Goran Bregović

In the 1950s, Piazza Ponterosso in Trieste became the favourite shopping destination for every citizen of Yugoslavia, and in the 1970s and 1980s blue jeans became a symbol of this phenomenon. Those were the years millions of Yugoslavs travelled to Trieste a couple of times a year, until the Balkan war put an end to it. This film is a mosaic of funny stories from both sides of the border.

Filmmaker Hermann Vaske explores the creative Balkan world in the hopes of understanding the meaning of "Balkan spirit", by interviewing philosopher Slavoj Žižek and various artists. However, the term's complexity very quickly becomes apparent and it seems increasingly difficult, if not impossible, to define the Balkans' geographical location, its people and its culture. Indeed, contradiction, chaos and change is at the Balkans very core.