{"id":1140,"date":"2021-01-21T00:12:23","date_gmt":"2021-01-21T00:12:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/?p=1140"},"modified":"2021-08-19T09:55:34","modified_gmt":"2021-08-19T09:55:34","slug":"lule-hasani-tahiri","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/lule-hasani-tahiri\/?lang=en","title":{"rendered":"Lule Hasani Tahiri"},"content":{"rendered":"

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n\n

[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Bjeshka Guri (interviewer)<\/p>\n

Lule Hasani Tahiri (interviewee)<\/p>\n

Acronyms: BG= Guri, LH: Lule Hasani<\/p>\n

BG: Good day Aunt Lule,<\/p>\n

LH: Good day,<\/p>\n

BG: The first question for you is, can you tell me something about yourself, so in general, what is something you usually want people to know about you?<\/p>\n

LH: What can I say, I am by nature a very sociable type, and others, I mean I just don’t say this for myself, others as well tell me that I spread positivity.<\/p>\n

BG: I confirm this.<\/p>\n

LH: Also, what is it that characterizes me and that I want everyone to see is that I am happy \u2026\u2026 how to say it,<\/p>\n

BG: You want to spread something positive?<\/p>\n

LH: Yes, yes, yes, definitely.<\/p>\n

BG: Very resonate,<\/p>\n

LH: Thank you.<\/p>\n

BG: In a word, or two how do you feel about the interview we will conduct today?<\/p>\n

LH: For the interview, good, if, as far as I understood it is about the war period, which for me are not the best memories because it is the most difficult period of my life so far, but, however, we must recall them time after time.<\/p>\n

BG: Over and done with.<\/p>\n

LH: Exactly.<\/p>\n

BG: Then, let us enter the topic like this, but slowly and not rapidly.<\/p>\n

LH: Yes of course.<\/p>\n

BG: How do you remember the circumstances of that time that led up to the war, that is, how do you remember the circumstances before the beginning that led up to that point?<\/p>\n

Lule Hasani -Tahiri: I remember a lot the period before the war, i.e. since when I was 7 yrs. old when I started school, actually it was before that, I started school at 6 1\/2 yrs. old, but, when I was 7, there were the demonstrations of 1981 which I remember fairly well because our teacher used to escort us almost to my house, we were all afraid of course, I even remember a parole which was interesting and it said “Republic, Constitution, either willingly or by war\u201d. And I remember when I came home, I asked my father what is this? who is scaring you, who is scaring us because I didn’t understand, I connected it with fear that is, and so on, we were always followed by that situation, almost all the time it was a state of emergency. I know back then, in 1981 it was a curfew somewhere between 19:30 in the evening until the morning, we did not dare to go out, there were few more or less latent years, but not calm, no, not calm at all, there were nonstop provocations. Then in the ’90s, people were fired a lot, I was in high school then, and the situation, yes, it was getting tenser each day, and to be honest, we were just expecting it just didn’t know when it will explode, then, later it became very obvious. Then there was a time during the years I would say 91 -92-93 it continued, back then we were under Yugoslavia as an autonomous province, when children, young people were going to serve the army, often returned inside the coffins, yes I know those tensions started to increase a lot, a lot of staging\u2019s, a lot, but even then in ’98 it already exploded.<\/p>\n

BG: And at the age, that is, as a teenager, when you saw these injustices and oppressions and violations, that is, this systematic oppression, did you feel in yourself that kind of will for activism?<\/p>\n

LH: I felt it and I was a participant in all the demonstrations, because then they were not called protests but they were called demonstrations because it really was a demonstration so obviously you demonstrated for the dissatisfaction that happened, even with tear gas, with police persecution, I experienced them all. Yes, as much as I could have been an active part of society, I have been, for that time it is, within the framework of that time, yes, yes, it was seen nonstop that is going to get worse and we knew that one day, indeed, that it was not going otherwise, our circle was narrowing then.<\/p>\n

BG: When you participate in demonstrations like this, sometimes you feel as if you are not having an impact, in fact in a way, but when you were part of these demonstrations, activities, did you feel that you are making a difference, that you are fighting for a cause?<\/p>\n

LH: Yes, you thought, I say it to myself, but as you said, it was a little problem, you could not do anything, you were going non-stop to demonstrations, the last one I remember was hmmm the year 1997 maybe, October, yes it must have been 97, it was a big demonstration of students. I remember very well that I was pregnant with my son and I went out, I was part of the demonstration, I just managed to escape haha.<\/p>\n

BG: both laughing\u2026. It too is an achievement.<\/p>\n

LH: Yes, indeed yes, it was the last one, and then in 1998, February if I am not mistaken the war started, so it is considered as a war because there were once the attacks of the Jasharaj\u2019s in January, and earlier, but, I remember the February a lot, if I am correct with the dates, because I do remember a lot, but It may happen to forget. I know this because less than 2 months after that, my son was born. Yes, it was stressful.<\/p>\n

BG: This is where I wanted to get to, what was specifically your personal experience during the war, i.e. what happened when they wanted to deport you?<\/p>\n

LH: Yes, so, now, I’m actually saying yes, Dreni was born on April 26, 1998, and we were then expelled from our homes on March 31, 1999, but that does not mean that we were free at the time, the war was going on, meaning 2 months before I gave birth to my son, I had stress, anxiety every night about when they are coming, when they are killing us, when they are driving us away. I managed to give birth to my son and he was getting almost, not almost but he was 11 months old when they kicked us out of the houses. Each day was a stress in itself about where they are sending us, in the mountains with small children? My daughter was 4 yrs. old back then, because my son and my daughter have 3 yrs. in between, and then, on March 31st<\/sup> they finally came to our house, it was a middle of the day, the police came, the army, the yard was full of people, they were telling us to leave. Where to leave, where to go? We don\u2019t care, you just have to leave we were told. I had prepared some clothes, as I knew what was going to happen, and yes, I thought that they were going to make us leave, we will go to the mountains as everybody else was, but, no, it didn\u2019t happen this way, in an organized manner they drove us out to the street, telling us where to go, we were not allowed to go where we wanted to go. We were not allowed to take a car, they did not let us take anything, what little you could have gathered from the house, some clothes for the children, some milk for my son, and, we were being taken to the train station, here in Pristina, like some kind of excursion, we could not take the short-cuts, but all the way down then we had to climb upwards towards the students canteen, then had to go downhill towards \u201cSanteja\u201d and Dardania, and took us there. We were asking the police, actually I have asked them myself \u201ccan I know where are you taking us\u201d and one of them said \u201cyes, we are taking you to the stadium to be killed\u201d. And there I experienced some shock; I can say that for a few minutes I could not come to my senses. I was worried, in the stadium, yes, they are killing us, but now will they kill me with all the children, are we all going to die and be saved, or will they just kill me and the children will remain and who will take care of them God forbid, if something happens to my children and I am alive, because they were known of doing such things, there were experiences and there were stories and stories of them doing such things. And, after several minutes, I asked another one of them since it was really shocking \u201cexcuse me, can I know where you are taking us\u201d? He said, \u201cyes, you are going to the train station and you are all going to Macedonia\u201d, it was a bit relaxing what he said.<\/p>\n

BG: Compared to?<\/p>\n

LH: We will kill you; we are taking you to the stadium, and in fact yes, they did take us to the stadium then, it was 3 o\u2019clock in the afternoon, it was March 31st<\/sup>, and we stayed there until 1:30 in the morning, i.e. of the next day, so it was 1st<\/sup> of April, and I, around 12 o\u2019clock midnight told to those who were around me \u201c hey, it\u2019s the 1st<\/sup> of April, and they will tell us to go home as it was an 1st<\/sup> April joke\u201d, I was trying at those moments to make some humour, but, no, it did not happen like that, and at 1:30 in the morning they told us to get into the train coupes, they were for 6 persons, three in one side three on the other side, and they put 26 people inside, I know cause I\u2019ve counted them.<\/p>\n

BG: In one?<\/p>\n

LH: We were 26 people in one train coupe, and one of my legs, I can\u2019t remember was it the right one or the left one, had remained in this position, slantwise, and that\u2019s how it remained until Bllace, I had no chance even to move my leg, that\u2019s how tight it was, children were small, my son was crying, I was not able to prepare his milk, I was not able to get the milk out of the milk carton because I was not able to move my arms. We were left like that without air and around 6 in the morning we arrived in Bllace. It is important to mention that, while we were still in Pristina, before leaving, they played a lot with our nerves because there were only 2 train wagons, one in one side that was going to Macedonia and one on the other side that was going to Nis, Serbia, and they used to start the train little bit and we thought that they are taking us to Serbia and God knows what will happen to us, and I don\u2019t know how many times in a row this took place during the night until finally we were heading towards Macedonia. Then, when we arrived there, was it\u00a0 a train station in\u00a0 Bllace or I don\u2019t know what, we were left there for about an hour, no doors or windows were open so we were left without air, suffocating, children were crying, screaming, of course they couldn\u2019t stand that, and at one moment I just found myself yelling \u201care you going to open those doors for us, since we are anyways dying\u201d, really, at least I thought to take a good deep breath of air and let them kill me, but, this did not happen thank God, the doors were opened, there we got off the train and they started to separate men, they were separating them also from the column of people while walking, not my close ones, but other people I have seen.<\/p>\n

BG: Were there any killings?<\/p>\n

LH:\u00a0 I do not know afterwards because we left and I do not know what happened. There were talks of rape in the Taslixhe neighbourhood, of murder here and there, but I have not been a witness and therefore I cannot confirm it. As soon as we went out, I gave my brother my son because he was small and I thought that if they see him with a child … they immediately stopped him, he stopped, and he gave the boy to me. I was not able to walk anymore as I wanted to see what was happening to him, they were pushing me around come on-come on. They kept him for a certain period of time, I don\u2019t know exactly how long, but they did not do anything to him, apparently, they asked him for some money, he gave it to them but they did not mistreat him or something, then he joined us and so on. We also stayed there for almost one night, in Bllace, and then from there to Gostivar, so we ended up in Gostivar.<\/p>\n

BG: When you were in Gostivar, did you encounter hospitality?<\/p>\n

LH: Very, they..of course, the wave of refugees started earlier but we did not know, but they were super organized. When we went there, they first gathered us in a mosque where there was a variety of food, all those people who were engaged in those activities such as burek shops, kebab shops, restaurants and others, all brought things to eat and to drink. In addition, there were some large cauldrons in the mosque, which also were the contribution of the citizens and no one else, with hot water, detergents, and shampoo, so that we could at least remove our shoes, to wash some socks or something. The hospitality was amazing, we did not stay there long, perhaps all day we stayed that day in the mosque and then in the evening, a family took us and sheltered us, as it happened with all the others, almost no one has remained in the mosque.<\/p>\n

BG: The families were Albanian or Macedonian, there were no Macedonians that hosted?<\/p>\n

LH: As far as I remember, no, they were all Albanians, even where we were, the owner of the house was in Switzerland but he had his brothers there and told them to go and get a Kosovar family and they came and they took us so, it was super.<\/p>\n

BG: During the time you were outside of Kosovo, how did you expect the situation in Kosovo to end, i.e., did you have positive or negative expectations?<\/p>\n

LH: Honestly speaking, it is the positivity that keeps you alive and makes you hope. All the time I even remember when we went to Gostivar, they gave us all some kind of green cards, they were identification cards as they called them. Such cards contained information like name, surname, date of birth, as a form of identity card, because that was how they identified the refugees where they were and what they wanted. Believe me, when I first saw it, I took it into my hand and saw the expiry date, I saw that its expiry date was 28 June 1999 and I told the others in Albanian \u201cwe will either go in June or in the end of June at home\u201d, no one believed me. I also was not so confident but I wanted to believe that. An uncle of my father was there in Gostivar too, I met him there, he was about 80 years old. He once asked me, \u201cdo you know what is happening?\u201d. I said, at the end of June we are going back home, he started crying. He said, I do not believe it, but when we met then in Prishtina, he hugged me and said, “It turned out as you said, not because I knew something, but because I wanted it to be so\u201d. I was always thinking that we would not be there for long and we would go back home. My mother was different, my late mother, peace be upon her soul, she was so sad when she was in Struga. Where we were talking on the phone, she used to say that we would never be able to go back home, and I used to try to give her hope, but she was saying to me \u201cyou do not know what they are\u201d. Do you know how many people have remained like this when there were wars, they have remained as refugees in other countries, and I said to her that we were not going to live in Macedonia. From my nature I am a bit patriotic, although we had the possibility to go abroad, anywhere in Europe, in America or Canada, just as many others left, I did not want to register myself to go abroad, simply I did not want to, I wanted to be as close as possible to the house, the moment everything would end, I could return home and that’s how it happened.<\/p>\n

BG: Did you have any Serbian neighbours near your home, when you lived there, and what were your relations with them, before and after?<\/p>\n

LH: No, in fact not, we did not have them here. At home, when we were children, there were 3 or 4 houses, but strangely they were good, we had no problems. We did not meet them at their or our homes, we did not go out to drink coffee with them, but when we met them on the street, we greeted each other. One of them was around my age, he was Milan, when we were children we even played together. We did not have Serbs here, so I cannot talk much about relations with them. When in primary school, there were classes only with Serbs but we never had any problems, no. We did not have any troubles with them,<\/p>\n

BG: Ok.<\/p>\n

LH: Sometimes we even changed among ourselves, when we had paper-work in each other’s languages, “can you write me one in Albanian”, or “can you write me one in Serbian”. There have been such things, but no tensions ever, and I think the whole problem has been politics and not with ordinary people, not with citizens, we have not had problems with each other. And then they made a million staging\u2019s, a million things. They were able to kill their children and blame Albanians, and there are various documentaries that are factual things. Now, not long ago there was an event in Peja, apparently the case of “Panda” or I do not know what they called it, that allegedly 5-6 Serbs were killed by Albanians, that they allegedly did it this way and that way and now it turned out that the Serbian court itself found that the Albanians had nothing to do with this but that the Serbs themselves had killed the Serbs, but this was done only to increase tensions, so pressures and tensions have always come from above, but now we are where we are and everything is over, you are a lucky generation.<\/p>\n

BG: So, in general, how would you define your experience, describe me in one word and how do you think it has influenced you as a person in what aspects?<\/p>\n

LH: In a word, it’s a bit of a problem because I’m saying that since I can remember, and until the war ended, our life has never been what it should have been, for example, I have completed the entire elementary and secondary school by never being able to go to an excursion. Each time something had to be organized, something always happened, then not forget to mention the poisoning that happened, I was in the second year of high school when we were poisoned. they brought poison to us at school. Only in my class, I had 4-5 students it seems to me, who were poisoned. I have seen their suffering, among them was my close friend from the neighbourhood that we grew up with, Aida. Therefore, I am saying that it is difficult to describe in one word our youth but also our childhood because it was extraordinary, and the situation was always extraordinary, and these things leave scars, it is not easy, I also non -stop I tell the kids that you do not know how lucky you are to be living in the time you are living, because we had everything limited, you could not have gone out as you do now, because for no reason you were stopped by the police on the street, you were asked for an ID card, and for example if you did not have it, it became a problem, you were arrested and then they brought out 100 other problems that you did not have anything to do with, then your family was implicated, and persecution took place. It has been a problem before, and now, as far as I am concerned, I feel the freedom and I enjoy it.<\/p>\n

BG: I am glad.<\/p>\n

LH: This is all.<\/p>\n

BG: Thank you very much for this interview, you were great and I never had any doubts about that.<\/p>\n

Lule Hasani-Tahir: You are very welcome.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text] [\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Bjeshka Guri (interviewer) Lule Hasani Tahiri (interviewee) Acronyms: BG= Guri, LH: Lule Hasani BG: Good day Aunt Lule, LH: Good day, BG: The first question for you is, can you tell me something about yourself, so in general, what is something you usually want people to know about you? LH: What can I say, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1028,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1140"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1140"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1140\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1372,"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1140\/revisions\/1372"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1028"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/museumofrefugees-ks.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}