War and Peace in the Refugee Camp

We had one room in the refugee camp.  The three of us: my mother, her nephew (my cousin), and myself.  My cousin was a little boy of two when his mother was killed during the war.  His father (my mother’s brother) was on the front lines, fighting the Serb aggressors, and when he was not “on duty,” my mother took care of his little boy. 

            After almost nine months in the war, we left, like many other women and children, in a convoy which led to the Czech Republic.  One suitcase.  It was the end of November.  Upon our arrival to the refugee camp, situated about 80 kilometers from Prague, we realized that most of the clothes which we packed were for spring and summer.  But no matter.  Somehow we kept going.

            We spent almost four years in the refugee camp before we came to the United States.  During that time, many journalists and news people came through the doors of what once was a summer camp for kids.  I was interviewed for the radio, television, and newspapers.  They wanted a child’s perspective I suppose. 

            I was happy to oblige.  Part of me hoped that someone out there would hear my story and rescue me.  I hoped that I will be saved from this wretched life in the camp.  A foolish wish, I know, but the naïve wish was not without substance.  It had an element of hope.

            But most of me simply loved talking to people.

            “Ah, you wish to interview me?  Why, of course, darling.”

            I am not sure what the purpose of such interviews was.  To gain the attention of the world because nobody is paying attention to the Bosnian war?  To show some pitiful little Bosnian girl (namely, me) in a perpetual state of sadness?  Good luck with that.  I’ve had plenty of darkness in me but pity was never part of my being.

            The journalists always left.  No matter how many came through the gates of the camp, eventually, all of them left.  None ever returned.  Despite the fact that I knew within me perfectly well that the journalists had no obligation to rescue me, my soul kept hoping and waiting.  Perhaps it is just the mere thought of salvation, which prevented me from committing suicide.

            One day, a freelance journalist working for The Prague Post came into the camp.  She wrote an article on two families in the camp, we being one of them.  I write “families” reluctantly because every family was broken up and was missing fathers, husbands, brothers, uncles. 

            Her name was Eva and she was a kind woman.  An American with Czech roots, she was fluent in both languages.  We spoke in both.  I showed her around our room as if it was an estate.  In reality, it was just one room with designated corners for each person.  My corner had books, a huge poster of Keanu Reeves who was the latest on my list of gorgeous actors, and quotes from Goethe, blending the high and low culture I suppose.

            She asked questions, which we expected.  How did we get to the camp, where are we from, how did I learn English, what are our hopes.  In the article, Eva included quotes from an essay I wrote in English while living in the camp.  It was hardly anything of incredible depth but perhaps I am being hard on myself, and am looking at my work from a level of a PhD student.   

            Although meant to be a theoretical essay on the notion of intolerance and tolerance, it primarily ended up being a reflection on Bosnia and the world which I was quickly losing.  I saw it slipping away.  The biggest question was will the war ever end and when will I be reunited with my father? 

Of course now I know that the war never ends.  It is perpetually in the present tense, even as time passes.  The possibility of peace will never be there, and I knew it even then.  Already in the camp, the stain of evil was changing my world view. 

            The question which ran through my essay was “why?”  Indeed why.  I was 14 or 15 years old when I wrote that essay, and was wondering why.  I am 34 years old now, and I am still wondering why.  The “why” is not historical or political – in other words, asked with specificity of events, although the specificity must be explored.  My version of “why” was and still is quite simply human, related to human suffering and pain.

            Eva left.  She printed our story in the newspaper.  I don’t remember whether she came back to deliver the newspaper to us, or whether she mailed it.  If you ask me now to remember it, then maybe on the more hopeful and peaceful days, Eva came back.  Maybe on the more dark days, she did not.  But she certainly came once.  And I opened the door to her.