By Maksim Rakipaj
The twentieth part
Memorie.al/ Maksim Rakipaj, originally from Përmet, whose family had helped and supported the Anti-Fascist National Liberation War, after graduating from the Navy School in Vlorë, in 1972 he was appointed an officer in the Merchant Navy, where he served with dedication until in 1977, on the “Durrësi” steamer, he was arrested and sentenced to 15 years in political prison, as part of a “group”, which also included his colleague, Aladin Kapo, the son of Hysni Kapo’s brother. Family biography was also the reason for his punishment. After the end of the war, two of his uncles were sentenced to political prison, his grandfather was declared a kulak and in 1976, his father was expelled from the party. Maksi began serving his sentence in the Ballsh camp and in 1979, he was transferred to the Spaçi camp and then to the Qafë Bari camp. He was released on September 12, 1984, benefiting from a reduced sentence, from an amnesty. After being unemployed for a long time, with many hardships, he got a job as a miner in the Mzezet mine, he worked until 1991. After the 1991s, he started working in the administration of the Municipality of Durrës, he served until 1997 and after that, he returned to the Merchant Navy (the last captain of the transoceanic ship “Vlora”), until he left Albania for Italy, (illegally on a dinghy), where he currently lives for many years. Since the 90s, in addition to various jobs, Maksim Rakipaj has also devoted himself to writing, such as; poetry, prose, fiction or documentary, translations, etc., publishing several books, such as: ‘Prophet – Khalil Gibran’, (translation from English ‘Toena’ 2003), ’20 love poems and a song of sadness’, (translation from Spanish, ‘Toena’ 2003), ‘Alive after the shipwreck’, (published by ISKK, 2014), ‘Bukowski – poetry’, (translation from English, ‘ENEAS’, 2015), ‘Trilusa m’Tirône’, ( translation from Italian, ‘UEGEN’, 2015), ‘Anthology of Arabic-Persian Poetry’ (English translations, ‘UEGEN’, 2015), ‘The Complete Sonnets of Shakespeare’, (English translation, ‘ADA’ 2016′) , ‘Survivor’ (autobiographical novel, ‘2 East, 2 West’ 2018), ‘Nobelists – poetic anthology, (UEGEN 2019), ‘Hymn of happiness’ (‘JOZEF’ 2023), etc. From the creativity of Mr. Rakipaj, Memorie.al is publishing the book “Survivor”, (published in 2022 by “JOZEF” Publishing House in Durrës, directed by Mr. Aurel Kaçulini), where he has described his life chronologically, where the part the main one is that of serving the sentence in camps and prisons, as well as various characters, his co-sufferers that he met in the communist hell, etc.
Continues from last issue
November ’82 – a bloody amnesty
Even the amnesty that the “vampire of Tirana” announced with great fanfare was made. We had the idea that less than half would remain in the Spaçi camp, because when we heard it on TV, he said: “If in the capitalist world the prisons are full, in socialist Albania, they are empty”! Rumors started immediately, introduced by the Security people: “Mehmet has artificially intensified the class war, because his goal was to antagonize the people with the party and Comrade Enver…!
Until now, in political prisons, there have been people who were related to members of the Political Bureau, also related to Enver, Hysniu, Ramiz, Adil and many others…! But he never had relatives with Mehmet, in political prisons…!? Even from Mehmet’s village, Çorrushi i Mallakastra, there is only Hysen Haxhia, whose family has always had a bad relationship with the Shehu’s. Here, and Hysen Haxhina, they have just re-sentenced him”!
So, few were released from Spaçi, that we didn’t feel at all that the amnesty was done, right? Our bedrooms are full as before, narrow spaces, we are again 50 people in one room, in beds, with three floors. I was hoping to move a little, because I am under the concrete architrave and every time I get up, I have to be careful not to hit my head on the concrete. But no, no one was released from my room, where 52 people sleep. I conveyed those few friends of mine who were released: Zydi, Islam, Gezim and, some others. I got two and a half years off the sentence.
…On Monday back to work, as if nothing had happened. Those few companions and friends left and left the sadness here…! “Will we ever be able to get out of here…”? The re-convicted do not get a single day off. Today I am on the 2nd shift. I have in my hand a volume of stories and novellas in English by Dymfna Cusack. I have to copy it, writing it in a notebook, to translate it later. The book is by Robert Vulkani, I have to return it tomorrow, because there are others waiting for their turn. There before drake, shots are heard. With bursts. They seem to come from around the mine. “Ah, they killed someone”! “Today they found the day to kill…”?!
The first news came: “They shot and killed one of Tropoje, who was working with the maintenance brigade. He had gone to get the concrete pillars to put them in the gallery. The sign with the note NDAL was posted by the soldiers the day before saw and they had placed it almost next to the entrance of the gallery, so the concrete pillars remained a few meters further. Where the soldier could kill you. The unfortunate man took the concrete pillars there every day, and he did not notice that the sign Stop, they had changed his place. However, the soldiers who served in the place of high guards, knew him.
It was time for the changing of the guards. The shift manager accompanied the soldiers who would receive the service. He saw the convict Rexhep Goci, who put the concrete pillar on his shoulder. Meanwhile, the guard soldier took aim and loaded his gun. The manager called to him: “Don’t shoot”! Annoyed, the soldier lowered his gun. Suddenly a volley was heard. The soldier of the nearby guard shot…! And how could he let this chance to win two weeks leave and a medal…?! The whole village would envy him, who killed an enemy of the party, his father and mother would brag about him, the most beautiful girls of the village would wait in line, the letter that the commissar would send, would be framed.
I remember that when the articles of amnesty were announced, the late Rexhep said sadly: “No! For a week, I can’t win release, if I had it behind me and a week in prison, tomorrow I would be in prison”! He had seven children and a wife waiting for him. He worked as a horse, all the money he earned from work, he sent to his family in a deep village of Tropoja. It was one of the rare ones that his family did not help him in prison, but this one from prison helped his family. They killed him. With a concrete pillar on the shoulder. When they went to get the body, they found the camp’s retired mule, “Mulon”, sitting at his head and looking at the murdered man, with those big, wet eyes. Even when the small group of convicts put the corpse on the stretcher and took the road to the camp, “Mulo” followed them with a slow step, like a corpse. May God bless you, the late Rexhep Goci!
Immediately in the evening, we were ordered to line up on the terrace: “Run, run! Quickly! Play daggers”! We lined up. Silence. On the balcony of the first floor of the palace of the unemployed, command officers and the Commandant of Prison Camps appeared as if on a podium. A dog son of a dog, known to all the convicts, Kasëm Kaçi. Kasem Kaçi starts barking: “Today, one of you went to cross the camp wires. He got what he asked for. If there are others like him, we will kill them too. This is how you reward the Party!? We with bread and you with stones! We with all the good and you with poison”?!
In the middle of a deep silence, two shots were heard, one from the left of over a thousand convicts: “MURDERERS”!… and after a while, from the right: “CRIMINALS”!… gone, completely clearly. Kasem Kaçi hungered: Who spoke…?! Who…?!
The cops were let out sniffing, and barking: “Hum-kum-ku-ku-who-fo-fo-fo????……?!”
Amnesty?!
“While in the capitalist world prisons are full, in socialist Albania they are empty. Tomorrow in the newspaper it will be officially announced”! – declared the vampire Enver Hoxha, in November ’82 on TV. There had been talk of a prison amnesty for some time. For 20 years, there has been no amnesty and people were hoping…! Here, finally, the long-awaited amnesty. Various comments began: How will this amnesty be, who it catches and who it doesn’t…! Optimism was in the sky.
I thought that for me too, the long-awaited day came. I called Zydi Morva, Hiqmet Myzyri and we went to drink in a coffee shop, in the place where it was allowed, in the “private kitchen”. After drinking the coffee, it became a habit to return the cup. There were “cup specialists” there too. I and many of my friends did not believe in these things, however, most of them turned it down, knowing that the “specialist” would lie to them as always.
We drank the coffee, turned the cups upside down and were smoking a cigarette, when behind my back, Dhosi Leka spoke in my ear: “Turn the cup a little, because I can’t see it well, don’t move, because I don’t want them to find out, that I see a cup “! After a while, he spoke to me again: “I saw… I’m waiting for you outside”! Curious as to what Dhosi would tell me, I followed him.
Dhosi was over 70 years old, with one glass eye. They had sentenced him to 25 years. Despite the age difference, he often stayed with me, especially when, a year ago, both of his sons escaped to Greece. I didn’t know that Dhosi looked at the cup, he seemed like a down to earth person, anyway I was curious, what would my friend tell me about the cup…!
I reached him outside in the yard, he was wandering alone waiting for me: “Ah, you came…?! Listen to me carefully. First, don’t tell the man that I saw your cup, I haven’t seen a cup for so many years, the other, about the cup. You are very happy today, because your mind is lying to you, that you are freed, but no, you are not. You still have a lot of suffering. You change prisons, then you are released. But even after the release, I saw a lot of black things about you…! Too late, you’ll laugh, boy. Don’t worry, you’re young and don’t believe what I told you. These cup chats are stupid!
I didn’t believe what Dhosi told me, I thought, I was now in Durrës…! Enver Hoxha said it himself… “Our prisons are empty…”! – then, what crime have I committed?!
…The next day I found out that I only had 2 and a half years to live, I still had 7 years left…! After a week, I was sent to Qaf – Bar, which would be the last station for me, in the communist political prisons of Enver Hoxha.
CHAPTER IV
“Re-education” continues in Qaf-Bar
Bus travel is difficult. We were killed by 15 people, inside it and after 10 minutes, you have to breathe from the stale air, from someone’s vomit, which is taken up by the car. We are the first group to leave from Spaçi, to Qaf-Bar. After several hours of travel, as if inside a can, we arrive at the Qaf-Bari camp. The camp is built on a hillside. In some two-story buildings, they are the bedrooms.
The rooms are small, the beds are double, not three, as in Spaç; we fall asleep, from 8 people in the room. Above the bedrooms, there is a promenade and above, the private kitchen. In front of the bedrooms, there is the pantry and the kitchen; behind the canteen, the ambulance building. Opposite, you can see the other side of the hill with pine trees, always green. When you enter the camp, on the right side, is the pyrite mine. Before us, there were the ordinary convicts of Bulqiza, who moved them to make room for us. The command of the former ordinary camp and the police remained.
They are all divorced. From time to time, the auto prison brings others from Spaçi, but also from the Zejmeni camp. They say that Ballshit Camp is closing. The first brigade, which will begin the exploitation of the mine, was created. I am the only miner in the brigade, here we work according to the tradition of Bulqiza. The command and the police are not, as in Spaç, specialized in running a political camp. The primary thing here is the realization of the plan, the performance of tasks. It works well for me, the hammers are of the Chinese type, lighter, with faster turns.
There is enough air coming from the compressors; only i’m a miner. Agim Agaraj, my friend, former officer in the Submarine Brigade, works in the compressor room. Even the selection criteria are not like those of Spaçi, where only spies and collaborators of the command and operative work in the technical office, etc.
For example, Kujtim Prendi, from Tirana, one of Spaç’s best sons, has become a brigadier; Dalip Zhaboli, is the head of the Technical Office; other honest people also work in that office; it’s Jani Pano and the tyrant Vedat Buzi. Aladdin works in the bread division and is the vice chef. Even the doctors of the camp are wonderful people: the Montenegrin Drago Vujosevic and the unforgettable Ben Çeta. Suddenly, people feel more relaxed; it is not that constant tension of Spaci.
Even the cooking seems to be better. Meetings with the family are held inside a room, not like in Spaç, on foot to the big gate of the camp. Working as a miner is fine for me. The freelance mining engineer, a guy from Pogradec, is satisfied with the quality of my work. For the camp command, the miner’s work is fundamental to the realization of the plan. In Bulqiza, miners are privileged. Here, as a miner, I enter the mine 2-3 hours after the brigade and the compressors are turned on 10 minutes after I enter the gallery.
The miner has to make beers, on all fronts; even in collapses, where 3 meters or more are needed. For the reinforcement of the galleries, there is a special brigade, which also deals with the laying of rails, air pipes, etc. Many of my friends from Spaci want to work as miners. I, as the first miner that I am, am speechless. I am also friends with Dalip, Vedat, etc. With my intervention, miners started working, the unforgettable Tom Ndoja, Gëzim Medolli, Xhemal Tota and others, which I don’t remember.
But over time, brigades and tours were added. We quickly become about 400 people in Qaf-Bar. From Burreli, where he was sent after his re-conviction, comes the well-known singer, Sherif Merdani. Foreign languages are taught freely. It has been some time, since the influence of Visar, that my love for poetry has returned. Even Zydiu wrote wonderful poems in Spaç, which he hid underground, together with Tofik Dobrolishti. But Visari is a great poet for me; when he likes one of my translations, I am very happy. There are many who have memorized my translation of the hymn poem; “INVICTUS” by William Henley, a poem that many have tried to translate here: Sheriff, Visar.
It’s cold here. It snows more than in Spaç, but we miners have an alcove that we use to keep clothes and work tools. We also have a barrel designed as a stove, where we warm up before entering the gallery. Even the accompanying policeman of the brigade, stay with us until it’s time to enter the gallery. It is bulqizak, they call it Beqir Biu. The camp commander’s sister is Beqir’s wife. All the time he chats with the other miners around the burning stove. I stay away from the fire, I get close enough to make coffee, which I drink calmly, away from others, there in my corner. Sometimes I also receive a poem to translate. I am satisfied with the work of the miner; with all the dangers it brings.
One night, when we were on the 3rd shift, policeman Beqiri spoke to me: “Oh you, moustache, come closer, don’t stay away from us. Tell us who you are, where you are from…”?! But before I could get closer, the others counted them all: “It’s durrsak, captain of the steamer.” There’s everything in the world, Max, O commander Beqiri…”! and many more, leaving Beqiri speechless…! “Don’t sit down here and talk to us, because I’m tired of cotton, I’m fed up…! “Don’t tell us at once, some external nonsense”!
I did as he told me, but he immediately understood that I was not much after the conversation. However, as a sign of friendship, he offered me a cigarette from his pack and for himself, shook it from my tobacco pouch. Things you couldn’t think of in Spaç. The policeman who exchanges cigarettes with the convict, in front of others?! What is happening…?!
KOSOVO ALBANIANS
When I was in the 7-year-old school “Hasan Koçi”, in Shkozet, Xhavit Podini taught us the subject of history and geography. Anyone who attended that school in the 60s remembers Mr. Xhavit, a handsome man with a black mustache. He started talking about the mountain of Dëmbel, or Tomorri and ended by talking about the mountain of Pashtriku; he had to explain to us about Vjosa, Shkumbin, but he was talking about the rivers, streams and creeks of his Kosovo.
Not even the bell, which announced the end of the lesson, stopped Mr. Xhavit, when he had to explain the uprisings and wars of the Kosovars, in the years 1910-1911. The League of Prizren hour lasted the whole week. I was a good student at school, I respected all my teachers, but I loved Mr. Xhavit. I wanted his Kosovo, ours. Mr. Xhaviti could not accept it, he could not understand it, he did not know how to explain to us either, why beautiful Kosovo, a place of brave men and rare beauties, was outside the borders. It also put love for Kosovo in my blood.
We have had many Kosovars in prison, but the Kosovars who did not have Albanian citizenship were imprisoned in a separate annex. This special place in the Ballsh camp was called the “Shelter of immigrants”, of foreigners. Those who had received the dreamed Albanian citizenship were in our prisons, together with us. I wrote about the Kosovar doctor, Jetullah, who was in Spaç. A man of character, like the heroes of without end stories, Mr. Xavit. But with Dr. Jetullah, I only had one greeting. I had a friendship with a bloodsucker, Hasan Kukal. He escaped from Kosovo, quite a young man.
He came to the land of dreams, to the motherland of all, Albania. He thought he would find the happiest country in the world, the richest, Enver Hoxha’s Albania, which terrified all the country’s enemies, “I trembled, I went Greek, Italian and Russian, and whoever came before him “…! He found a silent, miserable, poor country, with people who were afraid to say what they thought, an Enver, who made a people of slave’s tremble, who, with torn shoes and empty stomachs, filled the rally squares, screaming: “Party-Enver, we are ready whenever”.
As for the world, he understood that it did not care for Albania and the Albanians. They let us eat each other and hosanna to a filthy high school pervert and enjoy watching from afar how it went; “the Albanian experiment”, which continues, continues…!
Lively, outgoing, joker as he was, Hasan Kukali soon found himself in prison. He worked in the mine, in Spaç, and no one ever saw him upset or angry. Hasan kept everyone alive with his jokes. At the time of the war in Kosovo, ’99, I worked as the head of the office in the Municipality, for the Coordination of Support for War Refugees in Durrës. Imagine my joy when, as soon as I left work and was on my way home, I saw Hasan Kukal. A “Mercedes” stopped at my feet, in the passenger’s seat, my friend Hasani was standing with his teeth clenched.
He refused to come home: “I don’t have time, Max, have a drink with me and I have to go.” We sat in a bar. “Max, this man here is my uncle hahahaha”…! The other, who was the uncle, frowned: “Don’t eat shit Hasan, you know serious, you’re a bloody glutton”?! Hasani was already laughing: “No, no, no, I won’t tell him now, later, when we go, I’ll tell Max, who the hell are you”! “And fuck you, hopefully! I’m sorry, bro, but you know Hasan, I have nothing to talk about, where does this guy leave me to chat…”!
We each took a double shot of brandy and told each other about life after prison.
– “Did you go to Kosovo, Hasan”?
– “Well bro, in 1992 I went to Gjakova. From there to my village, I made my way on my feet, I longed to walk on my feet, I enjoyed every step, every step I took. As soon as I entered the village, I saw children playing in the street. Can you tell me, I told you, where is the village school? ‘Yessss’ – everyone left with me…! “There it was, right there…”! My knees were cut. The school building was almost completely destroyed. I sat squarely; my eyes filled with tears. I was 15-16 years old, when I left Kosovo, Gjakova, and I was coming back for so many years, I saw that we were ruined like myself…! The children were looking at me without speaking’.
– Come on, happy Max, happy honey, don’t pay attention to me…! Do you know that I am also a uncle, that’s how they have political prisoners in Kosovo?! Do you know why?! Because he loved Enver Hoxha! Do you know how much prison you spend?! Two years! And his grandson, who cursed Enver Hoxha, spent 10 years in prison in Albania!
– We were stupid, bro, we didn’t know, now I’m finding out, that Enveri has a puppy to the Serbs, who delivered 5 thousand Kosovar boys to Tito and the Serbs killed them, like bears, in Tivar. Now I am also finding out about the secret agreement between Enver and Tito, for the mutual return of the fugitives, and the others. My eyes have been opened, but there are still many Kosovars, who have sold their souls to hell, named Enver…”! Memorie.al
The next issue follows
