My mother's illness

My mother developed appendicitis, but the nearest doctor or hospital was 100km away. The communist supervisor refused to help because he said the horses were the property of the state and were used for work only. Eventually, a Russian couple travelling through our kolkhoz agreed to take my mother to the hospital, but none of us were allowed to accompany her. A few days later, we were informed that she had passed away. The hospital had no surgeon. I was told she was calling my name before she died. Her body was brought back to our kolkhoz and buried in a small cemetery out on the steppe. She was 45 years old. From that day on, my life changed. I began to cry a lot and then became very quiet. Then the Poles began discussing my father's condition and they didn't think he would survive the winter.

page 63

My father worried about me and took over the task of caring for me. I helped neighbours with odd jobs around the house in exchange for eggs or butter. I was eight years old now and my father did not want me to attend a Russian school, but he was threatened with arrest if I didn't show up. My maths was the best in class and my hand was always up during question time, but I would not answer questions on Stalin or the communists. Polish children in Russian schools were being told that God did not exist and to pray to Stalin instead, the source of all good things. To prove this, teachers told them to pray to God for sweets. When nothing happened, they told them to pray to Stalin's portrait. A surreptitious shake of the portrait and the sweets would shower down.