After a period of illness and following a brief stay at Dorothy Ley Hospice, peacefully with family and close friends by his side, on Saturday, September 24, 2016. Predeceased by his loving wife Karen (2009). Adored father to Jessie. Predeceased parents Stanko and Marija. Cherished brother of Zeljko (Jake) and wife Lidia and their children Amanda, Aleksa, Alivia, and Adam. Vlado will be deeply missed by his family and his friends.

Vlado Alajica
Vlado; a son, a father, an uncle, my brother and your friend. I paraphrased this caption that I found on the internet, which I feel so accurately describes who Vlado was to me; and in fact to so many of us in this room, and who he will forever remain in our hearts and our thoughts.

My brother Vlado; a person was is there when you needed him; someone who picked you up when you fell; a person who stuck up for you when no one else would; a genuine guy; most importantly, always a friend.

I was blessed to have Vlado in my life, however technically I had no choice, as we had the same parents.

Most of you had the choice to have him in your lives. Based on this description of him, it is clear that he was also a brother to many of you in this room. As they say in the “hood” he was a brother from a different mother. He was selfless, always eager to help and support virtually anyone who came across his path. He was unconditionally generous, giving of himself, whether it was his time and effort, or giving, or getting “stuff” to and for his friends, acquaintances, and sometimes even strangers; up to and including in many cases financial aid in times of need. As the saying goes he would have given the shirt off his back to help someone, and in many cases he literally did that. He did that over and over again all of his life without any expectation of anything in return; every aspect of him was pure generosity and care

He would help -
Family
Friends
Relatives of family
Friends of family
Friends of friends
Pretty much acquaintances or anyone that crossed his path.

Vlado was born 1958, 22 months after me, in the Krajina region of the former Yugoslavia. He and I are the only two siblings in our family. Our father Stanko came to Canada in the very late 50’s. Our mother Marija, Vlado, and I joined our dad in 1961 in Winnipeg, where we lived until 1964, at which point our parents decided to load up their 1959 Pontiac Stratochief, and move to Toronto, eventually living in the downtown area amongst mostly European immigrant families; generally Portuguese and Italian. We first lived in a flat on the second floor of a detached house. Eventually in 1967 our dad convinced the landlord to sell them the house, subsequently in which we lived all of our childhood and early adult years.

As young kids we shared the same bed, and later into our teens we shared the same bedroom. So you younger ones in the audience, take note you don’t each need to have your own bedrooms and what not – you can share. Being together with your brothers or sisters sharing rooms, or even beds, brings you closer together to one another. Vlado and I were sharing a bedroom together right up to the time that I got married and moved away from home.

A couple of years later my wife Linda and I moved back to my parents’ home, living in the upstairs flat; Vlado was always there with us, in our flat, sharing meals and lounging watching TV.

As young ones we had it really rough in terms of going to and from school; can you imagine how difficult it was for to wake up 5 minutes before start of school and have to walk all the way across the street; you see that’s because our junior and senior public school was across the street. It was really tough I tell you. You younger ones get driven to school, we had to walk.

Speaking of school, Vlado took an interest in music in public school, playing the guitar, violin, and the most noteworthy was his interest in the tuba. You need to understand that the interest in the tuba was for ulterior reasons. Picture the size of the cavity in the tuba horn; can you imagine how much public school audio visual equipment one could put into that cavity? Like cassette tape recorders, and film projectors; all sorts of things that he and we as kids were interested in. So I need not say any more, as I am sure you all get the picture.

His interest in that instrument diminished once we had one of each type of audio visual device at home in the basement; a lot of those items are still lying around in our parents’ home basement. But don’t tell anyone at the Toronto District School Board about that, particularly some of my cousins here who I think still work for the TDSB.

As brothers we were always together playing in the back allies of our neighborhood, or making forts in the back of warehouses lots over by the train tracks, a few blocks away from parents’ home; dragging old lumber bits from home, and using scrap materials lying around at the train tracks, to make roofs; old dirty damp furniture and chairs and whatever was lying around, to make the inside of our forts nice. One of our regular pass times was looking around in garages in the neighbourhood, and freeing up the neighborhood of surplus items that we were certain they would never use, and we knew for certain they did not want or need. I am sure you get the picture.

We were building at first wood pusher go carts, and then moving up to motorized go cars, and three wheel motorized bikes, that we rode up and down the alleyways, making all sorts of terrible noise. We upset some of the older Portuguese neighbors so much with the ruckus, that they chased us down the alleyway with shovels in hand.

I will never forget the time in our escapades that we “acquired” a vacuum tube radio, something you would consider as an old antique these days. It did not work. Vlado and I were in our basement at home trying to figure out why not. Here I was being Mr. Smarty pants thinking I knew about electronics and what not, trying to study and explain to Vlado how it was supposed to work. Of course I could not figure out why. Vlado took a piece of insulated wire, stripped the ends, and was ready to stick the wire between a couple random points in the radio. We argued about it, but he went ahead anyway and put in the wire; guess what, the radio started working. He was just lucky….

We never had any serious fights between us, but that is not to say that we did not inadvertently physically hurt each other.

- When we first came to Canada in Winnipeg, playing as kids, for some unrecallable reason I dropped a sewer cover steel lid on Vlado’s ring finger, which ended up chopping off the tip of his ring finger.

Fortunately some skin remained so the tip was dangling off the end of his finger, and the hospital was able to be reattached the dangling bit. His finger did look relatively normal except for the visible scare at the tip.

- One summer playing on the street in front of our house in Toronto when the street was being repaved; we made a teeter tooter from some construction boards; we were going back and forth, up and down, when Vlado decided to jump off his side. I fell off backwards and cut the back of my head open on the sharp edge of the boards that were behind me.

- Playing darts in the basement at home I was standing at the target getting the darts out of the wall I dared Vlado to throw the dart at me…guess what, he did. I had the dart stuck into the back side of my hand….while he was laughing and saying….you dared me…..

- Visiting the old country and at our dad’s cousin’s place using a pellet rifle to shoot at birds; I demanded he give the rifle to me. The riffle barrel was open as I grabbed it from him, while he proceeded to close the barrel in my hand. I went back to the house with blood dripped all over the place.

- I was very remorseful after the time I insisted and he refused to take empty bottles downstairs into the basement cold room. I wacked him in the back of the head with the bottle. Naturally he got a big bump from that. I have thought about that incident throughout the years and to this day feel remorse about doing action. But, fortunately he had a hard head, so there was no permanent damage other than the big bump for a while. In fact, it is possible that that bump on his head made him more stubborn, if that was at all possible

So young ones do not do this at home…do not hit your sibling in the head with a glass bottles; their heads may not be as hard as my brothers was.

- He broke his leg one winter at a toboggan hill, on of all things while riding some person’s bike. I had to tow him home on the toboggan over shoved sidewalks, I was considering leaving him there but eventually decided I should pull him home over 20>30 blocks. Kids don’t ride bikes in the snow, and don’t leave your siblings behind if they get hurt.

- He severely burned his leg one summer when a fellow teenager playing with matches threw a match at Vlado’s pants; as it just happened Vlado had been washing paint brushes with solvent an hour earlier. I know that it was not intentional on the part of his fellow teen, but that incident landed Vlado in the hospital for about 2>3 months with third degree burns to his ankle, and he needed skin grafts to heal the burns. Moral of this story - kids don’t play with matches

From these few examples, you can see that were a little rough towards each other at times as we are growing up. So young ones remember when your parents warn you about not doing this and that, they have likely done those things themselves, and know what the outcomes will be.

The underlying point here is that Vlado and I were always together, despite the injuries we inflicted upon each other along the way. Our father made it clear to me that I was the older brother, and that it was my duty and obligation to take care of my younger brother. I always carried that instruction with me, and throughout our life together I felt that need and urge to care for, and to help my brother, unconditionally and without reservation. The Serbian expression is “take care of one another, you are brothers”

Vlado was not the most motivated student. As our mother used to say he would go around the school rather into the school. He decided to end his formal education part way through high school, and went into the workforce, working at a few different jobs.

Throughout his teenage years Vlado was, to say the least, a bit wild.

We spend many of our teen years as part of the Serbian Folklore dance group; Friday night practices, and Saturday night performances; traveling and performing around southern Ontario and into the USA, in Chicago, Gary Indiana, and Detroit etc. We had a core of mates and friends in the group. One Friday night our friend Stan Zivanovic showed up at the practice with his shinny brand new Toyota Celica. Stan was really proud of his new wheels. We were all standing on the sidewalk as Stan proudly pulled up and stopped his car in front of us. Vlado asked Stan if he could park the car in the gravel paved driveway directly beside the dance practice hall. Stan said sure. Vlado hoped in the car (remember brand new car just out of the show room that day), he put the transmission in first gear, reved up the engine, and dropped the clutch. He left a big cloud of smoke from the burning tires, and two strips of rubber on the road about half a block long. He went down to and around the corner, around a few main streets and came up the street honking the horn for everyone to get out of the way. He whipped into the gravel driveway and did a side slide into a parking spot. He got out of the car and threw Stan the key, and said “nice car”. Meanwhile Stan’s face was pale, he was in total disbelief at what Vlado had just done to his brand new car, just fresh from the dealer. Moral of the story was don’t lend Vlado your car; certainly not during his wild years.

One of our close friends from the folklore group, Nick Mugosa (may he rest in peace) was living in Hamilton. Vlado visited Nick often. One weekend he spent a night at Nick’s house. Nick’s hair was just growing in after he had done the typical teen act of rebellion of shaving his head bald; an action that greatly upset Nick’s mother. Well, this weekend just as Nick’s hair had nicely growing back in, and reasonably back to normal, while Nick was asleep, Vlado somehow managed to brush cut one half of Nick’s hair. Needless to say the next day Nick’s mother was very upset with Vlado because here again Nick had to once again buzz cut his whole head to have his hair grow back evenly.

OK Jessie you need to plug your ears for a couple of moments as I talk about this aspect of your dad’s young life.

During these teen age wild years Vlado had many girlfriends. He stayed in relationships for periods of time before he formed new ones. But you should know that he was a “chicken” when it came time to breaking up one relationship before moving on to another. Guess who he got to do the dirty work to do the breakup with the girls? it was my then girlfriend now wife Linda. She did that for Vlado, and then she also had to deal with consoling the girls’ and their heartbreak from the break ups. When Vlado and the love of his life Karen met, she asked Linda to tell her about Vlado’s past girlfriend escapades. Linda refused to divulge any dirt, and told Karen she would have to get the details from Vlado. I don’t believe that she ever got any of that detail.

There are many more stories from Vlado’s wild years, which we will leave for another time, and talk about them in the coming years, as we remember him.

Vlado started his transition to settling down when our good friend Stan managed to get Vlado a job working with him in the maintenance department at the then Holiday in Downtown. That was in 1979. I recall that year well, for that is when Linda and I got married. He began to mature and show that all though he decided to end formal schooling early, by going around school rather into the school, he had the smarts and aptitude, and was a quick learner who began to excel and advance in that stable work environment. Thank you Stan for helping my brother into that first serious job – as it was that kind act of friendship on your part that enabled Vlado to learn and to demonstrate his abilities; if not for that, many of the people here today would not be honouring him as they would not have met.
Vlado and Karen met at work. As we have heard, although Valdo was not a shy guy when it came to girls, for some reason he was uncertain of how to approach Karen. He asked Linda for advice, and she told him to send her flowers. It worked, as they became a couple, and eventually they got married in 1987. As life goes, shortly after he and Karen bought their first house in Mississauga. Of course Valdo being the determined motived guy he was, shortly after that he built his deck in the back, built his basement with bar (which I don’t believe he actually ever used) redid his masterbath, the floors etc etc. and he did this all himself with some help from friends and family, but he was prompt and determined to get it done and finished. Things like that could not be delayed around him. It was get it done, and he did not accept no for an answer; unlike another member of his family- that would be me- who tends to prolong projects over a much longer time period – but honestly I have good reasons for the delays.

After some years he became the assistant manager of the maintenance department. At one point the manager’s position became available, but he was reluctant to seek the position unsure of his abilities. All of his colleagues were urging him to seek the job. The story goes that the general manager in fact called Vlado to a meeting in his office, on one of the upper floors of the building. He said Vlado, “I want you to take this job as Building Engineering Services manager”. The manager stood in front of the closed office door and said to Vlado, “I will not take no for an answer”. “You have two ways out of this office, one is through this door, and you are not going through me”. “The other one is through the window” - as in jumping out. “Take your pick but you are not leaving until you accept this job”. Vlado finally agreed to take the job.

What a job he did. He developed intimate knowledge of every aspect of the building and operations. Much of this has been affirmed by Vlado’s colleagues over these past few days. He proved himself to be a fair, reasonable, and generous “boss”; firm, but always wanting to give his colleagues a chance and the benefit of the doubt. Throughout his career he gained the respect and admiration of fellow management, external building service providers, and contractors. Vlado treated his place of work like it was his own; arriving every day to work at 7AM, and often not leaving until 7PM or later, or at many times spending multiple days at work depending on what was needed doing. Be it called out at all hours of the night or weekends, to attend to emergencies; be it flooding from broken pipes, or fire alarms being set off, or being there in 2003 during the great Toronto blackout trying tirelessly to start up the backup generator to run all of the pumps in the basement to prevent the lower parking levels from flooding out. While most, of if not all of his staff, were off during the Christmas holiday period, Vlado would walk the building alone examining all of the 750 rooms, and hallways, putting together the list of to do repair items, that his crew would address once they returned from the holiday break.

Over the years, we spent many of our winter weekends working on cars in the bottom parking level, in a warm comfortable environment; prepping cars for his demolition derbies, or rebuilding his boat, or just washing and cleaning cars. Speaking of cars, Vlado was a car crazy guy. He went through at least 10 to 12 daily drivers from fords, to Oldsmobiles, to his most favourite brand, Volvo, of which he had seven over the years. He had a real passion for antiques. He enjoyed going to antique markets, and hunting around for items of interest and for deals. He amassed an array items from ranging from slot machines, to cameras, to all sorts of weird and wonderful things like old telephones, and of all things a WWI gas mask. His pride and joys were his 66 Lincoln, his 75 Cadillac, his 59 Edsel, and his 70 jaguar, and last be not least, his 85 ford diesel pickup truck, which has unfortunately been laid up in my driveway at home for a long time waiting for me to fix, so it runs properly. I enjoyed spending time with him fixing these cars, as lord knows they were always breaking down, and we did spend a lot of time together.

Vlado was a stubborn guy, not just with me his brother, which is probably normal between brothers, but as I have learned he was stubborn with most all of his friends and colleagues. I decided a long time ago as probably most of us did, that it is better to give in than try and convenience Vlado to do something different from his mindset. As our mother used to say “the smarter person relents”; well I guess I was the smarter person as I always relented to my brother. I realized that I could not win the arguments. But I must admit that most of the time he did have good ideas. And to be honest it was nice to defer the planning and thinking over to him, and to just do as I was told, even though I am the older brother.

He gave entirely of himself to his family, his wife Karen may she rest in peace, to Karen’s family, and most importantly the “apple of his eye” his daughter Jessie. Vlado and Karen did not expect that they would be able to have children, but they were fortunately blessed with their daughter Jessie. Since she came into their life, Vlado did all he could to give Jess the best things, and best life possible, from her birth through Karen’s untimely passing, and beyond. Although he was our brother and our great friend, first and foremost on his mind was the wellbeing and security of his daughter Jessie, and that continued to be his primary objective through his last days with us.

I want to express my thanks to some important people in Vlado’s life, besides his daughter Jessie.

Thank you to Jessie’s grandmother Veronica, for all she has done to care for Vlado and Jessie, and to Karen’s sisters Caroline and Kathy, and brother Richard, for their care and support of Jessie and Vlado; particularly during this past seven (7) year period since Karen passed on.

Furthermore, thank you to Declan, Fatima with their family, Vito and Maria with their family, for their love and care for Vlado and Jessie over the years, especially during this past difficult year. And last but not least, the gentle giant Marco and Gloria, with their kids, who have been amazing supportive friends to Vlado for many many years, but particularly in this past year as Vlado’s health faded. They were unrelenting in their attention and care. Thank you to Winston and Rick for being amazing neighbors and for their comradery and friendship to Vlado over the years, and particularly in this past year. Thank you to Vlado’s colleagues Larry, Paul, and Sam for being great work mate and friends. I know that your friendship meant a lot to Vlado.

I want to thank my wife Linda for being a wonderful and supportive sister to Vlado over the 40+ years we have been together, and for making these superb arrangements seeing our brother Vlado off to his final resting place, and to express the deep love our children Amanda, Aleksa, Alivia and Adam had for their uncle Vlado.

- Generous
- Selfless
- Supportive
- Caring
- Giving
- Always there to lend a hand
- And so stubborn – you had to be prepared to do it Vlado’s way for he would not allow anything but.

Talking about Vlado’s stubbornness, his longtime neighbor Winston viewed Vlado as a brother but often said that he would have loved to have kicked the crap out of him, if he could, as Vlado would not listen to advice. Of course he could never do that as Vlado was a lot bigger, and younger than Winston. Nevertheless Winston continued to be a dear and devoted friend.

We cannot choose our family, it is preordained for us. I was blessed to have Vlado as a brother. We would talk every day and see each other at least two to three times per week, and often every weekend. When Jessie was visiting with Karen’s mother Veronica at her cottage over any given weekend, Vlado and I would often make our plans on Thursday or Friday night as to what projects we would work on during the coming weekend. We would sit together at my office or at in his living room, and often exchanged few words. The words we exchanged were generally centered on cars, trucks, tools and guy stuff. The underlying most important point was that we were brothers spending time together, and although we rarely said it, we loved each other. My mother mentioned to one of her cousins a long time ago, that I could not be without my brother. That is the complete truth, he was an integral part of my life. I wish for all of you that have brothers and sisters, that you could have the relationship with them, as I had with Vlado. Honour and cherish your relationships with your siblings, for one day you may not be able to, as they may no longer be around; and tell them often that you love them.

Jessie you meant everything to your dad. He was totally devoted to you. I urge you to honour your father, and mother as you continue to grow and mature; to develop wisdom, and to go through life with common sense, and to achieve a purpose in life; so that your parents looking from above, will be beam with pride, as you enter adulthood and beyond.

Jessie will deeply miss her father, I will truly miss my brother, and the rest of you will sincerely miss a wonderful friend, and colleague.

May he rest in peace.