Protagonist: Annamaria Zennaro Marsi
Author: Annamaria Zennaro Marsi
The housing situation of my family, consisting of 4 people, hosted after the exodus in my aunt's house, was very troubled. We were forced into a small room of perhaps 8 square meters where there was barely room for a double bed and a camp bed. The greatest dejection was caused by living with my aunt (my father's sister and little known to my mother) who, after having insisted on hosting us in her house in the Roiano district of Trieste, had not foreseen the difficulties of living so close together between people who were, all things considered, strangers, except for my father, her brother, who, however, after a very short time, to support us, had accepted a job on an oil tanker heading for Port Said, leaving us alone for a long time. The assignment of a space at SILOS, after nine months of long painful waiting, was therefore accepted as a liberation, as the possibility, for my mother, psychologically and physically destroyed, to regain the autonomy to which she had always been accustomed. We could not imagine, however, what, albeit different, anguish we were going to face. The boxes, delimited by wooden boards, prepared to accommodate the numerous requests and the continuous arrivals of refugees and displaced people, were insufficient, so we were temporarily assigned an empty space of about 16 square meters, dark, without windows, adjacent to two other families, delimited at the back by a wall and completely open in front, with the possibility of hanging gray blankets on a rope, already prepared, to protect our privacy. A light bulb dimly illuminated the "room" and a small circular stove, with a coil resistance, was used to heat the milk for breakfast in the morning and to boil water for some broth in the evening. The first month we went to get or eat lunch at the canteen in via Gambini where we were served an excellent, for me, “pasta rossa.” Every morning, alone, from Silos, with a half-hour walk, I went to Roiano to the Tarabochia elementary school to finish the school year in the same fourth class, with the same classmates and with the same teacher, Mrs Albanese, demanding and strict, but very understanding and human, to whom I was very fond.
After the end of the lessons, I sometimes wandered around Roiano until 15:XNUMX p.m., that is, until the Brunner recreation center in via Solitro opened, where, in the afternoon, in addition to some pleasant activities, they offered me a different snack every day and, on Wednesdays, even custard and hot chocolate. At Silos, the toilets were easily accessible but insufficient for the people who had to use them and, often, during rush hour, you had to queue to be able to "settle down". The water in the sinks was freezing and did not encourage frequent washing, so poor hygiene, mediocre food, forced cohabitation and the impossibility of heating and receiving a little air and natural light, negatively affected the development of children, generating influenza epidemics, respiratory diseases and above all the much feared "pulmonary glands". And, precisely to limit the damage to the health of a community of children so exposed to illnesses, the Italian Red Cross intervened and, after having subjected all the children to tests and vaccinations, presented the parents with some solutions to remove their children from that risky environment, with proposals that included the possibility of staying, during the summer, in mountain preventatories for those who were particularly debilitated and for the others, from 10 years old and up, the opportunity to be hosted by families in other European countries. Thus - desperation or perhaps recklessness - pushed some parents to send their children, mostly boys, to Denmark, a country that was certainly not around the corner, with the belief that they would experience a period of unexpected well-being, returning invigorated and healed.
ON THE ROAD TO……… DENMARK June 1949 So I, unbeknownst to my father, who would never have allowed it, found myself, at 9 and a half years old, together with 5 other unknown girls, in a compartment of a train, leaving for a country that I had indeed identified on the map, but which, for all of us, represented the unknown. I was proud of my suitcase, new, made of cardboard, with tiny white and green knots that contained the change of underwear requested on the Red Cross form: a sweater, a bar of soap and the necessary personal hygiene items. My mother added a packet of OSVEGO biscuits for breakfast in the morning. Since I was small and puny, they assigned me, on the train, the highest seat, on the net, where I would lie down during the night (so I understood that I would also sleep on the train). The journey, after the initial excitement, turned out to be more and more uncomfortable. At every stop I felt nauseous and the half lemon given to me by the assistant did not produce any improvement. The stops were very long and boring. I had no appetite and could only eat the sandwich that was handed to us when the train was stopped. The only service was far away and to reach it we passed in front of the male compartment, where I saw, among unknown faces, a childhood friend from Cres, also an unaware protagonist of the unknown adventure. In Milan other children from other refugee camps were welcomed and, proceeding through interminable tunnels, exhausting stops and increasingly turbulent nights, we reached Switzerland. From the window, near which I was sitting, I admired in ecstasy the varied postcard panorama. Two days and as many nights passed and the destination still seemed far away. The assistant reassured us, but rumours began to spread, coming from the older children, that our parents had abandoned us to dump us who knows where and with whom.
The sight of a devastated Germany increased our sadness. Piles of rubble, ruined houses, broken roads, stones everywhere passed before our eyes and, as we crossed large rivers, it seemed as if the train was proceeding in the void. The destroyed bridges had in fact been quickly rebuilt only to support the tracks and allow the very slow passage of trains. We were disturbed, all leaning out of the windows, to follow, with bated breath, the daring passage on the turbid and impetuous Elbe River, which seemed endless and extremely disturbing. After 5 days of travel, resistance was waning, some were crying at night and others did not have enough energy even to complain. When we reached the border, Denmark welcomed us with a pouring rain that did not abandon us for several days and a temperature to which we were not accustomed. It was June and few people had adequate equipment to deal with the cold. We were placed in barracks from which we only left for a medical check to make sure our vaccinations and documents were up to date, and then back on the train to the collection center. I must have been as yellow as the half lemon that my companion gave me every day, cold and exhausted, and I think that's how they saw me when, in the gym, in Aarhus, with a tag around my neck, lined up in a row with all the other children, Nielsa with Nielsafar and Birte came to pick me up. They made me get into a black car, as big as an English taxi, in which, after a journey of over 6 hours, I finally reached Grenaa, a pretty town on the sea facing Sweden.
My mind was so confused that I couldn't connect, I barely heard voices speaking an incomprehensible language, I saw smiling faces that I couldn't even manage to smile at. I didn't even see the beautiful red brick house at Havnevej 48, nor the flower garden, nor the other family members who welcomed me joyfully. English: I barely read the questions in the dictionary with the colors of our flag, which they had procured for the occasion, continually shaking my head to answer that no, I was not hungry, nor thirsty, nor in need of any kind, until at the question: "Are you sleepy?" still shaking my head, I nodded. They understood and led me to a real bathroom, white and perfumed, with a tub and hot water and, after having urged me to brush my teeth too, they put me on a small bed with wooden sides, at the foot of their double bed. The next day I would realize that I had not lived a turbulent dream, nor participated in a distressing film, nor reworked an adventurous story, but that I was totally immersed in a reality that would require a great effort of adaptation and acceptance of the continuous novelties that the new environment imposed on me and from which I could not escape because I was without any lifeline.
AWAKENING IN DENMARK When I woke up the sun was already high so I realized I had slept a lot. There was absolute silence around, as if no one was home. All I could smell was a strong aroma of celery and carrots, stronger than the one I smelled in Cres when my mother cooked meat for the broth. I didn’t know what to do: I could have said out loud: “Good morning” and maybe someone would have intervened; I could have lowered the side of the bed and gotten up or made some noise to make it clear that I was awake… or… instead I stayed still with my eyes closed, trying to quickly summarize the events of my life that had happened in those last 9-10 months. Away from Cherso, from my habits, from my friends, from my grandmother, from the masiere, from the boats, from the sea, away from the light and the freedom of the Prà, from the pink house, from the mandule, from the fresh figs and the “suti” ones, from the olives and the cherries, away from the Porta Marcella and the Bragadina, away from the Turion and the Loggia, away from the Duomo and the Church of the Friars, from the Munighe and the Piscio…Away from everything that represented my childhood, even though it was tried by the sad vicissitudes of the war. In Trieste I had to adapt to a new life, to the school in Roiano, to new classmates, to the concrete, to the trams, to the buildings with many floors and many windows, without my grandmother, without my cat and without the chickens, in a small space and with my mother always sad and suffering.
After the first shocking “pirouette” and after only a few months another upheaval: the SILOS, without windows, without air and without light, among unknown people and a life to be reinvented. Now, after an interminable journey, a humiliating wait to be chosen, as in an animal fair with a tag around your neck, by someone who didn't know you and who relied on his own intuition and needs. I remember anxiously watching those who entered, looking the other way when someone I didn't like from the look of it appeared at the entrance. We all thought we had already been assigned to the requesting families, instead we were told that those who were not accepted would all go together to a boarding school, a solution that disturbed us. Also for this reason, when I saw the Nielsen family at the door, I looked at them with sympathy and was happy to leave the row where there were still many children, especially boys. Dino was no longer there. I later learned that he had been taken in by a wealthy family in Copenhagen, where he had felt at ease. The slow motion of my thoughts continued to spin when a small head with short, blond hair appeared at the door and said: “Goddag!”, and I understood that it meant good morning; she added her name and surname, Gudrun Nielsen, and quickly left, returning shortly after with a tray with many inviting pastries and a steaming cup of tea. I wasn't used to drinking tea in the morning, but after devouring some pastries, I took a sip out of courtesy. From that moment I was immersed in a new existence: I had to intuit and record continuous and new messages and, in order to do it well, I erased all the recent past and even forgot my family.
The first few days, especially in the evenings when we were all around the big table, were spent getting to know each other and, with the help of “Den lille Italiener sproegforer”, with gestures and some rough drawings on my part, they learned a lot about me and I about them. I learned the names and ages of their four children: Johan, 4, Ersebeth, 18, Viggo, 16, and my peer Birte, a rather capricious and difficult child who, as her parents had hoped, could find a playmate in me. In fact, my presence made her, especially at the beginning, jealous and even more restless. During the day everyone went to school and I was left alone with Nielsa (as I baptized, Italianizing it, her surname, and her husband became Nielsafar), names that they kept throughout their life in their relationships with me. I discovered the garden behind the house with two apple trees and at the bottom plants of currants, graspini, lots of lettuce, celery and carrots and lots of colorful flowers on the sides.
I liked to climb the low branches of the apple trees, do somersaults on the grass and other acrobatics that Nielsa followed with some apprehension until, after a few days, Elda appeared, a girl from Trieste who lived in the house next door and who for a while became my playmate. She was sweet and good, but she complained constantly because she lived with a young widow who, according to her, had taken her to look after her 4-year-old son. She didn't understand what he was saying to her and couldn't stand her. I could play and talk with her but, after a short time, I didn't see her anymore, nor did I know anything about her. I still have two photos of it taken in the garden. I later learned that some of the children had been repatriated. The first month passed quickly and I was also lucky that until mid-July the days were always sunny and warm. They took me to visit the town of Grenaa, its Lutheran church, the Nielsafar clothing factory and, every now and then, sitting on the shaft of my father's bicycle, we reached my grandmother's farm, in the middle of a park with centuries-old trees, lots of geese and a small river, frozen in winter, where the boys could skate. I didn't know how to ride a bicycle and didn't feel like learning so, on long journeys, they had to carry me. One day, unexpectedly, a lady showed up on the doorstep and wanted to know my name and surname and asked to speak to Nielsa. She was a Red Cross official to whom my mother had turned to ask for news of me, since after a month I still had not written any letter, even though my family had urged me to do so. But the days passed so quickly and with so many new things that I forgot I had a family in Trieste.
For a while I also attended school where, with great difficulty, I had to forget the long exercises of rod and thread and of the circles to be contained precisely within the squares of the first grade exercise book in Cherso and get used to the slanted, English-style writing of the Danish school. I could only do this by holding the notebook diagonally. Every time I got good results in dictation or arithmetic, the teacher gave me a coin with holes (hours) which, without Nielsa's knowledge, who didn't like these, which I considered little prizes, I hid in my briefcase threaded on a string until I made a precious and original bracelet. At school, during science class we moved to an experiment room with uphill seats like in some universities, to better observe the lessons. Often, in front of the school, there were acrobats who, on a very high rope, without any protection, would perform spectacular and exciting acrobatics. During physical education class, weather permitting, we played baseball outdoors and, since I was a fast runner, I was able to get my team a few points too and this made me happy and well-integrated.
I didn't feel so good when, in August, I wanted to go with Birte and Viggo to a camp similar to the boy scouts, where I didn't like the early morning wake-ups, the freezing water for washing, nor the already autumnal climate, so they came to take me back. I also quickly got used to the food, especially the evening food, when on a large wooden disk they placed cold cuts, cheeses and delicious, piping hot sausages. which everyone placed on slices of black bread (smorrenbrod) spread with goose liver (leverpostaj) or delicious salted butter. The adults drank beer, while we drank cold milk or apple juice. Milk was considered a drink in all respects and, when I explained that I drank it hot and only in the morning, they were greatly surprised, but, even with an incredulous smile, they obliged me by often serving it with sugared oat flakes as well. To celebrate some important event they cooked rice, which was considered a delicacy and which in that post-war period was rationed. Nielsa, after cooking it, put it in a pudding mould, then turned it upside down and filled the centre of the large ring with jam, which she made with currants. For them it was the height of gluttony, while over time I had to get used to the sweet and salty taste of some foods. Pasta was unknown, while foods consisting of potatoes with chervil or boiled and accompanied by tasty sauces were abundant.
One holiday, with splendid sunshine, we all went to the seaside, on a sandy beach and a sea as deep blue as the swimsuit they had bought me for the occasion. A cool breeze was blowing from the sea and we sat in the shelter of a dune. I didn't understand why no one wanted to go swimming and I learned that no one knew how to swim and that the water was very cold even though it was summer. I couldn't believe it, I went for a jog and jumped in, without anyone being able to stop me. I still have the memory of my red, stiff legs and of Nielsa quickly wrapping me in a large towel. Nothing happened to me, but I learned that the sea was not the same everywhere. September came with gloomy and cold days. They made me wear wool sweaters and a thick cloth jacket with a zip. Every morning Nielsa braided my hair and tied it at the top with ribbons of various colors. My arms were now shapely and my face rounder. The day of my departure was now approaching, which would take place a few days after my birthday. That day, to celebrate me, Nielsa placed a large container filled with wet sand in the center of the table where she placed flowers of various sizes and then prepared a special lunch with rice and shrimp followed by various types of sweets. In the afternoon the guests (relatives and friends) came to eat the cake and placed many gifts on the piano that I opened with greed, incredulity and amazement. Then they all sang a little song together accompanied by Nielsafar on the piano. It was an unforgettable day with games, laughter and so much good humor that I wished it could last forever.
After a few days I went to get my suitcase, which immediately filled up and I had to carefully select what I wanted to take with me, so Nielsa added another bag, assuring me that the rest would be sent to me by post at Christmas and so it was. I said goodbye to all the family members, then they took me back to Arhuus, where the train arrived that would take me, together with many other children, back to Italy and then to Trieste. By now I understood and could speak Danish fairly well and Nielsa, before leaving me, with tears in her eyes said to me: "You must promise me that you will come back to us." I was very moved too, but I did not believe a return was possible, which instead happened, after 2 years, in 1951, again at their request and with the intervention of the CRI and then I saw them again, as an adult, in 1983, together with my husband and my daughter. We still keep in touch, especially at Christmas, with those who remained. I don't remember the return trip, it certainly wasn't as tragic as the outward journey and when we arrived in Trieste we were welcomed with great celebrations. The journalist Italo Orto, then very young, interviewed us and had me sing the Danish national anthem, which I had learned at school. “Der er et Yndigt land…”This is a lovely land…“ I felt like I could no longer speak Italian, my mother and sister saw me changed, I had gained 5 kg, which I struggled to put back on after a 4-month break. I was disoriented and had to quickly readjust to a new reality, finding the strength to face new and complicated “pirouettes.” To be closer to our home, they had enrolled me in the Ruggero Manna School, with another teacher and other classmates.