PART ONE - Part 03

“Pick up your things and get off the trucks. Then you all go down the road and wait there for us to tell you what we’ll do next.”

PEGIN - This was the name of a town near which lay a slightly downhill slope on which the refugees were given sanctuary. The slope was large and wide but too small to fit them all. Still shaken from their ordeal, the poor refugees were full of fear and doubt. They were wailing, crying and cursing. They were thirsty, hungry and dirty, and here too they were calling and looking to find those whom they had lost during the long trek and before that.

They were afraid, restless and their eyes were full of questions. The most burning questions on their minds were: “What is going to happen next?” “Where are we?” “Will we return to our homes or will we continue to travel on this strange road, and for how long?”

After everyone descended on the slope, the place began to look like a living anthill. To rest their weary bodies some people couldn’t

wait and lay down on the hard, bare ground. This was an opportunity for them to rest, collect their thoughts and be prepared for what was to come next. Some continued to look for their loved one, in hopes that this time they might find them. Others took the opportunity to look after their wounds and ease their pain. Among them voices of despair, pleas, cursing and pain could be heard... Here, in the space under the open sky, they searched, shouted, yelled, hugged and loudly rejoiced for being alive. Some held hands for fear of being separated again; they were touching and leaning against each other to make sure they were still alive and together. Others mourned their loss.

It was a new day. The sun was hot in the open sky. It was burning all day. The people lay down on the hard, sun burned ground and on top of all their other miseries, they now had to contend with the burning sun. Some began to smell and taste something similar to salt in the air. The west wind was carrying warm salty water and mixing it with their sweat. And in the evening they lay beneath the open sky watching the silver clouds roll over them.

The next day big and small tents arrived. They were moldy and smelly military tents with big holes in them. The Albanian military was setting them up. They figured they were good enough for those dirty newcomers to hide in from the rain and the heat. After they put the tents up, the soldiers brought in sweat and blood-stained mattresses and filled them with hay and straw. They were at least softer than the ground underneath them.

“You will now rest and sleep easier...” they said and left.

Those from the leadership were also telling them the same thing as they went from tent to tent to determine how many they could squeeze in each tent. One thing the people wanted to know, and they weren’t telling them, was how long they were going to stay in these lice-infested, moth-eaten tents and how many nights they would have to sleep on those sweaty, smelling mattresses... All they could tell them was to be patient and have faith… They weren’t told how long they had to suffer and what to have faith in from now on.

Not getting the answers they were looking for, the people reluctantly and quietly did what they were told. They packed themselves in the tents but found the stench of mold suffocating. As they all began to pack into the tents they found that there was no room for everyone.

That day and several days after that, the man with the paper funnel came back and gave persuasive and reassuring speeches. During one of those speeches he said:

“People have faith and patience, rest now, rest and gather your strength for another day or so, or perhaps for a few more hours... Our brave fighters are pounding the enemy at Gramos and soon will bring us victory and after that we will all leave this place and go home... So, wait patiently and have faith and confidence in us and it will all be over. When all this is done and it’s safe for us to return, our voices will thunder again with the good news. When the enemy is broken we will be the first to tell you to pick up your things – we are going back home...”

Some of the people who weren’t paying attention and who only heard the last words, assumed the enemy had been broken and that they were going home. So, they hurriedly ran around shouting:

“We’re going home. Hurry up people we’re going home!”

“Listen people, we’re going back home!”

The great misunderstanding soon turned into self-deception and people were overpowered with a great desire to go back - which enslaved them.

But not one of those who led them said anything similar to that.

They waited and hoped that someone would say something like that. But, as they waited and waited for the good word to be said - it wasn’t said. None of those who led them told them it was time to go home. They only told them that today they would be spending the night here, but no one told them what would happen tomorrow...

In time the voice, which days ago called on them to run to escape the evil, was also gone. Now there was no voice to bring them comfort and soothe their souls, to calm them down and tell them what was going to happen next. There was no one there to tell them where they were going and when they were going to return. There was no one there to ask them if everyone was there and if anyone had gotten lost on the way? Quietly the people waited, they waited to hear that same loud voice which days ago yelled at them to “run”, to loudly tell them that someone was here for them, to care about them, to hear their concerns and to worry about them...

There, on the slope at the fringe of Pegin, the nights didn’t bring bright dawns. There thick fog dominated the dawn which, when it dissipated, took with it all the hope that was there.

It was forbidden for people to stray outside the designated slope or go to town. They weren’t allowed to go to the gardens next to the slope in which pumpkins, tomatoes, peppers, watermelons and melons were rotting.

Every day a large flock of ravens fluttered overhead, scrambling and circling over the slope, creating a mobile, black shadow that floated over the refugees like a vision of a bad omen. The slope too must have looked black from above because almost every woman, every widow and mother was in mourning and wearing a black head kerchief on her head...

The people were hurting and there was no moment of happiness. Almost everyone was in some sort of pain and people spent their days and nights crying and cursing, some in silence and others loudly. With broken hearts and tainted souls they sat and stared at the rocks in pain...

Black clouds began to appear over the hills at sunset. Lightning flashes cut through the darkness. Someone said: “Lightning struck the top of the hill.” Then thunder was heard. There was a certain odour in the air. Those who recognized it ran and kept yelling: “The thunderstorms are coming here.” By late night torrents of muddy water were heard flowing down the river below as the north wind kept whipping the tents. Heavy drops of rain began to strike the

tents. The sound they made mixed with the heavy sighs and quiet and desperate weeping, breaking the silence in which all ailments and cries were gathered together. Awake, the people endured the long and painful night. And, if it was only that.

“Be patient! Be patient and all this will go away…” some prophesized.

They were patient and waited and endured, crouched under the wet tents while large drops of rain mercilessly fell upon them, filtering through the perforated material and landing on their heads and backs, adding to their existing misery. Crouched next to each other, the women huddled and silently prayed for a quick end to their plight. Their heavy sighs were swallowed by the darkness.

Time had taught them to keep quiet, deep down in their souls to be silent and meek. They had been taught to cry silently, whimper gently and curse the worst curses quietly with their cracked and bloody lips tightly closed, to be firm and strong with their afflictions and misery. Even though they had been uprooted from their native hearth, they weren’t torn like the leaves from the branches in late autumn. Gathered together in a circle, they consoled each other and whispered:

“This too will pass...”

Was there anyone to ask these people how much they were hurting? How deep in their hearts and souls they felt their pain and if their wounds would ever heal? Was there anyone who cared about their pain, their sighs and the flood of tears they shed?

No! There was no one!

Day and night they sat there overwhelmed with solitude, sadness and pain and felt abandoned down to their souls.

They were tormented by the uncertainty of what tomorrow would bring...

They had many, many, many questions, among which was the question:

“Will we lose our sanity???”

6

Mara went out and collected some dry grass and a bunch of dry twigs and placed them between two stones and then placed her gium full of water on top of the stones. She then lit the grass with a match and watched the small flame grow, overpower the dry twigs and lick the gium. She watched the flame grow, shrink and swirl all around as it was blown by the wind. Mara put thicker twigs into the fire and waited for the water to boil. She then took a bag of mountain tea from her sack, broke it into small pieces in her hands and placed them inside the mouth of the gium. A gentle gust of wind blew and carried the smoke and the faint aroma of the boiling tea into the distance.

As the tea boiled, more and more women came and sat around the fire. They watched the flames dance and lick the gium leaving black marks wherever they touched. The gium was getting darker and darker with time but not as dark as the head kerchiefs these women wore on their heads. The mothers and widows stared into the fire mesmerized by its dance, dancing like a living being, burning the twigs, licking the gium and turning it black... The thick black smoke made their eyes burn.

Looking at the gium Mara said quietly: “This gium has been used to put out fires since Ottoman times. It was used to put out the fires started by the Bashibuzuks (armed civilian Muslim raiders and looters), Arnaut henchmen (Albanian bandits), Ilinden revolutionaries, Greek Andartes (Greek armed gangs that operated in Macedonia during Ottoman times attempting by force to convert Macedonians to Greeks), Macedonians enlisted and forced to fight for the Serbian, Bulgarian and Greek armies, French and English soldiers, Indians and black people brought from the Asian and African colonies, and everyone else who came to this small piece of land (Macedonia) wanting to destroy it and leave only ashes, widows and orphans behind.”

Mara stopped talking for a moment, stirred the fire and continued:

“We filled the gium with water from the spring that sprang out of the large boulder and used it not only to put out fires but to quench our thirst, cool ourselves and wash our faces and bodies. People used to say that the water that sprang from the large boulder had healing properties so we also used it to wash wounds, cracked lips and all kinds of other ailments. In winter the water was warm and cool in the summer. Because it was believed to have healing properties people used the water to heal all kinds of ailments including headaches, poor eyesight, sore throats and sore mouths.”

Mara paused for a moment, looked at the women who were paying careful attention to her and said: “That wasn’t all. With the healing water from the spring this gium has quenched the thirst of many, many people which included Albanians, Turks, Ottoman soldiers, foreign soldiers who were here during the Great War, counter-bandits, Greeks, snitches and even policemen who walked up and down the village lanes and listened under people’s windows to hear what language the people in the house spoke. They listened to hear what language was spoken around the dinner table and in what language mothers sang to their children while putting them to bed. Even the communists, who caused much of this wickedness and left behind many widows and orphans, drank from the gium.”

Mara looked around for a moment and then said: “One by one, all those bad guys who set foot in our village and all those who caused evil, left us, but the gium always remained with us… always full of the life-giving water that sprang from the large boulder which not only quenched our thirst but also healed the sick...”

Mara stopped talking now but what she said was repeated and embellished far and wide on the slope where the refugees rested. By the time the story got around people were saying that some sort of great dragon was guarding the water that sprang out of the gash in the large marble boulder. People began to believe that the great evil that passed by the spring couldn’t contaminate the purity of the water because it was guarded by a great dragon.

Someone asked: “Is the dragon that guarded the spring still alive?”

The tea in the gium was now boiling. Mara picked up the gium and went from tent to tent offering people mountain tea. When the gium was empty she filled it with water again and made more mountain tea. Then when she ran out of mountain tea she made herbal teas, mostly from dry nettles, which gave the tea a light golden colour... Mara distributed the tea she made first to the sick and the old, and then to the children.

One of the women approached Mara and quietly said:

“Mara, look at your gium, it has turned black... blackness has covered it...”

Mara looked at her and whispered: “That’s okay. Its only soot from the flame, it will easily come out if I rub it with some fine sand and a little bit of water…” And then she thought but didn’t want to say: “What about the blackness in us? Who is going to wash that out?” She said nothing and kept the bitterness to herself but couldn’t shake the question that haunted her:

“Who is going to wash the black out of our black head kerchiefs?!”

Mara then remembered what an old woman in the village had told her while recounting what had happened during the bloody uprising. As the two women sat under the shade of the eaves the old woman said: “Our hopes, just like our homes were turned into ashes except for that old gium. It didn’t burn. It was blacker than the black walls of our house; it was black almost as black as the head kerchiefs of the rebel mothers and widows, but it didn’t burn…”

Only the black head kerchiefs of mothers and widows were blacker than the gium. This is how it was during all the bad times and this is how it is now.

Mara knew the gium was old, older than her mother-in-law, even older than her mother-in-law’s mother-in-law. Perhaps even older than that.

The women in the village took pride in carrying their stomne (ceramic pitcher) and gium on their head as they returned from the water spring. Mara too took pride in carrying the large and heavy gium on her head. She was a tall and thin woman with a long braid of hair and walked upright, standing tall and swinging her hips as she strolled down the main road in her village with the gium full of water on her head, attracting the eyes of every man that passed her by.

Mara, like many women before her, carried a lot of water in that big gium. She took it to the plowmen, to the grass cutters, to the grain harvesters, to the grape pickers and even to weddings and baptisms; everything that brought joy to the village. The gium served many generations. People were born and died but the gium remained. Sometimes it was clean other times it was dirty with soot. Some people have even claimed that the same gium was used about two hundred years ago to serve water to the builders from the Ianovian villages who built the village church... The gium was black in the fireplace but never as black as the black head kerchiefs of the mothers and widows…

Late at night after Mara returned to her tent she lay down and, through the half-open wing watched the moon lick her watery face with its dim light. Tears streamed down her face and long sighs quietly poured out of her like muffled voices of pain, gloom and humiliation...

Many of the refugees had children with them. There were infants and toddlers between one and two years old and three to fifteen years old. Most of the infants were born on the road, in the camp, under the open sky, in the rain, or on bare ground.

During the spring of last year (1948) not all two to sixteen year old children were collected and sent to the Eastern European countries, although rare, some mothers hid their children and refused to give them up. One such mother was Lina. Lina refused to be separated from her ten-year-old daughter and eight-year-old son. She, like others who didn’t want to give up their children, hid them in the cellar. Some hid their children in the forest, on the hills, in their barns under the straw, outside the village in bushes, in caves and so

on. There the children endured the cold, the humidity and the loneliness. From there, like frightened sparrows, they watched the airplanes circle over the mountains, hills, fields and villages and drop bombs. During the night their mothers or grandmothers secretly brought them home and hid them behind the tall walls of their courtyards with doors boarded up by thick planks. The first thing before doing anything, even before they were given food to eat, the children were sternly instructed to keep very quiet because the neighbours and the people from the village board might be listening. The children weren’t allowed to laugh or play loud games in the yard or at home. At night they gathered in dark rooms and silently ate the warm slice of bread just taken out of the oven. Sitting high up on the doorstep leading to the balcony, the children stared at the road that their older brothers and sisters had taken when they left. Their greatest desire was to be with their siblings and during every moment while awake they asked their mothers:

Mother, when will father, brother, or sister come home?

They asked questions...

They waited...

They hoped...

Lina held her children, one in her lap and the other on her knee and was constantly surrounded by the mothers who had let their children go. They silently watched her and her children with misty eyes and with a lump in their throat. The mothers mostly came to see Lina’s children because they missed their own and had no idea how they were doing and under whose roof they were spending their days and nights. They often wondered if there was anyone out there who would hug them, kiss them and give them love. The mothers who gathered around Lina treated her children like they were their own. They gently caressed their hands, feet, heads and kissed their cheeks. Some mothers sat around Lina looking unfulfilled with their arms crossed and laps empty while others sat with arms stretched out constantly reaching for Lina’s children.

Much waiting, many spilled tears and unfulfilled desires unfolded for the mothers with empty laps during those days and the days that followed. All that was left for them now were memories.

Donka, who was sharing a tent and bed with Lina, laboriously exhaled interrupting the peace and in a quiet voice said:

“My daughter was taken last year and my son half a year ago (By a decision made at DAG Headquarters, a violent mobilization of girls was carried out at the end of August 1947. The next wave of mobilization was carried out by a decision made on February 2, 1948 by the Interim Democratic Government of Greece, which was set up on December 22, 1947 in the village of Asamati in Prespa.). Two people came into our house and told my daughter to bring food for the wounded. My daughter was a tall, strong but slender girl with a braid thick like a scarf stretching down to her hips. She was just a kid. Before that, when they came to collect the children and take them to the Eastern European countries, I went to register her so that she could go with the rest of the children in the village. The woman who was writing names in her notebook looked at her from top to bottom, shook her head, raised her eyebrows and said:

‘You are too big to go with the children. Go home...’

She didn’t write her name in the book. Later they gathered all the girls together and told them that now that winter was approaching they would need warm clothing for the partisans; sweaters, socks, hats, gloves and so on. They told them they had a lot of wool and they needed their help to turn it into clothing, but for that they would have to bring their knitting gear and go to a certain village. They could see that my daughter was too young but didn’t tell her to go home or ask me for my permission to send her. They took her… They took all the girls and none of them returned from where they took them. My daughter turned sixteen the same day they took her…”

Donka crossed her arms over her chest as if hugging her daughter. She kept silent in the grip of her crossed arms but her fear and pain was plainly visible on her face... She kept silent...

There was silence in the tent. All the women around her seemed to have gathered all their strength and patience and waited and hoped in silence. Occasionally they untied their black head kerchiefs and used them to wipe the tears off their faces. And who now, today, tonight, or tomorrow would express the great pain of that bloody open wound? The mothers had lost their children during the breakup. They had disappeared into the large crowd. She yelled but there was no answer. Many heads were lost in the dark of night on the roads during the breakup. Voices, cries, cursing and words of bitter contempt were heard…

The tracks of pain cannot be easily erased...

In the great suffering, what should you regret first and what should you painfully endure?

7

Dedo Tode again went to look for Ilina. He went from tent to tent, from group to group, asking every man, woman and child:

“Has anyone seen my Ilina? People, people, have you seen my Ilina? She is my wife, I say, and her name is Ilina.”

But all he got from them were head shakes and lifting and lowering of shoulders, which meant that no one had seen a woman named Ilina. But Dedo Tode wasn’t the only one looking for someone. There were others like him who had been separated from their relatives, friends and fellow villagers.

Dedo Tode’s broken and muffled voice was picked up by the west wind and carried from one side of the slope’s ridge to the other, scattering between tents but getting no answers of Ilina’s whereabouts.

Mara heard Dedo Tode’s broken and muffled sad voice and slowly went to him and quietly, gently and humbly whispered:

“Please don’t punish yourself; Ilina is probably in another camp. This isn’t the only camp... Who knows in how many other desolate camps they have gathered us. Take it easy, calm down, be patient, one day we’ll all be together in one place and there you will find your Ilina... So please stop punishing yourself...”

So much for Mara’s comfort...

Dedo Tode wouldn’t listen and continued to search for his Ilina all through the camp.

“Ilina!” he kept yelling in a begging, broken voice. It would appear that no one else, except Mara, had even realized how inexplicably

painful Dedo Tode’s pleas were. Day after day, he kept looking for her and everyone he met and asked said “no they had not seen her”. But he refused to give up on her and kept describing her saying: “She is a short woman wearing a black dress. Her name is Ilina, have you seen her?” All he got was silence. And even though Ilina wasn’t among the people in this camp, Dedo Tode continued to go from tent to tent looking for her but she was nowhere to be found...

“Ilina! Ilina! Ilina! Don’t leave me alone Ilina!” he kept yelling in desperation...

Then when he became extremely tired, Dedo Tode returned to his tent and mourned her, sighing sadly, laying on his back on a sack full of ferns, with his fingers tucked under his head. He tried very hard to remember the paths they had taken together and the places they had sat for a brief rest. He remembered people fleeing in front and behind them like a fierce whirlwind sweeping and dragging everything in their path. That’s how he had lost his Ilina… That’s how she disappeared in the long and black river of refugees... On the way he looked for her and at every resting place he thought he would find her. He was sure she was looking for him too, asking people if they had seen him… Asking them if they had seen Dedo Tode… begging them to tell her where Dedo Tode was. With a heavy heart, she too must have been filled with sadness that made her tired eyes water, longing for him. Dedo Tode felt sorry for her and wanted to dream of her, but found it hard to sleep in these sleepless nights of misery. Every time he fell asleep he had nightmares. In his dreams he watched his house burn down and heard his ox Gaito roar in the burning barn. Gaito was his favourite ox with which he had plowed his fields for years. There was his lame horse which had also been burned alive along with his ox. He often used the two to plow the fields and carry shuma (oak branches with dry leaves) from the forest to feed his animals. Dedo Tode felt lucky that the partisans hadn’t take his horse. The partisan commander who wanted his horse felt embarrassed to ride it because it was lame. He couldn’t see himself riding a lame horse going into battle, so he didn’t take it. The poor commander was ashamed… how sad. Dedo Tode had witnessed many tragic things including people fleeing in frustration to the mountains and forests, running to save themselves behind the woods and rocks. There they found

salvation which lessened their fear but only a little. Dedo Tode couldn’t avoid remembering what he had seen… how the life giving fertile soil was heaped in piles and contaminated, plowed by the terrible burning bombs that fell from the heavens. He couldn’t avoid remembering the damage those dreadful burning bombs had done to the houses and the terrible flames they had created, which no one could extinguish, that burned down people’s homes.

The terrible nightmares often kept Dedo Tode awake. He would jump off his bed and, even before he was fully awake, hurriedly get out of the tent. Many times he was seen trying to do up his pants and shirt with trembling fingers. In addition to his own nightmares, Dedo Tode was also deprived of sleep by the cries of babies, by the song of the multitude of crickets that had infiltrated the tents. After experiencing a nightmare he preferred to stay outside, under the open sky, and contemplate his misery which had him enslaved. He tried to fall asleep and dream of his Ilina but couldn’t.

With short and careful steps, Dedo Tode walked to the road to see if any more trucks had arrived. Following close behind him was his inseparable puppy Sharko, his closest companion and only good friend who never left his sight on the road to the unknown. Sharko, with his sad eyes, always watched Dedo Tode. He appreciated his love and the dry crusts of bread he gave him. Dedo Tode always kept some bread in his pocket especially for Sharko so that the puppy wouldn’t go hungry, even though he often went hungry himself.

Dedo Tode lost the strength in his knees every time he found no trucks on the road. He stood there and waited and waited. For him every day and every night the truck came late. For him the trucks were somewhere on the road and coming. This night too the trucks were late.

Disappointed Dedo Tode walked back around the tents and listened to the heavy sighs, sobs, cries of the sick and cries of infants. And all that restlessness in the tormented people who slept or couldn’t sleep, weighed on him. He carried their anguish in his heart, feeling their pain and torment for which there was no ointment to appease him. He walked in a circle around the tents several times until he

was tired. He felt it was time to return to his own tent and lay on his bag full of ferns. That night he didn’t sleep at all. At dawn he quietly and slowly, not wanting to disturb anyone, got up, left his tent and went to the road. There, he sat under the old plum tree and waited. He waited until the sun was fully visible. He then slowly stood up and let out a painful but quiet murmur:

“The trucks are late again.”

The road was empty again. Dedo Tode decided to go back to his tent and go to bed. And for as long as he couldn’t sleep he cursed those who didn’t order the trucks to move. For as long as he wasn’t asleep, he quarreled with the crickets which sang their song inside the tent and outside in the tall grass... He also quarreled with his neighbour who constantly coughed but refused to get out of the tent for ten days. Then, during the next night, some hours before dawn, the coughing in the neighbouring tent stopped. There must have been some great sickness that silenced the cough that morning. But still, there were those damn crickets which wouldn’t stop singing...

Dedo Tode refused to give up his search for the trucks. He didn’t want to think that the trucks were no longer there. He only wanted to firmly believe that they were late and would surely arrive very soon.

“If they don’t come today, they will surely come tomorrow. I’m sure they will come tomorrow,” Dedo Tode was often heard whispering to himself. He repeated this every day until the day he lost his voice. For hours every day, during the day he sat in the shadow of the plum tree waiting. And when he could no longer speak he constantly thought to himself: “The trucks will come… Someday they will come… They can’t leave us here like this? They will come and take us back to our homes...”

The thought that the trucks were already on the road wouldn’t leave him. That thought was like a pesky fly circling around his head refusing to leave him alone. It wouldn’t leave him, not even for a moment. Every day and every moment of his life he spent thinking about it like it was engraved not only in his mind but also in his soul. He believed and held that belief firmly in his arms, breathing like it was part of his living. He constantly thought and believed that

the trucks had already left their origin and wherever they were, sooner or later, they would arrive here. That thought became his absolute hope, like his faith, like his daily bread and water...

His thoughts became his daily prayers in the morning which he silently whispered with unabashed hope.

After the first rays of sun the camp came alive. Staring into the pale blaze of the morning sun, Dedo Tode watched the sky as the first flocks of ravens swarmed, looking like the airplanes that had burned his house with flaming bombs that couldn’t be extinguished with either water or soil.

From his frequent repetition and unyielding desire and hope that the trucks would surely someday arrive, some people began to mock him. When they saw him returning from the road some yelled:

“Did the trucks arrive yet Dedo Tode? Did they pass by here and you didn’t see them? Surely they must have passed by; you just didn’t see them because you were sleeping! Poor Dedo Tode, may God multiply your years so that you can wait for those elusive trucks to go by...

“They will come, they will surely come…” he promised them all, and with a trembling step returned to the road again and waited.

8

As the day approached noon, a number of men carrying bags on their shoulders and a truck were seen arriving. It was rumoured that these were people from the leadership.

The newly arrived men unloaded planks from the truck and asked a number of men from the camp to build a stage and next to it a small shack with a table and four chairs. They said this was going to be the office of the administration. Every day after that one of those people climbed onto the stage and gave a speech telling the crowd about the beatings the enemy had received. Every speech ended with a thunderous shout of slogans which no one in the audience repeated. After shouting promises and threats against the enemy, the people from the leadership pulled out the notebooks and pencils from their bags.

No one knew what they were going to write but it is rumoured that they were going to make lists with names and surnames, by village, so that they would know who was here and where they had come from. One of them, perched on the stage, with a funnel stuck to his lips, called everyone to come over. Soon the tents began to empty and a crowd began to grow in front of the stage. The tents began to empty as the crowd gathered to hear what these people had to say. There was one overriding question in the mind of every person standing in the crowd under the burning sun, and that was: “How long do we have to stand here under the baking sun, in the open sky and in the smelly tents before we can go back to our villages and homes?”

Voice after voice, many questions were asked:

“What will happen to us? Where are we being sent? How long will we be there? When will we return home?”

While the people in the crowd became impatient waiting for answers, those on the stage patiently remained silent.

Those on the stage told the people in the crowd to “Take it easy! Everything was going to be all right.” They reassured them that they were waiting for good news. They told the people that they were winning the battle for Gramos and it was only a matter of days before they crushed the enemy after which everyone was going home. “Stick together and don’t worry... Don’t be afraid. The Party knows and cares about you. The Party sent us here to be with you. And please, calm down, no yelling, screaming, swearing and cursing. One by one, we will take your names and determine how many of you are sick and need treatment…”

“Well, now we feel so much better!” someone yelled. “Where have you been until now?”

“We have been at other camps. It’s not just you. There are many other camps where refugees are gathered and they are all alive and well... Hopefully soon...”

But the people talking on the stage didn’t finish what they had started saying and no one was told what was waiting for them soon...

The comrades on the stage now appeared to be very different in both voice and posture than they had been a few months ago. Then confident, now pissed off. Their voices were fading and sounded mournful... They lacked the proud determination, the anger, the storm, the call, the disobedience, the breakthrough. Now their voices were muffled and their promises were flying low and crashing.

The multitude of their great words of promise turned to words of contempt. Now they seemed like they no longer believed in anything or anyone.

The people from the Party went from group to group mingling with them, asking them to calm down and writing their name, surname and village in their notebooks. They repeatedly reassured the people with the words:

“We are making these lists so that we’ll know who you are and where you come from. We need to know this in order to take you back to the right village. So, now just stand still, be patient and wait for the good news to come to you. Today the first and most important news is that our brave undefeated fighters who have retreated from Vicho have occupied half of Gramos and are pounding the enemy to pulp.”

* * *

And there, at Gramos, where the people from the Party said our partisans were pounding the enemy to pulp, every hill, every rock, every path, every bunker, every trench and every bush on the entire mountain was a target for the government army (enemy), waiting for an order to open fire...

That same day, at five o’clock in the morning the DAG fighters charged into battle. This was exactly what General Tsakalatos from the Greek government side was waiting for and ordered a counterattack. One hundred thousand government soldiers with 120 cannons, many tanks and 90 fighter planes pummeled the partisans who were attempting to storm them...

Gramos was on fire. The attack was weakening and the number of attackers was decreasing. The stones alone weren’t enough for the partisans to hide behind. They were being beaten from the ground and from the sky.

In a solemn and festive mood from the top of Mount Amuda, accompanied by US General Van Fleet in charge of the government offensive, King Pavlos took out his binoculars and watched the course of the fighting. There was frequent and fast news coming in from the front confirming the unexpected that the DAG forces that were attacking the government units were now retreating to Albania. There was uninterrupted news coming from all parts of the battlefield reporting that the government army was winning.

When news broke out that Mount Charno, a strategic point, had fallen into government hands, General Tsakalos became very cheerful and visibly happy and, with a glass full of wine greeted

General Ketsias, chief of army headquarters, chanted “Long live the Greek nation”, then turned to the king and, with a victorious tone of voice, said:

“Your Majesty the war is over. Gramos has virtually fallen…”

That day and the next two days the area called Gramos was on fire. The peak of Mount Gramos was in flames. The partisans defended it until nine o’clock in the morning August 28 (1949). Two government army soldiers hoisted the Greek flag on the very top of the mountain, on the dead bodies of those who had defended it.

That day and night and the next day and night, the surrounding hills and peaks endured heavy blows from the government army.

Everything was burning… the earth, the rocks, the crushed trees, the hills, the sky and the people… Everything was burning.

With them the last hope was also burning...

On the morning of August 30, Golio Kamenik, the last stronghold held by DAG’s crippled units, fell. The same day Porta Osman, the only escape route to Albania for the remaining living DAG fighters, was cut off.

Huge fires were burning on the Gramos mountain tops and along the entire border line. The government army was celebrating its victory.

Three years later the war finally ended. There was no more gunfire and no airplanes flying. There was only silence all along the border.

Our people endured a lot during those three years in the mountains and police jails… Many Macedonians and some Greeks were killed, tortured, beaten and sent to the hot sands and rocks on the dry Greek islands. For three years the Greeks killed people in the Peloponnesus, Rumeli, Thessaly and Epirus but mostly in Macedonia. It was said, as the outside world was told, “Greeks were killing Greeks” in the big city sidewalks of Solun and Athens and in the narrow alleys of the Ritos Mountain villages. Greeks were killing Greeks on both sides of the warring parties, burning villages,

pillaging houses and raping women. After three bloody years of torment, Greeks would have killed, mutilated, tortured and uprooted many Greeks… too many to count. In future the victorious Greeks wouldn’t be counting numbers but measuring how much Greek blood was shed. The victorious Greeks would make lists of Greeks still alive and Greeks who fled, lists to remind the future Greek generations of the great evil these Greeks had perpetrated and to remember that in those three years “Greeks were killing Greeks” everywhere. Not a word about Macedonians… Macedonians don’t exist and never existed… “Greeks were killing Greeks”... Greeks on both sides of the war were destroying Greece for three years... Never before in their history had Greeks killed, tortured and mutilated so many Greeks, and inflicted so much evil as they did throughout those three terrible years. The hatred and malice was unprecedented... And no one from the inside or from the outside warned them and told them that: “Greeks shouldn’t be killing Greeks...!” Everyone inside and outside went along accepting the story that “Greeks were killing Greeks!”

* * *

The last defenders and defeated DAG fighters with mutilated bodies and souls sought salvation in Albania. There, not far from the border, they hid behind the hills where Albanian army officers disarmed them. Rifles, machine guns, pistols, semi-automatic rifles and ammunition were all gathered in a pile. With empty hands and broken spirits they lined up in a column, consoling each other, disappointed and desperate, and climbed onto the trucks that were waiting for them. Every one of them questioned the wisdom of their leaders who had sent them ill-armed, malnourished, exhausted and mentally overwhelmed to march from Vicho, after they were badly defeated, through Albania to cross into Gramos where the government army was waiting for them? What was the point of that?

The evil, gruesome and bloody three-year storm died in the morning of August 30, 1949...

The leaders of the Party who were registering the refugees at the camp near Pegin didn’t tell the people that DAG had been defeated. They kept that information to themselves...

And, as always, news of the defeat wasn’t shared, the illusion was maintained that victory was within their grasp...

* * *

Sofka dragged herself to the border with both legs wounded. She had been shot by a burst of machine gun fire. She occasionally stopped dragging her body on the ground to get some rest and regain some of her strength. Her eyes were filled with fear and pain – they reflected the glare of the flames and the great fires that burned on all the mountain peaks.

The defeated army was disarmed, loaded onto trucks at the Albanian border and driven north, to the far north of Albania.

9

The trucks traveled all night long nonstop. They were carrying the disarmed partisans who looked sad and restless. They had been through hell; they were first crushed in Vicho, they were then sent marching to Gramos where there too they were battered by the enemy in a crushing defeat. They were silent now and feeling lost, in their own minds they were searching for answers, answers that weren’t there. A large crowd of people was gathering on the road ahead. The partisans threw rolled up pieces of paper at them. They weren’t letters. Written on them were their friends and relatives and a few words. The senders wanted to let the recipients know that they were alive and well. Some pieces of paper carried bad news... Men, women and children ran after the fast moving trucks hoping to get a glimpse of the people inside and to catch a leaflet or two. Some searched the entire road and the sides of the road hoping to find a leaflet hidden somewhere, perhaps in the snow. Those who found leaflets hurriedly opened them to see whose name was written on them and what news they brought. Some rejoiced, others cried and with their hearts and souls crushed they returned to their tents. Wounded by their pain many gathered together in groups and mourned their loved ones. Some cried in silence. Their crying had no end and there was no one there to console them. That night when the trucks went by and the rest of the next day, the road and the entire surrounding area were flooded with people. They searched all day long looking in cracks, between rocks and in the ditches by the road to find rolled up pieces of paper. And those who rejoiced couldn’t avoid the pain of those who received bad news.

And so the crying, wailing, lamenting, mourning, grieving, sighing, cursing and swearing became a regular daily affair. People cried together in a crowd and alone in their tents...