Introduction - Part 03

“After wandering for a long time behind our heroic national army, a large group of communist bandits managed to cross the Greek-Albanian border…”

I understood. I did not read any more. I put the newspaper aside. I smiled, but very little, and said to myself:

“That was my unit… my unit… my unit was saved…”

Who saved it!?

* * *

The entire time that I was treated at a military hospital, I was constantly visited by investigators. They were from the military. They constantly asked me about my past. The questions and answers were always the same. I told them the same thing time after time. This routine, more or less, was repeated on a daily basis. Who am I, what family do I belong to, where am I from, where have I been, with whom, in which battle did I participate…

The investigators did not threaten me. They only asked questions, wrote things down and stuffed the papers in a blue envelope that grew thicker with each visit. They came in and left in silence, without any greetings.

Even though there were nine beds in the hospital room, in which lay the “Andartises” (a name the Greeks used to call the female

partisans), the room was always silent. I had the impression that we were all burdened with thoughts about our future…

“What is going to happen to me? When will they release me from this hospital? Where will I go? What would I do? How are things out there? Where is my family?”

One day I gained enough courage to ask the major who was interrogating me:

“Major, Sir, what are you going to do with me?”

He looked at me surprised and said:

“Nothing... You will go home, to your family... The war is over... Everyone is going home... except...

I also asked the doctor. He just smiled and whispered:

“Everything is going to be fine. The war is over...”

I repeated the words “the war was over” all the time and everywhere I went, like a prayer, like those words carried all the hope in my world.

That’s what I used to tell myself… “The war was over and everyone was going home...”

It was a great deal to find yourself on the path that led you home... And the word “home” became my dream. I dreamed of the narrow alleyways, the tall walls around the yard, the wide open thick oak gate, the thick wooden threshold, the cobblestones in the yard, the chiseled stone stairs, the entrance to our house, the living room, the guest room, the...

And who am I going to find in front of the house, in the yard, on the stairs, in the rooms?

As I sat here in the hospital, I dreamed about home and in my dreams I could smell the bread baking in the oven, the smoke rising

above the roof… Ah, home… home… is there anything left of my home, anything that will remind me of the house in which I was born and grew up … and that night they took me? Is there now a home? Who is at home? Questions and more questions begging to be answered…

“Everything is okay when there is no war...” This is what the doctor said.

I believed him…

The main doctor, a colonel with long years, visible by his tired eyes and by his unsure step, handed me my hospital discharge papers. He was an okay man; he had a peaceful look about him, a calming tone of voice and a light touch. He wished everyone in the hospital a speedy recovery. He was respected and loved by all, perhaps because most of the people in the hospital were his patients. When he handed me my papers he warned me:

“Wherever you go, whatever you do, please be careful... Be careful mostly from people... Go well and be happy...” he said and winked at me.

“Thank you... I will always remember you...” I replied.

With an easy gesture he showed me to the door where two men in civilian clothes were waiting for me. They asked me to go with them. I did not protest. They put me in a jeep and took me from the hospital directly to the police station. There they questioned me and finger printed me. After that they wrote a note with my personal data and something about my treatment in the hospital. The police chief signed the paper, placed it in a blue envelope which, as it turned out, later became part of me. Being in the envelope I would never be forgotten.

The next day the two men (who escorted me the day before) and I arrived in Kostur where I and the blue envelope were surrendered to the police. I was interrogated the entire day and, so as not to be forgotten, things were written down on paper and placed in the blue

envelope that traveled everywhere with me. After each time I was at the police station the envelope became thicker.

Up on the wall, behind the chief’s back, a number of folders were neatly arranged. He asked me:

“Name and surname, name of your father, mother, grandfather, great grandfather, grandmother and great grandmother... place and date of birth...”

As I answered his questions he interrupted me and looked at the folders. He drew one out. It was covered with dust and tied with a cord. He blew the dust away and opened it. He flipped a few pages and stopped. He looked at me, hit the open folder with his hand and, in a sharp tone of voice, said:

“Yes, here you are...”

As he was leafing through the yellowed pages he raised his eyebrows, curled his forehead and stopped for a moment. He then looked at me and went back to leafing through the pages. After he flipped through everything he sighed deeply, hit the page with his finger and said:

“In here there is everything about you. Everything has been written. Allow me to briefly repeat. I see here that you were head of the village pioneers and that you visited village streets singing “Mlada Partizanka da odam” (I want to be a young partisan) and other songs like “A bre Makedonche” (Hey you Macedonian) and “Makedonsko ime nema da zagine” (The Macedonian name will not be forgotten). I see here that you then joined the organization EPON (Ενιαια Πανελλαδικη Οργανωση Νεον) [Pan-Hellenic Youth Organization -formed on February 23, 1943 and outlawed by the Greek government in 1947. During the Greek Civil War it was restored by the CPG and disbanded by the CPG, in 1958] and one time you led the village youth organization and, in the spring of 1946, with the exception of a few, you organized the entire youth and brought them to Kostur to protest against the return of King George. Later on you helped the bandits (partisans) with information, food and clothing. Until you were captured you were active in fighting against the

Greek national army... In a word, you were against the state. Is that true?

“Your information is accurate but I was never against the state, I was against the regime, against the terror...” I replied.

He pushed me to sign the piece of paper that contained the information that he just read to me but I refused and said nothing more. The strong slap shut my mouth and my eyes.

He slammed the folder shut and put it back on the shelf. He then said:

“For people like you we have been issued orders to surrender you to the military courts where you will receive a lengthy prison sentence or death. You cannot stay here with a biography like yours. You will be sent to a camp for women, which is a lighter sentence. There, people like you will be re-educated to be useful and valuable citizens. It’s better being placed in the camps than rotting in prison for years.”

He pulled out a pre-printed sheet of paper from a drawer, filled it out with my personal information, signed it, stamped it and shoved it in front of my face.

I looked at the paper. It read: “Μερος εκτοπισµου για ενα χρονο στο ‘Στρατοπεδο Πειθαρχηµενης ∆ιαβιωσης’ στο Τρικερι σαν αµετανοητη και επικινδυνη”. (Place of residence for a year in the “camp for discipline” in Trikeri as irredeemable and dangerous.)

He then said: “Sign here acknowledging that you received the referral and tomorrow you will be on your way. This is like an identity card.”

Just then I remembered the doctor’s words when I left the hospital.

“The war ended... When there is no war, then everything is okay...”

Putting the piece of paper in my pocket I asked myself:

“Has the war ended for me?”

Chapter - 4

It took the old police truck two days to drag itself to the port of Volos. The trip lasted that long because the truck had to stop at many police stations along the way and collect more prisoners. We were packed like sardines. Finally they offloaded us in front of an anchored ship, called our names and then ordered us to climb up the long stairs aboard the vessel.

This was the first time I had seen a ship. I was afraid climbing up the stairs. The rocking of the ship in the troubled water made me feel strange; upset. There were two policemen with guns pointing at me who stood at each side of the ship’s entrance. I took a step over the threshold and followed the narrow iron stairs leading down inside the ship. Step by step I came down below in the stable. That’s what I heard them calling it – a stable. That’s were they put us partisan girls who had participated in the “bandit war”. That’s what they called the Greek Civil War – a bandit war.

The only light entering the stable came from two small windows, which barely provided enough scattered rays to cut the thick darkness inside to reveal the piles of rubbish on the floor. The stable had a terrible stench about it as if all the dirt and garbage from the entire ship had been collected for days, dumped there and left to rot.

The ship sat in the port for a long time. There was very little circulation of air in the ship’s stables. We kept calling them to open the windows so that we could breathe. But instead of giving us air they turned up the music and played military marches. The noise was so loud that we could not hear ourselves think. The loud music continued uninterrupted, one march after another. They repeated the marches over and over. Some were sung by choirs, like the songs “Greece will never die” and “Sofia and Moscow are our dream”. The loud music was not played to please us but to drown out our demands for more air and to stop us from talking to one another. For the most part we had to plug our ears to avoid listening to the horrible loud music and were forced to communicate by facial and hand gestures.

The wait was very long.

They closed the lids over the stables. A sharp loud whistle echoed. The ship began to shake and tilted slightly to the left, then to the right. And after several more whistles the ship began to slowly leave the harbour.

The loud music coming from the speakers was turned up. They not only wanted us to hear the marches, they wanted us to dream them in our dreams… They wanted us to dream their dream that they would march to Sofia and Moscow.

The ship was constantly rocking… to the left… then to the right… over and over again. One of the women prisoners yelled: “There is turbulence in the sea.” I don’t know what it was, the lack of air or something else, but I was feeling very sick, my stomach went up and down and after a while I started to vomit. I could not go out of the stable because an armed police officer was guarding the exit and we were not allowed to leave the stable... I felt ill and fell at the feet of the policeman. I came too on deck. I felt the fresh air in my face. I recovered. I regained my wits. I leaned on the ship’s wall and began to inhale the salty air deeply.

This was the first time I had seen the sea and traveled by ship. This was the first time I had seen waves and, when the water was calm, stars soaking deep in it. There were stars high up in the sky and there were stars deep in the water. Water, water and only water… there was water in front of me, all around me and below me...

They took me back to the stable. I lay on the dirty floor. I had nothing to put under or over me… nothing to cover myself with... I had nothing except for the clothes on my back that I was given when I left the hospital.

In the morning the ship stopped. They ordered us to come up on deck. In the crack of dawn I saw ugly rocks ahead of us with white snow, like froth violently splashing on them.

From the distance the island looked green and peaceful. Just a few houses, a lot of olive trees and several little fishing boats tied in the tiny harbour.

They ordered us to get off the ship one by one and then lined us up against a grey boulder near the shore.

We had arrived at Τrikeri...

We spent the night on shore, on the wet sand where they offloaded us. The next day they loaded us with supplies and marched us uphill to a monastery located on top of a hill. We carried everything from the ship on our backs. Step by step we climbed up a steep slope overgrown with bushes and thorn trees.

The monastery was abandoned. It had no doors or windows. Everything was rotting inside. There was mold growing in the corners.

They gave us quarters in the damp, moldy and cold monastic cells and in the basements. It was dark at night. The air stunk of moisture and mold. The stench was putrid. It was burning hot in the day, especially under the scorching sun. We were thirsty... It was prohibited for us to get close to the shade of the few olive trees. We spent the first few days and nights in torment before the next ship arrived and brought small and large American military tents. The sailors tossed all our supplies overboard on the shore and from there we picked them up and carried them on our backs to the top of the hill.

* * *

The interrogator, a military man, persistently tried to extract more information from me and kept repeating the same question:

“How many of our people did you kill?”

And I persistently replied: “I don’t know, I don’t know; maybe one, maybe ten, maybe twenty, or maybe none. When you shoot from a trench or from a bunker or when you charge, you don’t count, you just keep your head down and shoot. You do not count! You just shoot, shoot and shoot, sometimes with eyes open sometimes with eyes shut, you just shoot and you don’t count. Yes, soldiers fell in

front of our position… yes they were shot… yes they shouted, called for help and prayed... Did I shoot them? I don’t know. Maybe... It was a war and a war is just killing and mutilation. You know that? Perhaps you, yourself participated? If you held a position, or participated in an attack then you were not there to admire the scenery, you were there to kill and the rules of the game are that if you don’t kill them they will kill you... perhaps you will wound or get wounded but the aim is to kill, the goal is to bring death to the opponent. This is what soldiers are trained to do because the essence of war is to kill the opponent. That’s what they teach soldiers everywhere, even us up there on the mountains… that’s what we were taught. Kill so they don’t kill you. This is what the school of war is about. From the first day you put on a military uniform and shoulder a rifle, your education is to learn to kill. This is how it is everywhere… they teach you how to kill...” I said this seriously and with confidence because this is what others up there on the mountains had told me.

“How many of our people did you kill?” he asked the same question again.

Again I gave him the same answer.

“That’s all for today...” he said, put his pieces of paper in a folder, closed the folder and, with partly closed eyes, gave me a cold stare. He then lit a cigarette, blew his first puff of smoke in my face and loudly said:

“Duty officer! Take this woman to the other women!”

The room to which the duty officer took me was full of women. They stood side by side, shoulder to shoulder, with some leaning on others. I looked for a place to stand. There was none. I pushed my way past them and got to the corner. There was enough space for my two feet. I tried to kneel. There was no space. I remained standing.

* * *

The next interrogation began with a slight nod and some benevolence in the interrogator’s voice. He had a calm and amiable

look about him and a bright smile on his face. He gestured for me to sit down on the other side of the table opposite to him.

He looked at me with a peaceful look on his face leaving the impression that he cared, but during the interrogation slowly, very slowly he lost the peaceful look. His voice became rough and sharp, his eyes piercing full of sparks of disdain, cruelness and hatred...

“Child… young lady… here is a piece of paper and a pen…” he said.

“Why? What is this?” I asked.

“This is your pass to get you out of here. You don’t have to read it. Sign and go home, don’t be like those rotten women who we have collected from the streets and cafes of Athens for fornicating...”

He again gawked at me and said:

“Sign!! They are waiting for you at home…”

I knew very well who these women and girls were. That’s the way it was. They collected women and girls from the streets, cafes and taverns and locked them up in the cells. Many of them were suffering from venereal diseases. These women laughed and made fun of us and spoke about disgusting things with shameful words. They brought strange men dressed in women’s clothing. They lay between us at every opportunity… anywhere they could find space. They teased us. For as long I was in the mountains and everywhere else, while I was a soldier, I lay between men in the same trench and in the same bunker. We breathed the same air face to face, we warmed our bodies body to body, but none of the men lay a hand or said anything hurtful to me… they were honest and decent...

“You, girl, I see you are a nice looking, robust, mature woman ready to be married. What are you doing among these nasty women? You don’t belong among them. There is not a nice word coming out of any of them. They constantly threaten, some are more threatening than others, they are abusive, and some swear and curse terribly… Your future is black here…” he said. When he was talking slowly

in a low tone of voice that’s when he was best describing the hell I was living with a final outcome – being executed.

I kept quiet and stared into his eyes, which grew as his anger intensified, as his dictionary was enriched with new threats and new swear words. His eyes grew and shrank opening and narrowing, filling with hatred and more anger. It seemed like they were about to burst and madness would flow out of them as his tantrums continued. When threats were no longer enough to bring fear into my eyes, he raised his voice and, with an even sharper tone of voice, shouted:

“Sign! Sign! Here it says that you think that you are infected with some sort of idea that you can only dream of. But you can’t live in a dream. There is no doubt that such stubbornness will cost you your life. If that’s what you want then go ahead be stubborn, you will certainly condemn yourself and you will be shot. And let me tell you this… You will not be the first or the last to be shot. All of you who were brought here will be sentenced to death. So I sincerely advise you to give up your past and sign this statement of regret...”

“No! I will not sign... What you are asking me to do is nothing more than to defame myself, to humiliate myself, to turn myself into nothing... without honour and without dignity...” I replied.

∆υλωση µετανοιaς - statement of regret – were the only two words that truly mattered, that were repeated every day with each interrogation… words that stood behind threats of beatings, threats of jail time, threats of being shot… there was nothing more important, nothing more necessary, but the… statement of remorse… for the promise of freedom, life and an open door to exit the cell, the camp and the nightmare... These two words were spoken by the mouths of every guard, service person, driver… everyone who wore a uniform, carried a weapon, a stick, or a whip...

∆υλωση µετανοιας – statement of regret… Signing such a statement was a gift of life, hung over our heads like a sharp axe, ready to fall and smash our head at any moment...

My silence, my persistent silence – my refusal to sign - made them wild, drove them crazy to threaten and invent new ways of intimidation and, every day, do something more radical to mistreat us, to torture us… and make the evil worse.

I was insulted with every dirty word in the dictionary and I kept silent. Even though I was boiling deep inside, I kept quiet even when they filled my file with imaginary accusations. Even though I was boiling with growing anger and I felt like I was going to explode, I kept my cool. Even when it felt like I was going to erupt and pounce on their neck and cut their throat with my teeth… I kept quiet. I suffered but I restrained myself with great effort in order to weather the storm...

“It says here young lady that you have been contaminated with dangerous ideas which will put you six feet under. Many have ended up there. Give it up, sign the statement and you can go home tomorrow,” he said.

“No...” I replied.

“Seize this opportunity and sign... There is only one way out of here… sign! Otherwise the dark will eat you up and nobody will find out what happened to you...” he demanded.

“No... I will not accept humiliation, I will not accept to be turned to nothing...” I replied.

The interrogator had a long arm and a wide palm. With a single swing he took my breath away and put my lights out. When I came to they took me to the basement. The basement was a torture chamber. Behind the table was a policeman. He was frowning. His sleeves were rolled up above his elbows.

“Get closer!” he ordered. “Sit down! Now lean over!”

“This is how it’s going to be... Well, tell me now, are you going to sign?” he asked.

I kept quiet.

“I am asking you!” he said.

I kept quiet.

“It is only a signature! Are you going to suffer for a signature?!” he asked.

“Yes...” I replied.

Without warning, he began to slap me hard… I saw stars… then lightening and thunder.

The silence turned into ugly yelling as he continued to slap me repeatedly, pausing slightly after each slap, waiting for me to say something… Perhaps he was hoping I would plead with him or beg him to stop. But I did not plead, I did not beg and I did not cry… I just took the abuse… I felt a knot in my throat but held on… It was painful. The knot in my throat was my cry of horror...

Was I yelling? Yes I was yelling… a lot. But I was not begging or pleading… just yelling... He was not hitting me to kill me, he was hitting me to torture me… to torment me… at that point I should have wished for death, that way I would have died once instead of every day. In those dire moments I prayed to God to save the power of my mind so that I wouldn’t go insane. If they are going to kill me, I prayed, please God let them kill me the way I am, and not crazy, because murdering a crazy person can be justified.

Dark, dense, blacker than black.

I woke up with my head stuck in the corner and with the torturer standing above me holding a bucket full of filth. When I opened my eyes he dumped the contents of the bucket all over me. I wiped my face with the palm of my hand, looked up at him and whispered:

“Pray that nothing like this happens to your mother and to your sister... or” but before I was finished whispering he kicked me in the stomach and extinguished my words.

I was repeatedly kicked, punched, whipped with a whip made of braided wire and hit with sticks… I was yelled at, screamed at and cursed with the vilest words… but I endured.

He beat me every day...

They took me back to my cell on a stretcher.

I endured the pain from the beatings. I also endured the fear. It somehow encouraged me… It not only gave me courage but also gave me strength and made me feel content. It is a strange feeling to feel content when you are in pain. As I lay there motionless I could feel my entire body hurt and I would say to myself:

“If it hurts it means that I am alive.”

Pain is life. If you feel pain, it means you’re alive. When I was in a lot of pain I yelled, to hear my own voice. And my voice told me that I was alive.

This was the kind of pain I had to endure in the partisan hospital when the doctors did not have sufficient medication to put me to sleep and were operating on me without anesthetic. But my pain subsided after I lay in bed, after they gave me something that warmed me up. After that the pain began to slowly subside, to drain, to drain out of me. I filled my mind with images of the sky, the mountains, hills, rocks, meadows, springs, brooks, rivers, flowers, trees and the people whom I dearly loved… then I fell asleep...

If you don’t know how to bear and endure it, pain can be a large weight on you, which eventually will take you down, crush you and turn you into nothing. This was what they wanted to do with me.

I was numbed from the pain… Then I used to say to myself:

“I am alive...”

I was happy even though I felt that I was holding on with my last ounce of strength and constantly thought that I was dying.

I was in pain. Therefore I was alive.

And down there, in the basement, when I was listening to my own horrible screams, I would say to myself: “I am alive and becoming stronger with each beating…” I kept repeating that to myself.

My screaming, my yelling, my crying, my swearing and my whispering to myself were all signs that I was alive...

Even the smallest, barely visible movement of any part of my body, my tortured body, was a little sign of life.

They beat me, but I held on defiantly…

Stubbornness too is a sign of life. Being stubborn means that you are defiant, you endure… Stubbornness in the police basement is life, existence, opposition to evil, to horror, to humiliation... There, in the police cellars you are not allowed to die from beatings. You are only allowed to come out crippled or crazy.

I did not want to lose the thought that feeling pain meant I was alive... After each beating, deep down, I hid the horror, the despair and the persistent hopelessness and swallowed my pain without crying. I squeeze my eyes so that my tears of suffering did not flow and they remained hidden from my tormentors.

I endured the pain and in me boiled the thought that I was alive, rejoicing, feeling triumphant… I thought and said to myself: “I am alive! I am alive!” And at that moment I felt myself swell deep inside with joy. I wanted to talk, I wanted to say out loud that I was alive but my lips were swollen and sore, I could not push a word past them. Every word I tried to say spun in my mouth and, together with my bloody saliva, drowned in my throat.

Every time, after each beating, after I recovered, I would say to myself: “I am alive…” and to make sure that I was alive I would pinch my cheeks, squeeze my nose, bite my lips and tongue.

Then?

After that I would sink into oblivion. With great concern the women around me would try to revive me so that I could regain my composure.

I was very happy when the women gathered around me and comforted and encouraged me. I expressed my gratitude with a slight smile. And when I was unable to go out for the mandatory prison walk, I collected the blue and gentle leaves of the unforgotten that had fallen between the stones and gave them to them as gifts. All my gratitude, respect and love for the women and girls who looked after me and who encouraged me was in those leaves.

During that time, the time of horror, we were all one body and one soul...

* * *

During one of our regular interrogations I asked the interrogator:

“What do the words ‘vulgara’ (female version of Bulgarian) and ‘paleovulgara’ (female version of old Bulgarian) mean to you? Why do you call me that at each interrogation? And let me tell you one more thing… you can be sure that the more you insult and humiliate me, the more I will persist to be firm… and know that I will not sign because for me signing means I give up on life...”

After a long pause of silence the interrogator said:

“Any woman who is not Greek is Bulgarian…”

To that I said: “You call all the women in the camp ‘vulgares’, are none of them Greek?”

“Yes, they are all Greek but they are not decent. They are insolent, especially towards their fatherland, and that’s why they are here... are you satisfied now?” he replied.

“No!” I said.

“Silence!!! Paleovulgara!!!” he yelled at me.

Two policemen ran in, grabbed me by my arms and took me down to the basement. And from there they threw me into a dark cell while I was still unconscious. The cell was very small; I could touch the walls with my feet and hands while I was lying down. I recovered quickly thanks to the humidity and coolness of the cell.

I gathered all my strength and slowly rose up but was unable to stand up straight. The ceiling was very low. I sat on the wet floor. There was a weak beam of light coming from a small crack under the door. I don’t know how long they kept me in this hole. I also don’t know what time they took me out of there, dragged me down the hall and threw me into another cell. It was full of women. There were many of them. Half lying down half sitting up, they were crumpled together, body to body, sleeping. They languished here day and night, waiting for their fate to be determined.

They were beaten, bleeding and smelled foul, they breathed the moldy air saturated with the stench of clotted blood and the smell emanating from the buckets full of filth. Many of them constantly coughed. A little fresh air entered the cell when they brought someone in or took someone out.

They opened the door in the morning for just half an hour and allowed us to stretch, go to the washroom and empty the filth buckets. It was forbidden for us to talk or touch each other… not even to shake hands… We were only allowed to breathe the fresh air.

There were many prisoners from across the country; villagers, homemakers, teachers, professors, scientists as well as illiterate women. I was one of them.

But that did not matter, we were all the same here, I lived the same life as they did. These same torturers tormented us all and we all suffered the same pain. It was easier for some and harder for others. The interrogators, the policemen, the torturers, the laws, the courts and the state were the all the same for all of us.

I was just one of them in that big, smelly cell...

The nights were particularly torturous. There were many interruptions during the night… blaring loud music over the loudspeakers, playing recorded voices crying, pleading, moaning, begging... These were the voices of battered women. We listened to them with clenched hearts, fear and agony… After that they would play music again... and suddenly the cell door would fling open and two policemen would grab another woman and take her to be tortured. They would play her cries of pain over the loudspeakers. And then, suddenly, there would be silence and a strong knock of the cell door opening followed by the slamming of the tormented body being dropped on the cell floor...

How could you help her?!...

* * *

The often practiced way of multiple interruptions kept us up most nights. When they came down to our cells they carried strong flashlights and lit them straight in our eyes. During the day they often lined us up facing the sun. Even light was used as torture.

They used bright light – day or night – to burn our bodies and our spirits...

Chapter - 5

During the first days of January 1950 we heard voices saying that they would be moving us to the island Makronisos. From the scant news we received, mainly from the letters that had arrived, we learned about the horrible things that were done to the prisoners on that island… the news filled us with terrible fears. But we did not have to wait long before we learned more from our own camp commander, who ordered us to line up in front of our tents.

It was raining hard that day. The rain was mixed with snow. We were freezing, barely being able to stand up, while we waited for the commander to appear.

We waited and waited… and waited.

Finally he came out and climbed on the stage. Then, after looking at us with certain sympathy and, at first modest and restrained fascination, he shamelessly said that the life we were living on Trikeri… on this island… despite all its difficulties, was idyllic compared to the life we were going to experience in Makronisos. He also advised us to sign the statement of repentance immediately, so that we could go home, otherwise we were going to Makronisos where they would force us to repent, if we didn’t then there would be certain death for us.

He stopped talking for a moment… looking like a hungry wolf… and again began talking, attempting to convince us that there was no hope for us of ever returning to our homes by the end of our lives if we didn’t sign. If we didn’t sign, he said, we would stay on this island, then on another island and on the many islands that belong to Greece. And that we could only be saved if we signed.

His words crushed the spirit of many women. One after another, or two by two, more women went to sign the statement of repentance. They went and turned their heads to look at us for the last time. A terrible look of defeat was written all over their faces. They were fully aware that they were leaving us in the wild hands of our torturers. Almost all of them, who separated themselves from us, had husbands, brothers, sisters, fiancés and close relatives killed in

the war. Their last wish was to return home to their towns and villages, to their homes looted and laid waste, to escape the hell of exile.

A few hours later that same day, still standing lined up under the snow and strong cold wind, the commander ordered us to take off our jackets, shoes and head kerchiefs.

We obeyed the order.

“And now,” he shouted furiously, “I want you to line up in a straight line, in rows of three. Then I want you to run and I want to hear a single step with each step you all take! Now run!!!”

We ran twenty laps. We were exhausted, barely able to breathe. Some of us were falling on the wet snow and those who could not keep up with the rhythm of the music blaring from the loudspeaker, were ruthlessly beaten with sticks and whips by the police officers. The commander reveled in the terror and, with his sinister and ugly smile, cheered on the tormentors who beat us.

We did not yell or protest even though the many blows we received hurt a lot. Our silence infuriated and outraged the commander and the police who then beat us even harder. Then, with a single shout: “HALT” the running ended.

Beaten, disappointed and thoroughly exhausted we stopped running and silently collected our belongings; jackets, shoes and head kerchiefs.

That was a terrible day; a day of warning, of what awaited us in Makronisos.

The next day was a day of preparation for departure. They woke us at dawn and ordered everyone to gather everything that belonged to the camp including tents, barbed wire, stakes, cauldrons, boilers… everything to the last rusty nail... and bring them to a designated place.

The snow that fell the day before had not completely melted and the strong wind blowing from the north was freezing it. The snow was not the only thing freezing… our courage, however little we had, seemed to have also been frozen… We collected everything and brought it to the designated place. After that, without giving us a moment’s rest, they ordered us to take it all down to the beach. It was now night time and we had to walk in the dark and in the snow from the Monastery to the beach - a very steep slope. Loaded, we went down hill on a narrow path escorted by profanities and insults and beaten with sticks and whips.

We found it painfully hard to walk loaded down hill, in the dark, with nothing to grab onto, to stop us from sliding.

The third day was cold, grey and wet… the sky was dark. A large freighter was anchored in the port.

“Here are your orders!” someone yelled.

“Everything that was delivered and is lying on the beach must be loaded on the ship!”

Everything that belonged to the camp we loaded right away. After that, after about midnight, we loaded our own belongings.

I had only one bag and nothing else to transfer. They lined us up on the beach and under the lights of battery powered flashlights they counted us and ordered us to climb aboard single file. The steps up were narrow and unsteady. Strong waves were battering the ship being boarded by one thousand one hundred and forty-five women ages sixteen to eighty-two.

That’s how many the policeman who stood at the entrance counted and wrote down in his notebook.

We descended down into the stables. Filth and stench. The air was putrid. The stables were quickly filling up and there was no place to sit. We were exhausted from working all day. We were thirsty and hungry. We hadn’t slept for a long time and we were all looking for a place to sit. There was none. We stood tightly packed together and

started having difficulty breathing… there was a lack of air. We started yelling for them to open the tiny windows. There was no answer. Instead of air, they played music - military marches echoed from the loudspeakers.

The ship left the port sometime after midnight but our uncertainty, the great fear in our eyes and the many questions glued to our thirsty lips, still remained.

“What would happen to us now…?”

I stood pressed against the wall and tried to imagine that Makronisos was no worse; at least in terms of the difficulties I had experienced in the recent months spent in Trikeri.

I told myself: “I am sure there too will be more fear and more tortures of body, soul and thought…”

The ship traveled for a long time so there was plenty of time for reflection.

During the day we were joined by a boat full of soldiers. Some were transferred to our boat and they told us that they were ordered to help us unload the ship when we arrived in Makronisos. They then pointed to the island to which we were going.

The island was an awful sight. It was an elongated naked island and the closer we came the better we could see that there were no trees. The island was bare-naked with cliffs hanging over the sea. There was no sign of anything green. The oblong island was naked with steep and high rocky shores. It looked like a petrified monster flogged by frothing high waves. When the ship got closer I saw tents pitched in straight lines.

The ship remained at sea during the night. Then in the morning, with much difficulty, it was anchored to a concrete platform. In the morning light the island was everything we expected and worse...

We got off the ship in silence and, with strangled breath of alarm, we stepped on land in Makronisos...

Did I have any hope?

I was convinced that this bare rock did not look like earth, but I did hope that my days and nights would not be as bad as those on Trikeri where I was made into a martyr. I also hoped that I would have the strength to endure the storms that were conveyed to me in whispers and news about this infamous island of horrors...

* * *

By dawn, with help from soldiers, we unloaded everything we had loaded in Trikeri.

When I stopped for a moment to collect my breath, I looked into the distance and, with my own yes, I saw how hideous and terrible this island was.

An officer, with the capital letters A.M. sewn on his right sleeve, ordered us to line up in threes and, under rifles pointed at us by an entire line of soldiers, who also had the same letters on their sleeves, marched us to the square. There on the stage were generals, colonels, police chiefs and a bishop. A captain welcomed us on behalf of camp command with the words:

“The idyllic life you lived in the other places during your exile has irrevocably ended. Now you belong to OAM (Οργανισµος Αναµορφωσεος Μακρονισου - Society for rehabilitation in Μakronisos) and are part of AETO (Α Ειδικον Ταγµα Οπλιτων -First Separate Battalion of Soldiers) and your school is called ESAG (Ειδικη Σχολη Αναµορφωσεως Γυνεκων - Special school for the rehabilitation of women). Your life in AETO/ESAG will be very difficult. It will depend entirely on you how long you survive. We will do everything in our power to quickly return you to the bosom of the nation. If you don’t do that, I am warning you; all provisions of the law will be applied to force you to change your opinion. I have the honour to inform you that our esteemed commander has given you three days to change your mind. After that there will be no mercy. The process will be the same for both men and women.

There will be no pity. The law applies to everyone regardless of gender or age...

After that one of the generals greeted us by giving us our first lecture on the curriculum for rehabilitation. He began something like this:

“Our victorious national army defeated the partisan bandits... Today, from this moment on, I officially declare war on you... If you don’t sign the statement of remorse then you will wander barefoot, naked, hungry and thirsty over the precipices and you will eat snakes and dead horses and mules... I also promise you that if you proceed according to the law, you will go home soon. Before you came here the holy land of Makronisos, on which you are now treading, was stomped by forty thousand men who had left inclinations. But we re-educated them and they were well received by the bosom of our homeland. The same thing will happen to you. We have many means and methods available to make you choose the right path. If you don’t want to do this in a civilized manner, then we will show you another side… First we will give you three days to think about it… for your own good... Don’t forget, you have three days to think about it...”

The lecture contained many other threats and intimidation and promises to send us home… only if we repented...

We were ordered to leave the square. The loudspeakers came on and began to loudly pour out a military march. It was the anthem of the island and went something like this:

Μακρονησι σεµνο, σκαπανεων αγκαλη µια πατριδα ηρωων µε δοξα µεγαλη µια πατριδα µεγαλη, τρανη κι οχι σκλαβων η φοβερα κι ο ταφος των βαρβαρων Σλαβων

(Humble Makronisos, embrace of the great ones, homeland of heroes, a great glory, a great country, but not of the slaves but of fears and a grave for the Slavic barbarians).

They placed us in tents that were set up prior to our arrival. And from that moment on the countdown for what was to be done with us began. At night, every hour the loud speaker came on to reminded us:

“Women of ESAG. The clock is ticking. Do not waste time!”

Packed and frozen stiff in the cold tents, we listened to the reminders. Uncertainty and fear began to grow in all of us. The days and nights passed. The third day was January 29. At three o’clock in the afternoon that day they gathered us all in the square. The commander ordered us to sit down. Soldiers, officers and alfamiti (military policemen on the island marked with the letters AM) with all kinds of military equipment were placed all around us. There was complete silence. The commander stood behind the microphone and began to shout: