The Highlander Below Šator Mountain

Forty-six-year-old Žarko Jović is the sole resident of the village of Malo Tičevo, located about twenty kilometers from Bosansko Grahovo, a village with neither electricity nor water.

The village of Malo Tičevo is situated at the very foot of the Šator mountain, at an altitude of 1,500 meters above sea level.

Once, about twenty families lived in the village, but today only one returnee, Žarko Jović, lives there, who says he traded Banja Luka for the most beautiful village in the world – Malo Tičevo.

"When I left my native village during the war years, I dreamed of returning below Šator, to my homeland, and I returned two years ago. I live like a lone wolf, but I live on my own land, and that has no price. My heart is full. This is a part of me," says Jović, as he gazes at the 1,875-meter-high Šator mountain from in front of his house.

He says he gets his supplies from Bosansko Grahovo, more than twenty kilometers away from the village.

"The road is bad, I have no electricity or water, luckily I'm still young, so I don't need a doctor," Žarko says with a smile.

With a cheerful spirit, a smile on his face, and a firm handshake, short in stature but with a heart larger than Krajina, Žarko welcomes every guest and accidental passerby with special joy in his renovated house at the foot of Šator, but he also recalls past times with special emotions.

"I wish people would return to their homes, what are they doing abroad? I returned to where my father and grandfather were born, I am happy," says forty-six-year-old Žarko, who says in his free time he goes hunting and into the forest, thus spending his days and welcoming brighter dawns.

And in Krajina, where winters are long, and clouds rest when they move from the sea above Šator, the highlander Žarko Jović remains with hope for brighter dawns, without electricity, but with a sparkle in his eye in his native village of Malo Tičevo.