The shot heard round the sofa in Kosovo

I settled into a low divan to chat up the father of Ramush Haradinaj after motoring miles in a daylong victory tour for the onetime indicted war criminal in early April. The younger Haradinaj had been on trial on murder and torture charges stemming from the breakup of the former Yugoslavia. After years of legal proceedings, judges at The Hague tribunal acquitted him of any crime. On this first weekend home, Haradinaj had driven from village to village to thank his supporters.

Hilmi Haradinaj, a father of 10 who was hosting a huge party in his village in western Kosovo, said the family had been nervous for months. No one knew how the judges would rule, but, the 65-year-old said through an interpreter, "I always had faith."

I was smiling at his mild words when Hilmi, a man of some girth, suddenly shifted in his seat and whipped out-Was I seeing right? -a black pistol from his pant leg.

I gaped as he silently turned his heavy wrist backward, nearly touching my knee and then my thigh with the gun, and then punched the barrel deep into the sofa between us.

Bam! Bam!

Hilmi blasted the sofa open. The chasm of foam and stuffing between us-that is my still-reeling memory of the wreckage-was smoking. I rocked back and clapped my hand over my left ear. I was momentarily deaf. Hilmi was smiling.

A family friend, helpfully shouting into my right ear, later assured me that celebratory gunfire was not usually done inside the home - or even other villages in the rougher regions of Kosovo.

But Hilmi had sacrificed a lot in the past decade, he said.

The Haradinajs were among the most stalwart of ethnic Albanians who fought for Kosovo independence and its break from Serbia. Two sons died in fights with Serb forces in the 1990s. Another had been jailed for the killings of Albanians from that time. Another son was gunned down in his car in 2005.

The family had feared losing Ramush too, the friend said, so the ear-splitting bang-bang was a thing of joy. "It's the first time he has shot in three years, since Ramush went to The Hague," the friend said beaming.

Platters of roasted meat and bottles of good wine were soon passed around. More gunfire erupted, this time by men shooting, glass flying, right through a closed window. Even Ramush's wife, Anita, took a turn popping rounds into the sky. Ramush at some point moved closer to Hilmi and could be heard singing folk songs. A man in a police uniform strummed a string instrument, humming along.

It was that kind of Kosovo night.

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