Nearly two decades in Australia has transformed Lara Jakica's life from homeless refugee to a writer immersed in a vibrant life of culture and creativity.
By CHARLOTTE ROBERT
The apartment, on the third floor of this white building, is quiet and and the walls are covered with bookshelves. There is German, Russian and English, with some Georgian and French as well.
Lara Jakica is sitting in the kitchen, in front of her computer, writing her thesis. The perfume of the black tea she is drinking makes the atmosphere peaceful despite the storm outside. In two weeks, she will celebrate her 18th year in Australia.
Lara was a refugee in Belgrade, Serbia, trying to escape a raging conflict. Her home country, Bosnia, was in the middle of a civil war and she felt there was no choice but to leave. When she left her village, Šipovo, the army was close. It was time.
Several weeks later, she heard her house had been destroyed by bombs.
“We lost everything; we lost our house, it was all burnt and we did not know anywhere to go to so we decided to emigrate,” she remembers.
While applying for Canadian, New Zealand and Australian visas, she imagined herself and her family living Down Under.
“We will see kangaroos, go to the beach, walk in the bush, and have a nice weather,” she said to her sister.
First, she had to spend a year in Belgrade.
“Life in Bosnia during the war was easier than one year in Belgrade. There is nothing worse than to be a refugee because yesterday you were surviving and now you are in limbo, in the middle of nowhere. You are not a citizen any more,” she says.
Queuing at the Red Cross for food, other children would make fun of her because of her accent.
Finally her visa arrived. It was for Australia.
When she reached Melbourne with her parents and her sister, she did not know a word of English, but it did not matter; she was in another country, ready to start a new life far from violence and war.
“Fresh start with new people and a new language. I don’t even remember what my first word was. I don’t remember that someone told me: ‘OK, repeat after me. My name is Lara’,” she says pronouncing every syllable slowly like a teacher would do.
Lara studied English for one-and-a-half years before enrolling in biology at RMIT University. “When I learned English, I learned about myself as well and I realised nature was one of the most consistent loves in my life.”
She remembers bushwalks with her father where she had to recognise herbs and flowers. She thought she wanted to be a biologist but, before starting her course, she visited a biology lab.
Standing there, she realised that to be a biologist meant too much time spent confined “in a white coat between four walls smelling unpleasant chemical odours”.
For Lara and her passion for the outdoors, this was impossible.
She turned to the second love of her life: writing, particularly poetry. So she re-enrolled in Arts and did a languages and literature course that combined English, German and poetry.
She learned about other cultures, spent hours studying foreign literature and continued to write.
In 2002, her love for poetry was rewarded when she published her first book of poems, Vinograd (vineyard) — most of them written in Serbian.
Although her first years as a student were difficult, she persisted and is now working towards a PhD in cultural studies at Monash University.
Linking her past and her current life, she is writing her thesis on Serbian mythology through poetry. “Maybe I decided to pick this topic subconsciously,” she says, smiling.
Despite how far away life has taken her, she still has a love of Serbia and Serbian culture. As a member of the Multicultural Advisory Board for the city of Port Phillip, she organised, few years ago, a transcultural event in St Kilda Town Hall to celebrate Serbian culture in Australia. It explored poetry, theatre, dance and music.
At the same time, she wrote for theatre. Co-founder of the theatre group Cabaret Balkan, she organised festivals where her words could come alive.
“I played myself sometimes but I wasn’t the greatest actress; I was more into writing texts. So gradually I moved backstage,” she confesses.
But the atmosphere hooked her. She now flies from one festival to another, meeting people from other worlds, writing pieces and making coffee.
“Because yes, the third love of my life is coffee.”
To recreate the perfect flat white during festivals, she went to coffee schools. She uses her new expertise behind the coffee machine at the "village festival" where her stall is transformed into a stage. Wearing costumes and sometimes reciting verses, she makes coffee “to bring people together”.
In two weeks she will celebrate her 18th year in Australia. Since then, her life has changed and so has she. Both academic and artist, she is stronger and more than alive.
“I think of myself as a quiet person who likes to sit and read and think, but I appear to be very active and multi-tasking. Maybe I cannot just sit and just relax.”