“When you think of war, what pops into your mind? G.I. Joe toys, army print clothes, Schindler’s List? To a lot of us, war is just a sad story told by old people and old movies. Many of us never acknowledge that war can ignite in our countries at any time. I should know for I was one of these people. “It’ll never happen to my family,” I thought. But I was wrong.
My uncle and his family are stuck in Kosovo
I am an ethnic Albanian. My mother and her siblings fled Kosovo 18 years ago, to escape communism and Serb aggression. But my Uncle Qemo stayed behind with his wife and seven children. We’ve tried to bring them here, but U.S. immigration laws and soldiers’ blockades on the borders of Kosovo have made it impossible. To make matters worse, Uncle Qemo was diagnosed with lung cancer two years ago, bringing our fears to a whole new level.
In December, my uncle Frank (who lives here) visited Kosovo, and brought back shocking camcorder footage of how the Albanians are being treated. He recorded several Serb soldiers harassing Albanians, and Albanians fearfully running through the streets in order to buy the little food they could afford.
On March 24, when NATO began bombing Kosovo, we all went to my grandmother’s house. We were glad that someone was finally doing something to stop the Serbs, but would our relatives be okay? My mom called Uncle Qemo in Kosovo. The short conversation with one of his sons ended with someone screaming, “They’re coming, they’re coming…” Then the line went dead. Silence fell on the room.
For the next couple of days my mom and her brothers would get up at five in the morning to call Yugoslavia in an effort to contact Uncle Qemo. Finally Uncle Frank got through. He began speaking in Serbo-Croatian. Later I found out that a Serbian soldier had picked up the phone. My uncle, thinking quickly, posed as a Serbian general. “How are things going there?” he asked. The Serb said, “Fine! I’m just washing the blood from my hands.” We thought our relatives might be dead.
My mom bought a VCR and subscribed to the Internet in a desperate search for news of her brother and his family. She recorded every bit of news containing footage of refugees. Days passed, and our spirits and hopes were low. More and more Albanians were being thrown from their homes, slaughtered or raped—but there was no news of my uncle. My mother did everything she could from halfway around the world. She called TV stations, charities, humanitarian groups and embassies, pleading for help. She gave out information about our relatives—names, birthdates and descriptions—but how would they ever be found among hundreds of thousands of refugees? We were losing hope.
Fear and worry were tearing my household apart
It was tearing my household apart. My mom and grandma argued about every little thing. They discussed over and over all the hardships my uncle had endured. Once my uncle’s neighbor warned them that the Serbians were coming. The family cheated death by running out in sub-zero temperatures and staying there for weeks, only to return to a home with no furniture, pots, clothes, food, heat or windows. Another time Serb soldiers threw my uncle’s expensive cancer medicine all over the snow. Many times he was beaten when he went to get chemotherapy.
My anger at the Serbs got stronger. At a meeting at LA Youth, a Serbian student introduced himself. As I explained the horrors that were taking place in Kosovo, I saw him shaking his head in disagreement. “The Serbian people just want peace,” he said. I felt a shocking rush of hate blow through my body. I wanted to scream at him, to make him suffer the way Albanians have, but I just left the room in disbelief instead.
While these horrors were on my mind, I went to school, the movies and shopping. The guilt began weighing me down, forbidding me to even say “I care.” But I did. I cried at night and thought about them all day long. I tried to avoid talking about it in front of my mom because an argument always erupted, ending with some hurtful comment like, “THEY don’t have clothes but you have designer stuff that you don’t even wear” or “THEY’VE been walking for days but you can’t even get off your bed to get a drink” or “THEY…” whatever.
We are doing all we can to help
On April 2, my grandmother thought she saw Uncle Qemo on TV, being carried into Macedonia on a stretcher! This was truly a miracle, since there are several news channels covering the nearly one million refugees in Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro. My mom, who was taping the coverage continuously on the VCR, quickly rewound the tape. There he was! The whole family came over to see the tape of my uncle. My uncle Frank bought a ticket to Macedonia, planning to fly in and arrange for our relatives to come to the States, but the next day, a neighbor called from Kosovo saying the family was still there. That meant we can’t get them out. But it also meant they were still alive.
Since then we’ve heard they tried to take a bus to Montenegro, but they couldn’t get out because the main bridge was bombed. We’ve had no contact for the last six weeks. At the start of April, Uncle Frank’s wife Shirley quit her job and applied for a position as a refugee worker and interpreter. Because of her ability to speak German, French, Turkish, Albanian and Serbo-Croatian, she is in Albania right now wearing army gear and living in a tent. We are so proud of her.
But what about me? Well, I’m going to volunteer at the Red Cross, but as far as comforting the poor souls of my family, and all the Albanian people, how can I help? I send all my love and empathy to the Albanian Kosovars and their loved ones, wherever they may be. These people have lived through hell for too long—may it finally come to an end.
Unfortunately, the Serb aggression has intensified and more Albanians are being killed. I wish we could find Uncle Qemo, his wife and my cousins; I say I wish because “hope” has lost its place in this tragedy.”