… we weren’t just shaking from the cold, we were shaking out of fear, because we didn’t know what could come from behind our backs, because the line was long…
FLLANZA JUSUFI: Good afternoon!
HAJRIJE ILJAZI: Good afternoon!
FJ: Let’s begin with the time before 2001 – how was your life, were there any Macedonians in your village?
HI: No, there weren’t any Macedonians, at least I haven’t seen any, and the living – we had a tough life, we barely had food on our table. The day the shooting began, I had no flour at home, my husband had gone to the headquarters, he had gone to Tetovo for flour and didn’t return for three days, I didn’t have any food for my children… Out on the streets, food was being given to the soldiers, and my little ones had nothing to eat, sometimes some of the neighbors would give them something, and then when the bombing began, my son returned from the headquarters and he took us to a basement nearby in our neighborhood.
FJ: So that was the day when the war from 2001 started…
HI: Yes, that’s when the war started, that’s the day of the first bombing, because the first three days during the preparations in the headquarters they still didn’t know…
FJ: You… you didn’t know that…
HI: No, I didn’t know […] I took […] I went to my father’s house and they had slaughtered a big bull, and there my uncle’s son […] he had taken a big kettle, they used to make halva in it for their big weddings, and he said that a big wedding was about to come and I said: “What kind of wedding?”, I told them his sons had been already married, what wedding and I… From what the men were saying I understood finally what kind of “wedding” they were talking about [they meant war], that was supposed to be like a big Albanian wedding (laughs). Then I went back home and as I said, we had no flour at all. So I sent this one for flour, and he… went to the headquarters and didn’t come back home for three days (her husband enters the room) and…
FJ: So your husband was a soldier during the war, right?
HI: Yes, he was a soldier during the war, during the first 13 days he was at the Kale and then he went on the front again, after we had left, after we had gone to Kosovo, and then he came back here…
FJ: Who stayed at home with you?
HI: I was left alone with my two children, with my daughter and my youngest son, my two other sons had left with their father, they were some kind of assistants to those on the front, something like that.
FJ: So your sons left too, and your husband was at war and you stayed at home with your daughter?
HI: And my son.
FJ: Was your mother-in-law with you?
HI: She was with me in the basement where they put us, along with two of my sisters-in-law.
FJ: You were all hiding in a basement?
HI: Yes, yes, all in a basement, and some neighbors as well… And the day the bombings began, my father came at 6 in the morning…
FJ: When did you decide to leave your house?
HI: We decided at 7.30 in the evening, all the other villagers had already fled the village, we didn’t know, my mother-in-law went out one evening and when she came home she told us that the whole village is empty, she asked what were we waiting for, but before my mother-in-law came to our house, my sister came and said: “Come with us, we’re leaving, we’re going to Kosovo”, and I told her that I couldn’t leave my mother-in-law, she was sick, old, my husband was at war, my sons with him, who was I supposed to leave her with… And she said: “Are you married to your mother-in-law? Then stay with her”, and then she left, they left the village and we went back to the basement… But then my mother-in-law decided that we should leave and she told me to take some flour with me because… And she didn’t know that I…
FJ: How long did you stay in the basement?
HI: Two whole weeks we spent in the basement, and during those weeks my father was bringing us food… He was coming from this village, how do they call it, Gjermo, to bring us some bread, while a neighbor was milking his cow and he was giving some sour milk to my kids, and that’s all they had for food, nothing else.
FJ: What was going on the day you decided to flee?
HI: Look, the night before we left, I had no idea that the bombing was about to begin the next day early in the morning. I went to my mother’s to see my family and when I went there I saw some men in front of her house standing next to a lamppost, talking (she points her finger to that direction) about what was about to happen the following day, that everybody would leave the village, that’s what they were talking about, and I… I realized that all the commanders had already left, they were all gone, they had broken the computers… They were saying that (unclear), because I had left the door open and I could hear them…
FJ: You heard them.
HI: And I got back home, and the next day at six in the morning they started bombing with no pause, my husband was having a coffee, we finished our coffees right away and he went to battle, where the shootings were… in Gayre, where the enforcement was… The grenades wouldn’t let us take a breath that whole day.
FJ: Your husband didn’t know that you had left your home?
HI: No, he didn’t know, he… came to the village at 7, while […], maybe it was 8 when he came to the village and saw it was empty, there was no one there. So he went to the village Brodec to search for us, but he didn’t find us there.
FJ: Did you take anything with you before you left?
HI: I took nothing with me, except for one kilogram of coffee and one kilogram of sugar, because we didn’t even have bread, yes, and my children – 48 hours of walking were waiting for us, and we didn’t eat anything during the first 18 hours, we had no bread, because who could give us bread, when the whole village was destitute, not just us, but all the other were starving as well. And then we reached a narrow footpath, 3.000 people were supposed to pass through it, it was so narrow and old people were walking along as well, two others had to hold each one of them, because they could slip and fall down to the abyss.
FJ: Your mother-in-law was with you?
HI: Yes, she was with me.
FJ: She was walking, too?
HI: She was walking assisted by her sons, she had two of her sons with her, but one of them […], the older one, my brother-in-law, he’s an aged man himself and he wasn’t able to hold her.
FJ: You had your daughter with you?
HI: Yes, then when my son, the older one, saw what had been going on, he came home and he took my son with him [the youngest son], and I took my daughter and we left, and as we were leaving I thought “Why should I leave my house?” I thought maybe it was better to end it, that’s how I felt, I was thinking I’d rather jump from those heights than leave my home.
FJ: Was it because you felt sorry for leaving your home?
HI: Yes, because of leaving my home, but also because I was alone, I was losing my mind, as they say.
FJ: You weren’t well?
HI: I was tired, I wasn’t well (her voice is trembling), I was on sedatives.
FJ: How long did you walk? It was…?
HI: We started our journey at 7:30.
FJ: In the evening, right?
HI: Yes, and when we got to Veshala, it was 4 o’clock.
FJ: In the morning?
HI: In the morning.
FJ: So, you were walking all night long?
HI: Yes, all night long, walking, walking…
FJ: Was it cold?
HI: It was cold, but we weren’t just shaking from the cold, we were shaking out of fear, because we didn’t know what could come from behind our backs, because the line was long, there were sick people among us, we had to help those who couldn’t move, we had to help them up the hills, it was terrible, that was a terrible night, I remember thinking that even in death I won’t forget that night, it was a horrible thing for us.
FJ: Where did you stop at 4 in the morning?
HI: At 4 we reached Veshala and there they took us in a house, then my husband came.
FJ: How long did you stay there?
HI: Not long at all, barely three hours, and then at 7 we left for…
FJ: Did you have any food for the road?
HI: Nothing, nothing at all. There was snow on the…
FJ: There was snow?
HI: There was snow on these… how do they call them…
FJ: Did you have warm clothes on you?
HI: […] We had nothing on us, nothing. No blanket, no warm clothes, nothing, I just had a pair of my son’s boots on me…
FJ: Being alone, how did you went through all that, were you worried about…
HI: I was worried sick when we got to Veshala because I didn’t know where my husband was. It was… My sons came there, and my husband wasn’t with them, and I was wondering where he might be, was I going to find him – all this was running through my head and that was the worst of everything that happened.
FJ: The worst?
HI: The worst!
FJ: And then, from Veshala, where did you go to?
HI: From Veshala, we set foot to… reach Kosovo, but here [she means her village] the village headman didn’t want for us to pass to Kosovo, he wanted us to go back, and my brother-in-law’s son had come from Italy to take us there, and we went with me, when he came […] And I told the village headman that he can feel free to go back if he wants to, but that I won’t, because I couldn’t watch the Macedonians torturing my sons, that I would never allow, and so we left.
FJ: How did you leave?
HI: On foot.
FJ: On foot again?
HI: Yes, we went back up on foot, 18 hours of walking.
FJ: To where?
HI: We were headed for […] Brodosavce [a village in Kosovo], because in Brodosavce…
FJ: You had to pass over a mountain? How did that look like? Which way did you walk?
HI: We were walking through the woods, there’s no mountain there.
FJ: The woods.
HI: Yes, the woods, there was a road, then we reached a point of which we were told that it was Kosovo territory from here on, and then I felt a bit released, but I was still unset and we were worried because we had no idea where we were.
FJ: How many of you were there?
HI: I was with my mother-in-law and my brothers-in-law and my sisters-in-law with their children, that’s who I was with, and one of the sisters-in-law had her mother with her.
FJ: How did you take it, 18 hours on foot?
HI: Very very hard, I was feeling sorry for my mother-in-law because she was 86 years old at the time, she was all stiff, her arms were all blue from the pressure in her armpits, because of her sons holding her all the way, her legs wouldn’t move so her sons had to hold her under her armpits, and so we had to encourage each other so that we could move faster, get to a hospital or find another solution for her.
FJ: When you reached Kosovo, did someone welcome you?
HI: Just as we passed on their territory, some people on horses were waiting, carrying bread.
FJ: Waiting for you?
HI: Yes, now, they were waiting for us near the village Brodosavce, we didn’t go this place they called the read house, where the preparations for, you know what, were… People were being taken care of in a better way there, they were being put on a bus and taken to the cities or I don’t know where. While we had to stop in Brodosavce, and when we got there they gave us bread, but not in slices, it was in pieces ripped up by hand. How I felt then, I still feel like crying when I think of it (tearful) because it was 36 hours since the kids had put some food in their mouths (crying) and that’s the first piece of food they saw since then and ate it right away.
FJ: They hadn’t eaten for 36 hours?
HI: Yes, we hadn’t eaten anything […] nothing. Except for some sour milk that my neighbor had taken with him and… I felt really bad. I was disoriented, walking in circles, didn’t know where to go, yes, and then they put my younger son on a horse because they put my mother-in-law on a horse and so we had to send our younger one with her, while my older son stayed with me, he said to the younger one: “You’re younger, I’ll stay with our mother, because she too is unwell”.
FJ: So they put your mother-in-law on a horse along with your son?
HI: Yes, he had to hold her, the guy from Kosovo was cleaning the horse and my son and my brother-in-law’s son were holding my mother-in-law’s arms because she was not in a condition to seat on a horse all by herself, and my other son stayed with me and he said: “Mother, I’ll stay with you because you’re not feeling well” and I said: “No, I’m fine” and he said: “I can see how you feel”, and I was all lost, disoriented, and I was really touched when my youngest boy yelled – and he was just three at the time – “mom, we found bread!”, that was terrible for us.
FJ: How old was he, three?
HI: He was three years old, but he was a little devil, and so we were given bread, and then some Kosovo guy took him and put him on his back, they did the same with my girl, she was…
FJ: How old was she?
HI: My girl was seven.
FJ: So young!
HI: So young, seven years old, but she too was a little devil, she said “I’m not leaving my mom’s side, I’ll walk by her all the time”, and after a while I saw her sitting on a big rock, waiting for us, and I asked her: “Mirela, my love, why are you sitting here, why didn’t you go with them?” and she said: “I’ll walk by your side and I’ll rest when you rest”, that’s how it was.
FJ: Where did they take you to rest, what kind of place it was?
HI: They took us to some school to… They gave us food at the school, yes, and they told us where each one of us is about to go, they organized us in different houses, and this brother-in-law of mine, the older one, was with the wife of his brother who lived in Italy and he said: “I’m taking this one”, and my other sister-in-law had… had no kids, so one other guy said: “I’m taking this one”, and I was left alone, didn’t know where to go, and then some guy came and said: “How about you?” I said: “I’m not going anywhere until I find my husband”.
FJ: Did you know where he was?
HI: No, I didn’t, I didn’t know that…
FJ: You had no information?
HI: No, and this kid who took us in, he said: “Look, I’ll take you and your son to my house and even though I’ve never met your husband, I’ll go search for him.”
FJ: So, you they took you to a house where you didn’t know anybody?
HI: I didn’t know them, I had never seen them, but they were very hospitable, I don’t know how to describe how hospitable they were…
FJ: They welcomed you, served you well?
HI: Very well, without knowing me at all, I was nobody to them, I wasn’t even their relative, and later they came to visit us, the whole family, so they took me in along with my two youngest ones and my older son, but then he left with his father…
FJ: Your mother-in-law wasn’t with you?
HI: No, she didn’t come with me, she was taken directly to Prizren, because that group was taken to another direction, to the red house, and from there they put on a bus and transported.
FJ: How long did you stay there?
HI: I stayed till midnight.
FJ: In that house?
HI: Yes, in that house I stayed till midnight, and meanwhile my husband found his mother in Prizren, that’s where they met.
FJ: So your husband managed to find his mother…
HI: Yes, he did.
FJ: And you didn’t know at the time?
HI: I didn’t know, someone told him that there’s some old woman in a cart, and he saw it was his own mother, but she failed to recognize him and he started crying, and so we stayed there for 5 months, he took his mother with him and then he went searching for us, at the school they had information on where was everybody taken in, and he found us by those lists.
FJ: So he found you?
HI: Yes, he found us.
FJ: Your husband with his mother? And where did you go after that, where did you stay?
HI: He had accommodated his mother in a house.
FJ: Aha, that’s where you went?
HI: We went to Prizren, in the place called Arbana, that’s where my mother-in-law was, my husband came and took us with him, he took us to a family of which I have no words to describe how warm and hospitable they were, they let us live as if it was our house, a family so hospitable that I can’t even describe how…
FJ: How many of them were living in that house?
HI: There were 6 of them and we were… we were 7 people, including my mother-in-law.
FJ: They were 6…
HI: There were 6 of them, we were equal. We lived in the same conditions, one room for them, one for us, and they had a hairdressing salon.
FJ: Was there someone you could trust during this whole thing?
HI: What do you mean someone I could trust?
FJ: Well, did you suspect that someone was trying to cheat you, were you afraid of anyone?
HI: No, I’m the kind of person that is not afraid of anyone, never. I can spot right away if someone wants to harm me, if someone wants to deceive me, I face him right away, and as far as fear is concerned, I’ve never feared anyone.
FJ: So you weren’t afraid?
HI: No, not at all […] I mean, I’m the kind of person that is never afraid, I always face the problems here and now.
FJ: Are you blaming the Macedonians for anything?
HI: I’m blaming them for many things, because we Albanians have no rights at all, they turned against us and declared a war on us, they have more rights than us, and yet they declared a war on us who have no rights at all.
FJ: Do you think this war from 2001 brought any change for the Albanians?
HI: The Albanians gained nothing, and me personally, I still can’t pull myself together from all the consequences, because my husband got sick, yes, two weeks after we went there, he had to be hospitalized. Then he fled the hospital with all the medication in his pocket and he came back here, and I still suffer with his illness, and for what? For nothing!
FJ: So, you can feel the consequences?
HI: I can still feel the consequences (rises her voice in anger), now he’s sick [her husband], he has problems with his lungs, his heart, he has thrombosis from passing so many miles on foot, his leg hurts, he has all kinds of health problems, and I’m the one who suffers, and we haven’t received a single penny for his medication, and everything goes down the hill, the kids, the house, everything I have…
FJ: How about the Albanians, do you blame them for what happened in 2001?
HI: I don’t blame most of them, just some.
FJ: Could this have been done in a different manner, was it necessary to happen this way, with such bad consequences?
HI: Well, some people had personal gain, because they got rich in no time, they bought expensive cars overnight, finished education over night, but they’re a handful of people, while my children are the victims, we have nothing, I work day and night and all we have is this house we are sitting in right now. I don’t possess anything else.
FJ: Are you mad at someone because it turned out this way?
HI: No, I’m not mad at anybody for what happened, those who created this situation should bare responsibility…
FJ: Those who created it…
HI: …should bear responsibility. I…
FJ: What frustrates you most?
HI: Many things are frustrating me, the fact that they were riding mules up until yesterday, and today they ride BMWs, that’s what frustrates me.
FJ: Did you… lose something in this war, was your house damaged, for example? What did you lose?
HI: I didn’t lose anything.
FJ: Did anyone from the family…?
HI: Some from my family had losses, my father’s family lost all their livestock.
FJ: Were there any casualties in the family?
HI: No. No one died, no.
FJ: What do you think about the future, do you think it’s possible for us to live together with the Macedonians?
HI: How can there be coexistence after all I told you about, how can I leave in peace when – my husband is sick and – when I go to the hospital, I see them and the Macedonian doctor, I don’t like them, because they brought all this pain on me (rises voice), how can I like them…
FJ: Do you think we could forgive them all that?
HI: I could never.
FJ: You don’t think it’s possible for us to get along with the Macedonians?
HI: Well, how could I know? I don’t know, but if Albania decides to rise today, I’m ready… (laughs)
FJ: Is there anything I didn’t ask you that you would like to say?
HI: Look, I don’t know, I told all I knew, I think I covered everything, the way I lived and all. That family which took us in in Kosovo, the Raduni family, not that we didn’t like it there, on the contrary, but I was alone and unwell, I was on sedatives for 5 months, I was on heavy medication to calm my nerves, yes, because my husband went back to war, he wasn’t with me.
FJ: And when you got back home, how was it like?
HI: When we got back home, our house was so old, so we built a new house, yes, but no matter how old and ruined it was it seemed like paradise to me, you know, I felt like I was reborn… The worst thing was, when we got back, the… the prices went up, the oil reached a price of 100-150 denars, all the products went up, I don’t who they were trying to protect, they wanted to get rich overnight, to profit on the war, that’s something I didn’t like at all, because we had no money back then, no one wanted to help us, except for my brothers, nobody else. And even they were saying: “Why is you husband at war, why doesn’t he go get a job”, and where was he supposed to get a job, job was nowhere to be found, and the worst thing were the insults from the others in the village… When I’d go out to call him on the phone, they would insult us women whose husbands were at war, that was making things even more difficult, because they were saying that we were doing it the easy way, and what can you say, I’m doing it, I deserve your insults.
FJ: That’s how it is with gossiping in our country…
HI: Yes, but… This was really hard for me because honor is hard to preserve. Not… for me, but for the others.
FJ: Right, gossiping…
HI: They were spreading rumors for the women, the men, this and that, stupid talking, but everyone…
FJ: Knows what’s best for him.
HI: Right.
FJ: Anyway, thank you, that would be all.
HI: Thank you.
