Danube-Networkers
Concerning: Internment in Yugoslavia
Text: Lieselotte Stiegler
Our destiny of power agreement in Jalta was decided in 1945
A lot of german speaking individuals " Ethnic German" were dispossessed and expelled from there homes and yards. We were pushed in Internment camps and we had to work in different factories and in farming nonpaid only for the necessary subsistence.
Because there is no chance to life as a free human being in my homeland, I want to stay in Austria.
Franz and his wife Elfi are standing in front of the location sign Apatin, once the former Danube swabian territory Batschka, today a part of Serbia. It's Sunday the 20.08.1982. The overland bus to Vienna stops at the parking area, tourists are laughing, chatting, pushing with there camera-bags out of the bus.
Franz is standing motionless in front of the location sign, he is pulling a claim out of his coat pocket from the year 1947. Home, am I now in my home country ? He is reading the words on the backside of the claim he wrote at that time:
- Homeless with my thoughts
- Homeless with the vanishing point of my love
- Homeless with the testament of my ancestors
- Homeless in a city behind the border
- Homeless with the wind, which is shouting my name
- A foreigner - an invisible note in the face of the others.
He is holding on to the hand of his wife Elfi, which is still standing next to him. Than he moves slowly in small steps passing by the location sign. He is turning round, smiling at his wife. It nearly feels as if he is passing a border crossing. It is not a border in real times, for Franz it's steps in his homeland. Dreams, happenings, the past ,pictures turn real for the moment.
He was born in Budapest in 1921. he was four years old when he moved back to his homeland, to Apatin - a town by the Danube, a canton called Zapadna Backa.
His grandfather was very proud of his home and told Franz lot's of stories about his ancestors, who started colonizing in 1748 to Danube - swabia.
But at the beginning Franz didn't understand a word of German, he spoke hungarian with his parents. He felt like a stranger at playschool, he stood in a corner and cried.
He could not communicate with the other children, he always looked forward to the evenings by the fireplace in the little house of his grandfather. He would sit on grandfathers lap while he was singing german songs for him.
"Youngster" you are now at home and you will learn to love them, told him the grandfather. And he learned very quickly to love them and was quick at learning the german language. But from this time he certainly refused to speak Hungarian to his parents.
Franz is holding on to his wife's hand, smiling at her and takes her in his past. He is passing by the catholic church Maria Himmelfahrt, built in 1748. Franz takes devoutly one step after the next in direction to the center. He remembers the time when they were kids, playing and running barefoot after the ball on the street. After a small turning they arrive at his school. The building has been renovated, but the old maple tree is still there, proud and brave at the schoolyard. He is resting his hand on the trunk of the tree to feel for the grooving that he once carved in the bark with his friends. Only a few steps away is the house of his former Hungarian teacher, where he was taught in commercial education. He gave the little apprentice's premium to his mother, sometimes he kept a little bit and saved it so he could drive to Sombor with his friends a few times a year, that's where the first cinema was build in the Balkan.
Than the war started and Franz wanted to become a solder at the german armed forces. He remembers the long discussion with his mother, she was warning him and convinced him to complete his military service at the Hungarian army.
Now he is very grateful to his mother for the wise decision guidance, as many friends of him were killed in this cruel war by the guerrillas.
Franz is now standing outside his parents house, listening to happy children's voices from the garden. He closes his eyes, feels as the pain takes possession of his body. He can see his mother and father, how they took their little belongings, they could get hold of to load it on the wooden - carriage. It was March 11, 1945. Dispossessed, outlawed, displaced. They were brought to Gakova concentration camp, divided to forced labor. A lot of their friends were murdered, tortured from the guerillas.
"I can't delete this awful pictures out of my mind. Blood, blood in the steps of fizzled out feet", Franz whispers. He pulls his wife by her hand, turns round and starts running. "It's good to listen to the happy laughter of Children", he recalls. They are now in the center at the market place in front of the city hall. To the right of them is the new orthodox church, the cathedral of the holy apostle. It is on the riverbank of the Danube.
The Danube, the second biggest river in Europe, which left a lot of traces in its bordering countries. A river sung about by Ovid, Peter Esterhazy to Johann Strauss.
The Danube, it's histories, fortunes, crying and laughing, which carried a lot of people through countries.
Franz and Elfi seat themselves on the bank.
"Here my grandfather began suicide 87 years ago", Franz says quietly. Tears are running down his cheeks. "He left us only one sentence in his farewell letter in shaky writing: 'Please forgive me, I can't life like this anymore, heritage chain my heritage.'". Franz is holding his hand in the Danube water, hugging his wife Elfi, he whispers in her ear: "I can feel the Vulnerableness on this earth, but I place the earnest of homeland in your hand: love".
Franz managed in 1947 to escape illegally to Austria , got married to Elfi in 1949 and became his Austrian citizenship in 1951. He also managed to bring his parents over to Austria in 1956.
He was a migrant, a home seeking, a foreigner. He died as a foreigner on a journey to turkey in April 16, 1997. Franz M., a foreigner - an invisible notice in a foreign country.
