Zagreb, January, 2003
Letter No. 1

Dear C.G.,

I promised write to you about my life. You know that I have lived in the United States, Indonesia, Russia... You know quite a lot about the incredible period I have been going through since I began singing ten years ago when I was 47. But no matter what you know, no matter what you have experienced yourself, it might be interesting to hear about someone else‚s time on this planet of ours. And perhaps it will make me feel better to materialize my past. No better way than to turn it into black signs on a white surface and send it to someone.

Time: April, 1972
Place: The Soviet Union

I told you I married my first husband Misha after knowing him for only three weeks. I came to Moscow in order to improve my Russian, and so it turned out I continued improving it there for almost twelve years. Of course, the first months of marriage were not so bad. I was very much in love and it was easy to be blind and to overcome the differences.

Miűa was working with a Slovenian (former Yugoslavian republic) foreign trade company in Moscow. When I showed up in Moscow he had already been living there with his mother for a couple of years and trying to complete his studies. Misha‚s mother was the daughter of Russian October Revolution refugees. She was born and educated in former Yugoslavia but in her forties came to Moscow to work as a translator. Misha‚s grandfather was a former white Russian officer, whereas his grandmother had relatives in many countries, such as Poland or Georgia (former Soviet Republic).

Misha and I had been married for only a couple of months when we were invited by Misha‚s Georgian relatives to pay them a visit in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia. The weekend of our visit began one Friday afternoon in April with our flight on board of a regular Soviet plane together with many Georgian-looking people who were carrying many pieces of luggage (bundles, baskets, sacks) and I was wondering whether the sweet aromas in the plane were the aromas of Georgia. The Soviet regime treated foreigners with a great deal of respect and one of the ways was very strange: we were always separated from ordinary Soviet people, whenever it was possible. But it was not possible to afford separate planes for foreigners inside the Soviet Union, so sometimes we were lucky and got the chance to mix and meet real people. In those times when I was living in Moscow, Georgians were best known for the fruits and vegetables they brought to the Moscow markets straight from Georgia. This was formally not allowed, but there were always ways of fixing things. As my friend once said: „This is a country where nothing is possible and where everything is possible - if you know the catchä. There was such a difference in prices that it paid off to buy return plane tickets, sell Georgian tomatoes or kindza or pickles to people who could afford to pay market prices that were ten or twenty times higher than those in regular stores and return to Tbilisi with a pile of Roubles (in regular stores you could find tomatoes, for instance, only as a very rare vegetable and you could perhaps buy them only after standing in a long queue for a long period of time, hoping the supplies would not run out before it is your turn).

We were met at the airport by Misha‚s Uncle David (babushka‚s nephew ö the nephew of Misha‚s grandmother? - the question mark is there because I never seem to remember such details when it comes to who is who). It was not Misha‚s first visit to Uncle David‚s home in Tbilisi where Uncle David was a high-ranking police-something there (Ministary of Internal Affairs, or whatever). Misha always got several hundred Roubles (several mean Soviet salaries) as pocket money whenever he stayed at Uncle David‚s place in Tbilisi or whenever Uncle David came to Moscow. We were driven by a black Volga to the hotel where a room was booked for us and then to Uncle David‚s place. I don‚t remember hearing why he did not have a wife and children. The table at uncle David‚s was already covered with food and drinks and there were some people ö friends, already there: a young couple and, as far as I remember - all the others were men. The focus of attention was not on the food but the very refined and rare 25-year-old bottles of Georgian cognac. Georgian wines and brandies were very highly esteemed not only in Georgia and it was not difficult to drink along with the others after each toast. You have probably heard about Georgian toasts? They are the most extraordinary taosts in the world, often very long and very amusing, like fables. One should drink only after a toast has been said either by the tamada or by the other guests arround the table. Misha was amazed because I kept up with the rest of the crowd and drank as much as anyone else. When it was finally time to leave I seemed to be the most sober one getting up from the table (some could not get up at all). Misha admired me very much that night because everyone was very drunk, he himself could hardly walk, and there I was supporting him to our hotel room. He did not know what would follow the next day.

The next day I was either lieing down or vomitting in the hotel bathroom. I was still young then and I wanted to believe I could drink and get away with it. I am wiser now and after many years of such after-spirit- experiences I was forced to face the terrible truth : if I drink I get a migraine and spend many hours trying to release the spirits from my body by running to and fro from my bed to bathroom or vice versa. So I spent the whole Saturday in the Tbilisi hotel room and bathroom: time lost forever. It might have been any other room and bathroom in the world.

Sunday was a new day, a very sunny day, and a very extraordinary one as well. After an hour of sight-seeing (the little I saw of Tbilisi and its surroundings was really amazingly beautiful) we were taken to the house of Misha‚s other Georgian relatives. The strange thing was that he had never met them nor heard about them in concrete terms. So all at once he had other very high-ranking relatives besides Uncle David. The flat where we spent the rest of that day from late morning till evening was furnished with very expensive foreign furniture, the lady of the house and another lady were wearing expensive wigs that were very trendy and very obvious, but that was the fashion at the time, and the table was full of tasty dishes made from ingredients, the price of which amounted to several Soviet salaries. I don‚t remember all the details, but everyone was so happy to see us. All in all there were about twelve people there and it was a great day abundant in positive emotions, great jokes, long Georgian toasts and singing. Everyone was delighted when Misha said I could sing. I said I had to have a guitar to accompany myself and a guitar was supplied very soon. And then after a couple of hours I received presents from our hosts - the other uncle and aunt. I could not believe my eyes because as far as I could tell the bracelet I unwrapped was made of solid gold and the stones resembled rubies. (Several years later I saw a similar bracelet in a Moscow shop and it cost about 400 US dollars). There were other presents: a necklace resembling coins that cost „onlyä about a half of a mean Georgian salary, some black Georgian vases, some records with Gergian male-choir singing.

As time was passing Misha and I had but one worry: we did not have reservations for the evening plane to Moscow and he had to got to work on Monday morning. Our wonderful jolly hosts kept assuring us that it was no problem and somehow we believed them. When it was time to leave in order to catch the evening flight we said good-byes to all but the two uncles who drove us to the airport.

It was there at the airport we realized how high-ranking the uncles were. They passed through all the doors and check-points without even showing their credentials. One of them spoke to some officials in Georgian and we were rushed directly to the plane on the runway. Misha and I were standing there wondering what was going on. The uncles were talking to a person in uniform (captain?) and shortly afterwards we could not believe our eyes: another person in uniform was escorting two very angry-looking people (passengers?) out of the plane. Then Misha and I were rushed into the plane and there was hardly time to say our good-byes. The uncles were very cool-looking - as if they had done the most ordinary thing in the world, wished us all the best, many sons, and hoped to see us soon either in Moscow or in Tbilisi.

Thirty years have passed since. It was my one and only visit to Tbilisi. Never did we see any of our relatives again nor hear from them. Many were our efforts to reach them. We could not reach any of them by phone. They never phoned. Not even Uncle David who was seen in Moscow several times afterwards. To go uninvited to Tbilisi never seemed a very good idea.

In the meantime (after twelve years of marriage) Misha and I got divorced, I sold the golden bracelet in a moment of need, but I still have the coin necklace, one of the black Georgian vases and I love to listen to Georgian folk music.

I also love Georgian toasts and I‚m going to share one with you; actually just the ending (the toast would be longer than my letter to you).

So, my dear friend: May your wishes always be equal with your capacity to fulfill them!

Sincerely yours, Dunja

P.S. The aroma in our plane to Tbilisi was not Georgian at all, as I learned in the years to follow. It was the usual aroma of Soviet planes, the interior of which was alaways cleaned with the same type of detergent.