I
              "Cuckoo-coo..."
              "The Cuckoo bird."
              Anne, my wife, shakes her head.
              "A Cuckoo bird says: 'Cuckoo'"!
              "A Croatian Cuckoo bird says in Croatian: 'Cuckoo-
          coo'".
              From the window on the top storey of a house at the
          upper end of the Svibovac stairs, from the room in
          which I was born, one can see Zagreb, as if on the palm
          of one's hand. Slightly to the left, the golden horns
          of the Cathedral, to the right the ridge of the Upper
          Town and the huge, dark evergreens of the Jurjevska
          Street. Beneath, the hollow valley of the Medvescak,
          lined by chestnut trees, and the greenish helmet of the
          tower of St. John's. In the middle, in a distance,
          silhouettes of skyscrapers, the foggy plain, and blue
          crystals of faraway mountains. A garland of towers:
          Cathedral, St. Francis, St. Mary. St. Dizmus, St.
          Catherine, SS. Ciril and Metod, The Wounded Jesus, St.
          Mark, St. John, St. George.
              From the terrace the view expands by another 180
          degrees - the Cmrok heights, the Ksaver hills, the
          yellow facade of St. Francis Xavier winking from within
          a wreath of greenery. Above, the broad shoulders of the
          Zagreb Mountain.
              But for a student of micro-geography this view from
          the terrace discloses also something else, something
          that very few people realize, that in between the slope
          of the Rockefeller Street and the Medvescak there
          stretches, from the Zvijezda to the Svibovac, yet
          another low hill. There are houses today in that valley
          between the hill and the slope; when I was growing up
          there was only the impassable "Jungle," where we fought
          endless wars with the Medvescak kids.
              To the south of the Svibovac the hill disappears,
          the flat land pushes in, which makes for the wide
          backyards of the houses on this side of the streetcar
          tracks. Then the slope pushes out again, and falls
          steeply toward the former streetcar station at St.
          John's.
              "Cuckoo-coo..."
              Now that I have been warned, I can't stop hearing
          her. She sings from one of those backyards to the south
          of the Svibovac, maybe from that dark and shaggy fir
          behind the house with that flat roof and curving back
          wall. And as I listen trying to identify the exact
          spot, I recall that she used to sing, from the same
          place, some forty-five years ago, at the time of my
          earliest memories, toward the end of that long gone and
          long-forgotten war, which, in retrospect, had for
          Zagreb so little importance. How she sang on through
          the "liberation" and "rebuilding", through the
          "Informbiro" and "Postinformiro," before the Brijuni
          Plenum  and afyer, during the invasion of
          Czechoslovakia, during the Croatian spring of 1971. And
          that she must have continued with her song for that
          quarter of a century I spent on the other side of "the
          big pond", learning my trade, earning degrees,
          succeeding and failing, getting married, becoming a
          parent; while I kept on coming and going. Always the
          same, singing with the same voice, from that same fir
          tree which had been there before my memories. Since the
          beginning of time.
          
          II
              For the first time I arrived in free (or, rather,
          pre-free) Croatia toward the end of May, 1990. I
          witnessed the seating of the first ever freely elected
          "Sabor". I remember how I told Anne and Christine, when
          they joined me in June: "Now that I have Croatia, I can
          also accept that other country, on the other side of
          the Ocean."
              In September, during my second trip and after a
          scholarly conference in Trogir, after Serb attacks on
          Petrinja and the "Balvan Revolution", a few days before
          the return of Ban Jelacic horseback statue (I had to leave three days
          earlier), under the veil of fog and drizzle I listened
          carefully, in the night, waiting for the roar of tanks;
          I listened to the whistle of the jets above the blanket
          of thick gray clouds.
              Zagreb was suprisingly peaceful. The people used to
          say:
              "This is not 1971".
              And it wasn't.
              When my plane was taking off from the Pleso airport, I asked
          myself: "Am I ever going to come back"
              And I answered: "Either into free Croatia, free
          Zagreb, or never again".
          
          III
              On September 17, 1991, the Serb MIG-s attacked
          Zagreb.
              We used to say, in the Diaspora: "If they attack
          Zagreb, the World will intervene."
              The world did not intervene.
              They shot from the barracks, throughout that fall.
              People used to call me, in the middle of the night:
          "I live in California, my folks are in Borongaj. They
          shoot there... Do you know..."?
              I would say: "It's O.K. Let them shoot. They will
          use up the ammunition, and the war will be over".
              Or: "They have bombed Lu ko. My folks live near
          Lu ko, do you know...?"
              I would say: "Let them bomb. They will soon use up
          their bombs and then we will get them."
              My mother was on the Mountain when they rocketed
          the TV- tower.
              On October 7, they rocketed the "Banski Dvori".
              In the apartment of my friend, Dr. Vladimir
          Bedenko, in Demetrova Street, a shrapnel cut
          into the metal frame of the New Yorker poster.
          Another one shot through a cactus in the hall.
              The world did not look our way.
              We did not celebrate Christmas 1991. We did not
          feast, did not drink, gave only a few presents to kids.
          We refused to say "Merry Christmas", but we said,
          rather; "Have a Christmas". Instead of "Happy New Year"
          we used to say; "Have a Happy January 15th".
              The January 15th came and Zagreb had not turned
          into a pile of rubble.
          
          IV.
              I arrived on March 21, 1992, in rain mixed with
          snow. One still had to fly to Ljubljana since the
          Croatian air-space was closed. I was nine hours late
          due to a snowstorm at Kennedy.
              In Zagreb I went in search of war scars. In my
          friend's apartment I took a picture of that wounded but
          never conquered cactus. From his window I photographed
          the ruins of the "Banski Dvori". Along the basement
          windows there were piles of sand bags, with
          inscriptions in some oriental language. The art
          collections were in storage. One could not go to
          Medvedgrad because there was an anti-aircraft battery
          there.
              At the "Caritas" across from the Cathedral there
          were lines of refugees. I brought 25 kilos of food and
          toiletries and gave them to the "Caritas". The people
          were sober but friendly. They did not push in the
          streetcars. The drivers stopped at the pedestrian
          crossings. There were soldiers on the streets, our
          Croatian soldiers. They were cheerful and smiling and
          telling stories about how they chased the chetniks. The
          hedges along the streetcar tracks were neatly trimmed.
          Wherever necessary, they planted new trees.
              A friend, a social scientist and colonel in
          reserve, a native of Imotski, told me: "Put a bunch of
          people from Zagreb and a bunch from Imotski together,
          give them guns, and they fight like hell. Nobody can
          beat that."
              Zagreb had scattered its bones on all the fronts.
              That chilly and rainy spring, while plums and
          cherries blossomed like crazy, it was a quiet and sober
          Zagreb - a Zagreb of freedom. I returned with a few
          photos of sand bags, and with endless pictures of
          cherries, plums and pears in bloom.
              In Zagreb I also learned about the U.S. recognition
          of Croatia. Most appropriately, in the company of that
          outstanding Zagreb citizen, Slobodan Lang. We were
          crossing the Jelacic Square, when somebody screamed
          from the other side: "Slobodan, the vermin have
          recognized us!"
              This was the most valuable of my returns.
          
          V
              Toward the end of that long-forgotten,
          insignificant war, we often ran into the basement. One
          American (or British) bomb fell at the Glogovac, some
          two hundred meters away. For a while after the war
          there was a pile of blackened tile and rubble. Then
          somebody cleared it up, and built a new home.
              In the year 1242 the Tartars burned Zagreb and
          destroyed the Cathedral. Which Zagreb and which
          Cathedral? Some of my teachers at the Department of Art
          History used to say that the Cathedral was somewhere
          else. Some claimed it was exactly where it stands
          today. Then, it was not easy to destroy a building of
          that size. Today, it is a few minutes' work.
              From the age of the Tartars until the WW2 Zagreb
          was hit by earthquakes, fires, and floods. The Gric and
          the Kaptol fought among themselves. There were other
          kinds of civil trouble. But Zagreb was spared
          destruction by enemy arms; the Turks rode around it,
          but they never attacked its walls.
              In nine centuries Zagreb suffered two mostly
          bloodless "liberations", in 1918 and in 1945. It was
          finally freed in 1991, with some more shooting.
              Hundreds of long-range missiles are aimed at it, as
          they are pointed, after all, at almost every city in
          the world. One must not think too much about it.
              "Cuckoo-coo..."
              I kept coming back, alone, or with Anne and
          Christine.
              It almost became a routine. I went to meet with the
          new Croatian leaders, to talk to the editors and
          publishers. To see my mother, to spend the Christmas
          1992 in Zagreb for the first time in 23 years --
          freezing together with Anne in a sleeping bag and under
          three thick blankets in the "third", unheated room of
          my mother's apartment, where I used to bring my early,
          Zagreb sweethearts, and where I listened to the cuckoo
          bird before my migration across the "big pond".
              In the meantime people started to push and shove in
          the streetcars, to throw papers on the streets. From
          the harsh days of war we passed into even harder days
          of state-building.
              I wrote several times how Free Croatia is our
          Israel, our Promised Land, how Zagreb is our Jerusalem.
          For the New Year's in Jerusalem! For Christmas at the
          Cathedral!
              I have lived to see it happen!
          
          VI.
             "Cuckoo-coo!"
              I thought about taking Christine who likes
          adventures, and walking down to the Medevscak, into
          that courtyard with the fir tree. To look for her nest.
              I would take my camera and tape-recorder. I am
          writer and journalist, I am sure they would let me in.
              Then Anne said that my film was not sensitive
          enough, and that the tape recorder was voice-activated,
          and that the cuckoo bird's voice was not strong enough
          to start it.
              So I did not interview her.
              I gave up for technical reasons.
              And maybe I did the right thing after all by not
          disturbing her, who has sung there since the times when
          some kings by the name of Ladislav and Almos built a
          church on a hill to be later known as Kaptol, and some
          "zupan," possibly, sat on the other hill, to be later
          named Gric. How to face her who has been there for nine
          centuries, ever since the arrival of the Honorable Lord
          Duh, a pious Czech, who was selected by the Hungarian
          kings to be the first shepherd of the Zagreb Church.
              She sat and sang on that fir, or some of its
          forefathers, while, nine hundred years ago, bears, deer
          and boars roamed the banks of the creek. She sang and
          outlived kings and kingdoms, as she buried, in the
          course of that negligible half century of my own life,
          two establishments, and saw the birth of a third.
              And she will sing, from that fir, or some of its
          offspring, that eternal voice of Zagreb, for next nine
          centuries, without any change in tune, in intensity, in
          content.
              "Cuckoo-coo, cuckoo-coo"!
          
          Vladimir P. Goss