SLOVENIA'S 5 CORE VALUES

They don't have a live hamster (yet), but it's possible that in their next life they will be the most beautiful and "tippid" hamster on the planet, perhaps even on the Moon.

If you ever need anything (for example, egg containers, cabbage and all kinds of other goods from the shelves of supermarkets and minimarkets, retro shoes, costumes, bags and purses of all colours and sizes...), please contact me. I immediately ask my mother. All my friends, colleagues, acquaintances, out-of-towners ... already know this, but apparently some of my colleagues don't.

So, one beautiful early morning, my colleague Monika, our main and only waterer of the office flowers, says: "Mojca, a few years ago we almost threw away our mother-in-law's tongues, but now I want one so badly to clean the air in my house, but what the heck, they're just too expensive." And I think of my mother, my mother-in-law. Hmm, surely they have a treasure trove of these purifying flowers in their hamster sanctuary, among all the greenery that even the arboretum hardly reaches. In a flash, Monika and I call the mother - the chief of the hamsters. Mrs Hamster answers and happily announces that she is in the process of transplanting her mother-in-law's tongues. And that I should come and pick just the right one for Monika. In the meantime, like a loving mother-in-law, they greeted their son-in-law with pursed lips and tongue-lashed half the neighbourhood: "Mojca, can you imagine that Maria has got a new smart phone and now has no idea how to use it ... and she thinks she's clever, ha! But do you know that Lidija is hitting her son-in-law so hard that I feel sorry for the poor guy - we should set up safe houses for men too!"

I manage to interrupt the linguistic mother, also someone's mother-in-law, during her short intake of breath and tell her that I am here to get my mother-in-law's tongue. For the flower, not the original ☺. And the mother makes me two. But with a note that decorative pots are, unfortunately, not available in the hamster kingdom at the moment. But mothers are not only tongue-twisters. They are also very resourceful. The hops and the flowers are already comfortably housed in empty plastic pork lard containers.

Monika's mother was overjoyed. How Monica's lungs have just been filled with joy. The hardy plants with their upright and pointed leaves now decorate and clean her home. And the original mother-in-law's tongue, having done a good job, continues to go upright and tongue-twisting from all ends for the next half of the neighbourhood.

Mojca Guzelj, 4 Feb 2025