BROTHERHOOD UNITY - Part 12

The vultures stopped circling when the sky started to glow purple just before nightfall. The red disk of the bright sun slowly disappeared behind the mountain. At the clearing beyond the border, under a clear starry sky, the multitude was quietly crying, cursing, swearing, moaning and praying. The full moon began to shine from beyond the hill. Krstovitsa spotted an unoccupied spot and went to it. She took the woolen blanket off her shoulder. She leaned her shoulder on a rock which was still warm and radiating heat. A cloud blocked the moon and everything went dark. In the dark, beside her, as if she was not there and did not exist, strangers were passing by, carrying heavy loads on their backs, tired and exhausted, quiet, mute. People were passing by guiding their livestock, shouting at one another, infants crying and elders choking with emotion. A woman’s voice was heard cursing in the dark and drowning in the convulsions of her sobbing… Krstovitsa extended her hands, touched her feet and then the soil. It was easier to breathe now. She took a long breath and then wiped the sweat off her forehead and face and then put her black kerchief back on her head. She looked up. High up in the sky the stars were flickering. Occasionally the crowd went quiet, but just for a moment, that’s when the quiet roar of thunder could be heard in the distance with slight vibrations felt in the air. She slumped on the woolen blanket using it as a pillow and imagined that she was at home in her own house, in the dead of night beside her hearth in which she was sure the coals she had covered up with ash were still burning; she imagined that she was in her colourful guest room in which she had spread her worn out woolen blanket and thought about her children and her children’s children who had grown up on this woolen blanket. And now, where are they now? She knows that her oldest son is lying dead somewhere under a rock on top of Ivan Mountain. She knows that her second son is working in some mine somewhere in Canada and Kotsa, her daughter, she knows that she was exiled to Egina Island in the Aegean Sea because her husband left with the Aegean Brigade. She knows that since last year the remains of her two grandsons have been resting in pieces somewhere in Gramos. She heard that her granddaughter had been shot in the back when she was returning from Negush and was left to bleed in the snow. She was told, and she still believes, that her granddaughter recovered from her wounds and took the road to Vicho. And in her thoughts she again returned to the beginning, remembering everything that had happened, feeling the pain over and over again, and what hurt the most was her inability to get over her unhealed pain. Her heart had broken when she found out that Pavle, her eldest son, was left dead on Ivan Mountain. Her heart had broken when she received the dreadful letter with the king’s seal telling her that her son had died heroically in the Albanian mountains; heroically defending the Greek ‘patrida’ (country) against the Italians. Broken hearted, Krstovica did not have the courage to ask the man who read her the Greek letter with the king’s seal why they had sent him to prison in 1936. Why did they send her son, the hero who died on Ivan Mountain for Greece, to prison for six months on one of the dry Aegean Islands, for simply saying “good morning” in his Macedonian native language? And why did they have to give him castor oil to humiliate him? When they read her the Greek letter about her two grandsons, who only last year had lost their lives and left their bodies in the rocks on Kleftis in Gramos, they said they had died heroically for the glory of Greece. They said they had died as Greeks for Greece. Those words gave her no comfort, no pride and no dignity in her heart. In fact they insulted her and gave her sharp pains in her gut. Macedonians have their own country and their own roots soaked in the blood of so many of their own heroes. In their letters they write about Greece and Greeks and at the same time despise her for not knowing how to speak the Greek language, for not understanding the priest in church and for not knowing how to pray to God in Greek.

And when Krsto, her husband, did not return from the Asia Minor campaign, then too they read her a letter telling her that he, Stavros, had died admirably at Ali Veran for the greatness, for the glory and for the honour of Greater mother Greece. And before that when they made him wear their uniform, they called him “neznamitis” (“ne znam” in Macedonian means “I don’t know” or I don’t understand what you are asking”) because to every question they asked he replied with the words “ne znam” (I don’t know). The Greeks sent letters stamped with a Greek royal seal to the families of the “neznamites’, even to those who had died in foreign lands, giving the impression that now even the most beloved sons of Macedonia care for Greece and are dying for the glory of Greece. But the Greeks say this only when the “neznamites’ serve their interests, when they fight for Greece, when they kill on behalf of Greece and when they spill their own blood to glorify Greece. It has always been this way with the Greeks. They like the “neznamites” and glorify them as long as the “neznamites’ march to the tune of their military drums and trumpets. But even then, they rob them of their speech. Even then, they do not allow them to cry, moan, or speak of their problems in their Macedonian language. They won’t allow their mothers, wives and sisters to cry and pray for them on their graves in their native Macedonian language. They won’t even allow their Macedonian names to be written on the crosses standing at the head of their graves. And God, as we are told through the force of Greek law, does not recognize any other prayers besides those spoken in Greek. All mighty God, through the mouth of the all Greek Patriarch, obliges some to be happy and others to suffer in silence and to be sustained not by kindness and God’s love, but by bitterness and humiliation. So, in times of prayer, even though all people celebrate the One and same Christian God, not all are allowed to pray to him and glorify his name in their native language. And every week and holiday when church bells ring loudly, for some prayers are mute, recognized only by the expression in their eyes, foreheads, cheeks, low bows, foreheads touching the ground and by the barely visible movement of lips. People know to say “amen” loudly and “Christ has Risen” or “For Many Years” (Live a long and prosperous life) silently and away from inquisitive ears. And when they received a letter from the battlefield with bad news, they set aside their fears of castor oil, the whip, the dry islands in the Aegean Sea and begin to scream and wail in their own language because only through it they can find the deepest, most meaningful, most significant and most caring way to express their feelings and lighten their pain over the loss of a loved one. Krstovitsa had to set aside her fears many times, on three separate occasions over the years. She wailed and wept aloud, in her Macedonian language, many times; during a holiday, on a weekday, during a celebration, during a burial and during a wake. Before the Greek-Italian war broke out, learning Greek in the night schools, she barely managed to learn the first verse of the Greek version of “our father” but quickly afterwards when bad news began to arrive, prayer in Greek did not help her, not even when the priest and the teacher tried to convince her that God wanted to hear prayers whispered in Greek only. In her memory there was no place for forgetting, not the good and not the bad. Sitting there, leaning against the cool rock, Krstovitsa, through her teary eyes, struggled to gaze into the distance, in which, through her blurred vision, she could see her house. But she sensed that it lacked eternal warmth and brightness, the goodness and the sad view of the Virgin Mary in front of which burned an oil lamp every day and night. Now that too was gone. The eternal and serene beauty seen from the porch above was also gone. The vine that once thrived and climbed above the porch was gone.

All that remained now were the dry grapes hanging there burned by the heat wave. The old apple tree in the yard was burned too. It had been a shelter for all kinds of birds including swallows that constantly flew under it. It was now blackened by smoke and smelling like marigolds and basil of which there was so much in the yard. Desolate… Everything was desolate... She raised her arms and touched her face with her hands. She wiped her tears… For a moment she felt weak and as if something in her had just broken. She began to weep… very quietly, silently, without quivering, without loud sobbing, but from the bottom of her heart. Then after she wept for a while she felt something lift out of her, she was relieved by a long awaited calm. She tried to stand up but in spite of all her efforts she was still unable. She squatted down, looked around and attempted to identify the nocturnal noises around her. It seemed as if she was all alone. A step or two away she heard a cricket chirping quietly in the grass, then go silent. It stopped chirping as if wanting to listen and started up again; short chirps as if frightened from a firefly that flashed several times as it flew by near the road. It stopped again. It jumped a step further and renewed its chirping, this time it was more intense, louder, it filled the darkness with its sound. Krstovitsa turned her head and then felt a shiver as the night air from the distant mountains made its way past her. There were sounds of thunder in the air. She listened. The leaves in the trees all over the vast wilderness rustled, spreading their sound all around her. The wind blew gently on this hot August night, softly caressing her cheeks. She felt something awaken; come alive inside her, something that had been trampled on, crushed, by the severity of life. “Oh God, am I dying or going crazy?” she asked herself quietly feeling calm, peaceful and relieved of her fears. Squatting by the rock she finally became aware of her knees hurting. “Am I cowering? From whom? Why?” she asked herself and slowly stood up. Under the cover of darkness people, together with their possessions, were arranged in columns. And when those in the woods and those in the hills were combined together, as one, a thunderous voice behind them ordered them to move in the dark. Above them in the vast sky, in this penetrating deep darkness, the stars seemed to be moving, taking steps with them, slowly, step by step, moving above the columns… Dawn was breaking. A frowning, reddish dim brightness was beginning to descend from the direction of Bela Voda. Beyond there lazily lay the waters of Lake Prespa. Krstovitsa packed her woolen blanket, tossed it over her shoulder, and began to walk on the dusty desolate road bent forward as if walking into a strong wind. She was walking straight following in the footsteps of those who had passed here before her. She did not look back. The night she had spent in the meadow beside the dusty road, it seemed to her as if death had passed her by, looked at her tears and left, went behind the hills, towards the lake, towards the reeds that grow in the wide valley of Mala Prespa. Two columns of tanks, one from Lerin over Psoderi, the other from Kostur over Gabresh, met at the intersection in Oshchima, a small distance from Zhelevo and took the road towards Prevolot where the Government infantry was leading a battle. They hurriedly rushed uphill anxious to reach the Rabi plains and occupy Peroo, the straight between the two lakes and thus close the road to Albania and cut off the escape route of the units leaving Bela Voda and Bigla. Before entering Orovnik, three powerful explosions were heard. Three bridges were blown up at the entrance of the village. After that the earth shook and the air was filled with smoke as detonation specialists destroyed the stores of weapons and food buried in the bases in the hills between Orovnik and Popli. Government troops moved their artillery batteries closer to Prespa, to new positions and opened fire.

They were bombing the paths of the left over fighters fleeing into Albania. In the morning fighter planes, approaching from the south and following one another, bombed Vrba and then flew low and with rockets and machine gun fire, attacked the hills above Medovo and Rabi. Trucks were offloading infantry troops at Shtrkovo who immediately engaged in battle. Two DAG (Democratic Army of Greece) battalions were fiercely defending the region. The tanks turned left and plunged onto the plains around Peroo. Anti-tank mines kept erupting under them. The escape path was now closed. DAG units leaving Bela Voda now joined the defenders in Rabi but at noon they were fiercely attacked by Government forces, which appeared from the Kleshtina-Rakovo-German direction. Leaving their dead and wounded behind, the defenders withdrew towards Peroo along a clear corridor but the opponent used every arsenal in his possession to target them. On August 14th the bridge near the local tower, where the water flows from the large into the small Lake Prespa, was destroyed and DAG units from the 14th Brigade were left behind, cut off from their escape route. Along with them were also fleeing civilians who hid in the reeds between the bridge and the village Rabi. (There is a span of 5 kilometers from the bridge to Rabi). Here is where DAG’s greatest drama, outside of the Lerin battle, unfolded where defenseless people bravely fought with their will and bare hands. Here is where tens of low flying fighter planes unleashed terror with their bombs, rockets and machine gun fire. After the planes were finished the tanks, cannons and mortars were unleashed. And when they were done, the Greek Government unleashed their LOK (Special Forces) and Mountain Units which fiercely pursued the DAG fighters. They shot and killed all the wounded. In the morning of August 15th, DAG detonation specialists blew up the bridge between the two lakes. All hope for those living and wounded DAG fighters left behind was lost. Those attempting to swim across the lake were killed by flying aircraft. Others fought their way to the last bullet and then hid in the sand and amongst the reeds. The slaughter continued all day on August 14th. Part of the 14th Brigade that had defended Bela Voda, using the thick willow trees near the lake’s coast for cover, put up a fierce fight and after dark, slipped away and withdrew to the Yugoslav border. Yugoslav officers at the border proposed that the DAG fighters surrender their weapons as a condition for entering Yugoslav territory. The fighters, after long and fruitless discussions, refused. Being given some food and water they divided themselves into three units and, during the night, retreated to Bela Voda. Anyone who could still run, walk, or crawl left and hid in the high, thick reeds in order to save themselves. DAG fighters, including civilians, who did not get a chance to escape though Peroo, hid here in the sand and reeds. Most of those attempting to escape were shot at. The valley was filled with bodies of the dead and wounded. Most bodies were run over by tanks as they circled around the plain. Two tanks penetrated the straights. A powerful explosion took place at the embankment separating the two Prespa lakes. A rush of water flooded part of the Lake Prespa basin. This calmed down the fury of the tank attacks. The tanks stopped moving and shortly after withdrew to the road that passes below the villages. Low flying aircraft, originating from Rupishta and Kozheni, flew in a formation of three, pounding the plain and the lake reeds. They tilted their left wing, turned in a semicircle, pounded Suva Gora and disappeared behind Mount Vrba. They did this at intervals of five minutes and then the planes from Lerin came. They flew from the direction of Bela Voda, in a horizontal formation, covering and pounding the entire expanse near little Lake Prespa. The water flew high, the lake boiled and the reeds burned as bombs kept coming down. People attempted to swim away to save themselves but none made it to shore alive.

The telephone rang loudly at Division III command post located on the hill above the village Popli. The commander picked up the headset and quietly stood still while he listened. “Yes, yes, General, Sir. We are making progress. We already have control of the entire area on the eastern side of the lake. No, yes, there is only sporadic, almost single fighter resistance. Where? They are hidden in the lake reeds and are defending themselves there. Yes, of course, they will be overpowered by dark and during the night our troops will occupy the so-called Africa, west of the lake. What? Are you asking how our brave air force is holding out? In the plain and in the lake it is sowing fear and terror from the sky… It has brought hell on earth from the sky, General, Sir… Yes, everything is under our control… Yes, yes, General, Sir. Today is August 14th. Tomorrow we will be celebrating the Virgin Mary in peace. Yes, thank you. General, Sir, if you allow me, I want to tell you that what is happening here now, is no longer fighting, but pure murder, slaughter, not to say criminal. Order this hell to stop… the lake is red with blood… Yes, of course, General, Sir. As a soldier and chief I will do my military duty, but as a man…” The telephone went dead. There was no voice on the other side. It was August 15th and all over Greece the Virgin Mary holiday was being celebrated. News of the great victory arrived in Athens by radio but all night it was celebrated by the launching of glowing rockets and the firing of glowing bullets. Gunfire was relayed from hill to hill, from city to city, all the way to Athens. Villagers from the surrounding villages, who had failed to cross the border and escape, were gathering the bodies of the dead. The stench of death was spreading rapidly in the heat of August. Bulldozers arrived from Lerin in the afternoon and began to dig deep trenches in the sandy soil. And in them they tossed the dead bodies of DAG fighters one on top of another and after, when the trenches were filled, the bulldozers covered them with soil, carefully leveling them so that it looked like the land had just been ploughed. A column of military trucks was waiting in Rabi. Wounded and dead government soldiers were being collected, from all over the battlefield that stretched from the Prespa plains to the other side of the lake all the way to the Albanian border, and transported in jeeps. The dead were loaded on trucks and taken to Lerin. They dug special graves in the Lerin cemeteries and buried them in the presence of the Lerin Bishop and official military and civilian authorities, with trumpets playing and the singing of the Greek national anthem. They were buried with all military fanfare that included gunfire salutes with every burial. Their first and last names were then inscribed on a cross that stood at the top of the grave. The citizens, with their heads uncovered, gathered together at the cemeteries with every burial and among them stood those who had deserted, surrendered and collaborated with the enemy. They stood there in silence, mute, with their hands crossed and held just below their navels. When the church bells rang citizens came out on their balconies, hung their flags and brought their radios with them. The commemorations taking place in Athens were carried all throughout Greece, transmitted over the radio waves. Here in Prespa everything was quiet as the sun was about to set over the shimmering peaceful lake waters. Here at the large Prespa mass grave, a single white-bearded priest, whose shadow was elongated by the setting sun, stood on top of the freshly ploughed soil, carefully smoothed over by the bulldozers, and with a broken and trembling voice whispered: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God…” The priest ended his blessings and walked ahead, stepping over the soft soil. In Lerin the church bells were ringing and, before ending the commemoration, the bishop said: “Blessed are those who fulfill their commandments, to have the right to life and to enter the city through the gates. And outside are the dogs, the dammed, the prostitutes, the murderers, the idolaters and everyone who wants to lie and deceive…” The frowning citizens led by Gypsy musicians, laid flowers and wreaths on the graves of the fallen Government soldiers. And here at the Prespa mass graves the only thing heard was the lake water splashing against the shore. There was no crying, there were no flowers and wreaths, the church bells in Orovo, Popli, Shtrkovo, Medovo, Rabi, German, Nivitsi, Grazhdeno, Vineni, Lak, Bukovik, Drenovo… were not ringing. The north wind, however, carried distant sounds. A church bell tolled from Dolno Dupeni, from beyond the border… It was quiet but the extinguished voice of the old priest could be heard in the silence: “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you, and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world…” He paused, took a long breath, sighed and from his hoarse throat he squeezed the word “Amen!” “Amen,” repeated the darkness and the hills. “Amen,” repeated the desolate villages and wounded trees. At least that is how it seemed to the old priest, since there was no one around to cry or mourn. Here and there the lake soil hollowed out, settled down on the dead, it hugged them, it filled the gaps and empty spots between them. The day came to a close. In the night when the first stars appeared in the sky reflected by the lake water, candle lights could be seen on Sveti Ahil shimmering in the dark, lit by someone’s hand. The long and humble prayers delivered by the priest were welcomed like a long awaited emergence to life from a coma. The priest took the road to Rabi. He walked slowly and without pausing continued the funeral service and when he came to “the last rights” his voice began to shake. “The last rights,” he said, but there was no one alive in the Prespa fields to hear the last rights. He stopped on the uphill on the side of the road, turned towards the valley where the mass graves were located, raised his arms towards the sky and whispered: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied…” He crossed himself three times, then knelt and with his forehead he touched the ground several times. He got up slowly as if all the hardship, suffering and anguish in this world was resting on his shoulders, crossed himself three times and left for German. The choppy water of Lake Mala Prespa, whose blue mirror was broken by two days of aerial bombs, cannon and mortar shells and cut by thousands of hot bullets, was slowly calming down and surrendering its corpses to the shore. Giorgi did not make it to Peroo and failed to cross the strait between the two lakes so he found himself in the whirlpool of fire. He did however manage to hide in the tall and dense reeds. He dug a hole with his hands and covered himself with sand. From here he watched the struggle for life take place on all sides of the lake and inside the lake. He watched it boil wildly, blindly, angrily, stubbornly, passionately, madly, persistently like a controlled stanza. And as the struggle for life heated up so did the hatred and spite. While one side rejoiced the other defended itself with the last bullet and when it had used up the last bullet, then a knife, a dagger, a bayonet flashed in the hands of the women fighters… The next day everything calmed down, even the lake waters.

Giorgi watched from his hiding place as they collected the dead and wounded. In the night, not too far away he heard a quiet, tired cry. Crouching low he went to investigate. A boy was lying in the reeds half submerged under water. He had a huge glob of dried blood on his forehead and a swarm of flies on his left shoulder. Giorgi pulled him out of the water and laid him on dry land. He washed his shoulder and with a piece of his shirt he tied his wound. The frightened boy sobbing and shivering looked into Giorgi’s eyes. Giorgi knelt and at the moment that he was about to stand up, a little to the side, only about ten steps away, he saw a woman’s body lying in the reeds. He left the boy and went to her. And even though her face was swollen he could tell that the woman was young. Her cheeks looked beautiful and she had big blue eyes. Her chest was wide. She had a ring on her finger. Swollen from drinking blood the leaches were detaching. The waves were splashing, caressing the unknown woman’s dead body, splashing her gently then returning, then splashing her again. There was a machine gun beside her. Giorgi checked its chamber, it was empty. In her clenched hand, oddly tucked under her left shoulder, it seemed as if she was hiding something. He opened it and in it he found two cartridges. It looked like the poor woman, thought Giorgi, had never had the chance to use them. He stayed by the young woman a little while longer and then returned to the boy who now was lying between the reeds, like a frightened bird looking at the sky. Giorgi took him and carried him to the willow grove at the side of the lake. He then collected some green branches, carried them under his arm and went over to the young woman. He pulled her out of the water and placed her on dry ground. He dug a hole in the sand with his hands and buried her. On the pile of sand he then arranged the green branches. He placed rocks all around the grave and bowed and crossed himself. He then returned to the boy, sat beside him and waited for nightfall. When a sickle moon appeared in the sky he helped the boy up and, while holding him by his arm, they walked through the huge cemetery and then only for a moment without having to stop they looked up at the sky and it seemed to them that the stars were walking with them. Behind them quietly, a village church bell was heard ringing intermittently. Three times and all night dong-dong-dong… ringing three times for everyone in the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, AMEN… ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Petre Nakovski, a novelist and translator, was born on July 17, 1937 in the village Krchishta, Kostur Region, Aegean (Greek occupied) Macedonia. Dr. Nakovksi studied at the Pedagogical Literary Institute in Poland and at the Faculty of Philology in Skopje. He received his PhD from the Institute of Political Science at the University of Vroclavsk in Poland. He worked as a journalist for the newspapers “Vecher” and “Nova Makedonija”. He also worked for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and was the first Ambassador of the Republic of Macedonia to the Republic of Poland. He has been a member of MWA since 1989. Dr. Nakovksi has authored numerous articles published in Macedonian periodicals as well as a number of books including the books “Postela za Chemernite” (A Bed for the Sorrowful” (novel, 1985), “Makedonski Detsa vo Polska 1948-1968” (Macedonian children in Poland 1948-1968) (doctoral thesis), “I Kamenot e zemija” (And the Stone is Soil) (novel, 1988), “Golemata Udolnitsa” (The Great Decline) (novel, 2003) and “Golemata Izmama” (The Great Lie) (novel, 2007). Dr. Nakovksi has translated and published over 40 literary works and many songs and stories from Polish to Macedonian written by Macedonian authors in the Polish language. He is a recipient of the “Golden pen” and “Kiril Pejcinovic” (translation of opus) awards (awards for Polish authors). He was also awarded the Gold Medal of Merit for Polish Culture and the Gold Medal of Command.