Seemingly ordinary day. Although, if I had planned it, it would have been even better, but this is alright too. Sunday. Sunny and family Sunday. Just as I like it. If you ask me what is it that is not to my taste I would not know the answer at first. In addition, this week is missing something. Not big, but still quite important. Although, it is quite small. It is complicated, but that’s the way it is. A modest family breakfast – soup, a little meat and scrambled eggs. We are talking about the week behind us, just as about plans for future. And there appears the small issue that I would change. However, I do not know if it is too late.
Ever since I was little, I was raised differently than my peers. When everyone were going to play football and a monthly knee stitching, I replaced my spikes (that I got from my uncle in Austria) with dancing shoes. That was all. Every other day of the week, my grandma (who is now 70 and is still driving Golf 1 brilliantly) drove me to the practice and enjoyed her grandson’s dance steps. Therefore, for 13 years, my “stadium” were dancing tournaments, sore toes from dancing shoes and labels. Dancing is not for men. All men who dance are homosexual. Because of college, business duties, my dancing career stopped. I do not go to dancing competitions. I do dance for recreation, but I mostly enjoy in practices for little ones. However, the label is still there. The memory of ugly comments and stories still hurt from time to time.
FIGHTING FOR MILITARY BOOTS IN HEELS AND VICE VERSA.
This entire story does not hurt as before. More aware of the society we live in, the unwritten rules imposed on us; it is too sad that my first experience with gender inequality in youth still exists. It was more expressed, however, 13 years ago, when the society was raised between four walls, unlike today. When you are a few clicks away from education and parenting. Sad, but true.
It is clear that the situation is not black but can go blacker. Yet, we do not do much about it. In fact, we do nothing. Lolled in the dorm room our parents are still paying, we watch the fourth season of “Desperate Housewives” and enjoy the examples of inequality the film industry is serving. We even get annoyed for some stupid scene, unbelievable!
As long as it is not someone close to you, it is good. Yet, I wonder, whose mothers, sisters, crushes, fathers, brothers in Bosnia and Herzegovina are unequal. Are all young people from Bosnia and Herzegovina who daily feel some form of inequality a different species and belong to some other families who do not live in the this same wounded country? Whose mom is the woman taxiing and prior to learning the address to which she should take the client, she firstly receives couple of comments such as “To see with my own eyes a women taxiing. For how long are you driving a car? Do you know where this address is?” I wonder whose is the mom cop wearing a not so Gucci police suit and protecting the rights of all those who will shout to her a derogatory word out of the car, and tomorrow cry and manly beg for her to skip their parking ticket this time. To beautiful eyes and famous last name. In addition, it is still not clear to me whether the young man who works at the register in one supermarket on Vraca has a family also laughing at him for a not so deep and typically male voice? And whether the row in front of his register is shorter than the colleague’s across. A typical cashier woman. Fast, agile and very feminine. Sometimes I wonder how it would be if we listened to real life’s stories in childhood instead of fairy tales. We would dream of everyday life later. Something to learn from. What if we have been told that it is normal to see a woman in overalls, swarthy of valve, repairing a car. How it is normal to see a man at the sink washing the dishes after the women prepared appetizer, main course, and dessert for the guests and watched out for the daddy’s pride not to break the plasma from a small wedding with six hundred guests with an ashtray.
There are too many examples to write about. But I am another day will pass in which I will not do anything. Therefore, to you who are reading this I just want to say one thing! The world was made for you and her. Equally. By all and in all. Sports, arts, education, health, politics, agriculture, forestry, mining, extreme sports as in domestic work. And much more. You are worth as much as other people around you. As long as you are giving enough space for everyone. With birth, you were called to an equal fight for equality. For your mother, sister, aunt, neighbour, just as the father of your best friend, your brother, your friends from elementary school or acquaintances from the beach. Networked together with an equal right for HIM and HER to take the lead, we can change the situation for better. In combining charm, knowledge, eloquence, hard work, sacrifice, love for the work, it does not matter whether someone above us is a male or female boss, as long as the result is great for the whole team. And it does not matter whether we will have a ride with a woman taxiing for several months or a taxi driver we know from several rides. And it does not matter whether we take the car to a mechanic that makes money in makeshift shops or to the luxury service of a mechanic recommended by a waiter from the cafe where we drink morning coffee at.
It is essential that it is the same fight. On heels or in army boots. For equal rights. Better tomorrow. For football. Synchronized swimming. For dance. For him and her.
And this text will have its value only when equally written in the feminine gender. Until then, this is just the first step in breaking the blackness equally under the skin of a large number of young people in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Josip Milanovi?
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Josip Milanovi?, 25-year old young man from Kiseljak, living and working in Sarajevo for 6 years now. Master of health and ecology, an employee of the Archdiocesan Pastoral Centre for Youth John Paul II where he works as a project assistant at five projects. Professional dancer in Latin-American dance, loves working with young people and therefore has several certifications as a trainer of trainers. He loves volunteering, and finds time to volunteer in Caritas of the Episcopal Conference in BiH and the Institute for Youth Development KULT. He is a coach in Active Citizens program of the British Council, runs a show Youth – Joy on Radio Mary, and writes for IUVENTA youth magazine. Josip loves orange colour, and is one of the activists in Orange Day in prevention of violence against women and girls.
About the Campaign
The campaign begins with the Orange Day in prevention of violence against women and girls marked on each 25th of a month. The Orange Day has with the UN Secretary General been contributing to raising awareness of youth and their sensibility towards the gender-based violence problem whose victims are 98% times female, and their active involvement in containing and preventing this form of human rights and freedoms violation.
The Institute for Youth Development KULT is advocating a society with full participation of both genders in all spheres of life. The disbalance of social influence of men and women means reduction in many possibilities of any society. The Institute believes that the growth impulse youth possess a condition for social changes. The Institute implements this year’s campaign with the support of the International Olof Palme Centre.
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