Chapter nine – Instead of tears…

Chapter nine – Instead of tears…

Instead of crying in front of the skeleton of his mother, who was hung in the name of the revolution, Vancho, son of Lina and Lambro, also known as Johnny, who had just arrived for a visit from Canada, decided to say a few words about his beloved mother. He said: “You mother, in letters you sent to my father, wrote: ‘I am looking after our offspring in the white mansion with hedges and white gates, in the flower garden and yard in the open sun, in our garden where the rainbow appears in the well where children quench their thirst… We await your return our dearest...!

Now mother you are all alone, your skeleton swinging from this tall old tree and with your shadow you keep its roots cool. I noticed, dear mother, from the tears you shed for father and for us, your children… I noticed a dried up marsh...

I know those who brought you misery and death are underground…!”

* * *

Krapov walked over and knelt by the tall tree, staring up at the skeleton that slowly swung back and forth. He then spoke to Johnny. He said: “That was an ominous year (1948) for the Macedonian people. It was a time when people made many mistakes and were led in the wrong direction. The entire Macedonian nation was under attack by deception and by dirty tricks to achieve dirty goals. Their aim was to leave the Macedonian home without children, to remove the Macedonian people from their centuries old homes, to destroy the traditional Macedonian family and turn it into a political family. But the most shameful thing about all this is that Macedonian organizations took part in it. NOF and AFZH, both created in Yugoslavia on April 23, 1945, took part in it. This was a shameful and genocidal act against humanity – for the Party to take the children away from their families in the name of the people!

This cannot be tolerated!

This happened only here in Greek occupied Macedonia and has been ongoing since the Greeks arrived here.

Here in Greek occupied Macedonia under this Greek occupation, we Macedonians have no possibility of living a normal life. Conditions have been created so that if we want to live normal and happy lives we need to leave… go elsewhere outside of our homeland... which will achieve our occupier’s goal - to have a Macedonia without Macedonians.

The first genocidal step was taken by Queen Frederica, then it was followed by the communists. It is strange that both sides did this with Macedonian subjects,” concluded Krapov.

* * *

“It was a time of much vanity, egotism, hatred and acts of violence,” replied Johnny, who, after living for 65 years in Canada and the United States, came to visit the grave of his mother, a grave which did not exist but he found remnants of her skeleton still hanging high up in the tall tree, used as gallows by the communists during the Greek Civil War (1945- 1949).

It was mid-March 1948 when preparations for collecting the children were underway, but the women whose husbands were in America and Australia had not received approval for their children to be collected.

Panic had gripped these mothers and they worried and cried until late night.

During the last night before the children were collected, no one knew what was going through Lina Bogdanova’s mind. That day she was dressed in her best clothes and gave the impression of a diligent person, confident in herself. She was loyal, honest and attached to her husband Lambro, who at the time was working in America. But now she had to be careful.

An old man became very upset when a woman from AFZH pushed him aside and grabbed his grandchildren from his hands, without

even giving him a chance to say goodbye. On top of that she yelled at him and said: “Old man, this is a revolution, we have orders from above. The leadership ordered us to do this...”

Lina witnessed this but said nothing. She kept silent and sighed a heavy sigh. Her body began to shake and she felt very anxious. Her dress was drenched in sweat and she kept wiping her forehead. She could barely stand up and kept trying to keep her balance. Then finally, under great duress, she said to the woman from AFZH: “It is important for our men to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’, to giving our children or not. Is there anything holier; is there anything more loving than to have your child with you, so that your heart does not wither? Please… I can’t give you my children without my husband’s permission, without my Lambro knowing… Why did I give birth to them… so that the Party can have them? My sorrow is too great…”

But even before she was finished speaking, Lina heard voices yelling: “She is right! Please don’t take our children from us…” Lina was openly saying the same thing to all the AFZH women. She would often say: “History has shown that bad things have happened to us Macedonians in situations like this… We have witnessed things like this before and there is only one outcome… our extermination… our exile from our grandfather’s hearth… Forgive me if my testimony sounds arrogant but it is better to die here than in exile all over the world. I wholeheartedly want my children, to whom I gave birth, to stay here at home with me. This endeavour, which the communists and you AFZH women have undertaken, is a systematic destruction of our roots.”

The AFZH women were very, very resentful of Lina. One of them sternly looked at Lina and coldly asked: “What should we make of all these things you are saying? We and the Communist Party are fighting for a better tomorrow. I believe that we Macedonians should be at the front line doing our best to achieve our freedom and the freedom of all the Macedonian people.”

To that Lina Bogdanova answered: “These people here, including myself, don’t see it that way so please no more, I don’t want to hear your stories.” These arguments continued on until late at night.

During the night Lina again dreamt the same dream. When the door opened again and a terrible man slowly approached her, Lina wanted to yell but she couldn’t. At that very moment, however, she jumped out of bed and found herself in a strange situation between a bad dream and an AFZH woman who had just arrived at her door and was about to reassure her to give up her children.

The AFZH woman proudly asked Lina: “You do believe in the Party, right?”

Lina replied: “We Macedonians are unaware of how far we have to go in this war in order to find the place where we belong. So why should I believe? So that we can play the winners and victims game? To give you my children? What kind of people sacrifice their own children?!

My grandfathers, grandmothers and all reasonable people have raised children and now we have to give them the Party? My father used to say: ‘In our suffering as Macedonian people the children had been the pillars of our families. Our survival as Macedonians depends on them staying here and guarding our ancestral homes and lands!’ concluded Lina.

Donka Shokleva, of the AFZH, then yelled at Lina and said: “Come to your senses!”

That fateful night in 1948, after the noises died and silence crept throughout the village streets, Lina continue to think of a way to save her children. She lit her kerosene lamp dimly and sat down beside the beds where her children were sleeping and listened to their hearts beat like clocks. It must be three o’clock by now she thought to herself. It was still dark outside. Should she flee with her children during the night? If she did she could run into guards and that would be fatal. What times do we live in when a person is not afraid of death but is afraid of the evil situation in which they find themselves... She was not sure what to do... she was overcome with fear… She paced back and forth… She went to the icon of the Virgin Mary, crossed herself and prayed for salvation. Two thoughts circled around in her mind: “To send her children or not to send them!” Not to send them became the dominant thought.

She quietly went near the fireplace. Her determination was absolute: following her wish that hurt her most. She took the pot full of boiling water off the tripod and separated the burning kindling. She carefully took a step and stopped to take a breath. The pot with boiling water started to boil over as Lina came closer and closer to her sleeping children.

She stopped for a moment and looked at her sleeping children. She smiled gently but the smile quickly disappeared when she thought of the AFZH woman. She felt like her legs were cut off. She sat on the floor and watched her children and felt their warm faces.

The same thoughts kept circling through Lina’s mind: “Do I want a life without my children? No I don’t, I love them much too much to let them go! Something is holding me by my hands and pulling me into a big black hole. Oh, my dear beautiful children how peacefully you sleep.”

Her thoughts flowed uncontrollably one after another and something inside of her subconsciously said: “What are you waiting for? Only then will you save them...”

Some things she could not bear to watch. She could not agree with what the others were doing. It was not in her heart and soul… she belonged to another world… a mother to not be able to reach out to her children? Where is the ‘pleasure’ in that?

She again looked at her children and decided that she was going to do it. It would not be long... their pain would pass sooner than the pain she would have to endure if she lost them. “I don’t want to give them to the AFZH women. They are not going to make child soldiers out of my children and force them to fight and kill for their interests... They killed my father because he was a priest,” she said to herself.

“But what if they remain crippled?” she said to herself and kept thinking about it, wondering what their lives would be like. She hesitated and for a moment she forgot everything.

“I must not think of the worst,” she said to herself. “They will remain with me... and I will remain true to my husband and to my birthright… Exactly like that: consistency and fidelity. When Lambro set off for America he said: ‘Lina please look after our children so that I can go to America, make some money and return...’ and now these idiots call him a fascist and an American spy...”

The silence was disturbing. Lina closed her eyes, gathered her strength and suddenly spilled the pot of boiling water on her children’s feet. But when she heard the painful cries and gasps, she fell over them and poured the rest of the boiled water over their entire bodies. She screamed with a painful voice and thought to herself that maybe it would be better for everyone if we are all dead...

The frightened children squeezed themselves into her arms and she, powerless, gently, and with tears in her eyes, kissed their burned feet and said to herself: “Who knows why but its seems to me that if I cry, it means that I behave like a good mother. And there is nothing to be blamed for. And my children will have nothing to be angry about… they will remain with me...”

“We love you mother... We will always love you...” they said with shining eyes full of fear like they had never imagined. “You are mine and I will not give you to anyone…” she said and again kissed their burns.

At the crack of dawn when the first light appeared she examined their burns and was horrified to discover that their blisters were full of blood and were becoming very painful.

But the worst thing was when she heard the voices of the activists calling out: “You vile woman, what did your children do to you for you to have done this to them?” And in reply she said to herself: “I did not kill them! They will be alive! They will be mine!”

Sotir Gaidov, Lina’s brother, suddenly appeared at her door. He directed his gaze at the bed where the scalded children were lying and saw the horror in their weeping eyes. He then sat across from

his sister and wanted to personally hear the truth from her. Lina looked at him with wide open eyes and he addressed her with the words: “Sister, where were your eyes? What happened? Oh, the horror!”

Lina, trying to hide her fear and motherly pain, said: “I do not know if I behaved properly... I may be cracking up!” Then suddenly she looked like a child, confused and embarrassed. “But I think you will understand,” she said. “How would you feel if they took something from you that you loved very much and you knew that they were going to do it in front of your eyes? I swear to God… If they take my children I will go mad… Perhaps I have sinned... I may be frantic but I will not give away my children. They are mine and Lambro’s who left me to bring them up and not to give them to anyone.”

She was strong and persevered more than all the women in the village but she was unable to express her true feelings and explain her actions to her brother.

“Oh, my brother, for a long time now our lives have not been in God’s hands but in the hands of our persecutors. So how can I give my children to the Communists who beheaded our old father Gligor Gaidov down at the brook and we found him robbed of his life just because he was a priest. Our father wronged no one, he was a priest who served God and prayed for all the people.” Puzzled by her rambling Sotir asked: “Sister, what exactly are you trying to tell me? I was told that you tripped, stumbled and spilled the kettle with boiling water. Is that true?... She gave him a strange look and with fear in her voice she said: “I am not giving my children to anyone... I watched over them all night.”

The children began crying again but not as loud as when they had been scalded. Their uncle, Sotir, looked at them with a sad look on his face and felt sorry for them. Their names were Elena and Mito. A woman dressed in a uniform stormed up the stairs and entered the room. It was the AFZH woman and she was accompanied by two activists who were planning tomorrow’s actions to collect the children and transport them to Yugoslavia and their mothers to the DAG front lines. The moment Donka, the AFZH woman, entered

the room she started blinking her eyes, reacting to the bright flames emanating from the blazing fire in the fireplace.

The AFZH woman moved away from Lina so that she could have a better look at her and, as a concerned organizer of the holy struggle and accountable to the Party and to General Markos, make her assessment of the situation. After having had a good look at Lina she said: “We and the Communist Party are fighting for a better tomorrow. I think we Macedonians should be the first in line to give our best and by doing so we will achieve freedom for the Macedonian people. Only by doing our best can we guarantee that and show that our people are loyal to this holy war. For example yesterday Temelkovski, the Trsie village teacher, collected all the children into a group and took them all the way to the border without any problems. Afterwards their mothers left to join the ranks of DAG, respecting the decisions of NOF, AFZH and the CPG.”

After that the AFZH woman had some questions: “Have you alone decided to commit this heinous act or did someone, perhaps one of the enemies of our holy war, put you up to this? Is that it or is it something else? Tell the truth! Perhaps there was another woman with you? Everything you tell me will be kept in strict confidence. Perhaps she can help us with the investigation?” Hurt by the woman’s words, Lina closed her eyes and said: “You people destroyed our lives and now you want to take our children.” The AFZH woman looked at her with a cold stare and said: “It is stupid of you to talk like that. What could this possibly mean to you? You are only repeating the words of our enemies.” She then nodded her head, gave a slight smile and, together with the other activists, left.

Sotir, with his hands on his hips, stood there and watched the whole thing. Then shaking his head he pleaded with his sister to calm down. Finally at dawn, when the village children were all taken away like lambs to the Yugoslav border, everyone calmed down and gave Lina odd stares. But disappointed by what they themselves had done, full of grief, they found some hope in Lina’s decision not to give up her children.

A trumpet was heard playing one spring morning in “Dlaboka Iama” camp near the village Besfina. The campers were all standing while

Lina, looking like a majestic warrior, gently walked under the noose that hung under a tall oak tree. In spite of the numerous people in the vicinity, the place was dead silent... Lina, looking up at the gallows, said to herself: “Oh dear God they will hang me!” She turned toward the sun and yelled out: “Goodbye forever my dear children!”

When the trumpet stopped playing, Karanikas, the military judge, said: “Death to fascism and to our enemies!”