Fighting Demons Of The Past

SITTING in the train going to work, I started thinking about what I read other day in The Namibian.Mass graves found in the North! The words are so big and red in my mind’s eye, although they were written in black.

I felt tears building up in my eyes. Thinking, how could it be? All those years and nobody knew? How about the villagers? The South African soldiers whose bases were near those mass graves? Why did no one say something before? Those terrible years came back to me.The terrible war, the gunpowder smell, screaming, dying people, my brother dying in my arms, the first day I saw my dad cry, his sister died in the Oshakati bombing.Oh no! I felt my heart growing heavy.Tears! If only I could fight these tears, but I failed.Tears started running down my cheeks as I attempted to fight the thought out of my head.I thought I was strong.I thought I had succeeded in putting the past behind me.But no, the tears ran faster than the snow outside.The old Swiss woman next to me asked if I was all right.How could I be when the past came back to hunt me, I thought.But I found the courage to tell her that I’m fine, it was just a sad thought that crossed my mind.I found the energy to tell her about the mass graves.She was close to tears herself.She then said: “I know, oh how I know the feeling.I lost my mother, father, three brothers and a sister in a similar way.Gassed to death.”She paused, staring in space.I could hear bitterness in her voice “My two little brothers were just five and six.I was 10 then.”I looked at her, maybe with a puzzled look.”Yes, I am Jewish,” she said, but what I wanted to know was how she survived.She took me in her arms and we cried together.This was probably the most embarrassing moment in my life.We sat there, thinking of the sad things that had happened in our lives, which somehow connected us.My tongue was tied, so I started writing down my feelings.I thought about those who killed all those people and buried them secretly.They robbed the victims’ families of a chance to say goodbye.It does not matter whether the people buried in those mass graves were SWATF, Koevoet or Plan, they all deserved a decent funeral and their families surely deserved a chance to mourn them.Saddam is being prosecuted because of the war crimes he committed.April 1 1989 (not to mention the Oshakati bank bombing) was a crime and the responsible apartheid rulers ought to be prosecuted.I remember the news back then; it was said that the Plan fighters were not armed.Those were Namibians killed whilst overwhelmed with the joy of returning home after so many years in exile.Malan, Viljoen and others definitely know about this issue.Forensic tests must be done to bring more information in this puzzling, sad discovery.Namibia, take time for a few minutes’ silence and think about how many of your sons and daughters have been slaughtered for wanting to come home.Although they are buried in the wilderness and with hatred, they are at least buried in their motherland.The land they scarified their lives for.And yes, let us preach and practice reconciliation, but seeing some ex-apartheid ruler in a Swiss restaurant after reading such a story made me think: “You gave the order; you knew what was going to happen that day! You probably gave the command those days.Saddam is not enjoying Swiss cheese like you are! And you are nothing better than him.”Hard? Yes, but I held my dying brother in my arms, trying to push his intestines back into his abdomen.I saw a Koevoet soldier pointing a gun at my then 13-year-old old sister’s head or another threatening to blow us up with hand grenades.I saw half-naked dead men, aka terrorists, with their buttocks sliced like biltong and hanged on a Casspir and we were told we would be next if we didn’t say where the terrorists were.(I answered them then: “Oh, I thought they are hanging from your car”.) We were just kids then, at a school doing Grade One to Three.The discovery of the mass graves awakened all those sad memories that I thought had been put in a Pandora’s box.So, reading about some former Swapo detainees making scenes for not being mentioned in Nujoma’s book, I could only say: “At least you can talk now, say what happened to you, but those you were set to betray are dead and cannot tell their story.Be thankful that you are alive!” Our countrymen did not die in vain.Yes, in war people die – but after a peace resolution? Let us not hate, but rather grow stronger.Namibia is what it is today because blood was shed and because Nujoma believed in reconciliation.Imagine what could have happened if he had sung Mugabe’s song.As I sit in my office, I think: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.Thank goodness! One can build on forgiveness, not on hatred.Let’s pray for our dead countrymen.May their souls rest in peace! Long live Namibia!Thinking, how could it be? All those years and nobody knew? How about the villagers? The South African soldiers whose bases were near those mass graves? Why did no one say something before? Those terrible years came back to me.The terrible war, the gunpowder smell, screaming, dying people, my brother dying in my arms, the first day I saw my dad cry, his sister died in the Oshakati bombing.Oh no! I felt my heart growing heavy.Tears! If only I could fight these tears, but I failed.Tears started running down my cheeks as I attempted to fight the thought out of my head.I thought I was strong.I thought I had succeeded in putting the past behind me.But no, the tears ran faster than the snow outside.The old Swiss woman next to me asked if I was all right.How could I be when the past came back to hunt me, I thought.But I found the courage to tell her that I’m fine, it was just a sad thought that crossed my mind.I found the energy to tell her about the mass graves.She was close to tears herself.She then said: “I know, oh how I know the feeling.I lost my mother, father, three brothers and a sister in a similar way.Gassed to death.”She paused, staring in space.I could hear bitterness in her voice “My two little brothers were just five and six.I was 10 then.”I looked at her, maybe with a puzzled look.”Yes, I am Jewish,” she said, but what I wanted to know was how she survived.She took me in her arms and we cried together.This was probably the most embarrassing moment in my life.We sat there, thinking of the sad things that had happened in our lives, which somehow connected us.My tongue was tied, so I started writing down my feelings.I thought about those who killed all those people and buried them secretly.They robbed the victims’ families of a chance to say goodbye.It does not matter whether the people buried in those mass graves were SWATF, Koevoet or Plan, they all deserved a decent funeral and their families surely deserved a chance to mourn them.Saddam is being prosecuted because of the war crimes he committed.April 1 1989 (not to mention the Oshakati bank bombing) was a crime and the responsible apartheid rulers ought to be prosecuted.I remember the news back then; it was said that the Plan fighters were not armed.Those were Namibians killed whilst overwhelmed with the joy of returning home after so many years in exile.Malan, Viljoen and others definitely know about this issue.Forensic tests must be done to bring more information in this puzzling, sad discovery.Namibia, take time for a few minutes’ silence and think about how many of your sons and daughters have been slaughtered for wanting to come home.Although they are buried in the wilderness and with hatred, they are at least buried in their motherland.The land they scarified their lives for.And yes, let us preach and practice reconciliation, but seeing some ex-apartheid ruler in a Swiss restaurant after reading such a story made me think: “You gave the order; you knew what was going to happen that day! You probably gave the command those days.Saddam is not enjoying Swiss cheese like you are! And you are nothing better than him.”Hard? Yes, but I held my dying brother in my arms, trying to push his intestines back into his abdomen.I saw a Koevoet soldier pointing a gun at my then 13-year-old old sister’s head or another threatening to blow us up with hand grenades.I saw half-naked dead men, aka terrorists, with their buttocks sliced like biltong and hanged on a Casspir and we were told we would be next if we didn’t say where the terrorists were.(I answered them then: “Oh, I thought they are hanging from your car”.) We were just kids then, at a school doing Grade One to Three.The discovery of the mass graves awakened all those sad memories that I thought had been put in a Pandora’s box.So, reading about some former Swapo detainees making scenes for not being mentioned in Nujoma’s book, I could only say: “At least you can talk now, say what happened to you, but those you were set to betray are dead and cannot tell their story.Be thankful that you are alive!” Our countrymen did not die in vain.Yes, in war people die – but after a peace resolution? Let us not hate, but rather grow stronger.Namibia is what it is today because blood was shed and because Nujoma believed in reconciliation.Imagine what could have happened if he had sung Mugabe’s song.As I sit in my office, I think: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.Thank goodness! One can build on forgiveness, not on hatred.Let’s pray for our dead countrymen.May their souls rest in peace! Long live Namibia!