Re: Belgrad Blues

[Elliott <enr01...>]

Ingemar--
You should e-mail this to all the major newspapers in the US and Europe.
    Elliott   elllllll

Ingemar Johnson wrote:

> Dear members of the list,
>
> Below is a report on the current war in Yugoslavia, provided by an
> acquintance of mine, the Serbian female writer Jasmina Tesanovic. It has
> nothing whatever to do with Jewish Music, but it has a lot to do with the
> feelings of ordinary people driven desperate by hatred lunatics. It
> immediately made me think of the Holocaust, which also is my only excuse
> for posting it on this list. I know that I'm stretching the limits, but
> those of you who are completely uninterested in politics have the chance to
> stop reading now. As for myself, I think not much could be more important
> to read today than this report, so far away from ordinary, doctored upon,
> news bulletins. This diary is not only a war report, but good literature
> (Jasmana has produced several books and plays), written in tears.
>
> Ingemar
>
> ---------------------
>
> Jasmina Tesanovic: Belgrad Blues
>
>    March 26
>
>    I hope we all survive this war, the bombs: the Serbs, the Albanians,
>    the bad and the good guys, those who took up the arms, those who
>    deserted, refugees going around the Kosovo woods and Belgrade's
>    refugees going around the streets with their children in arms, looking
>    for nonexisting shelters, when the alarm for bombing sets off.
>
>    I hope that NATO pilots don't leave behind wives and children who I
>    saw crying on CNN as their husbands were taking off for military
>    targets in Serbia. I hope we all survive but not this world as it is.
>
>    . . . I went to the market in my neighborhood, it has livened up
>    again, adapted to new conditions, new necessities: no bread from the
>    state, but a lot of grain on the market, no information from the
>    official TV, so small talk among frightened population of who is
>    winning. Teenagers are betting on the corners: whose planes have been
>    shot down, ours or theirs, who lies best, who hides best victims, who
>    exposes best victories, or again victims. As if it were a football
>    game of equals.
>
>    The city is silent and paralyzed, but still working, rubbish is taken
>    away, we have water, we have electricity. But where are the people --
>    in houses, in beds, in shelters. I hear several personal stories of
>    nervous breakdowns among my friends, male and female. Those who were
>    in a nervous breakdown for the past year, since the war in Kosovo
>    started, who were very few, now feel better: real danger is less
>    frightening than fantasies of danger. I couldn't cope with the
>    invisible war as I can cope with concrete needs: bread, water,
>    medicines.
>
>    I think of the Albanians in Kosovo, of my friends and their fears, I
>    think they must be worse off then us: fear springs up at that thought,
>    it means that it is not the end yet.
>
>    March 28
>
>    Every evening I go with my friends and family to the big underground
>    station in the neighborhood: I know people there already, of all ages
>    and social types. They come with stools and small talk. We think of
>    making an emergency plan: in all cases, we try to list the many
>    possible developments of the situation. Hardly one can be good for us,
>    common people who cannot believe anybody anymore, who have nothing but
>    few dollars in our bags and a lot of bad experience. "At least we are
>    not pathetic," I say, "and our children will not be spoiled." . . . I
>    even say, "My daughter will be a rarity, a true Serbian raw beauty,
>    ready to die for nothing: won't some cultures love that?" It will be
>    so exciting for those who are afraid of lightning and thunder to see a
>    thin teenager in jeans not afraid of bombs.
>
>    . . . I watch Jamie Shea from the NATO press conference, he is
>    terribly precise, you hear him you hear it all, the reality that
>    happens to us seems only a slight deviance from his course. But of
>    course, it isn't that simple . . .
>
>    I fight for my computer every day, every hour, everybody in my family
>    wants my computer, the only one at home, for playing, for studying,
>    for communicating.
>
>    We heard our friends from Kosovo, they don't want to speak on the
>    phone, they are living already what will probably come to us in a few
>    days: killings and looting of flats, houses, complete anarchy.
>
>    March 30
>
>    Today no bombs, I slept 16 hours, no alarm to wake me up. . . . A BBC
>    journalist said Serbian people are big-hearted, they wouldn't have
>    killed the pilot of the fallen plane, they would have given him
>    homemade bread and brandy as they claim. But how come then NATO
>    generals claim that Serbian are committing atrocities against Albanian
>    civilians? I believe them both. . . .
>
>    My father used to dream of bombings long after the war was over, wake
>    up during the night and take me out of my bed and carry me out to the
>    basement: sleepwalking. I remember him doing it, I did it myself last
>    night, to my daughter, a few times. I feel as if a sickness is getting
>    out of my body, a long historical fever, a buried anxiety which I
>    inherited being a Serb of Serbian father from Herzegovina . . .
>
>    April 1
>
>    Last night we spent in shelter, three grownups, five children and two
>    dogs. Actually it is a private house with a good cellar next to a very
>    decent deep underground station, the one where I spent the night
>    Belgrade was first bombed, mostly inhabited by Gypsies and mothers
>    with small children. Our group was a large family, a psychological
>    family, we make a group on psychological not biological basis. Our
>    group was based I think on fear to be hit by a NATO bomb or some local
>    warrior. Yesterday a band of very primitive vandals was roaring
>    through the city destroying windows and screaming at whoever they felt
>    was different. But then police with shields scattered them: finally
>    the police were doing what I expect them to do. In '97, during the
>    demonstrations, those shielded policemen were on the other side from
>    where I stood.
>
>    . . . We were expecting bombs in Belgrade downtown, CNN said so.
>    Instead three American soldiers were captured by Yugoslav army, again
>    CNN says so. It is a dirty dirty war, I say, frightened people in
>    basements, bruised soldiers on TV without name, Albanian refugees
>    crying in TV all the time saying all those things people should never
>    have to say, especially not in TV. Human dignity is here at stake, of
>    all of us, actors and onlookers. April 1st, the fool's day.
>
>    My parents are alone in their flat, they hardly hear the alarm, they
>    watch official TV and every now and then phone me, saying, "Don't
>    worry, it will be OK." And I feel better, the voice of my father calms
>    me, as when I was a kid, he gives me security, I don't give that kind
>    of security to my children. On the contrary, it is a choice not to:
>    this world is not a safe place.
>
>    April 2
>
>    Today is the Catholic holy Friday . . . The son of my friend phoned
>    last night from the battlefield: he could hardly speak, he said he was
>    somewhere not saying where and that he was OK but that some of his
>    friends were not so. The age limit for the volunteers who want to join
>    the war has moved to 75 for men. What about women, no age limit, often
>    they are even more loud in their patriotism?
>
>    I watch the sea of refugees orchestrated from both sides on the
>    borders with Yugoslavia, Macedonia, Albania. It reminds me very much
>    of the scene I saw in '95, when Serbs from Krajina were pouring into
>    Serbia for days and days, without resistance, thoughts, ideas, of what
>    and why has happened. I had a feeling it was orchestrated --
>    everything except for the pain and the actors themselves, they were
>    natural.
>
>    April 3
>
>    It is morning, a beautiful sunny morning, I am crying . . . last night
>    center Belgrade was bombed with appalling precision, yes the military
>    targets, but only 20 meters from one of the biggest maternity
>    hospitals in the Balkans, the one where I was born and years later
>    gave birth. The destroyed building was Ministry of Interior: some of
>    my friends remember being interrogated there.
>
>    I am relieved, happy with NATO precision, it was even raining, but I
>    feel visible, exposed to those young responsible pilots who carry
>    their cargo wondering will they make it to hit the military building
>    without doing wrong to a newborn baby. They were all in shelters, the
>    babies, the mothers, and I am crying, relieved, all this matter of
>    life and death reminds me of a delivery, of my delivery, of being
>    brave and crying at the same time.
>
>    April 4
>
>    Again a night in shelter. Another two bridges have been struck down
>    towards Hungary and the railroad towards Montenegro is destroyed on
>    the Bosnian territory by SFOR troops. Facts which make me
>    claustrophobic, the wire is finally visible around our cage in the
>    zoo: [Here are] wild bad Serbs from 13th century, some disguised in
>    jeans, most speaking the language (English), but still different,
>    aliens.
>
>    This NATO strategy is completely in line with local nationalists who
>    said "when the maternity hospital suffered the concussions from bombs
>    nearby our babies didn't even cry, because they are Serb babies . . .
>    " Well, I am not a baby, but I cried yesterday like crazy, hearing the
>    song "Tamo daleko" ("There far away is Serbia"). It is a beautiful sad
>    song from World War I, when Serbian soldiers went to Thessaloniki,
>    Greece, to fight, and only few came back.
>
>    My grandfather was one of them. . . . When I was a kid he used to sing
>    me that song, when I grew up I sang that song abroad when asked to
>    sing a Serbian song. It is the only Serbian song I know how to sing
>    and make people cry: yesterday thousands of people sang it on the
>    Square of Republic during the daily concert. But I couldn't sing it
>    anymore, this is not my song anymore, this is not my Serbia anymore,
>    not the one that my grandfather fought for. Far, far away is my
>    Serbia, I am now in my own country in cage and in exile.
>
>    April 5
>
>    The most terrible thing in a way is that after all, nothing really
>    happens: in the morning we are alive, we have food, we have
>    electricity, we have even luxury articles like whiskey. But in a way,
>    we were there, where it all happened, once again not us but to
>    somebody else. As in false executions we survive our own death every
>    night.
>
>    I entered a pharmacy, it was full, fuller than ever, but you couldn't
>    get aspirins or tranquilizers, and everybody was asking for those. The
>    supplies were out.
>
>    Another detail: sweet-shops are full, people are buying sweets like
>    crazy -- emotional distress, lack of love. . . .
>
>    April 6
>
>    Today is the anniversary of the bombing of Belgrade in 1941 by Hitler.
>    However the major damage to Belgrade was made at the end of the war by
>    bombing of the allies, the so-called liberation or Britain bombs. I
>    know everybody today here will use this parallel to feel better or
>    worse, whatever. . . .
>
>    I was sitting on the terrace this morning, the sun was bathing me with
>    great love, I was dreaming of the sea and clear sky of which we spoke
>    last night waiting for air raids on the terrace, while the planes were
>    flying over our heads. And the planes came again. But they didn't bomb
>    Belgrade last night: again other places, other victims. I feel so
>    guilty, more than ever this morning for this Other. My friends and
>    enemies from all over the world ask me, do you realize how terrible it
>    is in Kosovo? I do, I really do, and I feel guilty that we feel bad
>    here without having the horror they do. But our war, for the past
>    10-50 years has always been this kind of invisible horror, we have
>    still a long way to run to the catharsis, to be free from our bad
>    conscience, wrong myths, inertia...
>
>    I feel we are being cut away from the rest of the world, more bridges
>    down, more friends and enemies pointing out to us here how bad we are,
>    more crazy people here making careers on screaming how we are heavenly
>    people. And the people? In cellars or just in beds waiting for
>    nothing.
>
>    I dreamed last night of bombs falling in my cellar, in my bed and
>    afterwards feeling relieved and free. I should stop writing, I hate my
>    dreams, thoughts and words. But it is a vice.
>
>    Shortly before midnight:
>    We are under raids, we hear boom boom all the time. I am hoping, I am
>    trembling, but my family is okay. And let's hope we all survive -- but
>    really, all.
>

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