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Hrabovski Serb SOU student was home when bombs hit By JOHN DARLING for the Mail Tribune ASHLAND -- Southern Oregon University student Nelli Hrabovski went home to Serbia to see her family over spring break, did some skiing in Macedonia and central Serbia, then headed back to Novi Sad to spend a few days with her father. Then the NATO bombing began. No one thought the Western allies would bother to bomb Novi Sad, which once was part of Hungary and still has a large minority of Hungarian nationals, Hrabovski said. "The whole city was talking -- will it be tonight? Would they bother with us?" she said. "No one expected it because we were way up north and all the conflict was far to the south." But then she heard the NATO jets. There were no warning sirens. Then she heard the bombs. "People ran into their basements. They turned out their lights." Was she scared? "Wouldn't you be scared,?" she replied with a roll of her eyes. "I thought, `They are actually bombing us! It's actually happening!"' The next day, Hrabovski went out with friends and family to inspect the damage. "They hit only military facilities, nothing civilian, although my cousin's apartment faces a military base and had all its windows blown out." Her cousin has three children, ages 4 to 9. No one was hurt, she said, but all were terrified. She said she doesn't know now many casualties there were in Novi Sad, because the next day she drove to Budapest, Hungary, to fly back to the United States. Although she grew up in the province of Voividana in Serbia, Hrabovski doesn't remember much of the past 10 years of conflict. Asked if she understood what the conflict was about, she shook her head. Asked if she thinks the conflict will ever end, she replied, "I certainly hope so." Hrabovski said she preferred not to discuss the political situation, but noted, "NATO strikes are not going to solve anything or lead to any solution. The situation is worse than it was before. It's threatening now to spread into Macedonia and other surrounding states." When she heard the phrase "Serbian attack on Albanians," Hrabovski said, "You can't say that. It goes both ways. They attack each other." Hrabovski is of Hungarian descent, but when the border of the old Yugoslavia moved north, she was born a Yugoslavian national in Novi Sad, a city of 500,000 in the agricultural plains along the Danube and the second-largest city in Yugoslavia after Belgrade. When she was a high school exchange student in Pennsylvania, a Serbian friend attending SOU encouraged her to apply for admission. She lives off campus with a Serbian roommate. When she finishes her degree in hotel and restaurant management next year, she plans to return to Serbia. She hopes eventually to land a hotel management job in Spain. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA