Us – Record of Ljubljana

You and me. We have known each other our whole lives, when we were little, you wove knots in my hair when I slept, because you were bored, because you could never sleep after lunch. Perhaps just because you had shorter hair, but you’ve always been my best friend.

Together, as little girls, we discovered the world, competed over who knows more foreign words, when we got tired of this game, we invented our own language, that only the two of us could understand. On summer afternoons, we ate ice cream in a room full of books, always the same ice cream from the “Ljubljana Dairy”. Do you remember when we read this in one of the books? »You have so many stories. You hide secrets within yourself that you revealed only to those who dared to hear and see them. You give every person a chance to get to know you, some people stay forever, those who don’t understand you leave, maybe someday they will return. Only a few have been with you from the beginning. You are small but full of life, surrounded by majestic walls that give you strength and energy, when the wind blows the sun shines in your heart. You are beautiful. Yes, you!…..you, my city, my Ljubljana.« And it really is ours, Ljubljana.

The city where we grew up, the place where we both fell in love for the first time, the place where we went to school and to ballet classes, in the winter months we often »played hooky« when the skating rink opened for the first time at Congress Square, do you remember? We both left our city, went out into the world, but we both returned.

Now grown up, we’ve changed, now we each have our own careers, each our own life, new love, new views of the world. But we still laugh together. We still listen to rock and dance in the rain. We still drink coffee from porcelain cups and saucers and never »save« special clothes just for special occasions. We still know our secret language and we are still from Ljubljana, a rare, endangered species. Women from Ljubljana. »Ljubljančanka« … No, I don’t croak like those from Ljubljana are often accused of doing and no, I don’t sit in cafes all day and drink coffee, I’m not spoiled and sublime, I’m not afraid to get my hands dirty and have dirt under my fingernails and I know that cows are not purple. I read, I listen to music, I know everything about medicinal herbs I gather on the weekends, when hiking in the mountains, I know how to cook, I dance, it’s not true that I don’t want to go anywhere, that I’m lazy, I go, but on my bike rather than by car because I see more, I hear the quiet whispers of hidden streets where you can’t go by car. I love nice things, I eat lunch on my great aunt’s china that she inherited from her grandmother, but that doesn’t mean I won’t eat from paper plates at picnics. I don’t go to the open market in a tracksuit on Saturday, I get dressed up, I put on red lipstick even if I just take out the trash and I go to the mountains with earrings, so what if I do? I dream, I laugh, I chase the sun and yes, I enjoy life!

Midve. Poznava se že celo življenje, ko sva bili še čisto majhni si mi ti v lase pletla vozle, ko sem spala, kar tako, ker ti je bilo dolgčas, ker ti, nikoli nisi mogla po kosilu spati. Mogoče tudi zato, ker si imela krajše lase, ampak ti si bila vedno moja najboljša prijateljica.

Skupaj sva kot majhni deklici odkrivali svet, tekmovali katera zna več tujih besed, ko sva se naveličali te igre sva si izmislili svoj jezik, nihče ga ni razumel, samo midve. Ob poletnih popldnevih sva v sobi polni knjig jedli sladoled, vedno isti slodoled iz Ljubljanskih mlekarn. Se spomniš, ko sva v eni izmed knjih prebrali to? »Ti si polna zgodb. V sebi skrivaš skrivnosti, ki jih razkriješ samo tistemu, ki se jih upa slišati in videti. Vsakemu človeku daš možnost, da te spozna, nekateri ostanejo za večno, tisti ki te ne razumejo odidejo, mogoče se kdaj še vrnejo, a le redki so s teboj že od začetka. Majhna si, a polna žvljenja, obkrožena z veličastnimi stenami, ki ti dajejo energijo, ko zapiha veter v tvojem srcu posije sonce. Lepa si. Ja, ti!…ti moja Ljubljana.« In res je najina, Ljubljana.

Mesto v katerem sva odraščali, mesto v katerem sva obe očutili prvo ljubezen, mesto v katerem sva hodili v šolo in na balet, ki sva ga »špricali« pozimi, ko so na Kongresnem trgu prvič postavili drsališče, se spomniš? Obe sva šli v svet, zapustili sva najino mesto, a obe sva se vrnili nazaj.

Spremenili sva se, odrasli sva, zdaj imava vsaka svojo službo, vsaka svoje življenje, novo ljubezen, nove poglede na svet. A še vedno se smejiva. Še vedno poslušava rock in pleševa v dežju. Še vedno pijeva kavo iz najlepših skodelic in nikoli ne »šparava« lepih oblek samo za posebne priložnosti. Še vedno znava najin izmišljen jezik in še vedno sva Ljubljančanki, redka, izumirajoča vrsta. Ljubljančanka…Ne, ne kvakam in ne, ne sedim cel dan po kavicah, nisem razvajena in vzvišena, ni me strah da bi si umazala roke in imela zemljo za nohti in ja vem, da krava ni vijolična. Berem, poslušam glasbo, vem vse o zdravilnih zeliščih, ki jih nabiram med vikendi, nekje v visokogorju, znam kuhat, plešem, ne ni res, da se mi ne da nikamor, grem, ampak raje s kolesom, kot z avtom, ker tako vidim več, slišim tih šepet skirtih ulic, kamor z avtom ne moraš. Rada imam lepe stvari, kosilo jem na krožnikih moje stare tete, ki jih je podedovala od svoje babice, ampak to ne pomeni da na pikniku ne bom jedla iz papirnatih krožnikov. V soboto ne grem na tržnico v trenirki, ja zrihtam se, tudi če nesem ven samo smeti si ustnice namažem z rdečo šminko in ja v hribe grem z uhani, pa kaj pol? Sanjam, smejim se, lovim sonce in ja, uživam življenje!

Julia Kaja Hrovat, 2020 Zapis o Ljubljani