Radio Stamps: Centenary Vaska Ilieva Glogovac.

This singer, who so many times crossed the Hertzian airwaves in the former Yugoslavia, was born in Chair [municipality that has the second largest bazaar in Europe after Istanbul]-Skopje on February 21, 1923 when the region was framed in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes; she died in the capital Skopje on May 4, 2001 [current Republic of North Macedonia].

The country is wedged between Greece, Albania, Kosovo [a contentious issue that has not yet been resolved and where hatred is palpable in the atmosphere], Serbia and Bulgaria.

The capital is the most important city in the area and has almost half of the country's population that does not reach two million people. There are two official languages Macedonian and Albanian, it occupies 25,713 square kilometers; it is a member of NATO and has been calling the EU since 2005.

She was one of the most popular folk singers of the Balkans or, if you prefer, of the former Yugoslavia, she was practically active for more than half a century and her voice reached the whole world through the broadcasts of the international service of Radio Yugoslavia [including that of the Spanish service] until the explosion of the Balkans, at the end of the XX, ended up ending the political entity that we knew as the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia that Tito kept with a firm hand until his death. Shortly after the conflict of the various exclusionary nationalisms that occur in the region broke out and brought us images of the most torn horror, also the intervention of NATO [thank goodness it is to preserve peace] and the bombings on civilian population, at that time it was led by a Spanish socialist.

Vaska began her career as a dancer and singer in the fifties of the last century within the national group Tanec, her style permeated the entire region and, especially, the area of Macedonia whose diaspora all over the world awarded her the nickname "The Queen".

The large colonies of emigrants [it was the only communist system that allowed emigrating] expanded his fame and allowed him to perform not only in Europe, but in America and Australia where his performances, multitudinous and cheerful, were especially followed in the traditional parties that these groups of emigrants usually hold to kill the little worm of nostalgia [something that also happened with the Spaniards in those times, especially in Germany].

Her repertoire had no less than eight hundred songs that made her one of the most versatile interpreters of the folklore of this Balkan region, she was one of the standard bearers, of the fighters, for the independence of Macedonia [the last country to be recognized in the area]. Vaska lived the years of struggle intensely, the declaration of independence was made in 1991, it would begin to be recognized by the international community two years later but, until 2019, it would not be recognized with the current name since Athens did not admit the generic denomination because it affected part of its homonymous region: they avoided at all costs to be identified with the territories and the violence of the remains of the terminated Yugoslavia.

Four years after that date, it was philatelized by Skopje with a stamp of 25 dinars issued to commemorate the centenary of his birth, it began circulating on November 8, 2023, the issue was made in miniplegs of nine stamps on which the legends appear in three languages, the two official plus English as a lingua franca that opens the doors all over the world. As a curiosity, a few months before, the Macedonian post dedicated a couple of stamps to the fiftieth anniversary of the death of the great Malaga painter Pablo Ruiz "Picasso".

Vlaska's label enters the radio theme, but also the musical, folk or history itself, all thanks to the versatility of the life of one of the most famous and feisty voices in the region; without a doubt the best performer in her genre in the Macedonian language.

The microphone takes us back to a golden era of shortwave radio that was in full swing at that time of the cold war but [that] was actually a stage of freedom for other payments, especially if we compare with the locks that new technologies are putting on us and the unjustifiable measures to charge you for the mail that comes to you from territories outside the EU.

It's a good thing they were selling us competition and freedom: we have to finance the war! But let's continue with the stamp that, personally, brings me back to that historical stage of radio [nothing to do with the current one, we have practically had our broadcasts cut off all over the continent and there are barely any public stations that still use the OC, dos quijotes are Radio Exterior de España and Radio Romania Internacional although, as happened with other nations, the Men in Black, that is: Brussels, have them in the crosshairs so that those services cease, history still has a chapter to be written and let's hope it takes many years to produce] when the broadcasts from Belgrade reached the entire orbe [the Croats maintained several stations, including one that bought time in America and broadcast to the Balkans in Spanish, after independence they kept the Shortwave for a while that would also be closed to them citing savings measures does that sound familiar?] and her extensive repertoire made Vaska one of the most representative voices, if not the best voice and the best interpreter of Macedonian folklore although, at that stage, that part was more muted and always came out on the air as the voice of Yugoslavia. Today, countless platforms or pages, collect his great legacy.

But let's continue with the stamp that, personally, brings me back to that historical stage of radio [nothing to do with the current one, we have practically had our broadcasts cut off all over the continent and there are barely any public stations that still use the OC, dos quijotes are Radio Exterior de España and Radio Romania Internacional although, as happened with other nations, the Men in Black, that is: Brussels, have them in the crosshairs so that those services cease, history still has a chapter to be written and let's hope it takes many years to produce] when the broadcasts from Belgrade reached the entire orbe [the Croats maintained several stations, including one that bought time in America and broadcast to the Balkans in Spanish, after independence they kept the Shortwave for a while that would also be closed to them citing savings measures does that sound familiar?] and her extensive repertoire made Vaska one of the most representative voices, if not the best voice and the best interpreter of Macedonian folklore although, at that stage, that part was more muted and always came out on the air as the voice of Yugoslavia. Today, countless platforms or pages, collect his great legacy.

We end with the fact that the stamps with the name of the Republic of North Macedonia would arrive in February 2019, until then they had appeared only with the name of Macedonia in Cyrillic characters.

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JUAN FRANCO CRESPO lacandon999@yahoo.es