Topic: Zagreb Diary 
** Written  9:51 AM  Aug  4, 1992 by wam@zamir-zg.comlink.apc.org in gn:yugo.antiwar **

Zagreb Diary
03-08-1992

Dobar Dan,

One week you really don't know were to get the volunteers from for the workcamps and the other week you have too many of them :-), no we never have to many. But it look if the best holiday place in the world begins to become an international workcamp with refugees in Croatia. People nearly get angry when we have to explain them that we are really fill up to the absolute limit.

This is rather motivating for the future. This workcamp is really magnific, the spirit is so high that it has a really positive effect of all the Croatian volunteers, those who first didn't dare to go to Gasinci are now dying to go with this group there. We shall see how long this group stays so powerful, but I think they can move really mountains.

Seeing the situation, hearing the stories makes the international volunteer aware of the crisis which is really going on, and how we together can do something. The plans they are making together are terrific.

In the main time all the votes are counted and the results not much different at last night, so it is clear HDZ and Tudjman have the absolute democratic elected majority. With as leader of the voting commission the head of secret police, if I have followed it all well. So what could wrong ?

So we have at least one dream less. For the time being the political situation in Croatia will stay as it is. What that means we will see in the next months. Lot's of people asked me this morning if they shouldn't leave the country. That's there reaction, I planned to stick around for a while.

At last we are now in the focus point of the European news and that means that we don't have to push so hard anymore. The workcampers will be the best reporter you can think. Maybe the plan will work...... at least a lot of children are made very happy and that is a good thing. 

Better is that we get more and more contacts with the adults in the Centers in Zagreb we the camp works. For myself I am noticing that I am more and more defending the Croatian situation. Over and over again we feel it that the prejudices are high and things not so simple as they may see.

We want to do a joint Serbian-Croatian project next month in the refugees camps, the earlier mentioned "Tour of Hope" a juggling and street music and theatre tour along the refugees camps. My brother with his Dragon bus will come, together with his French girl friend and his friend and Ian from Scotland and hopefully some more. This tour is planned to be joint by people from the Center for Anti War Activities from Beograd. But now we encountering the same problem as we thought about earlier, there is a UN resolution against people from Serbia and Montenegro. The resolution says that we should totally economical, scientifically and culturally ban every contact with Serbia and Montenegro.

And maybe in other countries this resolution is not taken so serious, but it is in Croatia. Earlier all people on universities were already informed that contacts with Serbian scientist would maybe costed them problems in the future. We try to estimate what that means for the possibility to do more workcamps in the future.

No we are not dropping the idea, especially not since EYFA has already organised funding for this project. And above all we think that it is good and that we should do it. The question is only how. The alternative could be inviting Serbian artists from outside Serbia, but that would be a too easy way out and the tour would loose a lot of it's meaning.

So when I speak about those things with foreigners here, they would immediately say, "You see, they don't like you to communicate, they want to fight (they is the government and most of the Croats). But again this is such a point from which you can say, how hypocrite, whole the worlds decided to ban Serbs and when Croatia follows up that International democratic decision they are called "nationalistic and War seekers". Don't get me wrong here, I am against the boycott in the first place, and think that the Croatian government should allow us this tour. But I am talking about the principle, the fact that Croatia is doing what they others where saying they should do (and some (most ?) do) and get's bad points for it.

Of course it is not so simple as I write and of course when everybody still wants to go this bus tour will take place, hopefully with some good people from Serbia. And this tour is hopefully just a start from a lot of similar activities. We are really being busy to organise a new type of relief work, hopefully it bring some joy, but especially trust in the future, or rather in a future.

Since working with the refugees learns you also a lot about the pain, which is in their hearts. Nina was the whole day nervous (nothing special, she often is), but what went to her head was that she give money to a single mother (her father was killed in front of her and her kids eyes), who just heard that her only brother (with whom she was very close) died. This women was in a real hopeless mood, Nina figured out how many asperine she could buy from that money. We convinced her that mothers don't step out of live, since they have children for whom they have to take care (sorry this sounds not very emancipated, but take it please). Let's hope we are true.

That's the other side of the medal. This third camp is lucky, or what you should call it, since lucky is a strange word, but the women from Hotel International (Hotel Vukovar) are willing to talk with them about Vukovar and what happened in their eyes. The earlier camps got their information about what happened with this children, before they came here from a tape from the Croatian Ministry of Information. In our eyes not always the most neutral source. On the other hand this women may not be a neutral sources either, but they at least tell their own experiences and you know that.

With Love from ZA-mir-GREB,

Wam:-)



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