Cheese

When the Croatian government gave in to the demands of protesting farmers, the minister of Economic Affairs said that he would forbid the import of cheese. Long live Croatian cheese, down with Gorgonzola and Roquefort. I could also say: long live paški sir, but then few of you would know what I meant. That's the problem with Croatian products: even the handful of products that are worth exporting (and that does NOT included Cedevita) are hardly know outside of the country.
I was seriously thinking of going to Billa (an Italian supermarket chain with branches in Croatia) to stock up cheese. But, as expected, the Croatian government had to break the promise it would forbid the import of cheese, as that is against all EU and World Trade Organization rules. Instead, it will try to raise the price of imported cheese. Same old protectionist story again: unproductive farmers receive help at the expense of ordinary citizens. Same goes for shipbuilding.
The Croatian government accuses other countries of dumping cheese (damping in Croatian) and unfair competition. Sure. The grass in Western Europe in greener, people work harder and the technology is more advanced. That is why the cheese is cheaper. If we follow the government's line of argument, holidays in Croatia should be made more expensive. Croatia has a lot of sunshine and a beautiful coastline and neither of them exists because of Croatian efforts, yet Croats reap the fruits. How unfair! Camping owners in Britain, Germany and The Netherlands can't compete with the Croatian sun, so booking a holiday in Dubrovnik should be taxed.

Spoiled students on strike

The social democrats try to warm the electorate for the upcoming local elections with manekenke or models (I wonder how many Croats know of the Dutch origin of this word - photo Jutarnji list). Political and educational temperatures ran high already. The economic recession and budgetary problems forced the Croatian government to cut the salaries of a public sector workers.
Public sector workers aren't happy with that and will start a strike on 13 May that should culminate in a big demonstration on the 16th, pre-election day. I am not sure whether the great number of workers that are, almost as a habit, on sick leave will join in, but striking nurses, professors, teachers and others who work in Croatia's monstrously big public sector should cause serious problems for ordinary citizens.
The expected strike of university staff will not have too great consequences as many students are on strike themselves for almost three weeks now. It is an almost nation-wide strike (Pula, Rijeka, Split) but the center is, of course, Zagreb. The core of the striking students study at the Faculty of Philosophy. Other than its name suggests, this faculty is the largest and most important faculty in the country and is a true monolith. You can study there everything from art history, Japanology, Turkish, psychology, sociology, linguistics to literature and archeology. There is so much to choose that 2 out of 3 students never make up their mind and leave higher eduction without finishing their studies. The rest, 1 out of 3, finishes on average after seven years.
An intolerable situation, you would say. But then you haven't met Croatian students yet. Instead of protesting against the chronic shortage of study materials, books, electronic journals and likewise, they protest against paying a small tuition fee and demand free education instead. With pathetic slogans like "Znanje nije roba" (Knowledge is not a commodity) and "Jedan svijet, jedna borba" (One world, one struggle) they try to shift the financial burden of their protracted studies to the rest of the Croatian population, which is not particularly wealthy. One should know that students pay only 16 euro per month for a room in a dorm (2 students per room), 70 cents for a dinner in the student restaurant (including a drink) and nothing for public transportation. Cinemas, theaters, museums and anything that is remotely connected to a student's life are available at reduced prices. Minister of Education Dragan Primorac offered free eduction for all students who successfully get a degree, but the students didn't go along. Everything should be "free" for "everybody".
There is no such a thing as a free lunch, said Milton Friedman, but as the students also protest against capitalism, privatization and liberalism, anything that makes economic sense will fall on deaf ears. Croatia, by the way, has preciously little of either capitalism, privatization or liberalism.