{"id":53428,"date":"2011-11-18T12:11:15","date_gmt":"2011-11-18T11:11:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.visit-ulcinj.com\/blog\/?p=53428"},"modified":"2011-11-18T23:07:35","modified_gmt":"2011-11-18T22:07:35","slug":"montenegrin-town-a-beautiful-melting-pot-with-a-surprising-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.visit-ulcinj.com\/blog\/2011\/11\/18\/montenegrin-town-a-beautiful-melting-pot-with-a-surprising-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Montenegrin town a beautiful melting pot with a surprising history"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Read More << Montenegrin town a beautiful melting pot with a surprising history >><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Slideshow: An Old Pirate Town on the Adriatic Coast<\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n

Ulcinj was once a home to slavery and pirates. Now it’s a somewhat diverse community that celebrates where people came from.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0Play in New Window<\/a> | Download<\/a> Story from PRI’s The World<\/a>. Listen to the above audio for a complete report.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Ulcinj looks like a picture postcard. Small waves splash against the rocky shore as fisherman bring in their afternoon catch.<\/p>\n

Ulcinj is a sleepy seaside resort city in Montenegro; 500 years ago, though, Ulcinj had a different reputation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was like a city of pirates,\u201d said Driton Abazi, sitting at a beachside caf\u00e9. He said maritime piracy turned Ulcinj into a melting pot, with people coming from many different countries.<\/p>\n

If you believe the local legend, Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes spent several years as a slave here during the 1500s. Cervantes is said to have named Don Quixote\u2019s muse, Dulcinea, after the Italian name for Ulcinj, Dulcigno.
\n\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

While\u2019s there\u2019s no evidence that Cervantes was in Ulcinj, there is a legacy of African slavery here.<\/p>\n

Resit Kastrati is a local fisherman with a common Albanian name. He\u2019s also one of Ulcinj\u2019s very few black residents. Kastrati said his ancestors came here as slaves about 400 years ago, and they eventually integrated into the predominately Albanian community. By the 1870s, about 150 black families lived in and around Ulcinj.<\/p>\n

Now it\u2019s just Kastrati and his ailing mother. The black population declined dramatically after World War II, with death, intermarriage and emigration taking their toll.<\/p>\n

But Kastrati insists racism wasn\u2019t a factor.<\/p>\n

\u201cUlcinj is a special city,\u201d Kastrati said. \u201cThere is no racism here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kastrati, the son of a white Kosovo Albanian man and a black woman from Ulcinj, doesn\u2019t see himself as belonging to a particular group. He refers to himself simply as \u201ccrnac,\u201d or black man, in Montenegrin.<\/p>\n

That gets him a lot of attention here in Ulcinj. In fact, Kastrati said people here have treated his family like a mascot. He said that he likes that because it\u2019s not about skin color. He sees it as recognition of his family\u2019s place as one of the oldest in town; a family that\u2019s made a lot of contributions.<\/p>\n

Kastrati\u2019s friend, Mensur Kaleziq, who owns a local bar, said cultural tolerance comes naturally in Ulcinj.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody is from here,\u201d Kaleziq said. \u201cMaybe everyone is from Arabia or Albania or mixed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kaleziq himself is Arab Sudanese and Albanian. According to him, Ulcinj embraces its diversity more than other places in the Balkans.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis city is always different \u2013 not like how people think,” he said. “Everybody respects from where you are from.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ulcinj recently became a little more diverse. Two of the newest additions to the city\u2019s pro basketball team, KK Ulcinj, are African-Americans.<\/p>\n

Rickey Young, who formerly played for West Virginia Tech, said he was surprised by the reaction he got in Ulcinj.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere we\u2019re from, there\u2019s a lot black people, a lot of white people. You get here, you\u2019re like the only black face they see,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re pretty excited to see us.\u201d<\/p>\n

This summer, KK Ulcinj signed Young and Paul Kirkpatrick, who played at Howard University before a brief pro stint in Morocco. According to Kirkpatrick, while the reaction here is friendly, it occasionally borders on the offensive. He said people will sometimes stop their cars and turn around on the street.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople just yell out our names \u2018Black man,\u2019 everything, the N-word,\u201d Kirkpatrick said. \u201d Yeah, they say the N-word a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Young said that took some getting used to.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I first was hearing it, I was like, \u2018What did you just say?\u2019 But they don\u2019t really understand where the word comes from. They hear it on TV. They see black people call other black people the N-word, and they\u2019re getting like the wrong portion of it over here,\u201d Young said. \u201cYou can\u2019t get offended because they don\u2019t even understand what they\u2019re saying. It\u2019s kind of awkward.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, Resit Kastrati, one of Ulcinj\u2019s last black residents, said all the attention he receives comes from a fundamentally positive place.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t stay here if it weren\u2019t like that,\u201d Kastrati said.<\/p>\n

———————————————————-<\/p>\n

Read More<\/strong> PRI Public Radio International <\/a><\/h3>\n

PRI’s “The World” is a one-hour, weekday radio news magazine offering a mix of news, features, interviews, and music from around the globe. “The World” is a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH Boston.\u00a0More about The World<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

[flv width=”508″ height=”360″]http:\/\/video.zoover.nl\/media\/play\/2010\/01\/20100125130811_025.flv[\/flv]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Read More << Montenegrin town a beautiful melting pot with a surprising history >> Slideshow: An Old Pirate Town on the Adriatic Coast Ulcinj was once a home to slavery and pirates. Now it’s a somewhat diverse community that celebrates where people came from. \u00a0Play in New Window | Download Story from PRI’s The World. 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