Although I have only seen it in flashes between the trees, I have a connection with Sarajevo, It looked beautiful. Past the rocky slopes and cracking pine cones, it shone at me from a valley. You can see my great grandfather Izy on the steps of the town hall in pictures, part of the committee that gave the Archduke Franz Ferdinand his send off. In India, during Indira Gandhi's emergency, long ago now, I met my first girlfriend, a budding Yugoslavian. She had obsidian eyes, fine bronze hair, a smile like the Medusa and stubby fingers. In1976 Yugoslavia seemed like a peaceful place and I romanticised it because I remembered Natasha and I felt I was a socialist and I was only 16. A year later, in summer, we lived together for a month. In 1980. She left her new boyfriend in town and took me to a small Island off the coast. We slept in the forest and swam in a bay surrounded by yellow rocks like. Her friends seemed to have so much time to waste, to get themselves into existential knots....
Left wing commentary from the heart and the head