Oh good grief, I finally plucked up the courage to reply to a spammer. He reckons he’s Serbian and hiding in Switzerland, which is perhaps why his e-mail originated in South Africa. Just his luck he spammed someone who spent most of the 1990s covering wars in the Balkans from the safety of a swivel chair several thousand miles away.
DEAR FRIEND,
PERMIT ME TO INTRODUCE MY SELF. I AM BORIS SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC, FIRST SON TO THE DEPOSED FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE SERBIA REPUBLIC OF BOSNIA. AS YOU MAY KNOW MY FATHER IS CURRENTLY IN DETENTION NOW AND IS FACING TRIALS FOR WAR CRIMES AT THE UNITED NATIONS WAR CRIMES TRIBUNAL SITTING AT THE HAGUE.
MY REASON FOR SOLICITING YOUR ASSISTANCE IS THAT DURING MY FATHERS REIGN AS PRESIDENT OF BOSNIA, I WAS ABLE TO WITH HIS INFLUENCE AND ASSISTANCE THROUGH CONTRACTS AWARDED MY DEFUNCT COMPANY SIPHON A REASONABLE AMOUNT OF MONEY TWENTY MILLION UNITED STATES DOLLARS (US $20M) WHICH I JUST MANAGED TO DEPOSIT WITH A SECURITY COMPANY HERE IN EUROPE SHORTLY AFTER THE UNITED STATES LED ALLIED FORCES OVERTHREW MY FATHER'S GOVERNMENT.
etc...
To which I replied:
Dear “Boris”
Glad to hear from you and I hope you are well. Next time you send this spam out, you may like to mention that old Slobodan was:
1) actually president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. You will find that the President of the Republika Srpska-Bosna was Radovan Karadzic who now makes his living as a Father Ted lookalike.
2) overthrown by his own people after an election-fixing scandal rather than by US intervention. Hard to believe in this day and age, but there you go.
3) a murderous self-serving bastard.
You may also like to know that Slobodan’s son is actually called Marko, a useless playboy with a penchant for destroying fast cars. The family money instead went to his rather ruthless daughter Mira, who controlled a large import/export empire and undoubtedly has stacks of cash and guns hidden somewhere, probably not a million miles from your Swiss hideout! Get your facts right.
Yours, Scary.
I await his reply with bated breath. This could be the start of a new hobby, culminating in the forcable removal of one or both of my kidneys.
Chunder
Jemma Jacobs' second prize winning story "If it's brown don't drink it down" is now on Robber Rabbit, my other other blog in all its alcoholic glory. Enjoy.
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