Talk:Croatia/Off topic discussion archive

Hello, Im a Croat - Serbian language is similar to Croatian but not identical. They were closely related though distinct languages anyways, and they got even more similar cuz through the XX. century we lived in a common state, and there is some history of pan-southern-slavenian ideas in these areas, as well, many would say, centralist opression of individual national identities... So, the language that was a mix of serbian and croatian elements, that existed by decree, was called 'serbo-croatian or croato-serbian'. Usually it was called serbo-croatian in serbia, and croato-serbian in croatia, but the combined phrase was used too. After the disintegration of yugoslavia and the war, nobody declares the language to be serbo-croatian. The language did change, at least officially, but mostly only slightly. Frankly, here linguists have many ideas and linguistic it totaly politicised, but ppl mostly ignore all that anyways...

Using the term serbo-croatian for the language of croatia however would offend many, most Croats, though its a fact that we can understand Serbs allmost perfectly, and for instance, dont need translations for watching Serbian movies..

Btw, train reliability varies significantly from region to region, but, the trains are quite old, often pretty slow and often late. Think they are relatively good in the northen parts though, but pretty bad on the south..

aryah 83.131.132.218 14:03, 22 March 2006 (EST)

That is not true. Serbo-Croatian language is one language linguistically. For political reasons, Croatians have declared it their distinct language, so have Bosnians, Montenegrins etc. However, linguistically, there are dialects in Croatia much more distinct than language spoken in Belgrade/Zagreb. The difference is like that between American and British English, if not smaller.

No, it is not true that croatian and serbian is the same language. They are pretty similar and based on similar linguistic rules, but had different ways of developing. They are also based on two different culturological worlds: Serbia belongs to eastern rite, orthodox church, and everything else, and Croatia belongs to the West, western rite and so on. The tradition and the culture are different. Therefore, naming serbo-croatian same language is false, because one observes only "technical" linguistic similarities. This unique linguistic similarity can be compared to the similarity American E.- British E., but the situation here is quite different. Differences between serbian and croatian are from middle ages, which is not the same for english. Also, the similarity of languages was politically forced in 19th and 20th century because of political reasons. (pavor)

Spare me your nationalist clichés; those are getting old and NOTHING good will come out of them. Serbo-Croatian is ONE language; in fact it is the ONLY Slavic language written in both Latin and Cyrillic alphabet. If you want to talk about another language, compare Serbo-Croatian with, let us say, Russian or Polish, now THOSE are similar, yet different, languages. "Politically forced"?; You know the Serbo-Croats (or Croato-Serbs; makes no difference) and the other Southern Slavs (except Bulgars) actually volunteered to create Yugoslavia in 1918 and in 1945?

WARNING - POLICE BRUTALITY IN CROATIA Hi,

You seem to be reporting only the good and nice stuff about Croatia. I'd like to report something very different about Croatia. You probably are not going publish this but I'll send it anyway just in case - because it should be made public as a fair warning to everyone planning to visit Croatia.

Incident 1. A friend of mine was on vacation in Croatia and one eveing after a nice dinner at the hotel restaurant he went for a swim in the evening sea. He jumped in naked and when he was getting back on the beach he was confronted by the police and brutally beaten on the spot - with guns, kicked and taken to a police station. It did not matter telling them he was a turist and stayed in the hotel nearby. He was held 28 hours at the police station and beaten several times again and again. He was forced to kiss the boots of the policemen and had to pay a huge fine. Afterwards he was let go with a warning that many have died there so he better shut up.

Incident 2. Another incident reported by a couple who had a small road accidendt and scratched someones car. The police took them in a had beaten them brutally - the man as well as the woman. They punched into her breatsts with AK47s and she had to sit down with her legs spread and they were kicking her in between the legs. They had to pay a huge fine and were let go. They were told by the embassy to make no complaints just to leave the country as soon as possible. The embassy told them that this kind of incidents happen all the time as often as several times a week and nothing could be done about that. They had their experiences with croatian police

The police in Croatia is heavilly armed and because of the tense situation with Albania/Kosovo they have a licence to use them as they consider appropriate - and you know where that leads to. The brutality and corruption of the Croation police is well known and those are also Croatians. So there are not only nice people in Croatia.

Also the situation with land mines is a huge problem. They claim that its all ok but would you trust them? With all the turist euros at stake they will say anything to you. There is many areas where the land mines are still in place as some unfortunate turist from Netherlands had to find out - he was lucky to lose his leg only.

I would not recommend to anyone spending a vacatioan in that country because you might end up returning from your vacation in a body bag.

I think you have some problems that you need to resolve elsewhere. This is Wikivoyage not Wikipedia or some political forum.