Slovenia (originally Republika Slovenija) is a young country. It was a part of Yugoslavia until 1991. In June ’91 it declared independence and was attacked by yugoslav army the very next morning. Struggle between slovene teritorial army and yugoslav army lasted for three weeks. After that period yugoslav army withdrew and started campaign in Bosnia. Slovenia formed all national institutions, parliament, government. It was time to form police and army, so Slovenia imported quite a lot of firearms and other weapons. With the real arsenal came to the country also paintball equipment.

First markers which were supposed to be used in police training were VM-68 Magnum’s, but police never showed interest in paintball. People slowly started to like paintball as a sport and recreation and first teams were formed in early ’92. They were equipped with markers such as VM’s, Vectors, Stingrays, Trracers, PGP’s. Most widely used goggles were Scott and JT’s Crossfire. Back then we used yugoslav camuflage overalls.

Years passed by and more and more teams were formed. In ’95 there wre about 20 teams who were attending the national league. That’s not very much for the whole nation but you should know that this nation has 1.8 million people. That would be like… Long Island. And the country size is a bit smaller than Long Island. The year 1995 was the golden age of slovene paintball. There was a very small tournament fee ($10/person) and we could use our own paint. The refferees were enthusiasts who ran whole day for free while the players were rude and called them names. I need not to tell that players were wiping hits all the time and conflicts were on every game’s schedule. In the meantime more teams got fancy equipment. Automag became the most common tournament marker. Somehow people didn’t like Cockers since custom work was very expensive (you had to ship the marker back to the States and wait for very long time). We played with stock markers. On the other hand Automag is a gun specialy made to make you a poor man. And since many couldn’t keep up the tempo many quit playing.

Here is the present situation: there are 4-6 very well equipped amateur teams and some of them also have international reputation. These teams are Gradisce, Bears, Slovenia Team and Salamander. Each team makes one tournament a year by IPPL rules. Players are now very disciplined and the refferees have all the authority. The main tourney marker is still Automag but there are some Eclipse and Evolution Cockers around too. Slovene paintball is also in close contact with austrian teams (Austria and Slovenia are neighbour countries).

To understand prices of paintball equipment in Slovenia one must know some things first. Paintball markers are by slovenian law treated same as airguns, teasers and other self defence weapons. That is why only authorized companies that are under strict monitoring of state institutions are allowed to import paintball markers. The same goes for paint. It is rather absurd, but on the other hand there is no law that would concern places where paintball should and should not be played. Actually, it's not advisable to play in public places, but noone tells us not to play in the woods (in Austria paintball must not be played in forest and no camouflage clothes should be used - they have problems with paramilitary neo-nazi groups). This is the reason why there are not many paintball retailers in Slovenia. I think I wouldn't lie if I said that more than half of markers and 3/4 of paint is smuggled into country illegaly (we have never used or bought any such material). Here is a sample what everything is added to the original price. If a marker costs $500 in USA, shipment costs are about $20, custom tax is $100 (20%), tax is $25 (5%), retailer interest is min. $50 (10%). Finally, the cost after two months of waiting is $700. In addition Slovenia is not a big market and said truth is that no major paintball retailers are prosent in the country. It just doesn't pay off. But somehow we manage to maintain the top equipment. One other thing that doesn't pay off in Slovenia is sponsorship. The best four teams in the country that could easily match top european teams are therefore sentenced to self-financing. This leads us to rich and busy people who take paintball as pleasure and not as competiton sport. We, the students play paintball with true competition spirit. Condition training and cross country running are parts of every training session. We take paintball seriously! And when we are rich aswell the world will tremble before us.

Slovenia is about to become (few more years) a full member of European Community (EC). When this happens custom taxes between Slovenia and other EC countries will be obsolete and paintball equipment from Germany, France and United Kingdom will be a lot cheaper.

There are no paintball or paint manufacturers in Slovenia. Sometimes small problems are solved by local gunsmiths. It's hard to work on a marker and simple constructions are preferable. Auto/Mini/Micromag is considered best marker for the conditions and only few people have time and money to bother with Cockers.

I have already mentioned some laws about importing markers. Now I'll explain the playing conditions. The best example of how paintball is treated is the following story which happened to me a year ago. We just got some new equipment and went in the nearest forest in the suburb. While driving through the forest we passed by two K-9 police officers with dogs. We stopped about a mile further in the forest and tried out the equipment. It was a nice sunny day and some people passed us by. After half an hour the police vehicle stopped by and the officers stepped out. It was obvious that they were alerted by those people that passed us. First they were very strict and tense. They asked us what we are doing. We explained them about paintball and they both knew a little about paintball. Then we let them try out our new markers. First on a tree, then one of then put on the dog protective gear and then they started to argue whos dog they are going to shoot. Since noone wanted to hurt his dog they took our telephone number and left saying they will once bring the whole K-9 squad to paintball.

This story proves that paintball is here still considered as a play with harmless toys. That is why we have no limits where to play as long as we are not caught tresspassing or threatening the public. Unfortunately there have been some paintball drive-by incidents. Such incidents may rapidly spoil the paintball reputation. Also we have very strict rules on tournaments. We know that when the first eye will be lost paintball laws will become so strict we will be happy if we'll be allowed to play at all. So let's not bug the lion while he's asleep.

On behalf of all slovenian paintball players I invite every team or player in the world to visit my country and play some realy good paintball on wonderfull terrains from forest to hills, swamps and fields.

I was born in August 1975 in the capital town Ljubljana. My first visit to USA was when I was five years old. I had a wonderfull time there. With six I started elementary school together with my older brother. We were fighting all the time and one of the teachers had a nervous breakdown because of us. That is why I started the second grade in a different class. I trained karate from first to seventh grade. I have a green belt. In seventh grade I was the tallest kid in the school (with the exeption of my big brother). I started to train basketball. With my team we were many times junior republic champions and we even went to yugoslav finals once. I finished elementary school with excellent grades so I joined the famous Bezigrad high-school, which is supposed to be the best one in the country. Three years later I first saw paintball in a slovenian magazine Obramba (Defence). I was overwhelmed and very enthusiastic. After a year I found out that one of my schoolfriends has been playing paintball for a year. Back then I was very busy finishing high-school so I haven't experienced paintball until summer that year. In May my friend and I went to this man who had some markers and wanted to put together a team who'd compete on tournaments. But all he got was about ten teenagers. He soon wanted to charge paint (which was not part of the deal) so we left and started on our own.

Now I'm a student of mechanical engeneering and I'll specialize in vehicles. I'm looking forward to spend my sallary on tons of waisted paint.

Salamander (Salamandra salamandra) is a cute black lizard with yellow spots. However this color patern means danger in nature. We are trying to get this reputation in paintball and in Slovenia we already succeeded. At the moment we are one of the two best teams in the country without any tough opponents. We have also intimidated austrian team Mercs on an international tournament. We have a serious intention to let the whole Europe see how we fight and let it know we are not satisfied with second place.

Salamander team is my biggest project in life so far. My friend Andrej and I established Salamander Team after we left our first team. We bought five VM-68 and five EXC-68 markers. Most of the money for the markers was sponsored by P.R.L. Ges.m.b.H. - a company from Vienna that handles food products. This company also sponsored us next year so we could buy competition equipment. As soon as we started attending tournaments we reached to the top. The next two years we just proved our position. In a very near future Salamander Team will go international. Permanent members of Salamander team are:

1. Andrej Bahar
2. Rudi Bernik
3. Joze Sopko
4. Ales Simoncic
5. Sergej Ivanus (team captain)

Salamander Team is also present on the web at http://wet.kiss.muzej.si/~k4fs0056/

Sergej Ivanus ( mailto:k4fs0056@kiss.muzej.si )

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