By Nestor Topencharov
The fifth part
THE DRAMA OF LIFE
(THE STORY OF A FAMILY)
I dedicate this book to: All fellow sufferers. Their families. And in particular, to people who did not have the opportunity to tell the odyssey of life, during the communist dictatorship.
FOREWORD
Memorie.al / I were born in the city of Korça, on October 22, 1953. I left Albania in October 1990, after we were given the right to repatriate to Yugoslavia (now North Macedonia) ). In June 1992, I emigrated to Italy, where I still live today. Although I have been away for 32 years, I did not cut ties, as Albania was the country of my birth, where I spent 37 years, and that part of my blood is Albanian. Years later, the ties with Albania were strengthened, as I also took my wife from Durrës. We came every year on vacation, but the short time of our stay meant that many contacts were cut off. However, true friends and comrades remained forever in my heart.
In the last three years, I did not have the opportunity to visit Albania. But during 2022, I came several times. My commitment on the one hand and the coincidence on the other, made it possible for me to re-establish connections with friends and colleagues whom I had not seen for decades. Knowing my past, some of them advised me to write down what had happened in my life. At first, this idea seemed like a utopia to me, since even though I had been a good student; I had no inclination towards drafting. Then I reflected. I would just write my story, true events, where not much inspiration was needed. Perhaps a writer would know how to present these events, as a true pen artist knows. While I will write them, without many descriptions: briefly, simply, naked, as they happened.
Something else that pushed me even more to write this book was an interview on TV Klan, which I saw in October of this year, directed by the well-known journalist Blendi Fevziu. I didn’t seek revenge. But I didn’t even have justice. With the help of this book, I will make known to the Albanian public opinion, the role of the individuals who contributed to my suffering and that of my family. And today, I am putting my finger on these “beings”, not for the task they had, but for the way they performed it. I will start my writing with my grandfather, from my mother’s side, to continue with my father, where I will touch on the most important moments of their lives. This will help the reader to know my background.
Then I will also talk about myself. In this book I will also tell some events, one more dramatic than the other, that happened to people I had the honor of knowing. I am glad that many books have been published about the suffering and persecution of “enemies of the people” and their families in internment camps and prisons during the communist dictatorship. I was able to read some of these works. I believe that this book, in a modest way, will contribute to know even more the inhuman methods of the State Security, the way they created accusations and how they destroyed people and families to keep the people under terror.
The author
December, 2022
Continues from last issue
CHAPTER TWO
After what he told us, he began to cry again, repeating that he knew nothing. Later, when he calmed down a bit, I told him to be careful and not take innocent people by the neck. Whatever it was. “As for running away without permission, you have committed a violation that the law will catch you,” I told him.
Then I added:
– “Tighten your butt, face it yourself and do prison like men”.
After these words, Maqo did not feel, but I also saw Josif who leaned in his corner, silent. Maybe he was also reflecting on what I had said.
The next day, Maqo was taken away and never returned. I thought of many variants that could have happened to him, but then I forgot his story.
I would not have known what the outcome of his last meeting in Dega would have been, if officer Niko had not come to Spač. After a few days that he was in the camp (I was in Spaç, a few months before him), I approached him as if from the area of Korça where he was and greeted him. After he told me how much he had been punished, I asked him about Maqo. He had been his main witness. I did not answer the question of how I knew. “I heard here in the camp”, I answered. Bringing this truth to light would not free Nikon, but for me, it would be a new punishment.
Several days had passed since Maqo was no longer in our dungeon. For more than two months, Joseph and I woke up and slept in the same dungeon. In that environment, the difference between day and night was not much understood. I had lost track of the day of the week, or the date of the month. Every 24 hours, it was similar. I had difficulty orienting myself in time, but it was easy for me to understand the mood of the dungeon mate.
As soon as he started a movement, I knew that he would lie down or be carried, when he wanted to talk, and when he didn’t. I looked at him as if he wanted to say something to me, but he didn’t have the courage. He wandered around the dungeon, chewing. Then he sat down next to me and told me something, which I could not imagine.
They had brought him from Spaçi, to discover my hostile activity. I was frozen. I could not understand the meaning of these words. Until that moment, I had not known that I had been such a dangerous enemy. I never thought that the security agencies would engage in such a secret operation to bring in a prisoner. An associate of theirs, to provoke me and spy on me, to find out. “What”???!!!
As I explained above, we were a family that looked after our work and did no harm to man. The father, a man who stuck to his job until the end. He retired in March, and managed to get his pension only once. It seems that the dictatorship was doing well, as long as it was at work. They replaced him with two specialists. Mom was a homemaker and always kept the house in order and checked our progress at school. I was a wise and studious boy. Sister, regular girl and good student.
Not having even very close relatives, we have generally lived a family life. As it seemed to us the Home Branch had a different opinion. I now connected this: With the widespread slander of the Security in the city, that they had found a radio transmitter and a large photograph of Tito in our house. With the watch. With multiple home controls.
With the thread of the electrical cable in the basement. With the suit tags, which were supposed to be Yugoslavian branded. With the gold coins, with which the agents were paid. And finally, with the presence of their man in the dungeon. Apparently, in their imagination, we were the ideal people.
Knowing that the accusations made against me had no basis, I was calm, that everything would be clarified. But after that I was no longer sure, as State Security was trying to turn that sick imagination into reality. I never thought that they would have organized to this point, doing everything possible, to convict two innocent people.
I, from the beginning, noticed some things that did not go to Josif, as a boy from Tirana with sneakers. When I asked him, he explained that since he was going to escape, he wanted to look like a villager, so as not to be noticed. I didn’t tell him that at that time, even the villagers wore shoes. But even the clothes he was wearing did not fit him. They were tight.
When we talked about Tirana, his city, some new changes that had been made in the center, he did not know. I knew the capital, even before I came to the faculty, as we often came as a family to the house where we had lived and where we were warmly welcomed. That’s how I knew the changes in the capital.
Another thing was that no one came to Joseph’s meeting to bring him change. This could happen. But the other thing that didn’t go well was that the policeman, the commander of the dungeons, Haxhiu, bought him white cheese, or kackavall, sugar and cookies every week. At first he told me that he had some money with him and his interrogator had allowed that money to buy him food. Weeks and months passed, the food continued and the money did not end.
It had caught my eye, since when we were going to the bathroom, the service policemen were looking at Josif and talking among themselves, in a low voice. I have a habit of not asking too much, but I also believe in people.
Joseph then showed me that he had developed a great respect for me. Not only as an honest and characterful person, who in these months had resisted the strong pressure of the investigation, with the serious accusations they made against me, but also for the way I spoke to Maqo, to face his problem . He knew that what he told me, if found out, would be fatal for him. But the trust it created and the desire to open up were stronger.
He came from a communist family. It was true that he had been caught at the border. But this happened almost 10 years ago and at that time, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison. He had health problems and for this reason, he did not work in the mine. Some time ago, the camp operative contacted him, putting a lot of pressure on him to help them.
“It is about a very important case”, – and then he added: “This matter is under the attention of the Internal Branch of Korça. Therefore, for this mission, you are very necessary”. The operator had closed the conversation.
The situation for Joseph was very difficult. On the one hand, the threat that they might punish him again, as he was associated with people who had been convicted in the Spaçi revolt. On the other hand, he would look at who he would spy on and, he would try not to harm himself, not to harm them.
– “If it wasn’t me,” added Joseph, “someone else would come to do this stinking job.” He swore to me that this would be the first and last time he was used in this role.
He asked me for a favor. When I came to Spaç, someone from my fellow believers would meet me. Not since the first days, of course, since the new arrivals in those days were monitored to see which people they would talk to and with which group they would hang out. I gave him my word.
When I went to Spaç, he came and met me, introduced me, saying that I was Nestor, the friend from the dungeon, with who he had been together for 4 months. With this, he proved his honesty to you. During the years I was in Spaç, I had only one greeting with Josif, from afar. This was necessary, to save each other. Someone in the camp spoke suspiciously of him as having once escaped as a dungeon spy. But I, who knew the truth, remained silent and kept my mouth shut.
In the beginning, when they took me to the interrogator, Josif told me, they often took him as well and turned him in front of me, so that he would not be understood. The questions were, what I told about the accusations against me, if I mentioned any names, any contacts, what I said about my father, about the embassy and about Yugoslavia. I remember that at that time, I had told all the investigators to Joseph, I had nothing to hide. He repeated my words to you, which did not satisfy their demands.
This situation continued until the moment of the confession. They often told him that it was impossible for me, so young in age, to have experience so as not to fall prey to provocations. That according to them, I was too dangerous and had too many secrets. Since the pressures were becoming strong for him as well, he had been asked for permission to provoke me, to beat me. They did not want this, because in this way, they would burn the role of provocateur and spy. But this, on the other hand, eased the pressure on him.
We are in December. In the investigator, both for me and for Josif, there was no change. The same questions and the same answers in the investigator, the same stories in the dungeon and the same retellings from Joseph, the investigators. Koçollari continued his investigation for almost two months. I am calling this the second period, since the first was with Reshat, which lasted two weeks. He, like his boss, did not keep any type of minutes.
Maybe he still didn’t have clear ideas about why he would finally accuse me. The questions were always general and there was nothing concrete. The help they expected from Joseph failed. First, because he had nothing to reveal and secondly, because now I had become more careful, not to fall into the trap they were trying to set me up.
The monotony of my investigation was broken one day. The police came, and after handcuffing me, he took me to an investigation office. Behind the desk Irakliu, who seemed different to me that day? He had gained the security of the first days. He looked at me with a triumphant look. In front of him on the desk was a file. I thought what had happened, what a new thing he had invented! He took out a letter from the file, which he put on top of it, and in a strict tone demanded to know what connected me with Vasfi Samim.
With Dr. I knew Samin in the faculty, in the third year. At that time, he was retired, but he often came to the halls and laboratories of Veterinary and Animal Husbandry, where he gave his valuable contribution to the lectures and practices of cattle breeding. The doctor was very passionate in the field of animal husbandry. He had dedicated his whole life to Albanian livestock. He had collaborated with Dr. Bilal Golem. He was among the founders of the veterinary and zootechnical service in the country.
The interest in learning something more than what I was getting from the faculty banks and the same interest in the science of cattle breeding made us friends. He invited me to his house for a visit, where he introduced me to his wife and two sons. His house was near the Madrasah, on “Rrugë e Dibra”. The building was one story, very beautiful and surrounded by fruit trees. What struck me when I walked in were several pages of walls, floor to ceiling, full of books? The house was very tastefully furnished and created a very pleasant atmosphere. Order and cleanliness prevailed.
In the last two years of the faculty, I had the topic of the diploma with Prof. Drita Çaushi, head of the Department of Genetics – Selection. The topic was developed in four agricultural economies, two farms and two agricultural cooperatives, in the district of Tirana. This allowed me to meet many specialists and employees of the sector and helped me to enrich my knowledge in the field of cattle.
In parallel with this study, with Dr. Samin, we were working on a Manual for technicians and foreman of the economy, with milk cows. This book would help in their daily work. It was also accompanied by humorous sketches, to make its use more pleasant and effective. We also relied on a book in this field, in the Bulgarian language, which I owned.
During the summer, the doctor and his wife came for vacation in the city of Pogradec, and from there he wrote me this letter, which Irakliu held in front of him, as a proof of my guilt. I was proud, that I had known a personality of these dimensions, in the field of Albanian veterinary and animal husbandry. It was a privilege for me, that he treated me not only as a book collaborator, but also as a family friend. –
“Tell us about the enemy Samimi”! Irakli continued.
– “Where were you known and what hostile activity did you do?” Now you have to explain to us, since we have all the facts”.
He waited for my answer and occasionally glanced at the paper in front of him.
– “I met the doctor at the faculty,” I answered. – He was my professor. When in your opinion he is an enemy of the government, how did you give him the right to give lectures to the younger generation?
After this answer, which left him speechless, the nervous Koçollari immediately called the police, who returned me to the cell. This was the shortest investigation I did during those months.
I remember the last night I faced him. We were in his bedroom. He was sitting on the side of the bed, while he left me standing, as always, in the middle of the room. He started making the same accusations against me, but with a difference. This time he openly insisted; “to accuse your father”.
– “Introduction! – he told me. – He is old. He made his life”.
And he continued: “In this way, the accusation against you will be easier.” When I was arrested, I thought that the investigation was going on to find out the truth. During that period, I was always in a defensive position. I tried to make them reason, explaining that they were wrong with the accusations they made against me. But I soon realized that their goal was to sink me as deep as possible.
This time, after this shameless proposal, I took the floor by opposing him: – “How!? You want to force me, to put it to my father? To be a witness against my father? To the father who made my head!? Did you not understand during this entire period of investigation, that I, not for the father who is not discussed, but also for any other person, that you wanted to mix in your diabolical plans, you could not use me”?! Memorie.al
The next issue follows
