Bosnian Serbs commemorate war victims

whoever tries to overlook the genocide against 4,000 innocent Serbian children,women and elder in Srebrenica, is a two-faced hypocrite.
May the souls of these people rest in peace, knowing the RS stands tall and strong in the hearts of all Serbs.
Long Live independent RS.

You PRN, and people like you, is why there will never be peace in the world. You value one ethnic life over another. Is that what Islam teaches you, or are these your own miserable feelings? I will not bother reading your comments hence.

PRN: "Some idiots try to equate genocide with killings of few people!!!!"

I don't hear anyone trying to belittle what happened at Srebrenica. But a savage and brutal murder is terrible irrelevant of ethnicity or numbers.

I don't hear you say anything about the innocent people, including children, who were brutally murdered and happened to be Serbian or any group other than your own.

Since when was there a sliding scale for the value of life or the severity of crimes? It's all horrendous.

Some idiots try to equate genocide with killings of few people!!!!

SHAME!

I suppose even Tadic would laugh at this.

RIP to all innocent victims. It's unfortunate that many ignore the crimes committed against Serbians.

My condolence go out to all the innocent Serbs who were slaughtered at the hands of the Muslims in Srebrenica!

The fact that the Bosnian Muslim officials chose to ignore this event is a clear sign of their guilt and that the condoned this slaughter!

SHAME on them!

We will never forget pictures of burning body`s,severed heads of Serbian people who were on the path of blood thirsty mujahedins led by naser oric.
And let`s not forget that UN to this day forbids those pictures to be published.
My heart goes to all who lost family members.
We will always remember them,and their pain.

The fact that no Muslims, Croats or Western dignitaries ever attend the memorial of Serbian victims of the Bosnian war underscores the crass double standard practices by the West and our media. What is startling is that the Serbs, victims in World War II of a monstrous genocide in Bosnia and Croatia, are ignored today. That genocide is long forgotten. And the new Serb victims in Croatia and Bosnia, equally forgotten.

The losers of a propaganda war unprecedented in history.

PRN,

So the murder of over 3,500 innocent Serbian men, women and children villagers is a massacre but the killing of under 4,000 Muslim soldiers who committed those crimes is a genocide?

Your hypocrisy is boundless.

Its almost as novel as you Albanians stealing Serbian land yet maintaining that 'Kosovo borders cannot be changed'. . .

Serbs have all the rights to commemorate their compatriots who were killed by the 1000s during the civil war. Srebrenica is not the sole sad episode in this terrible war.

Again in the wetern controlled media still the anti-Serb propaganda is alive, where the one-sided garbage is still written for the masses to be brainwashed.

lids, here are those pics you mentioned in your post about Serbs that were massacred and mutilated by mujahideen and their Bosnian Muslim compatriots

http://real-srebrenica-genocide.blogspot.com/

RIP!
Innocent people were killed on all sides of the war, this needs to acknowledged instead of everyone just pointing the finger at the Serbs.

PRN, whether you like it or not, the Srebrenica massacre didn't happen in a vaccuum. It was a crime, but it wasn't an unprovoked crime against an innocent civilian population like the Holocaust was.

The so-called Srebrenica "genocide" wouldn't have happened if these other massacres hadn't happened first. One was a direct result of the other.

During the trial of Slobodan Milosevic in The Hague, General Morillon was asked by Judge Robinson: "Are you saying, then, General, that what happened in 1995 was a direct reaction to what Naser Oric did to the Serbs two years before?" Morillon replied: "Yes your Honour. I am convinced of that."

So there it is from the UNPROFOR commander himself. The Muslims massacred the Serbs, so the Serbs massacred them back. It might be ugly, but it's understandable. How many people have died in Afghanistan because of 9/11? Srebrenica is "genocide" in much the same fashion as the dasht-i-leili massacre in Afghanistan was an act of genocide.

Nobody was innocent in Bosnia, but it's time for everybody to forgive and forget and move on. Every July this happens, and honestly it's holding everyone back.

The wounds of the Second World War healed faster than this. By 1960 (15 years after the fact) much of Europe had moved on from the war. Why can't Bosnia move on? The Siege of Sarajevo was a walk in the park compared to the Siege of Leningrad, or London During the Blitz, or the carpet bombing of Dresden. There were more civilians killed in the March 10, 1945 Tokyo fire bombing than all of the people (soldiers and civilians combined) killed in the whole Bosnian war.

I don't know about you, but I don't hear the Japanese accusing the Americans of genocide every time March 10th rolls around, and they lost 100,000 civilians in one night when the Americans firebombed Tokyo. Srebrenica with it's 8,000 (mostly military) victims is nothing compared to that. I don't hear the Japanese making accusations of Genocide against the United States on August 6th or August 9th either and that was when 200,000+ Japanese people were killed by the Atomic bombs.

If the Japanese people can get over it and move on so can the Bosnian Muslims and the Bosnian Serbs.

It is not true that no representatives of Serb Republic (RS) were present in Srebrenica on Sunday. The RS was yesterday represented by the Vice Premier Jasna Brkic , the Minister of refugees and displaced persons Omer Brankovic and by Miladin Dragicevic, advisor to the RS Prime Minister. But it is true that there were no representatives of the Muslim-Croat Federation in Bratunac.

"Orić's forces stormed the Serb villages of Zalazje, Biljača, Sase and Zagone and killed and massacred 69 civilians."

Killed AND massacred? How excessive.

people!!!!

SHAME!

I suppose even Tadic would laugh at this.
(PRN, 12 July 2010 09:43)
=====================

Words fail me here.

A few people? A FEW PEOPLE!!!
What is wrong with you?
Where is your humanity?
Thousands of Serbs were brutally killed and ethnically cleansed and you say a few people.

We should all cry for the Muslims but dare anyone suggest that we cry for the Serbs and it all gets belittled.
A few people indeed. Shame on YOU.

Actually, kate, people have been denying and belittling what happened at srebrenica while it was happening, and ever since, as i'm sure you are very aware of. let's just be clear about that.

personally i mourn the death of all the innocent victims. but the context of srebrenica -- which was surrounded, starved and targeted for "ethnic cleansing" from the very beginning by guess who -- that is what is so conveniently missing from the analysis here...

roberto
frisco

"On June 12 1992 - a day marked by Orthodox Serbs as the holiday of St. Paul and Peter - Orić's forces stormed the Serb villages of Zalazje, Biljača, Sase and Zagone and killed and massacred 69 civilians."
And the commemoration after the one of the Srebrenica massacre of 1995. It seems like an attemp of comparaison, so of relativisation of the facts of 1995

Xeni, I don't claim for a minute that the Japanese were innocent of wrongdoing in the second world war. They have blood on their hands for sure. But I hope you appreciate the fact that your argument about Japanese atrocities in China would be dismissed by the Hague Tribunal as "tu quoque" if they were having a genocide trial about the American attacks on Tokyo, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki.

The civilian population of Tokyo, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki weren't the ones who carried out the rape of Nankin. The Japanese military did that, but it was the civilians who were killed in the firebomning and the nuclear attacks.

At least in Srebrenica, the Serbs evacuated the women and children to safety and limited the killing to soldiers for the most part. Of the Srebrenica victims identified by the ICMP 93.9% are military-aged men, and the ICTY investigators have found ABiH military service records in Tuzla for 70.1% of the dead and missing men from Srebrenica. The Bosnian-Muslim military force was obviously the target of the Srebrenica massacre.

The number of women and children killed in the massacre was negligable. The ICMP has found remains for nine boys under age 14, and remains for eleven women, every other victim was an adult male.

The Bosnian-Muslim military force in Srebrenica is also the force responsible for the massacres being commemorated by the Bosnian-Serbs in this article.

One could argue that the Bosnian-Serbs over reacted, but one could also argue that the Americans over-reacted to 9/11 or to the attack on Pearl Harbor. But it's difficult to make a credible accusation of genocide when the entity being accused is retaliating against an attack.

The Bosnian Muslims are the ones who started the war in the first palce. They are the ones who rejected the Lisbon Agreement (after they signed it). They are the ones who set up Patriotic League and Green Beret paramilitary units before the war in order to attack the Yugoslav Peoples Army on it's own territory. I personally saw how they laid seige to the Marshal Tito Barracks in Sarajevo and attacked the JNA military hospital before the war. If you're going to argue that the Japanese can't have been victims of genocide because they have blood on their hands too, then you have to admit that the same holds true of the Bosnian Muslims. If they hadn't started the war in the first place there wouldn't have been any war crimes at all.

And Gladko, what evidence do you have that all 8,000 Srebrenica massacre victims were POWs? I don't see any good evidence that the Bosnian-Serbs captured all of those people and executed them. Many people died fighting their way through the woods out of Srebrenica towards Tuzla.

According to the ABiH, there were at least 6,000 armed soldiers in the column of men that left Srebrenica. We know from the UN Military Observers that the Bosnian-Serbs only had about 3,500 soldiers in the area. It was really a shock to everyone when Srebrenica fell because the Muslims had the means to repel the attack but they didn't. They decided to fight their way through the Serbian lines to Tuzla instead, and many of them died in the process.

It is entirely possible that the majority of victims died in the fighting. There is evidence that some were captured and executed, but that's only for a few hundred people. The cause of death for the vast majority hasn't been determined, and so rather premature to make an allegation of genocide when the facts aren't really known.

If the Japanese people can get over it and move on so can the Bosnian Muslims and the Bosnian Serbs.
(Alex, 12 July 2010 21:32)

I don't think Japanese can be compared to the poor victims of Srebrenica. All historians, even Japanese, agree that the behaviour and the atrocities committed by the Japanese forces upon Chinese were in a way at least as horrific as those of the Nazis.

Japanese have nothing to complain for !! in Nankin, they killed not less than 300 000 Chinese within a week !!! Japanese themselves know they only dare to shut up and "new" China is now up to ensure they shut up...

«Srebrenica with it's 8,000 (mostly military) victims is nothing compared to that.»

POW are protected by international laws, just as the civilians. Too bad that officers like Mladic, Oric, Gotovina and the soldiers have ignored and passed over the laws.

5,000 Muslim Lives for Military Intervention

Dani, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Hercegovina, June 22 1998

Interview with Hakija Meholjic, president of Social Democratic Party for Srebrenica, by Hasan Hadzi

http://www.ex-yupress.com/dani/dani2.html

"... So you rejected Izetbegovic's decision?

We rejected it without any discussion. Then he said: "You know, I was offered by Clinton in April 1993 (after the fall of Cerska and Konjevic Polje) that the Chetnik forces enter Srebrenica, carry out a slaughter of 5,000 Muslims, and then there will be a military intervention." Our delegation was composed of nine people, one among us was from Bratunac and unfortunately he is the only one not alive now, but all the others from the delegation are alive and can confirm this. Since the Convention had started the President entered to announce us, and when he did it all the present stood up and welcomed us with an applause as heroes. We had a request, in case the peace plan was accepted, that Srebrenica be provided a physical link with Tuzla and not with Gorazde. Therefore, we asked for Bratunac and Zvornik because a link across the desolate stretches and mountains did not suit us and we had never been linked to that area anyway. It was said the President would receive all delegations, but he accepted them all except ours..."

I disagree Andy, the difference between the Japanese and the peoples of the former Yugoslavia is that the Japanese don't dwell on the past. And they don't waste their time harboring animosity towards their wartime enemies and feeling sorry for themselves because of what happened in the war. They put it behind them and they went on to build one of richest and most prosporous nations on the planet. Everybody in the former Yugoslavia could take a lesson from that.

Nobody in the former Yugoslavia is innocent. Everybody did bad things. There is more than enough blame to go around for everyone. As far as I'm concerned everyone is guilty, nobody gets to play the righteous victim card and make demands that the other side be "held accountable" for their sins unless they're willing to confess their own sins first -- and everyone has sins to confess.

I guess the difference between the Japanese and the former Yugoslavia is that the crimes of the Japanese were mostly against those from other nations (Korea, China etc.) but in Yugoslavia, the communities were mixed in and continue to live side by side.

Alex, I agree that the Japanese have got on with it and not harboured grudges, but I think the reason for that is that they don't face those who they fought against on a daily basis and they aren't involved in territorial disputes with people living in the same country.

You're spot on that confessions need to be made. South Africa and Germany did this and moved forward, but it's still very clouded in the Balkans. Serbia at least seem to be facing the unpleasant truth, but RS are still in denial. As for the other parts of the former Yugoslavia, they hide behind the demonisation of the Serbs and need pressure from outside, probably the EU as the UN are little more than a talking shop.

Some idiots try to equate genocide with killings of few people!!!!

SHAME!

I suppose even Tadic would laugh at this.

PRN,

So the murder of over 3,500 innocent Serbian men, women and children villagers is a massacre but the killing of under 4,000 Muslim soldiers who committed those crimes is a genocide?

Your hypocrisy is boundless.

Its almost as novel as you Albanians stealing Serbian land yet maintaining that 'Kosovo borders cannot be changed'. . .

Again in the wetern controlled media still the anti-Serb propaganda is alive, where the one-sided garbage is still written for the masses to be brainwashed.

"Orić's forces stormed the Serb villages of Zalazje, Biljača, Sase and Zagone and killed and massacred 69 civilians."

Killed AND massacred? How excessive.

lids, here are those pics you mentioned in your post about Serbs that were massacred and mutilated by mujahideen and their Bosnian Muslim compatriots

http://real-srebrenica-genocide.blogspot.com/

The fact that no Muslims, Croats or Western dignitaries ever attend the memorial of Serbian victims of the Bosnian war underscores the crass double standard practices by the West and our media. What is startling is that the Serbs, victims in World War II of a monstrous genocide in Bosnia and Croatia, are ignored today. That genocide is long forgotten. And the new Serb victims in Croatia and Bosnia, equally forgotten.

The losers of a propaganda war unprecedented in history.

We will never forget pictures of burning body`s,severed heads of Serbian people who were on the path of blood thirsty mujahedins led by naser oric.
And let`s not forget that UN to this day forbids those pictures to be published.
My heart goes to all who lost family members.
We will always remember them,and their pain.

PRN, whether you like it or not, the Srebrenica massacre didn't happen in a vaccuum. It was a crime, but it wasn't an unprovoked crime against an innocent civilian population like the Holocaust was.

The so-called Srebrenica "genocide" wouldn't have happened if these other massacres hadn't happened first. One was a direct result of the other.

During the trial of Slobodan Milosevic in The Hague, General Morillon was asked by Judge Robinson: "Are you saying, then, General, that what happened in 1995 was a direct reaction to what Naser Oric did to the Serbs two years before?" Morillon replied: "Yes your Honour. I am convinced of that."

So there it is from the UNPROFOR commander himself. The Muslims massacred the Serbs, so the Serbs massacred them back. It might be ugly, but it's understandable. How many people have died in Afghanistan because of 9/11? Srebrenica is "genocide" in much the same fashion as the dasht-i-leili massacre in Afghanistan was an act of genocide.

Nobody was innocent in Bosnia, but it's time for everybody to forgive and forget and move on. Every July this happens, and honestly it's holding everyone back.

The wounds of the Second World War healed faster than this. By 1960 (15 years after the fact) much of Europe had moved on from the war. Why can't Bosnia move on? The Siege of Sarajevo was a walk in the park compared to the Siege of Leningrad, or London During the Blitz, or the carpet bombing of Dresden. There were more civilians killed in the March 10, 1945 Tokyo fire bombing than all of the people (soldiers and civilians combined) killed in the whole Bosnian war.

I don't know about you, but I don't hear the Japanese accusing the Americans of genocide every time March 10th rolls around, and they lost 100,000 civilians in one night when the Americans firebombed Tokyo. Srebrenica with it's 8,000 (mostly military) victims is nothing compared to that. I don't hear the Japanese making accusations of Genocide against the United States on August 6th or August 9th either and that was when 200,000+ Japanese people were killed by the Atomic bombs.

If the Japanese people can get over it and move on so can the Bosnian Muslims and the Bosnian Serbs.

RIP!
Innocent people were killed on all sides of the war, this needs to acknowledged instead of everyone just pointing the finger at the Serbs.

You PRN, and people like you, is why there will never be peace in the world. You value one ethnic life over another. Is that what Islam teaches you, or are these your own miserable feelings? I will not bother reading your comments hence.

RIP to all innocent victims. It's unfortunate that many ignore the crimes committed against Serbians.

My condolence go out to all the innocent Serbs who were slaughtered at the hands of the Muslims in Srebrenica!

The fact that the Bosnian Muslim officials chose to ignore this event is a clear sign of their guilt and that the condoned this slaughter!

SHAME on them!

Serbs have all the rights to commemorate their compatriots who were killed by the 1000s during the civil war. Srebrenica is not the sole sad episode in this terrible war.

whoever tries to overlook the genocide against 4,000 innocent Serbian children,women and elder in Srebrenica, is a two-faced hypocrite.
May the souls of these people rest in peace, knowing the RS stands tall and strong in the hearts of all Serbs.
Long Live independent RS.

PRN: "Some idiots try to equate genocide with killings of few people!!!!"

I don't hear anyone trying to belittle what happened at Srebrenica. But a savage and brutal murder is terrible irrelevant of ethnicity or numbers.

I don't hear you say anything about the innocent people, including children, who were brutally murdered and happened to be Serbian or any group other than your own.

Since when was there a sliding scale for the value of life or the severity of crimes? It's all horrendous.

Actually, kate, people have been denying and belittling what happened at srebrenica while it was happening, and ever since, as i'm sure you are very aware of. let's just be clear about that.

personally i mourn the death of all the innocent victims. but the context of srebrenica -- which was surrounded, starved and targeted for "ethnic cleansing" from the very beginning by guess who -- that is what is so conveniently missing from the analysis here...

roberto
frisco

It is not true that no representatives of Serb Republic (RS) were present in Srebrenica on Sunday. The RS was yesterday represented by the Vice Premier Jasna Brkic , the Minister of refugees and displaced persons Omer Brankovic and by Miladin Dragicevic, advisor to the RS Prime Minister. But it is true that there were no representatives of the Muslim-Croat Federation in Bratunac.

people!!!!

SHAME!

I suppose even Tadic would laugh at this.
(PRN, 12 July 2010 09:43)
=====================

Words fail me here.

A few people? A FEW PEOPLE!!!
What is wrong with you?
Where is your humanity?
Thousands of Serbs were brutally killed and ethnically cleansed and you say a few people.

We should all cry for the Muslims but dare anyone suggest that we cry for the Serbs and it all gets belittled.
A few people indeed. Shame on YOU.

Xeni, I don't claim for a minute that the Japanese were innocent of wrongdoing in the second world war. They have blood on their hands for sure. But I hope you appreciate the fact that your argument about Japanese atrocities in China would be dismissed by the Hague Tribunal as "tu quoque" if they were having a genocide trial about the American attacks on Tokyo, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki.

The civilian population of Tokyo, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki weren't the ones who carried out the rape of Nankin. The Japanese military did that, but it was the civilians who were killed in the firebomning and the nuclear attacks.

At least in Srebrenica, the Serbs evacuated the women and children to safety and limited the killing to soldiers for the most part. Of the Srebrenica victims identified by the ICMP 93.9% are military-aged men, and the ICTY investigators have found ABiH military service records in Tuzla for 70.1% of the dead and missing men from Srebrenica. The Bosnian-Muslim military force was obviously the target of the Srebrenica massacre.

The number of women and children killed in the massacre was negligable. The ICMP has found remains for nine boys under age 14, and remains for eleven women, every other victim was an adult male.

The Bosnian-Muslim military force in Srebrenica is also the force responsible for the massacres being commemorated by the Bosnian-Serbs in this article.

One could argue that the Bosnian-Serbs over reacted, but one could also argue that the Americans over-reacted to 9/11 or to the attack on Pearl Harbor. But it's difficult to make a credible accusation of genocide when the entity being accused is retaliating against an attack.

The Bosnian Muslims are the ones who started the war in the first palce. They are the ones who rejected the Lisbon Agreement (after they signed it). They are the ones who set up Patriotic League and Green Beret paramilitary units before the war in order to attack the Yugoslav Peoples Army on it's own territory. I personally saw how they laid seige to the Marshal Tito Barracks in Sarajevo and attacked the JNA military hospital before the war. If you're going to argue that the Japanese can't have been victims of genocide because they have blood on their hands too, then you have to admit that the same holds true of the Bosnian Muslims. If they hadn't started the war in the first place there wouldn't have been any war crimes at all.

And Gladko, what evidence do you have that all 8,000 Srebrenica massacre victims were POWs? I don't see any good evidence that the Bosnian-Serbs captured all of those people and executed them. Many people died fighting their way through the woods out of Srebrenica towards Tuzla.

According to the ABiH, there were at least 6,000 armed soldiers in the column of men that left Srebrenica. We know from the UN Military Observers that the Bosnian-Serbs only had about 3,500 soldiers in the area. It was really a shock to everyone when Srebrenica fell because the Muslims had the means to repel the attack but they didn't. They decided to fight their way through the Serbian lines to Tuzla instead, and many of them died in the process.

It is entirely possible that the majority of victims died in the fighting. There is evidence that some were captured and executed, but that's only for a few hundred people. The cause of death for the vast majority hasn't been determined, and so rather premature to make an allegation of genocide when the facts aren't really known.

If the Japanese people can get over it and move on so can the Bosnian Muslims and the Bosnian Serbs.
(Alex, 12 July 2010 21:32)

I don't think Japanese can be compared to the poor victims of Srebrenica. All historians, even Japanese, agree that the behaviour and the atrocities committed by the Japanese forces upon Chinese were in a way at least as horrific as those of the Nazis.

Japanese have nothing to complain for !! in Nankin, they killed not less than 300 000 Chinese within a week !!! Japanese themselves know they only dare to shut up and "new" China is now up to ensure they shut up...

5,000 Muslim Lives for Military Intervention

Dani, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Hercegovina, June 22 1998

Interview with Hakija Meholjic, president of Social Democratic Party for Srebrenica, by Hasan Hadzi

http://www.ex-yupress.com/dani/dani2.html

"... So you rejected Izetbegovic's decision?

We rejected it without any discussion. Then he said: "You know, I was offered by Clinton in April 1993 (after the fall of Cerska and Konjevic Polje) that the Chetnik forces enter Srebrenica, carry out a slaughter of 5,000 Muslims, and then there will be a military intervention." Our delegation was composed of nine people, one among us was from Bratunac and unfortunately he is the only one not alive now, but all the others from the delegation are alive and can confirm this. Since the Convention had started the President entered to announce us, and when he did it all the present stood up and welcomed us with an applause as heroes. We had a request, in case the peace plan was accepted, that Srebrenica be provided a physical link with Tuzla and not with Gorazde. Therefore, we asked for Bratunac and Zvornik because a link across the desolate stretches and mountains did not suit us and we had never been linked to that area anyway. It was said the President would receive all delegations, but he accepted them all except ours..."

«Srebrenica with it's 8,000 (mostly military) victims is nothing compared to that.»

POW are protected by international laws, just as the civilians. Too bad that officers like Mladic, Oric, Gotovina and the soldiers have ignored and passed over the laws.

"On June 12 1992 - a day marked by Orthodox Serbs as the holiday of St. Paul and Peter - Orić's forces stormed the Serb villages of Zalazje, Biljača, Sase and Zagone and killed and massacred 69 civilians."
And the commemoration after the one of the Srebrenica massacre of 1995. It seems like an attemp of comparaison, so of relativisation of the facts of 1995

I disagree Andy, the difference between the Japanese and the peoples of the former Yugoslavia is that the Japanese don't dwell on the past. And they don't waste their time harboring animosity towards their wartime enemies and feeling sorry for themselves because of what happened in the war. They put it behind them and they went on to build one of richest and most prosporous nations on the planet. Everybody in the former Yugoslavia could take a lesson from that.

Nobody in the former Yugoslavia is innocent. Everybody did bad things. There is more than enough blame to go around for everyone. As far as I'm concerned everyone is guilty, nobody gets to play the righteous victim card and make demands that the other side be "held accountable" for their sins unless they're willing to confess their own sins first -- and everyone has sins to confess.

I guess the difference between the Japanese and the former Yugoslavia is that the crimes of the Japanese were mostly against those from other nations (Korea, China etc.) but in Yugoslavia, the communities were mixed in and continue to live side by side.

Alex, I agree that the Japanese have got on with it and not harboured grudges, but I think the reason for that is that they don't face those who they fought against on a daily basis and they aren't involved in territorial disputes with people living in the same country.

You're spot on that confessions need to be made. South Africa and Germany did this and moved forward, but it's still very clouded in the Balkans. Serbia at least seem to be facing the unpleasant truth, but RS are still in denial. As for the other parts of the former Yugoslavia, they hide behind the demonisation of the Serbs and need pressure from outside, probably the EU as the UN are little more than a talking shop.