"It could be that all existence is a pointless joke,but it is not in fact possible to live one's everyday life as if this were so." (Christopher Hitchens in Hitch 22)
Readers sometimes develop very close relationship with authors.Most never meet in person. Yet it often seems so real, so intense -and almost always unilateral.In the past we usually got to know the writing first, then we may have decided to search for the persona behind the work.
Today's multimedia platforms provide us with several encounters. I have "met" Christopher Hitchens on radio first, then on TV and then started to look for his writings.
I have started reading Hitch 22, his memoirs, in the middle of my chemotherapy last summer, and very shortly after, on the eve of his book tour for Hitch 22 he told the world about his cancer. A fellow sufferer, loved and revered by many, despised by some for his views on religion and God.
Word got to him and he was asked in public whether he'd mind if people would pray for his recovery. While he was obviously touched by these gestures, he doubted whether prayer would help.
That was what most of us could do for him.
Reading Hitch 22 during my illness last year, while watching for any news about him brought him intimately close to me. His last contribution for Vanity Fair, an article to appear, ironically in the January next issue was particularly personal to me, as I have gone through some of the procedures at MD Anderson in Houston just a year before. As he said often, he was in stage 4 of his cancer, there not being a stage 5.
Perhaps prayer.
But Mr.Hitchens missed the point of prayer. It helped us in our impotence
to do something, anything for him. And for ourselves, in our pain and concern, lest our existence is a pointless joke.
Wednesday 21 December 2011
Thursday 15 December 2011
Ch.13 Getting a job, tobacco picking in Southern Ontario
On the tobacco farm, 1958 August.
By the summer, the news spread in the immigrant community that in the south part of Ontario there are huge tobacco fields, whose harvest in late summer could present a major new source of income. The terribly hard job of tobacco picking lasts for 4-6 weeks but the pay is exceptional, too.
The tobacco farmers were, for the most part, former Hungarian land cultivators, peasants who came around the turn of the century and were particularly successful growing tobacco in Canada, mostly situated in the area of Tillsonburg and Delhi, Ontario.
The three friends had given up their secure but poor paying, bleak prospect jobs and traveled to the tobacco farms area. Here, in one of the small town’s main square an informal “recruiting” center was set up on a given Saturday morning. It was a real market place for human beings! The local farmers had kept on coming and after an intensive scrutiny, where the judgment had to be made at what the naked eye saw from a physical point of view and after a brief bargaining, which was easy as almost everyone spoke Hungarian, for the daily stipend, the hiring was done.
The farmer wanted only their first names and within minutes they were on the back of a pickup truck speeding to one of the many farms in the area.
Their quarters were prepared in a part of the huge barn, furnished with simple wooden furniture and hay filled mattresses on iron beds. Shortly they were called to dinner which was served on long, covered tables, under huge chestnut trees in the farmer’s courtyard. The “gang” as they were now called consisted of 6 young men. During their short Canadian stay they have never experienced such a generous feast, vying with such a wedding feast that they had occasionally seen in the old country. Any delicacy that could be found and prepared by a well to do farmer in rural Canada with several experienced women chefs and that was steaming on the long table. The gang that to this point hadn’t worked a single hour made a valiant effort to be up to snuff and had achieved an appreciable success putting away most of the food. Tastes and aromas, reminiscent of Hungary came to be savored, almost to the point of shedding a tear or two, after long months in refugees camps and since over a year, in simple circumstances. The son of the farmer had sat with them, too, towards the end of the feast. Michael had a thick accent speaking Hungarian, he was Canadian born, but still managed to detail what was expected of the fresh farm hands.
The start of the tobacco picking season is always determined by the ripening of the so called sandy leaves, near the ground. That year the start happened to be on a Sunday. Only the sandy leaves near the ground can be picked off the plant. As the higher leaves continue ripening, the pickers move slowly higher. During the harvest there are only workdays, without any breaks, except for steady rain. So next day the wake up will be at 5 am, breakfast starts at half past five, so they are on the fields some kilometers away by 7am.
“ But in a few days the picked tobacco will be tied in bunches and placed on long sticks by the women, then wake up will be at 3 am so the tobacco laden sticks can be placed in the huge kiln-houses, for drying” continued Michael.
They didn’t really understand all that, but after the sumptuous dinner and the brief outline as to what will follow in the next few days, they knew that there would be a great need for very rich and nourishing food to cope with work demands.
Their first night on the tobacco farm, near the peaceful, ruminating farm animals, with billions of shiny stars in the August sky could not be spoiled even by the prospect of the early morning call. So close to nature, in such a quiet and peaceful place was such a change for these young men, after months of rather crowded refugee camps and then very Spartan basic city life after their arrival in Canada.
Following the generous dinner the night before, their breakfast was equally fitting and several farm matrons were asking them, one by one, whether they would like omelets from 4 or 6 eggs, with bacon, ham and cheese. By then the gang was getting just a little suspicious of all this attention and generosity ! Shortly after breakfast they hopped up on the cart, pulled by a massive tractor and soon they arrived on the tobacco field. Each green tobacco line spread for up to a kilometer in length, as far as the eye could see.
Tobacco field, Tillsonburg, Canada 1958
Michael had immediately occupied the first row in the field, bent to the ground and with a half circle of his right arm, he tore off the leaves of the tobacco plant. Then, still bent over, he stepped up to the next plant. Then the next and the next…
“You see, only the sandy leaves, the lowest ones you are allowed tear off…” he said looking at their faces for understanding, “…then as they ripen we keep on moving up on the plant. By the end of the season, it will be much less demanding on your backs…” he promised. It seemed simple and logical for these young men, reared in the city.
The six tobacco pickers had occupied their rows and began to work.
Behind them, a docile and “experienced” horse was pulling a wooden sled between the rows into which the collected, “sandy”, tobacco leaves from under their left armpits were carefully placed.
“Don’t break the leaves!” cautioned Michael.
They did not have to advance more than the picked sandy leaves of 10 tobacco plants, so that it can be stated that: they mastered tobacco picking. However, the continually bent backs had started to complain at each next plant, with each step they took towards these plants. After only a half an hour, while continually bending almost to the ground, the pickers believed they could not go on.
But Michael was there and by example he was jumping into one or another’s row, helping out, until somehow, miraculously they reached the end of their first row! At that point the six boys had just fallen to the ground, could only moan from the excruciating pain coming from their backs. Fresh water was brought by Michael and after a short rest they have started a new row.
Every step from now on was a painful maneuver, but goading each other on, the young and tenacious bodies, somehow, with many rest stops they lasted until noon, when Michael, literally picked them up one by one, and brought them back to the farmhouse. Again, a rich table was set up for them under the chestnut trees, but other than a few spoonfuls of soup, they preferred just to lie in the shade. After an hour’s rest, back to the cart and out to the fields. This struggle just to survive the day went on until 5 PM on their first day.
By the time they were back at the farm, they only had strength to wash up from the dust, sweat and the sticky sap from the broken tobacco stems, which dried and matted on their hairy arms, so much so that it simply could not be washed off by soap and water. Frankly, they could not care less about it.
Every part of their body was aching, especially their thighs and backs, so much, that none of them showed up for the evening meal. Within a short time, the whole gang was in deep slumber, awaking only for the pain caused by turning in their sleep.
If the unusual work seemed difficult and caused them pain on the first day, then the stiffness on awakening the following morning surpassed any such experience in their lives. One of the six had politely taken his leave that very morning, and the owner paid him fairly for his one day of work. The other five, overcoming the terrible pain, stubbornly began their second day of tobacco picking. They were still at the “sandy leaves” or sand lugs, as they were called by the farmer and they were still having the greatest pains with each step forward. They were encouraging each other, singing even, and also cursing all those who smoked, blaming them for this inhuman, bestial work! Where did the effort come from after each step taken forward with a back bent almost to the level of the ground, row after tobacco row? They could not explain even today perhaps.
They had overcome the greatest physical challenge of their lives then, in the first days of the tobacco leaves’ harvest. After the second Hungarian had given up and left on the third day, the rest had now stayed just out of spite and sheer bravado. In the meantime Michael had found three new pickers in the nearby town who were experienced, veteran farm hands who joined them and did their job without a word of complaint.
And as the bodies of the newly graduated farmhands adjusted to the physical demands, the muscle cramps abated and the task seemed easier. The veterans educated them on how they should shave their arms so that the sticky, gummy sap of the tobacco plant would not mat the hair on their arms.
Within days the muscles had adjusted, the body accepted and bore the daily punishment, the appetite returned. But by then the women had tied all the picked leaves on long, wooden stick which had to be racked in long, even lines in special places, called kiln- houses to dry. This was done on most mornings when they got up at 3am and emptied and refilled these kiln houses.
Tobacco drying kiln-houses, Tillsonburg,Ont.1958
These simple, wooden, under-roof drying places, with heating inside, were constructed inside of vertical and horizontal beams, resembled more monkey cages than anything else. They had no stairs, ladders inside, while two stories high, the lads, balancing on the horizontal beams, like monkeys handed each other the tobacco laden stick which were placed 3-4 feet apart on the beams, right up to the roof. Only the bravest dared to climb up to the top, one bad move could have resulted in serious injury. On most days the morning program from 3am to 6am was this acrobatic exercise, followed by a generous breakfast and out to the fields. If there was no rain they worked 7 days a week. Their wage was 25 dollars a day, with room and board included, as much as Peter’s first weekly stipend in Quebec City!
As the tobacco was ripening, so did “ease” their daily effort, since the top leaves could now be picked without bending over. It was life’s irony that the most difficult days of tobacco picking happened to be the very first days on the job.
Peter and the gang after several weeks in the country of the August summer in South Ontario were the color of chocolate, muscular and in top physical shape, had graduated possibly from the greatest physical challenge of their lives.
After a “tobacco picking ” session…
At the end of the harvest the Hungarian tobacco grower was satisfied with the boys’ work and paid them all in cash. Those who had survived the first days on the job had to be justifiably happy; their wage seemed like a small fortune. They had heard the stories about those who after many weeks of hard toil wagered all the money in horse races within hours, maybe the very day they were paid. But they had spent days deciding what to do with the money. It seemed they could always find work to look after their daily existence, but the one thing they thought was missing in their lives was the almighty automobile, which stood between happiness (girls) and frustration. Since they could not buy a reasonable car individually, even with the small “fortune” they owned, a few hundred dollars, pulling their money would get them a good used car.
On returning to Ottawa they found a car dealer who would sell them a 1954 Ford Meteor auto. The 4 year old car was in good shape and they believed the dealer that this exceptional automobile was owned by a retired lady school teacher. Since only one had a driver’s license, he taught the other two to drive.
The real purpose of the car purchase was their firm belief that the way to meet local girls was via the ownership of 4 wheels. Of course, the three way ownership resulted in alternating the days or evenings for usage. Of course, the logistics never worked out and the boys remained, for the most part, without significant relationships.
The object of their desire and the owners in their “ Sunday” best
Among the immigrants were many gloomy people who did not know, or realized perhaps only after many years, the opportunities of their new country. Which host country could have made it possible for immigrants capable only of manual labor, without language or professional skills, within a year of their arrival, to have an acceptable standard of living, that a working family could even afford the ultimate status symbol in the fifties, the purchase of a reasonable car?
The wealth from tobacco picking was not all invested in the car purchase, so Peter could realize his long held dream of owning a set of drums. His friend, Andy played on both the piano and saxophone, so their plan was to form a small band, maybe with a third countryman of theirs. However, the “drummer” was only an enthusiastic dreamer since he had no musical training whatsoever. He had practiced diligently in the basement of their flat, especially when the landlady was not at home, since she had many misgivings about the drums when they have arrived, with reason.
The student-drummer, in the basement , Ottawa, 1958
Towards the end of the fifties, when rock and roll was on its peak, light jazz music was not really a desired product. The small and intimate piano bars they had known back in Hungary were not really in vogue in those days. All they could achieve on the field of light music was the occasional Sunday afternoon entertaining the patients in old age homes, gratis.
Perley Hospital, (senior citizens’ home) Ottawa, 1958
By the summer, the news spread in the immigrant community that in the south part of Ontario there are huge tobacco fields, whose harvest in late summer could present a major new source of income. The terribly hard job of tobacco picking lasts for 4-6 weeks but the pay is exceptional, too.
The tobacco farmers were, for the most part, former Hungarian land cultivators, peasants who came around the turn of the century and were particularly successful growing tobacco in Canada, mostly situated in the area of Tillsonburg and Delhi, Ontario.
The three friends had given up their secure but poor paying, bleak prospect jobs and traveled to the tobacco farms area. Here, in one of the small town’s main square an informal “recruiting” center was set up on a given Saturday morning. It was a real market place for human beings! The local farmers had kept on coming and after an intensive scrutiny, where the judgment had to be made at what the naked eye saw from a physical point of view and after a brief bargaining, which was easy as almost everyone spoke Hungarian, for the daily stipend, the hiring was done.
The farmer wanted only their first names and within minutes they were on the back of a pickup truck speeding to one of the many farms in the area.
Their quarters were prepared in a part of the huge barn, furnished with simple wooden furniture and hay filled mattresses on iron beds. Shortly they were called to dinner which was served on long, covered tables, under huge chestnut trees in the farmer’s courtyard. The “gang” as they were now called consisted of 6 young men. During their short Canadian stay they have never experienced such a generous feast, vying with such a wedding feast that they had occasionally seen in the old country. Any delicacy that could be found and prepared by a well to do farmer in rural Canada with several experienced women chefs and that was steaming on the long table. The gang that to this point hadn’t worked a single hour made a valiant effort to be up to snuff and had achieved an appreciable success putting away most of the food. Tastes and aromas, reminiscent of Hungary came to be savored, almost to the point of shedding a tear or two, after long months in refugees camps and since over a year, in simple circumstances. The son of the farmer had sat with them, too, towards the end of the feast. Michael had a thick accent speaking Hungarian, he was Canadian born, but still managed to detail what was expected of the fresh farm hands.
The start of the tobacco picking season is always determined by the ripening of the so called sandy leaves, near the ground. That year the start happened to be on a Sunday. Only the sandy leaves near the ground can be picked off the plant. As the higher leaves continue ripening, the pickers move slowly higher. During the harvest there are only workdays, without any breaks, except for steady rain. So next day the wake up will be at 5 am, breakfast starts at half past five, so they are on the fields some kilometers away by 7am.
“ But in a few days the picked tobacco will be tied in bunches and placed on long sticks by the women, then wake up will be at 3 am so the tobacco laden sticks can be placed in the huge kiln-houses, for drying” continued Michael.
They didn’t really understand all that, but after the sumptuous dinner and the brief outline as to what will follow in the next few days, they knew that there would be a great need for very rich and nourishing food to cope with work demands.
Their first night on the tobacco farm, near the peaceful, ruminating farm animals, with billions of shiny stars in the August sky could not be spoiled even by the prospect of the early morning call. So close to nature, in such a quiet and peaceful place was such a change for these young men, after months of rather crowded refugee camps and then very Spartan basic city life after their arrival in Canada.
Following the generous dinner the night before, their breakfast was equally fitting and several farm matrons were asking them, one by one, whether they would like omelets from 4 or 6 eggs, with bacon, ham and cheese. By then the gang was getting just a little suspicious of all this attention and generosity ! Shortly after breakfast they hopped up on the cart, pulled by a massive tractor and soon they arrived on the tobacco field. Each green tobacco line spread for up to a kilometer in length, as far as the eye could see.
Tobacco field, Tillsonburg, Canada 1958
Michael had immediately occupied the first row in the field, bent to the ground and with a half circle of his right arm, he tore off the leaves of the tobacco plant. Then, still bent over, he stepped up to the next plant. Then the next and the next…
“You see, only the sandy leaves, the lowest ones you are allowed tear off…” he said looking at their faces for understanding, “…then as they ripen we keep on moving up on the plant. By the end of the season, it will be much less demanding on your backs…” he promised. It seemed simple and logical for these young men, reared in the city.
The six tobacco pickers had occupied their rows and began to work.
Behind them, a docile and “experienced” horse was pulling a wooden sled between the rows into which the collected, “sandy”, tobacco leaves from under their left armpits were carefully placed.
“Don’t break the leaves!” cautioned Michael.
They did not have to advance more than the picked sandy leaves of 10 tobacco plants, so that it can be stated that: they mastered tobacco picking. However, the continually bent backs had started to complain at each next plant, with each step they took towards these plants. After only a half an hour, while continually bending almost to the ground, the pickers believed they could not go on.
But Michael was there and by example he was jumping into one or another’s row, helping out, until somehow, miraculously they reached the end of their first row! At that point the six boys had just fallen to the ground, could only moan from the excruciating pain coming from their backs. Fresh water was brought by Michael and after a short rest they have started a new row.
Every step from now on was a painful maneuver, but goading each other on, the young and tenacious bodies, somehow, with many rest stops they lasted until noon, when Michael, literally picked them up one by one, and brought them back to the farmhouse. Again, a rich table was set up for them under the chestnut trees, but other than a few spoonfuls of soup, they preferred just to lie in the shade. After an hour’s rest, back to the cart and out to the fields. This struggle just to survive the day went on until 5 PM on their first day.
By the time they were back at the farm, they only had strength to wash up from the dust, sweat and the sticky sap from the broken tobacco stems, which dried and matted on their hairy arms, so much so that it simply could not be washed off by soap and water. Frankly, they could not care less about it.
Every part of their body was aching, especially their thighs and backs, so much, that none of them showed up for the evening meal. Within a short time, the whole gang was in deep slumber, awaking only for the pain caused by turning in their sleep.
If the unusual work seemed difficult and caused them pain on the first day, then the stiffness on awakening the following morning surpassed any such experience in their lives. One of the six had politely taken his leave that very morning, and the owner paid him fairly for his one day of work. The other five, overcoming the terrible pain, stubbornly began their second day of tobacco picking. They were still at the “sandy leaves” or sand lugs, as they were called by the farmer and they were still having the greatest pains with each step forward. They were encouraging each other, singing even, and also cursing all those who smoked, blaming them for this inhuman, bestial work! Where did the effort come from after each step taken forward with a back bent almost to the level of the ground, row after tobacco row? They could not explain even today perhaps.
They had overcome the greatest physical challenge of their lives then, in the first days of the tobacco leaves’ harvest. After the second Hungarian had given up and left on the third day, the rest had now stayed just out of spite and sheer bravado. In the meantime Michael had found three new pickers in the nearby town who were experienced, veteran farm hands who joined them and did their job without a word of complaint.
And as the bodies of the newly graduated farmhands adjusted to the physical demands, the muscle cramps abated and the task seemed easier. The veterans educated them on how they should shave their arms so that the sticky, gummy sap of the tobacco plant would not mat the hair on their arms.
Within days the muscles had adjusted, the body accepted and bore the daily punishment, the appetite returned. But by then the women had tied all the picked leaves on long, wooden stick which had to be racked in long, even lines in special places, called kiln- houses to dry. This was done on most mornings when they got up at 3am and emptied and refilled these kiln houses.
Tobacco drying kiln-houses, Tillsonburg,Ont.1958
These simple, wooden, under-roof drying places, with heating inside, were constructed inside of vertical and horizontal beams, resembled more monkey cages than anything else. They had no stairs, ladders inside, while two stories high, the lads, balancing on the horizontal beams, like monkeys handed each other the tobacco laden stick which were placed 3-4 feet apart on the beams, right up to the roof. Only the bravest dared to climb up to the top, one bad move could have resulted in serious injury. On most days the morning program from 3am to 6am was this acrobatic exercise, followed by a generous breakfast and out to the fields. If there was no rain they worked 7 days a week. Their wage was 25 dollars a day, with room and board included, as much as Peter’s first weekly stipend in Quebec City!
As the tobacco was ripening, so did “ease” their daily effort, since the top leaves could now be picked without bending over. It was life’s irony that the most difficult days of tobacco picking happened to be the very first days on the job.
Peter and the gang after several weeks in the country of the August summer in South Ontario were the color of chocolate, muscular and in top physical shape, had graduated possibly from the greatest physical challenge of their lives.
After a “tobacco picking ” session…
At the end of the harvest the Hungarian tobacco grower was satisfied with the boys’ work and paid them all in cash. Those who had survived the first days on the job had to be justifiably happy; their wage seemed like a small fortune. They had heard the stories about those who after many weeks of hard toil wagered all the money in horse races within hours, maybe the very day they were paid. But they had spent days deciding what to do with the money. It seemed they could always find work to look after their daily existence, but the one thing they thought was missing in their lives was the almighty automobile, which stood between happiness (girls) and frustration. Since they could not buy a reasonable car individually, even with the small “fortune” they owned, a few hundred dollars, pulling their money would get them a good used car.
On returning to Ottawa they found a car dealer who would sell them a 1954 Ford Meteor auto. The 4 year old car was in good shape and they believed the dealer that this exceptional automobile was owned by a retired lady school teacher. Since only one had a driver’s license, he taught the other two to drive.
The real purpose of the car purchase was their firm belief that the way to meet local girls was via the ownership of 4 wheels. Of course, the three way ownership resulted in alternating the days or evenings for usage. Of course, the logistics never worked out and the boys remained, for the most part, without significant relationships.
The object of their desire and the owners in their “ Sunday” best
Among the immigrants were many gloomy people who did not know, or realized perhaps only after many years, the opportunities of their new country. Which host country could have made it possible for immigrants capable only of manual labor, without language or professional skills, within a year of their arrival, to have an acceptable standard of living, that a working family could even afford the ultimate status symbol in the fifties, the purchase of a reasonable car?
The wealth from tobacco picking was not all invested in the car purchase, so Peter could realize his long held dream of owning a set of drums. His friend, Andy played on both the piano and saxophone, so their plan was to form a small band, maybe with a third countryman of theirs. However, the “drummer” was only an enthusiastic dreamer since he had no musical training whatsoever. He had practiced diligently in the basement of their flat, especially when the landlady was not at home, since she had many misgivings about the drums when they have arrived, with reason.
The student-drummer, in the basement , Ottawa, 1958
Towards the end of the fifties, when rock and roll was on its peak, light jazz music was not really a desired product. The small and intimate piano bars they had known back in Hungary were not really in vogue in those days. All they could achieve on the field of light music was the occasional Sunday afternoon entertaining the patients in old age homes, gratis.
Perley Hospital, (senior citizens’ home) Ottawa, 1958
Tuesday 13 December 2011
http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2012/01/hitchens-201201
If you have been wandering about how Christopher Hitchens is getting on in his fight against disease, you will get it here "up close and personal."
Wednesday 14 September 2011
US military bloggers respond to Paul Krugman's shameful blog.
Paul Krugman, of the NYTIMES, published a truly gutless piece in his blog, titled 'The Shameful Years' (those post-9/11), slandering practically all of the US military. Now the many bloggers from the US military respond, like this one: www.unknownsoldiersblog.com
Wednesday 24 August 2011
Ch.12 - May I have the next dance? Learning dance etiquette in the era of rock and roll.
Even Christmas gifts were given to each employee, a British Columbia commemorative silver dollar, the province where he was originally to be sent from the boat!
The first winter was approaching its end and Peter and his friends, young men in their most virile youth, when they had dared to entertain thoughts of making new friends, which really meant “going out” with girls.
He had a steady job, with a paycheck every two weeks that allowed him to purchase, on a 12 month credit arrangement, a brand new dark blue suit, white shirt and tie. He was happy to take home the new treasures, his first significant purchases in the new world. The new immigrants’ grapevine had suggested that the best place to meet girls is the Saturday nights dances at the local YMCA. The last dance he could recall was in his high school, oh so long ago, on another continent, in a far away land, and even farther epoch. Then the youth was going to these dances in a rather old fashioned way, according to old traditions, both in clothing and behavior. The boys in festive, dark suits, shirt and tie, and cute little dress the girls. Hungary and the other Eastern European countries were carefully shielded from the influences of the “evil” capitalist states in the West, including individual expression and style.
While in the Ottawa YMCA the young guys were comfortably rocking in their jeans and shirts, at home boys of the same age were sweating in their heavy suits and ties.
Peter and his friends were just amazed when a guy would just sidle up to a girl and casually take her by the hand and within seconds they would be furiously jiving away, a form of dance totally unknown to these immigrant boys. However, they recalled the English Dictionaries and language books, written decades before, how these were emphatically teaching the task to be performed:
“We approach the chosen lady, and with slight bow and polite demeanor, we “ask her for a dance “in a clear voice and appropriate manner, thusly: May I please?”- repeated to himself Peter, at least for the tenth time, being very careful of his accent and pronunciation, being very grateful that the verbal plea did not have a single “r” in it, which had been the downfall of so many foreigners, the sure give-away that the speaker is from “some other country”. In the best of cases one was to be a French Canadian, in the worst the foreigner was from some unknown land who was displaced due to the war: a DP!!
The friends were already nervous on this first daredevil move towards “fitting” into society, that is the company of young men and women, due to their accented English, the lack of their dance repertoire caused even more worry. An even more obvious and ominous problem was, that did not even occur to them at first, their clothing was totally out of place and painfully unique in a 1958 YMCA dance hall.
One can imagine what made-for-the-stage appearance was created by the three young immigrants, on the very peak of rock and roll, in their dark blue suits and ties, stiff and obviously awkward, when they entered at opening time, just after 8 PM in the dancehall.
Other than a couple of dozen young ladies and a few chaperons there were no others in the hall, as it turned out the local boys had started wondering in, nonchalantly little later. This time period gave an excellent chance to the girls and their mothers to observe and scrutinize the three funeral directors, standing in a corner and talking with each other. Even though they have felt uneasy at the beginning, over time they have ceased to remain the object of curiosity, while the dancing was starting to liven up. It was entirely certain to all the ladies present that none of them could possibly become the victim of any attempted terror action, emanating from either one of the other strange looking characters.
Finally it was Peter that was able to overcome the inertia they all felt, spiced up by his ever present compulsion to prove himself. He felt confident enough, so he thought, that after a thorough summing up the situation, he had ascertained by quick looks over and over that the chosen lady had absolutely no chance of being asked for a dance by any self respecting young man that evening, our hero had confidently strode up to the lonely wallflower and said:
“May I please?” sounded the expression , mainly to be found in the vocabularies of those studying British literature, but not anywhere in Canada in 1958, in the Northern region of the New World.
Perhaps it was his determined steps, the resolute expression on his face, maybe the lips that were so stubbornly resistant to full opening, that would allow the oft repeated expression to come out properly, but if not any of these then the unimaginable fact, that one of these Mars inhabitants had zeroed in on her of all people, who had not even danced once that evening, and as a result of this impertinence may not dance at all, that was more than bearable!
Since she did not believe her ears, or she did not understand the antiquated expression, struggling between anger and incredulity, she could only hiss through her teeth:
“What?”
Even though Peter had guessed that there was not much chance for the desired dance, in his last desperate moment he had to attempt just once more the well practiced phrase.
Failing to give it one more try, when his two friends have not even made their first move with which to take the first steps to fit into Canadian society, who were so attentively watching their heroic friend and those sitting around the chosen lady watching the unfolding drama, it was simply not possible.
The chance of failing, again, had flashed in his mind for a moment, but the hopes and investments that they have made to get that far, the plans made in the basement flat, the clothing they have bought were stronger. Now going for broke just then, so that the lonely nights and weekends, the movies houses with the 3 films in one show they have frequented, would again fill their free time?
Bowing just ever so deeper than before, and with a shade less volume in his voice, and a little more humility in his eye, Peter had repeated the plea:
“May I please?” and now he had nodded pointedly towards the dance floor, so that the plea would be well understood by this beauty.
It seemed like eternity until this insulted lady had found her faculties and with the look of the coldest Canadian winter, the indifference of the Canadian tundra, and the Brit colonials’ politeness, she uttered only:
“No,thanks!”
By then the sweat beads had pearled up on his face as he was creeping back to the safe sanctuary of his friends. They all knew that much more had transpired here than simply a gal’s refusal to dance on a particular evening. All reverie had become insignificant behind the more than one year that was spent away from their homes, and all things familiar. While up to now the effort was to establish a modicum of existence, this mostly restrained the testing of the boys’ feelings. Now they had to admit that the much desired melting into Canadian society and the potential rewards that this would bring will not happen for some time. The oddly dressed and accented strangers, without their own “cars”, will not easily gain the graces of young, local women.
The first winter was approaching its end and Peter and his friends, young men in their most virile youth, when they had dared to entertain thoughts of making new friends, which really meant “going out” with girls.
He had a steady job, with a paycheck every two weeks that allowed him to purchase, on a 12 month credit arrangement, a brand new dark blue suit, white shirt and tie. He was happy to take home the new treasures, his first significant purchases in the new world. The new immigrants’ grapevine had suggested that the best place to meet girls is the Saturday nights dances at the local YMCA. The last dance he could recall was in his high school, oh so long ago, on another continent, in a far away land, and even farther epoch. Then the youth was going to these dances in a rather old fashioned way, according to old traditions, both in clothing and behavior. The boys in festive, dark suits, shirt and tie, and cute little dress the girls. Hungary and the other Eastern European countries were carefully shielded from the influences of the “evil” capitalist states in the West, including individual expression and style.
While in the Ottawa YMCA the young guys were comfortably rocking in their jeans and shirts, at home boys of the same age were sweating in their heavy suits and ties.
Peter and his friends were just amazed when a guy would just sidle up to a girl and casually take her by the hand and within seconds they would be furiously jiving away, a form of dance totally unknown to these immigrant boys. However, they recalled the English Dictionaries and language books, written decades before, how these were emphatically teaching the task to be performed:
“We approach the chosen lady, and with slight bow and polite demeanor, we “ask her for a dance “in a clear voice and appropriate manner, thusly: May I please?”- repeated to himself Peter, at least for the tenth time, being very careful of his accent and pronunciation, being very grateful that the verbal plea did not have a single “r” in it, which had been the downfall of so many foreigners, the sure give-away that the speaker is from “some other country”. In the best of cases one was to be a French Canadian, in the worst the foreigner was from some unknown land who was displaced due to the war: a DP!!
The friends were already nervous on this first daredevil move towards “fitting” into society, that is the company of young men and women, due to their accented English, the lack of their dance repertoire caused even more worry. An even more obvious and ominous problem was, that did not even occur to them at first, their clothing was totally out of place and painfully unique in a 1958 YMCA dance hall.
One can imagine what made-for-the-stage appearance was created by the three young immigrants, on the very peak of rock and roll, in their dark blue suits and ties, stiff and obviously awkward, when they entered at opening time, just after 8 PM in the dancehall.
Other than a couple of dozen young ladies and a few chaperons there were no others in the hall, as it turned out the local boys had started wondering in, nonchalantly little later. This time period gave an excellent chance to the girls and their mothers to observe and scrutinize the three funeral directors, standing in a corner and talking with each other. Even though they have felt uneasy at the beginning, over time they have ceased to remain the object of curiosity, while the dancing was starting to liven up. It was entirely certain to all the ladies present that none of them could possibly become the victim of any attempted terror action, emanating from either one of the other strange looking characters.
Finally it was Peter that was able to overcome the inertia they all felt, spiced up by his ever present compulsion to prove himself. He felt confident enough, so he thought, that after a thorough summing up the situation, he had ascertained by quick looks over and over that the chosen lady had absolutely no chance of being asked for a dance by any self respecting young man that evening, our hero had confidently strode up to the lonely wallflower and said:
“May I please?” sounded the expression , mainly to be found in the vocabularies of those studying British literature, but not anywhere in Canada in 1958, in the Northern region of the New World.
Perhaps it was his determined steps, the resolute expression on his face, maybe the lips that were so stubbornly resistant to full opening, that would allow the oft repeated expression to come out properly, but if not any of these then the unimaginable fact, that one of these Mars inhabitants had zeroed in on her of all people, who had not even danced once that evening, and as a result of this impertinence may not dance at all, that was more than bearable!
Since she did not believe her ears, or she did not understand the antiquated expression, struggling between anger and incredulity, she could only hiss through her teeth:
“What?”
Even though Peter had guessed that there was not much chance for the desired dance, in his last desperate moment he had to attempt just once more the well practiced phrase.
Failing to give it one more try, when his two friends have not even made their first move with which to take the first steps to fit into Canadian society, who were so attentively watching their heroic friend and those sitting around the chosen lady watching the unfolding drama, it was simply not possible.
The chance of failing, again, had flashed in his mind for a moment, but the hopes and investments that they have made to get that far, the plans made in the basement flat, the clothing they have bought were stronger. Now going for broke just then, so that the lonely nights and weekends, the movies houses with the 3 films in one show they have frequented, would again fill their free time?
Bowing just ever so deeper than before, and with a shade less volume in his voice, and a little more humility in his eye, Peter had repeated the plea:
“May I please?” and now he had nodded pointedly towards the dance floor, so that the plea would be well understood by this beauty.
It seemed like eternity until this insulted lady had found her faculties and with the look of the coldest Canadian winter, the indifference of the Canadian tundra, and the Brit colonials’ politeness, she uttered only:
“No,thanks!”
By then the sweat beads had pearled up on his face as he was creeping back to the safe sanctuary of his friends. They all knew that much more had transpired here than simply a gal’s refusal to dance on a particular evening. All reverie had become insignificant behind the more than one year that was spent away from their homes, and all things familiar. While up to now the effort was to establish a modicum of existence, this mostly restrained the testing of the boys’ feelings. Now they had to admit that the much desired melting into Canadian society and the potential rewards that this would bring will not happen for some time. The oddly dressed and accented strangers, without their own “cars”, will not easily gain the graces of young, local women.
Sunday 24 July 2011
Michael Medved interviews Congressman McDermott
The Michael Medved Radio Show, July 21,2011.Hour 3.
If you want to have an insight into the mind of a liberal democrat regarding the debt limit debate,this is just the ticket.All happened during the Michael Medved Radio Show on July 21, 2011.
This is the congressman who visited and courted Sadam Hussein,as the US was pressuring the dictator to come clean aboout his intentions and plans to acquire/build WMD's.
During this interview, McDermott obfuscates, spins and lies about every single issue, question put to him. Medved tried, very diplomatically,to get a direct answer from him several times, never succeeded. McDermott, trying to play smart, though, made a fool of himself, again and again.
Question: would he approve budget reductions without tax increases?
Answer: (after a long,embarrassing silence)he threw another question back at Medved, never answering the original question put to him.
According to McDermott, we have an impasse about the debt limit increase, becasue we have lost our ability to 'compromise'. For 40 years , says he, there was compromise in the US Congress. Right, and the US has ended up with 14 trillions of debt. That is "compromise" for a liberal democrat.
When a listener had phoned in and asked this incredibly slippery "congressman", which part of the cut,cap and balance he didn't agree with (as he voted NO with 97 Dems on the motion), again, after long silence he tried to give a lecture about how he would never accept the possibility of not 'ever' raising taxes, for example, in case of war. When Medved immediately reminded him that the bill from congress (which Medved did read, but apparently McDermott didn't)specifically ALLOWED tax increase by a simple MAJORITY in congress in case of war, and any OTHER tax increase where 2/3 of congress deemed necessary, he had no answer, ignored the remark. Then immediately attacked Mitch McConnell for 'filibustering' every move by the majority dems in the senate.
What a dishonest, transparently fibbing windbag!
Michael Medved remained politely, maybe too politely affable during this sad spectacle of a liberal democrat, who was dodging all questions,exhibiting a callous disregard for any discourse on the issues.
And McDermott dared to utter the word 'compromise'...
If you want to have an insight into the mind of a liberal democrat regarding the debt limit debate,this is just the ticket.All happened during the Michael Medved Radio Show on July 21, 2011.
This is the congressman who visited and courted Sadam Hussein,as the US was pressuring the dictator to come clean aboout his intentions and plans to acquire/build WMD's.
During this interview, McDermott obfuscates, spins and lies about every single issue, question put to him. Medved tried, very diplomatically,to get a direct answer from him several times, never succeeded. McDermott, trying to play smart, though, made a fool of himself, again and again.
Question: would he approve budget reductions without tax increases?
Answer: (after a long,embarrassing silence)he threw another question back at Medved, never answering the original question put to him.
According to McDermott, we have an impasse about the debt limit increase, becasue we have lost our ability to 'compromise'. For 40 years , says he, there was compromise in the US Congress. Right, and the US has ended up with 14 trillions of debt. That is "compromise" for a liberal democrat.
When a listener had phoned in and asked this incredibly slippery "congressman", which part of the cut,cap and balance he didn't agree with (as he voted NO with 97 Dems on the motion), again, after long silence he tried to give a lecture about how he would never accept the possibility of not 'ever' raising taxes, for example, in case of war. When Medved immediately reminded him that the bill from congress (which Medved did read, but apparently McDermott didn't)specifically ALLOWED tax increase by a simple MAJORITY in congress in case of war, and any OTHER tax increase where 2/3 of congress deemed necessary, he had no answer, ignored the remark. Then immediately attacked Mitch McConnell for 'filibustering' every move by the majority dems in the senate.
What a dishonest, transparently fibbing windbag!
Michael Medved remained politely, maybe too politely affable during this sad spectacle of a liberal democrat, who was dodging all questions,exhibiting a callous disregard for any discourse on the issues.
And McDermott dared to utter the word 'compromise'...
Saturday 23 July 2011
Ch.11 Arriving in Ottawa-assimilating into society.
Ottawa City.
At the railway station he confidently asked for a ticket to „Ottawa”, but it was a struggle for the proper pronunciation of the word. „AA- TOVA” repeated the unfriendly French Canadian cashier, which was not even close to the Hungarian, that is, phonetically pronounced, word.
The new language, particularly its pronunciation had caused great difficulty for most immigrants. The more sensitive souls were maybe embarrassed, or slightly peeved , but many had reacted aggressively in delicate situations, and for them melding into society had become quite difficult. Their language frustrations have exaggerated the many cultural differences between Europeans and North Americans. Some have rebelled against making advances in their language skills over the most dire necessities. Refused to change their lifestyles, were reluctant to even try new dishes. In the extreme cases some looked down on anything that was not somehow „European” in style, taste or presentation.
From salted butter to the huge , but very weak coffee everything seemed second rate and unacceptable. The accumulated frustrations and the refusal to accept local customs and forms like slowly administered poison was effecting some immigrants. The worst conflicts were between the so called „old Canadians”, immigrants who had already spent some years in the new country and the „new Canadians”, folks who had just arrived.
Like most immigrants in Canada or the USA, in a relatively short time, every diligent and ambitious newcomer had achieved a fairly high standard of living. Thus the „old Canadians”, who had most of the initial difficulties behind them, were justly criticizing the grumbling and impatience of the newcomers about accepting life in society. The misplaced refugees of the second world war who made up the largest part of „old Canadians”, unlike the refugees of the 1956 Revolution, often spent long years in camps until they could get visas and fares paid for by some charitable organization.
However, during the splendid train ride from Quebec to Ottawa, problems of assimilation into Canadian society did not cause any mental anguish to the 19 year old. In a few short weeks, this was his second ambitious undertaking in his new homeland, moving to Ottawa, to be with English speaking natives! He had gotten off the train with high expectations. Since the station was in the heart of the city, he had a great chance to do his first sightseeing having but a small bag all his luggage.
Other than the majestic Parliament buildings , the center was quite a disappointment, it resembled more of a small, but up and coming provincial town than the capitol of an immense country. While passing through Rideau Street there were a few dozen or so people in , what seemed, a large empty store, listening to an intense looking gentleman, with an impressive baritone, obviously making some sort of political pitch. Peter could not have understood a single word but the speech seemed convincing and emphatic that was delivered by the gaunt and straight backed orator.
This was his first, if passive, participation in a free, public and democratic opinion expression. Peter happened to be witnessing a campaign speech preceding the 1957 fall elections, where he had experienced, with awe, the participants’ various and amazing reactions to the statements of John Diefenbaker. There were catcalls, too, amid the enthusiastic applauders, cynical remarks and laughter, people in pairs arguing with each other while the speech was being delivered. All kinds of behavior! Only one thing was missing, not a policeman or secret service man to be seen anywhere.
Not the center of the capitol, not the splendid stores on Rideau Street, not the elegant hotels that grabbed Peter’s attention in these first hours of his arrival in Ottawa.
The unfolding, live democracy , people’s open expression of their likes or dislikes as they have reacted to the politician’s words was what seemed so utterly wonderful!
This is, then, a free country!
He could not have known at that time, that the sympathetic orator was to become Canada’s prime minister that fall, and that several years later he would have two personal meetings with Mr. Diefenbaker. One of those meetings happened in a hotel in Saskatoon, as he was having an early morning breakfast. John Diefenbaker called over from his table, asking to join him if he was alone. The eventual winner of several elections and having been prime minister more than once, was just sitting there without any bodyguards, inviting a total stranger to his table! Then and there he had to tell John Diefenbaker the event from Ottawa in the first hours of his arrival, which deeply touched the former prime minister and warmly shook the „new Canadian’s” hand.
A rooming house, full of Hungarians , was run by the „old Canadian”, Mrs. Mitro, was his new home. The Mitro family had immigrated to Canada even before the war, the children were all born in the new country, but to the family’s merit, they all spoke Hungarian. This was even more appreciated by Peter and his friends when subsequently met other Hungarian families whose Canadian born children often did not speak a word, or very little, of their elder’s native language.
So the parents who managed to teach their Canadian born children their ancestors’ tongue were held in great esteem as it was a very difficult and frustrating task.
The Mitro house gave home to mostly single, young men and it was easier here to wrestle with problems of loneliness and the strange, new ways of society. On the other hand, it was to everyone’s disadvantage to be with Hungarians when the English language demanded daily practice. While in their simple work places like cleaning, dishwashing, construction there was some limited chance to practice English, their free times should have been passed with English speakers. Fortunately, the Hungarian rooming house was only a short stop as he had found new employment immediately, in the Royal Ottawa Sanatorium, quite far from the Mitro house. As an „experienced” dishwasher and general kitchen helper he had started to work in the wing of the ambulatory patients, those recovering from tuberculosis.
The Royal Ottawa Sanatorium, August 1957
He had asked for and received temporary quarters, a room near the power plant of the hospital, which he shared with an older Ukrainian immigrant working in the plant. The man spoke almost zero English, but insisted telling Peter his life story every night, in Ukrainian, when he had found out that Peter knew some Russian from his school back in Hungary.
Fortunately, they only met at night, when under the excuse of fatigue he could escape most of the Ukrainian’s endless monologues.
His work had become much more interesting. The ambulatory patients came to have their meals in the large dining hall, all dressed up, which was portioned out by two immigrant women and served by Peter. The meals had arrived from the main kitchen on steam containers on wheels.
Within days a rather pleasant and enjoyable relationship developed between him and most patients, who appreciated the young man’s effort and enthusiasm. This work had the human touch, encouraged the development of relationships with people, particularly with people on the mend from illness.
He learned, and was encouraged, much to his surprise, to call most of the patients by their first names, regardless of age or sex. It was already difficult to do away with the polite form, an essential element of most languages, and now on top of that he was to call these ladies and gentlemen by their first names like “Jim” or “Mary”. He had kept on trying for a while with the Mr. Jim’s and the Miss Mary’s, but the patients have insisted, with a few exceptions, that he is to call them by their first names, that soon enough he was used to this straight forward, natural form of communication, not well practiced anywhere in Europe.
Back in the camp in Melence he met and befriended a young man from the nearby village to Baja, eventually becoming chess partners. Mike had been sent straight to Ottawa, after landing in Quebec. He had worked at construction awhile, but the extremely cold Ottawa winter had chased him to the much less profitable, but warm work environment, the Sanatorium. That made it possible for the pair to seek and find their own flat, close to their workplace.
They have rented the half basement of a simple Canadian house, right next to the washing machine and not far from the furnace. The “flat” consisted of a large bed, a wooden dresser, and they paid 3 dollars weekly, each. But the rented place was close enough for getting to work on foot and it was spartan but warm. There was entertainment, too, besides work and that was provided by Mrs. Sutherland’s weekly language class, in a classroom of the local secondary school. The workplace and self-study brought some progress in this field, but the difficult English pronunciation made real conversation still difficult. Daily language frustrations were plentiful. When they were convinced that they have made some progress, some incident would happen to take their self-confidence away in the field of the mysteries of English pronunciation.
Like it happened one Sunday afternoon, when Peter caught some little kids of the neighbors peeking through their basement window. Forever ready for any practice opportunity for the use of English and always very grateful when native Canadians were to be engaged in conversation, especially kids who are always sincere and well meaning! With great courage he had walked up to the little window, mustering all his language skills and with a broad, encouraging smile he said something like:
“Halo, kiidsz, verr iiiz juur fadderr?” to which the kids answered in unison,
“Ejjjh???”
Peter‘s lips and tongue now in their most coordinated position possible, very slowly, carefully formatting the treacherous and foreigners gravest sound enemy, the “r”s, softening their rough edges, he had repeated the question.
The little kids looked at each other, then the oldest and wisest said:
“We don’t speak French!”
Unavoidably, situations much more humiliating happened due to lack of language skills. On one occasion, when Mike and Peter were traveling on a local bus, they observed that those passengers wanting to be let off at their stops have signaled to the driver by pushing a little button near the door. They also saw that getting off was from the rear. Confident in these important bits of familiarity, the new Canadian passengers coming from the rural areas of Hungary not really having been on any public transportation in the fifties, now felt confident and signaled to the driver that they would like get off the bus at the next stop. The bus stopped and they have patiently waited for the door to open. Since it did not, Peter had pressed, once more, now longer and firmer the little button for the driver. The driver looked up in the rear view mirror and with just a bit raised voice he had said something to them. The door still would not open.
By then the driver was gesticulating with both hands, what’s more now a passenger or two also got into shouting, but the boys still could not figure out the puzzle of opening the door.
The driver then, after pulling roughly on his hand brake, had rushed towards the rear with aggressive steps, and then stepped onto the last step of the door and as if by magic, the door opened. The driver’s less than complimentary remarks were still audible as they were rushing away into darkness.
There was no other solution; they had to start a formal language training course, designed specifically for new immigrants. The evening course led by the very kind Mrs. Sutherland was populated by a rather motley group of new immigrants. From the 50 years old German engineer to the almost illiterate, young shepherd boy from Sicily, there were immigrants from every conceivable nation and age. This multicultural group was to be thought by the ever smiling, patient and brilliant literature teacher, Mrs. Sutherland. This mixed background and nationality was the best asset of the class, as the pupils had no other choice but to communicate with each other in one language only, English. Here, nobody was afraid of making a mistake in pronunciation, or committing a grave grammatical error, everybody was in his or her natural awkwardness for the ordeal of communicating in English. And Mrs. Sutherland achieved results, because most of her charges had enriched themselves to the tune of their own language aptitudes and openness.
The fall season came and that also meant for all Hungarians at home and in foreign lands, that one year passed since the most proud and also the most tragic autumn, the one in 1956.
The Hungarian newspapers, written and printed in Canada, were also available in Ottawa and after Sunday mass they would buy them at the Hungarian church. These became their sources of information from home and the world. Soon the papers were calling all Hungarians in the West to get ready for big protest demonstrations on October 23, the anniversary of the Revolution, in front the various Soviet Embassies. Every able Hungarian was there, with candles in hand at the Soviet Embassy in Ottawa. Peter and his friends came with several bottles of red ink, which were tossed at the building’s walls. There was some mild police interference, but not before the building was full of the ugly red marks, reminding the world of the brutal and murderous assault by the Red Army on Budapest a year before.
These demonstrations took place in every major Western city, with exactly the same results, bringing the world’s attention back to the events a year before.
The work in the sanatorium’s serving kitchen was pleasant, particularly due the patients’ kind and appreciative disposition; however it has been a nagging concern for Peter that after all he worked in the ward of patients suffering from tuberculosis. He would not even dare write to his parents about it, since his right kidney was removed in Budapest just 2 years prior, due to an infection with TBC. One can live with one kidney for many years, counseled the famous surgeon, Professor Babics, who during the revolution became the Minister of Health of the short lived revolutionary government. But without any kidney, in the fifties, meant death. The salary in the sanatorium was also lower than out there in the open “market”, so he had decided to seek a new job.
By the time their first, really cold winter had arrived around the beginning of December Peter was already working in the newly built Westgate Shopping center on the edge of town.
The Simpson Sears department store had a large cafeteria which shoppers and staff frequented, and the “experienced” young man was hired in the kitchen of this cafeteria, ran by the huge local bakery, Morrison Lamothe. In addition to dishwashing he had been given extra duties, the daily collection of all the garbage bins throughout the store, daily, before the night cleaning brigade had arrived.
The kitchen chef was German, his assistant Portuguese, the waitresses mostly French Canadian women. The unofficial, but well known “second class” citizens and immigrants made up then, and even today, the serving-cleaning needs of Canadian society. And among these the poorly spoken newcomer Hungarian became the “last” man of the department store. However, it seemed like a promotion, that unlike in the previous job, here he was given every morning a freshly washed and starched white shirt, with not so stylish, but useful striped pants. These little perks counted a lot in the life of immigrants. However, those dirty nails on his hands were hopeless, full of tiny bits of food particles that seemed so difficult to clean, causing great vexation.
The staff of the cafeteria was friendly. They would have their morning coffees together, just before opening and it was impressive for Europeans to experience a uniform acceptance of everybody at the tables. No privileges or exceptions in terms of rank or position, everybody sat with anybody, everybody calling the others by their first names! At least at work, society was without pretenses and formalities.
Around Christmas of 1957, the season’s songs were being played non-stop during opening hours, among them many rock inspired Christmas songs. All that seemed so new and interesting, every experience, every new English word, every new custom, behavior, rock number had continually and incessantly evened the road toward assimilation into society. The initial difficulties and uncertainties, the real and imagined hurts had slowly, very slowly been softened, exchanged for the satisfaction of salaries earned from daily labor, the momentary joys of a successful English dialogue with someone. Just before Christmas the company running the cafeteria had organized a party for the employees. This was his first experience being a guest in a better Ottawa restaurant, served a splendid dinner by - other immigrants.
Even Christmas gifts were given to each employee, a British Columbia commemorative silver dollar, the province where he was originally to be sent from the boat!
At the railway station he confidently asked for a ticket to „Ottawa”, but it was a struggle for the proper pronunciation of the word. „AA- TOVA” repeated the unfriendly French Canadian cashier, which was not even close to the Hungarian, that is, phonetically pronounced, word.
The new language, particularly its pronunciation had caused great difficulty for most immigrants. The more sensitive souls were maybe embarrassed, or slightly peeved , but many had reacted aggressively in delicate situations, and for them melding into society had become quite difficult. Their language frustrations have exaggerated the many cultural differences between Europeans and North Americans. Some have rebelled against making advances in their language skills over the most dire necessities. Refused to change their lifestyles, were reluctant to even try new dishes. In the extreme cases some looked down on anything that was not somehow „European” in style, taste or presentation.
From salted butter to the huge , but very weak coffee everything seemed second rate and unacceptable. The accumulated frustrations and the refusal to accept local customs and forms like slowly administered poison was effecting some immigrants. The worst conflicts were between the so called „old Canadians”, immigrants who had already spent some years in the new country and the „new Canadians”, folks who had just arrived.
Like most immigrants in Canada or the USA, in a relatively short time, every diligent and ambitious newcomer had achieved a fairly high standard of living. Thus the „old Canadians”, who had most of the initial difficulties behind them, were justly criticizing the grumbling and impatience of the newcomers about accepting life in society. The misplaced refugees of the second world war who made up the largest part of „old Canadians”, unlike the refugees of the 1956 Revolution, often spent long years in camps until they could get visas and fares paid for by some charitable organization.
However, during the splendid train ride from Quebec to Ottawa, problems of assimilation into Canadian society did not cause any mental anguish to the 19 year old. In a few short weeks, this was his second ambitious undertaking in his new homeland, moving to Ottawa, to be with English speaking natives! He had gotten off the train with high expectations. Since the station was in the heart of the city, he had a great chance to do his first sightseeing having but a small bag all his luggage.
Other than the majestic Parliament buildings , the center was quite a disappointment, it resembled more of a small, but up and coming provincial town than the capitol of an immense country. While passing through Rideau Street there were a few dozen or so people in , what seemed, a large empty store, listening to an intense looking gentleman, with an impressive baritone, obviously making some sort of political pitch. Peter could not have understood a single word but the speech seemed convincing and emphatic that was delivered by the gaunt and straight backed orator.
This was his first, if passive, participation in a free, public and democratic opinion expression. Peter happened to be witnessing a campaign speech preceding the 1957 fall elections, where he had experienced, with awe, the participants’ various and amazing reactions to the statements of John Diefenbaker. There were catcalls, too, amid the enthusiastic applauders, cynical remarks and laughter, people in pairs arguing with each other while the speech was being delivered. All kinds of behavior! Only one thing was missing, not a policeman or secret service man to be seen anywhere.
Not the center of the capitol, not the splendid stores on Rideau Street, not the elegant hotels that grabbed Peter’s attention in these first hours of his arrival in Ottawa.
The unfolding, live democracy , people’s open expression of their likes or dislikes as they have reacted to the politician’s words was what seemed so utterly wonderful!
This is, then, a free country!
He could not have known at that time, that the sympathetic orator was to become Canada’s prime minister that fall, and that several years later he would have two personal meetings with Mr. Diefenbaker. One of those meetings happened in a hotel in Saskatoon, as he was having an early morning breakfast. John Diefenbaker called over from his table, asking to join him if he was alone. The eventual winner of several elections and having been prime minister more than once, was just sitting there without any bodyguards, inviting a total stranger to his table! Then and there he had to tell John Diefenbaker the event from Ottawa in the first hours of his arrival, which deeply touched the former prime minister and warmly shook the „new Canadian’s” hand.
A rooming house, full of Hungarians , was run by the „old Canadian”, Mrs. Mitro, was his new home. The Mitro family had immigrated to Canada even before the war, the children were all born in the new country, but to the family’s merit, they all spoke Hungarian. This was even more appreciated by Peter and his friends when subsequently met other Hungarian families whose Canadian born children often did not speak a word, or very little, of their elder’s native language.
So the parents who managed to teach their Canadian born children their ancestors’ tongue were held in great esteem as it was a very difficult and frustrating task.
The Mitro house gave home to mostly single, young men and it was easier here to wrestle with problems of loneliness and the strange, new ways of society. On the other hand, it was to everyone’s disadvantage to be with Hungarians when the English language demanded daily practice. While in their simple work places like cleaning, dishwashing, construction there was some limited chance to practice English, their free times should have been passed with English speakers. Fortunately, the Hungarian rooming house was only a short stop as he had found new employment immediately, in the Royal Ottawa Sanatorium, quite far from the Mitro house. As an „experienced” dishwasher and general kitchen helper he had started to work in the wing of the ambulatory patients, those recovering from tuberculosis.
The Royal Ottawa Sanatorium, August 1957
He had asked for and received temporary quarters, a room near the power plant of the hospital, which he shared with an older Ukrainian immigrant working in the plant. The man spoke almost zero English, but insisted telling Peter his life story every night, in Ukrainian, when he had found out that Peter knew some Russian from his school back in Hungary.
Fortunately, they only met at night, when under the excuse of fatigue he could escape most of the Ukrainian’s endless monologues.
His work had become much more interesting. The ambulatory patients came to have their meals in the large dining hall, all dressed up, which was portioned out by two immigrant women and served by Peter. The meals had arrived from the main kitchen on steam containers on wheels.
Within days a rather pleasant and enjoyable relationship developed between him and most patients, who appreciated the young man’s effort and enthusiasm. This work had the human touch, encouraged the development of relationships with people, particularly with people on the mend from illness.
He learned, and was encouraged, much to his surprise, to call most of the patients by their first names, regardless of age or sex. It was already difficult to do away with the polite form, an essential element of most languages, and now on top of that he was to call these ladies and gentlemen by their first names like “Jim” or “Mary”. He had kept on trying for a while with the Mr. Jim’s and the Miss Mary’s, but the patients have insisted, with a few exceptions, that he is to call them by their first names, that soon enough he was used to this straight forward, natural form of communication, not well practiced anywhere in Europe.
Back in the camp in Melence he met and befriended a young man from the nearby village to Baja, eventually becoming chess partners. Mike had been sent straight to Ottawa, after landing in Quebec. He had worked at construction awhile, but the extremely cold Ottawa winter had chased him to the much less profitable, but warm work environment, the Sanatorium. That made it possible for the pair to seek and find their own flat, close to their workplace.
They have rented the half basement of a simple Canadian house, right next to the washing machine and not far from the furnace. The “flat” consisted of a large bed, a wooden dresser, and they paid 3 dollars weekly, each. But the rented place was close enough for getting to work on foot and it was spartan but warm. There was entertainment, too, besides work and that was provided by Mrs. Sutherland’s weekly language class, in a classroom of the local secondary school. The workplace and self-study brought some progress in this field, but the difficult English pronunciation made real conversation still difficult. Daily language frustrations were plentiful. When they were convinced that they have made some progress, some incident would happen to take their self-confidence away in the field of the mysteries of English pronunciation.
Like it happened one Sunday afternoon, when Peter caught some little kids of the neighbors peeking through their basement window. Forever ready for any practice opportunity for the use of English and always very grateful when native Canadians were to be engaged in conversation, especially kids who are always sincere and well meaning! With great courage he had walked up to the little window, mustering all his language skills and with a broad, encouraging smile he said something like:
“Halo, kiidsz, verr iiiz juur fadderr?” to which the kids answered in unison,
“Ejjjh???”
Peter‘s lips and tongue now in their most coordinated position possible, very slowly, carefully formatting the treacherous and foreigners gravest sound enemy, the “r”s, softening their rough edges, he had repeated the question.
The little kids looked at each other, then the oldest and wisest said:
“We don’t speak French!”
Unavoidably, situations much more humiliating happened due to lack of language skills. On one occasion, when Mike and Peter were traveling on a local bus, they observed that those passengers wanting to be let off at their stops have signaled to the driver by pushing a little button near the door. They also saw that getting off was from the rear. Confident in these important bits of familiarity, the new Canadian passengers coming from the rural areas of Hungary not really having been on any public transportation in the fifties, now felt confident and signaled to the driver that they would like get off the bus at the next stop. The bus stopped and they have patiently waited for the door to open. Since it did not, Peter had pressed, once more, now longer and firmer the little button for the driver. The driver looked up in the rear view mirror and with just a bit raised voice he had said something to them. The door still would not open.
By then the driver was gesticulating with both hands, what’s more now a passenger or two also got into shouting, but the boys still could not figure out the puzzle of opening the door.
The driver then, after pulling roughly on his hand brake, had rushed towards the rear with aggressive steps, and then stepped onto the last step of the door and as if by magic, the door opened. The driver’s less than complimentary remarks were still audible as they were rushing away into darkness.
There was no other solution; they had to start a formal language training course, designed specifically for new immigrants. The evening course led by the very kind Mrs. Sutherland was populated by a rather motley group of new immigrants. From the 50 years old German engineer to the almost illiterate, young shepherd boy from Sicily, there were immigrants from every conceivable nation and age. This multicultural group was to be thought by the ever smiling, patient and brilliant literature teacher, Mrs. Sutherland. This mixed background and nationality was the best asset of the class, as the pupils had no other choice but to communicate with each other in one language only, English. Here, nobody was afraid of making a mistake in pronunciation, or committing a grave grammatical error, everybody was in his or her natural awkwardness for the ordeal of communicating in English. And Mrs. Sutherland achieved results, because most of her charges had enriched themselves to the tune of their own language aptitudes and openness.
The fall season came and that also meant for all Hungarians at home and in foreign lands, that one year passed since the most proud and also the most tragic autumn, the one in 1956.
The Hungarian newspapers, written and printed in Canada, were also available in Ottawa and after Sunday mass they would buy them at the Hungarian church. These became their sources of information from home and the world. Soon the papers were calling all Hungarians in the West to get ready for big protest demonstrations on October 23, the anniversary of the Revolution, in front the various Soviet Embassies. Every able Hungarian was there, with candles in hand at the Soviet Embassy in Ottawa. Peter and his friends came with several bottles of red ink, which were tossed at the building’s walls. There was some mild police interference, but not before the building was full of the ugly red marks, reminding the world of the brutal and murderous assault by the Red Army on Budapest a year before.
These demonstrations took place in every major Western city, with exactly the same results, bringing the world’s attention back to the events a year before.
The work in the sanatorium’s serving kitchen was pleasant, particularly due the patients’ kind and appreciative disposition; however it has been a nagging concern for Peter that after all he worked in the ward of patients suffering from tuberculosis. He would not even dare write to his parents about it, since his right kidney was removed in Budapest just 2 years prior, due to an infection with TBC. One can live with one kidney for many years, counseled the famous surgeon, Professor Babics, who during the revolution became the Minister of Health of the short lived revolutionary government. But without any kidney, in the fifties, meant death. The salary in the sanatorium was also lower than out there in the open “market”, so he had decided to seek a new job.
By the time their first, really cold winter had arrived around the beginning of December Peter was already working in the newly built Westgate Shopping center on the edge of town.
The Simpson Sears department store had a large cafeteria which shoppers and staff frequented, and the “experienced” young man was hired in the kitchen of this cafeteria, ran by the huge local bakery, Morrison Lamothe. In addition to dishwashing he had been given extra duties, the daily collection of all the garbage bins throughout the store, daily, before the night cleaning brigade had arrived.
The kitchen chef was German, his assistant Portuguese, the waitresses mostly French Canadian women. The unofficial, but well known “second class” citizens and immigrants made up then, and even today, the serving-cleaning needs of Canadian society. And among these the poorly spoken newcomer Hungarian became the “last” man of the department store. However, it seemed like a promotion, that unlike in the previous job, here he was given every morning a freshly washed and starched white shirt, with not so stylish, but useful striped pants. These little perks counted a lot in the life of immigrants. However, those dirty nails on his hands were hopeless, full of tiny bits of food particles that seemed so difficult to clean, causing great vexation.
The staff of the cafeteria was friendly. They would have their morning coffees together, just before opening and it was impressive for Europeans to experience a uniform acceptance of everybody at the tables. No privileges or exceptions in terms of rank or position, everybody sat with anybody, everybody calling the others by their first names! At least at work, society was without pretenses and formalities.
Around Christmas of 1957, the season’s songs were being played non-stop during opening hours, among them many rock inspired Christmas songs. All that seemed so new and interesting, every experience, every new English word, every new custom, behavior, rock number had continually and incessantly evened the road toward assimilation into society. The initial difficulties and uncertainties, the real and imagined hurts had slowly, very slowly been softened, exchanged for the satisfaction of salaries earned from daily labor, the momentary joys of a successful English dialogue with someone. Just before Christmas the company running the cafeteria had organized a party for the employees. This was his first experience being a guest in a better Ottawa restaurant, served a splendid dinner by - other immigrants.
Even Christmas gifts were given to each employee, a British Columbia commemorative silver dollar, the province where he was originally to be sent from the boat!
Sunday 3 July 2011
Ch.10 Arriving in the New World
Quebec City,Canada,June 30,1957
The long train was full of Hungarian refugees, coming from several camps in Italy, transporting them to Le Havre, France, where a bit aged, but newly painted ocean liner was waiting for them.
While everyone was excited that finally they are on their way to the new homeland, leaving the continent proved to be very emotional to most, as they had tears in their eyes, realizing that, now, their lives are definitely and drastically changing.
The Italian registered ASCANIA made just one more stop as they have left Le Havre, before charging the open Atlantic, briefly mooring in Southampton and taking on British emigrants, bound for Canada. Peter was standing near the main bridge in the early morning darkness , when had heard the first really British English, which was so very different from the English that was attempted to be taught by a couple of Italian language teachers, just before they were leaving for Canada ( with very poor results). Shortly they were on their way.
Most passengers were present for breakfast that morning in the main dining hall, but as they were heading out to the open sea and the waves were becoming increasingly huge, for most, the voyage had become a new experience that they just as soon not have had! By lunch-time less than half of the passengers were present for the meal and by dinnertime, only a handful of the nearly 400 on board were brave enough to even think about eating. Peter had taken a few oranges to his seriously ill friend, with whom he had become friends since Melence, but the poor soul was just lying on his bunk bed with the greenest of faces, and wanted to die.
The next few days were pure hell for most of the passengers.
They could not eat, became weak, and the waves of the ocean were not getting calmer. It was taking the better part of 6 or 7 days by the time when most passengers have somehow acclimatized themselves to the ever present swaying and dared to show up on deck. Then on the ninth day they caught glimpses of the rather big chunks of ice formations as they were floating by in the mouth of the St.Lawrence where their ship was now steaming to its destination. While it was towards the end of June, the passengers, seeing the ice floats, were expecting the worst as they were getting ready for the June 30th arrival. Every conceivable warm clothing they could find in their meager luggage they put on, including heavy winter socks to brave the docking in Quebec City, it seemed they would be landing on the North Pole!
By the time they have arrived in the early morning hours, the thermometers of the Port signaled near 85 F! Added to this was a humidity index that made the 85 much worse in terms of comfort.
The arrival formalities were conducted still on the ship, they were given temporary id cards, documents. The Hungarian refugees were sorted out according to profession and need for labor in the various parts of the country, and then train tickets were handed out and finally everybody received 5 dollars.
Peter’s Entry Visa and destination in Canada.
Peter was directed to Vancouver, given train and meal tickets that were valid for several days and in his i.d. card they wrote „General labor”. He thanked them and asked the immigration officer where this Vancouver actually was in Canada. The obliging Canadian led him to a huge wall map and showed him the city on the foremost Western part of Canada. In answer to his question they have explained that, by and large, Vancouver is as far away from Quebec City, as Quebec City is from... Budapest!
The very moment within which he had decided that he will not go „that far”, that is „ farther” even from Budapest than Quebec , came back to haunt him for many, many years. Every time he realized that he made a hasty and unwise decision in such a fateful situation. If he knew what were to become the result of this quick decision , surely then he would have accepted it. However, he had declared, almost heroically, that he would rather not go to Vancouver. They accepted , without a word his decision, received his 5 dollars, and informed him that he was to stay in Quebec, there is no other alternative. They offered him temporary shelter in the sailors’ dormitory at the Port until he found a job and living quarters.
He had a quick farewell with his new friends from the various camps in Europe, who were sent to various cities of Canada and looked for his new living quarters in the Port.
He was quickly assigned a top bunk in the dormitory and within minutes he was climbing the steep road to the old center of the city which was just above the port, high up a hill.
This was the summer’s busiest long weekend, both from the Canadian and American side, and the French Canadian city was one of the most popular on the continent. Huge luxury cars were sparkling in the summer heat, throngs of people everywhere, shops, parks, streets. There was noticeable joy and happiness on the people’s faces, music blared from the cars, rock and roll was just coming into vogue that summer of 1957.
Peter had no destination point, but had already made some specific short range plans back on the ship before disembarking. It was not difficult to assess the possible skills and talents that he had to offer, but even if he had any marketable skill the lack of language would have rendered these unmarketable. Lack of both English and French meant the pursuit of an occupation which required no speaking or writing.
His only consolation was remembering the famous stories of (mostly American)millionaires who had started with nothing and through perseverance and a little bit of luck made it to the top, often becoming fabulously wealthy. If on this first day of his new country, a hot and humid day, he was not dreaming of millions , an inner force was pushing him towards the most elegant part of town, until he found himself in front of the famous Chateau Frontenac. One quick look at the hotel and the doorman, who looked like a colonel in full army gear, was enough to discourage him of trying his luck there. But opposite the hotel, on the other side of the corner of the square stood a very elegant restaurant, called the Old Homestead.
The Old Homestead restaurant, side street staff entrance, in 2005, after 48 years.
Awkwardly, but with some gusto he had entered through the main entrance and a well dressed, bearded, smiling man rushed towards him, with what looked like a bunch of files in his hand, and said something which did not sound English or Italian. Peter tried to muster at least some of the English words he had learned.
„Hallo, I...me...want job, I make...good work.”
The Greek owner, who spoke only Greek and French, took a good look at the entrepreneur and without any ceremony he had nodded to follow him. They went directly to the kitchen at the back through the happily chatting and eating crowd of people. The man put a large apron on Peter, led him to a huge sink full of dirty pots and pans.
„OK, you start now.” said the Greek. He never even asked his name. The three young chefs were also so busy that they could not devote any time to the newcomer. The task seemed simple enough. When he had finished washing the big pots, the waitresses were already showing him how to sort out the used dishes brought in from the dining hall, how to feed them into the monstrous washing machine at one end, how to rack them up when the freshly washed and steaming plates and glasses came out the other end. Within hours a certain routine established itself, much like in some wholesale factory. Peter had to smile when he thought of his dad , often admonishing him because he was reluctant to help his mother at home washing-up the few plates after their meal! Well, there was some washing-up to do now!
Was this 19 year old, on a new continent, without language or skill, able to create and sustain an existence?
Fresh off the boat, the young immigrant, in spite of his youth was not unfamiliar with physical work. The fifties in Hungary did not allow too many young people to escape hard work. His mother’s wages were enough only for the basic necessities. What his father could send home from his various jobs in the country was also too little to clothe and school the kids at home. It was evident that if he wanted to go to school in the fall in decent clothes and shoes he had to earn this during the summer. This is how he got a job far away from home, in the newly built „socialist” city of Sztalinvaros.
The communist leaders had planned to change the country from a predominantly agricultural land to an industrial power. The economic base for this scheme was to be able to „purchase” (at high prices)from the Soviet Union raw materials, then turning these into finished products „selling” them back(cheaply) to the Soviets. Buying dearly and selling cheaply was the most blatant exploitation of all the Eastern European countries in the fifties.
The reigning government was ready for any sacrifice to make this insane idea successful. People came from every part of the country to the town named after Stalin, because there was work and the pay was better than anywhere else. So Peter had signed up and became water boy for a team of transporters. The team worked hard, 12 hours a day, with very few days off. They emptied freight ships on the Danube, railway cars, transported cement and bricks and so on.
The boy, still in his puberty, had started learning from the school of life, perhaps somewhat too early in his life, how men had lived off manual labor. He had learned to smoke as the others did in the brigade, heard the first curse words and vulgarisms and saw up close how men, far from their families had behaved, often unfaithful to their wives. He was growing up quickly, indeed.
The weekly good-times had started often even before the week was over, at times his water container would be filled with beer or wine from taverns on the way.
This was how he spent the summer of 1951, from the first day of the school recess to the last days of the summer vacation.
Page from his diary in 1951:”…I got to love people. Now I know what it means to be a worker. I appreciate them more than any other…”
The following summer he had arrived as an experienced „worker” in Sztalinvaros and secured a job as surveyors’ helper, carrying measuring sticks and equipment for engineers. This was a real promotion, but alas less money although he was now a year older.
In the following year, 1953, a new „socialist dream city” was emerging in the North, Kazincbarcika. So the summer school vacation was now in a new venue, even much farther from his home. Here, too, engineers’ helper was the job, now with hands on experience. He lived in workers’ barracks, his window opened up to the courtyard of the adjacent forced labor camp, housing political prisoners, building the „socialist dream”. Every dawn began with the guards’ deafening shouting as they were organizing the ranks of the prisoners, getting them ready for the day’s work. Among these abused souls were priests, university professors, merchants, former army officers, judges, the so called undesirables, class enemies who supposedly threatened the dictatorship of the proletariat!
This is how he spent three summer vacations. But during school year there were some chances to earn some pocket money, too, thus helping the family to cope. The neighbors all relied on him to carry in the wood, coal in the fall that was just dumped in the front of their homes. He had an ongoing job at the house of one his well off friends, too, pumping full with water, once a week, the water tank of their bathroom. The weekly 4 hours of pumping by hand assured him that he could continue his favored sport: swimming and water polo. Since his hometown had no indoor pool for the winter, their practice took them on Sundays , by train, to Pecs, some 100 km's from Baja to the university’s swimming pool.
The junior water polo team, Bajai Honved,1954-front row:+Csere Robi,+Bánhidy Tilu,Galántai „Guszti”,back:Urbán Péter,Szepessy Kálmán,Krikovszki Józsi,Szepessy Laci.
These all day trips came free with train tickets, but food was the responsibility of each participant. The simple, one dish, home cooked meals could not be brought on trips like these, and cold provisions were too expensive for his mother to buy. But with the pumping job he earned enough each week that allowed the purchase of cold cuts and bread for these trips.
In spite of the many months of idleness in the various refugee camps and the hard choice that had to be made on disembarking the boat, it seemed incredible the ease, or perhaps the sheer luck with which , on his first day , at the first chance he could find work! There was no time to be afraid , to be lamenting the difficulties of a new world, strange language , the frustrations that should have surely followed within a short time. If there ever was the first step toward the BIG DREAM, toward life here on the new continent, then right there, in the old town-centre of Quebec, in that restaurant, it was taken.
Within a couple of hours , when the chefs found a little break, they checked out the tall, skinny guy from some strange land. With various sign language, and some words they could share they found out where the new dishwasher came from. Once they knew he has from Hungary, he immediately became a hero! The most famous Hungarian soccer team of all time, in 1954 , had carved into the hearts of ardent fans admiration everywhere in their world by coming second of all nations, barely losing to Germany in the World Cup final.
Peter was celebrated as if he were a member of that famous team. And the 1956 Freedom Fight and Revolution had substantially increased people’s admiration for the tiny country and her people.
The chefs had immediately begun work and within minutes they had Peter sit in front of a long table laden with every imaginable food, most of which was totally strange to the newcomer. After the so called fruits of the sea appetizer, boiled lobster claws, and what looked like raw, bloody slices of beef was served. Peter was able to eat some of these strange delicacies, but others he had to leave due to their bizarre consistencies, not well known to a Hungarian lad on his first day in North America.
But the friendship was instant and warm, which made these first hours on the job very pleasant. The hours were flying by, as more new customers came in for supper and everybody was busy with their tasks. When the last guest was gone, Peter still had the big pots to do, and towards one a.m. in the morning the owner showed him how to sweep and wash up the main dining room while he was busy with the cash register.
By 2 a.m. the newcomer had everything ready, but the owner insisted that he stay the night. They went behind the kitchen, to the storage room where from potato sacks and blankets a makeshift bed was made, being in July the cool room was a welcome change from the hot and steamy kitchen.
There was just one more “new” discovery left on this, for him, historical, day: in the storage room there were boxes and boxes of Coca Cola! The communist government and party in Hungary in the fifties had tried with every means of propaganda to depict the “imperialist West” as the devil. It meant to throw at it the worst possible criticism, whether in politics or culture. Thus the capitalists had used Coca Cola to drug and stupefy the poor working people. Well, Peter had found himself, alone, with boxes of Coca Cola, of which he had heard only bad things, that is, from a teenager’s point of view, exciting things, but never ever tried! He could not resist the temptation and opened a bottle, but after just one gulp from the strange tasting , lukewarm liquid he had enough. Poor imperialists of the West , he thought, you will never succeed with such a dismal tasting “drug”.
In less than 24 hours, the European, “landed immigrant”, said his document, had found, according to his qualifications, employment, friendly co-workers and even without knowing the amount, a salary, he apparently had room and board: what more could an East European guy have hope for in the New World in 1957?
He had tried in the next few weeks to get in to several Canadian Universities via the Immigration Office in Quebec via interpreters, but there were no answers, not at least until he was in Quebec City. Universities and colleges in Quebec had declined to take him on, with full room and board, without tuition fees. They had advised him to try other provinces.
In the meantime days were spent at the Old Homestead restaurant in the French Canadian capitol, from 3 pm until closing, for $25 weekly, plus all the delicious food he could eat and even a place to sleep if and when he wanted.
On his days off, Mondays, he was off to see the few English language films which were showing in the original, with subtitles for the French.
During his short stay in Quebec city only one embarrassing incident happened that remained in memory for a long time. On the second Sunday, before his afternoon shift at the restaurant, he went to mass in one of most beautiful churches. The huge church was full of worshippers, a magnificent organ led a truly amazing choir. He could only find standing room at the back. After the sermon, all of a sudden he had found in front of him a collecting box with a tiny bell attached to it, held by a straight backed and serious looking gentleman. The little bell that rang was sudden, but he had realized instantly that he should now produce some coins and place them in the box. However, only some banknotes were in his pocket that represented to the immigrant a rather big value, his stipend from the work in the restaurant, without any coins.
He could not do this, could not permit himself to take any of those dollar bills and donate them to the church! The man with the collecting box had now stepped closer to him and the little bell had signaled that he should give some money. Embarrassed, but he shook his head. The determined collector was not deterred and shook the little bell once more. With a red face, Peter did not react and the man passed on with a scornful face.
He felt ashamed and did not dare to go to church again in that city.
After some weeks he had said good bye to the Greek immigrants’ restaurant. There was an emotional farewell from his co-workers, who had retained rather bizarre memories of him. They smiled at his method of learning English during working hours by attaching a new list of words to his long dishwashing machine and reciting these words , loudly, each day. They have tried to understand his country’s political history and the recent events in 1956 during their coffee breaks, which he had presented with a mixture of English and Italian words. They understood his reason for moving on so that he could be exposed to a totally English speaking environment, it was his choice. Ottawa, however, did not seem right to them, but they did not mention this to him.
There was one important visit he had to make before getting on his train to Ottawa, in the city of his Canadian arrival. As in many other days, he sought out the most open space in the Port, where the huge ocean liners were docking, and sat on the most comfortable piles of ships’ rope. His eyes were searching, in vain, for the continent he had left behind, so long ago it seemed, in the far distance. Searching for the country which was once again surrounded by barbed wire and minefields, shot away from the world and the revolution’s victorious two weeks. These were painful and homesick hours, the acknowledgement of stark reality, that he was thousands of miles away from his family, friends, from all that gave him his identity so far. To bid good bye to Quebec City, which was his first home on the new continent, in Canada, seemed now almost as bitter as walking out of his hometown on that rainy November day. He recalled his walks here among the big ships during the mornings, before he went off to work, how often he was seriously considering sneaking up on a Europe bound ship and hiding as a stow away!. The loneliness, the strange environment, the daily frustration with the language, and that which was the most difficult to fight, the homesickness that all immigrants feel in the beginning, that had caused many to despair. Those without families and friends had a tougher time in the initial stages of a strange country.
Maybe Ottawa would help to get out of this dark mood!
Tuesday 7 June 2011
Ch.9 From Italian refugee camp to...Canada
Not every young Hungarian volunteered for the US Army. Some were afraid that a war such as the Korean one, can happen again, so the idea did not seem, all of a sudden, so attractive. They had tried consoling Peter in this manner. Then, in a couple of days, after an emotional farewell, several young men were on their way by air to the USA, apparently to San Francisco.
Celebration of March 15, a Hungarian festive holiday, in the Colony.
The first Hungarian national festive day in the Colony was March 15.and was celebrated by the compatriots with the National Anthem and flag, their mind on their loved ones at home.
As a fourth grade student, in 1948, at the time of the 100.anniversary of the 1848 Freedom Fight, Peter remembered well the occasion. That celebration took place in his hometown’s Teachers’ College. The practice elementary classes for teacher-students were also present when the national flag was raised, right in front of the senior choir, led by Professor Arato. These student-teachers taught them to read and write, as well as to behave in class, protecting, guiding them through the 4 years of elementary school.
Peter remembered the sudden spring that exploded from the normally short winter, even promising the prospect of summer in the not too distant future. He remembered the little dispute with his mother, when he wanted to dress in shorts while she insisted on the long pants of the winter, still. But the tears in the eyes of the 10 year old did not last long when he saw the other kids, all in their winter garb. And all of them had the proud, three-colored rosette in their buttonholes, and all knew by heart the most famous Petofi poem written for the occasion of March 15, 1848. They could not really comprehend the day’s significance, the 100 years that had passed since, and the two world wars, one of which had been affecting their young lives as well. These barely teenaged children could only feel the pride of being a Hungarian that the National Anthem on that day is more festive than on other days, that the message of the most famous poem’s of Petofi had a more urgent tone that was valid for all ages and eras.
The inhabitants of the Colony must have all had similar thoughts when only after 8 years of the 100th. anniversary of the 1848 Freedom Fight, were recalling the painful days of the 1956 Freedom Fight and Revolution.
The waiting for some news continued, while some in the Colony had tried to find an occasional job in the local community. Peter and his new friend, Mike, had found in the nearby fishing village a small family store whose front sign must have survived many tens of years. With their rudimentary Italian they have convinced the proprietor to have the store sign repainted. The owner was the most surprised when he went out to the street with them to examine the rather beat up sign and consider the necessity of the offer. So, they have began their task for which they had no knowledge or experience whatsoever. The job which had lasted 3 days did not seem at all long, when compared to the speed of the other work projects in the village. The two fresh paint artists had walked the daily 4 km's , there and back, always passing by a couple of seaside villas being constructed by Italian workers. Somehow it always looked as if these workers were on their lunch break, coffee break or afternoon siestas. But even if they were actually working, they always waved to Peter and his friend and implored them to „Piano, piano...” take it easy, don’t rush, the job will wait for you. In other words, the foreign painters had taken on the local work moral, so that the painting of the store sign, consisting of two words „Pescheria Nonni”, lasted 3 whole days!
Their wage was 5,000 lira for each, which then was the equivalent of 9 dollars. However, the money from the Nonni family had assumed historical perspectives in the lives of the two Hungarians ,then, as this was their first, ever, money earned in the free West!.
The weeks became months from the time passed at the orphans’ resort when a larger group, being offered to settle in Australia accepted and finally left the Colony. In a few weeks the first letters and postcards had arrived from this group, relating their trip that took them more 5 days by several air flights to reach their new home! The ones still in the Colony had chosen Canada, as that was by then the only country willing to have them. Peter made his choice based on the not very scientific criterion by looking at the map and compared the relative distances of the two continents - from Budapest!
Canada was closer.
From his childhood readings he had recalled the red uniformed Canadian Mountain Police, the huge spread of the land across the North American continent, the terrible winters that were worse even those of Sweden. There was one last letter from his benefactor at the BBC, encouraging him, congratulating him on choosing Canada, because „for a young man that is the best choice in 1957. Old Europe is a much more difficult place, we have unemployment in Britain, just go on to Canada.” He managed to notify his parents back home of his decision to emigrate to Canada and his dad sent back a telegram agreeing.
Celebration of March 15, a Hungarian festive holiday, in the Colony.
The first Hungarian national festive day in the Colony was March 15.and was celebrated by the compatriots with the National Anthem and flag, their mind on their loved ones at home.
As a fourth grade student, in 1948, at the time of the 100.anniversary of the 1848 Freedom Fight, Peter remembered well the occasion. That celebration took place in his hometown’s Teachers’ College. The practice elementary classes for teacher-students were also present when the national flag was raised, right in front of the senior choir, led by Professor Arato. These student-teachers taught them to read and write, as well as to behave in class, protecting, guiding them through the 4 years of elementary school.
Peter remembered the sudden spring that exploded from the normally short winter, even promising the prospect of summer in the not too distant future. He remembered the little dispute with his mother, when he wanted to dress in shorts while she insisted on the long pants of the winter, still. But the tears in the eyes of the 10 year old did not last long when he saw the other kids, all in their winter garb. And all of them had the proud, three-colored rosette in their buttonholes, and all knew by heart the most famous Petofi poem written for the occasion of March 15, 1848. They could not really comprehend the day’s significance, the 100 years that had passed since, and the two world wars, one of which had been affecting their young lives as well. These barely teenaged children could only feel the pride of being a Hungarian that the National Anthem on that day is more festive than on other days, that the message of the most famous poem’s of Petofi had a more urgent tone that was valid for all ages and eras.
The inhabitants of the Colony must have all had similar thoughts when only after 8 years of the 100th. anniversary of the 1848 Freedom Fight, were recalling the painful days of the 1956 Freedom Fight and Revolution.
The waiting for some news continued, while some in the Colony had tried to find an occasional job in the local community. Peter and his new friend, Mike, had found in the nearby fishing village a small family store whose front sign must have survived many tens of years. With their rudimentary Italian they have convinced the proprietor to have the store sign repainted. The owner was the most surprised when he went out to the street with them to examine the rather beat up sign and consider the necessity of the offer. So, they have began their task for which they had no knowledge or experience whatsoever. The job which had lasted 3 days did not seem at all long, when compared to the speed of the other work projects in the village. The two fresh paint artists had walked the daily 4 km's , there and back, always passing by a couple of seaside villas being constructed by Italian workers. Somehow it always looked as if these workers were on their lunch break, coffee break or afternoon siestas. But even if they were actually working, they always waved to Peter and his friend and implored them to „Piano, piano...” take it easy, don’t rush, the job will wait for you. In other words, the foreign painters had taken on the local work moral, so that the painting of the store sign, consisting of two words „Pescheria Nonni”, lasted 3 whole days!
Their wage was 5,000 lira for each, which then was the equivalent of 9 dollars. However, the money from the Nonni family had assumed historical perspectives in the lives of the two Hungarians ,then, as this was their first, ever, money earned in the free West!.
The weeks became months from the time passed at the orphans’ resort when a larger group, being offered to settle in Australia accepted and finally left the Colony. In a few weeks the first letters and postcards had arrived from this group, relating their trip that took them more 5 days by several air flights to reach their new home! The ones still in the Colony had chosen Canada, as that was by then the only country willing to have them. Peter made his choice based on the not very scientific criterion by looking at the map and compared the relative distances of the two continents - from Budapest!
Canada was closer.
From his childhood readings he had recalled the red uniformed Canadian Mountain Police, the huge spread of the land across the North American continent, the terrible winters that were worse even those of Sweden. There was one last letter from his benefactor at the BBC, encouraging him, congratulating him on choosing Canada, because „for a young man that is the best choice in 1957. Old Europe is a much more difficult place, we have unemployment in Britain, just go on to Canada.” He managed to notify his parents back home of his decision to emigrate to Canada and his dad sent back a telegram agreeing.
Wednesday 27 April 2011
Chapter 8, Refugee Life in Italy, waiting for a v isa
The advertised hunger strike had quickly faded due to the new group’s obstinacy, when the “Yugo” group appeared for every meal with great anticipation and appetite. Soon they were given their first Western identity document, issued by the Italian Red Cross, stating that bearer is a Hungarian refugee.
Life of the camp on the Adriatic had become routine, but the inhabitants’ thoughts were universally preoccupied with their future. They have already heard in Trieste, which was later confirmed in the Colony as well, that every refugee could settle in any country which would take him or her. All this was happening in the spring of 1957 when in Austria nearly 200,000 Hungarians have been arriving and gaining entry in dozens of Western nations. These countries established certain maximum quotas and these are quickly filled from the Austrian camps. In the meantime the camps in Italy and Yugoslavia were still full of refugees and there remained but two large countries that still had available quotas: Canada and Australia.
Finally, correspondence with the families at home began in earnest, but this proved expensive, as the Red Cross could not finance all the postage. Peter’s father tried desperately with all his friends abroad to help his son an entry into a European country or else get some money for correspondence. It proved to be difficult, except for one willing friend, Gyorgy Urban. He was only a namesake for father and an old friend from before WW2, who had settled in London, eventually finding a job with the BBC. He was answering Peter’s letters and when found out that Peter had expressed eagerness to get to England, perhaps via the BBC in some capacity, he was glad to help.
Gyorgy Urban had arranged for Peter to take an announcer’s voice test and a short entry exam at one of the radio stations in Bologna, possibly leading to a job with the BBC.
Peter was feverishly getting ready for the big day when he could board a train from Ravenna to Bologna, and face his short Western life’s biggest opportunity so far.
At the station in Bologna a very pleasant, young journalist was expecting Peter and drove him immediately to the Bologna radio station. There, after short instructions a Hungarian text was put in his hands and they would record his voice test-presentation that went rather well.
Since the entry exam also called for rudimentary English proficiency, a short English news item was given to Peter to translate into Hungarian, after all the interview and test was for a possible position with the BBC in England.
The sympathetic journalist sat next to Peter and had encouraged him to start the translation, he would help. The first two words to be translated from the English text will be remembered by Peter until his last day on earth. The text had begun: “The government…” But there, in the Italian radio-studio, the 19 year old Hungarian refugee did not know a single word of English! His Italian benefactor tried everything , in Italian, in French to explain, to make Peter understand the meaning of those two first words , perhaps Peter would suddenly understand and write down in Hungarian the meaning…all in vain! And these were only the first two words of the two page translation requirement!
Peter had finally made them understand that it is useless; he does not speak a single word of English. The entry test had to be stopped there.
The empathetic Italian journalist had taken Peter by the arm, sat him in his little Fiat Toppolino and took him home for dinner. There were a number of well dressed gentlemen sitting at the elegant dinner table, and a three course dinner was served by a pleasant woman, who was probably their landlady. The dinner companions were all very polite and have tried to make the guest welcome, but of course Peter’s Italian was only marginally better than his non-existent English, woefully insufficient for any conversation.
In the end, they parted at the railway station and Peter sat in the train with dark and somber thoughts. His mood now reminded him of another “entry test” that took place in Budapest less than year before. In May of 1956 he had tried to realize a long held dream when he had been up for a test at the Film and Theater Arts College. The famous film and theater star of the day, Maria Sulyok had the task of screening some of the hundreds of applicants for a few available places at the school. As with those two English words at the radio station, the minute details of the test in Budapest would never be forgotten:
They called him in from the corridor and Peter entered a simple, little room where sat the star on one chair and a secretary on the other.A small podium in front of them.
“You were supposed to be here yesterday, why didn’t you come then ?”- asked the film star.
“Yes, but I have sent a wire a week ago, that I was in my graduation ceremony yesterday …and I got permission to come today…”
“Graduation ceremony? In what?” –sounded the rather complex question.
Peter’s brain was lightening quick in assessing all the possible answers, including asking for clarification to the “In what”? question. But then he remembered the advice given by professional actors from Kecskemet, with whom he had shared the stage as an extra during their guest appearances in his hometown, that at the entry test one must exhibit spontaneity and quick humor that attests to great fantasy and wit, prerequisites for the performing arts! So, with a great deal of bravado and self confidence, he answered:
“In a dark-blue suit” and was anticipating a rewarding smile.
A numbing silence had fallen. The secretary looked up from her files, and then looked at the star with obvious fright, unable even to guess what the star’s response will be to this obviously impertinent answer!
“In what school you had the graduation ceremony, that is what I wanted…go on, recite something…” snarled the obviously upset prima donna at the scared candidate.
The yearlong preparation consisted of excerpts from the drama Bank Ban and a poem from Arpad Toth that he practiced with his literature teacher even recited to his father several times. There were occasions when he could recite the material to his classmates and on the day of the graduation ceremony, just before this entrance test the recital was done in front of all the graduating classes. All that work and preparation gave him self-confidence, as the delivery was being polished and refined while getting plenty of critical feedback and advice. However, on the critical day, the yearlong preparation was reduced to but a few lines from each work as the slighted diva interrupted him twice, rather abruptly, and said without even looking at Peter, coldly: “We’ll notify you…”
It was not necessary.
The same feelings came back to him in the train to Ravenna, as a year before when Maria Sulyok sent him on his way, and he walked out to the banks of the river Danube.
There, sitting on the stones, in the splendid May afternoon, he was waiting for his evening train back to Baja. All his dreams seemed to have been lost then, as now on the train for Ravenna, everything hopeless. Too many young people at the start of life, do not realize that every experience, every emotion, good or bad, joy, pain, achievement or failure, shame, success come and go on, because that is life. And real unhappiness is when one fights such unavoidable fluctuations in life…
Indeed, the disappointment about the BBC test in Bologna really lasted only a few days, as the young men of the Colony were now excited about new hopes. The news came that US Army recruiters would be passing through camp in a few days, and any young volunteer, by signing up for 5 years, would be immediately transported to the USA. There would be language school while getting the army training, then American citizenship, even opportunities for attending university afterward with generous bursaries.
Almost all young people, then, were dreaming of immigrating to America and this new chance to get there was hope for some. The recruiters arrived promptly in their enormous station wagon, a kind of vehicle not seen before by most refugees. Questionnaires had to be filled out, interviews started with the help of interpreters, followed by medical exams conducted by medical officers. These exams were not particularly detailed, they wanted to visibly check the applicants’ physical shape. When Peter’s turn came he had been casually asked about the long scar on his right side which was obviously the result of a surgical operation.
„I had an operation in March of 1955, when I was seventeen, they took my right kidney out. The kidney had tuberculosis, it had to be removed, but I have been healthy since!” translated the interpreter Peter’s explanation.
The army doctor waited until Peter had dressed and then sat down next to him on the bench. His expression seemed sincere and a bit sad, too, when he had told him that unfortunately Peter cannot join the US Army with one kidney.
Life of the camp on the Adriatic had become routine, but the inhabitants’ thoughts were universally preoccupied with their future. They have already heard in Trieste, which was later confirmed in the Colony as well, that every refugee could settle in any country which would take him or her. All this was happening in the spring of 1957 when in Austria nearly 200,000 Hungarians have been arriving and gaining entry in dozens of Western nations. These countries established certain maximum quotas and these are quickly filled from the Austrian camps. In the meantime the camps in Italy and Yugoslavia were still full of refugees and there remained but two large countries that still had available quotas: Canada and Australia.
Finally, correspondence with the families at home began in earnest, but this proved expensive, as the Red Cross could not finance all the postage. Peter’s father tried desperately with all his friends abroad to help his son an entry into a European country or else get some money for correspondence. It proved to be difficult, except for one willing friend, Gyorgy Urban. He was only a namesake for father and an old friend from before WW2, who had settled in London, eventually finding a job with the BBC. He was answering Peter’s letters and when found out that Peter had expressed eagerness to get to England, perhaps via the BBC in some capacity, he was glad to help.
Gyorgy Urban had arranged for Peter to take an announcer’s voice test and a short entry exam at one of the radio stations in Bologna, possibly leading to a job with the BBC.
Peter was feverishly getting ready for the big day when he could board a train from Ravenna to Bologna, and face his short Western life’s biggest opportunity so far.
At the station in Bologna a very pleasant, young journalist was expecting Peter and drove him immediately to the Bologna radio station. There, after short instructions a Hungarian text was put in his hands and they would record his voice test-presentation that went rather well.
Since the entry exam also called for rudimentary English proficiency, a short English news item was given to Peter to translate into Hungarian, after all the interview and test was for a possible position with the BBC in England.
The sympathetic journalist sat next to Peter and had encouraged him to start the translation, he would help. The first two words to be translated from the English text will be remembered by Peter until his last day on earth. The text had begun: “The government…” But there, in the Italian radio-studio, the 19 year old Hungarian refugee did not know a single word of English! His Italian benefactor tried everything , in Italian, in French to explain, to make Peter understand the meaning of those two first words , perhaps Peter would suddenly understand and write down in Hungarian the meaning…all in vain! And these were only the first two words of the two page translation requirement!
Peter had finally made them understand that it is useless; he does not speak a single word of English. The entry test had to be stopped there.
The empathetic Italian journalist had taken Peter by the arm, sat him in his little Fiat Toppolino and took him home for dinner. There were a number of well dressed gentlemen sitting at the elegant dinner table, and a three course dinner was served by a pleasant woman, who was probably their landlady. The dinner companions were all very polite and have tried to make the guest welcome, but of course Peter’s Italian was only marginally better than his non-existent English, woefully insufficient for any conversation.
In the end, they parted at the railway station and Peter sat in the train with dark and somber thoughts. His mood now reminded him of another “entry test” that took place in Budapest less than year before. In May of 1956 he had tried to realize a long held dream when he had been up for a test at the Film and Theater Arts College. The famous film and theater star of the day, Maria Sulyok had the task of screening some of the hundreds of applicants for a few available places at the school. As with those two English words at the radio station, the minute details of the test in Budapest would never be forgotten:
They called him in from the corridor and Peter entered a simple, little room where sat the star on one chair and a secretary on the other.A small podium in front of them.
“You were supposed to be here yesterday, why didn’t you come then ?”- asked the film star.
“Yes, but I have sent a wire a week ago, that I was in my graduation ceremony yesterday …and I got permission to come today…”
“Graduation ceremony? In what?” –sounded the rather complex question.
Peter’s brain was lightening quick in assessing all the possible answers, including asking for clarification to the “In what”? question. But then he remembered the advice given by professional actors from Kecskemet, with whom he had shared the stage as an extra during their guest appearances in his hometown, that at the entry test one must exhibit spontaneity and quick humor that attests to great fantasy and wit, prerequisites for the performing arts! So, with a great deal of bravado and self confidence, he answered:
“In a dark-blue suit” and was anticipating a rewarding smile.
A numbing silence had fallen. The secretary looked up from her files, and then looked at the star with obvious fright, unable even to guess what the star’s response will be to this obviously impertinent answer!
“In what school you had the graduation ceremony, that is what I wanted…go on, recite something…” snarled the obviously upset prima donna at the scared candidate.
The yearlong preparation consisted of excerpts from the drama Bank Ban and a poem from Arpad Toth that he practiced with his literature teacher even recited to his father several times. There were occasions when he could recite the material to his classmates and on the day of the graduation ceremony, just before this entrance test the recital was done in front of all the graduating classes. All that work and preparation gave him self-confidence, as the delivery was being polished and refined while getting plenty of critical feedback and advice. However, on the critical day, the yearlong preparation was reduced to but a few lines from each work as the slighted diva interrupted him twice, rather abruptly, and said without even looking at Peter, coldly: “We’ll notify you…”
It was not necessary.
The same feelings came back to him in the train to Ravenna, as a year before when Maria Sulyok sent him on his way, and he walked out to the banks of the river Danube.
There, sitting on the stones, in the splendid May afternoon, he was waiting for his evening train back to Baja. All his dreams seemed to have been lost then, as now on the train for Ravenna, everything hopeless. Too many young people at the start of life, do not realize that every experience, every emotion, good or bad, joy, pain, achievement or failure, shame, success come and go on, because that is life. And real unhappiness is when one fights such unavoidable fluctuations in life…
Indeed, the disappointment about the BBC test in Bologna really lasted only a few days, as the young men of the Colony were now excited about new hopes. The news came that US Army recruiters would be passing through camp in a few days, and any young volunteer, by signing up for 5 years, would be immediately transported to the USA. There would be language school while getting the army training, then American citizenship, even opportunities for attending university afterward with generous bursaries.
Almost all young people, then, were dreaming of immigrating to America and this new chance to get there was hope for some. The recruiters arrived promptly in their enormous station wagon, a kind of vehicle not seen before by most refugees. Questionnaires had to be filled out, interviews started with the help of interpreters, followed by medical exams conducted by medical officers. These exams were not particularly detailed, they wanted to visibly check the applicants’ physical shape. When Peter’s turn came he had been casually asked about the long scar on his right side which was obviously the result of a surgical operation.
„I had an operation in March of 1955, when I was seventeen, they took my right kidney out. The kidney had tuberculosis, it had to be removed, but I have been healthy since!” translated the interpreter Peter’s explanation.
The army doctor waited until Peter had dressed and then sat down next to him on the bench. His expression seemed sincere and a bit sad, too, when he had told him that unfortunately Peter cannot join the US Army with one kidney.
Tuesday 19 April 2011
Chapter 7, Arriving in Italian Red Cross Camp
Of the Hungarian refugees staying at the Colonia, Peter’s group was not the first, as more than a hundred were brought here from the overcrowded refugee camps in Austria. The Colonia, built under the Mussolini regime, was a simple, gray, stone based building on the brilliant, sandy beach of the Adriatic Sea. Green, so called Italian maritime, Cyprus was all around the building, criss-crossed by walk and bicycle paths.
The winter of February was mild and pleasant due to the warm currents from the sea, so much so that on Sunday afternoons groups of people from nearby Ravenna waded in knee-deep, rather cool water looking for exotic crustaceans of the sea, which they consumed, with the help of a few drops of lemon, on the spot, much to the total amazement of the formerly landlocked Hungarian onlookers.
The rather forlorn and bewildered group, still carrying the horrors of the Gerovo camp got out of the bus and was touched by the small group of Hungarians welcoming them to their new home at the Adriatic Sea resort. They were moved and grateful for the turn in their fortunes.
The Red Cross nurses on duty were also on hand in their starched uniforms and with their warm smiles, and, it seemed the only policeman of the Colony, Cesare, also.
The nurses of the Red Cross, and their interpreters at the Colony, Feb.1957.
There was the Camp Leadership Committee, a camp physician and a priest, Hungarian cooks and helpers, house-rules. After a short greeting, the new arrivals were informed that while lunch is served at twelve noon, the Leadership Committee had recommended they stay away from meals until the Red Cross Camp Supervisors met certain “demands”. In other words there was a “hunger strike” going on.
The new group who had survived the harsh conditions of the Yugoslavian refugees camp, emaciated and practically deprived of even basic sanitation so far, was asked, on their first day at this seaside resort for Italian orphans to forsake their first meal and join the group in a protest strike! The newcomers were incredulous when they have heard the “demands” which were for more free movie tickets at the local cinema, more than the daily 10 free cigarettes, more fresh fruit on the dining tables and some other “urgent” needs.
It seemed, that some of the propaganda humbug of the “class-conscious workers” who always fought for their “rights” was brought with the escapees to the West. Not only have they brought the right to strike with them, a right that no one was ever able to put into practice at home, but they had the chance, in free Italy, to try out.
There were no acceptable reasons to join the strikers, specially for the group just arriving from the Yugoslavian prisoner of war camp. Nobody should have compelled them, on their day of arrival, to behave like sulky children and support the frivolous demands of the other group.
They did not take long to decide. Even if they could not prevent the strike, not one would take part in this ungrateful behavior towards their Italian hosts.
Soon after getting to their dormitories and getting organized, enjoying the luxury of hot showers, they were dressed in their newly acquired Red Cross donated garments and sat with great anticipation in the long dining hall, half empty due to the strike. Like in Gerovo, the cooks were also Hungarian, as well as the serving staff. Not one took part in the strike, as they were getting small rewards for their work which they did not want to lose. These house-chores were always well appreciated as they took care of the daily idleness on the one hand, but also provided a chance to go out to the markets, meeting and befriending Italians.
Peter’s thoughts were back in his hometown, where his mother must have been just getting ready to serve the fish soups she had prepared each day in the tavern where she worked, his younger brother would come by later and have some of the leftover if there were any. By the time the two-course lunch was served, Peter had also recalled those abundant and special meals he was invited to by his richer friends’ parents in the early fifties, during the greatest trials his family endured. He must write about this in his diary!
This wonderful day, from the arrival in the morning at the Colony, to the walk on the beach in the afternoon did not seem real at all. Why, the day before they were half frozen as they tried to wash up at the cold, outside tap in Gerovo, and were waiting with canteen in hand for the cabbage soup and now they were sitting at the long, white clothed table and enjoyed the two course meal, accompanied with a glass of wine!
Not even the other group’s tasteless invitation for a „hunger strike” could dampen their high spirits. They had gone through too much to worry about whether more than 10 cigarettes were “due” or not for refugees.
After his first ever, unforgettable walk on the seashore Peter had found a quiet corner in the main hall, asked and happily received a splendid notebook and pen, originally deemed for kids in elementary classes. It said on the cover: Bella Copia.
Peter’s diary. On the cover, barely legible, some lines from Petofi Sandor, Hungary’s patriotic poet:
„The school of life is the world
Where much of my sweat is lost,
Bumpy and oh, so hard your road,
Where man oft on the desert trod.
(Translated by PU)
He felt the compulsion, that then, in this splendid environment and mood he continue the diary he had started on Christmas Eve in Gerovo. Then, only bits and pieces of paper were available.
Already at lunch earlier the memories of the immediate past have rushed him and he felt the weight of the distant past that seemed rapidly disappearing amidst ever newer life experiences. Here, in Italy, he had realized once and for all that he had left his birthplace, there is no more turning back.
The Yugoslavs have kept their promise , they were free to go on to the West. He had finally arrived in a free land!
He thought of his dad, forbidden to write, to practice his profession for years, because there was no freedom of the press, who had rushed up to Budapest just 2 days before the Soviet invasion had started. He was ecstatic to restart writing and publishing the small town paper he had been denied since 1948, and now with the revolution being victorious he could write again! He was going to bring the newspaper stock to Baja, but the 4th of November brought the Soviet tanks back to Budapest and dad never made it back to Baja with the paper, hopefully, Peter was praying! For days they could not communicate with the family, and Peter had escaped without ever saying farewell to him.
How bitter his father must be now! He cannot possibly hope that he will ever write again, as a free man, without becoming an agent for the secret police.
Perhaps it was this helplessness of his father not being able to write that pushed Peter to write, to fix his thoughts, to do something, anything , without skill and experience , with a teenager’s undisciplined mind, but he had to – write! Maybe in years, these notes will serve some purpose, so he started to write about his father, the gagged journalist.
Based on the notes from the Diary,Feb.5,1957, at Marina di Ravenna:
„My father had moved to Baja, with my mother and older brother, two years before my birth, in 1936. Then 34 years old, this journalist left the Zalai Kozlony in Nagykanizsa and moved to the provincial town of Baja, to try his luck. It was an open secret in the family that he had personal reasons for this sudden move. My birth took place in a rented house and the next 18 years, until I have left the country I would be passing my life in this rented house.
Father had managed first one and then two weekly papers’ publication, where he had done most of the writing, all of the editing and looking after the circulation as well. In spite of the ’owner’ and ’publisher’ titles he could never make any fortunes with the papers, never owned a home, but secured a reasonably decent existence for his family, at least until 1948.
Father’s days were consumed by running after advertisers and the printing process, his only „means” of production was an ancient typewriter and a bicycle that substituted the telephone in those days. The bicycle served as transportation and provided, as well, for his only hobby which was fishing on the Danube.
The nights from my childhood are still vivid in my memory, when dad wrote his articles amid umpteenth cigarettes and several strong espressos, late into the night. This was a family business. Mother prepared and maintained the subscribers’ list and the two boys were sent to the railway station twice a week to post the bundled and addressed copies of papers to the neighboring villages.
After the Russian army had occupied the country towards the end of WW2, a fairly democratic system of government was established, with multiparty participation and free elections, for awhile. However, the communist party had difficulty asserting itself as the main party by legitimate means, they have resorted to subvert democracy with ever increasing rough, and later deadly tactics. All this of course with the support, if not the instigation, of the Soviet Union. By using the so called „sliced salami” tactics, the multiparty system slowly became a one party system, where any opposition was simply jailed, or worse.
By 1948 there was only one legitimate and substantial force to stand in the way of the communists: the Roman catholic church, representing more than 85 % of society, led by the staunch defender of his church and flock , Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty, Primate of Hungary, the Vatican’s representative.
This was the only rival to the slowly developing, ruthless dictatorship of Matyas Rakosi and his conspirators.
One outstanding , single event and the last one from this era that had signaled the beginning of the darkest period in Hungary’s sad history was the Days of the Virgin Mary, held in my birthplace, Baja, in June of 1948. When the communists’ and socialists’ most famous and drummed up day, the first day of May, celebrated around the world by their ilk, had attracted a couple hundred sympathizers to the main square of Baja, the Days of Virgin Mary , led by Cardinal Mindszenty had hundreds of thousands in days of prayer and devotion in the same small town!
This is what irritated most the only political party in power and government then, this is what initiated the most brutal oppression of church and anyone not bowing to the Soviet puppets in Hungary!
The two weekly journals of Baja in June of 1948, Bajai Hirek and Delvideki Kis Ujsag, which were written and published by my father, had two special editions, in tens of thousands of copies, for these unprecedented celebrations in our hometown. The pilgrims came from every part of Hungary, including sections that were chopped off Hungary, as a result of the infamous Trianon „peace” accord, so that they all could pray together with the Primate Mindszenty against the ever increasing menace of Red dominance!
Father was there, in every ceremony, reception, religious procession so that he could record these historical events for his two journals. He was able to write up and send to the press his latest notes of the key events, so that the thousands of participants could take home their festive journals of those days in Baja.
I still see him on the main square, on the side of the ceremonial platform taking notes while the solemn ceremonies were taking place, led by Cardinal Mindszenty. By evening a huge crowed filled all the main streets of town, thousands of candles lit the happy and devout faces. That same night dad wrote and sent to press the special edition that could be on the newsstands next morning.
The day after the special edition was on the newsstands; my father never made it home that evening. As we found out it later, the State Secret Police had arrested him and locked him up in the local headquarters on Toth Kalman street. He was never formally charged with any crime, indeed what could have been the charge? That he had reported the events of those days in his legally published newspapers?
“IMPOSING WERE THE DAYS OF MARY IN BAJA” said the headline in the Délvidéki Kis Újság.
What was certain, that his bi-weekly, provincial newspapers would never again appear in any news stand. His journalist permit was taken away, his rented printing shop was closed forthwith, and never again could he publish a word until his death in 1989.
In the following weeks he suddenly became an aged and tormented man, disappearing for 24-48 hours from time to time. His children, my brothers and I, knew nothing of these days and nights not spent at home. Only much later mother had told us that dad was on frequent “questioning” sessions at the station of the secret police and was being “persuaded”, often with night sticks, too, to accept the “offer” , that of becoming a reporter at one of the national, daily newspapers in Budapest, the Magyar Nemzet. In exchange they only wanted “information” about the other employees’ possible “anti-state” behavior.
It is not known when, how soon would have Gyula Urban be broken during or after these “persuasion” sessions, his family being starved and emotionally tortured daily, and accepted like many others in those days, the vileness into which they were forced.
Within a few weeks five prominent physicians of the small town had certified and declared that Gyula Urban, former journalist, is suffering from a serious mental condition and was immediately locked up in the hospital’s most secure mental ward. This is how my father escaped from the hands of the State Secret Police in late 1948, just before the most shameful court proceedings started against Cardinal Mindszenty, subsequently sentencing the Cardinal to prison for life on totally false charges of espionage!
It was those five courageous physicians who collaborated and saved my father from the vileness that he, like many others, most probably, eventually would have succumbed to, but it meant 18 months of total isolation from the outside world, even shut up from his family, until the Secret Police had given him up. After his mental ward imprisonment he could no longer find a job in Baja, so the inevitable breakup of our family started then, in 1951, when he had to travel to the newly built “socialist” cities, where practically anyone could find employment. He lived in workers’ hostels; saw his family infrequently, for days only, while our family had gone through hardships and worry. For awhile even our house was being watched, especially in the evenings until one day my mother could not stand it any longer and verbally attacked the surprised character lurking in the shadow. He disappeared in minutes and from then on we were of no interest to them.
My mother who had raised three children had to find employment for the first time since married my dad, first was a cleaning woman then a cook in a local tavern.
These were my family’s difficult years, which for many other families could be many times more dramatic and serious between 1948 and 1956. Those preoccupied with the search for the triggers of the 1956 Hungarian Freedom Fight and Revolution should only examine the lives of these families in the last 8-10 years.”
The winter of February was mild and pleasant due to the warm currents from the sea, so much so that on Sunday afternoons groups of people from nearby Ravenna waded in knee-deep, rather cool water looking for exotic crustaceans of the sea, which they consumed, with the help of a few drops of lemon, on the spot, much to the total amazement of the formerly landlocked Hungarian onlookers.
The rather forlorn and bewildered group, still carrying the horrors of the Gerovo camp got out of the bus and was touched by the small group of Hungarians welcoming them to their new home at the Adriatic Sea resort. They were moved and grateful for the turn in their fortunes.
The Red Cross nurses on duty were also on hand in their starched uniforms and with their warm smiles, and, it seemed the only policeman of the Colony, Cesare, also.
The nurses of the Red Cross, and their interpreters at the Colony, Feb.1957.
There was the Camp Leadership Committee, a camp physician and a priest, Hungarian cooks and helpers, house-rules. After a short greeting, the new arrivals were informed that while lunch is served at twelve noon, the Leadership Committee had recommended they stay away from meals until the Red Cross Camp Supervisors met certain “demands”. In other words there was a “hunger strike” going on.
The new group who had survived the harsh conditions of the Yugoslavian refugees camp, emaciated and practically deprived of even basic sanitation so far, was asked, on their first day at this seaside resort for Italian orphans to forsake their first meal and join the group in a protest strike! The newcomers were incredulous when they have heard the “demands” which were for more free movie tickets at the local cinema, more than the daily 10 free cigarettes, more fresh fruit on the dining tables and some other “urgent” needs.
It seemed, that some of the propaganda humbug of the “class-conscious workers” who always fought for their “rights” was brought with the escapees to the West. Not only have they brought the right to strike with them, a right that no one was ever able to put into practice at home, but they had the chance, in free Italy, to try out.
There were no acceptable reasons to join the strikers, specially for the group just arriving from the Yugoslavian prisoner of war camp. Nobody should have compelled them, on their day of arrival, to behave like sulky children and support the frivolous demands of the other group.
They did not take long to decide. Even if they could not prevent the strike, not one would take part in this ungrateful behavior towards their Italian hosts.
Soon after getting to their dormitories and getting organized, enjoying the luxury of hot showers, they were dressed in their newly acquired Red Cross donated garments and sat with great anticipation in the long dining hall, half empty due to the strike. Like in Gerovo, the cooks were also Hungarian, as well as the serving staff. Not one took part in the strike, as they were getting small rewards for their work which they did not want to lose. These house-chores were always well appreciated as they took care of the daily idleness on the one hand, but also provided a chance to go out to the markets, meeting and befriending Italians.
Peter’s thoughts were back in his hometown, where his mother must have been just getting ready to serve the fish soups she had prepared each day in the tavern where she worked, his younger brother would come by later and have some of the leftover if there were any. By the time the two-course lunch was served, Peter had also recalled those abundant and special meals he was invited to by his richer friends’ parents in the early fifties, during the greatest trials his family endured. He must write about this in his diary!
This wonderful day, from the arrival in the morning at the Colony, to the walk on the beach in the afternoon did not seem real at all. Why, the day before they were half frozen as they tried to wash up at the cold, outside tap in Gerovo, and were waiting with canteen in hand for the cabbage soup and now they were sitting at the long, white clothed table and enjoyed the two course meal, accompanied with a glass of wine!
Not even the other group’s tasteless invitation for a „hunger strike” could dampen their high spirits. They had gone through too much to worry about whether more than 10 cigarettes were “due” or not for refugees.
After his first ever, unforgettable walk on the seashore Peter had found a quiet corner in the main hall, asked and happily received a splendid notebook and pen, originally deemed for kids in elementary classes. It said on the cover: Bella Copia.
Peter’s diary. On the cover, barely legible, some lines from Petofi Sandor, Hungary’s patriotic poet:
„The school of life is the world
Where much of my sweat is lost,
Bumpy and oh, so hard your road,
Where man oft on the desert trod.
(Translated by PU)
He felt the compulsion, that then, in this splendid environment and mood he continue the diary he had started on Christmas Eve in Gerovo. Then, only bits and pieces of paper were available.
Already at lunch earlier the memories of the immediate past have rushed him and he felt the weight of the distant past that seemed rapidly disappearing amidst ever newer life experiences. Here, in Italy, he had realized once and for all that he had left his birthplace, there is no more turning back.
The Yugoslavs have kept their promise , they were free to go on to the West. He had finally arrived in a free land!
He thought of his dad, forbidden to write, to practice his profession for years, because there was no freedom of the press, who had rushed up to Budapest just 2 days before the Soviet invasion had started. He was ecstatic to restart writing and publishing the small town paper he had been denied since 1948, and now with the revolution being victorious he could write again! He was going to bring the newspaper stock to Baja, but the 4th of November brought the Soviet tanks back to Budapest and dad never made it back to Baja with the paper, hopefully, Peter was praying! For days they could not communicate with the family, and Peter had escaped without ever saying farewell to him.
How bitter his father must be now! He cannot possibly hope that he will ever write again, as a free man, without becoming an agent for the secret police.
Perhaps it was this helplessness of his father not being able to write that pushed Peter to write, to fix his thoughts, to do something, anything , without skill and experience , with a teenager’s undisciplined mind, but he had to – write! Maybe in years, these notes will serve some purpose, so he started to write about his father, the gagged journalist.
Based on the notes from the Diary,Feb.5,1957, at Marina di Ravenna:
„My father had moved to Baja, with my mother and older brother, two years before my birth, in 1936. Then 34 years old, this journalist left the Zalai Kozlony in Nagykanizsa and moved to the provincial town of Baja, to try his luck. It was an open secret in the family that he had personal reasons for this sudden move. My birth took place in a rented house and the next 18 years, until I have left the country I would be passing my life in this rented house.
Father had managed first one and then two weekly papers’ publication, where he had done most of the writing, all of the editing and looking after the circulation as well. In spite of the ’owner’ and ’publisher’ titles he could never make any fortunes with the papers, never owned a home, but secured a reasonably decent existence for his family, at least until 1948.
Father’s days were consumed by running after advertisers and the printing process, his only „means” of production was an ancient typewriter and a bicycle that substituted the telephone in those days. The bicycle served as transportation and provided, as well, for his only hobby which was fishing on the Danube.
The nights from my childhood are still vivid in my memory, when dad wrote his articles amid umpteenth cigarettes and several strong espressos, late into the night. This was a family business. Mother prepared and maintained the subscribers’ list and the two boys were sent to the railway station twice a week to post the bundled and addressed copies of papers to the neighboring villages.
After the Russian army had occupied the country towards the end of WW2, a fairly democratic system of government was established, with multiparty participation and free elections, for awhile. However, the communist party had difficulty asserting itself as the main party by legitimate means, they have resorted to subvert democracy with ever increasing rough, and later deadly tactics. All this of course with the support, if not the instigation, of the Soviet Union. By using the so called „sliced salami” tactics, the multiparty system slowly became a one party system, where any opposition was simply jailed, or worse.
By 1948 there was only one legitimate and substantial force to stand in the way of the communists: the Roman catholic church, representing more than 85 % of society, led by the staunch defender of his church and flock , Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty, Primate of Hungary, the Vatican’s representative.
This was the only rival to the slowly developing, ruthless dictatorship of Matyas Rakosi and his conspirators.
One outstanding , single event and the last one from this era that had signaled the beginning of the darkest period in Hungary’s sad history was the Days of the Virgin Mary, held in my birthplace, Baja, in June of 1948. When the communists’ and socialists’ most famous and drummed up day, the first day of May, celebrated around the world by their ilk, had attracted a couple hundred sympathizers to the main square of Baja, the Days of Virgin Mary , led by Cardinal Mindszenty had hundreds of thousands in days of prayer and devotion in the same small town!
This is what irritated most the only political party in power and government then, this is what initiated the most brutal oppression of church and anyone not bowing to the Soviet puppets in Hungary!
The two weekly journals of Baja in June of 1948, Bajai Hirek and Delvideki Kis Ujsag, which were written and published by my father, had two special editions, in tens of thousands of copies, for these unprecedented celebrations in our hometown. The pilgrims came from every part of Hungary, including sections that were chopped off Hungary, as a result of the infamous Trianon „peace” accord, so that they all could pray together with the Primate Mindszenty against the ever increasing menace of Red dominance!
Father was there, in every ceremony, reception, religious procession so that he could record these historical events for his two journals. He was able to write up and send to the press his latest notes of the key events, so that the thousands of participants could take home their festive journals of those days in Baja.
I still see him on the main square, on the side of the ceremonial platform taking notes while the solemn ceremonies were taking place, led by Cardinal Mindszenty. By evening a huge crowed filled all the main streets of town, thousands of candles lit the happy and devout faces. That same night dad wrote and sent to press the special edition that could be on the newsstands next morning.
The day after the special edition was on the newsstands; my father never made it home that evening. As we found out it later, the State Secret Police had arrested him and locked him up in the local headquarters on Toth Kalman street. He was never formally charged with any crime, indeed what could have been the charge? That he had reported the events of those days in his legally published newspapers?
“IMPOSING WERE THE DAYS OF MARY IN BAJA” said the headline in the Délvidéki Kis Újság.
What was certain, that his bi-weekly, provincial newspapers would never again appear in any news stand. His journalist permit was taken away, his rented printing shop was closed forthwith, and never again could he publish a word until his death in 1989.
In the following weeks he suddenly became an aged and tormented man, disappearing for 24-48 hours from time to time. His children, my brothers and I, knew nothing of these days and nights not spent at home. Only much later mother had told us that dad was on frequent “questioning” sessions at the station of the secret police and was being “persuaded”, often with night sticks, too, to accept the “offer” , that of becoming a reporter at one of the national, daily newspapers in Budapest, the Magyar Nemzet. In exchange they only wanted “information” about the other employees’ possible “anti-state” behavior.
It is not known when, how soon would have Gyula Urban be broken during or after these “persuasion” sessions, his family being starved and emotionally tortured daily, and accepted like many others in those days, the vileness into which they were forced.
Within a few weeks five prominent physicians of the small town had certified and declared that Gyula Urban, former journalist, is suffering from a serious mental condition and was immediately locked up in the hospital’s most secure mental ward. This is how my father escaped from the hands of the State Secret Police in late 1948, just before the most shameful court proceedings started against Cardinal Mindszenty, subsequently sentencing the Cardinal to prison for life on totally false charges of espionage!
It was those five courageous physicians who collaborated and saved my father from the vileness that he, like many others, most probably, eventually would have succumbed to, but it meant 18 months of total isolation from the outside world, even shut up from his family, until the Secret Police had given him up. After his mental ward imprisonment he could no longer find a job in Baja, so the inevitable breakup of our family started then, in 1951, when he had to travel to the newly built “socialist” cities, where practically anyone could find employment. He lived in workers’ hostels; saw his family infrequently, for days only, while our family had gone through hardships and worry. For awhile even our house was being watched, especially in the evenings until one day my mother could not stand it any longer and verbally attacked the surprised character lurking in the shadow. He disappeared in minutes and from then on we were of no interest to them.
My mother who had raised three children had to find employment for the first time since married my dad, first was a cleaning woman then a cook in a local tavern.
These were my family’s difficult years, which for many other families could be many times more dramatic and serious between 1948 and 1956. Those preoccupied with the search for the triggers of the 1956 Hungarian Freedom Fight and Revolution should only examine the lives of these families in the last 8-10 years.”
Tuesday 5 April 2011
Chapter 6, 'To the West, Feb.4, 1957' for the first time
TO THE WEST-FEB.4, 1957, TRIESTE, ITALY.
On that wintry day in February an open transport truck carried the 62 refugee-volunteers to the border of Italy and Yugoslavia. The mountain road with its frozen surface seemed treacherous enough, so that it took some time to get on to more stable terrain. Its passengers were still feeling the embraces and well wishes, and a few concerned looks, of their compatriots who remained behind the barbed wired camp in Gerovo.
Did they make the right decision?
By the time the truck had stopped just meters from the border, the guards had to help them off the high truck as most of them were stiff and frozen from the open journey.
After some formalities, at the guards’ encouragement, the group slowly walked towards, first the Yugoslavian barrier that was then raised for them, and then through no-man’s land to the Italian barrier which was raised, also, for them to pass through.
Those 25 meters of no man’s land between the two countries became the group’s most cherished distance ever traveled in their lives!
Every step they took brought them closer to a new life they were soon to begin. The stern warning of the Italian consulate officials that they will have to remain in Italy, the prospect of unemployment did no longer matter to them.
The short road they had to take without their armed guards was the first free steps of these Hungarians since they have arrived in Yugoslavia.
One could imagine the affect of this disheveled, unshaven, pale faced group on the Italian officials waiting for them on the other side! They could still smell the unpleasant fumes of the diesel truck behind them; they could still feel the somber and perhaps envious looks of their guards on their backs as they were crossing over.
But their determined steps attested to their will and desire to accept whatever was to follow, no matter what, there was no returning now.
The emerging light from the fog had shined on a site for the 62 Hungarians that they could not have imagined in the last several weeks. Behind them closely were their former guards and the stark border office that looked more like a fort than an office. But ahead, on the other side stood a long caravan of sedans and ambulances from which white coated doctors and nurses were rushing to meet them, grabbing them by the arms, helping them to the vehicles. Not much was said, but smiles and warmth in their eyes spoke all the more. Soldiers or police were hardly visible, and the few present were helping them to get in the cars, just like the medical people.
Hot chocolate, oranges and cigarettes were offered in the cars. There were Hungarian interpreters among the Italians, who were changing cars from time to time to benefit all the refugees with their translations.
The translators told them that, naturally, they are being transported to a temporary refugee depot and in a short time they will be going to whatever destination they desire and would be available to them, in the West. The warnings by the Italian consulate lasted only so far!
The shabby refugee group found itself within a short time on an entire floor of a luxury hotel in Trieste. Warm baths, barbers at the ready, used but clean clothing was waiting for them and haircuts and shaves later the group would have looked reasonably acceptable on the streets of Trieste.
But most importantly, paper and pens were available so that their families would finally get their quick and enthusiastic letters, postcards, that they were well, in the free West, in Italy. After so many weeks of incertitude this was the biggest gift they could imagine. These letters, postcards were immediately mailed by Italian Red Cross personnel. It was just early afternonoon by the time the group cleaned up and wrote their letters, then met in the lobby of the hotel. They were grateful for this change in their lives and a few had tears in their eyes. The group was escorted to nearby restaurant for their main meal of the day.
They walked to this luxury restaurant in the heart of Trieste, where a whole section was closed off to them. Since not one of them spoke a word of Italian they had let the restaurant serve them at will, and were patiently awaiting their first ever Italian meal, in the free world.
It was only natural that the first course was pasta or a spaghetti in this case. And it was also certain that none of them ever had real spaghetti before, but the exciting aroma and their hunger for tasty food after so many months overcame their suspicions and started as cultured men, with fork and knife to attack the unknown delicacy. Unfortunately, the tiny bits and pieces of spaghetti after their diligent use of the knives and forks had made their task quite difficult, so the first course lasted a very long time. The serving team of the restaurant had been very patient with them and were even attempting to teach a few of the Hungarians the intricate maneuver of eating long pasta with a fork and spoon, of all things, not with knives!
After this abundant meal they were taken by several cars to the Trieste railway station where they boarded a train for Ravenna.
The station was full with crowds of people, most of who came out specifically to greet and glimpse at the Hungarian refugees. They have heard that the group was arriving from Yugoslavia on their way to Ravenna. Trieste was so close to the once, and only, Hungarian seaport Fiume, that many had felt a special kinship with historical Hungary. Fruit baskets and small gifts were handed to all, whose faces were now smiling for the attention and love that surrounded them. Indeed many felt an overwhelming humility and respect for the Italians of Trieste for this manifestation of their care and concern.
Peter, like the others was in a heightened emotional state since their arrival in this wonderful Italian city. But after so many vicissitudes, the absence of his family, the fate of mother and his younger brother who were left in Baja without a man in the house, who now are facing the harsh winter in the poorly heated, old house, weighed on him still.
All this, in a totally new world. And Trieste, with the cavalcade of Vespas and sedans on the roads, the rich store windows, the elegant men and women with their obvious carefree attitude, how different all this was from the sad, and gray Hungarian small towns, with their somber moods. Especially, the openness and unabashed joy on peoples’ faces in Trieste, by contrast, was so striking.
The train was warm and comfortable. Peter leaned out the window and grasped a man’s hand as it was extended to him from below. The couple, speaking Hungarian, came out to the station to meet the group, like the others from Trieste.
“Welcome in Italy, God bless you all, we pray for you, all Hungarians…where are you from?”
“I am from the South, a small town…” said Peter
“Yes, but which one…?”
“I am from Baja…” and the man’s face lit up…
“My mother is from Baja…we are both from Baja…and mother still lives there , today, in that town…maybe you know her…she lives on Budapest Road….the widow of Poth Gotthard?”
“Mrs.Poth? My God, … dear sir, she is our landlady, we have been renting her house for years…every month I take the rent to her, Mrs.Poth…that cannot be true!”
The train was long into the night and Peter was still thinking about the incredible meeting of the Hungarian couple in the station, before departure for Ravenna. His first hours in the West, his first meeting anyone there with whom he can communicate and they turn out to be the son of Mrs.Poth and his wife, from Baja! As they recounted the story, the son was born in Baja and after the war, in 1946 he had gotten out and settled in Trieste, here he opened a pasticeria, a coffee and cake place.
They were on the train the whole night when finally they arrived early morning in Ravenna. The local Red Cross was waiting and had them transported to the nearby Marina di Ravenna, by the Adriatic Sea.
On that wintry day in February an open transport truck carried the 62 refugee-volunteers to the border of Italy and Yugoslavia. The mountain road with its frozen surface seemed treacherous enough, so that it took some time to get on to more stable terrain. Its passengers were still feeling the embraces and well wishes, and a few concerned looks, of their compatriots who remained behind the barbed wired camp in Gerovo.
Did they make the right decision?
By the time the truck had stopped just meters from the border, the guards had to help them off the high truck as most of them were stiff and frozen from the open journey.
After some formalities, at the guards’ encouragement, the group slowly walked towards, first the Yugoslavian barrier that was then raised for them, and then through no-man’s land to the Italian barrier which was raised, also, for them to pass through.
Those 25 meters of no man’s land between the two countries became the group’s most cherished distance ever traveled in their lives!
Every step they took brought them closer to a new life they were soon to begin. The stern warning of the Italian consulate officials that they will have to remain in Italy, the prospect of unemployment did no longer matter to them.
The short road they had to take without their armed guards was the first free steps of these Hungarians since they have arrived in Yugoslavia.
One could imagine the affect of this disheveled, unshaven, pale faced group on the Italian officials waiting for them on the other side! They could still smell the unpleasant fumes of the diesel truck behind them; they could still feel the somber and perhaps envious looks of their guards on their backs as they were crossing over.
But their determined steps attested to their will and desire to accept whatever was to follow, no matter what, there was no returning now.
The emerging light from the fog had shined on a site for the 62 Hungarians that they could not have imagined in the last several weeks. Behind them closely were their former guards and the stark border office that looked more like a fort than an office. But ahead, on the other side stood a long caravan of sedans and ambulances from which white coated doctors and nurses were rushing to meet them, grabbing them by the arms, helping them to the vehicles. Not much was said, but smiles and warmth in their eyes spoke all the more. Soldiers or police were hardly visible, and the few present were helping them to get in the cars, just like the medical people.
Hot chocolate, oranges and cigarettes were offered in the cars. There were Hungarian interpreters among the Italians, who were changing cars from time to time to benefit all the refugees with their translations.
The translators told them that, naturally, they are being transported to a temporary refugee depot and in a short time they will be going to whatever destination they desire and would be available to them, in the West. The warnings by the Italian consulate lasted only so far!
The shabby refugee group found itself within a short time on an entire floor of a luxury hotel in Trieste. Warm baths, barbers at the ready, used but clean clothing was waiting for them and haircuts and shaves later the group would have looked reasonably acceptable on the streets of Trieste.
But most importantly, paper and pens were available so that their families would finally get their quick and enthusiastic letters, postcards, that they were well, in the free West, in Italy. After so many weeks of incertitude this was the biggest gift they could imagine. These letters, postcards were immediately mailed by Italian Red Cross personnel. It was just early afternonoon by the time the group cleaned up and wrote their letters, then met in the lobby of the hotel. They were grateful for this change in their lives and a few had tears in their eyes. The group was escorted to nearby restaurant for their main meal of the day.
They walked to this luxury restaurant in the heart of Trieste, where a whole section was closed off to them. Since not one of them spoke a word of Italian they had let the restaurant serve them at will, and were patiently awaiting their first ever Italian meal, in the free world.
It was only natural that the first course was pasta or a spaghetti in this case. And it was also certain that none of them ever had real spaghetti before, but the exciting aroma and their hunger for tasty food after so many months overcame their suspicions and started as cultured men, with fork and knife to attack the unknown delicacy. Unfortunately, the tiny bits and pieces of spaghetti after their diligent use of the knives and forks had made their task quite difficult, so the first course lasted a very long time. The serving team of the restaurant had been very patient with them and were even attempting to teach a few of the Hungarians the intricate maneuver of eating long pasta with a fork and spoon, of all things, not with knives!
After this abundant meal they were taken by several cars to the Trieste railway station where they boarded a train for Ravenna.
The station was full with crowds of people, most of who came out specifically to greet and glimpse at the Hungarian refugees. They have heard that the group was arriving from Yugoslavia on their way to Ravenna. Trieste was so close to the once, and only, Hungarian seaport Fiume, that many had felt a special kinship with historical Hungary. Fruit baskets and small gifts were handed to all, whose faces were now smiling for the attention and love that surrounded them. Indeed many felt an overwhelming humility and respect for the Italians of Trieste for this manifestation of their care and concern.
Peter, like the others was in a heightened emotional state since their arrival in this wonderful Italian city. But after so many vicissitudes, the absence of his family, the fate of mother and his younger brother who were left in Baja without a man in the house, who now are facing the harsh winter in the poorly heated, old house, weighed on him still.
All this, in a totally new world. And Trieste, with the cavalcade of Vespas and sedans on the roads, the rich store windows, the elegant men and women with their obvious carefree attitude, how different all this was from the sad, and gray Hungarian small towns, with their somber moods. Especially, the openness and unabashed joy on peoples’ faces in Trieste, by contrast, was so striking.
The train was warm and comfortable. Peter leaned out the window and grasped a man’s hand as it was extended to him from below. The couple, speaking Hungarian, came out to the station to meet the group, like the others from Trieste.
“Welcome in Italy, God bless you all, we pray for you, all Hungarians…where are you from?”
“I am from the South, a small town…” said Peter
“Yes, but which one…?”
“I am from Baja…” and the man’s face lit up…
“My mother is from Baja…we are both from Baja…and mother still lives there , today, in that town…maybe you know her…she lives on Budapest Road….the widow of Poth Gotthard?”
“Mrs.Poth? My God, … dear sir, she is our landlady, we have been renting her house for years…every month I take the rent to her, Mrs.Poth…that cannot be true!”
The train was long into the night and Peter was still thinking about the incredible meeting of the Hungarian couple in the station, before departure for Ravenna. His first hours in the West, his first meeting anyone there with whom he can communicate and they turn out to be the son of Mrs.Poth and his wife, from Baja! As they recounted the story, the son was born in Baja and after the war, in 1946 he had gotten out and settled in Trieste, here he opened a pasticeria, a coffee and cake place.
They were on the train the whole night when finally they arrived early morning in Ravenna. The local Red Cross was waiting and had them transported to the nearby Marina di Ravenna, by the Adriatic Sea.
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