More than 20 years have passed by since we
settled in our new Heimat in 1976 and as I put
pen to paper about this chapter of our lives
more and more things keep coming back to me.
To put an exact date to the beginning of
our resettlement is difficult and it seems a
paradox that even years after the end of the war
many of our fellow countrymen have returned. In
Alexanderhausen, Niki Lambing must have been the
first to leave in 1958, and his sister, who was
married, had to wait another 12 years before she
could join her parents. I had a colleague whose
father was in Germany and who, together with her
cousin’s family, had made the first application
in 1952. Her cousin was lucky enough to be able
to emigrate during the 1960s, but she only after
22 years of effort and umpteen applications.
I can still remember well being in High
School (1952) and my mother visiting me and
telling me that there was so much talk in the
marketplace about the deportation of Germans in
other countries, which we were only just
beginning to hear about now even though it had
been going on for several years. She wondered if
it would be sensible for us to emigrate, too. We
talked about the fear of the unknown. We had a
roof over our heads, the garden produced enough,
I was still at school, mother was 55 and
grandmother was 67 years old, and even though we
had been dispossessed we were relatively
satisfied with the little that we’d been left
with. We were still a close German community and
had gradually grown used to the Romanians who
over the years had been settling in our village.
I didn’t know of anyone who had left
Alexanderhausen at that time.
Now it was 1962 and there were places
opening in Temeschburg where one could get
application forms. Many handed in their
applications but only very few could emigrate.
This only ran for a very short time. Meanwhile,
my uncle and his family had gone from Romania to
Germany in 1957 and from there on to the USA (a
special case - they hadn’t taken up Romanian
citizenship as they had escaped from Serbia to
us and inevitably had to live near Bucharest); I
was married and we had just bought ourselves a
house in Temeschburg. My mother offered to queue
for applications as it was just for a general
resettlement at some time or other. How right
she was! Unfortunately, not everyone is equally
adaptable to change and my mother-in-law was
dead against it. She thought that as her husband
had had to die at such a young age (50) she
didn’t want to leave his grave, and her sisters,
to whom she was very close, didn’t want to leave
either. This is still the case today with our
fellow countrymen who feel incredibly strong
ties with their old Heimat and many of the older
people could never really put down roots in
their new Heimat. They only came in order to be
with their children (written in 1986).
Well, a family shouldn’t have to be split
up and the chances of really being able to
emigrate were very slim. We were at the
beginning of our careers and such an application
could have disastrous consequences. I believe a
few Alexanderhauseners got applications at that
time. The Götz family from Temeschburg, who we
were quite close to, managed to emigrate to
Germany at that time, but they had relatives
there who could deal with the authorities.
The question ‘why?’ is not easy to answer
as behind every resettlement lies some other
motivating force, but the one that applied to
everybody was the feeling of hopelessness of
preserving our Germanness, the lack of freedom
and the worry about the future of our children.
To understand this properly one has to have
experienced all this.
Unfortunately, earlier applications were
later no longer accepted and one had to start
all over again. It must have been at the
beginning of the 1970s when things started to
move again in the resettlement direction. We now
only had my grandmother (85) and our little boy
(5 - 6). My husband’s cousin, Franz, who hadn’t
wanted to emigrate in the 1960s, had meanwhile
realised that it was a waste of time clinging on
to the old Heimat. I can still picture us
sitting together, him telling me how things had
gone in Bucharest.
There were endless queues again at the
Temeschburg prison building, which even led to
traffic jams. Shortly afterwards, the admission
centre was moved. It was about this time that I
first heard about the modern ‘slave trade’, or
human trafficking, where applications were
handled high up, even though most of these
didn’t lead to resettlement. Quite outrageous
demands were made and many people took great
risks. Franz had got hold of an application by
bribery. That explained all the trips to
Bucharest, but it was all for nothing. Because
they lived in the countryside (the whole family
was born in Alexanderhausen, only our son was
born in Temeschburg), the risk wasn’t as great
but for us our careers were on the line. Today I
regard it as fainthearted but at the time so
much was in decline and we couldn’t know what
would later await us, without parents, who could
have perhaps help support us. We had no idea
that we would be supported here (Germany) and
thought we would have to be a burden on my
cousin, who had sent us the entry papers from
the German embassy, to begin with. We no longer
had relatives of the first grade (parents) - my
father had died in Russia at the age of 39 and
our other parents all from cancer. It was at
this time that I fell seriously ill and I was
sent to hospital when I was 31 years old. And so
another couple of years went by before I could
carry on with my efforts. In the meantime we had
learned from people that we knew that the
business of being bought off by the West was
coming to an end. Our friends’ contact had
stopped doing this. I’d already taken the
trouble to try and get an application form,
without success (Franz got no further either).
Then came the illness and death of my grandma
and after 1973 we couldn’t hold back any longer.
My husband thought I would only jeopardize our
careers and still get nowhere. I had already
changed careers in 1970 so that it would be
easier to find work in Germany, as being a woman
in a man’s job, and an emigrant with Romanian
education at the same time, I felt I’d have
little chance. I’ll never forget how, at three
o’clock one afternoon, I gave the cardboard box
I had put my identity papers in to others and
entered my name on a list for the following day.
You have to take into account that many
superiors at that time did not discriminate
against us and would allow a quick day off now
and then. When I arrived very early the
following morning the courtyard was already full
up. We didn’t know how the officials would
proceed, how many or in what order we would be
heard (first you had to get a number for an
audience), or whether it would all come to
nothing. The courtyard was very small, behind
the central department store in the town center,
and we stood shoulder to shoulder. I bumped into
some acquaintances and we would tell so many
jokes just to ease the sorrowful situation. It
began to rain but everyone stuck it out and the
queues barely grew any shorter. Finally, my turn
arrived and I saw that our garage neighbor was
the one questioning us. At that time I knew from
my aunt in America that we had some kind of
right to emigrate as my father-in-law had been
born in the USA, but I didn’t know anything for
certain. I told this to the official and so
received a form with questions about reasons for
emigration and a number for an audience after
umpteen months (anything up to a year and was
often postponed). Nothing came of these
audiences, either.
Meanwhile, we had visitors from America and
I asked them whether my many cousins (four of my
mother’s brothers and sisters had moved there as
exiles from Serbia) could buy us off and that we
would only want it as a loan. At the time, I had
a contact via an acquaintance but there was a
condition that the money had to be promised. In
those days, everything had to be done furtively.
But our relatives couldn’t help us at the time.
Some time passed and then my aunt, who had
stayed with us for a while after her escape
(uncle had died meanwhile) with her family,
simply transferred 7,000 dollars to the Romanian
bank, marked ‘for emigration’. Unfortunately,
she had been badly advised and it was also too
late because what we needed didn’t go through
official channels and as my acquaintance had
emigrated we could no longer get in touch with
our source.
During this time I tried to arrange a visit
to my cousin Sepp in Germany but it was made
clear to me by the authorities that I would be
busy and so my application was refused. It
should be said that the firm where I was
employed had given their consent to the
application for a visit. I had hoped to stay
here and be able to find a way of buying off my
family as I had meanwhile got an address from
Germany but I didn’t want to burden my relatives
there as we had no overall view at all.
As we had several free train journeys (my
husband worked for the railways), I made many
journeys to Bucharest, all of them unsuccessful.
As I had some business to carry out there, too,
I kept on trying to get something sorted out.
All these visits are old history now after so
many years, but one particular audience I can
remember as though it were yesterday. We sat for
hours in the ante-room (about 1973) and had
written our request on a sheet of paper. Some
people had their whole family in Germany but had
still been refused several times.
My turn came (which wasn’t always the case
as only a certain time was allotted for the
audience, and only on certain days) and the
first question was, why did I apply there (in
Bucharest) as Temeschburg was the authority
responsible and Bucharest couldn’t do anything
in this case. I reasoned my visit with the true
state of things, that in Temeschburg there were
no appointments to be had for months on end
(Temeschburg was responsible for most of the
Germans in Romania). The good man was polite,
made notes, and said we’d just have to wait for
an audience in Temeschburg (we had no prospect
of any application). I mentioned also that my
father-in-law had been born in the USA (what
this meant, we learned only much later), that my
relatives lived in Germany, that I had not even
been allowed a visit and that we had 7,000
dollars in the Romanian bank to be used for our
emigration. I was asked, why did I think this.
Well, my aunt had transferred the money and
written that our emigration would be possible
now. Unfortunately, I left without achieving
anything. I also mentioned how we had once stood
for a whole day in the rain waiting for an
appointment.
It wasn’t long before I was called before
the authorities. We could hardly wait for the
day and we had high hopes of receiving
applications at last. It was the chief of police
who received me and on his desk lay our file, to
which he kept referring. I noticed that a lot of
notes had been made in the margins. Our file was
considerably thick as I had written every month.
The reply to the requests was always the same -
just the word ‘received’. My hopes for an
application fell when I was asked how I came to
apply to the authorities in Bucharest.
Everything that I had said there had been noted.
Today, when one talks about the actions of the
Stasi, I ask myself just how much has been
recorded about us Germans from Romania. A
comment was also made about us being a highly
qualified work force in which the State had
invested and we should banish all thoughts of
leaving the country and put our knowledge to use
in our fatherland. When I asked, then why had a
young Jewish couple, both engineers, and their
parents been allowed to leave, I was given the
short, harsh reply, ‘that was different’.
Amongst other questions I was asked was
where had our parents died. With ‘my father was
displaced to the Soviet Union’ came a big
‘aha!’ Yes, I said, then our parents, being
German, were made responsible and yet now we
were not allowed to be Germans and allowed to
leave. I could go, without having achieved
anything. But we never had any trouble over it.
Today I ask myself, where did I get the courage
from!
President Nixon was visiting Romania at the
time and had granted the clause of preferential
nations to this country. There was a proviso
tied to this, that Romania had to allow Romanian
citizens who had the right to American
citizenship, to emigrate. By coincidence we now
learned the relevance of my father-in-law’s
birthplace. My husband had the right, as a
descendant, to apply for American citizenship as
he had been born before 1941. I would mention
here that Hans’s father, as a born American, was
also a citizen of America and yet, as life would
have it, became an American prisoner of war.
Now it came out that the Oberthier family,
also from Alexanderhausen, had known this for
quite some time but had had nothing but
difficulties as the American embassy was under
observation and apart from the recognition of
American citizenship, did not help their
citizens any further.
Now the attitude of the authorities
changed, too. Now the battle with the Americans
started. The first step (1974) was for Hans to
go to the American embassy. We now knew that
however many obstacles were put in our way, one
day we would be able to leave. The American
birth certificate was not enough (we had that).
We were asked for the baptism certificate, which
we didn’t have. And so we had to get one from
Philadelphia after 60 years and with no clues.
This was like looking for a needle in a
haystack. Luckily, this almost insoluble problem
could be solved by my aunt. She had to write to
umpteen churches in the city of Philadelphia
with its 10 million inhabitants. But six months
later the baptism certificate was at the
American embassy. Next, Hans had to bring
witnesses to prove that he knew nothing about
the possibility of applying for American
citizenship, as he should have done this a long
time ago. How absurd to have to prove that one
doesn’t know about something! Of course, such
things weren’t made public in Romania. So we see
that it’s not only the Romanian authorities that
make difficulties. And all this when our
applications to leave had already amounted to a
considerable number.
A year later we had won this battle too and
we received permission to apply for the exit
permit (1975). We had to attach various records
from the employers we worked for to the
application forms. The firms were instructed to
talk us into staying. I was called to the
Director and amongst other things it was made
clear to me that I could not keep my job as I
intended to leave the country, that I was deemed
unreliable (but they could not give me any
definite details), that it could be that I would
not be given any more work and it wasn’t even
sure that we would be allowed to leave. I should
really think it over again. My answer, that we
had already thought it over and if need be would
do menial work across the water and that my
relatives in the United States had also spoken
to various authorities and that my husband would
have to be allowed to leave at some stage, being
an American citizen, was all listened to
politely. A few days later I received the
documents and at the same time my transfer from
the EDV (I was the boss) to another department,
without any cut in salary and still as an
engineer. A very fair treatment.
Things didn't go so well for my husband. He
sent in a written application for the necessary
papers but weeks went by and there was always
another excuse, until he was told that he would
not receive these without first giving in his
notice. He gave in his notice, received the
confirmation and at long last we could hand in
the applications. So we was unemployed for over
a year, with no unemployment benefit of course,
and this year wasn't even counted towards his
pension.
Meanwhile, Hans was ordered to the local
authority to be worked on there. You have to
take into account that the area leader let
someone else take his place to do the
questioning as it would have been embarrassing
for him to question an acquaintance. It ran to
the same thing though, how important his
contribution to the country was etc. etc.
Handing in the applications with all the
documents was easy, but how long would it all
take now? At least I could still go to work, but
many people know how slowly time passes when you
are waiting for something. At the same time,
legal proceedings were taking place against
teachers. According to the article of the law,
employees of the education department who had
applied for an exit visa would be given notice.
The article said that it was not enough for
teachers to claim to be professional. Now in one
fell swoop a whole number of German teachers
found themselves in this situation. I believe
these legal proceedings marked the beginning of
the great wave of emigration of teachers at the
beginning of 1977. In any case, often both
partners in a marriage were affected and they
didn't even know whether they would manage to
get away. Our long time teachers, the Grawisch
family, were also affected.
With us, the application procedure took 15
months. Permission arrived on September 30th
1976. The following day I gave in my notice and
received the necessary papers at the same time.
For the period that Hans was unemployed two
witnesses had to guarantee that they would pay
any possible debts. There were difficulties with
our son who was in the 6th class and who also
had to bring confirmation that he had no
dealings with secret files. He was told this,
however, only after handing in his school books
as they were deemed the property of the State. I
am writing in so much detail in order that you,
our descendants, may be able to understand just
a little how 'communist democracy' worked.
Now we had to get rid of all our worldly
goods. We adults were allowed to take 70kg with
us and our son 35kg. I had already sorted out
and weighed many things during the past year. We
had already cleared the apartment provided by
the State in the previous year, but there was
still plenty in Hans's parents' house and the
stuff in the apartment in town just didn't seem
to diminish. We had, in those days, to sell our
house and the apartment to the State (this was
not always administered in the same way) and in
order that the State could establish a price (it
was almost always the same anyway!), we had to
provide detailed plans with photographs and
allow an estimate to be made. Well, why
shouldn't they be allowed to make money out of
us again! If the apartment hadn't been paid for
in full, we would have had to do this before
selling. When we bought the apartment (from the
State) it had cost us five times more than it
was worth and by the time we emigrated it was
worth 14 times as much as the State had given us
for it. It was similar with the house. Through
various contacts we managed to get rid of our
possessions, for which our ancestors already,
and now we for the past 20 years, had invested
so much in, very quickly. There was no problem
in handing over the house as relatives (the
Waltrich and Wilhelm families) lived there.
Unfortunately, the State then demanded a rent
from them. With the apartment there were
problems. Once a high official had agreed to
take on the apartment and had already taken on
some of the furniture, too, it then turned out
that the apartment had been allocated twice
over. The high official who had to make a
decision on the matter was out of the country.
Once again, we were sitting on our suitcases and
another long wait began. The apartment was
finally allocated and we had to remove all the
hand-measured fitted furniture as the apartment
had to be handed over completely empty and in
good condition (we even had to repaint the
walls). Only then would we receive our
passports, which were already nearing their
expiry date. This was often the case and you had
to pay plenty to have it renewed. We were lucky
and did not have to wait long for an appointment
for the baggage handover. At the time, one had
to leave the country by air; only the seriously
ill were allowed to travel by train.
As the Oberthier family had obtained their
exit visas six months prior to us, we knew that
they hadn't managed to stay in Germany. We
didn't dare tell anyone that we didn't intend
going to the USA and even in letters I only
wrote 'we're going to Sepp's' (letters were
censored). Unfortunately, this was misunderstood
and we were expected in America, but never
arrived.
Now we gradually got to know some of the
'good uncles' who specialized in buying off us
Swabians, and I drove with such a man to
Bucharest to buy air tickets. At the ticket
window I was told that I wouldn't get a ticket
just to Germany as our passports were made out
for the USA. I knew that I now had to speak to
the Director, as the 'uncle' knew his way
around. I was let through straight away (it had
all been pre-arranged), handed over my envelope
with a month's salary (engineer's), in other
words I handed over 10% of the value of the
house and apartment, and then I received my
ticket to Germany. The 'uncle' got his similar
share. There were still several things to clear
up in Bucharest. We had to get permission from
the Ministry of Culture and Science to take our
qualification documents with us, hand in the
application to the Employment Ministry so that
our working hours could be sent to Germany, and
get permission from the Customs Office to take
with us the typewriter, macrame works,
hand-knotted carpets, pictures and wall clocks
(as mementoes of our parents). Unfortunately, we
had to wait again for several weeks and an extra
demand was confirmation from the museum that the
clocks and pictures weren't special works of art
or of antique value (we hadn't even got original
hand-painted pictures - only prints which were
for us of spiritual value).
As the last appointment loomed we took our
175kg to Arad. Luckily we still had our car as
this had been sold to Hans's nephew (Herwig
Stefan). First of all we had to procure special
measured chests which were only available from a
firm in Arad at that time. By handing out tips
we were lucky enough to get some on the same
day. We were allowed three chests. Our
Alexanderhausen fellow countryman, Reinhold
Müller, took a photo of one. We had hundreds of
books but also gave away many of them. We had
already sent some of the technical books by post
(very expensive) to our relatives and we hoped
to take some more with us, hidden. Books which
had been printed before 1945 were not allowed to
be taken out of the country. We had a few framed
family photos. We had to take every one out of
its frame in case something had been hidden
behind the picture! We knew that some customs
officers could go over the top but bribery could
cut two ways. We had decided to risk nothing.
Every piece of underwear was held up, every
handicraft, shoe etc. was checked. Oma's large
statue of Our Lady we lost as we didn't dare
take this with us, but we had a few smaller
mementoes and even though the customs officers
thought they weren't allowed, they turned a
blind eye. They allowed lead crystal objects,
too, but they snatched the macramae handiwork
back. Hans was allowed to close the lid and when
they turned their backs on us I slipped the
macramaes in as well. I have to say, the people
had to stick to the rules, which was quite
unusual.
Now we had to say our goodbyes. On the way
back to the cemetery we met our teacher in front
of the Schmidt house in Alexanderhausen. Frau
Grawisch wondered, with a worried voice, 'do you
think we will be allowed exit visas - we have
both been unemployed for so long...'. On the one
hand, people desperately wanted to leave; on the
other hand one was facing the unknown and the
fear of not finding any work in the new country
and whether one would be able to integrate at
all.
It was a difficult parting and we didn't
even know whether we would be able to visit our
parents' and relatives' graves again. The graves
were, and are to this day, the only thing that
is left of us in the old country.
The last night we still had a desk
(collected by a friend) and a couch (a colleague
took this), so we said our goodbyes once again.
The next day after leaving Temeschburg we flew
to Bucharest. There, as usual, it was a problem
finding a hotel and so we spent the first night
with a friend. Next day we had to hand over our
suitcases at Otopeni international airport.
Hans's nephew, Herwig, had come with us in order
to take any rejected items back with him.
Everything had to be unpacked again. We had
brought something to eat with us as we didn't
know what to expect. The cake and the sausage
was broken in pieces (were they looking for
hidden gold?). As the highlight, the female
customs officer thought that we weren't allowed
to take the leather coats that we were wearing
(it was late November). I asked her in as
friendly a way as I could whether they would
give us other coats instead, and then she put
three months' salary as duty on them! For the
contents of the suitcase we had to pay even
more. We didn't even have that much money on us.
Luckily we were helped out by some of our fellow
travelers. She didn't think we were allowed to
take the gold necklace, earrings, silver jewelry
etc. with us.
So on Sunday November 28th 1976 it was time
to leave. First we had to say goodbye to Herwig
and to the old Heimat. The typewriter, which had
been allowed, we could pay duty on as hand
luggage and the chains, earrings etc. didn't
bother these customs officers. Our hearts beat
wildly as we had our exit visas for America on
us. But checking wasn't very strict. We had been
told that we shouldn't take anything in writing
with us and so we had learned the most important
addresses off by heart and had only smuggled a
tiny notebook about 4cm x 3cm (less than 2" x
1.5"). As we were waiting for our departure
flight we realized that we hadn't even had any
breakfast but unfortunately we couldn't buy
anything with Lei (the Romanian currency) any
more and we hadn't been allowed to take any hard
currency with us. At 9.30 on the dot we finally
left the old Heimat and were on a flight to the
unknown. The weather was beautiful and we had a
good view. When a lake came into view I guessed
it was the Plattensee and the announcement
confirmed this. To our great surprise we
received a hearty breakfast: an egg, cheese,
ham, salami, two bread rolls, tomato, butter,
coffee and cream. Up to now we had only been
used to domestic flights. We saw Vienna beneath
us, tiny, and the Alps looked wonderful in the
bright sunshine. There were 17 of us
re-settlers, amongst us was a man with two small
children whose mother had already been living in
Germany for a couple of years (she stayed there
after a visit). So many families had sacrificed
so much just to be able to leave. Two hours and
ten minutes later we began the descent and after
a further 19 minutes we stepped onto the ground
of our new Heimat for the first time.
