Two letters by a Belgrade woman (Maja Nikolic). The first 
one depicts the bombings of May 20th. The second one 
describes the popular mood on May 25th.

1. A crazy party

My dear friend,

Here I am, alive and healthy, lack of sleep, with my nescafee in front of 
me. I checked electricity, phone connection on my Panasonic, wow, all is 
fine, my Mac is working. I can light that Gauloise, now.

Well, my friend, we had party last night. Like all parties in Belgrade, 
it started just before midnight. They know we are night birds, so they 
don't want to bother us during the day.

It started when planes scratched my roof, with big roar, wrooar, and my 
dear friend, you know my beautiful apartment is in the penthouse, with 
that fantastic view on all potential targets, few tv stations, the only 
remaining bridge on Danube and others, less important. 

Then it all started, with that long wrooar, a huge fire-work, and me, running 
from one window to another watching and all excited, and the sky, oh, the 
sky was burning, stars flying, stars falling, red, yellow, white...my 
friend, burning on all four known sides of earth, east, west,south, 
north...Artillery, implosions, explosions, long live anti air craft 
defense. Boys were working hard, I could feel it, and hear 
it and see it. 

Bastards were running away in their planes and throwing their huge bombs 
wherever, and then it wasn't the night anymore it was the day in 
midnight. White and red sky, my windows and doors shaking, trembling, 
ceiling was waving, oh, what a rave. Our artillery, their bombs,fighting, 
who is stronger. That party lasted three hours, not very long party, but 
believe me, it was really wild party.

And on the TV a movie,some romantic movie, Horse Whisperer, 
R. Redford was kissing C. S.Thomas, kissing and kissing, not aware of 
fire-work behind their heads, ha, ha what a beautiful distorted 
reality. Everything is shaking, flashes all around, and he was kissing her 
passionately. 

So, after three short hours, the party was over, and me, excited from 
screaming "come on boys, burn their tails", with adrenalin in blood, I 
drank one, two, three drinks, and felt asleep calmly, for four long  
hours. That crazy siren started to scream in my ear at 7 in 
the morning. Why don't they switch on that siren at 9, who 
cares is it alert or not, is our sky free again or not, let us sleep!!

My dear friend, here I am sitting and giving you a report about crazy 
parties in Belgrade, just to make you little jealous, I know your life is 
calm and boring, just to give you a little excitement. 

Music on my radio is loud, and in this moment is that old song, I think that 
fellow Black,...no need to know and hide it's a wonderful, wonderful
life...that 
stupid song just struck me in my head, fuck that dj, he didn't deserve 
his salary, what a song for early morning after wild night. 

Switch him off. We need something more powerful.

2. Everyday life in Belgrade, may 25th.

 
 I can not generalize people's feelings, but one is sure.

 NATO expected that our rage will be directed against our
 president, but it is contrary, nobody's thinking of him.
 We are all very enraged toward NATO, specially towards
 America. That is because they are hypocrites, they are
 always repeating that they have nothing against the people
 in YU, they love us, even that old cow Madeline
 Half-brihgt repeats that message in Serb language, like a
 parrot, on the TV program they transmit from their planes,
 you know, to inform us. But they are bombing bridges 600
 km away from Kosovo, food factories, hospitals, water
 supplies, electricity supplies telling that those are all
 military targets. People here are not so stupid, they know
 they want to make our life hard is it can be, considering
 that then we will start a civil war, throw away our
 president, and welcome NATO as rescuers with open hands.

 But, their psychology team is very bad and stupid, who
 will go to fight with our police when the bombs are
 falling on our heads, when we only fight to survive, when
 I have to wait for bread or sugar for an hour in a row, I
 have no need for demonstrations, I can only blame NATO.

 More, we haven't invited them, they came breaking all
 international laws by the name "humanitarian angel".
 
 You are probably interested how ordinary people feel and
 live. I must say that people on the streets are much
 kinder between themselves than before bombing. Everybody
 is pretending nothing is happening, people go to work,
 although almost nothing work and there are no salary. We
 all have some savings, we are used to make savings, last
 ten years. It was always some unpredictable situation, and
 we are used to leave some money on the side, just in case,
 well the case came. 
 
 Yes, of course we help each other, in small things mostly.
 Just a little example, cigarettes are precious. You can
 buy them very rare in shops, they bombed our two tobacco
 factories, and there are imported cigarettes but they are
 very expensive. I can buy them, but my mother can not, oh,
 we all smoke here, I know, I know, bad for health, but who
 cares now. If somebody ask you for a cigarette in cafe,
 you will give of course, or for example, the daughter of
 my mummy best friend, she doesn't smoke. But she just
 happened to be in one shop in the moment when they got
 cigarettes. She bought a 10 packs for my mother. She just
 remembered her. So, people are solidar to each other in
 those small everyday's things, well, we are all in same
 shit, sorry, sometimes I don't speak decent words, like
 all Serbs.
 
 When I didn't have electricity last few days, I told you a
 friend of mine [...], he always had it few hours
 more than me, lives next to the hospital and they are
 priorities. I went to his place to cook something small
 for children in any time day or night, in the moment he
 got energy, he just phone and says [...] "come here,
 I just got it". 
 
 When you walk through the streets, you would never say
 that we are in war. Streets are full of people, during the
 day only, sitting in cafes,walking, all nice dressed,
 chatting, joking, but the problem is all our talks are
 about this situation. Do you have electricity, do you have
 water, did you manage to buy bread this morning, did you
 sleep last night, was the detonation near, all practical
 problems. Then, talks about global politics, who will
 sign, who will not, what is Russian role, we all became
 experts in politics. And finally jokes, i heard so many
 jokes last period, I can not remember all. The sense of
 humor is on high level. few days ago I saw some graffiti
 on the wall, and I laughed and laughed. One: NATO
 SURRENDER!!!! (come on guys, you are going to kill us
 all)!! ; Dear president, you were not at home, when we
 needed you the most. ( it is about bombing his residency);
 Sorry, we didn't know it was invisible ( this is about
 F-117 the invisible plane we shoot). And I heard so good
 joke yesterday, Do you know how a Serb man feels in the
 morning when he wakes up? Missed. And a Serb woman? Missed
 twice. Well this word "miss" in our language has double
 meaning. "miss" can mean for example you missed a goal in
 football game, so the bomb missed. And "missed" can mean
 that he done nothing worth in his life. 
 

[Here I am snipping a very interesting but perhaps too 
personal paragraph on everyday life of a Belgrade woman]

 
 People are somehow bored with all this, 60 and something
 days is not small when you have a tension day and night
 and pretend everything is fine and normal. Some of my
 friends ran away at the beggining, some just few days ago,
 some who ran away couldn't stand there and they returned.

 We all wish this to end as soon as possible, nobody is
 thinking of tomorrow, you know that old movie, Gone with
 the wind, and at the end Scarlet o' Hara is crying and she
 says, "I'll think about that tomorrow". It is sugar movie,
 but this sentence on the end explains perfectly our
 behavior. But everybody is terrible enraged by NATO and
 West, and if they try to use ground forces I think that
 they will have a new Vietnam. Every old woman on the
 street is prepared to take a gun and shoot at least one
 soldier. I don't share that opinion, but it is most
 common, and you asked about ordinary people. Before the
 war we had all kinds of western products here, from food,
 wardrobe, technics....and yesterday I saw commercial on
 TV, selling something, saying: "none of our products are
 made in NATO countries", I think it was for Nokkia
 cellular. Well it is stupid because we still have all
 those products here. The problem is only food when there
 is no electricity, you know bakeries doesn't work,
 refrigerators, and it is great problem with water, so
 shops don't work....no food.