EUROPE: LIFE IS SOMEWHERE ELSE

"Europe: Now you see it, now you don't."
Wim Wenders (from the speech during the conference "A Soul For Europe" in Berlin, 2006)

The project consists of three parts: Europe, Brussels & Serbia, and it questions the sense of national identity (or the lack of it) in today's Europe.
EUROPE is mostly proud of its non existing borders between the countries. It gives the sense of freedom and equality among people who used to be devided. It gives the illusion of belonging everywhere when in truth many people end up not belong anywhere.

"The Commission's civil service  has 23,043 persons who were employed by the Commission as officials and temporary agents. In addition to these, there are also 9019 "external staff" and  only 21.4% are Belgians."

Most of the people working in the European Commission , spend five days a week in Brussels "just for work" and two days a week they are at home. Can you really call home, a place where you spend two days a week?
BRUSSELS also has a large number of immigrants who are grouped in numerous communities and created a home for themselves. What differs them from the native citizens of Brussels is the fact that immigrants are closely binned together with the strong accent on the national symbols. Walking through the city you could easily forget yourself and for a moment think you are in a different country.
"In 2000, the Belgian authorities voted a so-called “Quick Citizenship” Act, bestowing Belgian nationality on foreigners as a simple procedure. So far the Quick Citizenship Act created 337,904 "new Belgians"  – an average of 4,277 per month."
SERBIA is, in my opinion, in a last few years in a kind of a specific position regarding its national identity - geographically  it IS a part of Europe but politically it ISN'T part of the EU. In the last elections it was shown that practically half of the citizens wants to enter the EU, the other half doesn't. On one hand, we have young people who leave the country either to get better schooling or a job and become themselves the young Europeans with confused sense of national identity. On the other hand, there are are numerous people living in Serbia, joined in groups with emphasized national symbols and convictions.
"On the elections in May 2008 "List for the European Serbia - Boris Tadić" got 1.590.200 votes i 102 mandates in the parliament,  "Serbian radical party - dr Vojislav Šešelj" 1.219.436 votes i 78 mandates."

For all the people of these three groups, the title of the project EUROPE: life is somewhere else, means something completely different.

Project will be finished in summer 2010.