“Each one of us has been broken-hearted at one time or another. The museum teaches us to deal with loss and closure,” says my guide, urging me not to miss this popular attraction in Zagreb, Croatia. The museum itself is a by-product of a breakup. When co-founders Dražen Grubisic and Olinka Vistica (a filmmaker) ended their relationship of four years, they had to divide their sentimental memorabilia between them. They didn't want to just get rid of it, so they created a museum. They invited friends to donate some artefacts of their own failed relationships, and created an interactive project about lost love that had the potential to connect with varied audiences across the globe.

It’s a rainy, grey day when I walk into the tiny museum. Ironically, it is located just across from Zagreb’s City Hall, where local couples get married. The museum displays some 100 ‘relics’ out of the about 1,000 that are in its ‘bank’. It began as a travelling exhibit, collecting mementos in the form of letters, clothes, footwear, keys, and so on before, finally, making its home in Zagreb in 2010.

What is unique about the museum is that even today, the heartbroken can donate their stuff and find closure.

Each display is accompanied by the dates and locations of the relationships, and notes of explanation written by their anonymous donors. I talk to a British tourist at the museum and he says, “Seems a bizarre idea and voyeuristic to me, but since it’s working, I guess it’s different strokes for different people.” The museum’s objective is “to overcome emotional collapse through donating some article that reminds you of the sad incident and letting go.” It explores the whole panoply of emotions and relationships — romantic, parent-child bond, divorces, separation from loved ones, and many more — and tries to find universal patterns in loss.

An arched entrance leads into the gallery, which is an intimate space with subdued lighting. Narrow passageways are lined with exhibits — a toy car, a hat, love notes, a beautiful red gown, and black stilettos. The cards mention the length of the relationship, city and country, as also a short note about the object and its association with the relationship. I become absorbed by the candid stories shared by people that touched on issues like early death, teenage love lost, AIDS and people who never came home. I am not surprised that in 2011 the place was voted Europe’s ‘most innovative museum’.

The exhibits are organised in aisles that represent different emotions. The Aisle of Rage and Fury, for example, holds objects like the garden gnome sculpture that was thrown by an angry wife onto the windshield of her husband’s new car on the day of their divorce. The Resonance of Grief is a room that holds a single object that belonged to a young girl who ended her life on the night of her break-up. A suicide note from a mother to her son brings me to tears. One section called the Rites of Passage is mostly about weddings. There are photo albums, wedding gifts and a dress. I see a vinyl record of the Terry Jacks number “If you go away,” donated by a girl who listened to it every day through the four months of an intense relationship. A quirky stuffed toy caterpillar in candy colours catches my eye: it was donated by a girl who had a long-distance relationship between Zagreb and Sarajevo and resolved to tear off one leg of the toy every time they met. They would start a life together when the caterpillar lost all its legs: that never happened as they split before that. There is an old Nokia cell phone with a message from an anonymous donor that reads: “It lasted 300 days too long. He gave me his mobile phone so I couldn’t call him anymore.”

I think that the success of this quirky museum probably owes to the fact that every person on earth is intrigued by the twin themes of love and loss. We all need to let go of past relationships as it results in liberating our bottled emotions. There is a graffiti wall where you can write a message to the museum or something that you want to express and let go. I see a 20-year-old woman’s scrawl: “I have never been in a serious relationship yet. I hope when it is over I can donate to the museum.”

“If you wish to get rid of a gift from an ex, you can send it — with your story — to the museum and they will display it without revealing your identity,” says the girl at the counter.

On sale in the gift shop are T-shirts by young Croatian designers. The biggest-selling item, the receptionist says, is a white eraser with the words “bad memories eraser”.

Material objects give meaning to our lives and create a narrative around them. Their value is not always monetary: objects can be valuable because of emotional association or depending on who gave them to us.

Empathy is healing and that is what the museum creates a stage for. The exhibits are ever-changing, dynamic, just like relationships are.

Travel log

Getting there

Fly Lufthansa to Frankfurt and connect to Zagreb.

Stay

Best Western Hotel Astoria has comfortable doubles in a central location. www.hotelastoria.com

Tip

The colourful Dolac Market is a great place to get a peek into Croatian life and mingle with the locals. Fridays and Saturdays are busy; any other day of the week is good to wander around the stalls tasting the smoked cheeses and pickled cabbage.

Kalpana Sunder is a Chennai-based travel writer

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