My next appearance in the Municipal Court in Pazin is scheduled for September 8, a mere fortnight from today. Ostensibly, I am facing the mayor of Motovun for libelous writing about the conflict of interests surrounding golf development and the sale of municipal land (“Croatia Spells Conflict of Interest,” October 3, 2008). In fact, I am facing wholesale corruption in Croatia, where golf development has been seized by the politicians from top to bottom as an opportunity to profit from the sale of land in the hands of the state (“A Matter of the Past,” July 2, 2009). The corruption reaches well beyond Croatian borders, it goes without saying (“The Right Words,” July 19, 2009).

So, what do I do? This time I am eager to go on the offensive, but I am aware of the forces facing me in Motovun, Istria, Zagreb, and beyond. Awesome they surely are, as are their stakes. But can I help derail the lucrative land grab they have had in mind from the very start?

To be honest, as the ghastly expression goes, I very much doubt that anything I manage to do will have much impact. Together with the political crisis in Croatia, the global economic crisis is a much tougher opponent to crooked golf development than I can ever become. Still, I am eager to go on the offensive for the hell of it. In the last analysis, this is the only good reason to confront the bad guys anywhere, including Croatia. If I make the slightest of dents in the money-laundering scheme behind golf development in Motovun, so much the better. But that small gain is, as it were, incidental. There is joy in the fight as such. Besides, if anything funny happens to me, all the relevant authorities will know exactly where to look: the fake foreign investors in golf development. Follow the money, you idiots!