By Maksim Rakipaj
Part twenty-nine
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
A brazen “alien”.
One of my tasks in the Municipality of Durrës was to prepare the program for the visits of various dignitaries to our city. In September ’96, I made the work program for the reception of the German ambassador in Durrës. Among other things, I also anticipated a visit of Mr. Ambassador to the “Naim Frashëri” gymnasium. I chose “Naim Frashëri” because it was my high school. I spoke beforehand with the principal of the high school, who was very enthusiastic about this visit; we set the schedule and agreed on everything.
To accompany Mr. Ambassador, I also invited the deputies of our city, including Mr. Bashkim Kopliku, who was also Deputy Prime Minister. Around 11.00 am, it was the turn of the gymnasium visit; the environment created around Mr. ambassador, who was quite warm and friendly and he felt this. He behaved quite redeemed, with all his mistress.
In short: he was very pleased with this visit and the reception that was reserved for him everywhere. I often acted as a translator, from the English language. After visiting the school grounds, the principal invited us to a large hall, prepared and decorated even with various writings in the German language, in honor of Mr. ambassador.
We took the seats that the school director had assigned us. I sat next to the ambassador and his lady, to serve as an interpreter. The students had prepared some recitations of poems, in the German language, by prominent poets, such as; Goethe, Heine, etc.
The ambassador and the lady were surprised and applauded each recitation loudly and even often, I saw them miss the art of the students. Meanwhile, the director of the school, begged me to tell the ambassador to consider the desire of the high school students from Durrës, for a twinning with a German high school. I told Mr. Bashkim Koplik, to tell him in German, but he withdrew: “I can’t, Max. For the task I cover, it’s also a matter of protocol, understand me please.”
I myself told the ambassador in English the desire of the high school students for a twinning with their German peers. I made a brief introduction about the pro-German sympathies in Durrës and not only about German football and Bayern Munich. The German immediately became cold, distant, as if I had asked him for money…!
– “Ah, I understand, the principal and the students of the school are looking for twinning with a German school, yesss, I understand. Hmm… this reminds me of the years in post-war Germany. At that time, the German schoolboys asked (just like you now) to be twinned with the French schools, because they went there and ate better, they brought with them when they came back, sausages, different foods, some clothes, sweaters, things like that, you know… eeeh…?! Me, personally, understand me, I’m against twins…but I understand what’s behind them…!?
I was bad. I glanced at the student out of the corner of my eye. They were upset, insulted, they understood everything that Mr. ambassador. I had to give him an answer, but I had to hide the rage, the insult…! I don’t hide it… I enjoyed answering him with the favorite and insulting slang of sailors, without using that of the prison…!
I saw from Bashkim Kopliku, I understood from his facial expressions, that I had to speak, the other MPs, they didn’t feel…?! I took a deep breath and said:
– “I inform you, Mr. ambassador, that the other gymnasium in Durrës has had such a twinning for a long time and the English who came to Durrës from this twinning are more satisfied. I assure you that this will also happen with German students. Another thing, which I think you should learn, your excellency, is that German is not part of the curriculum of this school.
These students, who thrilled you with their German, have learned this language with private teachers, for a fee, and finally I tell you that; we are indeed a poor country, but, in any case, we are not at the levels we were in the years ’90-91, neither at the level of post-war German poverty, nor at the level of post-war Albania, destroyed by your Germany, Mr. ambassador. Be sure that the pro-German sympathies of these students will not be hurt by your hasty words. Thank you for your patience in listening to me, Your Excellency.”
Some “aliens” are really cheeky…! After a few years, I met one. He introduced himself to me once as an American and after a year, apparently, he didn’t remember that we had been introduced before, he introduced himself to me as an Irishman. This one dealt with non-governmental associations, the famous NGOs. He was in Albania for about three years. When we were drinking with some mutual friends from a café in the center of Tirana, suddenly this English-Irish-American said:
– “Do you know, my friends, that my two daughters are enrolled in university to learn the Albanian language”?!
– “I believe that his father spoke well of Albania”, – someone told him.
– “Ahahahahah, no, you’re wrong. They are learning Albanian, because here in Albania, they become money…! Ahahaha, that’s why they’re learning it.”
– “This friend is doing well,” said the one who was sitting next to me. – This bastard gets $1,000 for one lecture, in addition to the travel, sleeping, transportation, food”!
– “Where does all this money come from”?
– “From the aids. The Council of Europe grants several million dollars every year as aid to us. The majority goes into the pockets of these friends, what do you say, but in the press, they are declared as aid for Albania”!
“How talented they are”?!
Shoah, contemplation
On January 27, the world commemorates what Israelis call the Shoah. It is the day when everywhere in the world, the innocent victims of Nazism are commemorated. It’s been two days since TV Italian broadcasts films on this topic. Films that generally have writers of Jewish origin. Undoubtedly, German, English, French, Russian, American TV shows films with the same theme.
It is the gnawing of conscience that the world has, towards the innocent victims. Because it has its share of blame. But the world is not enough, just with conscience. Even today, the hunting, trial and punishment in the courts of those people, former officers or officials, who were responsible for those crimes against humanity, committed 60-70 years ago, continues.
MOSAD, the Israeli secret service, is still quite sensitive and active against those individuals. The perpetrators of those crimes are arrested and punished, even though they are 80-90 years old or sick. Someone from my acquaintances used to tell me that; this happens because a good part of the world’s wealth is in the hands of millionaires and billionaires, of Jewish origin. I do not believe that this is the only reason for all this human activity.
It must be the love of justice that does this, it must be the hatred of totalitarian systems and dictatorships that must be condemned as such. And not only with books and movies.
I saw a film about life in a Nazi concentration camp. It gave me goosebumps; I couldn’t see it to the end. I was left with the image of those corpse-men, wearing those blue-and-white striped uniforms. The same uniform, the one I wore and thousands like me, in times of peace, in the concentration camps of the totalitarian Enverist system. White-blue stripes. My maternal grandmother found me in that uniform when she came to Spaç in 1979.
It was raining and grandmother, mother, brother was shivering from the cold. The rain masked my tears, which I couldn’t hold back when I heard my grandmother’s shrill cry: “God, damn it!”… my eyes fill with tears even now that I remember it.
And the mother of Ylli Tabaku, what should she say, when her son was arrested, 6 months after his release from concentration camp no. 309 and exactly on his wedding day?! A cousin of my mother was also arrested on the day of the wedding. “For that evil! Boy like a star, lawyer, groom in a black suit, five or six policemen jumped on him and dragged him away…! The wedding turned into a mortuary; the bride dressed in black…”!
They were just some meditations on the day of the Shoah, the terror exercised by the Germans, against the Jews, not the red terror, exercised by the Albanians, against the Albanians. In times of peace. But in Albania; “nothing like the Shoah has happened”. A famous politician of our day, a prominent democrat, thinks that we have all been co-sufferers and co-culprits! Like the hanged poet Havzi Nela, so is his prosecutor.
“Finally… there are ‘documents’! Havziu has ‘admitted’ the guilt himself, to the investigator”, – writes a miscreant, supposedly Albanian journalist, from America. The state is not kept in the air. Well, there are also some burghers who can read and write and vouu, black cards. Let them write, whose crack! We are in a democracy, let even those deserters enjoy the right to talk… ahahaha…!?!
Former political convict
The life spent in prison did not make my character wilder. It only increased my hatred of injustice. It taught me to accept the opinion, different from my own. I have said another time: in prison we did not all share the same opinions about history, politics, art, but this did not separate us from each other at all, on the contrary, it united us, to confront our thoughts, ideas with each other. He made us judge with our mind, what was right and what was not.
One thing united us: hatred for Enver Hoxha’s personal dictatorship. Everyone was free to express his opinion, that he was ready to change it, when he heard someone wiser than himself, and it was not difficult for him to accept this. Even after being released from prison and after the changes of 1992, when I was working as a steamboat captain or a municipal clerk, I have accepted the opinions opposite to mine, without calling the interlocutor my enemy.
But not all of them accepted me. Not all members of the “Vlora” crew were happy when I became the captain! But I knew how to separate politics from duty, they didn’t. They tried to hinder me in my duty, to sabotage me. I knew who they were and I tried to convince them. When I had mutiny on the ship, I had the offer of the agency to bring in the Yemeni police, to land the mutineers.
I objected. My conscience did not allow my sailors to die in Yemeni prisons. Many of them abandoned the ship in November ’95, when the ship was in Piraeus port, and I gave them the right, it was difficult to work in those conditions. But I was sad, when I learned that a hundred black people had said against me, in the directorate, while they had left me in writing, that the reason for leaving was bad management from the directorate, salary delay, etc.
Full of rumors were circulating against me before they left: “Max has taken the share from the Greeks and we are suffering like animals here”! When I was an employee in the Municipality of Durrës, I often went to a bar in front of the beach bus station. I loved the coffee and the service at that bar. The waiters knew me and brought me coffee and bread, even without ordering.
One day, after taking a seat alone at a table in that bar, the waiter brought me coffee and a double Fernet. My questioning look; “why double”? he replied:
– “You can rent it from those bags on that table. I turned my head and saw four former sailors of “Vlora”: E.L., A.K., etc. I went and approached their table. The four stood up and one of them spoke:
– “We are fed up with you, captain. It is our fault, that we behaved badly with you and caused you discomfort, without any right. Our rental was a kind of apology from our side. Sorry, captain”.
How could I not forgive them? Their behavior was that of men.
– “Alright, boys, alright. This is how I accept your lease. Today I don’t have time, but next time, we can sit at a table”.
I worked for several years in the Municipality of Durrës, then I started again at sea as a captain, on different ships, always hoping that the situation in Albania will change.
When I realized that the situation was not only not going to change for the better, on the contrary, it was getting worse, I decided, heartbroken, to go into exile. Memorie.al
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