Anonim 4: Yes, I was at my mother’s in Podujeve. Then, after two days, on the 29th or the 30th they killed the Jasharaj family, I don’t know…
The interviewer: Yes, in March.
Anonim 4: By the end of March… or no…
The interviewer: The Epopee is till the 5th of March…
Anonim 4: In February, by the end of Februaru … because my mother died on the 2nd of March.
The interviewer: Yes.
Anonim 4: So, that happened on March 2nd or at the end of February…
The interviewer: The Epopee of UÇK is from the 2nd of March to the 5th of March.
Anonim 4: Really?
The interviewer: Yes.
Anonim 4: I know that it was a terror. They didn’t allow you to enter Prishtina. I had to spend the night in Podujeva. My mother was so scared and because of that, she had a heart attack. She woke up in the morning and watched the news. She found out that they were killed and the Serbian army was there and wouldn’t let anyone pass. My brothers were working in Prishtina back then and my mother was so scared… She had a heart attack in the morning and she died.
The interviewer: After your mother died and you got to Prishtina, were there policemen or militaries? Were they around?
Anonim 4: Yes, you could see them from time to time. They were staying at the traffic lights close to the flee-market when we arrived there, also at the Slovenia Sportit, you know when you take the turn there.
The interviewer: Did they ask you anything or did they stop you?
Anonim 4: No, no they didn’t. My brother took me there by car. They didn’t stop us. We then…
The interviewer: Okay. Let’s talk about when you decided to leave the country. What happened that you decided to leave?
Anonim 4: Yes. We decided to leave because life was getting monotonous. Children were scared of bombings and the different news we got. We didn’t have electricity in the evening and we had to light up a candle. We didn’t have enough food and children were asking about the foods they used to eat. I had some refugees in my house – my aunt, her husband, and their son. They stayed there for a week. Then their brother, who was staying in the mountains, came and stayed there for 2 or 3 days, and then they left back to the mountains – in Dyz – perhaps you’ve heard of Dyz.
The interviewer: And…
Anonim 4: Then we left… I was only with my husband and the children. We decided to… my sister lived near us so we wanted to come together because it was a terrible situation. We also discussed with some of the neighbors about what to do. The children were crying because they were scared. My husband removed the railings of the balcony because he was scared the Serbians would kidnap our children. So, we went to my sister’s. We stayed there for two days. They had enough food because they had had their own market. They welcomed us in their house and the children got adapted there because they stayed with their cousins and felt better…
The interviewer: The situation had normalized…
Anonim 4: Yes. On the third day, a neighbor came to inform us that people were leaving. The people from the neighborhood of Muhaxhereve were leaving – we were contemplating on leaving or not – we all agreed to leave. We started packing our stuff. We tried to get some clothes and stuff. We would bake bread two or three days beforehand in order to have food in case we had to leave – we would make bread in two or three baking pans because we couldn’t find bread in the bakery. I got home, took some clothes and got ready. People were all leaving in groups. We had a neighbor whose mother was in a wheelchair; she was 70 years old. When we had to walk down the road we all helped him. The children were crying and some of them were sick. The crowd was too big when we arrived at the train station. We were waiting for the train. All the neighbors were staying together. The train arrived and we gradually got on. We sat close to one of our neighbors. That neighbor lived close to us and we didn’t separate. We heard they were taking us to Bllaca in Macedonia. Along the way, the train stopped. We were extremely scared at that moment because some policemen got on the train and they were so harsh. One of them was from the Roma community. He was harsh – he told us to open all of our bags so they could check what we had inside of them. I had taken my golden accessories with me and my husband asked me to give them to them once they try to do anything bad. But, nothing happened, they were just checking in. Then they got off the train. After that we were close to passing Kaçanik … after a while, we got off the train. We had to walk within the railway tracks because the field was mined – that’s what they told us. I had to hold my children’s hands because you know children like to walk on top of railway tracks. My old son slipped once for a moment and I saw the mine so close to him. I was terrified, he was so close to stepping on it. When we arrived there we saw too many people and it was so dirty. Some people had gotten there a week before and they couldn’t take showers. Albanians from Macedonia came as a great help because they provided us with water, clothes, blankets, and food. There were rumors that people would be able to leave the next day or that they just got the news that some buses will take us to Stankovec. It got dark. It was so dirty there and we had to find a place to stay in that big meadow – it was an inhabited place. It was dirty and people defecated outside. You had to find a place to build a tent to make a place for the children to sleep. It was so cold. It was too cold that even though the children had their winter clothes on I had to breastfeed them during the whole night in order for them to feel warm – I couldn’t lay them on the ground. My husband and our neighbor built the tent and we stayed there. On the following morning, around 8:30 they told us some buses would take us away. There were rumors they’d take us to Germany. We didn’t know where they were taking us but it didn’t matter, we just wanted to leave from there. We got our children and we left some of the clothes there because it was so heavy. We were in a hurry because there was a big crowd. Plus, there were cases when people got separated. The police were trying to interfere. There were children whose mothers got on the other side without them and there were mothers whose children passed on the other side without them; they didn’t have any information about their children for months. We got there, waited in line, and then got on the bus. It was so crowded and you couldn’t even find a place to sit. My husband found a seat for me because I wasn’t feeling well. My husband together with my two oldest daughters was standing – one of them was 8 years old and the other 10. They were standing and I was sitting with my two younger children. It smelled terrible on the bus because people hadn’t showered in a while. It was hard to stay on the bus. People vomited. You could smell stinky feet and people would vomit. One of our neighbors fainted – the youngest one. We asked them to open the bus door so that we could take her outside. She then got better and we again went on the bus. When we arrived at the border in Albania, some of them said they were taking us to Greece. I really wanted to go to Albania. We then set off to Albania. That was my first time going there. The houses were made out of bricks, you know old style, and we knew it was Albania. They welcomed us when we arrived there.
The interviewer: In which city did you go?
Anonim 4: In Korça. They took us to a football stadium. They were so welcoming. We sat on chairs because it was so crowded. They provided us with food, water, juices, and everything we needed. There were so families who were hired to help people there. One of them liked our family, they liked our children and invited us to go to a mosque – a mosque in Korça which was located in the center of the city. We got shelter there. They brought us mattresses, pillows, duvets, blankets, food, and all we needed. They also gave us a check so that we could go and buy food in the store for the children. They were really welcoming. The guy who took us there had a car. He would take the children out every day and take them to the store. He was a teacher in Korça – in the mosque of Korça. We didn’t have religion classes back home, but they had them in Albania – twice a week. So, along with their regular classes, they also had religion classes twice a week. The teacher would take the children to his classes. He had once bought some candies for my son. When he went to class he opened the bag of candies and shared them with all the children. The teacher was impressed by that behavior because my son was only 4 years old. The teacher then told some of his relatives who were living somewhere in the suburb of Korça about us. He told them that we were a family from Prishtina and that we had kind children. He also told them what my son did in class. His mother told him to take us there to their house. That was in the village of Zvervaska. It was a village 40 minutes drive away from Korça. They took us to their house and welcomed us there. They had a cow – they boiled the milk every day so that I could feed my children. They were so caring. They offered us a room and looked after us. It was like we were their family members and not someone they never knew.
The interviewer: You stayed in Korça for three months?
Anonim 4: We stayed there for two and a half months.
The interviewer: Then you decided to return home after two and a half months…
Anonim 4: Yes… they also took us to Pogradec. We didn’t have any information about our relatives. I only knew they came here somewhere from the village of Dyz. We didn’t know who had survived. A countryman had a phone and would come around once a week. But, we didn’t have any contact numbers so we couldn’t call anyone. Whenever I heard the noise of the motorbike I ran outside to see whether any of my relatives had sent a message. But, no. A week before we left my brother-in-law sent us some money from Finland. We could go out in Pogradec and eat anything we liked – we ate burek and anything that reminded us of home. The weather was good so we also went to the beach. It was sunny so we went to the beach in Pogradec. That family was so welcoming…
The interviewer: … they met all your needs…
Anonim 4: But, we could hear the bombings in Albania. We could hear the bangs there.
The interviewer: How did you return home?
Anonim 4: My husband got together with a group of people in Pogradec – people were all spread so we were still hanging out with the neighbor we were from the beginning. He was in Korça and we got in Zervaska. We stayed in touch with him. The teacher would take us to his family whenever he went there to hold classes. So, my husband then got in touch with some other people from Prishtina and Vushtria. After NATO got to Kosovo we decided to return. People had already started to return home. We paid someone to take us there in a van. I don’t know how much, but it wasn’t too expensive. But, we had money because my brother-in-law had sent us some. We were three families in that van. We took the road of “Qafa e Morines”. It was traffic and it was a narrow road. It was so narrow. A tractor hit the van on the way to the border.
The interviewer: The van you were in…
Anonim 4: …It was the driver’s van… my husband felt sorry for him because that’s what he did for a living. So, he gave him a 50 note (money). We arrived in Kosovo at 4 in the morning. The place looked horrible. The houses were all ruined. When we arrived in Prishtina it was still dark. He stopped first at the neighborhood in “Qafa” – you know the bridge there at “Qafa”. Whenever I pass by I still remember the night we stopped there with the van. One of the families stopped there. We asked him to take us to “Breg I Diellit”. My husband told him to stay the night at ours because he was sleepless to return to Albania. We got back home. The house was empty. My brothers had gone home. We got inside and made room for the driver to sleep. We woke up happy and felt liberated the following day.
The interviewer: Thank you very much!