The time of lights, fairs, feasts and celebrations is approaching with Christmas and New Year’s celebrations across Slovenia. This is an overview of the programme that will take place in Maribor, the city with perhaps the most spectacular arrival of Grandpa Frost in the country.

Turning on the Christmas lights: November 29, 2019;

Just like many other cities, Maribor will also turn its Christmas lights on this Friday, November 29. At 17:00 the Mayor Aleksander Saša Arsenovič and pupils of Prežihov Voranc elementary school will turn on the lights at Trg generala Maistra and then move to Trg Svobode and at 17:20 turn the lights on there as well.

Festive Fair: November 29 – December 30, 2019

Craftsmen, potters, beekeepers, herbalists, farmers' wives associations and caterers will put their products on their stalls at Grajski Trg and Trg Svobode starting this Friday as well.

City of Fairies Festival: November 29 – December 28

Also this Friday begins a programme with puppet shows, workshops, street performers, and concerts known as the Fairies Festival. For details please visit Narodni dom Maribor’s website for details.

Concerts and DJ sets at Leon Štukelj Square: November 29 – December 31, 2019

For details on daily programme and lineups, klick here.

Winter Fairy tale at Grajski trg: November 29 – December 31, 2019

Aromatic offerings of mulled wine, sweets and other foods will be available in the company of live music at Grajski trg every day starting this Friday. 

City Ice Rink: November 29, 2019 – February 29, 2020

An ice rink will be opened at Trg Svobode this Friday as well, one that will eventually offer the possibility to spend New Year ’s Eve on skates till two in the morning. Click here for more.

Arrival of Grandpa Frost: December 7 at 17:00

Do not miss Grandpa Frost’s spectacular arrival from Maribor’s Pohorje on December 7^th.

Grandpa Frost’s Farewell: December 28, 2019

At 17:00 Grandpa Frost will greet children for the last time in 2019 at Vetrinjski dvor, where a magic show will also take place, then he will walk to the stage at Leon Štrukelj Square, where he will address the children one more time at 17:45, before returning to his home in Pohorje.

Winter Air 360 Luft Bar: November 22., 2019 – March 21, 2020

At the eleventh floor of the Slavia business centre (Ulica Vita Kraigherja 3), an open terrace promises to offer a magical experience out in the open almost throughout the entire winter: with lights, a fireplace, snowy trees, Christmas tree, and wooden signposts, all while being served hot chocolate or mulled wine.

New Year’s Celebration: December 31 Leon Štukelj Square

Maribor is a city with the longest tradition of celebrating the New Year’s Eve out in the open. This year visitors will do their countdown at Leon Štukelj Square in a company of two bands, Groovocado and Big Foot mama.

STA, 23 November 2019 - Slovenia observes Rudolf Maister Day on Saturday, remembering the general who established the first Slovenian army in modern history and secured what later became Slovenia's northern border. The holiday commemorates the day in 1918 when Maister (1874-1934) took control of Maribor.

Several events commemorating Maister were held this week. The main ceremony, on the eve of the holiday in Murska Sobota, was addressed by parliamentary Speaker Dejan Židan.

Židan praised Maister's courage, patriotism and determination also in his address to MPs yesterday. He said that Rudolf Maister Day was a great opportunity "for us to ask ourselves how do we contribute to a better society on a daily basis and whether we are worthy of the great deeds of our ancestors".

He added that Maister and his fighters could serve as an inspiration particularly to "us, current decision-makers" to be "bold enough to join forces in our efforts for a better future".

Interior Minister Boštjan Poklukar noted in his message marking the holiday that Maister had not hesitated for a minute before taking his army into battle for "our northern border".

After laying a wreath at the monument to Maister in front of the Defence Ministry building on Friday, Defence Minister Karl Erjavec said Maister, a superb army commander, had felt at the end of the First World War that a historic moment is coming.

"It was a time, when we were able to take advantage of the first opportunity to get to independent Slovenia. It was a dream of many generations, many have given their lives for this goal. This is why is consider General Maister's actions as the first step towards our country," he stressed.

Today, President Borut Pahor will welcome visitors at the Presidential Palace, and the honorary guard of the Slovenian Armed Forces will be lined up in front of the building.

In Maribor and Kamnik, where Maister was born, memorial plaques will be unveiled, honouring the ardent Slovenian patriot.

Following the break-up of the Austro-Hungarian empire, Major Maister prevented Maribor and the Podravje area from being made part of German Austria, the country created after WWI comprising areas of the former empire with a predominantly German-speaking population.

On 30 October 1918, the German city council declared Maribor and its surroundings part of German Austria, which Maister found unacceptable.

He set up a Slovenian army of 4,000 soldiers, disarmed the German Schutzwehr security service, and disbanded the militia of the German city council.

The general then occupied Slovenian ethnic territory, establishing the northern border between Austria and Yugoslavia that was later ratified by the Saint Germain Peace Treaty. The same border still runs between Slovenia and Austria today.

Maister is buried at Maribor's Pobrežje Cemetery, where he has a modest grave.

23 November has been observed as a public holiday since 2005, although not as a bank holiday.

All our stories on Slovenian history are here

One of most recognizable buildings in Maribor stands at Glavni trg 1 (Main Square No. 1), where the centre of Maribor’s social life was hosted for most of the 20^th century.

The story of the building is closely related to the nearby bridge, now called the Old Bridge. It was built by a German man Ludwig Franz, who had amassed significant wealth by manufacturing pasta, and decided to bring some advanced urban spirit into the city by building a well-equipped up-to-date house at one end of the new bridge which was being constructed.

The completion of the building occurred one month after the opening of the bridge, which was on August 23, 1913. With his brother Ludwig dedicated the house to their mother and named it Cafe Teresienhof (Theresa’s Court Café).  

The house was quite advanced for the time, having its own electricity generator, while the café’s services included the possibility of ordering a lunch at the City Square, where it was then delivered by a carriage.

When Adolf Hitler paraded across the main square in 1941, the house was already called Velika Kavarna (Grand Café).

In the fifties and sixties Velika Kavarna was a venue of many pleasant social events for the citizens of Maribor, with many later stars in the Slovenian popular music scene beginning their careers there.

Following this golden age of the Velika Kavarna, a casino came into the building, which went bankrupt in 2009 and left the old café’s salon in not so splendid condition. Apparently, the casino’s management, having no money at hand to pay staff their deserved salaries, decided they could just take with anything valuable they could find on the premises. This is how Velika Kavarna was stripped of its lights and chandeliers.

Years of negotiations and fights over ownership ensued, all slowly inscribing themselves into the walls of the building, until the Grand Café was finally reopened as the Salon of Applied Arts, which decided to preserve the entire history of the place on the walls and equipment and turn the café back into a hangout for everyone curious about history of the house and local design.

Unfortunately, Salon of applied  arts closed its doors permanently in July 2019. We wonder what will happen next.

Ljubljana may be the capital of Slovenia, but when it comes to St Martin’s Day celebrations (Martinovanje) the first city is Maribor. This claims to have “the biggest public one-day celebration” of the hour when the year’s new wine if officially launched. It also comes a short time after the weeks-long Old Vine Festival in Maribor, nominally focused on the oldest vine in the world that still produces grapes, but in reality a celebration of all things food, wine and Slovene.

As the video above shows, the city it thus ready, willing and able to get into the festive spirit, with some 20,000 people expected to take part in a day that brings the producers and consumers of wine together, and much more to do than just drink a glass or two. There will be a “celebration of autumn” procession, with wine queens and others, wending its way around the city centre. There will be a ceremony when must – the immature wine – is blessed and becomes the focal drink. There will be food to sample along with the wine, from local farms and restaurants. And there will, of course, be music and dancing.

The whole thing kicks off at 11:11 (not a typo, for once) on Monday 11 November, with the organised events set to run until 21:00. All the events are centred at Trg Leona Štuklja, while the Old Vine House (Stara trta) should also see some action, and that can be found not far away, at Vojašniška ulica 8. If going to a wine event on a Monday is not possible, then consider a visit to the smaller – but still very grand – Ljubljana Wine Route, which takes place this Saturday, 9 November (2019), as detailed here.

STA, 3 November 2019 - A 500kg World War Two bomb was safely defused in Maribor on Sunday, hours after hundreds of people were evacuated from their homes in the direct vicinity, with sirens sounding the end of the alarm.

 In the largest such operation in Slovenia's second largest city since 1945, the authorities called on 1,000 people living within a 300-metre radius of the bomb to leave their homes.

A further 2,200 residents in a 300-600-metre radius were told to keep indoors and away from the windows facing the bomb site close to a rail track near the city's main coach station.

A similar, but much smaller operation was carried out in Maribor on Thursday as a 250kg bomb from WWII was safely disposed of near the city's biggest shopping mall, leading to the evacuation of 80 people.

"The pyrotechnicians have succeeded in safely defusing the bomb," Maribor police spokesman Miran Šadl told reporters after sirens signalled the end of danger at around 2pm. "The danger is over and people can return to their homes," said Šadl.

The evacuation started at around 8am, completing shortly before noon, after which members of the national unexploded ordnance disposal team got down to work.

"481 people got evacuated," Šadl said, adding that the operation proceeded smoothly except that in three cases residents had to be prompted by police officers to retreat to safety.

The pyrotechnics Sašo Turnšek and Aljaž Leban did not specify the procedure, expect for saying that they removed the detonator with a special tool, and thanking everyone involved in the operation for allowing them to work in peace.

The unit commander Darko Zonjič too praised cooperation with all the services involved and lauded the people of Maribor for following the authorities' instructions.

The air bombs were discovered last weekend during construction work, the smaller bomb was found at a site close to the Europark shopping mall and the larger one at a railway construction site.

Both bombs will be destroyed within three months through phased burning of the explosive. Zonjič said that a potential detonation today would have caused extensive damage to property.

Due to the operation, several roads as well as the central coach and railway stations were temporarily closed, and gas supply was disrupted. Europark area was sealed off again today.

Maribor, which the Nazi Germany made part of the Third Reich, was heavily bombed by the allied forces during World War Two. It is estimated that close to 16,000 bombs were dropped on the city, some 200 of which are believed to continue to lie unexploded across the city.

Today, officials did not make estimates about further potential operations needed, but Zonjič welcomed the city authorities' plans to make detection of the ground mandatory before construction work.

People living within a 300-meter radius around the site on Plinarniška ulica, Marbor, where a WW2 bomb was recently found, will need to leave their homes around noon today, as the area is being evacuated. However, those living within 300-600 meters of the bomb are being asked to stay at home during the operation to defuse the device. At 12 noon an alarm will sound, signally the start of the process, and there will be another siren when the danger is over.

Source: City of Maribor

The evacuation area is shown below, in a map produced by the City of Maribor

The approximate location of the bomb is shown below

STA, 31 October 2019 - The first of two WWII-era bombs discovered at construction sites in Maribor last week was successfully defused in the early afternoon on Thursday. Sirens signalled it was safe for residents living within a 300-metre radius to return to their homes just before 2 pm, less than two hours after the start of operation.

The 250-kilogramme bomb, one of thousands dropped on Maribor by the Allies between 1944 and 1945, was deactivated by experts of the national unit for protection against unexploded ordnance. Maribor police PR officer Miran Šadl told the press that technicians managed to unscrew both detonators.

The bomb has been found by construction workers near the Europark shopping centre, which is closed today, as Slovenia observes Reformation Day, a bank holiday.

Today's evacuation, overseen by the Civil Protection and Rescue Administration, was not too demanding, as it involved only some 80 people.

About two dozen came to the Tabor sports hall to wait out the operation. Most of them were Bulgarian construction workers and a few families. Some brought their pets with them, fearing that a potential explosion would upset them.

"We would have probably spent the day elsewhere if weather were better. But it's raining and we're better off here," Aleksander Rotman, one of the evacuees at Tabor sports hall, told the STA.

The second bomb is to be detonated on Sunday. That operation will be more demanding. The bomb is twice as strong and located at a site that will demand the evacuation of about a thousand people, including an entire hospital wing. Another 1,000 will have to stay indoors.

While today's detonation was completed at the site of the bomb, the second bomb will have to be moved to avoid an even more extensive evacuation.

A 250 kg unexploded WWII bomb was found yesterday on a construction site near Europark, Maribor, where a new Lidl store is being built. Whether and in what scope any evacuation will be necessary will be decided on Monday.

Meanwhile, the bomb is being guarded by the Maribor police.

Apparently, this is not the first WWII bomb found in the area. During the construction of the Europark shopping complex itself four such bombs were found.

Occupied Maribor was quite heavily bombed by the allies. The first bombing took place on January 7th, 1944, with 276 bombs dropped on the city, which killed 55 people. Bombings continued on October 13th and lasted until April 12, 1945, when the city was bombed for the last time. The worst bombing occurred on October 14, 1944, when around 560 bombs were dropped on the city, killing 76 people.

STA, 19 October 2019 - The Maribor-based pharma company Marifarm is gradually implementing its strategy of becoming a drug manufacturer instead of just providing drug packaging as it used to. So far, they have been manufacturing drugs for other pharmas, but Marifarm wants to enter the market with their own drugs.

The company went private to avoid bankruptcy in 2016. It was acquired by Arterium International, a company registered in Amsterdam, which invested over EUR 11 million in three years.

At the end of August, the company got new owners - the Aquer GMBH group, established in Vienna, while Arterium International remains Marifarm's strategic partner.

Marifarm administration adviser Viktor Gryban told the STA that this shift in ownership had been planned and did not change the pharma's long-term strategy of manufacturing own drugs.

The company's drugs have already been developed and are now waiting for approval from relevant authorities to enter the market - a procedure that could take between three and four years.

To follow this goal and boost its business results, Marifarm has started working for other pharmas in drug manufacturing.

The company has been so far without profit and the owners are not expecting it this year either. Last year, Marifarm generated EUR 1.7 million in revenue and over EUR 3 million in net loss.

Although still in the red, the company has been improving its results and boosting its promotion at international pharma events.

Gryban expects the company to generate almost EUR 4 million in income this year and climb out of the red next year due to possible new business contracts.

The EUR 11 million investment has gone into modernising equipment as well as hiring new employees. The company currently employs some 150 workers and is planning to raise this figure to 170 by the end of the year, according to its director Romana Fišer.

Marifarm's current production capacities are the highest ever and will continue to be expanded. The company cooperates with Slovenia's largest drug maker, Krka, as well as pharmas from Switzerland, Germany, Latvia, Ukraine and India.

STA, 14 October 2019 - The 54th Maribor Theatre Festival (Festival Borštnikovo) will get under way today with an international conference on ways to develop theatre audiences. Running until 27 October, the country's leading theatre event will feature a record 42 productions from Slovenia and abroad.

While the festival officially opens on Friday, the busy schedule, which is in keeping with last year's programme expansion, already starts with the segments Young and Student Theatre today.

"Both were already conceived last year as permanent festival features, which we want to develop further in the future. They feature Slovenian as well as foreign productions and make for a kind of joint festival platform for the development of new audiences, which we see as a primary mission," the festival's artistic director Aleš Novak said.

Meanwhile, a selection of theatre productions staged in Slovenia in the last season reamins at the core of the festival. The first of 12 shows in the competition programme is scheduled for Saturday.

Awards will be conferred on the final day of the festival, including the Borštnik Ring for lifetime achievement, which this year goes to Marinka Štern.

The list of the competing shows includes two productions each by SNG Drama Ljubljana (In the Name of the Mother, and Ali: Fear Eats Your Soul), by Mladinsko Theatre (No Title Yet, and The Opposite) and by Ljubljana City Theatre (Fireflies, and A Silent Breath).

Also selected were the Damned by Drama SNG Maribor, Inventor On Earth by Anton Podbevšek Theatre, Macbeth by SNG Nova Gorica, At Dawn by the Prešeren Theatre from Kranj, River, River by the Delak institute, and The Misanthrope by the Slovenian People's Theatre from Celje.

The accompanying programme features 19 more productions, seven of which from abroad. One of the highlights will be a performance by British critically-acclaimed physical theatre company Gecko, led by artistic director Amit Lahav, who will play their hit show The Wedding.

The festival will also feature talks about the shows, an international conference on theatre criticism, a regional meeting of the International Theatre Institute (ITI), a panel on theatre professionals, concerts, and guided tours of Slovenia's second largest city.

The website with all the details can be found here