Retrospective Statement
(continued)

          We awoke the next day and my host mother and sister went to work as usual, though the two of us left at home made plans to call our host mother hourly to update her on the news. As the day wore on, the threat seemed to be more and more of a certainty. Things were not going well at the negotiation table. With every impasse the negotiations reached, a new meeting was announced or a new time set for the attempt to resume talks. But this was encouraging, because we knew that when they failed to announce another resumption of talks that we would really be in trouble. Our hearts sank a little with each moment. Things were happening every minute. I was used to thinking of negotiations in terms of days, weeks or months, but the situation in Serbia was shifting every minute. Finally, at 1 p.m. we received a call from our host mother. She told us to pack our things. She had called Croatia from work and had decided we were leaving. She was very pleased to find that we already had packed. There was nothing else useful to do that morning while we listened for news.

          We were to be ready to go at 2:30 p.m. It would take her that long to get home from work because we were still living in the suburb. We were to pack her a bag as well and she gave her son a list of things to take. At 2:30 p.m. she would arrive and we would take a taxi to the bus station, for which I volunteered to pay because they did not have that kind of money. Taxis are ridiculously expensive in Belgrade for anyone who is paid in dinars, or even Deutsche marks. The last bus for Croatia was leaving at 3:30 p.m. We would have an hour to make the trip downtown.

          It all happened so fast that it is hard to remember which emotions were most prominent at the time. I was angry, afraid, and I felt helpless, but all of my emotions were heightened. Packing my suitcase was the thing I remember agonizing over the most. My host brother had lost everything once already, so for him what to take was not really an issue. He was thinking practically, along the lines of a toothbrush, a towel, a little pillow, a flashlight, matches...etc. On the other hand, I am very sentimental and I had brought many photographs, books, and other memorabilia with me and I was heart-sick about the fact that whatever I didn't squeeze into my suitcase might be lost to me forever. I was thinking of all the stories I'd heard from refugees about how they left with only the clothes on their backs while the rest of their things fell to the looters, bombs and other wartime evils. I was thinking about how to fit my pictures into my suitcase, how to save the gifts Vladimir had sent with me for his parents, how to keep the newspapers I had purchased in Serbia during my first two days... At one point, my host brother sat me down and explained that I was being unreasonable. I already knew this, I was just unable to help myself. I felt almost like it would have been easier to leave with just the clothes on my back. I wanted all or nothing.

          Finally, after trying and crying all morning, I had managed to pack so when my host mother called we were already ready. My host sister was due home between 2:30 and 3:00 p.m. and we were hoping that it would be earlier than later. She called around 2:00 p.m. and we let her know our plans. She said she would leave work immediately. All of our plans were foiled because my host sister did not arrive home until near 5:00 p.m. and the last bus to Croatia had already left. She also had a long bus ride home from work and one of her busses was drastically off schedule. We all agreed not to go without her, and the news was still changing every minute, so there was still hope. With her delayed arrival home, our decision was made for us and we settled in for another anxious evening.

          The situation slowly diffused over the next few days and I was able to explore the city and get into a routine. NATO would threaten to bomb Yugoslavia three other times during my seven month stay in Belgrade, but I can say with complete certainty that the first threat was the scariest and most disturbing for me. The other two close calls were no picnic; I was nervous and attentive to the news, but I somehow felt much more prepared to withstand any crisis. With each renewal of the threat, followed by a last-minute negotiation breakthrough that prevented bombing, I came to think of NATO's antics as simply empty threats. This was not simply delusion, as I really didn't think that it would happen. Logic was against it. At least, my logic was against it.

          Spring came and I visited Kragujevac, Valjevo, (home to the Filipovic statue) and other cities in Serbia. My most bitter regret is that I did not visit any monasteries while I was in Serbia. Those in the south were a bit to close to Kosovo for comfort and those in the north were not easily accessible without a car. Toward the end of my time in Serbia, things started to look ugly in Kosovo again and the attempt to bring a solution to the crisis in Rambouillet had failed miserable. Nevertheless, I was still going about my business and on March 19, 1999 I made a trip up to Novi Sad, a city in the northern region of Serbia, to visit a museum. My friend picked me up at the bus station and decided to stop for some groceries at the small kiosk she and her husband own on the way home. She popped out of the car. After a moment, I thought it would be nice to have a picture of her standing in front of her kiosk with her husband so I bungled out of the car and started across the road. Who knows exactly what the culprit was; it was probably a combination of my own clumsiness, a long coat, black ice on the road, and panic over a car that had appeared out of nowhere that was headed towards me. I fell hard to the ground and my concern was more for my life than for anything else. I sprang up and bolted across the street to safety. I took a picture of my friend in front of her store and she took one of me waving at the camera as well. This picture will forever be a reminder of my luck. I noticed that my little finger on my left hand had started hurting as we returned to the car and by the time we got home, it was throbbing terribly. We thought it was sprained and put some ice on it. An hour later, we examined it again. It had tripled in size and had interesting blue-green swirls covering it. It was then that I noticed the peculiar angle of the finger and it hurt like crazy.

          My friends finally convinced me to go to the hospital. I had to present myself to a secretary whose job it was to scrutinize the documents of each patient. When she saw my American passport, she just gaped. She had no idea what to do with me. So she asked her usual set of questions. She asked me if I was from Serbia. I said no. She asked if I lived in Serbia. I said yes. Then she asked me what my complaint was. I showed her my finger. She stood up and sat down several times, shuffled some papers and finally seemed decided. She handed me a piece of paper that stated that I was not from Novi Sad and that I was to be treated as a resident of Belgrade.

          After a long, exhausting and painful wait in a dingy hallway with very dim light (no chairs), a very disheveled man appeared and asked me to follow him. They did not want to let my host brother come with me but I insisted. The doctor poked and pulled on my finger and after I explained to him with my most vivid threats that he was not going to successfully "straighten" my finger while I was conscious, he shrugged and ordered an X ray. My finger was shattered. It had been broken in six places and all of the breaks were complete; three of them intersected the knuckle. When he saw my X ray he told me that he would set my finger and put a temporary cast on my hand until the swelling went down. Then, he said, I would have to see a doctor in Belgrade to receive a more permanent cast. No problem, I thought. I had only broken one bone before and it was also a finger. I have experience here, I thought. I kept waiting for the shot of painkiller that would deaden my finger to the pain, but it never came. He tried once to set my finger and I screamed like a banshee and he asked me what the problem was. I explained my reluctance to have my finger set without some painkillers. He laughed and said that was not procedure. Two more times he tried to set my finger but I pulled it away at the last minute. Finally, exasperated, he asked me if I wanted his help or not. I asked him for some whiskey. He had a hearty laugh at that and it seemed to soften him toward my plight. He kneeled down and addressed me like a child. He convinced me that what he was going to do was necessary for my health. I was scared out of my wits. The hospital did not look like a hospital to me. It was not clean, the system was completely different, sick people were just mulling around, bleeding and wandering around our large open examination room. I was beyond tense but I told him to do what he had to do.

          My host brother held my good arm down and blocked my view of the "action area" with his body so I could not see when "it" would be coming. One doctor forced my finger back into place with a gradual grinding pressure and the other covered it with the cast material. It was dreadful. I lived through it and a few minutes later the doctor came over and asked me if I had forgiven him yet. I said that I supposed I had. He then presented me with a lollypop and sent me on my way. The total bill came to eighteen dinars, or about $1.80. My Advil was in Belgrade so we stopped in a pharmacy to purchase some something to kill the sharp ache. I was very dazed and I didn't read the label of the drug very carefully, I just trusted my host brother and the fact that our purchase was an over the counter product. I took two tablets and they were so strong that I barely made it home before I collapsed. I did not pass out, I was just drowsy and relaxed. It was then that I speculated that the reason they do not give you painkillers at the hospital is because you are supposed to pick up your own on the way to the hospital!

          My hand proved to be only one of my problems during my last week in Serbia. By the time we returned to Belgrade on Sunday, March 21, there were rumors all over the city that the airlines operating in Belgrade would shut down operations in fear of NATO bombing. I was due to leave Belgrade Thursday, March 25, 1999 and the rumors intensified Monday morning with the news that Richard Holbrooke had broken off negotiations with Slobodan Milosevic and was preparing to leave the city. I spent all of Monday (March 22) packing and saying my goodbyes and no one was particularly uneasy. The same fiasco had been played out several times before and there was a sense of resignation in the air: if NATO did bomb, the civilians in Serbia would be trapped, as none of the surrounding countries would accept refugees. I called the airline Monday afternoon to confirm that they would maintain operations, expecting a resounding "Yes! Of course madam!" Instead, the lady told me she did not know the answer to my question and that I would have to call back at noon on Tuesday. That concerned me a bit. I continued to pack and sort. The process was awfully slow with one hand and my heart was not in it. I went to sleep with my packing chore less than halfway done.

          I never got to make my phone call at noon on Tuesday because the major airlines, including mine, announced bright and early Tuesday morning that they were "suspending service" to Belgrade until further notice. My host brother did not go to work that day so he could escort me around town and help me make other arrangements out of town. We went to my airline first and a nice lady gave me a voucher and wished me good luck in finding a bus or minivan out of the city to the airport in Budapest, Hungary. From there, she assured me, I could continue on as planned. If I was unable to make my flight in Budapest, my ticket would remain open and useable whenever I arrived. This was early Tuesday morning and my flight was scheduled to leave Budapest for Frankfurt at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday. Obviously, we went looking for a travel agency that could book me a place on a bus to Budapest. Many other people in Belgrade had the same idea. The first place we tried was scheduled to capacity. I panicked a little at this but the pain in my hand had me preoccupied enough to keep it from sinking in that I might be trapped. Fortunately, the second place we came upon had two seats left on a minivan that was to leave the city at 10 p.m. the following evening. The estimated arrival time in Budapest was 6 a.m. Thursday, plenty early for my flight. After some serious thought and debate, I convinced my host brother to come with me and I used my last forty American dollars to buy him a seat. He had friends in Budapest and I needed someone's help with all my luggage. That was my excuse to get him out of there. I knew he was in danger of being drafted in Serbia even though he had a Croatian passport, whereas the women in the family could go come and go as they pleased. They would be safe in Croatia if necessary. If my host brother planned to leave Serbia, I knew instinctively that he had better do it before the Serbs tightened border control to contain their pool of army-age men in the country. By the time we returned home that evening, I had accepted the fact that things were worse than they had ever been before, but I still did not think that NATO would really bomb Yugoslavia. I packed late into the night on Tuesday and I went to sleep with a sick heart and an aching hand.

          The next day, we all sat around the apartment, staring at each other, not knowing what to say. My host mother and host sister were relieved to find out that my host brother would be leaving, but it was still a very morose day. The family of three had been through many hardships together and it would be their first extended separation. Our closest group of friends came over to say goodbye to us and a few of them who were musically inclined decided to record a tape for me on our last day together. The guitars came out and they sang while I puttered around the apartment making final adjustments.

          Around 8 p.m. on Wednesday, March 24, 1999, the air raid sirens went off in downtown Belgrade. They were very loud in our area and it was a very foreign noise to me. The first thing that my mind turned to was a tornado or hurricane siren, then it occurred to me that they were probably testing the air defense system in case bombing occurred. Surely they were being overcareful. NATO, even if it did attack Yugoslavia, would never attack anywhere near Belgrade. It is a city of 3 million people.

          A half hour later I was kneeling over the stereo, fiddling with my new cassette when I heard a loud noise in the distance. It sounded like thunder. I stood up and noticed everyone on the balcony, which commanded quite a view of the city. My host brother started toward me, and drew my attention to something else in the room but the thunder came again, this time even louder. I actually asked him if there was thunderstorm because we had watched a few together off of the balcony before. The thunder came yet again. This time I was across the room and out on the balcony before he could stop me and I stood there for a moment looking around the city for the cause of the sound. A minute later the whole western horizon lit up as if the sun were setting and we heard the thunder again simultaneously. Bombs were falling about twenty miles outside the city limits of Belgrade, a military barrack was the target. I was watching the making of history up close but the aspiring historian in me was asleep at that moment, I was in absolute shock. Other ominous sounds could also be heard coming from the hills south of Belgrade. Our little minivan was due to arrive in two hours and I was standing on the balcony watching my own country bomb me. People started to come out onto our street with drinks in their hands, looking up at the sky like it was a fireworks display. I was totally flabbergasted and incredulous. I felt only anger, shock and shame at the NATO aggression.

          We moved my luggage down to the curb so that it would be easy to load into the minivan. My host brother had only a plastic shopping bag with a toothbrush, a CD and a book in it. He still had it in his head to return to his mother and sister after he had seen me to safety, but the main reason he left with so little is because he had to claim some of my luggage as his own because I had so much. We were only allowed two pieces each. As we all stood there waiting for our minivan, we were all in agreement that the bombing wouldn't last long. It was simply unthinkable to all of us to imagine more than a few days of bombing. When the bombing continued and even intensified, my host brother decided to stay in Budapest with only his toothbrush, his CD and his book to keep him company. He again had to start all over again. I feel guilt over his sacrifice to this very day.

          As our minivan pulled away at midnight Wednesday March 24, 1999 from the corner that held all of our friends, I thought that I would break, not just my heart. I was going back to my comfortable American life, and despite the fact that we would be driving for five hours through territory the was being bombed, I would soon enough be safe and sound back home. These people, whom I had grown to love, had so little and they deserved so much. As we drove north, I thought about them and what their lives might be like for the next few days and it stung me. The night around us was pitch black and loud. A half hour after we left our apartment I saw a bright, blazing fire that seemed to stretch for miles and miles off to the west of the highway. My host brother told me that was the remains of the military base we had seen bombed from our balcony.

          The border crossing was long and it involved a lot of waiting but it went surprisingly smoothly considering that there was an American, a Croat, and a Serb of military age in the minivan. The Serbs gave us no trouble at all and the Hungarians were stuffy, gruff and they searched everything carefully but they grudgingly let us enter. I made it to the airport with two hours to spare. The lady who checked my luggage should have charged me a extra hundred dollars for excess baggage like they did on my way to Yugoslavia, but she did not. I guess I looked quite pathetic with my dirty cast and my American passport.

          I arrived home safe and sound and unable to sleep a wink despite my exhaustion. I stayed awake waiting for it to end. On my first day back home in Idaho, one of the local news stations called and asked for an interview. I wanted to talk about the absurdity of the bombing and the reporter wanted to talk about my hand and whether or not I had found love with my host brother. I was disgusted with the final product and so began my well-nurtured bitter disdain for the media coverage of the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. I had see the movie Wag the Dog in Belgrade and I felt that I was in the midst of a performance of it. The coverage was selective at best. I spent my first month back in the U.S. glued to the television, quivering with rage. Oddly enough, I found a hero in the strangest public personality: Oliver North was the only dissenting voice in the media. Or better said, the only dissenting voice whose owner had a daily television show. North was taking the words right out of my mouth. "Vietnam!" "Two wrongs do not make a right!" "NATO is only strengthening support for Milosevic!" It was an unhealthy and fuzzy thirty days. I felt guilty and when I saw that it would be an extended campaign, I just wanted to shrivel up. All I could think about was how Vukovar had looked. Now, the city and the people I had fallen in love with were being damaged, and they would never be the same. Would they look like Vukovar in the end?

          As I recovered, I began to realize that I had also been fundamentally changed as a person. After I had shed my hate, anger and disgust, I was left with an acute sense of sadness. I became a more careful consumer in every sense. I no longer felt sorry for myself because I did not have the money for this or that, I appreciated those who love me even more, I considered everything around me with a more critical eye. I learned how to function with a crushing worry hanging over my head: would anyone I love or know become a "collateral damage" statistic? I groveled in my own sorrow for a month but thenh a good friend reminded me that I was not benefiting anything or anyone by destroying everything positive inside myself. I was active in several anti-bombing campaigns in Indiana. I was one of only nine people who met on the steps of the Terre Haute courthouse to protest the bombing, and our group had heavily advertised the protest. It did irk me that no one seemed to care about the actions of our government. Most people couldn't even find Yugoslavia on a map. It was unacceptable to me for my government and its supra-national protege to continue bombing Yugoslavia.

          Now, a little more than one year later, I am a little more cynical and jaded, but I have tried to walk away with only positive lessons. My thesis was completed in December 1999 and I and living in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. I intend to begin work on a book about my experiences in Belgrade this summer and in the dead of winter 2000 I am set to return to Belgrade and Vukovar to begin research on another project, a more academic endeavor, on the history of Vukovar. In the meantime, I am a language editor for a small journal on Serbian studies and I translate articles when necessary. I am also an English and reading tutor. I have private students who are charged for my time but I also volunteer at an educational center for refugees from around the world here in Baton Rouge.

          All in all, my experience in Yugoslavia made me firmer in my resolution to better myself and to bring as many positive things into the world as possible. I am more aware of the people around me, I think more, I feel more, and I feel I am a stronger person for it. I honestly think I am more alive. I am looking forward to weaving all that I have learned into a book; I feel I have a lot to say. I can only say thank you so very much to all of you who helped make my program at IU and its extension, my trip to Serbia, possible and so fulfilling.