BELGRADE, May 24, 1999 -- 3:00 a.m.
The power went down while I was typing this. Luckily, I haven't lost the material, and my disk didn't crash. Again I copy what I have been jotting down on paper ...
6:00 a.m.
Power on. Fridge and freezer routine. Back to sleep.
9:00 a.m.
Power off, water back on. Belgrade's water reserve is down to 10 percent. The all-clear sirens sound off -- I wasn't even aware that the air-raid-danger sirens had sounded. I'm getting used to this horror. No bread in the nearby store -- the bakeries didn't have power, nor any of the priority users. Natasha went to the supermarket -- their checkout counters don't work when there is no electricity. Still, they are organizing themselves somehow. People are very calm.
An A-10 plane was shot down last night over the city of Gnjilane in Kosovo. Another batch of 20 rockets has been let loose on the same prison in Kosovo. This is the fourth day that it was bombed. There are further casualties.
1:00 p.m.
I am sitting on the terrace writing this. It is a cloudy day, but the rain has stopped. Kids are playing in a yard next door. Through the loud chatter of birds, I hear the voices of two little girls playing. One is saying, “America is bombing us.” They both laugh.
Yes, America is bombing us. Or rather, Bill and Madeleine and Wesley and the rest are bombing us. Is CNN's Christine Amanpour bombing us, or is it her husband, the White House spokesman -- what's his name? My friends in the U.S. aren't bombing us, nor the hundreds of people writing to me in response to these letters from Belgrade. I wish I could respond to them, as I used to over these past eight weeks, but I have great problems even sending this out. I'd like to respond to the Vietnam vet who prays for my family and talks of his first-hand experience with the tragedy that is war, and the even greater tragedy of a war that can't even be called a war, a war fought in the name of love with “humanitarian bombs.” I wish I could respond to the wife of a U.S. soldier stationed in Bosnia. The life of a soldier is never easy, and that of his family is even worse. It helps when they know that their loved one is out there, in harm's way, but fighting for peace, fighting for what they believe in. Yet now they know that peace is not the mission.
8:00 p.m.
The power is back on. I hurry to heat up dinner. While my family is eating, I make some food for tomorrow. We've even turned the water heater on. The power will be on for a few hours at best -- we have to have some hot water to bathe the kids. I am very nervous; I shout at the kids to hurry with their meal. There's no reason for it, really; they aren't to blame for anything. It is just that Natasha and I are under great pressure to finish as much as possible in the short time we have before the power goes back down.
9:00 p.m.
I type everything in. I have to be fast, really fast.
The electric-power plant at Oberenovac is named after Nikola Tesla, a Serbian inventor whose many inventions made possible the practical use of electricity on a massive scale. Like me, he lived half his life in the U.S. He felt allegiance to both countries. Tesla made inter-city high-tension power lines possible; he was the first to use alternating currents; he built the first hydroelectric plant at Niagara Falls. Now his life's work is being bombed, along with his people.
The best way to end this absurdity is with a joke:
Bill Clinton visits a school while the kids are learning about the meaning of various words. The President asks the kids to give him an example of a tragedy.
A little kid stands up. “A child playing in the street runs after a ball and is run over by a car. That's a tragedy.”
“No,” the President says, “that is not a tragedy; that is an accident.”
Another kid stands up and gives his example of a tragedy: “A driver of a school bus full of children makes a mistake, the bus swerves and falls off a bridge. All the people onboard die.”
Clinton says, “That is not a tragedy; that is an unfortunate mistake.”
Now the kids are quiet. After a while, one more child stands up. “Air Force One explodes up in the air, and the President and his wife die.”
“Excellent,” says Clinton. “Now that is a tragedy. Can you explain to me why that would be a tragedy?”
The kid continues: “Because it wouldn't be unfortunate, and it wouldn't be an accident.”
Good night America, wherever you are. 
_