From: wam@zamir-zg.comlink.de
Newsgroups: soc.culture.yugoslavia
Subject: Zagreb Diary
Date: 6 Oct 92 06:14:42 +0100
Article-I.D.: ZAMIR-ZG.4nGKbSu3tC
Distribution: soc


  

Zagreb Diary
04-10-1992

Dobar Dan,

"Hello, we just like to check if you are sick or so, since 
you didn't came up to Suncokret last night" said Astrid when 
she phoned me this morning at Vesna's place. "Sorry, but it 
is raining and storming and I don't like to climb the 
mountain by bike in this whetter, what is the problem". "Oh, 
nothing, except that there are over 17 guests, the sealing 
from the downstairs bathroom came down, the upstairs bathroom 
has still no light, somebody fuck up the telephone central 
installing a fax selector, the downstairs electric heather 
burned a electric cable and we have no money to buy any food, 
but for the rest is everything in good shape)". 

For a moment in time a was speak-less, had a grenade hit the 
house or what, unbelievable what can happen in a house I 
thought. I jump on my bike and drove up the little mountain 
in the hope that something of our house was left over and 
some free space to sleep as well. But at arrival I was 
happily surprised, most of the house was still there and all 
of the other destruction where rather fast to repair.

On my bike up the mountain I thought however about the 
television pictures I just have seen from yesterdays shelling 
on Slavonski Brod, beside the "normal" pictures of people 
showing grenades holes in their houses and soldiers cutting 
wood on their farm for the winter in between two shellings, 
this time there was a picture of a young boy, who was on his 
bike when he was hit by a grenade. I guess him around 12 
years old, he and his bike were totally black and it look 
like the reverse picture they put on the road in the 
Netherlands to show that something is a biking path. A very 
macabre thought. It was if he still was biking and suddenly 
felt on his side.  You maybe know this pictures from Pompei, 
where life was capture by a volcano. Something similar, this 
picture look like.

Yesterday evening there was a story about the 50 anniversary 
of the V2 in Germany, via some tricky way this was linked to 
some or another official celebration as well, where Kohl 
would come and more officials. At the last moment Kohl seems 
to have found out about it and saved his face. What precisely 
happens I didn't catch it went to fast, but I catch the V2, 
which is very normal in a country where daily land-to-land 
missiles are used.

Another picture from last evening television I also 
remembered biking up the hill, a story from the BBC in which 
they showed how people in the UK fill shoeboxes with things 
they think they would need if the were refugee. All those 
boxes are being collected and send to refugee camps in 
Croatia. I sincerely hope that the organisation which is 
organising that has made a list of good and less good ideas 
of things which could be putted in those boxes. Otherwise it 
is a real game of fortune who gets what. You can't see what 
is in the box when you get it and may would like to take 

another one if you knew it.

The idea is however not bad, person to person. But I have 
more and more the feeling that we are going into a situation 
in which relief is a gift rather than a human right. It is 
fine that so many people like to help and like to do 
something, but it must always be in the field of "extras" on 
top of the basic things for life. When somebody give me the 
advise to ask for money there and there I have got the 
feeling we as Suncokret should not be busy with finding 
money, but with the work in the refugee camps, Other bigger 
organisations and network should gather the money, for them 
it is a lot easier. We can share our experiences with them, 
but they don't have to fight for ever Dmarks. 

At home there was a lot of post from the the Netherlands 
which came with one of the volunteers which stays in our 
house. And there was also the letter from Marjolein and Tyche 
(who wrote me that it was hard to be in the fourth group of 
the Waldorf school, since they have such heavy mathematics). 
Marjolein absolute not surprised that I was here in Zagreb, 
that is the right place for you at the moment.

Yesterday there was also a demonstration in Amsterdam for 
support with the victims of the war in former Yugoslavia, we 
don't know what happened yet, but we hope that Hanneke was 
able to speech there. We hope to hear the results soon.

Again no aeroplanes to Sarajevo, the wetter is still bad. And 
today again shelling on Slavonski Brod, the war in BiH may be 
more in the international news and by far more intense and 
dramatic than the war at this moment in Croatia, but it is 
still war in Croatia. 

When I am writing this a purple light comes over the 
mountains on the other side of the valley, Zagreb starts to 
get up and makes itself ready for the Monday morning. The 
lights go on in the houses on the hill and people probably 
start the morning with coffee and news. A beautiful picture, 
full of peace and full of another day. The fax-voice selector 
is finally working, the lights in the bathroom function, 
people have their money and went for food, the bathroom 
sealing is still there for the half and all the guests found 
a place in the house. Also those which came unexpected from 
Germany, but brought us our first wheels, a ten year old 
Renault 4 transport, which was to old to get through the car 
checks in Germany, but is good here. 

I think we will take it to Resnik next Thursday and ask the 
children to paint it full with sunflowers, it will look 
beautiful if we drive with it through Croatia. And a driving 
exhibition, since every day we get requests for children 
drawings from refugee children. We will drive around in one 
and when it works we do it with all the cars we get. At least 
ours should look full of hope and seed for the future.  

With Love from ZA-mir-GREB,

                            Wam :-)

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I dedicate Zagreb Diary to Tyche, Pjort and Rik
to know what their father was doing all that time