Coffee with the President

Monday, January 15, around noon… I am at pains thinking what to write for tomorrow’s issue of Danas daily. My mobile rings.

I´m calling from the cabinet of President Milutinovic, says a pleasant female voice. The President would like to talk to you, would you be interested? Why not, I answer. Hold on a second while I connect you. I think: if Kostunica can talk to Milosevic, why shouldn´t I chat to Milutinovic.

Hello, Milutinovic speaking, how are you? He says that he follows my work, he has my books, he collects copies of my cartoons. He also has some suggestions with regards to my site and so on.

Mr. Koraksic, I suggest we have coffee together, says the President. Where? I ask. Why, in the presidency. We make an appointment for Friday at noon. It´s true that I agreed, but all sorts of thoughts are passing through my head. What should I do, I think, while the President and I are sitting, chatting and drinking coffee, if all of a sudden Sloba bursts in and says: “I´ve come for a cup of coffee as well!”, carrying clippings of my cartoons under his arm for me to sign.

I hope he doesn´t, I tell myself.

Friday, noon.

I enter the presidency, a cordial lady greets me: do you want to take the elevator, the President is on the first floor?

No need, I say. We ascend.

In front of the office – the President, we shake hands and enter the cabinet. A large desk, flags, the emblem of Serbia, black leather armchairs, artistic pictures on the walls, there are no political portraits… What would you like to drink? Coffee, as agreed, I say. The President is interested in my last name, he says it´s rare and unusual. I answer saying that I come from Cacak and in the village of Gornja Gorevnica there are fifteen Koraksic households. The President inquires about the origins of my last name, I say that Koraksics have come from Herzegovina and that, maybe accidentally, one Greek fresco painter monk was called Koraks, which is why I took that pseudonym. Then the President asked how I got started and what I had studied. I say – architecture, and after the third year I devoted myself to cartoons. He joyously announces that he had as well, true, only for a month, studied architecture, and then switched to law.

I can go anywhere I like with law afterwards, reminisces the President about his old decision. Now I ask what had always tickled me most – how did the former government react to my work? I heard some rumors, but I would like to hear firsthand. The President says that I had made him guffaw with laughter a couple of times. He says they had thrust my drawings under each others´ noses, giggling. From his story I comprehended the truth which defeated me – they laughed at how each of them was depicted, as though the message of the cartoon wasn´t important to them. You have made a few epochal cartoons, says the President. At one point he had an idea and suggested it to his colleagues from the political pinnacle that the State should buy advertising space in the New York Times and publish Korax´s cartoons there. He gave up that idea when others screamed at him. He still thinks it was a good idea. I say, wouldn´t that have been hypocritical? Why, asks the President. I remind him of the story I heard from Gordana Logar, how, following a reprimand that the media has no freedom here, Milosevic thrust my cartoons in front of Richard Holbrooke´s nose with the question: “Has this magazine been forbidden, and is this cartoonist scared?”. President Milutinovic confirms this and says he was there in person. Then the President heads for his bookcase, takes out my two books, Que Sera Sera and A Year Later, which he bought at the book fair in 1997, and a bundle of photocopies of the cartoons which I am to sign for his son. He says the copies were downloaded from my site, while I notice that they were photocopied from these very same books. And I tell him that.

They tricked me, he laments. I promised the President that I would send him the real complete set of the cartoons´ photocopies in which he is one of the heroes. 

I examined your site and I suggest you introduce an additional page with the heroes and “who´s who” signatures, since the visitors to the site don´t always know who the actors are, and your work will be around for a long time and everyone should know, says the President. All modern politicians keep a diary. Are you keeping some notes for history? I started writing once, but that is highly strenuous work. An old politician advised me that if I wanted to do this, then I would have to write every day, even if only one sentence. For example, what I had for lunch that day. I did keep a diary for a while, and then I thought, “what if someone gets hold of my diary?” That is extremely dangerous. Even Milosevic doesn´t keep a diary. Then I gave up, admits the President. We advance to more serious topics – Dayton and Rambouillet.

Things were pretty dramatic in Dayton, the President informs me. Panic-stricken Americans came and said “The Bosnians have changed their minds and refuse to sign, and we need at least two signatures”. They´re looking for Milosevic. I tell them he´s sleeping. What am I to do now? I decide to wake him up after all, he jumps “as though doused with cold water”, rushes to see Tudjman and convinces him to sign. That´s how I saved Dayton.

The story was so tense, that I let out a sign of relief at the end as well. You met Madeleine Albright?

She is a very pleasant person, it´s not like what the people are saying.

Does she know Serbian, I ask the President.

She doesn´t, but I´m absolutely certain that she understands everything. She sang a lullaby in Serbian to me. Did you fall asleep, I ask.

The President says he didn´t. Towards the end we talked about some other important events which aren´t meant to be published in a newspaper. The President begged me not to publish it “even if your life depended on it”. While he was seeing me off, he kept repeating at the door – “even if your life depended on it, even if your life depended on it”. I come home, the telephone rings. Gruja is calling from the editorial office and says – Karic has sent a letter, he is thrilled with the cartoon and wants to buy it.

Who´s next?