Melania Trump is the business of the city where she grew up in Slovenia

The cake of Melania. Melania cream Melania wine. Melania tea Melania slippers. Salami of Melania. Melania chocolate coated apple slices

There are few products that enterprising burghers from Sevnica, a small Slovenian rural town where Melania Trump spent her early years, have not tried to promote by referring to the first lady of the United States. 19659002] Due to copyright restrictions, the articles simply refer to their identity: the wine is called "First Lady", while the slippers (silvered and adorned with a tail of white rabbit) call "White House"

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But Leaving aside the legal turmoil, Melania It was good for Sevnica (pronounced "seunitsa"), a town of about 5000 inhabitants located in a forested valley about 90 minutes drive from Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia [19659002] The city reopened earlier this year. The annual tourist traffic – which, of course, has contributed to Melania's travels – has increased by fifteen percent, reaching 20,000 visitors, in the three years after the husband of Melania Trump, who then he was a tycoon. real estate and star of reality TV, he became the favorite to get the presidency.

"After Melania, things have really changed," said Srecko Ocvirk, the mayor of the city. "We now have tourists from all over the world."

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] Sevnica is a small rural town in the east of Slovenia: Photo: Wikimedia Commons

In Kopitarna, the shoe company that makes slippers inspired by Melania, the staff members congratulate the first lady for putting Slovenia on the map. "Many other people thought that our country called Slovakia," said Marija Balinc, director of exports.

However, if you look at the situation a little more in detail, there are signs that novelty is exhausting, including for people like Lidija Ogorevc, one of the local guides who sometimes takes them Tourists take a tour of Melania's places in the city for a price of nearly $ 35 per person

"Yes, that's Melania's wine," Ogorevc sighed during a recent tour, while he was pbading near a bottle of First Lady sold in the city castle of the twelfth century

"But that's the best wine," he added pointing to a bottle. by Grajska Kri, a Blaufränkisch red

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Currently, Ogorevc does not not. hides the indifference that it causes to all Melania's hustle and bustle. "I do not really care about all that," said Ogorevc, who apparently does not care how such comments might be perceived in a Melania-themed tour. "Sevnica has a lot more than this story."

For Ogorevc, the glory of Sevnica is its castle, located on a nearby hill with dreamy landscapes of the Sava River that pbades underneath. "Can you imagine what it looks like during the summer?" He said, while he was looking down the valley from the castle gates. "Damn it, it's very beautiful!"

The mood is darkened when, halfway to Sevnica, we parked outside a tower of the communist era on the outskirts of the city. to make a stop at the building where they lived, "he said, referring to the future first lady, then named Melanija Knavs, and her family.

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"I can not tell you exactly where they lived because I do not have this information," she adds, a little irritated.

At the city's tourism office, the visitors can buy a book on the first stage of life of the first lady – "Melania Trump: the Slovenian side of history" – and a large catalog of inspired products, including slices of chocolate-covered apples.

However, Mojca Pernovsek, the director of the local tourism board, only accepts interviews if the subject of Melania is not mentioned. [196] 59002] There are many other topics to discuss, says Pernovsek. The valley where the village is. The hike The log cut. Salami party only for men. The wine festival (for all). Beer and fishing festivals. And, of course, the castle

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Until 2016, when Melania Trump began to be relevant around the world, she would not have made the same comment.

At the time, Sevnica was better known as a minor industrial center, where Kopitarna, one of the oldest shoe companies in Slovenia; Stilles, a furniture company supplying international hotels, and Lisca, the largest lingerie company in Slovenia.

When Melania was a child, her mother, Amalija, was working in a factory that was already closed. Viktor, his father, is said to have sold auto parts. Few residents remember … not even Ocvirk, the mayor, who is one year older than the first lady and who attends the local elementary school at the same time as her.

Melania left Sevnica almost 30 years ago. in Ljubljana in the late 1980s and a few years later to work in the United States.

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However, she does not Did not return publicly to Sevnica, nor anywhere else in Slovenia, since she became First Lady, and for the majority, the connection remains essentially a

At the Rondo restaurant, diners can taste a "Presidential hamburger": The bread has a slice of crispy fried cheese that convincingly resembles the hair of President Donald Trump

. my staff members share the same emotion about Donald and Melania.

"I think that when he was elected, people were excited, but now the novelty is over," said Mia Podlesnik, a young woman waitress in Rondo. "I do not think that marrying someone is a real success."

The New York Times 2018