The Story of a Refugee: Short Stories

I remember being a little girl, maybe three years old-really my first conscious memory. My mother had just brought in the clean laundry freshly smelling of the outside spring air. I remember sitting on top of the bed, my mother dressing me up in a fresh, ruffled, red-and-white checkered dress. I remember asking my mother to fix my favorite hairdo, which was big curl pinned up on top of my head and set with a big red checkered ribbon. I was getting ready to go outside and play with other children.

I was filled with joy and trepidation waiting to get out. I told my mother I was to play with children in a nearby playing ground, but in my mind I knew differently. I had already made up my mind to go to Cismigiu Gardens, where I heard the bigger children went. I had a vague idea that the park was just straight ahead from my house and I was confident I could make it on my own without telling anybody. The truth be told, I knew deep inside, that if I was to tell my mother, she was not going to let me go. I was filled with an adventurous feeling and ready to go in the exploration of new grounds.

So, I left the house sometime during mid-morning and went straight ahead on the street leading from our house to Cismigiu. I passed the nearby playground called Gradinita (little garden) where the other children were playing and went farther until the street ended. There it was another street, wider, that was perpendicular on the street leading from my house. Now, just across this street were the Cismigiu Gardens, but that I did not know at that time.

Now, here I stopped and looked around me. I did not recognize anything anymore. Worse, I turned around and now I got totally disoriented. I forgot which direction I came from and I could not go back home. Everything looked different, the streets so big and wide, cars crossing the road and me, a small girl, totally lost.

I remember getting near a power pole and starting to cry. Nobody was nearby. Finally, a man passed by and asked me why I cried. I didn’t remember exactly what he asked me and how it came that I went with him to his house.

I remembered during that day playing with children in and out of some cars parked on a big empty terrain. I remember having a good time and having totally forgotten about my parents. When the evening came and the people took me inside their home, I remember that I started to cry again and ask about my parents. It was the man’s name day, Saint Gheorge, and they were celebrating with food and wine. I remember their offering me sweets, but now I wanted my mother and I refused to eat anything. Finally, I remember my mother and father appearing in the doorway of the people’s house and looking at me; my father wearing his overcoat and his hat, his heavy briefcase in one hand and the other around my mother’s shoulders’; my mother with a scarf covering her hair and clutching in her arms my little brother-Radu. (That’s how I know I was three years old at the time, as Radu is two years younger than me and he was a small baby at the time).

Probably, as small as I was, I knew where I lived, or remembered the home telephone number, or the people who found me reported to the Police.

Meanwhile at home, as I learned later, Mother was going totally out of her mind with worry and trying to find me through the Police. My older sister, Mady, who was in charge of me, took all the blame for not watching over me.