Drugi jezik na kojem je dostupan ovaj članak: Bosnian
By: Ekrem Dupanović
Today is the first day of Eid al-Adha. The holiday aroma can be felt in houses and yards. People are cheerful and beautiful. They will spend the entire day today visiting relatives and friends, sharing Kurban, pieces of meat (usually sheep or veal) that was offered as a sacrifice to the Allah Almighty
To all Muslims I wish Eid Mubarak!
For you who don’t celebrate Eid, I wish that the next three days you feel the same joy that I feel when every year in November I go to Belgrade, for a patron’s day celebration with my friend Goran, or on Christmas when I visit my friend Tomislav. Let us rejoice not only our own, but the happiness of other people as well. Let us spread the positive energy and make the lives of all people better.
A couple of days ago I was on the phone with Dunja Ivana Ballon from HURA:
“Hi Ekrem, how are you? What are you up to?”
“I’m just lying in bed.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I had a nasty fall a couple of days ago while playing football, so I’m lying down now, unable to leave the bed.”
“Dear Ekrem, how old are you?”
“Sixty-six.”
“Are you insane? Playing football in your age! Please come to your senses.”
It’s true, a couple of days ago I fell playing football, hitting the floor with my whole weight, so now I’m tied to bed, with severe pain in the lower back. Luckily nothing was broken, but it hurts. A physiatrist and a superb physiotherapist are trying to raise me to my feet. Interference current therapy (I had so much current running through me, if someone was to put a light bulb against me it would lit up), ice massages, gel massages, Bioptron therapies, exercise… Each treatment lasts two hours, and every day I have three therapies. Asja is sending essential oils from St. Galen via DHL. “Breathe them Papa. They reduce pain and have a beneficial effect on the brain.” The whole situation is masterfully managed by Vedrana. A man who has a wife like this can handle anything. Only she knows what she’s going through, but her smile never leaves her face, because she knows how important it is for me to have positive atmosphere now.
My working room is limited. I always liked Steve Jobs, but now I love him even more, because of the iPad that allows me to work. What iPad can’t do, Amir can, who is spending the entire days with me. We talk about the development of our digital media, so while in my bed I promoted Amir to Chief Innovation Officer. We also solved some technological issues which we were mulling for a long time. As soon as I receive something on the iPad, I read it and arrange it, and then Amir goes to my computer to upload it all to Drive, so Adnan can translate it and send it to Gina for proofreading. Adnan took over the editing of the portal and the preparation of most of the news. We’re a small but a badass crew. Nothing can break our stride.
I hope I’ll be able to travel to Zagreb and Tuheljske Toplice on Wednesday. To Zagreb for a goooood one seafood lunch with Ksenija Renko and Rene Bakalović, and to Tuheljske Toplice for the Direct Media Academy. The Academy would mean a lot in terms of getting more familiar with media planning, because we’re preparing a special edition of Media Marketing dedicated to media business. I could really use these three or four days in the company of friends, and the hydro massage and swimming would also come in handy to completely fix my back. God willing that by Wednesday I’ll be able to endure the five-hour drive. Amir would drive, but I have problems sitting down. Today is Eid and I will spend all day praying to Allah (what little prayers I know) to grant me mercy and lifts me to my feet.
We’re going through a big reorganization. It’s what Ivan Stanković would call a reorganization out of necessity. By the end of October we should complete our business plan for the next year. We need to strengthen our team. We need a creative director, a new interpreter because Adnan will be taking on the responsibility of executive editor, we need someone who will lead our business section (ads, banners, sponsorships…), we need an event manager… I will try to get out of daily operational activities and deal with strategic issues and strategic communication. The problem for us in drafting a business plan for the next year is not how to come up with work, but how to give up on some ideas and projects, because we can’t get to all of them. We don’t go to pitches and we don’t have clients that would try to turn us into their slaves, as they do to the agencies, we do only those projects that we have created, for which we believe can contribute to the development of the communication industry and for which there is a market. For next year we have really big plans. I told you, we’re a small, but a badass crew!
12 April 2016.