Front Matter - Part 04

Tito and the Macedonians in NOF told the Macedonian people in Greece to start a liberation war to liberate themselves from Greece and unite with the Yugoslav part of Macedonia. You got that? The Macedonian people were told to start a war with Greece, liberate themselves and join the Yugoslav part of Macedonia. Tito, the leader of the communist party of Yugoslavia, told them that.

Earlier, if you remember, I told you that the Iron Curtain separated the Greek part of Macedonia from the Yugoslav part. So the only way these Macedonians could breach the Iron Curtain and ‘unite’ Macedonia was by fighting against the entire Western world, including the United States, and winning. How was that possible? But nonetheless, our friend Tito encouraged the Macedonians in Greece to fight.

So my friend what do you make of this? Were the Macedonians capable of such a feat? Of course not! But then why would Tito suggest it to them if not for an ulterior motive?

So when the local Macedonians in Greece refused to join NOF and fight, both the Greek fascists and some Greek communists escalated their terror activities against the Macedonian villages to a point where people began to fear for their lives. Many ran up into the mountains to save themselves and began arming themselves… and naturally NOF was right there to help them.

NOF started creating cells in almost every village and began to recruit Macedonians, first to fight against the terror and later to ‘liberate and unite Macedonia’.

At this point one needs to ask, ‘What were the people in NOF thinking… that they could win this war?’ Or I should say they weren’t thinking at all and were blindly following Tito’s orders.

Please don’t misunderstand me. The Macedonian people were true patriots but most of all they’d had it with Greek rule and the abuse they were taking. So they were ready to ‘do anything’ to change their situation. That’s how England trapped them, took advantage of them and got them to ‘pick up guns’ and fight. Once they picked up guns it was over for them. A situation was created in Greece where the Greeks ‘had no choice but to fight back and protect Greece’s integrity’. And from then on whatever Greece did against them would be legal.”

“I don’t see how England trapped the Macedonians. It makes no sense.”

“Let me explain. England created the conditions, false conditions, for the Macedonians to believe that they would get what they truly desired – to be free, to be recognized as Macedonians and to have a piece of land called Macedonia… but only if they fought against the Greeks and won.” “I understand now. One more thing… How does it make it legal for Greece to kill Macedonians, if that’s what you mean…?”

“You know that in Canada if you pick up a gun and shoot at people, especially at the authorities, the police will shoot back and if you refuse to surrender they’ll eventually kill you. Is it legal if the police shoot and kill you because you shot at them?”

“Yes.”

“Well, the Macedonian people in Greece picked up guns to defend themselves from the Greek terrorists but the Greek propaganda machine was busy telling the world that some bandits from Yugoslavia had invaded Greek Macedonia and were trying to take it from Greece and give it to Tito… to join it with Yugoslavia. As for the Greek authorities, as far as they were concerned NOF had been created in Yugoslavia and therefore wasn’t only a Yugoslav organization but was dispatched to Greece to start a war… inside Greece. So it would only be reasonable for Greece to fight back and defend its territory, right?”

“So that’s what you mean by legal. It makes sense. I must say it was a clever plan. The English are clever that way. No wonder they had a huge empire.”

The Macedonian people, on the other hand, had no reason to ‘mistrust’ Tito and their Macedonian NOF leaders. They witnessed the creation of the Socialist Republic of Macedonia in Yugoslavia and wanted the same thing in Greece. They figured Tito was a clever world leader and was capable of doing what he promised them. But they had no idea what England and its accomplices were planning for them.

Now to truly understand the tragedy of our story we must examine what the Greek government and the Greek communists were doing in the meantime. But before we do that let me tell you something else that was tragic. Let me tell you what the Greeks did to secure their position in Macedonia.

Did you know that the Greeks created conditions for the Macedonians to fight each other? I’m not talking about Macedonians in the Greek Civil War fighting on the Greek government side against Macedonians in the communist resistance. You know that both sides recruited Macedonians and forced them to fight one other. I’m going to tell you about that later but for now I want to tell you about how the Macedonians in ELAS, the communist led army, fought against the Macedonian freedom fighters in Kostur Region. I’ll only give you the highlights here… you’ll have to read my books to learn more.”

“Okay, I’ll do that…”

“During the triple occupation, Kostur Region was occupied by the Italians. But even during the occupation many Greeks were active in the region and made life a living hell for the Macedonians. So one day the Macedonians appealed to the Italians to ‘do something’ to protect them. The Italians said no… They insisted that these were local and internal matters and none of their concern. But since the Italians hated these Greeks, they offered to arm the Macedonians so that they could defend themselves. As a result the people of Kostur Region organized themselves and created armed bands in practically every village.

As long as the people of Kostur didn’t interfere in the affairs of the occupiers they were allowed to freely carry on with life. So the armed bands encouraged the people to speak Macedonian, open Macedonian schools, perform liturgy in Macedonian, etc.

These armed bands, however, were still armed and active after WW II was concluded and the occupiers had gone. The Greek communists tried to disarm and disband them but they couldn’t. The bands, especially when they combined to form a huge force, were too strong for them. At the same time these people wanted to live free and out of the hands of the Greeks. In other words, they wanted to remain free Macedonians and fought hard to keep it that way.”

“I heard somewhere that the Kostur bands were Bulgarian… Were they…?”

“No! There were also Bulgarian bands but these particular bands were Macedonian. The Bulgarians tried to recruit them but they refused… they knew better. The only people the Bulgarians recruited were criminals and lowlifes and they were few and far between. The Greeks unfortunately labeled all of them Bulgarian and used that information in their propaganda campaigns to mask the fact that they were Macedonians fighting for their rights. The Greek communists especially hated them and the bands hated the Greek communists just as much…They were very suspicious of the communists.

So, with Yugoslav help, the Greek communists were convinced that the only way they could get rid of these bands was by getting Macedonians to fight against Macedonians.

So the Greeks created an exclusively Macedonian army called the Slavo-Macedonian National Liberation Army (SNOV) and unleashed it on them. But first they convinced the Macedonians that these bands were Bulgarian and worked exclusively for Bulgarian interests. Many Macedonians to this day still believe these bands worked for the Bulgarians.

In any case, when the Macedonian army clashed with the Kostur freedom fighting bands and the bands found out that these people were Macedonians and had a Macedonian army, they not only surrendered but joined the Macedonian army.

Regretfully, because these freedom fighters were fierce fighters and refused to give up their Macedonian ideals, the Greek communists killed them, one by one, in the most horrible way. You’ll have to read my books to find out more about that.

The Macedonian army (SNOV) was disbanded right after the bands were disarmed and disbanded. So in reality, there was no ‘Macedonian army’, it was just a ruse to disarm the Kostur Region freedom fighting bands.

Now I’ll tell you more and prove to you that the Greek Civil War was perpetrated with the aim of getting rid of the Macedonians and the communists and that neither the Macedonians nor the communists had a chance of ever winning.” “Okay, I’d like that very much… But it’s getting late… Can we pick it up next Friday?”

“Yes we can…” I replied and with that we departed and went our separate ways. Part 10 – About the Greek Civil War

The next Friday we met Stefche looked tired and a little sad. I didn’t know what to make of it. He was my friend and I couldn’t just dismiss what was bothering him without asking, “Is everything okay with you?”

“Yes, everything is okay… It’s something I have to work out for myself…” he replied and looked at me. I didn’t say anything.

After a short pause he said, “It’s my parents… I haven’t been able to sleep… They have been at me to register my children in the Greek school at our local Greek church. I don’t want to send them there and neither does my wife. After what I’ve learned I honestly can’t send them to Greek school. It would be hypocritical… I just don’t know what to do…”

“My friend, this is your family… I told you how it would be the moment you met me and listened to me. I know it’s hard for you but this is your family. It’s important to maintain a good relationship with them and not let what you have learned interfere… It’s not worth it…”

“What would you do?”

“I don’t know but I wouldn’t sacrifice my relationship with my parents over ‘historic Macedonian matters’…”

“How would you handle it if you were me?”

“These are your children and you and your wife must do what you think is best for them… what your hearts tell you… what makes you happy… or in your case what makes you less sad. But whatever you do keep the Macedonian issue out of it.”

“I guess you’re right. I’ll have to think about it some more. Sorry about that. This is my problem. Now tell me more about what happened during the Greek Civil War.” “Last Friday I told you about the Macedonian army that fought the Kostur freedom fighting bands being disbanded, but what I forgot to tell you was that the Greek communists wanted to destroy the Macedonian army. They wanted to send it south into Greece where they could encircle and destroy it. But some Macedonians must have got wind of it and refused to go south. One of the leaders, a fellow from our neighbouring village Statitsa, told the Greeks ‘we don’t want to go south, we want to stay here where our homes and families are so we can protect them, we have no business going down south’. Because of their insubordination the Greek communists made preparations to attack them. But to avoid bloodshed the Macedonians crossed over the northern Greek border and went to the Yugoslav part of Macedonia.

The composition of NOF was created from these soldiers. Later most of them returned to Greece and fought in the Greek Civil War.

A little later, after NOF recruited, trained and armed many Macedonians units, Tito abandoned NOF and passed it on to Zahariadis and the CPG. One day, the NOF leadership was invited to Skopje where the leaders weren’t asked but were told ‘now you go back there and fight. From now on you’ll be reporting to the CPG. The CPG will be your leader.’

And like good soldiers they went back and supposedly negotiated a merger between the Macedonian and Greek military units led by the communists. But this wasn’t a merger, it was a takeover. All the Macedonian officers and leaders were demoted to simple soldiers and sent to the mountains to fight. The new force was made up roughly of half Macedonian and half Greek soldiers but all of them were led by Greek officers… except for one. But he might just as well have been a Greek because he was a Grkoman, working for Greek interests.

NOF was subordinated to the CPG and all throughout the Greek Civil War had almost no rights and only served as a recruiter bringing more and more Macedonians into the meat grinder.

I also have to tell you that initially when the Macedonian people discovered a Macedonian army was being built, they began to join in droves. Obviously the Greeks didn’t want to be overpowered so the recruitment centres began to turn them back. The doctors told the volunteers they weren’t fit to fight, which was ridiculous... Then, for ‘mysterious reasons’, when these young men tried to return to their homes, they were intercepted by government forces and Greek terror groups and disappeared. They were picked off and killed before they could return to their homes. As far as their families knew they had joined the Macedonian army and died fighting.

So now I have to ask you, ‘if Tito and Zahariadis wanted the Macedonians to liberate themselves then why did they keep restraining them and not allowing them to create a large Macedonian army. Why didn’t they allow them to lead their own people?’…”

“Obviously they were telling them one thing and doing another…”

“But for what reason?”

“Well, like you said, they had ulterior motives…”

“So, when Zahariadis had the chance to build up a large resistance force of about 60 thousand soldiers, he told the recruiters to only recruit about 5 thousand. The reason he gave was that he was going to try to seize power in Greece through the election process.

Then, after he lost in all the elections, he tried recruiting again but it was too late. The Greek governments in Athens in those days were very unstable and kept failing. It seemed like no party was able to hold onto power for too long.

When the English supported party finally seized power in Greece, it escalated the terror campaign against the Macedonians and the communists. And because of these terrorist actions, Zahariadis boycotted the next election and allowed another English supported party to win. When that too failed, Zahariadis told his supporters to vote for the liberal party to stop the extreme right from taking power. But after the liberals came to power they opened the way for the extremists to take over. Was that a mistake or was it done on purpose?” “Obviously, from what you’re telling me, the Greeks were incapable of forming a stable government and naturally Zahariadis tried to help them. But what I don’t understand is if the majority of the people in Greece favoured the communist party, why didn’t they just vote communist?”

“Most of the people, especially in the rural areas where the populations were small, were terrorized by the extremists and threatened with death if they voted communist. In fact people were given ballots and told for whom to vote. It was a real mess; the people weren’t free to vote for who they wanted…”

“So, I guess they didn’t vote communist and were coerced to vote for the extremists…”

“That’s correct. When the political right took power it escalated its terror activities against the communists and Macedonians and began to arrest people. That’s when Zahariadis started thinking of seizing power by force, which eventually resulted in the start of what later was named the Greek Civil War. But by then recruitment had dried up and the best Zahariadis could do, at the peak of the war, was build up a force of no more than 25 to 30 thousand soldiers, half of whom happened to be Macedonian.

This was when NOF went into overdrive recruiting first Macedonian men and then, after the Macedonian children were sent out of the country in March 1948, Macedonian women.”

“The Macedonian children were sent out of the country?”

“Yes. I’m surprised you haven’t heard about that?”

“Who would tell me? My parents…?’

“You have a point. So, as the war escalated and started moving north into the heart of the Greek part of Macedonia, the Greek air force started bombing our villages. From what my mother told me the airplanes were dropping bombs on everything that moved. It wasn’t even safe for the animals. So to save the children from the Greek bombs, a program was started where all the children aged 2 to 14 living in the war zone were collected and evacuated north into the Yugoslav part of Macedonia. This was supposed to be temporary, until the war was over, but as it turned out it became permanent. When the war was over the Greeks wouldn’t allow the children to return so they ended up exiled all over Eastern Europe to this day. But this wasn’t the worst of it. When the communists started collecting children, overwhelmingly Macedonian children, the Greeks, including the Fascists in the Greek government, complained to the world that ‘the Slav bandits’ were kidnapping ‘Greek’ children. And the Greeks also began to collect children, including many Macedonian children under a program called “pedomazoma’. Unfortunately for us these children were brainwashed and indoctrinated to become Greeks. If you remember earlier I told you a story about a Greek soldier who didn’t know that he was Macedonian and who, as an orphan, was adopted by a Greek family? He was one of those children collected by the Greek army from our villages. It was the Greeks who were kidnapping Macedonian children, taking them by force, and not the communists. From what I know from our people the parents of the children from our village, for example, sent their children voluntarily. They weren’t kidnapped or taken by force. My mother was one of those children who qualified for evacuation. But she stayed behind to look after her ailing mother who was very sick and dying. Her younger brother left with the children and so did my other young uncle, my father’s youngest brother.”

“You mentioned ‘Slav bandits’, who were they?”

“They were the Macedonians, the local indigenous Macedonian people like you and me who were living in Greece. The Greek government called them ‘Slavs’ and claimed they had ‘come from the north’. The Greeks didn’t want to admit that Macedonians lived in Greece, so they concocted the idea that these people, the indigenous Macedonians, were foreigners; bandits that came to steal ‘their’ Greek Macedonia and give it to Tito. The communists were also accused of the same thing… but the communists supposedly were all Greeks who wanted to take the Greek part of Macedonia and give it to Tito. As a result they were bad people.

This is how the ‘idea’ that Tito ‘created’ the Macedonian identity was invented. Many Greeks, to this day, still believe that… that Tito ‘created’ the Macedonians. These were lies the English and Greek governments concocted and perpetuated to hide the fact that Macedonians lived in Greece and that those calling themselves ‘Macedonian’ were nothing but Tito’s agents. The idea that they were there to ‘steal’ their Macedonia aggravated the Greeks and riled them up. As a result they gave their support to the Greek government and demanded that it drive them out. There are many articles in newspapers of that time that echo their sentiments.

You must understand that the Greek Civil War was different things to different people. To the Macedonians it was an ‘uprising’. The Macedonian people were told that they were fighting for their rights… to liberate themselves from the Greeks… to re-unite their Macedonia. The Greek people were told they were fighting to expel the ‘Slav invaders, the ‘bandits’ and to destroy the communist menace which strived to steal their Macedonia and give it to Tito. The rest of the world was told that this was an ideological war between communists and capitalists. The name ‘Greek Civil War’ was coined much later, many years after the war ended…”

“Your family wasn’t driven out… you told me that you were born in Greece. How did that happen?”

“Well, I told you how my mother ended up staying in Greece. My father was left behind because he was in prison. He was confined in the prison in the Greek island concentration camps.

I forgot to tell you that while helping Greece, England went bankrupt and the United States took its place. This was in March 1947. When the Americans took over they made every effort to destroy the resistance in Greece. Unfortunately for them, they continued to fail, that is until they brought in a general who specialized in guerilla warfare.

The Greeks had difficulty defeating the Macedonian and communist resistance because they were unable to anticipate where they were going to attack. But Van Fleet, the American general, suggested that in order to defeat the ‘guerillas’ the Greek government needed to rob them of their food and recruits. To rob them of their food, which was supplied by the surrounding civilian population, the Greek government evacuated all the villages and placed the people under guard in villages that had Greek army garrisons. To starve them of their recruits the Greek government collected all the young men of military age and put them in prisons on the dry Greek islands in the Aegean Sea.

Мy father was taken to one of these Greek island prisons in 1947 and was released in 1951, a couple of years after the Greek Civil War ended…”

“Can I stop you here?...”

“Yes, but why?”

“You can tell me more about your family the next time we meet… Earlier you told me you would give me the highlights of the Greek Civil War but you’re giving me way too much information… too many details. I can’t remember all that….”

“Sorry about that. But if you do want to know more you should read my books, especially the material at these links:

http://www.pollitecon.com/Assets/Ebooks/Analysis-of-historical-events-in-Greek-occupied-Macedonia-2.pdf

http://www.pollitecon.com/Assets/Ebooks/Analysis-of-Historical_Events-in-Greek-Occupied-Macedonia-Part-3.pdf

http://www.pollitecon.com/Assets/Ebooks/Macedonians-and-the-NOT-so-Civil-War-in-Greece.pdf.

Now I’ll focus on the most important points that prove that the Greek Civil War wasn’t what it seemed.”

“Thank you.”

“Well, let’s put it this way, if Siantos and Zahariadis weren’t English agents, which we know they were, why did they do things that created conditions necessary to defeat the communists and suppress the Macedonians.

1. Siantos, for example, had a large army and could have resisted the English and the Greek government from landing in Athens. He could have easily installed a communist government in Athens… but he didn’t. He already had all kinds of cells everywhere running the country. But instead he acquiesced and allowed the English to install a Fascist government in Athens.

2. After the occupiers left, the communist led army could have gone to Solun and occupied it but instead the top communist leadership allowed the English to go in first, establish themselves, and then ‘tell the world’ that the England had liberated Solun. There too, in the heart of Macedonia, the communists allowed the English to take root.

3. If the top communist leaders really wanted to win in Greece and if they wanted to ‘liberate’ the Greek part of Macedonia, then why did they disarm and disband their own army and allow the Greek government, with England’s blessing, to recruit former collaborators and Fascists?

4. Most important of all, both Siantos and Zaharadis knew they had the military power to take over Greece. Why did Zahariadis wait until the Greek government in Athens was strong enough before engaging it in combat… and with such a small force? In the heat of the war the Greek government had 600,000 soldiers, the most modern aviation, tanks, heavy artillery, etc. While the resistance had at most 30,000 lightly armed fighters, mortars and light cannons.

5. If the communists in Greece and Yugoslavia wanted the Macedonians to fight, win, liberate the Greek part of Macedonia and join it to the Yugoslav part, why didn’t they allow the Macedonian people to raise their own large Macedonian army and lead it?

6. If Zahariadis wanted to win the war why did he replace his army’s fighting tactics. Why did he drop his successful hit and run tactics and opt for stationary tactics and engage the Greek government army in a frontal attack. Was it because a ‘stationary’ army would make a better target for the Greek artillery and aviation to tear apart?

Historians tend to call all this ‘mistakes’ but they weren’t mistakes; this was purposely done so the resistance forces would lose the war and be driven out. 7. Another puzzle that adds mystery to the Greek Civil War was Tito and the Yugoslav involvement. Not only was Tito supporting and fueling the war but he involved the Macedonians in it. Why did Tito create NOF in Skopje and send it to Greece to start a war. Was it because the English wanted it to look like Greece was being attacked from the outside?

Tito never asked the Macedonians if they wanted to start a war in Greece, he just ordered them to start it. Also, how did Tito know that a civil war was going to start in Greece at some future time? Unless this war was pre-planned?

The Macedonians didn’t want to fight. Tito encouraged them and lied to them, telling them they could liberate the Greek part of Macedonia and unite it with the Yugoslav part, despite the fact that the Iron Curtain separated the two parts of Macedonia. Tito knew the Macedonians couldn’t win, especially with the USA supporting Greece, but he made them get involved in a losing war anyway.

8. If the communists wanted the Macedonians to have rights as Macedonians then why did they call them ‘Slavo-Macedonians’ and why did they give them concessions (equal rights with the Greeks, autonomy and even independence to separate from Greece) and then immediately take them away?

One of the authors (Stoian Kochov) whose books I translated told me that in order to understand why the communists gave the Macedonians concessions you must look at the Greek Civil War in its entirety in chronological order. Look at the big picture of what events were taking place before the concessions were given and what resulted from them. He said that every time the Greek government needed to ‘do something’ which required the assistance of the Greek people, Zahariadis gave the Macedonians concessions. Immediately after that the Greek government would react negatively and get the Greek public riled up. Zahariadis also did this to ‘motivate’ the Macedonians to fight harder. You get the picture.

9. If Zahariadis cared so much for the Macedonians why didn’t he surrender and make agreements with the Greek government to spare the civilian population. Why did he send all the people to Albania; outside the Greek border? The entire resistance force, including all the Macedonian civilians, was evacuated to Albania when the war was concluding, after which Greece permanently closed its borders. My grandfather and grandmother, on my father’s side, were part of those civilians. I never got to meet my grandfather, after whom I was named… he died in Poland several years after I was born.

10. And while all this was going on, Greece was passing all kinds of laws to make sure the Macedonians would be robbed of their rights, properties and assets. I have an entire chapter dedicated to this in my book ‘The not so civil war in Greece’ which can be found at this link: http://www.pollitecon.com/Assets/Ebooks/Macedonians-and-the-NOT-so-Civil-War-in-Greece.pdf.”

Why was Greece passing laws to confiscate citizenships and properties even before the war was over? Did Greece know ahead of time that these people would be leaving en masse and crossing the border into Albania?

I can give you many examples where the top communist leadership made it possible for England and the Greek government to achieve their objectives; destroy the communists and get rid of the Macedonians.”

“Listen, I’ve heard enough for one day. My head is spinning… Can we pick it up next Friday?

“Sorry, next Friday I’ll be busy with something else. Can we do it the Friday after?”

“Okay but you’re buying dinner…”

“Okay, see you then…” I said and with that we both left. Part 11 – after the

Life in the village Greek Civil War

The next time we met I told Stefche, “A couple of Fridays ago I forgot to tell you that when the number of Macedonians in the communist army grew a little too large for their liking, the Macedonians were again ordered to go south and again they refused. When some realized what was going on, that they weren’t only being mistreated but also misled by the Greeks, they separated themselves from the Greek forces and again fled to Yugoslavia. In other words, they deserted the communist led Greek army… I’m telling you this because there were lasting consequences as a result of that, not only with the Greeks but also with the Macedonians who stayed and fought in the Greek Civil War.”

“What sort of consequences?”

“The fighters who fled must have realized that the Greek Civil War was a futile war and only served Greek interests, so they felt that the Macedonians who were still fighting in it were fighting for Greek interests. Unfortunately this became public knowledge and upset those who were still fighting in the Greek Civil War, who didn’t believe they were fighting for Greek interests and still believed they were fighting for their rights and to protect the Macedonian people in Greece. So,in response, they called those who had fled cowards and traitors for abandoning their comrades and their own families.

As a result, a verbal war was started between the Macedonians fighting in Greece and those who had deserted, which resulted in a deep divide which is ongoing to this day.”

“What sort of divide?”

“I didn’t know about the divide even after I wrote my book ‘Macedonians in Greece 1939 – 1949’, in 2009, which can be found at this link: http://www.pollitecon.com/Assets/Ebooks/Macedonians-in-Greece-1939-1949.pdf. When I went to Macedonia for a visit, I had discussions with various people about my book and found out things I’d never heard of before. One of those things was this deep divide between our people. That’s when I decided to start translating other people’s books from Macedonian to English because these authors knew far more about the wars than I did. Up to that time I was misled to believe that the Macedonians hadn’t written any books. I didn’t know that books existed that contradicted the official Yugoslav narrative and that they were written by independent authors. But when Macedonia gained independence from Yugoslavia these books began to surface. Most of the books I translated were written by people who had either fought in the Greek Civil War or were Macedonian children who were exiled during the Greek Civil War.”

“Again, let me stop you here. I’m more interested in knowing what happened to our families. I want to know things about which you haven’t written in your books. You don’t need to tell me things you’ve written in either your books or the ones you’ve translated. My interest right now is to know who we are and what happened to you and me personally.”

“Got it. As far as your family is concerned I know nothing about them but I know your grandmother, on your father’s side, was still alive when my family left the village.”

“That’s too bad. I wonder if my father served in the resistance.”

“No way…! Your family was ‘Grkoman’ and wouldn’t have served with the Macedonians or the communists. The Grkomani always served with the Greek political right. Your father was probably serving in the Greek government army or was hiding somewhere in a big city. Why don’t you ask him?”

“I have… but he refuses to talk about it.”

“Then you should ask someone who knew him in the past, like your aunt who calls you Stefche. Make the effort to find out whatever you can from her.”

“Not now, maybe later... Now tell me about your family.” “Well, I told you about my mother and father. I have written about them in my book: ‘OSHCHIMA The Story of a Small Village in Western Macedonia’, which can be found at this link: http://www.pollitecon.com/Assets/Ebooks/Oschima.pdf. In fact I’ve written about many Oshchimians and their tragic experiences in that book. You can also learn a lot about Oshchima.

I haven’t written much about my mother’s side of the family but my cousin Spiro has written a book called: ‘A story told about a person from Zhelevo A book about Risto Mavrovski’, which can be found at this link: http://www.pollitecon.com/Assets/Ebooks/A-Book-About-Risto-Mavrovski-English.pdf. He has written extensively about my mother’s family.”

“I don’t want to know ‘everything’ about your family. Can you just give me a summary?”

“That I can do… Let’s start with my grandparents on my father’s side. They were too old to be directly involved in the Greek Civil War or to look after their farm and livestock so they were left in the house. While their other children participated directly in the war, my father was left behind to look after them and the house. And just when the war was about to end, they were told… the communist leadership told them to leave their home and go to Albania because the Greek army was coming and the soldiers would kill them. And so they did… with the understanding that this would only be temporary. That’s what the communist leaders told them.

Unfortunately it turned out to be permanent. After my grandparents left, the Greek government closed its borders and wouldn’t allow them to come back. They ended up in Poland.

My oldest aunt joined the resistance as a field medic. She was married and had five children. Her husband was a resistance fighter and was killed. Because of that the communists relieved her from duty and allowed her to leave Greece with four of her children and other children from Oshchima. This was during the 1948 child evacuation. Her oldest son was recruited as a fighter by the resistance. Eventually she ended up in Skopje in the Republic of Macedonia where she raised her children on her own without assistance. She worked for a company that collected herbs from the mountains and turned them into pharmaceutical products.

My oldest uncle died in 1943 from appendicitis at age twenty-two. He was one of the first from Oshchima, and the first in our family, to make contact with the WW II resistance movement and signed up as a volunteer fighter. Tragically, very soon afterwards he became very ill and died. The loss was devastating for my grandparents.

My second oldest aunt was also drafted into the resistance and she too served as a field medic. From what she told me, her greatest fear was of finding her younger brother or brother-in-law, her older sister’s husband, dead in the field. She was devastated when she found out that her brother-in-law had been killed. She too was married and had two daughters who were evacuated with the children in 1948. Her husband was also drafted but not in the resistance. He served in the Greek government army and fought against the resistance. They had both been brainwashed by the ideological propaganda waged by both sides and were unable to reconcile their differences for the rest of their lives, even though they lived together under one roof. Most of their lives they lived in Toronto, Canada.

Because my uncle served in the Greek government army he was allowed to leave Greece. My aunt at the time had been evacuated and ended up in Poland. Eventually my uncle brought his family to Canada; his wife from Poland and his two daughters from Yugoslavia. My aunt and uncle had a third child in Canada, a boy. They named him Risto, like me, after our common grandfather. My aunt made it possible for us to go to Canada.

My second oldest uncle fought in both WW II and the Greek Civil War. Both times he joined voluntarily. He was wounded multiple times. During WW II he served in the resistance as a police officer and during the Greek Civil War he served as a resistance fighter. Once he told me that he had guarded Zahariadis who congratulated him for his bravery. As a result my uncle admired Zahariadis. Unfortunately he didn’t know what kind of person Zahariadis was. My uncle died before I found out who Zahariadis was and the harm he’d done to our people. After the war my uncle was sent to the USSR where he married my aunt, a woman from Trnaa, a neighouring village, who had also fought in the resistance. They had two boys, both born in Tashkent, USSR. They too ended up in Toronto. I lived in their house for a year before my father could afford to buy his own house. His older son, my cousin, has been my best friend ever since we met.

I’ve already told you about my mother and father.

Next was my aunt, my father’s youngest sister. She was drafted by the resistance in 1947 when she was only fifteen years old. But because she was young and frail, initially she was assigned to courier duties. Later she was issued a machine gun and fought in many battles. Because she was a combatant, after the evacuation she ended up in Tashkent in the USSR where she married my uncle and had two children, a boy and a girl. Eventually they too ended up in Canada.

The last in my grandfather’s family was my youngest uncle. Because of his age (twelve years old) he qualified for the 1948 child evacuation program and ended up in Romania. Then when Zahariadis was desperate for recruits, for more bodies for his meat grinder, he was brought back to fight. His was thirteen by then but because he of his large stature and ability to carry a gun he was brought back. He was in the second group that came back. Everyone in the first group was killed. When parents and generally all the people found out that the children who were supposed to be saved had been brought back, they protested to the communists who then decided not to send the children to battle. My grandfather, my uncle’s father went and got him from the training camp and kept him home until everyone was evacuated. He too ended up in Poland with his parents and older sister who later brought him with her to Canada. He married in Canada and had three daughters. He was the one who sponsored my father’s family and brought us to Canada.

On my mother’s side, she had four brothers. As for her mother and father… My grandfather was drafted to build roads and bridges for both sides in the war. For most of the time he was out in the field working while his wife, my grandmother, was ill and bedridden. She had been tossed into a cold pool of water during the German occupation by German soldiers having their fun and then she was attacked by a German shepherd. She never recovered from the shock and eventually died.

My oldest uncle was killed during the Greek Civil War. He was badly wounded and lost his eye but still he went back to fight and was killed. Like my other uncles he too was a volunteer. He was often abused and beaten by the Greek police in his village, which motivated him to go and fight for his freedom.

My second oldest uncle, despite his mother pleading with him not to join the resistance, also joined as a volunteer. He was wounded many times but survived… He lost the use of one of his arms. He was recovering in a hospital in Poland when the war ended. There he met and married my aunt who was also an evacuee and they had a son while living in Poland. After that they moved to the Republic of Macedonia, to Bitola where they had two more children, a boy and a girl.

I’ve already told you about my mother. She often said she regretted not leaving with the children in 1948 because her life in the village was terrible. Her father remarried and she had to live with a stepmother who had two children of her own.

My youngest uncle was evacuated with the children in 1948 and ended up in Hungary. From there he moved to Poland to be with his brother. After that he followed his older brother to the Republic of Macedonia, to Bitola where he married a girl he knew from Poland, originally from the village German, Prespa. They had one child, a boy.

That’s the whole story of my family in a nutshell…”

“Wow, that’s fascinating… that you know so much. I know practically nothing about my family. In fact a few months ago, I didn’t even know who I was, where I was from, or that I was Macedonian…”

“You too will learn more like I did… Just give it some time. You remind me of a second cousin of mine who came all the way from Australia to interview my father and find out about her past. Her immediate family were Grkoman but she was curious to know ‘what the other side of her family’ had to say about her family. My father told her many things, some negative, which were different from what her family had told her…”

“Was she disappointed?”

“I don’t know. As soon as she gathered her information she left and went back to Australia.”

“Now can you tell me a little more about your immediate family and your life back in the village? Tell me how life was in the village for you.”

“Well, after he being sent to prison my father was finally freed and arrived home in January 1952. When he arrived in Oshchima he found his home empty and looted. Everything was gone; his father’s tools, the farming tools, furniture and clothing, everything. His parents, along with ninety percent of the people from Oshchima, had abandoned everything and fled in a hurry to avoid being killed. And like I said, when the war was over no one was allowed to return. His entire family was gone.

I told you before that I was born in Oshchima and my parents wanted to name me Risto after my grandfather (my father’s father) but the Greek government wouldn’t allow it. So the Greek priest who baptized me named me Hristos. Because I belonged to a family that had participated on the losing side of the war and because my father had served in prison my family was looked down upon. But because I was born into that situation, that kind of life was normal for me. It was normal to be suspicious of everyone, especially strangers, not to ask questions, not to speak Macedonian in public and to be very cautious and fearful of authority; especially the Greek police.