BUDAPEST — On the bus ride out of Belgrade, Nevana Rudan cowered in her seat as fierce flames from a burning oil refinery leapt toward the sky.
“It was horrible,” the 21-year-old recalled.
Equally horrible was leaving her father, mother and grandmother behind as she and her younger sister Jelena fled the NATO bombings for safety in Hungary. The sisters are among more than 400 Yugoslavian Jews who have sought temporary refuge in Budapest.
The Jewish communities of Yugoslavia and Hungary have had a long-standing agreement. If either ends up in a war, the other will come to its aid. Now war has erupted and the Hungarian Jewish community has stepped up to the plate, offering food, shelter and hospitality to Jews from the neighboring country.
The Jewish Agency for Israel is helping fund the $5,000-a-day effort, as well. Refugees have been offered the opportunity to go to Israel, where they can stay temporarily or remain and make aliyah.
The assistance “means everything,” said Rudan, a student of Serbian and world literature who wants to be a writer. “It means life at least. It means food and sleep and not worrying for myself and my sister.”
The Rudan sisters, along with many other Yugoslavian Jewish refugees, are staying in Budapest’s modest Park Hotel. Its lobby serves as a meeting place for the refugees, who crowd into the space at all hours to drink coffee and talk about home.
Often, the talk turns to relatives left behind in Yugoslavia. Law dictates that men of draft age — 14 to 60 years old — cannot leave the country. As a result, many families have been separated. Their torment is palpable.
Slavica Abinun’s eyes fill with tears when she talks about her husband back in Belgrade. She has fled to Budapest with daughter Jana.
“I cry all the time because I don’t know if we will be together again,” the elder Abinun said.
Last week, Aca Singer, the 76-year-old president of the Belgrade-based Jewish Federation, drove from Belgrade to Budapest to meet with a United Jewish Communities delegation. The North American Jewish leaders were visiting Hungary, Albania and Israel to observe efforts to aid war victims.
He said Jews in his homeland oppose the bombing, although he admitted not everyone supports Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. “The economy in my country is ruined,” he said.
Indeed, many of those gathered in the Park Hotel lobby expressed anger toward NATO and the United States for disrupting their lives.
“There would be no ethnic cleansing if you hadn’t dropped the bombs,” one woman said. “You do not know the other side of the story. The Kosovars were troublemakers, pushing for independence.
“The stories about mistreatment of Kosovars were exaggerated,” she continued. “There were no murders. Villages were not burned. Not until the bombing.”
Taking a different approach, Nevana Rudan framed the situation somewhat philosophically.
“I’ve learned that nothing is for sure,” the articulate and soft-spoken young woman said. “You never know what’s going to happen…I’ve learned a lot about surviving and changing my point of view.
“My granddad was a rabbi,” she added. “He taught me not to hate anybody. It’s just happening. I can’t do anything about it.”
Though other young people who passed through the Park Hotel have left for Israel — deciding to immigrate, or at the very least committing to a two-week pilot program there — Rudan expects to stay put, at least until her mother and grandmother can join her and her sister.
Living in Budapest has been an adjustment.
“I’ve never been to Hungary. I don’t speak a word of Hungarian,” Rudan said. Outside the confines of the hotel, where she speaks in her native language, she does her best to communicate in English, French and German.
Some of Rudan’s peers will soon be speaking Hebrew.
Belgrade natives Evona Yankovech, 18, and Tamara Nestorovic, 17, have been friends since childhood. Last week, they sat in the Park Hotel, bags packed, waiting to travel to Israel on a chartered plane carrying the North American delegation.
“My one wish is to go to Belgrade, not to Israel,” Yankovech admitted.
Still, for now, Israel offers a haven, a peaceful change of scenery. At least that’s what friends of the pair who have already traveled there report. “They say it’s beautiful,” Yankovech said. “They’re amazed by it.”