SLOVENIA'S 5 CORE VALUES

She is a woman who likes to socialise with older people, has a respectful attitude towards others and is close to helping her neighbours.

As she thought back, she began to say, "Women used to come to my mother's house, women gardeners who worked in the garden in Radenci. When they came back, they came to see her. It made my heart feel good to think that they visited and loved each other. They really loved each other," she points out.

"I was pulling on my ears and gained a wealth of experience and knowledge from them. One of them talked about cooking, another about gardening, another about raising children..."

In Radenci, where Cvetka and her family lived, she and her retired neighbour chatted until midnight. "This neighbour was very nice," she mentions. "When she was still going to work, she often said: 'Cvetka, don't cook today, I will.' email in a coastal way, because she came from those parts. She also baked a lot of pancakes for the whole family; for her son Boris and his wife and for her grandson, who lived with us for a while. The flat under the firehouse where they lived before burnt down."

At that time, her mother was mostly in bed, having suffered a stroke, and Cvetka was looking after her. Her husband's mother was suffering from cancer, so they all moved to Vučja vas. For three months she took care of both of them at the same time. My husband's mother died, but her mother lived for eight years. She was kind and good-humoured until the last, but mostly she was lying down, except when Cvetka massaged her back. If necessary, even at midnight. She still couldn't sleep because she was used to getting up for her. Feeding her, washing her, massaging her, talking to her. To look after her completely.

In her new surroundings, in Vučja village, she missed socialising with older people. She thought of Women's Day: "If I were in Radenci now, I would go and visit one of my neighbours." One of them used to dig her garden and plant something. "I took her flowers, chocolate." She couldn't do it herself, because when she came home from work, she was busy with her two daughters.

Then she thought; the oldest person in these parts is her neighbour Anna. She deserves to be looked after too. And on Women's Day, she went to her. For 13 years now, it has been a tradition for women to gather there every year on this day. Later, they were joined by their neighbour Irena, and sometimes Anna's daughter Lea is there too.

Ojunachile and started visiting her eldest neighbour Milan, who celebrates St Lucia's Day, for his birthday, as she remembered that her husband's mother had the same habit. She said: "My mother took home glaze, you put it under furtoh (apron) and gone!

"When they are stacking firewood at Ana and Milan's house, I think, "I'm not doing anything like that at the moment..." and I go to their house with the wheelbarrow to help them." She adds: "Why not help the elderly?" Irena sometimes comes to the rescue too. The neighbourly help, the attentive respectful attitude and the belonging to the environment can be felt in Cvetka all the time. 

Did she learn or pick up these beautiful values from her mother?

"When my mother was two years old, she lost her father and mother. She grew up with her grandfather and grandmother, so she was used to older people." She says with a happy smile, "I feel good and I feel good when I am with older people."   

For three years now, she has been visiting her cousin, who is her age and went blind ten years ago, every Sunday. Her family visits her during the week, preparing the soil in the garden, sowing and planting, but she does all the other work herself. "What she does...!" she says, enchanted. "The first time I visited, she came down the stairs from the fourth floor with a jug of water. She was cleaning the windows."

Lea Lebar, 29 May 2025