BELGRADE, Serbia -- On a bright autumn day, Renato Grbic was out
fishing on the Danube with his brother when he heard a big splash.
At first, he thought somebody had thrown something off the
bridge.
Then he saw a man flailing in the water.
"We hurried and pulled the man out," Grbic recalls. "I remember
telling him: Such a glorious day and you want to kill
yourself!"
It was the first time Grbic saved a life. From that day 15 years
ago, his own life would never be the same. The bright-eyed,
tattooed restaurant owner from a shabby industrial zone on the
outskirts of Belgrade has rescued 25 people who tried to kill
themselves by jumping off the tall bridge over the Danube.
Always on alert in his little wooden motor boat, the burly
51-year-old has pulled people out of the river's muddy waters
without asking for anything in return.
"I couldn't turn my back on them," Grbic said. "They are
desperate people."
Grbic has been dubbed the "Superman of the Danube" by his
admirers and awarded a hero's plaque by Belgrade city authorities.
But even "Superman" can't save everybody who jumps off the
18-meter- (60-foot-) high bridge: At least as many as he had saved
have killed themselves at the spot since Grbic's first rescue.
"When I hear that someone has jumped and I wasn't there I really
feel bad," he said. "My eyes are always on the bridge."
The Pancevo bridge became a favored suicide spot because it is
Belgrade's only bridge over the Danube, which is bigger and colder
and has stronger underwater currents than the city's other river,
the Sava.
The first person Grbic pulled out of the Danube turned out to be
a mental patient. Grbic took him ashore, gave him dry clothes, hot
tea and cigarettes. Later, an ambulance came and took the man
away.
"That was it," Grbic says. "He didn't speak, they never do."
Over the years, Grbic has rescued men and women of all ages and
social backgrounds. Grbic remembers them all, but "they never
return or call, they hardly ever say thank you."
Goran Penev, a researcher with Serbia's Institute of Social
Sciences, said Serbia's suicide rate is at the upper side of the
European average. Penev noted there was a sharp rise in the early
1990s, at the beginning of the wars in the former Yugoslavia, but
the situation has been relatively stable ever since. In 2011,
nearly 1,300 people in Serbia – a country of 7 million people –
took their lives.
Grbic has found that some of the people he rescued had cancer or
other terminal illnesses, while others cited poverty or unrequited
love.
All, he said, felt lonely.
"It is a cry for help," he said. "They often do it in daytime so
they would be seen. They want attention, love."
Only a couple of weeks ago, a 22-year-old girl threw herself off
the bridge near Grbic's restaurant. He was there to pick her up and
ask: "Why did you do it?"
"For my boyfriend," she replied. "Do you think he would do it
for you?" he asked in return.
Grbic said the girl was conscious and clear-minded when he
plucked her out of the water. In winter, however, it is a question
of minutes before people will lose consciousness in the freezing
Danube and drown.
On one of those days, in mid-January about seven years ago,
Grbic was just preparing to turn his boat to shore and go home –
when he heard a scream.
An 18-year-old woman going through a mental crisis had burst out
of her parents' car at the bridge, taken off her jacket and jumped,
shouting: "Goodbye mom!"
Grbic said something had made him stick around: "It was a very
windy day, a few minutes later and I would have gone."
The girl, Grbic said, is the only one who has stayed in
touch.
Every January she comes to his fish restaurant to celebrate her
"second birthday." She is married now and has a child. Grbic was
invited to the wedding reception.
"My heart leaps every time I see her," he said.
Grbic has little or no information about what happened to the
others he saved. It would be nice, he says, if they came to tell
him how they were over a brandy at his restaurant.
"I gave them a second chance and it was up to them to use it
well."