What would be if…? That is, my dear Marina, how you could describe in the shortest way the task I received from Nedeljnik magazine. At the helm of a kind of emotional time machine (because the time machine certainly needs to have a helm and its navigator) and only with the help of imagination, without any maps and navigation devices, I have to reach to you as a child, or a young girl, and give you a couple of short tips. And who knows you better than I do – your future self, the bearer and the devoted guardian of all your memories?
To: Marina Maljković
Jurija Gagarina…
11070 Novi Beograd, SFRJ
October 1981
I have no special message to send to the most beautiful baby born in Block 63, except perhaps to eat better and not be skinny. Although, I know you well, you won’t listen to me, not because you don’t but because your “gu gu ga ga nooo” doesn’t mean a baby rejection, but an attitude. You are born with an attitude. It’s not something you adopt along the way.
To: Marina Maljković
Vrtlarska…
11080 Zemun, SFRJ
May 1985
To my little girl, growing up in the space between Vrtlarska street in Zemun and Block 30 to Block 21, I would say to play as much as she can. Actually, I wouldn’t change anything for her. In all honesty, you couldn’t even theoretically get more love than you get in that triangle.
To: Marina Maljković
Ribareva…
21000 Split, SFRJ
September 1988
Marina, to you who are just starting school, I would say to fall in love in basketball, because I know how big this mutual love is, how loyal and firm.
To: Marina Maljković
Đure Jakšića…
11000 Beograd, SCG
November 2001
Dear Marina, as you can see, people change. They are good and they are bad, they come and they leave. I was right about basketball, wasn’t I? It’s worthy of the sacrifice, believe me. All the schools and universities cannot teach you what you already know on your own. The fact that you went to trainings after school, and that you still go after classes in the university, is the only normal and right thing to do.
To: Marina Maljković
26300 Vršac, Srbija
October 2008
Dear colleague, coach, be diligent! Everything else will follow the efforts and talent invested!
To: Marina Maljković
Olympic Village
20000-000 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
August 2016
See, I was right! Now celebrate!
To: Marina Maljković
Somewhere in the USA
(i.e. 90210)
May 2027
My dear Marina, every past has its future. If you are studious and diligent enough, perhaps you will succeed in projecting yourself a couple of years in the future. Perhaps not. You wouldn’t be you if you don’t try. Perhaps some WNBA, or even an NBA team! Who could stop you except the dear God and you yourself?
Instead of a “P. S.” for all these letters, I give you my lasting advice – Marina, be what you are, and everything will be OK.
About the project
Project Letter to Younger Self is implemented in collaboration between Nedeljnik and McCann Truth Central Belgrade, as part of the research “Truth About Years”.
We are used that surveys and research mainly deal with the ratings of political parties and leaders. The real life is somehow avoided by researchers, but when they do pay attention to it, the results often surprise us.
Truth About Years, the research conducted globally by McCann Truth Central, had interesting results in Serbia. In the country that is currently considered “the oldest in Europe” results show the perception of Serbs toward old age. So we learned that a large part of the population was indifferent, and that a considerable part of the respondents were concerned, and even fearful of old age.
That is why McCann Truth Central Belgrade and Nedeljnik decided to launch an action following the research about years, in which every second issue of the magazine will publish a letter from a public figure to their younger self, and a letter to their older self. All of the texts will eventually be compiled in a book that will be released in 2019. It will be a kind of collection of opinions, and an inventory of youth and promises of the old age.
