Middle of Everywhere - Mary Bray Pipher [37]
Mirzana told me about her father's camp. She said, "Many men were in a small, empty room. They had nothing to eat, no papers, and no money."
Their father developed a lung infection. Still, he was lucky—he was only there for a month and not too badly beaten. He suffered most hearing the pain of others when the soldiers took them out and beat them. He listened to men scream for hours.
Their father saw many bad things, most of which he didn't tell them. He did tell of a drunk soldier who came into their cell and shouted, "Run to the corner. The last one there will be shot." One man didn't run and was killed by this soldier. Mirzana shook her head sadly as she said, "This man was deaf."
Eventually their father was released. Before he could escape the country, he was ordered to fight the Serbs. He didn't even have a weapon and, as Mirzana put it, "He was there to be shot." After a while, he managed to run away and find his family in Croatia. When he came to their door, none of them recognized him. In the two months he had been away, he'd aged ten years.
The family lived in Croatia for two years. Eventually a friend helped them get into Germany. They spoke no German and lived in one small room, which Kareem didn't like. He said no one could ever be alone and there were fights about space and sharing.
Mirzana and Kareem learned German, but their family couldn't become German citizens and they had no hope of improving their situation. In 1998 the Germans kicked them out and they came to the United States.
They were optimistic on the plane here, but when they arrived in Lincoln they were taken to a small dirty apartment. They were exhausted from the thirty-hour flight, but they couldn't sleep. Their mother was in shock. She cried, "I want to go back." The father said, "You forget, we have no choices. We have no country to return to."
They had no car and they didn't know anyone. No one in the family spoke English. But after five days they moved into their own apartment and they discovered next door a family that the father had known as a child. The two families cried with joy to be reunited. Now the family knows all of the Bosnian community. Bosnians in Lincoln share meals and throw parties. The men help each other find jobs and the women help each other learn English and shop for bargains.
When I met them, Kareem and Mirzana had been here only three months, but already they were speaking pretty good English, their fourth language. They laughed as they talked about early experiences in Nebraska. A neighbor gave them bananas, but they thought they tasted like soap and threw them away. They missed European bakeries. In America everything supposed to be sweet was salty and vice versa. Here herring was sweet and butter was salty.
Kareem and Mirzana like it here. Mirzana is making A's and, after school, she is a stocker at a supermarket. Mirzana laughed as she explained. "The staff teaches me a new word each day." Kareem is too young to work, so he cleans the house, does laundry, and studies after school. Both Kareem and Mirzana want to go to college and get good jobs. They want to care for their parents.
Their parents are ambitious, too. They have difficult factory jobs because their English is still poor. They work from two until ten. But in the morning they study English. Mirzana said, "In a year or two they will have better jobs."
This family is lucky. They have each other and a supportive community. Everyone has many of the attributes of resilience. The family carries with them a great deal of human capital. The external environment has been pretty harsh, but most likely, they will eventually transcend it.
Sometimes Mirzana wishes that her life these last few years were just a dream and she would wake up in Bosnia in their old house. Her grandmother would be calling her to come work in the garden. There would be no war. Kareem disagrees. He is filled with newcomer zest. He said, "I could smell freedom