little, because you have to change to rich the top as easy as possible. Afterwards you are able to apply gained knowledge in everyday life as well.
If one is passionate hiker, has to learn many lessons of life wisdom:
1. You learn how to gain focus, actually you have to learn it, because without focus, you can hurt yourself very easily, or miss the way. Concentration is necessary.
2.You learn that you never can predict everything, there are always surprises on the way to the top, or on the way back. Life also cannot be completely under our control, we create it, but our inner wisdom makes divine puzzle game of our wishes and dreams, and creates most interesting living mosaic of it, some situations come suddenly in order to surprise us, just in the right moment. We are multidimensional light beings, our life is here to teach us, to fulfill us, to entertain us, always gives us opportunity to develop some talent or inner quality.
3.You learn how to adjust yourself to the every circumstance on the way, sunny day, rain, big fallen tree, ruined shoes, too havy baggage, not enough water, path much more challenging then expected, lack of necessary comfort in the shelter, pain in the body... Learning the lesson of adjustment, you also learn that you cannot expect that desired path changes itself completely just because of you. Sometimes you can avoid challenge, but most often you simply have to adjust and transform it into the worthy experience.
4.Path without challenges would be very boring: our souls create challenges in order to gain experience, self-confidence, in order to develope and become stronger. But when you are really tired, you prefer soft and flat path, or beautiful peaceful meadow where you can enjoy and just exist in pure happiness.
5.You learn that there are always many choices: you can choose different path or different goal...you can change your mind and go back, but after riching certain point there is no going back, you have to walk to the end.
6.You can choose to walk slowly or quickly run to the desired top/goal, but if you run, you do not see beauty of the nature and you do not enjoy your path. The most important is too look around and connect yourself with all life and creativity around you. If you do that, you see that all these miracles are part of you... then you enjoy your path, and enjoy hiking to the top. Top is never so important as precious world of other living beings around you.
7.You can reach the top only if you have PASSION, LOVE for hiking and nature, you also need to TRUST IN YOURSELF. There is no place for imagined fears: fears create only troubles, or you stay at home because of them. You cannot hike or be fully alive, while trembling from the fear. Only love, passion and self-confidence lead you to the top. Right tempo as well.
8.Some paths you can walk completely alone: great experience for learning how to protect and love yourself. You learn how to rely on yourself, what is extremely important knowledge. But for more difficult paths and goals, you need the company, and adjust yourself to that company, and your company has to adjust to your rhytm as well.
9. lesson: NEVER GIVE UP, IF YOUR GOAL IS WORTHY AND SACRED
Most important lesson which this mighty mountain gave me last year was: NEVER GIVE UP, NO MATTER WHAT CIRCUMSTANCES ARE .
Explanation: 2/3 of 6 hours hiking on the hill Stap (South Velebit) I suffered from heavy food poisoning, and went up without water, dehydrated, on very warm day, through the difficult rocky goat paths. My hiking colleague created military training from that trip, instead of being tender, majority of the time he left me to walk alone, although I was ill and completely exhausted. There was nobody that day around on that part of the mountain, we were there completely alone. 20 minutes before the shelter, I founded nice flat rock and decided to spend the night there, because my body did not listen me any more, but my friend command me to carry on with walking. I succeeded because I got angry with him, so my adrenalin went up and gave me enough force to walk. In the shelter I recuperated completely after drinking fresh water in 30 minutes, and was great the rest of the time. Although my friend`s behaviour seemed to be very non-compassionate that day from the my point of view, my soul created such challenge in order to learn the most important lesson in my life: IF THE GOAL IS SACRED AND WORTHY, NEVER GIVE UP - NO MATTER WHAT CIRCUMSTANCES ARE: THERE IS ALWAYS HELP FROM INNER SOURCE AND OUTSIDE WORLD. Because I was able to hike despite all conditions, and came up almost alone (at least to my flat rock) I realized that everything else in my life is just easy game, and that I have no need to be afraid of anything any more.
I am more then grateful and full of deepest unconditional love for my friend and spirit of nature, who taught me that lesson intentionally, learning it was relief and blessing. It passed few months which I needed to fully integrate the deep meaning of that happening...
Everything is Divine in our life, difficult conditions are not there to punish us, or frighten us: they happen just to teach us what we need to correct in our attitude in order to become more balanced and stronger, the consciousness seeks challenges to develop and become wiser and more compassionate.
Life is sacred and always worthy to be lived, and always is the most interesting novel, most exciting dream, most passionate artistic work. As soon as you make and effort to perceive it on that way, you start to see the bliss, which is always in us from the beginning of the time.
NP Paklenica, South Velebit
National Park Paklenica consists of two canyons and rivers, both the canyons and creeks are called Big and Small Paklenica (Velika Paklenica and Mala Paklenica), Big Paklenica Canyon is approximately 14 KM long, whilst Small Paklenica canyon is 12 KM, both of these canyons get deeper and deeper over time as the river help to erode the limestone walls of the mountain. These beautiful two canyons are surrounded by romantic rocky hills, among them are the highest peaks of the Velebit Mountains (Vaganski Vrh at approximately 1757 meters and Sveto Brdo at approximately 1753 meters).
The total size of the park is 96 square KM.
The park has 70 explored caves, the only one that is open to the pubic is Manita Peć.
The park has an abundance of flora and fauna some of which are unique to the park and the mountain, there are over 800 species of flora and a huge variety of fauna.
There are 12 types of snakes in the park, some of the snakes include the Balkan whip snake, leopard snake, aesculapian snake, nose-horned viper and the Orsini's viper, there are 97 species of birds, some the birds include the rock nuthatch, blue rock thrush and the Griffon vulture, there is also a large variety of mammals in the park some of which include the Roe deer, red deer, chamois, wild boar, brown bear, wolfs and lynx.
If someone loves hiking or mountain climbing, Paklenica has it all on offer:
For the hikers there are more than 150KM of very interesting hiking tracks available. Paklenica National Park has some of Europe's best climbing areas and is the most frequented by Croatian climbers, one of the attractions of this area is due to its location, which is next to the coast.
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Hmmmm, snakes... you can see them actually only during the summer, when is far too hot to hike. Hikers and snakes has an agreement: they do walk the same paths, but in different times of year. Everyone has to be a little bit careful though: We walk with sticks, with them we make noise and vibrations, which give signals to potential snakes to move away. The most dangerous Croatian snakes are just babies if we compare them to the tropical snakes, poison needs many hours to rich the lethal phase, so there is enough time to get medical help. The point is not to be frightened, to be careful and... believe that spirit of the nature will protect you from any danger. Up till now, I saw on Velebit two snakes only, but they moved away from me.
Thank you very much for your nice words and your lovely comment.
Love and Light.
A great hub, Tatyana, brilliant pictures too! :)
Thank you very much, QS. Nature has everlasting beauty and inspired me.
Glad you explained the caveat about snakes. Thanks for posting such a nice comment on my hub. I see so much light and joy in your words. Would surely love to visit this part of europe when I have enough money and time.
Croatia is small but very gorgeous country, I enjoy here so much that I would not want to live anywhere else, especially since my life-desire is fulfilled and I have started to live on the Adriatic coast, connection with the see is heart-opening. I hope you will come one day, will be glad to show you how nice is here.
I also feel a lot of light and love in you, you are inspiring me as well.
Anyway it is said that Croats (Slovens) came from India, they arrived here in the 7th century, so it must be some connection, although we have to learn how to be peaceful, so we are like "black sheeps" relatives he, he...
Thank you for your comment...blessings.
WOW!! Such a nice place. Glad to know you are at peace and very happy there. Sure would love to meet positive people like you. Btw can you elaborate more on this I didn't know all this:-
"Anyway it is said that Croats (Slovens) came from India".....,so we are like "black sheeps" relatives..."
Der Countrywomen, I just copy/paste one good article about Croats (Hrvati) roots and ancestors, this is better that I try to explain, I am also in the process of learning all details, thanks to you. Besides that facts, Slavic old religious tradition, also has many gods,f.E we used to celebrate God Svevid, god of Light as the main God, some scientists find many similarities to the hinduistic religion. Croats (Hrvati) become Cristians in the 10th century.
Here is the theory about our roots:
"PROTO-LANGUAGE AND SARASVATI CIVILIZATION ca. 5750 - 4200 BC(Proto-Croats in India)
Indo-Iranian origin of the non-Slavic name HRVATI (= Croats), is accepted nowadays even by persistent slavists (although according to them Croats must be Slavs).Dr. S.K. SAKAC (whose reprint book is just about to be published) has done the most excellent research on the origin of Hrvati (Croats).According to him, the key point is an East-Persian province (satrapy) called Harauwatya, under ancient Achaemenids, in today's Afghanistan.Early Persian and Elamite written texts (Avesta and others) mentioned this province, in historical sequence, like Harahvati, Harauwatya and Harraovatis (Curic, 1991).In old Indian Vedic texts the most similar word from pre-historic times was Sarasvati, whose name is mentioned in early Indo-European literature(the RgVeda) about sixty times. Until the 80's, the location and even the very existence of the land Sarasvati was not clear, and it was considered as myth and legend. Recent discoveries by modern technology almost fully proved the historical foundations of nation Sarasvati, and its culture, also its period of existence and its time,which is much older than previously thought. It existed at the same time, or even earlier, than Sumerian culture and Egyptian Pharaohs, that is 3750 – 2200 BC.The main discoveries about that were published in India, by Prof. Dr. S.R.Rao ("Dawn and Development of the Indus Civilization", 1991)and by Dr. Rajaram and Frawley in 1995 ("Vedic Aryans and the Origins of Civilization").Here follows some short extracts from these books, which are particularly significant regarding the early origin of Hrvati (Croats).
1.
Discovery of the river Sarasvati and land Vaeyah, by Satellites. In order to prove or dismiss the legends about Sarasvati, detailed satellite photographs of land around Afghanistan, Pakistan and Punjab were made Photos were taken by infrared rays, which can detect buried archeological places under the earth,sand or sea. There were no important findings of more advanced civilizations before pre-history, in Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan.But many convincing locations of a prehistoric civilization were found further east, in North India, particularly in the big desert of Thar,now in the Indian provinces of Rajastan and Gujarat.
Under huge sand dunes there are, until recently unknown, ruins and walls of a dozen prehistoric towns, which are located mainly along the actual dry bed of river Sarasvati, which was at that time the main and biggest Indian river, bigger than Indus and Ganges. Due to the melting of huge Tibetan and Himalayanglaciers after the Ice Age, 9000 - 12000 years ago, river Sarasvati was flowing with much water down the snowy Himalayan slopes in a southwest direction,through the green and fertile VAEYAH valley, to the Indian ocean. It entered the sea with 7-km wide bed at peninsula Kutch near Bombay.According to Mahabharata, the town of Dwaraka was here, and was "swallowed by the ocean"; Krishna saved its citizens.All this was considered to be a legend. But now, satellite photographs found that town at the bottom of the sea, close to the mouth of Sarasvati.It is already being examined by under-water-archaeologists. Dwaraka was built around 3000 BC and it sunk in 1500 BC.People of Sarasvati (valley) used to call their land Aryane Vaeyah (Homeland of Aryans), and their first known ruler was Yam Raha(in early Persian literature known as Yima Ksheta). The texts of Rg Veda, and scanty archeological findings from India,show that early Aryan ancestors were living here even before VII-V millenium, so today we can trace the history of Indo-Aryans 9000 years backwards.
2.
Decoding of early Aryan script and language. The second key turning point in understanding early Aryan prehistory was done by systematic decoding, till now enigmatic scripts from Harappa and Sarasvati civilizations. Only in the 90s was this script, as well as language of early Indian texts,translated and understood. Texts on clay seals as old as the first Sumerian and Egyptian texts have been translated, which gave quite unexpected resultsto the historians. They had thought that Dravidians lived in that area, and that Aryans came about 12 century BC, but these old Indian texts and sealsare already written in old Sarasvati-language, very similar to Vedic language. Today four early-Aryan languages are known:1. The best known is classical Sanskrit (Samskrita),2. An earlier one is Indo-Vedic (12th - 5th century BC),3. In actual century in Kurdistan were found very scanty prehistoric texts of Mitanni (16th - 12th century BC) which are very similarto early Aryan's language of Vedas,4. Today's finding of the oldest Aryan pre-language Sarasvati is from 37th - 22th century BC, simultaneous with Sumerian and early Egyptian language.The similarities and connection with early Croatian language are shown in the next comparative numerical sequences:SARASVATI (North India - actual desert of Thar 37 - 22 century BC):1 = aeka, 3 = tra, 4 = chatus, 5 = penta, 7 = happta, 9 (?), 10 = dasa, 20 = dvadasa, 100 = sata.MITANNI (Kurdistan, 16th - 12th century BC):1 = aika, 3 = tera, 4 (?), 5 = panza, 7 = satta, 9 = na, 10 (? – further unknown).INDO-VEDIC (Pakistan, 12th - 5th century BC):1 = eka, 3 = tri, 4 = chatur, 5 = panca, 7 = sapta, 9 = nava, 10 = des, 20 = dvides, 100 = satam.Veyska zayk (now present as the most archaic Croatian tongue of the interior villages on Island KRK in the Adriatic Sea, Croatia):1 = eni, 3 = tari, 4 = cetyr, 5 = pet, 7 = sedaan, 9 = devet, 10 = deset, 20 = dvayset, 100 = stuo.
In Sarasvati there are more important words which are very similar to this old Croatian, for example: bhrata = brat (brother), gatha = ganga (hymn), bhesha = besjeda - older bjesyd (speak), devas = djeva (girl - goddess), angira = andjeo - older angjel (angel),visa = ves - selo (village), maria = marjan (hero), vaeyah = zavicaj - older veyaan (homeland), etc
Between 2000 and 1500 BC, when Himalayan glaciers melted, river Sarasvati dried up, the Early Aryan green homeland Vaeyah became recent Thar Desert. Old civilization Sarasvati was destroyed by hunger and lack of water, but some of these Indo-Aryans moved westwards, close to the river Indusand the mountains of Afghanistan, where ancient state Harauwatya was formed. Others moved even further towards Kurdistan and upper Mesopotamia,where the early Aryan kingdom Hurrwurtu, with Mitannian dynasty of Maryanni developed. In that prehistoric time, furthest to the West, the Celts arrived in Europe.Their language and middle age traditions are closest to the early Indo-Aryans. Later, in a second wave, Aryan Persians settled down in Elamitic Arran,after 12 century BC, thus breaking connections between Indo-Aryans and western early Aryans.The later arrival of half-Aryan Germans, and of others enlarged this break.
3.
Importance of these discoveries for the origin of HRVATI (Croats) Due to the lack of archaeological proofs and of written documents earlier than 12th century BC, the origin and prehistory of early Aryans has been an issue of different ideological and political manipulations.
...
The first Croatian ancestors became from North India and not only from Persia,
nor from the Carpathian area in Europe. In the beginning, 3700 BC or earlier, these pre-Croats were part of a common early-Aryan ethno-group Sarasvati in India.
Due to the change of climate they emigrated westwards in ancient Afghanistan (Harauvatya) and Kurdistan (Hurrwurtu, Huratina) and then reached ancient
Tanais on the Azov Sea, where was inscribed Synodos Horouathon (= the first Croatian Parl
The first Croatian ancestors became from North India and not only from Persia,nor from the Carpathian area in Europe. In the beginning, 3700 BC or earlier, these pre-Croats were part of a common early-Aryan ethno-group Sarasvati in India.Due to the change of climate they emigrated westwards in ancient Afghanistan (Harauvatya) and Kurdistan (Hurrwurtu, Huratina) and then reached ancientTanais on the Azov Sea, where was inscribed Synodos Horouathon (= the first Croatian Parliament). In the early middle age they came to White Croatia(Bijela Hrvatska) in Carpathians, and then in southern Adriatic Croatia (actual Hrvatska), where we persisted till now."
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It is also interesting that even now we are Cristians, we celebrate Mother Mary /Goddesss Mary who is very much alike as Mother Saraswati, usually dressed in the white robe, full of compassion, wisdom and understanding, Croats are much more dedicated in their prayers to her then to Jesus. People pray to her for health, abundance, wealth, mercy. Actualy, spiritual protector of Croatia (Hrvatska) is Mother Mary: Goddess in white robe.
Interesting, huh?
Love & Light
Fabulous mountains. We have just been to Arizona, Sedona, and the red rocks there were so amazing. Before that we went up Rigi Kulm, near Zug in Switzerland, not far from where we live. My wife has photos on her Facebook http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1301850333
Jim
Thanks Jim,
on the Facebook, I can see somebodies pics only if I become friend with that person...So, would be that be OK?
If you are already on Facebook, then why not. My wife would be glad to have another friend. So would I :)
Tatjana- I SO want to go to your home! I'm telling you...SOMEDAY!
These pics you have on here literally bring tears to my eyes!
Thank you for such a beautiful view!
Yes Shannon, I hope to see you here.
Velebit is like dreamland...wild and proud...and so beautiful. First time when I hiked there, I was also crying.
A lots of love....
Gorgeous photos! What a lovely trip you had! :)
Thanks, Suzanne, it was fantastic, planning new ones, as soon as possible....
Nice place to visit. I like those beutiful picture.thanks for share.
Thanks, Prasetio, Velebit is really gorgeous.
The entire pre-history of alleged 'historical' Sarasvati Aryan origin and their expansion from Sarasvati into Asia and Europe is totally wrong! This is a theory invented from the air that has no shred of evidence in any archeological , linguistic , historical or any other field of science. It was exactly another way around; the people of Europe and Cenral Asia were the one who emigrated from these lands, from this part of the world to other places. A one group ventured as far as India, this group called themselves Aryan and we call them Vedic Aryan. That is why Vedic Aryan language ,sanskrit, is so very much similar to not only Croatian but to Latvian, Lithuanian, and dozen of other languages - word for word., becouse all these languges came from the same place. The name of our common proto-language:-Baltic-Slovac-Croatian and many other languages of the same family should be called Euro-Indian becouse it was taken from Europe and brough to India ( but not as is erroneusly called 'Indo-Europen' which is terribly missleading. It happened such error due to the English man Mr Jones who noticed similarities between Sanskrit and other langueges when he was working in India. He was astonished at these similarities and assumed that Sanskrit is so old so it must be the first one, and that other languges arrived from it. Since his times there came hundreds of linguistic scholars who work on the genesis of so called Indo-European languges and they proved clearly - with the support of innumerous archeological evidence that the 'nest' of this entire group of languages was located in today area of Andronovo - Poltavka-Potapovka.
Please read the work by prof. David Anthony - extremly well reserched material. The Vedic Aryan as a 'nation' could not and did not originated in India-Sarasvati, Harappa or any of these areas in 3000 BC becouse their ethos of identity place focus pn horse-centerd culture. (see all the texts of Rig Veda pertinnet to this subject). Horses were not known in India till the time of some 1500 BC , becosue they came with Aryan (or more correctly Aryan came with horses). Eureopen culture and not lunar ca;lendar The Aryan were of the same 'family ' as European tribes of that time , 3500 BC who spoke the same languge in Europe , but some of us stayed her and still have words of this language in out vacabularies , while thye emograted and took this language with them to India. So similarities between their language and nearly all other European languages are clear. Their cradle was place called Sintashta , here in Euro-Asia, and not Sarasvati in India. The emigtarion of the big population from Europe took them from Ukrainian steppe - via Mezopotamia and Iran, Afganistan, and to finally a one of the group -to India. Croatian language is indeed very old and archaic but not becouse it is derived from ancient Indian/Sarasvati language but becosue Vedic Aryan got their languge from our old archaic Europe, from the proto language in which Balts, Slavs, Croatian, and others spoke on this land., and took it TO India in c. 1500 BC.
Thank you for your comment Anna.
I am familiar with the theory you presented here (it was recently on National Geographic) and my personal opinion is that it might be very correct.
My own genetic inheritance is very mixed (I do not have only Slavic roots) so I would need to spend very many decades (that I do not have) to find out where from all my ancestors came.
Main topic of this article is - nature and amazingly beautiful mountain Velebit, so despite my comment about possible Indian origin of Croats, I would prefere to stick to the real topic of my Hub...
Thank you very much for the visit and comment.
Dear Tatjana
I was prompted to type in google search a question: "similarity between Indian and croatian language". This happened after I have seen news on ninemns.com of an Indian not eating or drinking for years. When listening to him on video-news and seeing the Indian text under it, I certainly was very suprised that I could understand some of his sayings and there is similarity in writing of some of the words of that old Indian man and dialect of the croatian language spoken in my birth town in Croatia. Reading the comments on your Velebit pages from other people is very interesting. I was taught that Croats came to present land in the seventh century from somewhere beyond Carpathia. There in the comments our croatian roots could be from India, or our ancestors went to India. I do not know how could one or other scholar prove it, either way. Maybe one day will know. Anyhow, I am very impresed with your presentation of Velebit to the rest of the world, it is indeed very nice, both, the Velebit and your work. When I was there in 2005 I drove from Zagreb to Dubrovnik and have seen the Velebit (from car) but it did not appear as nice as you have it shown and presented. I do not know if this is going to reach you, but keep the good work up.
Regards
Steve
from Australia
Dear Steve,
thank you so much for your comment and info about obvious similarities between Indian and Croatian language.
Form the car, Velebit is really not so special like when you go a little bit deeper in the mountain - there the real miracles begin.
Thank you for your beautiful and encouraging words and wish you all the best.
Ja sam uvjeren,da su Hrvati dosli sa obala rijeke Sarasvati,koja je presusjela 1900 godina BC.Spomeni na njih nalaze se po mnogim zemljama i dokumentima od Indije do sjeverne Europe.Hrvatski grb u Iraku 11 000 000
godina star,hrvatski grb na sjedistu Ramzesa II,2000 godina BC,Behistunski nadpis itd itd i teorija da su Arijevci dosli u Indiju sa zapada,po mom misljenju je teorija povjesnicara,koji su htjeli opravdati kolonizatorske pretenzije.Arijevci su nastali u Indiji oko 5000 godina BC i oni nisu bili ni vojnici ni osvajaci.Nisu bili ni rasa ni nacija,nego fenomen vremena-lutalice,ciji su putevi isli svuda,a vodili nikamo.Isto tako,ni Slaveni nisu bili ni nacija ni rasa i ne spominju se prije Vl stoljeca i to kao bizantska podvala jednom dijelu Hrvata,koji su ih napadali skupa sa Avarima.Da bi ih okrenuli protiv Avara,govorili su im da ne budu avarski robovi"Schlaves"i tako je ta naljepnica ostala na Hrvatima i na svim narodima,koji su skupa s njima zivjeli u Velikoj Hrvatskoj-Sarmatiji.Ja posjedujem nekoliko stotina rijeci,koje se i danas upotrebljavaju u Indo-iranskim jezicima,a svi tzv.slavenski jezici su nastali iz hrvatskog.Toliko za sada.Pozdrav iz daleke Australije.
It is hard to believe but I grew up right next to this paradise and never set foot on it, I left my homeland young, disgusted with communist rule that offered nothing to young high school graduate but seasonal work, did not look back for a long time, but now, more and more often I am researching my homeland, looking for identity that slipped away.
I am hunting for a way, job, potential business or activity that can sustain my family.
I have a place to stay in, place is in ruins but can be recovered with some efforts and investment.
I have no money, no more then I had when I left there, I am prisoner of mistakes and find nothing worth perusing where I am, the only place I want to be at, is back home.
Free at last and yet unable to make anything of it.
Retiring in US is a gamble, retiring age keeps being pushed up and one has no guaranties of ever collecting a penny of earned benefits.
Prospects of having to work past age 62 is disturbing and difficult to swallow.
That should be the time for me to slow down and do what I want, not what someone tells me to, basic survival becomes an issue.
This is not just nostalgic outburst, I am suffering inside, no material thing can correct the condition, new car, new boat or new anything is just a distraction and new trap that postpones the inevitable.
I never adopted the "new life" here, I hate American football, baseball or any sport that was not part of my growing up, I travel 150 miles one way to attend an event where Croatian people have picnic, so I can enjoy our foods once a year, done professionally and with passion no restaurant can duplicate.
Internet is the bridge here, no more denying it, I am home sick and there is no cure other then homecoming.
Then and now, I think beauty of the land opens some possibilities but does not provide direct way to make a living, one has to be creative in making something of it and I can't help but wonder if things have changed for the better in that regard.
In any case, stunning beauty of landscape, pictures are awesome, please visit the islands and post more pictures, they are therapeutic and inspiring, provocative and influential, thank you, hvala.
Thank you Bodul for your very interesting comment.
Sarasvati (vedic sanskrit) --> Harahvati (Avestan) --> Hrvati (Croatian).
The name Sarasvati (a huge river which once flowed in north-western India) is the oldest attested form of the word (about 1500 BC, from the oldest existing poetry called Rigveda). Harahvaiti is the Iranian form of Sarasvati (Avestan converts all 's' to 'h'). Hrvati is a croatian derivation from Harahvati.
Since Sarasvati is a vedic word, and the people from the Sarasvati river basin moved west, they retained the name of their old land as their ethnic identity.
countrywomen 3 years ago
You do have a photographer's eye for detail(Btw I like the color of your hair matching the T-Shirt and you look so happy). Great hubs with lots of beautiful emotions(you freaked me out withe mention of snakes) & pictures.