Raffarin laments, "Geez, haven't you embarrassed us enough?"
Posted on 02/18/2003 4:54:49 AM PST by BigWaveBetty
Raffarin laments, "Geez, haven't you embarrassed us enough?"
AMERICA'S FUNNIEST VIDEO (Follow the thread)
By Mary Butler and Christine Reid, Camera Staff Writers February 17, 2003
. . . . Andrich's mother, Vujka Andrich, immigrated to the United States in the 1960s from Serbia and still lives in Boulder. The astrologer said she's proud of her daughter for keeping her values throughout the show.
Zora Andrich could not be reached by phone for this story. She told a Camera reporter earlier this month that she signed a contract with Fox TV that forbids her from talking about the show or herself without the network's approval. . . .........................................................
Remember Ivo Andric from Bosnia? Awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in the 60s.
HEADLINE: Aiding the survivors of war
BYLINE: By J. Marie Spilsbury, Colorado Daily
SOURCE: U. Colorado
DATELINE: Boulder, Colo.
BODY: There are things about her homeland of the former Yugoslavia that Gunbarrel resident Vujka Andrich wishes she could forget, but she knows she can't. Her family is still there.
Even though the civil war that ripped apart the Eastern European country ended more than a year ago, Andrich said people there are not much better off than they were during the conflict, still having to fight for food and to meet their basic needs. Her family, as well as the rest of her homeland, needs help, she said, and she wants to come to the rescue.
"The war has stopped, but the struggles continue," Andrich said.
She said in most households, only one member of the family can find work. Most factories have closed and moved out of the country. The cost of living in her village, near Belgrade, Serbia, is comparable to the cost of living in the United States, while most families only make $ 80 a month.
"Everyone is scared," Andrich said. "They are just trying to survive."
To try and help her family, Andrich is organizing a garage sale to be held at her home this Saturday and is now asking for donations from local businesses and residents. Andrich held a similar garage sale four years ago and raised $ 1,500 to send to her 30 family members still living in Serbia.
"I send the money directly to my family and ask them every time to share in the villages and cities where they are," she said.
She said she hopes the money will help her family so they won't have to resort to desperate measures to survive. Morality has disappeared as people there fight for basic needs, she said.
As an example of the corruption that exists today in the former Soviet bloc, Andrich explained how her sister, who suffers from cancer, must pay extra money to receive medical attention.
"They have a system there that if anyone in the family works, it covers everyone else's medical expenses. Every time my sister goes to the hospital for care, they tell her to get the best care possible, she must come up with money and lots of it. They're not supposed to do that. My sister had to sell her family's food to pay the doctors just to stay alive," she said.
The last time Andrich visited her home in Northern Serbia, about 50 miles from the Bosnia-Herzegovina boarder, was two years ago in the heat of war. She was afraid to leave the United States, but Andrich said her sister was deathly ill with cancer, and she needed to see her one last time.
Andrich is reluctant to talk about the things she heard and saw in her homeland. Those are the things she wishes she could forget.
"There were times at night when you would just hear people wailing and sobbing," she said. "Many people felt very innocent in this mess."
Andrich said her sister told stories of Muslims raping Serbian women and villagers tortured by Muslim extremists. "The things I heard people were doing were just below human beings," she said."
Still, Andrich said she understands why the fight has lasted so long.
"The Bosnians invaded the Slavics 300 years ago, and they wanted to throw the Serbians out now," she said. "The Serbs responded with a fight. It's an injustice according to (the Serbs). Imagine if someone comes and rapes you in your own home and then tries to throw you out of your own home. That's how (the Serbs) look at the Muslims."
Andrich said she remembers her homeland as a bit happier. She was a shepherdess, and said she spent her childhood sitting in meadows and dreaming about a place where she could share her ideas freely.
"I grew up with respect for the (Communist) party, and I did what I was told," she said. "Occasionally, there would be food shortages, and we would eat bread with crushed garlic and water for dinner. We were poor, but we weren't the poorest ones. I had a very loving mother who would push my hair out of my face, brush off my dress, and I would believe everything would be fine."
Andrich worked in a factory in Belgrade before emigrating to the United States in 1966 at the age of 22.
"I fantasized about a place that would resonate in me more of who I am," Andrich said.
She arrived in Kennedy Airport in New York in August 1966 with three changes of clothes and $ 1 in her pocket, which she promptly spent on ice cream.
Andrich said she found a second family in the budding hippie movement and spent several years in Greenwich Village before moving to New Mexico in the 70s and Boulder in the 80s.
Andrich now works as an astrologer and thinks about her family often.
"There are children there. There are good people, honest people. They are hard-working people," she said. -------
That explains why Clinton supported the Muslims in Kosovo - kindred spirits.
Hey, did you all read about the human shields, who finally pulled into Bagdhad?
BAGHDAD — Squabbling peace activists were recovering from a chaotic overland journey yesterday after limping into Iraq aboard two London buses, a day late for Saturday's worldwide series of anti-war demonstrations.
Three double-deckers, all crammed with "human shields," had set out from London on Jan. 25 to reach Baghdad in time for the day of global protests. But only two of them, with 65 activists, made it to the Iraqi capital late on Saturday.
The third bus was abandoned in Italy after breaking down. Everyone crammed aboard the others, one of which had to be dug out of snow drifts near Istanbul. Several activists dropped out on the way. The rest endured bitterly cold weather, illness, poor living conditions and a great deal of bickering. When they arrived at Iraq's border with Syria on Friday, Iraqi officials held them overnight, which made them miss Saturday's peace demonstration in Baghdad. Wash. Times
Oh, the stench.
Is Chelsea Clinton on her way to scoring 100,000 on the McKinsey scale? A source tells cybersnoop Matt Drudge that the former First Daughter has accepted a job, said to be worth $100,000 a year, at management consultants McKinsey & Co. But one of Chelsea's pals told us last night that she has not accepted any job offer yet - even for $100,000.
Drudge writes: "An internal voice memo sent early last week to McKinsey & Co. employees specifically stated that Ms. Clinton was being hired as an 'Associate,' a position only open to MBAs, Ph.Ds and MDs. This would be a blatant violation of McKinsey policy."
Clinton will graduate from Oxford University this spring with a master's in philosophy in international relations. A McKinsey spokesman said the company - which has offices all over the world, including New York - would not comment on hirings. He also declined to confirm whether the voice-mail report was accurate. NY Daily News
The Chinese have cleared the walks — most of them — at their embassy at the old Windsor Park Hotel on Connecticut Avenue. So have the Yugoslavs, just across the avenue.
But the French haven't disturbed so much as a flake on the walks running the expansive length of their ambassador's lawn fronting the avenue. The snow was still knee-deep along the entire property. Strollers had to use the street, dodging cars and trucks navigating the ruts in a single lane.
On nearby Massachusetts Avenue, the walks were passable, if not always entirely clear, past the Japanese, Korean, Turkish, Romanian, Greek, Pakistani and Vietnamese establishments. No word on what frightened the French ambassador, but spring begins four weeks from today. WashTimes
England's Sun has issued a special French edition of today's paper, depicting Chirac as a worm, story here.
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