Sanja Jugovic Burns Fugue [ EPF 2018 FINALIST ] In 1980, Josip Broz Tito died. Yugoslavia followed him a decade later. My family emigrated to Australia in 1985, before the war (so this project is n…
My first journey back to Yugoslavia was as a “foreigner” and a tourist, but not a stranger. It was summer of 1990. I witnessed a country preparing to slide violently towards its death and still denied this ever being a possibility. For a long time after, and elsewhere, I did not have a reason to bother recalling the country of my birth. Then my mother passed away. My very entry into this world disappeared and I needed to relearn the world, relearn that I was from nowhere.The idea that we are from some place has an irresistible magnetism, but what happens when that place is gone? One realises all we are is a collection of fragmented images. I return to my home town frequently to look for traces of life I have left behind, but all I find is an unceremonious blur playing out in a parallel universe. The life I have had is forever gone. I languish in nostalgia. The more nostalgic I become, the less I remember. All I have is my fragments.
